Man On Dog

Last night I finally got a round to watching the Dick Santorum interview on the Daily Show. This was a bit contested in the sphere as many people thought 1 why the hell did John even allow this to happen, and B why was he so damned soft on the guy.

Lucky me, this morning over coffee, American Morning's Soledad interviewed Man on Dog (transcript not yet available) while I was spending quality time with my cup of joe, fiance', cat and dog. This is a special time for me since it is nice to sit back relax and hope that CNN will actually let me know what is going on in the world.

Soledad being a working mom (of twins no less) took Santorum a bit to task regarding his statements about feminism is to blame for mom's having to work to make ends meet.

There was nothin cute or new about watching Santorum squirm and try and state his gastly opinions.

What I just can't get out of my mind whenever I see this guy hocking his book on TV I only hear the subtext of the interview. I hear something like this everytime Santorum opens his mouth:

"Well, I am in deep shit when it comes to my campagn this comming year because of my stupid opinions. So if I am on my way out, I might as well write my wingnutty ideas in a book and make some money off of my short tenure in the Senate. Sine my ideas are so nutty every reporter will take some issue with some other issue in the book, as such I can call them crazy moonbats of the vast left wing conspiracy. So thanks Soledad, I really could give a rat's ass if you agree or disagree with me, the fact is that I just used you and your network to sell more books for me and my publisher, and every book counts towards that bonus I get if I sell so many thousand copies."

John Stewart is also part of the book pimping crowd (probably not directly under his control, if all those episodes of the Larry Sanders show are any indication of reality). As such, perhaps he should just stop having people on simply because they want to sell books.

If there is anything more degrading it is the knowledge that on most of these shows, if you have a book and the publisher has a deal with the network, you will interview so and so. Not because the book is factual, interesting, or a pillar of great literature of our time, but more because your producers get paid to push the book.

Payola? Maybe? It isn't like this doesn't happen in other forms of media or anything.