Something eerie is going on with the right-wing talk-radio shock jocks. All of a sudden they've stopped pounding the war drums and gone back to custody battles being unfair to fathers and why we ought to send the Mexicans back to where they came from. It's as if word came from upstairs, at both channels, KLBJ and the CBS affiliate. A minute ago the story they were all hammering home was that the Israelis were doing the work of God, pounding hell out of Hizbullah, which is just the same as Hamas and al-Qaida, an enemy of our way of life, and don't you pay no attention to anyone who says any different. Right-wing is the only kind of talk-radio you get here in Texas, even in Austin, which fancies itself an enlightened oasis. Maybe it is, but someone listens to these jackasses around the clock.

LRB 17 August 2006 | PDF Download