Small Wonder They Call Me The Last Angry Man
Last week, I gave money to NPR during the annual spring membership drive; today, I had cause to regret it. I declared that I would not give money to NPR as long as Day to Day was on the air, the rationale being that the show is co-produced by the online magazine Slate, which is somewhat to the left of The New York Times editorial page, thus making a mockery of NPR's supposed objectivity. But, I reasoned it was hypocritical of me to ask people to donate money to The Newsletter if I was unwilling to pony up support for NPR.

But this afternoon, a reporter on All Things Considered referred to Eric Rudolph as an "accused bomber"... hours after he fucking plead guilty! He entered into a plea bargain, you cunt! That means he is no longer an "alleged bomber" or an "accused bomber," he is a fucking bomber! He is guilty! HE SAID SO HIMSELF! I understand the desire to be fair, and that a man is indeed innocent until he is proven guilty, but calling Eric Rudolph an "accused bomber" after he has allocuted in court is fucking factually inaccurate. To clal the man an "accused bomber" is crummy journalism and I am embarrassed my dollars are going to support it.

Later on, still during All Things Considered, they began a story on the Catholic Church by referring to the censure of Galileo. This is not a problem specific to NPR, but rather a symptom of the anti-Catholicism that still pervades American culture. If NPR interviewed Billy Graham, the most famous Protestant minister in the country, would they ask him about the Salem Witch Trials? Would they ask him about Gustavus Adolphus's rape of Germany during the Thirty Years War? The Sacred Inquisition tried and punished Galileo FOUR HUNDRED YEARS AGO. Why is it that the Church is still hounded for that mistake? The Salem Witch Trials were only three hundred years ago, yet the Protestant churches in America seem not to be carrying that milestone. Glad to know that the multicultural, politically correct denizens of NPR still find room in their hearts for good old fashioned anti-Catholicism.