3 Chords & the Truth: Nasty ugly out there. Fine in here.

What can you say?

Yeah. Well, crap.

Sums it up, because it's nasty ugly out there. You don't want to be out there too much in the nasty ugly feces-flinging match that is American life and American politics today. You just don't.

That, friend, is why 3 Chords & the Truth is here. It is your refuge; I can't do much, but I can do this. I can create a musical refuge that summons the better angels of our nature . . . while the devils run amok outside the safe confines.

I mean, it sucks out there.

SO, while the U.S. Senate is out there "boofing" and the Supreme Court is nervous, we'll just abide in the Big Show safe space where the ladies can be at peace and the gentlemen will act like . . . well . . . gentlemen. And we'll all enjoy ourselves listening to the best music on the best dang show on the Internets.

That would be this one -- 3 Chords & the Truth.

Well, that's about it. Oh . . . at the end, there may be some thoughts spurred on by Boz Scaggs.

Now that really is it.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

Another endorsement for the Big Show

We take what testimonials we can get. Such as they are.

And "some of it might be alright, we suppose" is better than anything I could say about the state of these United States today, which I truly find too distressing to even discuss on here much anymore. Sometimes, however, the despondency lifts some, and your Mighty Favog tries to spread what light -- and music -- he can on this little thing called 3 Chords & the Truth.

3 Chords & the Truth: Start of something big

The song's right. This could be the start of something big.

Or we could just do long-distance dedications all day here on 3 Chords & the Truth.

What will it be? Could it be both? Beats me -- I just work here.

I could go on (actually, I couldn't) but the edification is in the discovery here on the Big Show, dear listener. (No . . . I have no damned idea what that's supposed to mean, if anything.)

IS THAT 500 words yet, teach?

No?

Tough. I'm done. Just listen.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

A day late and a bunch of dollars short

Science, technology, engineering and . . . squirrel!
 
Try as I may, try as I might, there's no way I could've made this s*** up tonight. Fetch me a Smirnoff Skyball, willya?

Fly me to the m . . . just fly me

(Baton Rouge) Morning Advocate, July 27, 1967

I love this ad with the intensity of a million supernovas. 

I don't know why.

3 Chords & the Truth: Up all night with the music

Forget alternative facts. We need alternative reality.

Fortunately, you've come to the right musical place -- 3 Chords & the Truth.

This week, we're going to be up till dawn with some night-light highlights of the tuneful variety. It's late night radio the way it used to be . . . kind of. With a twist, of course.

Picture this in your mind's eye: Some fool has just given your Mighty Favog a 50,000-watt, clear channel AM blowtorch to play with, and he's appointed himself the all-night host. Radio will ensue.

So come with me on an overnight journey with the electrons, the radio waves and the music -- especially the music -- for an alternative reality where broadcasting still matters, a live body is still behind the microphone, we don't assume you're a knuckle-dragging idiot . . . and magic just might break out at any moment.

IT'S ALL here, right now, on the Big Show, brought to you by the Ambassador Cafe, alternative Omaha's all-night spot for quality eats and a hot cup of joe.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there.  Aloha.

3 Chords & the Truth: Your refuge from the s***storm

I can't stand it anymore.

I suspect you can't either.

Well, let's you and I turn up the music real loud, grab a beverage or 30, then pretend the whole s***storm out there isn't happening at all. That's the game plan for this edition of Everybody's Favorite Podcast, otherwise known as 3 Chords & the Truth.

(thud)

Sorry, I may have started a little early on the drinkin'.

Good tunes, witty rejoinders, a little fascinating info . . . and drinkin'. That about covers it this go around on the Big Show. Descriptionwise, that's all I . . .

(thud)

. . . got.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there.  Aloha.

Jesus is just all white

Democracy dies in . . . Bayard.

Bayard?

Bayard, Neb. If you were in Bayard, you'd croak, too.

