SENTINEL WATCH January 20, 2003 Issue

Talk radio: healing words—not hateful words

By Bill Dawley

Numerous radio talk shows out there these days are going a little over the top when it comes to a particular political message. Politics? Well, OK. We all have a right to vent. But hate? No thanks. Personally, I've had enough. I want to hear something different. Like love, for example. Here's a sampler of the negative rhetoric I'm talking about, heard over successive nights of cruising the AM dial:

• A recent president is characterized as symbolic of evil, along with Adolf Hitler.

• Muslims, particularly those in Afghanistan, are referred to as "ragheads"—presumably because of their headgear.