They constitute a healthy amount of ego; they gravitate and cater to that growing legion of folks who make up the lowest common denominator; they have enormous, inflated opinions of themselves and seem to think that what they spout out, (usually useless bits of tedious minutiae,) will make the world go round.
Not.
They are cable-TV performers. I use the word "performers" because they perform; nothing more or less. Real "journalists" usually end up on C-SPAN and take calls from the "Democratic line"
Performers get paid millions of dollars and might get to mingle with Roger Ailes.
OK, this isn't a scientific study, so let's begin with the almighty one to five:
BILL O'REILLY: Too easy, I know, almost like tearing wings off of flies, but Fox News' Billo gets more annoying by the day. And he gets away with it too. For a guy who graduated from Harvard, you'd think there'd be a bit more bite to this dog, but no sir. O'Reilly's hour-long self-congratulatory mish-mash is an amalgam of boorish interviews with innocuous leftist has-beens; pious, pissed-off patoons, (Bernie Goldberg); and weekly riffs with ex-leftie "comics" whose careers tanked, so they conveniently veered right, (Dennis Miller.)
Somehow, some way, O'Reilly is the most-watched tonsil on cable; another indication of the coming end of mankind as we know it, and I'm going to give you the last word on that one.
**GRETA VAN SUSTEREN: Another of the easy targets and, I mean, why pile on, but then again, between her claim to fame, (courtesy Orenthal James Simpson,) as a TV lawyer; her pointed and infamous participatory involvement into various murder cases, (Holloway in Aruba, for example) and her brown, toilet-paper kissfests with Sarah Palin, Van Susteren is way, way qualified to be uber-annoying, which she is about 99% of the time, but like Billo, her numbers are good, and in spite of occasional rumors she's looking to leave Murdoch's castle, she continues to droll on at Fox for the time being.
Oy vey.
ALI VELSHI: Who at CNN decided to make this miserable, pompous, bald-headed Canadien a leading voice? I mean, we already have Howie Mandel--isn't that punishment enough?...Velshi started out as a business reporter for the network, but some genius in Atlanta had the bizarre notion that Velshi would be great to be an occasional anchor. Why? Maybe its just because Velshi looks the part. He doesn't necessarilly say anything pertinent and his on-screen reporting amounts to nothing more than a shamwowish-type TV pitchman. Whatever.
CHRIS MATTHEWS: Why is this man shouting? Seriously, if you could answer that question, you may just be invited to be a contestant on "Who wants to be a millionaire?...Matthews is a sort of Geraldo-lite; at one time, he used to be in the journalism club as an ex-political reporter for the SF Examiner and an congressional aide for the late Tip O'Neil, but then started appearing on the talking -head shows, and soon realized that shouting and screaming can be quite profitable, particularly if you had perfect white hair and teeth, and mingled with the elite white guys at the Bohemian club. Check please!
RICK SANCHEZ: OMG, someone please tell me this guy has pictures...He must! Sanchez' latest blunders at CNN are far too numerous and compelling to pontificate upon; suffice to say, he's beyond mere annoying--in fact, you get the distinct feeling that its all a joke and that he and the suits in Atlanta are IN on the joke. Why else, then, would they put up with a guy who makes idiotic statements about volcanoes and earthquakes?, (and that's just for starters)
Every time I see Rick Sanchez I feel better about my life, and that's saying a lot. Sanchez makes Ron Burgandy look like Walter Cronkite.