Religious services have not been finalized, but interment will be in the back yard of state Sen. Steve Erdman, R-Greater Nebraska Trumpian Reich, in a plot between those of tolerance and decency. Erdman indicated that the funeral would be a white, Christian one.

No word on whether the funeral luncheon will be scheduled for before or after the book burning and Two-Minute Hate of University of Nebraska President Hank Bounds.

From the Omaha World-Herald:

A western Nebraska state senator recently criticized the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s plan to hire a diversity vice chancellor, saying it bodes poorly for “white Christian conservative males.”

State Sen. Steve Erdman of Bayard wrote in a column or letter last month to constituents that the NU system complains about inadequate state funding but it still has money for a “six-figure-salaried” person to assist with diversity.

Bayard, Neb. . . . The Florence of the high plains

Erdman said Wednesday that the reaction from some constituents was: “It’s about time somebody said something.”

The matter highlights some conservatives’ belief that universities are swarming with liberal professors who seek to indoctrinate their students. Edna Chun, a national consultant in diversity, said Wednesday that most universities have diversity officials.

NU President Hank Bounds said in a written statement Wednesday evening that he is proud that the university supports diversity. “Throughout my career, I’ve seen again and again that we are stronger when we serve alongside people who don’t look or think like us.

“I was shocked and deeply saddened when I read the column. For any elected official to champion these kinds of dangerous views only serves to damage our great state and our ability to recruit and retain the top talent that will grow Nebraska for the future.”

UNL has never had a vice chancellor for diversity and inclusion, although it has had employees devoted to those tasks. The vice chancellor is the first diversity administrator who will report directly to the chancellor.

The aim of diversity work, Florida-based consultant Chun said, is to broaden the awareness of all students and prepare them for a global society.

“The whole goal of it is educational,” Chun said. She said minority students can feel isolated when there are small numbers of them on a campus. Diversity and inclusion also refer to gender, religion, disability, sexual orientation and gender identification, she said.

UNL data show that last fall, minority students made up 14.3 percent of the university’s student body — 3,719 of 26,079 students.

Erdman said he wants no preferential treatment for anyone. “Favoring people by way of their genitalia, the color of their skin and their sexual orientation is as much an insult as discriminating against them for these very reasons,” he said in his letter, which he called “Straight Talk From Steve.”

His letter says he can envision “white Christian conservative males” being “excruciatingly scrutinized against the backdrop of the new Vice Chancellor’s extremist progressive worldview.”

Erdman said his views don’t come from contempt for any race. “I’ve got black friends. I’ve got Mexican friends,” he said in an interview Wednesday. “I look at them as being a friend and an American.”

But some Nebraskans are rebelling against the university’s liberalism, he said. An acquaintance told him his daughter changed her mind and isn’t interested in attending UNL.

“People are starting to wake up,” said Erdman, a 68-year-old retired farmer who sells some real estate. He said in his letter that a student who suggests that marriage is the union of man and woman in the future might be “beaten down by a torrent of LGBTQ complaints followed by psycho-analysis and reprogramming.”

Ground Zero: Senator fears UNL will rename his favorite cereal 'LGBTQ Loops.'

I'M SO OLD that I remember when Nebraska was better than this -- when western Nebraska was better than this.

I remember when there were Democrats outside Omaha and Lincoln. I remember when conservative outstate Nebraska was, by today's standards, vaguely "libtard" and RINO-ish. I remember when state senators from outposts like Bayard, hundreds of miles beyond the last traces of black Nebraskans, weren't angry nativist cranks.

Some were even moderates. Hey, it was the '80s. In 2018, moderates are the new communists to mouth breather-friendly politicians like Erdman.

And raving, paranoid projection is the new Keeping Your Powder Dry Until There's a Demonstrable Problem With the University's Diversity Program. But when you're playing to voters' prejudices and fear, you gotta do what you gotta do.

