First we learned that corporate interests were hiring blog commenters to push right-wing memes on net neutrality, health care reform, taxes, anti-unionism, and myriad other issues. Then we found out the in-person Tea Party protests were being funded and directed by big business interests. Now it seems there's a corporate service for supplying radio talk-show callers, ready to spout whatever life-like script is required:
(via DU, CJR, and C&L)
The caller told his story with passion and verve, and then asked the station’s listeners for their advice...Or at least he would have, had this been a real conversation. The young man—who asked to remain nameless in order to protect his chances for future employment—was an actor, and the staged call an audition. A short while later, he received the following email: “Thank you for auditioning for Premiere On Call,” it said. “Your audition was great! We’d like to invite you to join our official roster of ‘ready-to-work’ actors.” The job, the email indicated, paid $40 an hour, with one hour guaranteed per day....
[H]e would be invited periodically to call in to various talk shows and recite various scenarios that made for interesting radio. He would never be identified as an actor, and his scenarios would never be identified as fabricated—which they always were....
Checking further into his prospective employers, the actor
learned that Premiere On Call was a service offered by Premiere Radio Networks, the largest syndication company in the United States and a subsidiary of Clear Channel Communications, the entertainment and advertising giant. Premiere syndicates some of the more sterling names in radio, including Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and Sean Hannity.
Why am I not surprised?
The on-call service provides actors, voices, and scenarios tailored to whatever you request:
"Using our simple online booking tool, specify the kind of voice you need, and we’ll get your the right person fast. Unless you request it, you won’t hear that same voice again for at least two months, ensuring the authenticity of your programming for avid listeners.”
Nothing like providing carefully crafted fake authenticity, for a fee!
The next time you wonder how the people who write letters to the editor, comment on blogs, show up at tea party protests, or call in to radio shows can be so stupid, resistant to facts, and/or insane, consider - they may not be. They may be innocent hired dupes or people hard-up enough to be willing to sell out their birthright for a few pieces of silver up front.
Don't let yourself be faked out by the corporately constructed mind poison. Don't despair. And don't ever give up hope for a truly liberal future for America - unlike what the corporately funded mouthpieces want you to believe, it's a hope that most people actually share.