"Ladies & Gentlemen:
I have been alone in a room for almost 24 hours with 6 TVs, a laptop and two radios, listening to and watching and reading only political shows and pundits and blogs, sometimes monitoring four or five things at the same time. Just to see if it can be done.
I'll tell you it can be, but I cannot tell you how horrible it is. It rattles the very center of your being. If you care about the state of humankind, it fills you with despair. We are as a people bleak and hostile and suspicious, filled with senseless partisanship and willing to believe anything and everything about anyone. We are full of ourselves and we hate. And we do it 24-7.
Would you be willing, as a sign of compassion and empathy, to do the unthinkable and broadcast right now, as a Valentine to me, 20 seconds of blessed dead air?
Complete silence. Just read my text and then say...nothing. Twenty seconds.
Just to show it can be done. I SEND IT IN.
It turns out, no, it can't be done."
-Gene Weingarten (Excerpt from "Cruel & Unusual Punishment", Washington Post
3-23-08).
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