That would include accusing the University of Nebraska-Lincoln of the nefarious thing you're actually doing.  For example, note that Erdman is calling an unknown vice chancellor who hasn't been hired an "extremist progressive" based on non-existent things not yet done by the chimerical administrator. Just look:

The addition of a Vice Chancellor for Diversity and Inclusion also means that every word spoken by White Christian conservative males at the school will be excruciatingly scrutinized against the backdrop of the new Vice Chancellor’s extremist progressive worldview. For instance, any student who dares to suggest that marriage should be defined as the union between a man and a woman will quickly find himself being beaten down by a torrent of LGBTQ complaints followed by psycho-analysis and reprogramming. If the student doesn’t understand the underlying reasons for his stereo-typical beliefs, one will be provided for him.

MY GOD. Sure, it could happen. Than again, maybe not. Actually, probably not. 

This is the demagogic, academia-bashing version of an old Southern tactic for getting rednecks and white trash all riled up . . . just in time for a political Great White Hope to "defend their way of life" at election time.

Southerners had a term for that. I'll not use it.

We wouldn't want to encourage Sen. Erdman to use that word in his next "straight talk" session -- no doubt justifying himself with "Black people use it all the time in rap songs."

Besides, they're all just commies, anyway. No, really:

Recent Left-wing movements, such as Black Lives Matter and #MeToo, have undoubtedly put tremendous pressure upon the administration to do more about diversity and inclusion. While nobody I know advocates for racial, gender or sexual orientation discrimination, we should still ask why NU needs a Vice Chancellor for Diversity and Inclusion, if not to impose favoritism upon these groups.

#MeToo? Being against sexual harassment and sexual assault is an ideological stance?

Outstate Nebraska sure ain't what it used to be.

Like much of rural America, it's emptying out. The young are leaving. The brains are draining. And the remnant is content to imagine itself superior to the citified sinners vilified by bumfuck mediocrities who imagine themselves leaders.

Increasingly, even in states like Nebraska, contempt is a two-way street. If rural Nebraska sees cranks like Erdman as features and not bugs, the day will come when it will end up with the short end of its own shtick.

Big time.

The Brown Plague Report . . . or News Down the Rabbit Hole

If I never see Michelle Root on television again, it will be too goddamn soon.

In January 2016, Eswin Mejia rear ended Root's daughter, Sarah, on L Street in Omaha. He was driving a pickup. She was in a car. She was slowing down or stopped. He was street racing.

She was sober. He, say authorities, was drunk as a skunk.

He also was 19,  from Honduras, had no license and no papers. The judge set bail, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement wasn't interested enough to take him into federal custody when he left the state's.

Mejia, for his part, wasn't interested in a future as a guest of the Nebraska Department of Corrections. He skipped bail and, presumably, the country. All political hell broke loose. And the Root family has been poster children for "doing something about them fuckin' Mexicans" ever since.

Hondurans? Whatever.

The bottom line is the Roots have immigrated to the local TV news . . . and the pages of the Omaha World-Herald . . . and they won't leave. Because now they're activists for "immigration reform." And whenever somebody with brown skin and no immigration documentation does any damn thing that somehow impacts a regular white American, it's lights, camera . . . MAGA!

MEANTIME, regular white American drunk drivers who fatally plow into regular, sober white Americans are feeling a little ignored. Not-as-regular black American evildoers are thanking their lucky stars they're not Dominican.

And Michelle Root can be found on television sympathizing with any other regular white American who's had a regular white American child hurt or killed by One of Those People (TM). That is, when she's not found on television campaigning for Donald Trump . . . or onstage at a Trump presidential rally . . . or at the White House or otherwise protesting the Brown Menace.

Facts are facts: The Root family, with Michelle right out front, has been exploited by Trump from Day One. Michelle Root has become such a pro-Trump and anti-immigration fanatic that, to my mind, she's completely tainted as a news source.

And that's completely apart from the ethical and media issues that present themselves when shallow reporters -- particularly the TV variety, who always have been and always will be suckers for this sort of journalistic cheap grace -- put their brains in neutral and set their jerking knees to 11 anytime a Latino without papers does any damn criminal thing.

