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Columns by G.D. Gearino | Home / Lifestyles / Columns by G.D. Gearino
Topics: Arts & Entertainment | Family & Community | Food & Fitness | Home & Garden | Religion | Skiing Columnists: Bangs | Book Reviews | Good for You | Gearino | Jackson | Carolina Cook | Snow | Specialty of the House | Stein | Weekend Gourmet | Zane
Published: Apr 13, 2004 12:30 AM Modified: Oct 23, 2005 11:27 PM This time, straight talk G.D. Gearino, Staff Writer I should have known better. I'm a professional, but last week I made an amateur's mistake: I trafficked in irony. Smart writers -- smarter than me, at least -- handle irony as if it's an explosive, volatile substance. They deploy it in small amounts, and only in carefully selected spots. In fact, the wisest writers usually skip irony altogether. They know it can blow up in your face, leaving you looking like Wile E. Coyote right after he had yet another defective Acme product explode as he was holding it. That's me right now. My face is singed and darkened, and my hair is standing straight up. (Yeah, I'm bald, but work with me here.) A quick review of my mistake: Air America Radio, the new network that seeks to become a progressive broadcast alternative to entrenched conservatives like Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly, cranked up for business two weeks ago. I listened for a couple of days, I talked to an experienced talk-radio veteran about Air America's prospects for success, and I read a dozen or so articles about the new venture.
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Among the many things I learned is the fact that Air America's flagship affiliate, WLIB-AM in New York, has yanked the majority of its black-themed community shows to accommodate the new network's programming -- which mostly features white, liberal on-air personalities. I also learned that this switch in WLIB's programming is not sitting well with some black activists in New York. This struck me as particularly -- dare I say it? -- ironic. I have a fondness for political pieties, in the way that the needle appreciates the balloon. But conservative pieties, which tend to be rooted in the grubby realities of economics and realpolitik, aren't nearly as much fun to mock as liberal pieties, which almost always have a preachy, moralistic flavor to them. (To put it another way, conservatives think their opponents are idiots, while liberals think their opponents are evil.) I was entertained by the notion that the first consequence of this progressive, liberal radio network's debut was the displacement of programming that served a minority community. How progressive is that? (This was the same question, more or less, that the activists were asking.) In short, Air America Radio was what the military calls "a target-rich environment." Last week's column was my strafing run on the new liberal radio network. Trouble was, I crafted the column as an ironic (here we go again) nod of approval toward Air America. I knew I had a problem when reader responses came in. The first three were (and I'm paraphrasing here): (1) More liberal claptrap from the mindless liberals in the liberal media. (2) Why are you happy that the black-themed programming was taken off WLIB? Are you racist? (3) What were you trying to say, exactly? Me, liberal? Smile when you say that, pardner. Racist? Nah, just clumsy. What was I trying to say? Well, I'll try again, going slowly this time to prevent further misunderstandings: Air. America. Is. Just. More. Partisan. Self. Indulgence. Like. Any. Other. Radio. Talk. Show. (Rush. I'm. Looking. At. You.) Hope that's better. In the future, I'll just rant like everyone else -- to avoid confusion. G.D. Gearino can be reached at 829-4802 or dang@newsobserver.com.

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