“Chicken Little vs. the Sky”

Tough economic times bring change.  That’s inevitable.  Some change is welcomed.  They are called “corrections.”  This is a rather cute euphemistic term for something that usually happens to industry behemoths, which are too big to fail. 

You can assume I am talking about the financial markets or the current affair in the state of the banking industry, but I am not. 

In the past month, major newspapers across America have folded or will fold by the time March Madness is over.  Two weeks ago, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer permanently stopped the presses after 146 years.  This week The Ann Arbor News says it will cease operation in July.  Other papers that could fold include the San Francisco Chronicle, the Miami Herald, and even one in our own back yard.  If someone doesn’t come to the rescue of the Tucson Citizen, that paper may stop printing after 140 years. 

But is this the end of print journalism, as we know it?  Hardly.  Does it represent a seismic shift in the way people will get their news?  That depends on the dinosaur-like newspaper industry.

Change is good, but it can be gut-wrenching and painful.

I work in a medium that has supposedly been on death’s door since FDR came up with the idea of those “fireside chats” back during WWII. 

With the advent of television, radio was supposed to have a life span of a brown banana on a grocer’s shelf.  Sure, radio’s Golden Age was over; no more would big bands, soap operas and radio plays be broadcast over land and sea to millions of people on NBC, CBS or the Mutual Broadcasting System on any given night.  Families no longer gathered around the old Philco at the end of a long day.  They would gather around a large box with a small grey screen for entertainment and news. 

But radio didn’t die – it had to change, morph and adapt in order to retain prominence in the “media.” 

And it has.  Sure, radio is not the same as when you listened as a child, but neither is television.  Cable was supposed to put local TV (and some even thought national) newscasts out of business.  That hasn’t happened. 

The same goes for print journalism.  Just because papers aren’t being printed doesn’t mean that they cannot exist on some alternative platform.  Look at our own East Valley Tribune; they stopped printing about six months ago, but you can still find them online.  Does it suck that they had to stop printing actual copies, reducing their staff and selling subscriptions?  Absolutely.  Are they dead?  Absolutely not.  I read it online every day, as I do many different newspapers from all over the country as well as the world. 

So why are there so many Chicken Little’s predicting that newspapers folding all over the country means the death of print journalism?  Because they are shortsighted and don’t know the first rule of survival: adaptation.  

Newspapers have to reinvent their business model if they want to survive.  More papers will go under, but print journalism isn’t dead – far from it.  With the brave new digital world of blogging, twittering, online sites from the mainstream to the banal (as well as the burgeoning field of “citizen journalists”) the written word is more vibrant and important than ever.

What’s dead is an out-dated and out-moded concept of buying a sheaf of paper with printed news, weather, sports and comics from a box (or dropped on your front door) that you used to line the birdcage or wrap fish when the next edition came.

Remember that radio has been supposedly dead for over 60 years.   I’ll talk to you today, tomorrow, etc. – on the radio.

Mac

“Obama the Optimist vs. Obama the Pessimist”

President Barack Obama was on 60 Minutes Sunday night.  I’ve seen Obama on TV a lot lately.  I saw him on ESPN giving his NCAA picks.  Sorry ASU fans.  I told you my Syracuse Orangemen would win that one!  I also saw Obama on The Tonight Show.  He won’t come on Mac and Gaydos because we don’t allow guests to use Teleprompters…
OHHH BURN!!!! 

CBS’s Steve Kroft conducted the interview with Obama.  Topics ranged from solving the banking crisis to how the President needs the financial community to help solve this crisis.  But here is the part you will all be talking about at the water cooler at work:
 
Kroft said, “You’re sitting here.  And you’re— you are laughing.  You are laughing about some of these problems. Are people going to look at this and say, ‘I mean, he’s sitting there just making jokes about money—’ How do you deal with— I mean: explain. . .are you punch-drunk?” Kroft said.

Obama responded with a huge smile and a laugh saying “No, no.  There’s gotta be a little gallows humor to get you through the day.”
 
