KKFI host: The opposite of "leftie" is "wacko"

Aaron, I just wanted to drop you a line to say first, thanks for supporting the Atheists' right to not believe and still be able to voice that in the paper. However, I am trying to people to stop using 'dissin'' adjectives when refereing to a group or organization. It continues the divide and gives the reader the sense that if the adjective is supportive of their belief - they will accept what the org said. If, however, the adjective is an alternative of their belief - then the door to conversation is slammed shut.

You did that when you labeled Media Matters 'leftie.' I am not sure where you got the idea that that org is 'left' -if you have read any of their website material, stories, or seen videos, they do their best to ferret out what the MSP is trying to pass off as 'news' today and they back up their claims with facts. When facts don't support your viewpoint- that doesnt' make them 'lefties'. I don't think I've ever seen you use the adjective 'wacko' Heritage Foundation, so why would use that same kind of derogatory word for a progressive org?

Vicki Walker
KKFI 90.1 FM Kansas City Community Radio
www.kkfi.org
Listen Mondays 9:30am - KC Media Watchdogs - KC only media critique show!

Thanks for your thoughtful note. However, I am pretty sure that even David Brock himself would not mind my calling his organization "leftie." I'm afraid, too, that you're revealing your own biases when you assert that the opposite of "leftie" is "wacko."--AB

Good lord! Read your Bible, Major Garrett

Religion is much on the brain these days. As some of you know, a while ago I started editing the "Faith Walk" column that appears every Saturday in our pages. My predecessor, Bill Norton, did an all-call every year and selected 12 people from the community to write about what their belief system means to them in their everyday lives.

The group I inherited included a scientist named Chuck Lunney, who proudly identifies himself as an atheist. This weekend was his turn, and he used the occasion to declare the National Day of Prayer, coming up later this week, as essentially an exercise in futility. He went on to encourage non-believers and freethinkers everywhere to donate blood instead. I guess that's become the official anti-Day of Prayer activity. Lunney's piece stirred up a small hornet's nest among readers, including this letter that I loved for its proudly self-contradictory logic:

As a Christian, my complaint is not that Mr. Lunney, as an atheist, is given space in The Star; it’s where his column is placed that offends me. If I am reading the Business section, I’m not likely to find a featured column ranting on the failures and fallacies of American capitalism. When I read the Sports section, I’m probably not going to see a piece that suggests that sports fans, in general, have lower IQs than, say, musicians. By placing this column in the Faith section, The Star is essentially saying, “here’s your religious section, believers, and oh, by the way, none of it’s true.”

I’ve visited with atheists numerous times and have found that they can be every bit as “evangelical” in their “non-belief” as the most conservative Christian. It’s certainly Mr. Lunney’s right to believe as he does, and I wouldn’t begin to try to denigrate him for it (although I suspect he may not know as much about us as he thinks he does). And I’d also have to question the thinking behind putting an atheist on a 12-member “Faith Walk” group.

Where to start? First off, last I checked, Paul Krugman's views appear in the Business section, or used to, and he's delighted to puncture pro-business myths to an extent that some readers think he's a socialist who hates capitalism. The Sports analogy doesn't quite work, since there are people of many, many different faiths who read that section, including people who believe only one sport is deserving of the name "football."

But you can't both A, argue that people who are atheists "are every bit as evangelical in their nonbelief" ... and then B, deny them entry into a section called Faith, since even you are admitting that's what they have: a belief called Unbelief.

Anyway, this is leading into a video clip that the leftie watchdog group Media Matters just posted of Fox News Channel's Major Garrett, trying to give Sen. Barack Obama a Scripture lesson.

The Golden Rule is "not exactly rooted in Scripture but in the ballpark," Garrett asserts. Actually, it's more rooted in Scripture than a lot of things that so-called "values voters" hold dear. Perhaps Garrett is confusing this with the old Ben Franklin aphorism, "God helps those who help themselves," which is not in the Good Word but often gets cited as though it is. (Which is funny, because most of the New Testament, not to mention the history of Protestantism, is rooted in a firm rejection of the Help Yourself message.)

What carries over Garrett's error from Unfortunate Goof to Appalling Misstatement is the fact that Obama's response is exactly the one I would make if I had an embarrassing mentor or brother (Roger Clinton, Neil Bush) whose exploits were in the news.

Plus, what the heck church was Major Garrett brought up in that didn't teach that the Golden Rule were the words of Jesus?

LETTER: KKFI host objects to my use of the word "leftie"

"Dancing" with Paula Abdul??

