Is There A Correlation Between Trumpf Fans And Ted Nugent Fans? I'll Guess Yes, A Strong One

Last night I was invited to be a guest on WBZ's NightSide with Dan Rea, to talk about why so many people are urging President Obama to replace Debbie Wasserman Schultz as chair of the DNC. I've been doing these Wasserman Schultz interviews on TV and radio for the past two weeks and they're kind of routine for me now. Tuesday wasn't. I was unaware that I was going on a right-wing radio show. Now, as it turns out, Rea is a knowledgeable guy and a gentleman, and a genial host. I had just been reading Glenn Greenwald's report at The Intercept that asserts, quite correctly, that "Wasserman Schultz is the living, breathing embodiment of everything rotted and corrupt about the Democratic Party: a corporatist who overwhelmingly relies on corporate money to keep her job, a hawk who supports the most bellicose aspects of U.S. foreign policy, a key member of the 'centrist' and 'moderate' pro-growth New Democrat coalition, a co-sponsor of the failed Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), which was 'heavily backed by D.C. favorites including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the music and motion picture industries' and which, if enacted, would have allowed extreme government and corporate control over the internet." So I was all fired up and ready to go-- even if I was hooked up to an IV tube pumping antibiotics into me for the entire hour-long interview.

I'm no stranger to Boston radio. Back in the day I had been a guest at WBCN many times and once or twice on WFNX, as well as a couple of the local college stations. I love the Boston accent and I always feel at home with Bostonians. What I was less prepared for, though, were the crackpot callers. I had forgotten about callers. I though Dan would ask me questions and we would have a discussion about how bad Wasserman Schultz is. And we did-- until he opened the phone lines. And then came the deluge; you can see why Herr Trumpf has a following. These self-referential, deluded sad-sacks were all certain Hillary Clinton would soon be in prison for e-mails and servers. And they really believe it-- 100%. One guy, who ostensibly wanted to ask me a question about Wasserman Schultz, kept calling Hillary a "witch," until I interrupted and explained that I wasn't going to pay any attention to his ad hominem name-calling and that he had to stop. He seemed stunned. Apparently, calling Hillary Clinton a witch on right wing radio is nothing out of the ordinary.

Hate Talk Radio may take a certain "bad boy" perverse joy in snubbing political correctness but it has coarsened and brutalized American politics and is turning off people entirely from politics. Today on his Facebook page, third rate former rock musician and right-wing crazy person (and Trumpf supporter) Ted Nugent was spreading the manure around, in a "review" of a widely panned film GOP fantasy film about Benghazi, for his poor deluded fans: "Our unholy rotten soulless criminal America destroying government killed 4 Americans in Banghazi. Period! What sort of chimpass punk would deny security, turn down 61 requests for security, then tell US forces to STAND DOWN when they were ready to kickass on the allapukes & save American lives! Obama & Clinton, thats who. They should be tried for treason & hung. Our entire fkdup gvt must be cleansed asap." Will be get a visit from the Secret Service? I hope so. Calling for the lynching of presidents and presidential candidates is a no-no even most Republicans haven't been crossing, at least not publicly.

I guess the country is strong enough to survive this onslaught of willful ignorance and stupidity. I hope so. I will say, though, that when I went to work for Warner Brothers I did all I could to get Nugent's excruciatingly bad band dropped from the label. His was the only band in my life I was happy to see crash and burn and fail miserably.