First of all, Obama can never win with his tone on the economy.  When he tells us the truth about how bad this crisis is, everyone jumps down his throat saying he needs to be more optimistic.  Those people want him to give them hope that we will get out of this mess someday.  Then when Obama tries to give us an optimistic look at the future and flashes a smile at the camera, people say he is ‘punch-drunk.’  So what should he do then??  I feel he should do what he is currently doing now.  Do both!  Obama needs to tell us the truth about how bad the economy really is and then give us hope for the future.  They have to go hand in hand. 

Obama hopes that at times, humor can calm the economic anxiety.  He is laughing because he is trying to sell his plan to the American public.  He is on TV 24-7 because he is trying to get us behind his plan to save the economy.  The laughing and smiling is to reassure us.  I don’t think he is “punch-drunk.”  I do think that he is trying way too hard though….
 
That’s How I Roll…
 
Gaydos

“The Tonight Show… with Celebrity Guest: Barack Obama”

Everywhere I go people ask me, “Sean, what’d you think of Obama on the Tonight Show?” Ok, that’s not even remotely true. However, I did watch it last night and I have mixed feelings about it.

Let’s start here – I’m a fan of the Tonight Show. I tend to check the schedule regularly to see which Celebrities are coming on the program, and my favorite segment to watch is “Headlines.” Though, last night was rather unusual. I’m used to seeing Jay intro the Celebs, I’m used to hearing the audience go nuts over their favorite Actor, Musician, or TV star… and in rare cases their favorite politician, but last night’s ovation for the sitting President of the United States was something to behold. I would rate a politician’s typical applause a 5 on a scale of 1 to 10, and a big-name Actor’s applause a 10 on a scale of 1 to 10; Obama’s applause was, without a doubt, a 10. He appeared from the back like a Celebrity, embraced Jay like a Celebrity, and for a brief moment, I thought he WAS a Celebrity. He’s not however, nor should he be… and his perceived “Celebrity” is what got him into trouble last night.

Now normally I would take the stance of, “this is dumb. Why am I watching a sitting President appear like an Actor on the Tonight Show?” However, I think it was a brilliant move (except for one aberration that made national news). That was exactly the audience President Obama wants to hear his message. That’s the audience that has heard Obama’s talk of “Anger,” “Catastrophe,” and “Crisis.” That’s the audience that you need to address, in a light-hearted manner, and tell them not to worry… which is exactly what he did. So for that, I compliment him… brilliant move.

Here’s the problem. I think the President got too comfortable playing “Celebrity” that it caused him to slip, and compare his bowling ability to that of Special Olympics Athletes. It wasn’t meant to hurt anyone, and it was a generic comparison, AND it was a comparison that an actual Celebrity would have gotten away with – but not the sitting President. Sorry, that’s just the way it works. Celebrities don’t command a Military, Celebrities are not responsible for ensuring our safety at home and abroad, and Celebrities are not Executives in matters of National Legislation. Sorry, that’s the way of the world… and Ronald Reagan doesn’t count because he was a Celebrity THEN a Politician – not a Celebrity because he’s a politician; big difference.

So it’s not wrong that the President appeared on the Tonight Show, and it’s not wrong that the President discussed Economic policy with Jay Leno… it is wrong to treat the President like a Celebrity, and it is wrong for the President to feel like a Celebrity.
It’s like Coach K of Duke said about President Obama filling out his March Madness brackets, “the economy is something he should focus on…more than the brackets.”

- Producer SEAN

“Bad Mood Explained”

If you listened to the show yesterday, I mentioned to Gaydos that I was in a really bad mood.  Surprisingly, it had nothing to do with him… burn!

Yesterday, Natasha Richardson died after suffering a brain injury from a skiing accident.  Around the same time yesterday, I found out a person I worked with in radio back in Baltimore died as well.  He wasn’t a celebrity, wasn’t married to anyone famous, however he, like Natasha Richardson, died unexpectedly. 

