Friday, September 18, 2009

Q Tips

NPR related comments welcomed.
Posted by Mytwords at 6:36 AM
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12 comments:

GRUMPY DEMO said...

I sure am glad Morning Edition today seems to be playing in a non-stop loop President McCain and Boehner of Orange telling us how Obama but America at risk by not deploying a Missile Defense that doesn't work against Iranian missile that don't exist.

Remember when NPR gave Bush/Cheney critics non-stop air-time?

(P.S. excellent work on the prior two reports.)

Yeah me neither.

9/18/09, 7:31 AM
krameroneill said...

I'm listening to an NPR report on the abandoning of the "missile shield." They are quoting a bunch of Polish and Czech politicians who are upset with Washington, but have called popular support for the program in those countries "mixed." Is it "mixed"? Last I heard, our "missile shield" was opposed by something like 70-80% of those populations (technically, yeah, that's "mixed," but I can think of another word for it: "overwhelming"). Does anyone have real stats on this?

9/18/09, 7:51 AM
Porter Melmoth said...

We have duly noted here, repeatedly, how much NPR is relying on its in-house mutation, Planet Money/Monkey/Moneygrub/Monkeygrub, WHATEVER. With its lousy - but whimsical! - mascot: a Mr Magoo astronut suit, all topsy-turvy, so that you have to rotate your head to see who's inside, and it is...... one-buck George Washington!!! Ha ha!

Here's the point though. As a self-appointed Style But No-Substance cub reporter making a pest of himself, scratching around this blog, I have to tell you that Adumb Davidson's fatal flaw as a money guru can actually be distilled down to one very telling characteristic.

(Yes, he was on Mourning Ed with Renaay, explaining some more about how Narcissistic Capitalism works.)

And what is that telling characteristic? (If we were tweeting, I could ask for a multiple choice quiz...)

On with it!

It's that little quasi-laugh - almost a suppressed snicker - or a titter - or a scoff-laugh, that Adumb strategically applies to various words and phrases that immediately and permanently makes him invalid as any sort of source for information. He is, of course, a veiled apologist for raw, untreated capitalism, no matter what he says or implies, but that's not my point.

To dissect on a nano level, this little Davidsonian laugh or smirk indicates that he, the wise one on all things, considers himself above and beyond the stupidity of things lower than himself, so he betrays this attitude by these little mirth punctuations, just to remind you that he is just so cool and hip. beyond that it gets harder to explain.

You can tell he actually succeeds in stopping short of outright guffaws when talking about things that he particularly considers stupid or absurd, so listeners might actually characterize him as a clever but well-mannered gentleman who knows how to reign himself in.

Bottom line though is that, giggles or not, Davidson is difficult to listen to, difficult to absorb, digest, eliminate. The verbiage is delivered by bulk mail, supposedly ingenious, but not worth the VU readings its carried on.

See what you think when you listen to him. One of my favorite bits of observant wisdom is from Wally Shawn, and I paraphrase him: these people, these media people (and Neocons, essentially), they CHUCKLE as they're talking about death (or in this case, money).

I interpret such chuckling as indicating a superior-minded detachment, a smug knowledge of profiting from the game. But you know, Davidson is actually quite a tinkertoy player in such a league, as compared to the Richard Perles of the world.

OK, I plainly don't like this Adam Davidson person. neither do many of us, for varying reasons. At least Glenn Beck is a certified loony and Jim Cramer is an obvious fake and Lou Dobbs is plainly an abomination. But Davidson & Co. smirk their way through a Cheneyan dark side, relishing their self-delusions that are facilitated by public broadcasting, laughing all the way to the bank.

I, uh, don't like that sort of thing at all.

9/18/09, 11:24 AM
miles said...

This morning on Morning Edition, ACORN was referred to as a 'liberal organization.' What? ACORN's mssion is to empower poor people. Just because conservative hate ACORN doesn't mean it is a 'liberal organization' by definition. Yeeesh.

9/18/09, 6:33 PM
Anonymous said...

Speaking of Adumb Davidson (how apt).

I bet this will REALLY piss him off no end if it comes to pass:

Elizabeth Warren to replace Ted Kennedy?

Adumb is a perfect example of Dunning–Kruger effect in action: basically, a clueless moron who thinks he's a genius.

Come to think of it, NPR as a whole is a case study of the effect.
Alicia Shepard and Steve Inskeep would be other examples.

9/18/09, 7:27 PM
beeg!peenk!foozy!boony! said...

'My Dinner with Porter' hahaha

There was something about that weasel Davidson that curdled my Maalox from the start (wasn't it a prior stint at MarketDisgrace?) - way back when I paid the organization any heed of course; it was that feigned affected lilt at the close of every phrase, like a perfunctory program on an android to make it sound more humanoid. Does he still do that, at least when not desperately containing his smug, smarmy smirkle?

Thankfully I have suffered no exposure since he ascended to the throne of alpha primate on the plantain tree, but he sure do make for a fun lil' punchbag for all us displaced malcontent gadflies, ain't 'e?

~GO LIZZY WARREN!!~

9/19/09, 6:35 AM
RepubLiecan said...

@ miles
"'liberal organization' by definition."

NPR's new definition of liberal is anything conservatives oppose.

9/19/09, 10:18 AM
Porter Melmoth said...

Yes beeg!peenk!, any dining with Adumb, and you'd projectile-vomit your carrot juice, preferably right in his gnome-like mug!

9/19/09, 1:38 PM
larry, dfh said...

For GrumpyDemo, and all others who care, a 'missle shield' update. Remember, you heard it on npr...NOT.

9/20/09, 9:58 AM
a.m. said...

In his conversation with Liane Hansen this morning, David Welna informed us that Jimmy Carter's recent comment about the racist nature of attacks on the president had had the unwelcome effect of injecting race into the health care debate. Thanks for clearing that up, David! Somehow I had the mistaken impression that race's place in the health care debate had something to do with rabid wingnut charges that Obama is a foreign-born Muslim terrorist socialist witch-doctor Stalinist who hates white people and America and wants to kill your granny. Silly me! In future I'll leave it to NPR to identify who's responsible for mucking up civil bipartisan discussions of issues that are important to our country. They're so much better at it than I am.

9/20/09, 10:14 AM
goap-soap said...

a.m. - Wellna was na well this AM. In fact, he is one sick mofo, cramming more falsehoods per word than is ordinarily deemed feasible.

How about (from memory), "the public option is not acceptable to centrists on both sides."? Made me jump out of bed: ok for a weekday, but on a Sunday?

Waste matter discharged from the body is infinitely more redeeming.

9/20/09, 11:35 AM
Porter Melmoth said...

"Waste matter discharged from the body is infinitely more redeeming."

And once said waste is flushed, it doesn't keep coming back.

9/21/09, 10:23 AM

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