Selander Watchers Wanted
I think we all know the dangers of allowing right-wing disinformation and lies to go out through the media unchallenged especially in an election year.
I think we also know that Brian Selander is a nice guy. But do we know if he is tough enough? Is he letting Rick Jensen get away with parroting too much GOP spin and basically pull complete wingnut nonsense out of his ass each afternoon on WDEL?
Who knows? Not me.
I can’t listen much in the afternoon, so I’m asking you to help out by listening and reporting back on Selander’s relative effectiveness in rebutting whatever bullshit Jensen picked up from Bill O’Rielly the previous evening.
To make it even easier on you I’ve created this numerical scale that you can use to report on Selander.
1 = Useless Alan-Colmes-itude
5 = Kick-Ass Rachael-Maddow-ocity
Good Luck and thanks to Nancy Willing and Liz Allen for yesterday’s report.
Nancy Willing // Feb 21, 2008 at 8:28 pm
I wasn’t near a radio today any time after 10 AM. I hope Selander didn’t disappoint.
No prob Nancy. this will have to be a group effort.
liz allen // Feb 21, 2008 at 10:41 pm
You didn’t miss much…bringing on Banksters to tell us a lot of bs….while even the Wall Street Journal this am…front page…our economy is in stagflation!
Thanks Liz!
I listened in the car yesterday while poor Brian was dealing with a complete raving lunatic who called to talk about Michelle Obama being the high priestess of Obamaism and how that’s much worse than anything Bill O’Reilly said. OMG! Brian handled the nutter well but you could tell Rick was laughing his butt off.
What Brian is doing isn’t easy. I’ve tried to talk on the radio a couple of times and failed miserably. Jason you do well with Al but Al isn’t the same as Jensen. 99% of the time Al makes sense. Jensen is a Limbaugh wannabe. I have nothing but admiration and respect for Brian being willing to walk into that padded cell with Rick every afternoon.
Thanks for that perspective Rebecca. I’m not going to join a lynching party – not unless he hates America. In that case it is legit.
Does anyone know why Selander’s blog disappeared from the WDEL website?
Jason you were great with Al this morning.My lay-off allows me to listen everday.Brian, or DJ SnowWatch as I call him, always refutes the wingnut lies from jerky Jenson with rational points of fact but Rick’s creationist background roars over like a T Rex after a homosapien.
Thanks for the compliment Joe. Also, thanks for your take on Selander.
I have to remember that our side is bound by things like “reason” and “proof” and “facts” but guys like Jensen think that you can create truth by repeating a lie at ever increasing volume.
Well,most of our side uses reason and truth.I’m not positve the Clinton campaign just outright lies but they are well versed in subtle innuendo and partial truths.
Today I’ll begin taking notes on WDEL’s afternoon show and report back.The hard part is keeping control,Rick drives me to the “Hulk smash!” state.Because it is Rick’s show I wonder if Brian is concerned about oversteooing his bounds.
Jason,
Thanks for pointing out the fact that lies repeated often enough make people perceive they are listening to the truth. It is a nutty fact that almost alone among industrialized nations our commentary acts more like social indoctrination than informative debate. Anyone who contributes to that is acting like a power maniac.
I come from a family of right-wing crazies and want to state that Brian always has an uphill battle. Jensen truly enjoys hearing himself speak (like most O’Rielly and Limbaugh copy cats). Brian does a good job of serving Jensen a plate of humble pie day to day and I commend him on a job well done.
In the first hour: Selander keeps the wolf at bay. R insists HRC calls the big O a liar and cheat by way of the “Xerox” comment, ie a personal attack.Basically a rethug can’t say enough negative things about SenClinton.To his credit Brian IS able to say good things about her,making him less partisan than I.They float the idea of debating a single issue only.One caller cheap shots Bri,another defends and some old lady has no concept of life outside of Lawrence Welk.
I picked a great day to listen in. Agreeing with Jensen on Hillary is making me queazy.
No Selander is about to come back and say that Hillary wrote that closing crap and that it was from her heart.
In Fact John Edwards said that stuff in the December 3rd debate:
Edwards the December 13 debate:
What’s not at stake are any of us. All of us are going to be just fine no matter what happens in this election. But what’s at stake is whether America is going to be fine.?
Oh shoot-Jason you’re on!!!You don’t me me as a Selander listener!
I enjoy Edwards and Obama, I think they both have great ideas and idealism. I hope at some point he comes raging back out of obsurity. Howard Dean certainly would be happy about that. My G-G-granddad on my Dad’s side was ambassador to Italy and worked for many of the same goals that these guys talk about now. I really like that type of validation of idealism. The last politician who did that was Kennedy.
I want to say for the record that I do not agree with all their ideas, but I like the idealism they show and the cooperative approach to international affairs. It is not more blah blah blah bomb bomb bomb militarism that we are getting from the national GOP’s resource war foreign policy.
I listen to the show when I pick my kids up from school – for approx. 20 minutes. I think Brian’s problem lies with the perception that it is still the Rick Jenson show. Jenson’s obviously dominant… er… I mean louder. Hopefully this perception changes in time.