I am not good with eulogies, but TJ was a great guy to work with in an industry filled with narcissists, psychopaths and egomaniacs.  He had a great sense of humor, a work ethic that bordered on perfection and an infectious laugh you could hear outside of the studio, echoing down the hall.

I found out from a radio website that TJ had died.  It had a short blurb about him passing after surgery.   I emailed someone back in Baltimore with the only thing I could think to put in the subject line,  “WTH???” The body was two sentences:  Is it true about TJ?  What happened?

Natasha Richardson died after she fell on the bunny slope skiing.  She wasn’t going particularly fast.  She wasn’t on a steep slope or difficult course.  In fact, it was reported that when she fell, she was helped up and was talking and walking around right after the accident…

A couple of hours later, she was taken to a hospital and reportedly was brain dead.  Just like that.  

When my friend replied to my email, it was eerie how strange and random TJ’s passing was.  TJ had been diagnosed with a rare form of bone cancer.  But that’s not what killed him.  He was in the hospital to have two tips of his fingers removed.  After the surgery, he was awake, alert and joking around with the doctors who performed the surgery and moving his hand… 

Minutes later, he went into cardiac arrest and was pronounced dead.  They think it was a blood clot that hit his heart.  They will do an autopsy, which is inconsequential to me.  Like Natasha Richardson, TJ leaves behind a family, friends and people who will never understand how their loved one was alive one moment and taken the next.

I have worked with some strange, wonderful and despicable people in radio.  I’ve worked with people who’ve died of drug overdoses and one person who tried to commit suicide.

You don’t meet many “normal” people in this business.  I am glad I got to work with a guy named TJ.

- Mac

“Wristband Discrimination”

A Valley school principal told a gay 14-year-old student to turn his rainbow wristband inside-out or stop wearing it to school.  The boy’s cloth wristband read “rainbows are gay.”  The child’s mother said her son was harassed for being gay earlier this school year and that the same principal told her, “if he didn’t put it out there the way he does, he wouldn’t have much of a problem.”  First of all, it’s pathetic for a principal to say something like this; that’s not the answer to the situation!  I don’t think the principal really cares about the wristband.  I think he just wants the kid to stop acting gay.  Maybe he also wants black kids to stop acting black, or white kids to stop acting white, or Hispanic kids to stop acting Hispanic!

The American Civil Liberties Union demanded that the school district rescind its ban of the wristband saying the principal’s demand violates the boy’s constitutional rights.  I’ve always said that students don’t have any rights at school.  When they enter the building, they need to listen, behave and learn.  As for the wristband, I believe it IS distracting.  If something is distracting other kids in class, the school and the teachers have the right to eliminate that distraction.  Schools can enforce the dress code.  You cannot wear something that is distracting in class.  It’s impossible for a teacher to teach if a kid is wearing a gang sign or a Nazi t-shirt.

So the wristband is distracting…but I also think the school feels this kid’s gayness is more distracting than the wristband.  This has become a major problem with schools these days.  When kids come out of the closet at a young age, the teachers, the school administrators and the other children don’t know how to handle a gay child.  A gay kid is going to act differently than a straight kid.  We need to teach kids how to co-exist with other kids who are gay.  Teachers and administrators have to learn to deal with children when they come out of the closet at a young age.

There was a story last year about a teenager who told friends he was gay.  He wore makeup, jewelry and high-heeled boots with his school uniform.  Many said the teen had the freedom to do this under his First Amendment rights.  The teen was bullied by one specific individual.  Life was rough, but this boy decided to turn the tables on the bully.  How did he do this?  He began flirting with the bully!  He even asked the bully to be his Valentine’s Day date!  The boy flaunted his gayness and the school did nothing about it.  So how did the bully react to being teased by the gay teen?  The bully came to class one day, sat behind the gay student, pulled out a gun and shot the kid in the back of the head, killing him instantly.

I think it’s time we realize that kids come out of the closet at a much younger age now.  I also think it’s about time we figured out how to handle this situation far better than we have…

That’s How I Roll…

Gaydos