Shari Elliker and I talked about the week's wackiest TV story on WBAL Radio.
Download wbal_20080429.mp3

Talk talk; plus, "Gossip Girl" is the CW's last best hope? RUFKM?

It's that time of the month. I'm on with Walt Bodine today. And this time I mean it. Listen live or revisit this post for a link to the podcast.

Just before that, I'll be calling in to Shari Elliker on WBAL. Podcast of that coming too, if all goes well.

And while you're waiting for all that high-quality audio excitement, you can listen to Paul Harris and me. This was recorded last night, our second weekly Skypecast, in which we covered the usual wide range of topics in our folksy, non-elitist way:

Harris Online TV Barn podcast 4-28-2008

Speaking of elitists, I'm not sure what to make of the CW's big spring push for "Gossip Girl." There was that OMFG campaign to promote the show's return from strike-induced hiatus. Now I see that the show is being featured on the cover of New York Magazine, where the cast is assembled on the cover in a shameless imitation of that famous magazine cover where... well, I think it's a famous magazine cover they're imitating.

Oddly enough, all of this publicity has not exactly whetted my appetite for more stories of overindulged preppies from the Upper East Side, whose moms are NY Mag's target audience. But it has piqued my interest in what ever the hell happened to the CW. And I see I am not alone, judging by the story that appeared last night noting the alarming drop in ratings for the sixth network (yes, I know there was a merger, I'm referring to Univision as the fifth network).

It now appears that all the broadcast networks were impacted by the 14-week writers strike this season, but the CW appears to have been hit harder than most. That makes sense, since most of their old warhorses are their best-known brands, and the network was relying heavily on its rookie shows, including "Gossip Girl," to keep the network viable.

But now that my favorite new CW shows, "Reaper" and "Aliens in America," appear to be doomed, this is what I'm stuck with? A show about the sons and daughters of millionaires engaging in bedroom romps that would have been scandalous a generation ago on TV with grownups?

UPDATE: James Hibberd has 7 ideas for saving the CW. Here's one: "CW needs (an) anything-goes urgency ... During its 1990s growth phase, Fox would beat up a hobo for a ratings point."

UPDATE 2: I'm reminded that the "Green Acres" meets "Bachelor" reality show, "Farmer Wants a Wife," is premiering Wednesday on the CW. Matt Neustadt lives on the other end of the state, and CW is barely a network, but it's not every year we have a made-in-Missouri network show. Paul Harris and I talked about that, too, in our Skypecast.

MORE AUDIO: Tuesdays with Shari.
WBAL - 4/29/2008

Oh Miley! O'Fallon!

Paul Harris and I talked about the latest controversies and news from the TV front today in our weekly podcast.

Download harris_online_042808.mp3

New bio reports Clinton told ABC to kill "Path to 9/11"

Carol Felsenthal is a Chicago-based journalist who first contacted me about three years ago, when she was working on a profile of Roger Ebert for Chicago magazine. I was impressed at the resulting piece, which pulled no punches and suggested strongly that the only reason Disney was keeping the Ebert and Roeper show on the air was prestige, not profits. Felsenthal's work would be borne out by later events, as re-up negotiations have gotten bogged down since Ebert took himself off the air, and his partner has had to stop using the famous thumb ratings.

Felsenthal has a new book out this week May 6, Clinton in Exile: A President Out of the White House. I'm about halfway through, but I think that Felsenthal has set the bar high for subsequent biographers/apologists/attack dogs writing about the Clinton post-presidency. Yes, she conducted the requisite supersize number of interviews (165), with enough insiders to the Billary circle to make her reporting credible short of actually getting access to the Clintons. And yes, there's a pile of footnotes, though a separate list of interviews conducted would've been nice, too. But it's her storyline that people are going to find compelling, not to mention timely. She argues that Clinton's bad habits, excess, and lack of focus all cost him dearly as President and now threaten to tarnish his legacy. He is the mirror opposite of his nemesis Jimmy Carter. While Carter has used his inner discipline to rebuild his brand from one-term dud to Nobel laureate, Clinton is spending all the goodwill he built up over two terms like a riverboat gambler. His 2004 memoir My Life, Felsenthal writes, is the embodiment of the ex-President's lack of discipline, a 1,000-page rush job that, she pointedly notes, disappointed Clinton when it didn't win a Pulitzer.

