It's open season on left's talk radio

GREENVILLE, N.C. — They've taken to the airwaves, those liberals. The Limbaughs of the left have launched their own offensive — no pun intended — and planted a flaming flag in what was formally conservative turf.

Just listen to what they're saying.

"They can't show the carrier footage with him in front of 'Mission Accomplished' — it just looked stupid. Now I think they can't do 9/11," said comedian/author Al Franken. "The only thing they're going to be able to do is ads of him clearing brush."

Franken is host of the liberal radio show "The O'Franken Factor." The "him," referred to is President Bush. And "they" are the conservatives, the "W" contingent. Those Loyal to the President Even Without Evidence of WMDs.

Open season has now been declared.

"Closet-bigot, homophobe, misogynist people who masquerade as Republicans" declared Janeane Garofalo on her 8 p.m. show.

"The Bush family is just like the Coreleones . . . Jeb fixed his brother's election," said brassy Randi Rhodes, a longtime Florida radio host. "Republicans have been drinking this Kool-Aid for a really stinking long time."

What a mouthful of feathers.

You had to be in the right place at the right time to catch "Air America," the fledgling liberal radio network, the day last week it debuted. In Los Angeles, the signal was elusive. The San Francisco station was a no-go. And the Internet feed was up and down.

But the real drawback was content. The ranting and raving was uninspiring, unchallenging, and at times, as downright mean as Richard Nixon.

Nobody should really be surprised. Talk radio is show business, period. Entertainment. It does not seek to enhance anyone's understanding. One listen to a Limbaugh litany on liberals confirms that fact. "Air America" simply follows the same caricature.

Rather, the appeal of talk radio rests on bombastic personalities like Limbaugh and their ability to stake out ironclad positions. Black or white. Right or wrong. Left or right.

Funny, though. It doesn't work that way in the real world.

The far left's rush to the air is fueled by the hope to galvanize the left in the same way Limbaugh galvanized conservatives in the days when they, too, were out of favor in Washington.

Al Franken's shtick was fine for "Saturday Night Live." But he's not ready for prime time politics. And in the end, the rhetoric on "Air America" is no different than the hot air from other side of the dial.

With apologies to Bill Shakespeare, it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

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Mary Schulken is senior associate editor and editorial page editor for The (Greenville, N.C.) Daily Reflector. E-mail: mschulken@coxnews.com