This is the laziest form of bullshit, stereotypical journalism there is. It plays into the hands of demagogues -- like the one Americans elected president -- and it will get someone killed.

You don't have to be a journalism professor, a philosopher or an ethicist to be outraged the 10th time some lazy reporter or editor tries to foist this sob-sister act on the public (which, naturally, will eat it up), much less the hundredth time the Roots pollute my TV screen with their grief-soaked vendetta.

IS NO JOURNALIST curious about Michelle Root's Twitter feed? About the retweets of posts from the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), a group that not only advocates against illegal immigration but also against most legal immigration and is considered a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center?  Retweets of extremist Iowa congressman Steve King? Retweets of missives by Arizona's "Sheriff Joe" Arpaio?

Listen, any normal human being grieves for, and with, any parent who loses a child. But that cannot and does not give the press license to turn a blind eye to reality for sentimental reasons, nor does it give the reporter license to become, in effect, a propagandist. In this case, we have local reporters who cross that line every time they run to the Roots for another bong hit of tragedy and aggrievement every time an illegal-alien Latino hurts somebody somewhere.

It's not only wrong, it's horrible journalism. The victimized Michelle Root the Omaha press portrays is a simplistic and deeply misleading portrait. It's sanitized. People who should know better are engaging in some real "fake news" because, one suspects, they figure the public can't handle the truth . . . and neither can their ratings or circulation numbers.

Reality in this case is a lot messier, a lot uglier and a lot sadder. I think it's also a lot more interesting, but there's more profit in playing to people's prejudices than in piquing people's interest. Always has been, always will be.

IF YOU'RE a reporter tempted to lazily saunter over to the Roots for yet more pathos and dire warnings about the Brown Menace, just ask yourself this: "Would I dare do this kind of story every time a white person is killed by a black person? Would I dare do it every time a Gentile gets offed by a Jew? If I would, exactly why would that be?"

I think we all know the answer to that question. So does Donald Trump. So did Adolf Hitler.

And isn't propaganda nothing more than telling the same misleading, incomplete story over and over and over again? That's where the Omaha press is now with the Root family. We hear all about the tragedy of Sarah's death. We hear all about criminals with brown skin and no papers.

We never hear a fucking thing about the rabbit hole you followed Michelle Root down into so you could do the same damn interview you already have done -- or so it seems -- a thousand times before.

I, for one, eagerly await the next Michelle Root PR availability when, say, a Norwegian who overstayed his visa slits an American's throat or drinks a fifth of Jim Beam before turning some young woman's compact car into a sheet-metal accordion.

I said I eagerly await it. I didn't say I'd be holding my breath.

3 Chords & the Truth: R-E-S-P-E-C-T

The Queen of Soul is dead.

Long live the Queen of Soul . . . Aretha Franklin. May her memory be eternal.

Thursday's horrible news came at the end of a typically horrible week in this country, and this episode of 3 Chords & the Truth is dropping onto the platter a few hours late. You see, I procrastinated.

I imagine you want to know why.

Dunno. Maybe it has something to do with the news not being real -- being "fake" in today's banal terminology -- if I just don't do this tribute edition of the Big Show.

That, of course, is as silly as any of the silliness we're surrounded by these days. The sad news, sadly, is not "fake."

The proof is in the headlines. And the proof likewise is in this week's program. Dammit.

Long live the queen.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

Gates of Hell 1, Catholic Church 0

The Catholic Church -- the institutional church, at least -- in this country is finished. The gates of hell, we are assured by scripture, will not prevail against the church everywhere, but they have here.

I say this after reading a "little" story from Pennsylvania uncovered in today's grand jury report on the spiritual, ethical and legal cesspool that is the Catholic Church there. The entire document is here. Maybe you have the stomach to tackle it in its immensity -- I do not.