I'll let other reviewers deal with the sauciest revelations from the book, which could be summarized as billionaires, bimbos and Boeings. There's some news in here from the TV front. Felsenthal reviews the inglorious stint of Clinton and Bob Dole doing a point-counterpoint segment on "60 Minutes." Don Hewitt, the show's creator, wanted Bill O'Reilly instead of Dole. But even if Hewitt had found a more acceptable pundit to spar with him, Clinton wouldn't have done anything to hurt Hillary's future ambitions, Felsenthal writes. So a FOB from the GOP was picked instead, with predictable resultzzzzzz.

But the really eyebrow-raising story, and the one that may have legs if the primary battle between his wife and Barack Obama stretches into the summer, is how Team Clinton worked hard to kill off the "Path to 9/11" miniseries on ABC in 2006. Though even close advisors to the Clinton Administration have conceded shortcomings in their response to al-Qaeda — so well laid out in Lawrence Wright's magnificent account The Looming Tower — they all went into attack mode after some FOBs saw a preview of the first night of "Path to 9/11." Even though the script was from a veteran TV docudrama writer who had no real axe to grind, and had been reviewed carefully by 9/11 Commission icon Tom Kean, he was quickly demonized as a right-wing hack by Clintonites and their amen corner in the blogosphere. I remember interviewing Kean and finding him not just to be a celebrity endorser of the miniseries but someone who seemed well acquainted with the accounts and descriptions of the two-night commercial-free program. That, of course, was before Team Clinton went to work. Kean's relationship with Clinton was damaged by the "Path to 9/11" fallout.

Most shameful are the performances of Sandy Berger, who called scenes "defamatory" that reenact accounts he had corroborated elsewhere; and Madeleine Albright, who wanted the movie censored without bothering to watch it. As to the claim that Clinton was less than fully focused on world affairs from 1998 to 2000 because he was being distracted by a certain long-running sex scandal ... does anyone NOT believe that? By recounting the events of "Path to 9/11," Felsenthal tells us a lot about Clinton 42 and how its efforts to protect its legacy may ultimately cripple his wife's chances of being Clinton 44 or 45.

Anyway, it's a great read. Chip Franklin and I talked about the book and other political TV items (Antonin Scalia on "60 Minutes," Craig Ferguson at the White House Correspondents Dinner) today on KOGO. Click the arrow for the player or the link to download: KOGO with Chip Franklin 3-28-2008

Ferguson's turn to heckle Bush; Clinton and "Path to 9/11"

It's an all-politics version of the KOGO morning show as Chip Franklin and I discuss Antonin Scalia on "60 Minutes," Craig Ferguson on C-SPAN at the White House Correspondents Dinner and new revelations about Bill Clinton trying to kill that ABC docudrama "Path to 9/11."

Download kogo_20080428.mp3

Visit to "Confidential" high school; plus, weekend links and more video

On Friday I joined several other Kansas City Star columnists, including Mike Hendricks (to my right), Vern Barnet (to my left) and John Mark Eberhart (man in black), at an annual columnists panel convened for the AP English students at Blue Valley Northwest High School. That's right, the very high school featured in the WE series "High School Confidential." Happily, my grilling at the hands of BVNW students was light; after all, I was the guy who blew its cover. There are two "Northwest Highs" in Overland Park, and the show never reveals which one it is. A high school, however, is not a minor, and I didn't get why we were supposed to treat it as such and obscure its identity. Water under the bridge, I suppose.

Speaking of water, as in rainwater, my page one story about J. Eggleston and his daughter Stefanie ran today. Here's the blog entry I wrote after discovering his detailed analysis of Kansas City weathercasters had made the NYT Freakonomics blog.

Oh, and speaking of "High School Confidential," last episode airs 9 p.m. CT Monday on WE. It's a nice wrap to the series if you missed all the previous eps. Here's my Sunday story on it and the marathon of "Day Under Fire" programs, shot by Kansas City's Wide Awake Films.

And now, here's the second in a series of videos running on local cable right now. In this exciting installment, Cynthia Smith and I talk about the writers' strike's aftermath.

Let's see if this works.

David Cook's talent, not his brother, "is the reason he is doing so well"

The only issue I have with your story is to make it seem that David's rise on AI is due to the sympathetic "storyline" as you call it ( I call it real life, and sad stuff, at that)...of his brother's cancer.

David's talent and stage presence is the reason he is doing so well, he has not talked publicly about his brother's illness at all, and to make it seem otherwise is a misrepresentation of the facts.

Not to mention, it's pretty crass in light of the fact that it's an extremely tragic event for David and his family.

Mary McCulley
San Francisco, CA

Andy Richter: Is there something wrong with making a living?

