People like Stern and Imus and Coulter and sometimes even Bill Mahar are nothing but trolls. So I don't pay any attention to them. They are merely provocatuers. If people didn't pay them any attention, maybe they'd go away.

If people didn't pay them any attention, maybe they'd go away.

Probably not. But if people didn't pay them, they would go away.

Exactly right.

I have no definite opinion on Imus, since I never heard of him till this morning and have only skimmed a couple of news stories. But if his employers suspended him for being offensive, they were certainly within their rights.

Saying that Howard Stern has Freedom of Speech isn't saying anything positive about him, unless you limit Freedom of Speech to humans.

I suppose how seriously I am likely to take this is implicit in the apology scenario -- Imus says this offensive thing, then lets somebody talk him into volunteering to make an apology on Al Sharpton's show, and Sharpton puts him on the air. Well heavens, why would Sharpton deprive himself of a ratings boost from the very person he wants fired?

Better they should never have hired him in the first place. Having done so, they're responsible for the arbitrary manner in which they booted him.

This whole thing isn't really arbitrary -- it's fairly common broadcast business practice to pull people who cross over the lines of appropriate racial, ethnic, or gender comments (Rush Limbaugh found that out).

And NBC haven't booted him. Yet. Soon, though, one (well, me, anyway) hopes.

Here's a more extensive account, btw, of what was said, from the Washington Times,

On April 4, during the "Imus in the Morning" show on radio, which is simulcast on cable-TV's MSNBC, Mr.

Imus referred to the Rutgers team -- with a black coach, eight black players and two white players -- as "nappy-headed hos." His producer, Bernard McGuirk, also referred to the championship game between Rutgers and the University of Tennessee as "a Spike Lee thing," adding, "the Jigaboos versus the Wannabes" from the movie "School Daze."

Lukewarm apologies were issued from the host and disclaimers from the network that carries the show, WFAN-AM in New York and MSNBC. Last night, MSNBC announced that it would suspend Mr. Imus' program for two weeks.

He had a regular gig, and they booted him from the air. That he hasn't yet been fired is a different point.

These "lines" are always arbitrary. That his previous antics didn't cause his employers to take action, but this did, makes them seem (from the perspective of those who enjoy such broadcasting) picayune, pedantic, and arbitrary, and (from the perspective of those of us who don't) late-acting and clueless.

That his previous antics didn't cause his employers to take action, but this did, makes them seem...picayune, pedantic, and arbitrary, and...late-acting and clueless.

I see what you mean. My point is actually that it wasn't an arbitrary decision made on a whim...but the decision of an organization that is a business about someone they don't have to continue a business relationship with.

Now, with that said, I think you are overly generous to NBC. I don't believe that any of your adjectives properly characterize them: they are crying hold! enough! this time because they've been busted. They knew exactly what Imus was for them -- a shock jock who brought them attention and ratings and money.

Now that the attention's gotten too hot, they've decided that He. Must. Be. Punished. It's not pedantic or arbitrary or clueless or moralistic...it's the butt-covering of the greedy.

Now you make them sound like Claude Rains in Casablanca. ("Shocked, shocked!") Worse and worse. Butt-covering and still also picayune, pedantic, arbitrary, late-acting, and clueless, all at the same time.

Now you make them sound like Claude Rains in Casablanca.

Not at all. Claude Rains had class and style. :-)

By the way, someone should come up with a better way to spell "hos". It looks to me as if it should be pronounced the same as "hoss" (as in Hoss Cartwright). The pronunciation they want would be spelled "hoes" (as in multiple gardening implements).

Yeah, I know what you mean. I've seen it spelled both ways, and "hoes" would be better. (Actually, we could spell it ho's...but people would assume the apostrophe was for the possessive, rather than indicative of removed letters.)

I can't stand Howard Stern. The broadcaster, not the lawyer.

There is no confusion as the lawyer is Howard K Stern. And he's not the father of Anna's baby, Berkhead is.