But this one snippet from a massive global scandal and sacrilege is instructive. A huge story begins to just become a jumble of factoids and statistics, but the horror is best appreciated in looking at just one thing.

JUST ONE destroyed life. Sorry, make that two . . . because abortion. Just one mutilated soul. Just one sociopathic prelate.

This, from Diocese of Scranton in the 1980s, is just one in an unbelievably long parade of horror from just one American state since World War II. Here is the account from the local newspaper today, the Times Leader:

You can be assured that what the grand jury -- various grand juries over recent years -- uncovered in Pennsylvania will likewise pop up out of the clerical swamp in every diocese from sea to shining sea.

You also can be assured that most of our shepherds are wolves in chasubles and mitres.

I feel as if I should have more to say about this, something eloquent, profound and original. I don't.

Perhaps it's the cynicism I've clung to for the last 16 years as a coping mechanism. It's not ideal, but it seems to work for me and keeps me somewhere within Christianity instead of screaming "F*ck you!" as I storm out the door into . . . what? Nothingness?

Yeah, probably nothingness. And then the pointy-hatted motherf*ckers could notch yet another lost soul onto their liturgical staffs.

And yes, I just said "pointy-hatted motherf*ckers." The great scandal of American clericalist Catholicism is that all the "right" faithful will be a lot more scandalized by my phraseology than by priests raping young boys and girls, homosexual brothels disguised as Catholic seminaries and "princes of the church" aiding and abetting all of the above.

If you are offended, go say a rosary for my damnable soul . . . on the grave of an abuse victim who killed himself or herself after the misplaced shame and the unceasing torment became too much to bear.

Some of us will remain Catholic in the wake of this filth. I don't know which -- the jury's still out for most of us, I suspect. But I do know this: Whichever way we find to keep the faith, such as it is and assuming we do, it will not be the way we have kept it in the past. At all.

The collapse of the institutional church will follow the collapse of the hierarchy's reputation and credibility, a process begun in earnest in 2002 and finally completed today with the Pennsylvania grand jury's scathing 900-page report. The collapse of that credibility flowed out of the collapse of episcopal integrity, the visible sign of God-knows-how-many collapsed episcopal souls.

May God have precisely as much mercy on them as they showed their flocks.

3 Chords & the Truth: It all starts here

It all starts here.

Right, Robin? Becky? Michaela? Carol and Ashley?

This . . . is 3 Chords & the Truth. And it allllllllll starts here.

Not there. Here. And we've put it all in a nifty Summer 2018 scrapbook to prove it.

Because the great sounds of summer all start here on the Big Show.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

You gotta do what you gotta do

“Push back against the age as hard as it pushes against you.”

— Flannery O’Connor

Look, it's everybody's mama at Winn an' Dixie!

Well, this looks like just about everybody's mama makin' groceries when I was a young'un.

(Midwestern translation: "This is amazingly close to how nearly everyone's mother looked when they were grocery shopping when I was a child.")

Add some curlers to the hair of that lady on the right, stick a cigarette in the mouth of that lady on the left, maybe add some cat-eye spectacles to that lady in the middle . . . and you'll be knowing that your butt is so gonna get whipped when you get home if you don't BEHAVE RIGHT NOW!

Welcome to domestic life in Baton Rouge, July 29, 1968.

And you just wait until your daddy gets home.

Land of the Pee (Tape), and the home of the depraved

Just a sample of the sad scene we faced at the Trump rally in Tampa. I’m very worried that the hostility whipped up by Trump and some in conservative media will result in somebody getting hurt. We should not treat our fellow Americans this way. The press is not the enemy. pic.twitter.com/IhSRw5Ui3R

— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) August 1, 2018

I fear war is coming to America.

But you want to know what's even worse than that? That I think civil war no longer is the worst possible thing that could befall this benighted land.

The triumph of this is the worst possible thing that could happen to the United States of America. I call it "White Trash Fascism." And Donald Trump is its prophet.