This originally appeared in The Kansas City Star, August 4, 2004.

To all the fans who wish that he were still doing "Andy Richter Controls the Universe," Andy Richter has a simple message: Let it go.

Richter, the affable Midwesterner who played straight man to some of the most bizarre comedy churned out in the 1990s, now stars in "Quintuplets," a relatively conventional TV sitcom on Fox. That is the same network that canceled his critically acclaimed "Universe" after separate launches in 2002 and 2003 failed to draw much of an audience.

"Quintuplets" is doing well enough in the ratings that Fox has ordered a whole year's worth of the show and is airing it three times a week this summer in the hopes of building an audience. A new episode airs at 7:30 tonight and is repeated 8:30 p.m. Sunday and 8:30 p.m. Tuesday on Channel 4.

From his appearance in the loopy box-office dud "Cabin Boy" to seven years as Conan O'Brien's sidekick, Richter perfected the part of what improv-comedy people call the "low-status character," the schlub who is forever humiliated. In one classic "Late Night With Conan O'Brien" bit, Richter stumbled naked onto the "Today" show set and asked Matt Lauer for directions.

Now, on "Quintuplets," he presides over a family of five 15-year-olds and a brood of standard-issue sitcom plots. (The quints go to the prom. The quints throw a party on Dad and Mom's night out.)

Critics have not been nearly so kind to "Quintuplets" as they were to "Universe." In fact, the most common note sounded in reviews is a quixotic longing for the old show.

"What do these people have against me working?" Richter said at the TV critics press tour last month, sounding both bemused and irked. "What I found particularly irritating was a review in Newsweek, a story about Fox's summer lineup with two-sentence reviews of each show, and the one about our show said: 'Andy Richter can do better.' Well, apparently, I can't."

The sarcasm underlines a hard lesson Richter has had to learn about show business since leaving "Late Night" in 2000.

"I've tried selling scripts," he said. "The first draft they're always, 'We love it!' But the further along you get in the process, you know, it becomes, 'Could you make it more like, like, something else?' "

As in something familiar?

"Yes," Richter said. "It took me awhile to realize that the cliche was true. They'd always say, 'Be bold! Be different!' And then I'd realize, no, they want the same old thing."

When he was developing "Universe," Richter recalled Fox executives telling him, "All our shows are about families," which wasn't what he wanted to hear.

"When I first left the Conan O'Brien show I resisted playing a father," he said. "I would come out here for meetings and they'd say, 'Well, do you want to be a dad? What kind of dad do you want to be?' I didn't want to be a dad. So then it was, 'OK, what kind of office do you want to be in?' So we did an office show. We did it for two seasons, two partial seasons. I felt we had done that and now let's try some other thing."

He developed comedies for CBS and NBC that weren't picked up. That left "Quintuplets," on which he was asked to star. (His "Universe" co-star, Paget Brewster, is in the cast of "!Huff," a Showtime drama that begins in November.)

On "Quintuplets" Richter is just the star -- no writing, no producing -- which has left him more free time than usual.

He's taped one episode of the upcoming NBC animated sitcom "Father of the Pride," and he and a writer friend are talking about making an independent film together.

Right now, however, Richter admitted that he, wife Sarah Thyre and their child are spending a lot of time "just vacationing."

Because he's on a family schedule, Richter doesn't stay up to watch much late-night TV. He's not surprised, though, when he tunes in "Late Night" and sees how O'Brien now single-handedly carries the show.

"I'm always amazed what he can do with pure personality and self-possession," he said.

Richter also is optimistic that there will be an "Andy Richter Controls the Universe" DVD set.

"So far, Paramount is dragging its heels," he said. "But you know, my wife had a recurring role on a show called 'Strangers With Candy' on Comedy Central. (She played Coach Wolf.) That wasn't a big show, either. Mostly it was watched by TV critics and people who sell shoes at Barneys. And that'sbig on DVD." (Shortly after this interview, filming began on a movie version of "Strangers.").

When "Universe" comes out on DVD, though, Richter hopes that reviewers will resist the temptation to take yet more potshots at "Quintuplets," the show that's currently paying his bills.

As he put it, "It's sort of like watching 'Beverly Hills 90210' and thinking, 'Well, it's no "West Wing"!' "

"The Agenda" online; also, David Cook's DialIdol dominance

My Tuesday night appearance on Toronto's "The Agenda" is now online. And you get your pick of video or audio. Our panel begins about 15 minutes in.

