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Tom Ashbrook

New York Times Editor Sneers at Media Reporters as 'Oxpeckers' to His Rhinoceros

By Tim Graham | November 11, 2010 | 17:37

New York Times executive editor Bill Keller has a funny way of expressing humility. Slate’s Tom Scocca found he expressed surprise that media reporters are obsessed with his newspaper, so much so that one writer live-blogged his recent appearance on NPR’s On Point with Tom Ashbrook. But his metaphor – the media reporters are “oxpeckers” while he is a massive African rhinoceros -- sounded more than a little haughty:

One of the things that continually surprises me about this job is the fascination of those outside The Times with every micro-facet of our work. Recently I did an hourlong radio call-in show, and The NY Observer actually live-blogged it. Seriously, my own wife isn't as interested in what I do all day as John Koblin, Michael Calderone, Jacob Bernstein and the rest of our obsessive chroniclers. These guys always remind me of oxpeckers, those little birds that ride on the backs of large African mammals and eat their ticks.

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Boston NPR Analyst Hopes Our Captured Soldier Isn't Tortured Like He's at Gitmo

By Tim Graham | July 27, 2009 | 14:40

Boston talk-show host Michael Graham (we’re not related) was shocked and appalled by Jack Beatty, a liberal writer at the Atlantic Monthly and former book reviewer at Newsweek. Beatty’s a weekly news analyst on the WBUR show On Point, distributed nationally by National Public Radio to more than 150 stations. Looking back at the week in review on Friday, host Tom Ashbrook brought up the case of Pvt. Bowe Bergdahl, captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan and videotaped pleading for his release. While NPR correspondent Liz Halloran said the clip was heart-rending, Beatty went Cheney-bashing:

We have to hope that he is treated better than we have treated people we have taken prisoner in Afghanistan. We have to hope that he’s not essentially given indefinite detention, or as Lindsey Graham said this week about people in Guantanamo, ‘locked away forever.’ We have to hope that despite the worst efforts of John Yoo and Dick Cheney and others, he is not tortured, because we tortured.

NPR Show Blames Beck for Cop Killing, 'Conservative' Guest Disses Limbaugh as a 'Buffoon'

By Tim Graham | April 15, 2009 | 20:25

The NPR-distributed talk show On Point from WBUR in Boston – which airs nationwide on 169 stations –  took up “Angry America” as a topic on Monday, illustrated on the show’s website with pictures of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, and Michael Savage. Host Tom Ashbook summarized that radio talk could lead to violence: “Lately, the language on air in the age of President Obama, economic bust, and big government bailouts, has been particularly hot – and hot when sales of guns and ammunition are surging.”