Because that's exactly what it is, and no further explication is necessary. None. Not a goddamn bit.

3 Chords & the Truth: Musical truth

Like any product of the 1960s and '70s, I admit my fondness for the Top-40 radio of that now long-ago era. Whenever I hear a recording of that, from then, something comes over me.

Nostalgia, wistfulness, longing . . . whatever you want to call it. It's like an emotional wave crashing upon the graying sands of a middle-aged shore.

But Top-40 by definition is musical popularity, which is something quite different from musical truth. There can be truth in there somewhere . . . but my musical truth and yours isn't subject to the Billboard charts or a survey of local retailers.

Musical truth comes from the soul -- from what speaks to you and moves you, deeply and immediately. That is what 3 Chords & the Truth  is all about.

FOR ME, that's what this week's show is about, what last week's show was about and what every episode of the Big Show will be about. It's kind of like walking a tightrope without a safety net. You know the songs you play, and how you string them together, speaks to you. But will it speak to anyone else?

Good question, no pat answer.

It's an art, not a science. Science has its purpose, but this isn't one of them. Every week, I'm hoping for the best and fearing the deafening silence of the worst.

And I'm hoping for that kernel of musical truth for me and for you.

That's all anyone can do when it comes to the God's honest musical truth.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there.  Aloha.

Rep. Adolf Gump

I can't be sure, but a fat legislative Bubba from Georgia throwing it in reverse with his britches around his feet and trying to use his ass as a battering ram while screaming "AMERICA! AMERICA!" could be one of the signs and wonders Jesus told us would herald the Apocalypse.

It's in the Bible. Somewhere in the back.

THIS HERE? Also from Georgia. This fool is running for governor.

Oh . . . we sooooo doomed.

3 Chords & the Truth: Color your world

This is the episode of 3 Chords & the Truth where we look at the whole flippin' world of radio, both on the Internets and online, and tell it to just hold our damn beer.

Because we're gonna show our true colors on the Big Show. All of 'em. Many of them in the same set of music.

This is not something you would hear on your local commercial radio station. This is something you'd hear on vanishingly few non-commercial radio stations.

This is something you hear all the time on 3 Chords & the Truth.

That's about all I have to say . . . HEY! I TOLD YOU TO HOLD MY DAMNED BEER, NOT SPILL IT!!!

Y'all, I gotta go. I have to fetch what's left of my beer. You can't trust most of the radio world to do anything.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

Plunging into the ruined, moldy heart of a metaphor

Vintage FCC 'history card' for WJAR radio

Last month, an urban explorer trekked into the wilds of East Providence, R.I., in search of adventure and long-abandoned places.

Wielding nothing but a video camera and a respirator, "RnK All Day" brought his YouTube viewers along as he pored through the ruins of radio stations WHJJ, WHJY (94 HJY) and WSNE that once broadcast from the crumbling building at 115 Eastern Ave. He got more than he bargained for -- as did we.

What the intrepid archaeologist of urban abandonment found was a moldering, unsealed time capsule of mid-market AM and FM radio, circa 2002. It almost seemed as if, going on a couple of decades ago, the DJ on 94 HJY was playing Lenny Kravitz's latest CD while the talk guy on WHJJ argued with a caller about George W. Bush . . . and then the apocalypse.

The lights blinked. The phone went dead. A blinding flash. Someone spied a mushroom cloud in the distance.

Then everyone ran from the building, in a panic and in search of a fallout shelter. No one ever came back.

Yes, scavengers would go through the place from time to time. But they were looking for canned goods, cash and booze. Maybe some forgotten weed from the HJY wing. Broadcast electronics held no attraction for nuclear survivors worried more by the threat of irradiated zombies.

Fate had left these postmodern ruins amazingly intact, save for the smashed windows, some trashed rooms . . . and the mold that was everywhere.

THIS WAS the result of no nuclear detonation and the sudden collapse of civilization, though. This was another kind of apocalypse -- a corporate apocalypse.