***

It's official: There's a new king of the hill on "American Idol," and his name is also David.

For weeks, callers to the "Idol" phone voting line belonging to David Archuleta have been the busiest, according to DialIdol.com. DialIdol distributes a piece of free software that lets people rapid-dial from their computers; in exchange, they agree to let DialIdol know (anonymously, I assume) how many busy signals they're getting on their line. DialIdol then crunches the data to predict, with uncanny accuracy, who's up and who's down. Contestants who have far more busy signals on their line than others are considered safe from elimination; those with relatively low busy counts are in danger of being ousted.

Until last week, little Archuleta was topping the DialIdol "Predictions" chart. But then David Cook was the beneficiary of a highly empathetic storyline in his sick brother Adam Cook (and yes, I realize how crass it looks to refer to a young man with brain cancer as a "storyline," but for the purposes of explaining the outcome of the program, how can you not?). Cook shot to the top of the DialIdol busy-signal strength list, though Archuleta, Jason Castro and even Kristy Lee Cook (oops!) were also considered safe. DialIdol's good, but it ain't perfect.

Anyway, fast forward to this week. I thought Archuleta might be bumped back up to No. 1, but no, this has suddenly become David Cook's contest to lose.

New study finds KC weathercasters are ... ready for this? ... often WRONG! No, really!

J. Eggleston, who lives in rural Missouri and watches Kansas City TV stations, has a fascinating guest article in the New York Times "Freakonomics" blog. Over 220 days in 2007, Eggleston and his fifth-grade daughter took down the nightly forecasts of the four TV stations in town and then compared what they forecast to the weather we actually got.

What the Egglestons found confirmed what many Kansas Citians already know: Those forecasters get it wrong. A lot.

Some of his findings were pretty common sense, though it's always interesting to see them buttressed by hard numbers. His most important conclusion -- that forecasts can't be trusted beyond the second day -- I've reported on before. (A weather official in Pleasant Hill told me that all 7-day forecasts trend out to the seasonal highs and lows by the end of the week, so that a prediction of and get revised as the farthest date becomes the day after tomorrow and then tomorrow.) And on the point that drives some people around c-r-a-z-y — the constant interruptions of regular programming for severe storm coverage — the Egglestons have little to say except to note that all four stations do an excellent job of alerting the public.

I found one conclusion of the study enlightening and fun in a freakonomish way: If you were to follow the simple guideline, "Tomorrow it will not rain," 100 percent of the time, you would be right 87 percent of the time. If you followed the day-before rain forecasts of your favorite local meteorologist, you would be right between 38 percent and 60 percent of the time. And for those of you who watched a certain forecaster last night predict a 10 PERCENT CHANCE of rain overnight, about four hours before the heavens opened up and dumped rain and hail throughout the metro — can I get an amen?

Eggleston and I talked earlier today for a story on his blog piece and its reaction. He's been delighted by the comments being left at the blog (168 and counting as I write this). By far the most-repeated comment was "can you do this in my city??" Be sure to read comment #47, where Eggleston convincingly answers several doubters. (By the way, it's not a privacy thing — he calls himself "J" because in the small town where he lives, there are just way too many guys named John, including two direct ancestors: he was born John D. Eggleston III.)

Double media alert today

Going to be on at 10 a.m. today (CT) with Walt Bodine and new cohost Gina Kaufmann (yes, it's a Star-Pitch summit meeting!). You can listen live here, or if iTunes isn't your bag, there are more options on the home page.

UPDATE: Nope! Walt Bodine isn't until next Tuesday.

Tonight, I'll be on another hour program, one that doesn't air in the United States, except in those border towns lucky enough to get the Toronto-based TVO. There I will be on with four other TV scribes, including fellow TCA members Marc Berman and Rob Salem, to discuss "Television in the Internet Age" on "The Agenda with Steve Paikin." I'll post a podcast of the audio portion tomorrow; my impression is that the sound is about 99 percent of the program anyway.

But I could be wrong.

And since I didn't have a Walt Bodine link for you to follow, how about this instead. Last week the local cable companies, Time Warner and Comcast, began running a fresh set of "Newsmakers" segments, including three interviews with me. Thanks to some timely cancellations by other guests, host Cynthia Smith invited me to stick around and tape some more. Here's the first of three, where we discuss this decade's Y2K, also known as the DTV transition.

If you're a local viewer, "Newsmakers" airs in a rotation at :55 past the hour on CNN Headline News most hours. Cynthia and co-co-host Jerry Fogel interview local politicians, nonprofit leaders and MSMers like me.

