NPR Begins the Slide to Irrelevance

Current.org, a trade magazine for public media has an article about NPR in which they spout a marketing study as some kind of scientific theory.  The strength of my disdain for the entire marketing industry is difficult to express.  I decided to point out to the author and NPR how fucked up stupid this idea is with the following letter:

Cc:  NPR ombudsman

re:  http://www.current.org/audience/aud1017npr-opportunities.shtml

Dear Karen Everhart,

I'll be up front and tell you that I think "marketing" is generally a complete and utter fraud run by shallow, simple fools that believe in what they're doing while it drains dry the businesses it advises and our society in general.  This "study" is marketing research and in my mind is about as plausible as Scientology.

That being said, there is one enormous problem with the idea NPR can "expand" its audience by becoming more "accessible" (read:  by dumbing itself down):  As NPR attempts to lighten its content it will lose the people that already listen to NPR.  The television news networks did this same thing in the late 70's to "capture the youth demographic" and the result was that the people that watched the news quit watching it because it was more flash and chattiness, cute pandas and celebrity gossip than news.  None of the kids started watching it because it was the NEWS.  So viewership continues slowly to decline.  All sorts of attempts have been made to place blame on societal changes, different age groups, etc. but the fact is the people that don't listen to NPR aren't going to start but those that do listen to NPR may very well stop listening as the programming gets reduced to stupidity.  A perfect example of this is the flagship talk show Talk of the Nation.  This show has been dropped by stations around the country since it was broken up into multiple short segments around 2001 by the current host to "keep it moving."  Well, the reason people listened to the show was to hear long, serious discussions with experts about complicated issues.  You can't have that when your programming is designed to "keep it moving" and "give it energy."  As a result I know I quit listening to TOTN a few years ago and it was removed from my local NPR's lineup without so much as a whimper of protest from local listeners.  They had to keep Science Friday or the listeners would have stormed the station with pitchforks and torches.  Why?  Because Science Friday tackles difficult questions without dumbing it down and isn't afraid to bump the next subject if the host senses they have really started to make headway in explaining the topic.

I've sensed for years that NPR was heading down the road of listening to marketing professionals and focus groups rather than trying to report the news as thoroughly as possible.  This study and your cheerleading coverage of it I'm sure will be more nails in the coffin of one of the few reliable news sources we still have in this country.

Sincerely,

Alan Miller

Letter to NPR about Fox Correspondents on Their Staff

[updated 6/17/2010]

I'm sure I join a loud chorus of listeners that are sick of your correspondents that also work for Fox News.  You need to completely purge your organization of these contaminated, damaged anti-journalists.   Fox News is not a news organization and you should not allow anyone to be employed by NPR and Fox simultaneously.  You don't have correspondents that are in the employ of the RNC's PR office, do you?  There is no difference except the RNC might lie less.


On today's ATC, Fox employee Mora Liasson in a typical Fox-style meaningless aside commented that the President was "reading from a teleprompter."  This is unnecessary information and serves only one function:  To belittle the President of this country.  Do you know what a Dixie dog whistle is?  Well saying Obama was reading from a teleprompter is a wingnut dog whistle and you should be ashamed you let it on the air.  Every single President since Carter has used teleprompters constantly.  GWB always had one though he obviously had trouble reading it.  The only people that make note of this President's use of a teleprompter are people that hate him and are out to end his career.  You seriously need to check your editors and producers about this kind of crap, or is NPR more worried about getting teabaggers to listen to ATC than in presenting the news in a truly fair and balanced manner?

[response from NPR 6/17/2010]

Sent: Thursday, June 17, 2010 2:46 PM

Subject: Re: Right Wing Fox News Language – Message ID:26967

Response to Message #26967:

Dear Alan,

Thank you for contacting the Ombudsman. We appreciate your feedback on NPR National Political Correspondent Mara Liasson who also appears on Fox New.

It is not uncommon for NPR reporters to appear on other networks, such as CNN and PBS.  Ombudsman Alicia Shepard wrote a column on this issue. NPR continually evaluates what its reporters say, how they present their work, and whether that crosses an ethical line, and NPR staff is held to a strict code of ethics and practices. These standards are in place to protect and support the integrity, impartiality and conduct of journalists.

When recently asked, Senior VP of News Ellen Weiss confirmed that NPR is continually evaluating how appearances on other news outlets may or may not undermine the NPR journalist’s reputation as an impartial source of information. 

Again, thank you for bringing your observations and thoughts regarding language used in Mara Liasson's report on All Things Considered to our attention. We appreciate you taking time to write.

Best,
Alexandria Neason
Office of the Ombudsman
NPR

[My response]

Please let it be known that I think any correspondent with a link to Fox News is damaged merchandise and should not be allowed airtime on NPR.  With no problem I can find you 10 qualified individuals in New Orleans that can do her job without throwing in disguised insults against our President in the process.  Anyone that is associated with Fox News is contaminated by their fascist leadership and should not be allowed a voice on National Public Radio.

 

Also you did not address her noting the President was reading from a teleprompter.  This is unacceptable on every level, especially that of journalistic behavior.  It is a BS partisan slur and you damn well know it whether it is stated specifically in your code of ethics (which it isn't) or not.

You may not watch Fox News (what sane person can?) but this teleprompter nonsense has been one stick in the continuous drumbeat of opposition to our President, along with the birther nonsense and more recently the "he's not angry enough/he's too angry" blather that you have also stooped to covering.  When will NPR have the balls to say enough is enough?  Fox News is a propaganda wing of the GOP and to say it is other is to lie to oneself.

 

 

What is Up With this Teleprompter Noise?

So not only are right wingers stupid, they have collective amnesia?  You would think no public official had ever read off a teleprompter until Obama... or is that they're pissed he does it so well while Shrub managed to fuck up even when reading his speeches?

