LIBERADIO(!)

Though Mary and I co-host a show (and are seldom seen in the same place at the same time), we are not, in fact the same person. On a weekly round-up of what Nashville was talking about this week, Brittney Gilbert from WKRN and Nashville Is Talking misattributed a quote to me. Here’s what I was alleged to have said:

In Nashville alone right-wing conservative talk show have 34 hours a day in which to spout their hate…that’s 170 housr per week.

See for yourself.

I did a double take when I first saw this. “I didn’t mention anything about spouting hate, did I?” I said to myself.

This journalistic mishap bugs me in part because Brittney was familiar with my testimony, which she had quoted on NIT. But it also bugs me because the FCC public hearing was such an important event. I generally try to avoid name-calling (unless it’s funny), and my testimony to the FCC was not an attack on conservative talk radio or any particular hosts; it was an illustrative case study in a local media market partly controlled by a media conglomerate and serving to contrast available political perspectives in talk radio.

Perhaps she was thinking of something Mary said? Again: same show; different people and, often, different perspectives. Otherwise, Mary would never be able to call me an ignorant slut.

UPDATE: Brittney apologized (as well as in the comments on this post), and I subsequently stepped in it in the comments on her blog. Let’s call it even!