"Call me crazy, but I always thought the job of journalists during a debate was to ask substantive questions which would help people decide where to cast their vote"

Saw your posts -- Call me crazy, but I always thought the job of journalists during a debate was to ask substantive questions which would help people decide where to cast their vote. I mean, aren't these the same guys who walk around complaining about issue-less elections, stage-managed campaigns and overly scripted candidates?

Does anybody really think Obama is secretly some kind of Weather Underground-loving, Nation of Islam revering, hate-America black nationalist in disguise? Does he owe these guys anything, in terms of contributions or support? Have they affected his policies at all?

Gibson and Stephanopoulos and every other journalist covering this campaign knows the answer to those questions. At least with Clinton's bimbo eruptions there was always the question of whether they were actually true, and whether they might affect his ability to govern.

But nobody with half a brain really believes any of these issues -- except maybe, his long association with Rev. Wright -- has anything to do with what he's actually done as a politician. I find it interesting that no one has connected any of this stuff to anything he's done as a senator or state rep.

Seems odd to me to spend so much time dissecting issues that people know aren't that germane. It would be nice if our news media spent more time trying to cut through the clutter than add to it....that's all i'm saying....

Eric Deggans
TV/Media Critic
St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times

(I think Frank Rich and others who pointed out that ABC reaped what an entire news media sowed were exactly right. You can't excuse Charlie Gibson but you can't say he and George S. were just a couple of bad apples. And while we're at it, that CNN "Compassion Forum" deserves to have a truckload of manure dumped on it, too.--AB)

Today's podcasts; also, rise and shine, Verbeck is back!

Some pretty good chatter,if I may say so myself, took place today with Shari Elliker of WBAL Radio and Paul Harris of HarrisOnline.com. In fact, I can practically guarantee when you're done listening you won't be saying, "Boy, I wish I had those 40 minutes back."

Which is what you were probably saying after the first 40 minutes of the ABC debate.

Last week I loaded the slick new Yahoo player on this page. It's so slick, in fact, that you may not even notice it at first. But basically the way it works is when you see a link to an audio file, look for this right next to it: Click on that and up pops the Yahoo player. Not only will it play that file but it will immediately load every single MP3 on the page, which you can scroll through like a jukebox. You'll never need this again.

First up, Shari and I talked about "Idol" and its slipping ratings. We also discussed tonight's "Deal or No Deal" and what might possibly be motivating the POTUS to go onto a game show.

WBAL 4/21/2008 - Shari Elliker

Next, Paul and I discussed upcoming HBO programs, I batted down some of the recent uncalled-for trashing of HBO, Barack Obama's and Bryant Gumbel's and Pam Ward's names came up, as did those of Charlie Gibson, George Steph, Stephen Colbert, Dick Enberg ... it's a packed half hour, let's just leave it at that.

HarrisOnline 4/21/2008 - Paul Harris

HarrisOnline-TV Barn: HBO, the debates ...

... and Pam Ward and the NFL Network and much more in our new expanded Skypecast!

Download harrisonline_04212008.mp3

POTUS on "Deal," and the deal with "Idol's" ratings

Shari Elliker and I talked reality TV on WBAL this morning.
Download wbal_20080421.mp3

Podcast: David Cook's brother went to "Idol" for all the right reasons

Interesting question came up today on our local newsradio station, KMBZ-AM (980), when I joined anchors Ellen Schenk and E.J. Becker to discuss local boy David Cook's emotional performance on "American Idol."

David's very sick brother Adam Cook was in L.A. to see the show this week. The citizens of Terre Haute raised $80,000 to cover the costs of getting him out there, which we talked about earlier this week. I had once relied on a family member's access to a Cessna to get myself medical treatment. And though Adam Cook's cancer is much more serious than mine ever was, the reason was the same: getting aboard a commercial jet with compromised immune systems is a no-no. Plus, if I were to get sick, could we land in time to get me to medical care?

Terre Haute solved all those problems ... and a heartwarming storyline was made possible. David Cook had tears in his eyes at the end.

On the radio this morning I was asked: Was bringing Adam out to L.A. just a ratings ploy? Well, if it was, it failed. And no, I don't believe it was. You can hear my reasons why in the podcast.

Click the arrow to get the player or Newsradio 980 KMBZ - 04/18/2008

"Idol" chatter

KMBZ-AM hosts E.J. Becker and Ellen Schenk chatted with me about this week's "American Idol" and local contestant David Cook.

Download KMBZ_20080418.mp3