On the April 20 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio show, Neal Boortz attacked Media Matters for America, which he called “Media Morons,” for an April 20 New York Times article by reporter Jacques Steinberg headlined "Talk Radio Tries for Humor and a Political Advantage." In the article, Steinberg noted that Boortz, while discussing the recent shootings at Virginia Tech on the April 18 broadcast of his show, speculated that "[w]hen the history of this event is written ... we will have 25 students standing meekly waiting for this guy to execute them" and then aired an instrumental version of the Pat Benatar song “Hit Me With Your Best Shot.” Boortz went on to state: "[S]omebody out there feeds this, because I know damn well Jacques Steinberg wasn't listening to The Neal Boortz Show. ... So my guess is Media Morons, I mean Media Matters. My guess is it was them. Because they specialize in disinformation." In fact, Media Matters did not publish an item documenting Boortz's comments -- or choices of music -- on the April 18 broadcast of his show.
Media Matters did, however, note Boortz's comments regarding the Virginia Tech victims on the April 17 broadcast of The Neal Boortz Show, during which he asked: “How the hell do 25 students allow themselves to be lined up against the wall in a classroom and picked off one by one? How does that happen, when they could have rushed the gunman, the shooter, and most of them would have survived?” Media Matters also noted that in the April 18 edition of his program notes, called Nealz Nuze, Boortz wrote that the Virginia Tech incident represented “the wussification of America.”
In the April 19 edition of Nealz Nuze, Boortz wrote: “I actually listened to my show ... or parts of it ... and I became very angry. Upset and angry. At who? Well, mostly at me. I was angry at me for the way I was handling the Virginia Tech matter. I wasn't angry at what I was saying ... just with how I was saying it.” Boortz went on to reiterate that “Mark Steyn has it right [about the Virginia Tech shootings]. We have produced a culture of passivity.” As Media Matters noted, Steyn, a Chicago Sun-Times columnist and National Review contributor, attributed the shootings to, in part, “a general culture of passivity, which Virginia Tech exemplifies.”
During the April 20 broadcast, Boortz also claimed that the music for each segment is “completely and totally random” and selected by a “computer.”
From the April 20 broadcast of Cox Radio Syndication's The Neal Boortz Show:
BOORTZ: So, during the break, I actually talked to Jacques Steinberg, New York Times. Belinda [Skelton, producer] talked to him and said, “Neal wants to talk to you about this.” And he said, “Absolutely not. I stand by the story.” Then they put me on the line. I explained to him -- I said, “I, you know, Mr. Steinberg, I never choose the bumper music for this show. I never do.” Royal [Marshall, engineer and “sidekick”], in the 14 years we've been working together, have I ever selected the bumper music for any segment of this show? One time? When was that?
MARSHALL: You asked me to play Etta James' “At Last.”
BOORTZ: I did one time, didn't you -- didn't I?
MARSHALL: Yes, you did.
BOORTZ: Which is not our normal bumper music.
MARSHALL: Yeah, that is not the normal --
BOORTZ: Because I think that Etta James -- I think that is just one of the most beautiful ballads out there. I really love that. So I asked you to play it one time. But at any rate, so I'm talking to Jacques Steinberg, and I say, “I don't select the bumper music.” I [sic] said, “Well, who does?” And I said, “A computer. We have, it's just a big, massive .wav file. I don't even know how it works.” Royal, how does it work?
MARSHALL: If you can imagine having a -- lets put it in layman's terms.
BOORTZ: An iPod.
MARSHALL: Having, a c-- OK, an iPod. Well, I was going to go CD player.
BOORTZ: An iPod with 300 30-second songs on it.
MARSHALL: See, you're kind of in the ballpark. It's more like 5 iPods, each of them with 75 songs on them.
BOORTZ: OK.
MARSHALL: And, so, we just pick a particular iPod, and whatever song's next on that iPod, that's what plays.
BOORTZ: So it's completely and totally random.
MARSHALL: Yes.
BOORTZ: Except for every once in a while, Royal will pick something that matches the thing, but in this case, random. Royal is thinking, “It's time for a break. Neal is in there beating his gums, he has no clue what, you know, what time it is, I'm going to play some bumper music, that'll be his clue to shut up, and we can get into a commercial break or news break.” So Royal pushes a button and an instrumental -- no words -- version of “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” comes up, and then somebody out there feeds this, because I know damn well Jacques Steinberg wasn't listening to The Neal Boortz Show. I don't have a Jacques anybody that listens to The Neal Boortz Show. I don't have an anybody Steinberg that listens to The Neal Boortz Show. But especially somebody named Jacques.
So my guess is Media Morons, I mean Media Matters. My guess is it was them. Because they specialize in disinformation. So anyway, Jaques Steinberg prints that I selected it, I paused -- in all fairness, I talked to him on the phone, he asked me some questions, and really, really tried to understand the process by which we play bumper music. And I told him, I said, you know, I just want a correction to this, this is the paper of record, this is The New York Times. And now internationally you printed this that I went out there and selected “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” to wrap up a segment where we're talking about Virginia Tech.