Brian’s main goal should be to do everything in his power to not let the show go the way of Hannity and colmes. (In case of plagerism I give full credit to Al Franken for his use of the small “c”.)
Yeah, the show is going that way. I think “real debate” would get a new meaning if they would try it.
Pandora, I think it would be plagarism if you wrote
Hannity
and
colmes
.
That made me smile every time I read it and cannot see the name of the show without thinking it…
God bless Al Franken!
Is the afternoon program still known as ‘Live (Loud) ‘n Local’? I stopped listening weeks and weeks ago. We don’t need a couple party spinmiesters…..we need resolution of LOCAL issues….Primtime, Fox :0, CNN, etc. shove enough national info at us daily. When the local talk shows addressed local (statewide) issues we made some inroads to better government…remember Atkins? Prison & Psy. problems, etc.
These two blow hards are a waste of ear energy….let me know when it’s over and I can once again identify w/the topics and callers.
Rick Jenson is the worst talk show host in Delaware. His arguments are filled with his opinion, his right wing take. I started calling WDEL in 2000 when Rick was am, Hannity and rush in the afternoon. It was unbearable! They sold the Iraq war and as far as I’m concerned Rick Jenson who believes himself a patriot, is nothing but a rush ditto head liar! He used to call me a commie, a looney, or simply start talking over you, when you were delivering fact , I would have the article up on my computer so I didnt misquote. He then attacks you personally, either while on air, or click you off and demonize you. He tried to paint me as the loon, but I feel absolutely vindicated in my presentation of the truth, and indeed history has proved the left right and the right wrong. He is a pathetic little man, who was obviously raised as a military kid. and never taught to question anything.
He believes he is a patriot, when in fact, I believe his yellow journalism, his style make him just another warmonger, corporate protecting goon with a microphone.
His take on single payer care as “socialism” is a moral crime in my opinion. We are talking life and death, yet he used the power of the public airwaves to flame the stupid and ignorant into believeing his lies. He has learned the google bar…because I used on him so many times to uncover his lies…he probably has a computer at the ready.
I was told that the consultants WDEL brought in, had a very low opinon of his talk show style, and I heard he has been fired from about 14 stations. Too bad they didnt hire Randy Nelson when they had the chance….now there is someone who could take Rick on.
Brian is doing a little better, although he is young and has little grasp of past historical fact and allows Jenson to repeat his opinion again and again…thats when I just turn it off.
Usually when there are two hosts, they agree to a topic before the show. Brian will have to bone up before the show, and never show Jensen his sources….its the art of surprise!
Liz – Being aware was insanity inducing back then.
I knew the war was bullsit. You knew the war was bullshit. Joe Biden knew the war was bullshit. Hillary Clinton knew. Everyone knew. And yet, It was as if every person with a glimmer of awareness in the country was being subjected to some kind of sick psychological test.
We were being told that we needed to close our eyes tightly to see what they saw. We needed to demote reason and common sense as tools for interpreting the world and rely instead on fairy tales, magic dust and ancient texts that had long ago lost any meaning.
Fear became the new courage, and we were all told to burnish our fear and keep it close. Because fear meant that you were vigilant and concerned about security. A lack of fear made you suspect.
Fear so totally gripped some people that they were eager to close their eyes and yell out, “Yes, I see it! I see the magic yellow cake. I see the Iraqi people thanking us! It is beautiful.”
And they did see it. Because they needed to see it. Even today some people are as addicted to that fear as the most pitiful crack addict is addicted to crack. It has warped them. They are a new type of creature; Homotimidus: Fearful Man.
And, perhaps, that was the most un-American part of the whole episode. How quickly we divested ourselves of the legendary courage of our pioneer forefather and mothers. How quick we were to spit on it and wipe our asses with that antique fabric.
Rick Jensen and people like him were village idiots elevated to lords of misrule. Only it was not a one day celebration of perversion. It went on for years. It continues even today.
And so for 8 years a formerly fearless people have been turned into slaves of fear. Maybe this election means that we are finally striking off those chains.
I hope so.
We have nothing to fear but fear itself..FDR! I think the title of this should be Jenson Watching!
Brian needs to question Jenson everytime Rick uses “his source”…who the hell are his sources…right wing think tanks. Brian should call him out on that! Tell us Rick who are they…so we can get our google ready.
Today Tuesday was especially sickening, listening to Jenson talk about why we shouldn’t have full day kindergarten..has this man every looked at the studies that show children learn faster, quicker the younger they are!
Going after the Red Clay School Referundum is so Rush Limbaugh! Rick could really learn some facts if he went to deinformedvoters.org and read the Quality District School Model that is in effect in Kentucky!
If you fail a child before 4th grade they have a 70% rate of going to prison in later life. They should not be testing these young children, as all childrens brains do not develop according to chronological age. You teach them early even at 3 years old, they can learn languages, and more. Most children love the whole idea of going to school, they thrive on it. But when they get there we put them in these rows…we discourage them from speaking out, we make little robotons of them. Those that didnt get the opportunity to learn to read, write spell usually will even out with the rest of the class by the 4th grade. We are destroying our children with this 100 year public school system…we need a complete overhaul! Not the 2015 initiative.