About the Flu Vaccine

or
Open Letter to Bill Maher

Dear Bill Maher,

Let me start with a little brown nosing: I almost always agree with you, politically and socially, and even when your teleprompter reading is at its most obvious and awkward you make me laugh, and I was one of those that was totally behind you after 9/11. Had to get that out of the way so you know I’m not just some random lunatic hater and thus will go on to read this lengthy diatribe.

You have been a very bad atheist of late. You are making decisions and statements based on your beliefs and not science. I am, of course, referring to your irrational opposition to the flu vaccines. You are listening to your gut, and not the facts. You are also completely misunderstanding the way the immune system works and you then use your beliefs to convince you you are right about it.

You are acting like a True Believer, Bill. Even the evangelical Bill Frist who has faith he can diagnose a woman’s mental condition by watching a video told you that it’s what you believe but it’s not true. Your conviction that eating a pure diet and exercise will keep you safer than getting a flu shot and that, in fact, the shot itself is dangerous is belief. It is not logical nor rational. I’ll come back to this repeatedly. You are a man that spits at the idea of the “True Believer” but here you are behaving like one.

Here’s how the immune system works. Something invades the body, the immune system wakes up and detects it, attacks it and attacks and attacks until it figures out the antibody it needs to make to get rid of the attacker, body wins, and we feel better. What makes a completely new type of virus dangerous to us is that our immune system has none of the building blocks it needs for creating antibodies because our immune system has never seen anything like it. I don’t care how pure your food and lifestyle, when your body is attacked by a virulent, completely new type of virus you are going to be sick as runny shit. And that’s what makes the swine flu so dangerous, the immune systems of the healthy and young launch such a vicious attack against this totally new invader that it backfires and kills them. So far it appears a healthy older person might have been exposed to something similar in the 70’s so we may be fine. But nothing you eat, no amount of exercise or pure spring water colonics you, uh, enjoy as it were will prevent you from getting the flu if you haven’t already been exposed to that virus. You’re fucking screwed, basically, if you’ve never had something close to this year’s flu. The danger is in believing that getting any kind of flu isn’t really fucking awful.

A vaccine gives your immune system the information it needs to fight these viruses. That’s a fact, not a belief. Scientists (hundreds of thousands of them) have been creating, administering, and testing vaccines for over a century. They’re really good at it and only getting better. What you believe is being told to you by a few dozen blowhards and True Believers who are convinced by coincidence that vaccines are bad. It’s insulting to scientists everywhere to believe like you do. If there were some huge cover-up and sinister aspect to the vaccination programs, do you really think all those scientists are so corrupt they’ll kill people to stick with the program? Do you believe all the scientists and doctors working with vaccines are just making up the published numbers? That’s just fucked up, man. Those are far better people than fucking performers and politicians, don’t you think? And they’re especially better people than those that come up with these conspiracy theories.

And you should know about conspiracy theorists, Bill, considering how they regularly heckle you during your show. You’re acting just like them. You are acting on your beliefs and not the facts. Just as Fox News believers are convinced that the “balanced” perspective they are fed has a bearing on reality, you are getting your information from a very small group of very loud people and not listening to an incredibly large group of scientists and doctors that work on these vaccines around the world. You are not using logic, you are using belief.

The risk of side effects from the flu vaccines is vanishingly small. So small, in fact, that on the scale these vaccines are delivered, the correlative, non-causative events far outweigh actual problems. For instance, some guy dies right after getting vaccinated, but he would have had a heart attack that day regardless. That kind of event happens far more often than someone getting sick from the vaccine itself, which almost never happens, and in many years it doesn’t. People that continue to believe these correlative but non-causative events were caused by the vaccine rather than occurred coincidentally with it (causation, not correlation, remember that from your first science class?) are ignoring the facts and following their feelings and beliefs.

There is a risk to the vaccine. By any rational, logical process of thought and learning you should only come to the conclusion that the risks to you from getting the flu is much higher than any risks from the vaccine. Why would you think otherwise? Because of belief. If you haven’t had the flu in the last few years you’re lucky. If you had the flu a lot when you were younger your body may not be seeing anything really new. You may very well have had the sniffles a few times and didn’t realize you had a very mild flu because you were sick as holy shit fifteen years ago and this flu was very similar. But the H1N1 virus is completely new to most people and if you didn’t have the swine flu during Carter’s days then your souped up immune system may not be able to see this invader until you’re a sick, sorry mother fucker. I really think you’re putting many people in jeopardy of missing ten days of work because they didn’t get the vaccine. Try to imagine the loss of ten days of work for someone who is barely able to make ends meet and has no cushion or savings. It’s hard when you’re making millions to remember that the one in one billion chance of getting hurt by a vaccine has no comparison to the damage of getting sick and missing a week of work.

So anyway, get with being logical. This batshit conspiracy crap is for the birds. And don’t forget, it is the conservative mind that can not change.

Sincerely,

Alan Miller

[full address and phone number removed]

Lipstick on a Pig

I hereby declare this to be one of the stupidest diversions the Nazis (a.k.a. Republicans) have come up with yet. Listen to this NPR piece and tell me you believe Obama was referring to Sarah Palin. They play the lines preceding the pig and lipstick lines and it is obvious he is talking about McCain's policies. Palin is not mentioned at all. You will hear several other politicians, including John McCain using this old saw in their speeches exactly as Obama used it.

The phrase "lipstick on a pig" is commonly employed by politicians including Senator John McCain, Vice President Dick Cheney and Rep. Charles Rangel. Farmer Joel Salatin of Swoope, Va., talks about what actually happens when one attempts to put lipstick on a pig.

Do you smell Karl Rove? Makes me wish for the smell of pig shit.