Hannity Is Boring
Ok, the title of my post is just to grab attention. I think Sean Hannity is a great American, and wish him no ill will. But let's face it: listening to talk radio every day on the commute is in fact boring. It's not as boring as station surfing after 5pm, but it's boring. The fact is, there's only so much talk radio one can listen to. That's why I'm so thankful I discovered Ricochet and the Ricochet podcast. Today I had the privilege of listening to the fellas do "Mark Steyn Returns" on the way home. What a great podcast. Earlier this week I listened to Pat Sajak tell the story of Bill Buckley and the Heliocopter.
If you aren't listening to the podcast, then you are, as we used to say in the Army, "wrong and disobedient!"
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May '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
I have all the podcasts saved in my iTunes and listen to them almost every day. I, too, heard again the story of Pat Sajak and Bill Buckley and the heliocopter today. It still makes me giggle. Shopping for shoes in a tiny Alaska town.
Nov '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Sajak is such an elitist.... ;-)
Aug '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Yes, you're so right. He repeats himself endlessly without ever delving more deeply into things. I've lost count of the number of golden opportunities to break new ground I've heard him pass up during interviews with opponents. He's just not that smart.
How about we all agree to stop using - for a while - the term Great American? As in, "Our Great American panel".
It's so worn out that it's become a sad caricature of something that was once real.
Nov '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Totally agree, Ken. I just don't really "get" talk radio, I guess. But the podcast is sensational! I particularly loved the Mark Steyn Returns epi that you referenced. I actually laughed out loud a few times, which is so refreshing.
Aug '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Steyn cemented his place in the history of wit for all time when he commented, regarding a speech of Obama's, and his frequent pronunciation of "corpse-men" (instead of core-men):
"The four corpse-men of the Obama lips".
Nov '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
River: Steyn cemented his place in the history of wit for all time when he commented, regarding a speech of Obama's, and his frequent pronunciation of "corpse-men" (instead of core-men):
"The four corpse-men of the Obama lips". · Nov 23 at 6:46am
River, I think a better Steyn quote is when he referred to the stimulus as the American Recession and Redistribution Act.
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Well, I love talk radio--if I had the time, I could listen to Rush for all three hours, all five days a week, and I'm a big consumer of Sean Hannity's TV show--but who am I to differ with a man who has such superior taste in podcasts?
Thanks, Ken. And welcome to Ricochet.
Oh--and just wait until the podcast we recorded just this morning goes up. From James Lileks in a muscle shirt to Rob Long's going through a pat-down at the Miami airport to Amb. John Bolton discussing, well, the prospect of war. Let's just say it was a full hour.
Oct '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
I want to ditto the podcast praises. I notice that when Peter isn't there the podcast has a when the cat's away the mice will play-feel to it. Keep up the good work.
I also forgot to mention that enjoy listening to the podcasts as I walk to/from campus on my ipod shuffle. However I think I look a little weird when smiling because of something Steyn, Breitbart, Long, etc. said.
Edited on Nov 23, 2010 at 11:21amNov '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
bereket kelile: I want to ditto the podcast praises. I notice that when Peter isn't there the podcast has a when the cat's away the mice will play-feel to it. Keep up the good work.
Edited on Nov 23 at 11:21 am
Oh, yes! One of the best things about the podcasts: Listening to the various gentlemanly ways that Peter attempts to rein in the other rascals. Too adorable.
On fave Steynisms, mine comes from America Alone: While we sneer at the French as cheese-eating surrender monkeys, Steyn sneers at what passes for cheese here in America and calls us "cheese-surrendering eating monkeys." Classic.
Nov '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Time is exactly my problem. I would prefer Rush to Sean, for whatever reason, but he's on during the working day, so no luck. I could turn him on in the office, but I live on the blue side of a blue county on the blue side of a blue state. I'd worry about getting shot except these aren't mid-western democrats we are talking about here. Actually I'd probably want to shoot myself 30 seconds into the sensitivity training.
Thanks for the welcome, I can't wait to hear the latest podcast.
May '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Jun '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Ken Owsley
Time is exactly my problem. I would prefer Rush to Sean, for whatever reason, but he's on during the working day, so no luck. I could turn him on in the office, but I live on the blue side of a blue county on the blue side of a blue state. I'd worry about getting shot except these aren't mid-western democrats we are talking about here. Actually I'd probably want to shoot myself 30 seconds into the sensitivity training.
You can listen to a Rush "three hour" show on a downloaded podcast from the subscription site in 1hr:50min without the commercials, even less if you fast forward through the football and golf blather. Very time-sparing; I can catch up on most of the week's programs on Saturday mornings working on the honey-do list.