There were no glowing zombies staggering through deserted streets searching in vain for human brains. The survivors of this apocalypse were the ones who brought it about -- the business-attired men and women walking crisply through cubicled offices in search of shareholder value.

Sometimes, they spat out glib clichés about "thinking outside the box" and "It is what it is." Other times, they merely moaned "EBITA! EBITA!"

A few years ago, one of this country's tens of thousands of "downsized" (or "right-sized" . . . or "redundant" . . . or "laid off" . . . or whatever) radio professionals -- I was told it was a disc jockey fired about 2003 -- cornered a regional program director outside the offices of a "station cluster." He just wanted answers to a few questions.

Would he ever feel useful again?

Was his training -- were his talents --  now useless?

The man in business casual was silent.

"Will I ever fucking work in my profession again!?"

Quoth the Craven "Nevermore."

Yet the suits could move three stations out of one building into another building with new equipment . . . and just abandon all the old. Utterly. Hundreds of thousands of dollars, at the time, of "utterly."

That waste represents "shareholder value," no doubt. Efficiency and belt-tightening, don't you know?

OK, I LIED about the tale of the questioning DJ. I don't know that it happened. I'll bet it probably did somewhere, however. I didn't lie about the apocalypse part. What's befallen radio -- and to a lesser extent, TV -- since the Telecommunications Act of 1996 ushered in the Lord of the Flies is an apocalypse. In ancient Greek, "apocalypse" meant "an unveiling." In modern English, it can mean a prophetic revelation . . . or an inferno . . . or a great disaster.

The tens upon tens of thousands of cashiered broadcasters say, "Take your pick, man. Hard to go wrong." And millions of listeners across the land might agree.

Once, WHJJ was a big deal in Providence. Before 1980, the call letters were WJAR, and for much of its history, it was a pretty big deal in the Northeast. After first taking the air in 1922, WJAR became a charter affiliate of the National Broadcasting Co., in November 1926.

And legendary NBC announcer Don Pardo (of Saturday Night Live and every-damn-thing-else fame) got his start at WJAR in 1938.

SO LOOK at the mysteriously, confoundingly abandoned studios, once the pre-ruinous home to the jewels of the Franks Broadcasting Co., Inc., beginning in 1980. Before Franks Broadcasting, the old WJAR was the pride of The Outlet Company.
 
Outlet owned WJAR for six decades. Franks owned it for a few years. Then it gets consolidatingly confusing until you end up at iHeartMedia, a crapload of assumed debt and -- how do they put it? Ah . . . yes. Efficiencies, economies of scale, elimination of redundancies and . . . "right-sizing." 

It sounds so much better than "You're fired." But it still means "apocalypse." And the abandoned, fully equipped ruins in East Providence still make for a hell of a metaphor for an entire ruined industry and an entire unraveling country.

What you hear wafting across the ether today is substantively denuded. The happy-clappy corporate speak of besuited Visigoths is risible -- especially if you jack up your eyelids with toothpicks, turn your radio on and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to the stupid in the air.

. . . and listen to th. . . .

SORRY. The program server had a bit of a meltdown, nobody's in the building after 5, and I had to drive in from home to reboot it.

Next time that happens, just go online and call up the iHeart station in (fill in the blank). It's playing the same damn thing -- probably at the same damn time. How're you liking those "economies of scale"?

The legions of former radio people -- the first casualties in the apocalypse, the ghosts inhabiting our East Providence metaphor in ruins, the men and women who have radio in their blood and nowhere to show it, the ones who talk incessantly about the old days on Facebook because there are no more new days -- they're not liking those "economies of scale" at all.

And they don't much care for your station, or for bombed-out radio studios full of perfectly good equipment being perfectly ruined.

Neither, I suspect, do they care for metaphors. Unfortunately, it seems as if metaphors are the only damned thing we have left in this sad, sad land.

Don't forget to call in your request to the studio line. No one will answer.