Rory’s phone has been ringing off the hook after a shooting at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Tennessee. Apparently, one Jim Adkisson opened fire during a children’s play, killing two adults and wounding seven others. According to the Knoxville News, upon questioning the suspect told police that he targeted the church

“because of its liberal teachings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country, and that he felt that the Democrats had tied his country’s hands in the war on terror and they had ruined every institution in America with the aid of media outlets.”

When Adkisson’s home was searched,

officers found “Liberalism is a Mental Health Disorder” by radio talk show host Michael Savage, “Let Freedom Ring” by talk show host Sean Hannity, and “The O’Reilly Factor,” by television talk show host Bill O’Reilly.

[Read more...]

Broadcasting & Cable’s BC Beat column about the right-wing radio strawman that is the non-existent “Hush Rush” bill notes:

But while some Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, have recently expressed interest in seeing the return of the doctrine, which was declared unconstitutional in 1987, critics of conservative talk-radio say the idea is a straw man ginned up to get listeners in a fighting mood.

In his new book, Shock Jocks: Hate Speech & Talk Radio (AlterNet Books), veteran journalist and filmmaker Rory O’Connor notes that “[m]ost informed political observers believe there is scant possibility that the fusty doctrine will ever be reimposed.”

WGBH, a PBS affiliate in Boston, invited Rory to talk about Shock Jocks–watch the video here!

And don’t miss this mp3 of Rory’s excellent in-depth interview by Loraine Ballard Morrill on Clear Channel’s Philly-based WDAS-FM and 104.5. Ms. Morrill is Clear Channel Philadelphia’s Director of News and Community Affairs.

Angry citizen reaction to the latest cynical, cyclical outpouring of hateful speech over the public radio airwaves – top-rated talk show host Michael Savage’s despicable attack on autistic children as “brats, morons and idiots” – has once again injected America’s talk radio problem back into the mainstream news cycle. But why did it take a full week of protests, pressure, pickets, pullouts by advertiser, and stations dropping the program – Savage’s remarks occurred on the July 16 edition of his nationally syndicated radio show — before the mainstream media finally responded to the latest outrage? Is it because they are part of the racket? [Read more...]

Don Feder, conservative political communications consultant and former Boston Herald writer, makes Shock Jocks the centerpiece of a column which also ran at freerepublic.com, entitled “Obama And The Conspiracy To Kill Talk Radio.”

The piece isn’t quite a book review; as Feder writes, “[a]ccording to its cover, this penetrating analysis” is a “just the latest manifestation of the left’s obsession with talk radio,” and serves adequately as a jumping off point to rally Republican voters with threats of the damage liberals will do to America if elected.

Feder doesn’t waste any time connecting the dots between liberals and terrorists:

In 1987, the Reagan FCC repealed the grotesque anachronism. Now, the left is panting to bring it back.

This is how the Fairness Doctrine would be applied to talk radio: If a station broadcast three hours of Rush Limbaugh — or Sean Hannity or Bill O’Reilly or Dr. Dobson — in the afternoon, it would have to provide equal time to The Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright, Father Michael Pfleger or Osama bin Laden.

[Read more...]

As the Michael Savage autism controversy grows (no doubt Savage’s refusal to apologize is helping) this piece on ABC’s Good Morning America features Rory talking about the most Savage man in America.

Watch the video here at Yahoo Video.

Also, check out Media Matters” coverage and a good summary of Savage’s talks about autism here.

From David Hinckley at the New York Daily News:

Rory O’Connor, a writer, critic, filmmaker and blogger, thinks he hears poison coming out of conservative talk radio, and he’s written a whole book explaining why.

“Shock Jocks: Hate Speech & Talk Radio” (AlterNet, $14.95), which O’Connor wrote with Aaron Cutler, identifies 10 hosts he considers the worst offenders, and the list is about who you’d expect: Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, Mark Levin, Glenn Beck, Neal Boortz, Hugh Hewitt, Laura Ingraham and Imus.

Imus may be a little surprised, though one imagines most of the others – perhaps alongside Phil Boyce, the WABC program director who has five of the top 10 on his station – might feel slighted if they were excluded from this particular club.

O’Connor, however, finds nothing admirable about their work. They cynically distort the truth, in his estimation, to sell an entertainment product. They pander to our worst sexist, homophobic, racist and xenophobic instincts, he argues, and in their wake leave their country a nastier, uglier place.

For O’Connor, the good news goes only this far: He suggests their sledgehammer approach has helped spark a backlash that O’Connor thinks could put the country on a more progressive course.

That remains to be seen. But O’Connor and Cutler will make their case in person tonight at a reception, 6-8, in the New York Tolerance Center, 226 E. 42nd St. It’s not open to the public, but it does mark a step in what Cutler clearly hopes will be a counteroffensive to the conservative voices that have dominated talk radio for 20 or more years.

Here’s Rory on KGO-AM, talking about Shock Jocks and Rush Limbaugh’s monstrous new contract.

Kansas City scribe Aaron Barnhart can’t stop talking about Shock Jocks, whether he’s writing about Bill O’Reilly as Ted Baxter or MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann:

One of the valuable insights in the new book by Rory O’Connor and Aaron Cutler called Shock Jocks: Hate Speech and Talk Radio is how even the most loathsome right-wing talk show host, if he or she is popular, has a peculiar genius that almost nobody else in our culture has. “Entertaining people with strong opinions about the news (without actually reporting or gathering any) sounds easy,” the authors write, adding that while “anyone can do it, very few people can do it well.”

Listen to Rory talk about Shock Jocks in advance of the National Conference for Media Reform in Minneapolis this weekend.

You can read more about the conference on the Free Press web site:

NCMR brings together thousands of activists, media makers, educators, journalists, scholars, policymakers and engaged citizens to meet, tell their stories, share tactics, listen to great speakers and build the movement for better media in America.