American Radio

This trip has involved a lot of driving - which I've really appreciated - and combined with that I've had the opportunity to sample some of what is broadcast on American radio frequencies. FM here is mostly music, and although there are a lot of stations, its still hard to find something worth listening to. Mixed in with the commercial stations there are many religious broadcasters who play Christian pop and rock or host talk on issues like "The Day of Rest and the American Work Ethic".

AM hosts a lot of talk radio, and it gives an indication of how polarized America is. The recent intelligence report on Iraq was a hot topic two days ago, but the commentators took wildly different spins on it (we are winning militarily and now they are moving the goal posts vs we cannot win because of the political situation in Iraq). On a syndicated show on one of the CBS stations, environmentalists were made scape goats for Hurricane Katrina (they prevented new sluices being put into place), the collapse of the WTC during 9/11 (fire-dampening asbestos stripped) and car accident fatalities (pollution controls make cars lighter). One virulent right-wing show that I kept on getting was that of Sean Hennity who makes a living out of liberal-bashing (and in America liberal is a dirty word). A lot funnier was Doctor Laura who's show (at least the part of it I heard) consists of people phoning in with some kind of heart wrenching story (my daughter was abused by my husband, for example, or I lost the love of my life through my own selfishness) only to get told that they are total morons or they are unintelligible and hurry up, why don't you? It is very entertaining (for a short while).