Edited on Nov 23, 2010 at 12:31pmOct '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
I grew up on Rush. His insights and weaving of disconnected stories into insights on how the left maneuvers surpass the "grand conspiracy" Beck. Rush is anchored in the real world.
Converted to a huge Mark Levin fan about two years ago. His capability to educate on complex legal issues and take-no-prisoners attitude demonstrate that Levin is more than a radio guy. Perhaps he should just quit taking phone calls because neither he nor the callers perform very well. I don't mind Mark's abusive treatment of idiot callers--just that it's bad radio.
Aug '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
The hardest thing is listening to your wife scream as you attempt to do a Stitcher search while driving. Drives her crazy ! I think she must have had a bad texting while driving experience. In Missouri, texting while driving is a prerequisite to Interstate driving, unless you're going under 75 and don't know what LOL means.
Without Ricochet podcasts, the shuffle is my oasis. My wife is on Hannity, Savage, all of these guys barking stuff and then at the moon with their sycophantic cavedwellers somewhere. The occasional crank call from the same guy, who after exchanging pleasantries, goes on a gently psychopathic trope which ends badly ? That has to be the guy's cousin in a set-up.
I am as conservative as the next guy, heck more so I hope. But we need more podcasts that mix the erudite humor and speaker depth that we get but once a week.
And boy do I miss Frank Zappa. Great picture of the man. Susie....? Susie Creamcheese...?
May '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
This is one reason I dislike talk radio. I once heard Levin have this exchange with a female caller:
HOST: Answer me this, are you a married woman? Yes or no?
CALLER: Yes.
HOST: Well I don’t know why your husband doesn’t put a gun to his temple. Get the hell out of here.
She was a liberal. And that's just the thing. The Mark Levin mindset is that if someone is an ideological opponent, it justifies treating them in the most rude, dehumanizing ways. It's indefensible, and grounded in an elevation of the importance of politics that conservatives should know better than doing. Lately he's been treating the Powerline bloggers as rudely.
May '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
When Mark Steyn sits in for Rush, it's a must listen. He is absolutely hilarious!
Sean Hannity makes me cringe for a lot of the same reasons listed above. Instead of destroying liberal arguments he just starts rattling off Reagan's accomplishments.. I Just change the station.
Sep '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Differences do exist among the various radio talk-shows--one reason I like G. Gordon Liddy's show is that he does some humor (often more lowbrow than erudite, however). He also reads and comments on other conservative folks' columns he finds relevant or interesting, and he has a ton of (mostly good) guests. This glut of guests sometimes makes the show's quality uneven, but you can just (on the podcast) FF through the ones you don't find compelling.
Edited on Nov 23, 2010 at 4:51pmOct '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Sean Hannity seems like a really nice and well meaning fellow, but I find his show unlistenable. He's not much more than a conservative Republican cheerleader who endlessly repeated the talking points without adding much value.
I get much more out of listening to Rush. Rush's secret sauce is that he's a master of the radio medium and he's an insightful political analyst. He's an original thinker when it comes to looking at the issues of the day and applying his analysis to them. I think one of the reasons he does so well is because he understands the leftists better than they understand themselves.
I absolutely adore the Ricochet podcasts. I can't get enough of them. Peter and Rob are such fantastic hosts and the guests are amazing. I have my James Lileks Giant Foam Finger(tm) on order and I expect it to arrive any day now.
The only quibble I have with the podcast is that it when they got a lot of people on the show, they tend to step over each other trying to make their great points all at once.
May '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Where else but on Hugh Hewitt can you regularly hear James Lileks, Mark Steyn (well, when he comes back from whatever it is he's doing), Victor Davis Hanson.
Rush is a flaming monomaniac on the subject of Rush.
Hannity is, in fact, boring. Levin is basically a screamer.
Prager and Medved are both pretty good (although unbelievably obtuse on the scanner/patdown issue)
Beck can be entertaining when he lays off the paranoid rants.
Aug '10
Re: Hannity Is Boring
Nick, I agree; HH has an excellent mix of political news and commentary, cultural highlights (e.g. author interviews) and Christian stuff (I appreciate his straightforward willingness to claim his faith, even when interviewing someone like Chris Hitchens or Richard Dawkins).
And the best thing these days is that it's perfectly feasible to listen to a day's entire three-hour show in just over an hour: download as a podcasts, and listen at double speed on the iPhone. The commercials are all edited out, and I find I almost never miss a word, even at the increased speed.