Friday, December 4, 2009

"A Dangerous President"

Those were the exact words that Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen used to describe President Barack Obama when she appear on Radio Mambi last month.

Rep. Ros-Lehtinen occasionally appears on Radio Mambi to provide updates for listeners on her activities. She represents Florida's 18th Congressional District, which includes parts that most people recognize as "Miami," such as Coral Gables, Downtown Miami, Key Biscayne, Brickell and Miami Beach.

On November 13th, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen appeared on "La Mesa Redonda" (The Roundtable) with Armando Perez-Roura, programming director of Radio Mambi. I believe other issues were discussed, but the main issue seemed to be the decision that day by the U.S. Justice Department to federally prosecute five men accused of conspiring in the attacks of September 11. Rep. Ros-Lehtinen was outraged, as were many in the Republican party that day.

But, near the end of the radio show, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen summed it up for listeners. She not only felt that the decision from the Obama administration was misguided, and that the decision put U.S. security at risk (as other Republicans asserted), but she also felt that we had "a dangerous President" in the White House.

So I wonder what kind of decision a Radio Mambi listener might come to after that interview.

Here's an indication. Yesterday it was reported by El Nuevo Herald (Wilfredo Cancio Isla) that the U.S. Secret Service is investigating a call to Radio Mambi of someone who made an on-air threat to Pres. Obama saying someone should "shoot him in the head."

Now, some of you might think that maybe this was just some crazy person who called in one day, and said something stupid. Not likely. The Herald reports that the voice was from a regular caller to Radio Mambi (which is the case with most callers to Radio Mambi), and quotes an anonymous employee at the radio station saying that "what is heard there [on Radio Mambi] everyday against Obama and against any other is outrageous."

There is also a larger context here. Ever since Barack Obama became President, Radio Mambi has reached a new level of radicalism that I had never heard before. I will try to post about that soon, and with some audio samples.


[Another thing. The Herald article by Wilfredo Cancio Isla is not easily accessible to regular users of The Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald websites. Doing a search for the article is useless. It doesn't even appear on Google News. Wierd.]

[Background on the recent decision by the U.S. Justice Department to prosecute 9-11 conspirators.]

[Photo by Getty Images]

3 comments:

Daniel @ Campinas said...

meh.. randi rhodes made similar comments about w, with the gun shot audio in the background.. i think she even got a visit from the secret service over it.. i think it was a case of "alls well the ends well", no harm, no foul..

Mambi_Watch said...

If Randi Rhodes made similar comments then they contribute to a climate of violence as much as threats from callers to any radio station.

We should not accept this kind of language so easily from media broadcasting, and describe it as "no harm, no foul."

If you accept this attitude then you accept violent rhetoric on the radio, at the risk of the public.

But this is only the tip of the iceberg for Radio Mambi. I listen to this radio station regularly, and it is true that the level of radicalism against the Obama administration is outrageous.

It ranges from the typical Obama-is-a-socialist rhetoric to Obama is part of a global conspiracy to control the world through his "fabian" and socialist goals. The tactics of fear are quite sophisticated.

I'll post more soon.

Mambi_Watch said...

If Randi Rhodes made similar comments then they contribute to a climate of violence as much as threats from callers to any radio station.

We should not accept this kind of language so easily from media broadcasting, and describe it as "no harm, no foul."

If you accept this attitude then you accept violent rhetoric on the radio, at the risk of the public.

But this is only the tip of the iceberg for Radio Mambi. I listen to this radio station regularly, and it is true that the level of radicalism against the Obama administration is outrageous.

It ranges from the typical Obama-is-a-socialist rhetoric to Obama is part of a global conspiracy to control the world through his "fabian" and socialist goals. The tactics of fear are quite sophisticated.

I'll post more soon.