The End Is Near

So, Did He, Or Didn't He? I'm Just Asking A Question.

As time goes by we will hear less and less of you, Mr. Patterson.
-- Dean Jagger, to Glenn Ford: 'Brotherhood Of The Bell' (1970)

Yesterday I was barking about the cyclical nature of modern Fame -- that (in line with the 'Bubble' cycle of Western economies) being famous isn't actually about doing anything, making use of the term 'famous' a bit risky. Does "Famous" cover Karl Marx, Amelia Erhart, Thomas Pynchon and Charlie Sheen, for example?

Or is it that Notoriety is more useful to purveyors of Die Spotsbillig Fast-Food culture in America? That being known as the Freak Of The Moment can be more easily packaged and sold to huge numbers of passive Rubes? Charlie Sheen will probably find this out soon -- along with Elizabeth Gilbert, Chia Pet Obamas, "Survivor", and the two guys who discovered Cold Fusion.

Someone else, it seems, will also learn relatively soon that same lesson; from David Carr in the New York Times:

Mr. Beck... burst into television prominence in 2009 by taking the forsaken 5 p.m. slot on Fox News and turning it into a juggernaut. A conjurer of conspiracies who spotted sedition everywhere he looked, Mr. Beck struck a big chord and ended up on the cover of Time magazine and The New York Times Magazine, and held rallies all over the country that were mobbed with acolytes. He achieved unheard-of ratings, swamped the competition and at times seemed to threaten the dominion of Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity...

But a funny thing happened on the way from the revolution. Since last August, when he summoned more than 100,000 followers to the Washington mall for the “Restoring Honor” rally, Mr. Beck has lost over a third of his audience on Fox — a greater percentage drop than other hosts...

He still has numbers that just about any cable news host would envy and, with about two million viewers a night, outdraws all his competition combined. But the erosion is significant enough that Fox News officials are willing to say — anonymously, of course; they don’t want to be identified as criticizing the talent — that they are looking at the end of his contract in December and contemplating life without Mr. Beck.

Little Glenny has been the target of recent criticism from more senior, less 'god'-driven pundits on the Right, and it's on the order of the Look, friend, you've just pissed your pants and its time to stop drinking kind of advice; I mean, if an unindicted war criminal like Little Billy Kristol and a barely coherent winner of the Mordecai Rumkowski Award like Jonah Pantload are saying he's out of line... well, maybe Glenny should pay attention.

So far, he seems hell-bent (snigger) on hewing to that old-time delusion of world-wide conspiracy. Is that why Glenny is losing so much market share? Because he's a Whack Job (Well; this is Fox we're talking about), or... is it that little unpleasant episode that's supposed to have occurred back in 1990?

I don't really know. Just asking a question.

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