Here is another opinion to be reckoned with. :
OK, I was holding back the response from a local conservative talk show host that interviewed the fellow that wrote the above op-ed (opinion-editorial) piece. This is what the local pinhead had to say:
Lighten up, conservatives, and laugh
DAN FAGAN
COMMENT
(05/10/08 23:50:24)
This past Wednesday I learned something new about my people, conservatives.
My lesson began after I fired up my laptop Wednesday morning and found my inbox full of angry e-mails. It's seen its share of those, but this time the anger was not directed at me but Anchorage Daily News editorial page editor Matt Zencey.
Zencey came out swinging and swinging hard with a column on talk radio.
He argued talk radio is better suited for conservatives than liberals because "liberals have minds of their own. Unlike Rush Limbaugh's dittoheads, they don't respond like Pavlov's dogs when the master rings their emotional bells."
Zencey went on to write, "Liberals operate higher up the brain stem than most talk radio listeners." Ouch!
Zencey painted a picture of talk radio listeners as sitting around in T-shirts and boxer shorts all afternoon, beer in hand, yelling from the Barcalounger, "You tell 'em, Rush!"
He said they goof off at dead-end jobs listening to rants on the radio while munching fatty snacks jimmied out of the company vending machine.
Just in case there was any doubt about where Zencey stood on talk radio, he finished off his rant with a deadly blow.
He accused listeners of not seeking enlightenment but instead entertainment. He characterized us as sheep led into mass action to frighten politicians who might otherwise do the right thing.
Sounds like unions more than talk radio.
Being an avid listener, I disagreed with Zencey's take on talk radio.
But to his credit, the same day his column came out, he appeared in front of my beer-swilling, Dorito-stealing, T-shirt- and boxer-wearing, lower-brain-stem, Pavlov's-dog listening audience to take the heat.
Most callers were upset, but Zencey handled them with calm and good nature. At one point he even admitted he painted talk radio listeners with too broad a brush. Zencey's appearance shattered the stereotype some conservatives hold of liberals, which is they are all angry, bitter and jaded.
He explained his editorial was a caricature, cartoonlike assessment of talk radio and its listeners.
Don't get me wrong. I know Zencey won't be signing up for the Limbaugh newsletter anytime soon, but his column was more about making fun than attacking. There is a difference.
I wrote a similar column about liberals ("Dan Fagan Just Wants To Be Liked") in which I took liberal stereotypes and made fun of them. I accused liberals of loving mother earth so much, they recycle everything, even their bath water.
Liberals were not too happy with me over that one.
I remember thinking back then how liberals take themselves so seriously. Why are these liberals so angry? I wondered. Can't they take a joke?
Until Wednesday I held onto the notion that conservatives were more easygoing than liberals. We are fun-loving folks able to laugh at ourselves. And that may still be true, but it's not true for all conservatives.
Reading e-mails late Wednesday night after Zencey's appearance on my show, I began to wonder about my people.
All of a sudden, the same angry e-mailers targeting Zencey in the morning turned their wrath toward me.
How could you let Zencey get off without crucifying him on the radio? many wrote.
My fellow conservatives were accusing me of being a sellout, not faithful to the cause, a man without convictions. I didn't want to lose my (allegedly) high-paying job at the Daily News, one e-mailer wrote. (If he only knew.)
I've received hundreds of such e-mails from liberals accusing me of being a shill of Big Oil. All of a sudden now I am a shill of the Daily News.
I think it's great when people are passionate about their ideas. I am as passionate as anyone. But we should never lose the ability to laugh at ourselves.
No one likes nor listens to those who think too much of themselves. And isn't that what's important, trying to convince people that our conservative ideas are better than their liberal ideas? For the sake of our movement, let's just lighten up a little. We'll leave the stuffy, haughty anger to the liberals.
www.adn.com/opinion/story/402536.html