Topic 15 of 54: Hightower radio
Sat, Feb 1, 1997 (18:03) |
Paul Terry Walhus (terry)
Hightower has skirted talk radio for a while. Jim Hightower. Former Texas Ag
Commissioner.
2 responses total.
Topic 15 of 54 [radio]: Hightower radio
Response 1 of 2: Paul Terry Walhus (terry) * Sat, Feb 1, 1997 (18:03) * 27 lines
Some second hand info I got from jonl at minds:
Here's an interview in which Hightower discusses ABC's
decision to drop his show...and other stuff. It's at
MoJoWire (Mother Jones' site).
Excerpt:
see the ABC action as the result of what I call the
three M's: my message, the merger with Disney, and
marketing, or lack thereof. ABC did a
terrific job of getting me an initial stable of
stations--it's very unusual for someone who's never had
radio experience to be able to launch a
national show. But in our second year, some of the
stations began to balk--I believe because of pressure
from advertisers. We lost San Diego and
St. Paul. At that point, ABC began to get a little
antsy about what I was doing. Then came the merger,
which, of course, I took on-on the air. The
next thing I know I'm hearing ABC is in all kinds of
budget meetings. It seems the bean counters were very
focused on what was being
broadcast. I think somebody higher up began to listen
to the show and decided this is not a message for the
new Disney/ABC, and that they
didn't want to put more money into it.
Topic 15 of 54 [radio]: Hightower radio
Response 2 of 2: Paul Terry Walhus (terry) * Sat, Nov 3, 2001 (21:51) * 121 lines
The Hightower Lowdown story:
"Terrorists have no ability to destroy our democracy--but we do,
simply by surrendering it, by keeping our mouths shut while it is
dismantled by the authorities.
'America is being tested,' bellowed the political and media
establishments after September 11. True, but the test is not merely of
whether the military has the brute force to smite our enemies, though
this will certainly continue to be mightily tested in the far-flung,
open-ended offensive drawn up by the Bushites. The real test is going
to be of our democratic resolve. Will we citizens settle for life in a
guarded and gated corporate empire?
'Everything has changed,' we're told. No, it hasn't.
This pitiful wail by politicians and pundits went up as quickly as
the Trade Center towers fell, and now it's the prevailing excuse used
by those who tell us that to defend freedom we must surrender freedoms,
to stop terrorist assaults on our democracy we must militarize our
society.
Republicans are the harshest of the newly assertive autocrats in
Washington, but Democrats too were quick to accept the post-September
11 coventional wisdom that liberties now must be set aside: 'We need to
find a new balance between freedom and security,' asserted House
Democratic leader Dick Gephardt just days after the attack, adding
ominously, 'We are in a new world.'
No, we're not. We're in the exact same world. It has just come a
lot closer to us, that's all, introducing itself to us in a terrible
and personal way that we've basically been uninformed about until now.
Yet we are not some backward, powerless people who must flee to our
caves.
The adjustment we most need to make is not in our freedoms, but in
our understanding of who else is in this big world with us and what it
will take for all of us to get along. At a minimum, getting along will
require that our nation's political and economic policies begin to
reflect our people's democratic values--economic fairness, social
justice, equal opportunity for all.
In practical terms, this means putting America on the side of the
poor and repressed people of the world, rather than continuing to stand
alongside the thugss, dictators, corporatists, and monarchists who
prosper on the misery of an increasingly angry Third World majority.
Far from building on these strengths, however, the Powers That Be
are appealing solely to our nativism and pessimism, demanding that we
withdraw into Fortress America and meekly allow them to deal
secretively, paternalistically, and cataclysmically with an uppity
world.
But it's our world too that they plan to up-end. The same old pols
like Dick Cheney, Trent Lott and Denny Hastert--who built their
political careers on the hackneyed line that the ten scariest words in
the English language are 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help
you'--are now squinting into the TV cameras and, with tight-lipped
greasy smiles, saying, 'We're here to protect you.'
A mess of the 'protection' they have in mind is collected into a
hellish handbasket that they've labeled the 'Provide Appropriate Tools
Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act.' Yes, believe it or
not, they've cynically constructed an acronym that spells: PATRIOT.
Clever, what? T.J., Jimmy Madison, Old Ben, Tom Paine, the original
George W., and all the other founding patriots would gag on this piece
of privacy-invading, liberty-denying nastiness...."
Further down, the author depicts Bush the Younger's, or his
advisors', plan for our future thusly: "They also propose to 'unleash'
the CIA. (When, exactly, was it leashed, and to what?) They want our
super-snoop agency to be officially authorized to assassinate
people--just like terrorists do. They want it to return to what George
Bush the Elder calls the 'dirty business' of espionage, which is to say
hiring 'unsavory people' as CIA agents to do what needs to be done
(Daddy Bush would know about unsavory, for he was V.P. when our CIA
financed Osama bin Laden)."
"On the military front, the United States has no choice but to go
after the bastards. Terrorism ain't beanbags. The ruthless mass
murderers smacked our nation and all of civilization right in the face,
and turning the other cheek only means we'll get smacked again....
"With blood and billions of our dollars involved, we have a right
to demand a new honesty from Washington. For starters, they should
start telling us the truth about the elites of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and
the United Arab Emirates, who are the primary source of brains, money,
and recruits for this Wahhabit jihad.
"Leaders of these nations, however, are the oil buddies, business
partners, and longtime Middle Eastern enforcers of America's corporate
empire, so Bush, Cheney & Co. won't cop to the fact that the murderous
theocratic now tormenting us is based in the very nest where their
coporate chums have found such comfort and profit. Will Bush go there
to 'smoke 'em out of their holes?'
"How about a little honesty, too, on money laundering? Bush has
pointed furiously at foreign banks, but how about the
multi-billion-dollar networks of secret accounts in the 'private
banking' departments of such U.S. giants as Citigroup (a major Bush
campaign contributor)?
"It's on the home front, however, where we citizens must be most
forceful in holding Washington accountable. The looters are loose. Not
common looters rampaging through the streets, but coporate looters
rampaging through the Congress...."
I hope a few people manage to find a copy of the newsletter and
read the whole thing.
Hightower's vision for America finding her way through this
includes:
--Stop the airlines and other hard-hit industries firings. Why
should the airlines get $15 billion from taxpayers while axing 100,000
employees?...To stimulate the economy, put these bailout funds into the
hands of working families all across America.
--Strengthen our national security by making major long-overdue
public investments in our schoohouses, hospitals, road, bridges and
parks--and reconnect our population corridors with high-speed passenger
trains.
--Expand our renewable energy sources to wean us off the oil which
weds the Bush-Cheney crowd to the Saudi royal family and their ilk.
--Instead of cutting income taxes, cut payroll taxes, raise the
minimum wage, extend health care, unemployment benefits, and day care.
All of this spreads money, like fertilizer, to the grassroots economy
rather than piling it up inside global banks.
--Finally, demand openness and full public discussion on everything
from war and peace to restrictions on our liberties.
He closes with this thought: "The better part of patriotism is for
us to raise hard questions, put out inconvenient information, assert
our values, and appeal to what Lincoln called 'the better angels of our
nature.'"
radio conference 
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