Idiot Radio
Published by Ninth Stage May 14th, 2007 in Media, Talk Radio.Michael DelGiorno is an idiot, he’s also the new morning radio talk show host on 99.7 WTN here in Nashville.
Last Thursday a breathless DelGiorno exercised his meme busting skills. The meme he was destroying was the “half of all marriages end in divorce” meme. DelGiorno came across this factoid: “Divorce rate: 3.6 per 1,000“. Elated by the good news, he then invited callers to come up with their best guess, out of 1000, how many divorces there are. Answers ranged from 750 to 200 or so, DelGiorno kept hitting the buzzer and chirping “too high”. I was led to believe that the answer Mike was looking for was, how many divorces out of 1000 marriages are there and from the audience’s answers it is obvious that everyone else thought so too. At the end of all this, DelGiorno smugly informs the audience that the answer is 3.6 out of 1000, and isn’t that far from what we’ve been led to believe? We’ve been told this depressing statistic that half of all marriages end in divorce and how come this new data isn’t news?
Turns out that that Mikey had misunderstood what he was reading. The datum is, for every 1000 people in this country there are 3.6 divorces. Also, for every 1000 people in this country there are 7.5 marriages, making a divorce rate of 48%. Far from the .36% Mikey was touting and quite close to that unbusted meme, you know the one, “half of all marriages end in divorce.”
I’d thought my opportunity to comment on this has passed but today DelGiorno is rowing back, acting like he knew all along, all without mentioning that the point of his show that day was that the “half of all marriages end in divorce” meme was wrong!
Michael DelGiorno is an idiot and black bowling shirts are not slimming.
Yes, he is an idiot. This is so typical of his horrible math “skills” that he constantly used in Tulsa to try to make his points. As an example, when the city proposed a $3.71 optional fee to be added to residential water bills, DelEgo morphed this on air to 300,000 X 12 months X $3.71 for a grand total of “about 15 million a year”. He trumpeted that for 3 or 4 days until someone pointed out that City of Tulsa tax records only shows about 120,000 residential properties. The dollar figure changed without any explanation.
It appears that at least some of the staff of WTN are trying to correct this moron’s most egregious errors. That never happened in Tulsa, so we could be treated to laughable wrong figures, pronunciations and generally “misconscrewed”* half baked ideas.
* a DelJerko original malaprop…listen for it
Krise-ten-dumb for Christendom has already annoyed me, now your telling me that I have “misconscrewed” to look forward to? Great. Mikey being stupid wouldn’t bother me som much if he wasn’t smug at the same time - oh, and BORING.
When he was in Tulsa, did he take a topic worth maybe an hour and stretch it into an entire show?
Oh, you have MANY more misprounced and wrongly used words to look forward to from DelEgo. One that comes to mind is “unbeNOUNCED” for unbeknownced. Watch for the especially cringe-inducing” That’s Andrea’s and I’s song, candidate,etc”. I’m not kidding, he really thinks that’s proper English.
I agree that stupidity is ok, and arrogance can be tolerated, but this cretin has massive amounts of both, with a huge dose of hypocracy thrown in. It is amazing how such a “controversial” radio guy can be so boring, but painfully boring he is. At least he’s restrained himself from his signature vulgarity so far, and this low rent guy is VERY vulgar,be assured, That’s a coming attraction.
He’s unintelligent, and with his tiny vocabulary, he constantly has to resort to tired, trite aphorisms. That’s one way he stretches the program.
The train wreck rational for listening at all is the fun one has when the monumental hypocracy surfaces. I listened a little today and heard a great example. He was hawking an upscale housing development, mentioned a $600,000 house and said”that’s almost in my price range”. That’ll be news to any credit bureau, since he stiffed the mortgage company that lent him the money for the $700,000 house that he walked away from here. Even his dim lawyer wife is probably smart enough to know that Mikey won’t be getting a mortgage for at least TEN YEARS due to the foreclosure. Or maybe they’re both that stupid…
As far as stretching a topic, he was railing about a Tulsa bond issue the last week he was here. He’s been railing against it since it passed…on September 9, 2003.
He is smart enough to know that he doesn’t have the intellect to take on anyone that has an opposing viewpoint, so look for guests and callers that totally agree with him, pretty much without exception.
Tulsa is a far better place without this fake. But I have a feeling that Nashville may not have to suffer him for long
I thought people in Tulsa were nice? Tulsa man, you sound low rent insulting his wife. How sad.
What’s the insult? Dim? She married this atrocity. Lawyer? She is one. Smart enough to figure out that her husband’s oversized materialism has got them to a place where they can’t get a mortgage? I’m sure she knows that.
DelEgo constantly prattles about how smart his wife is…so I think she’s fair game. And if you want an example of a low rent person, just listen in on Mikey’s common and vulgar schtick…he won’t disappoint you there.
No one is going to agree with Michael all the time. But, in Tulsa, he was _the only_ outlet for anything but the local hiarchy’s press releases.
Sure, he’s been wrong, in often visible ways. But, anyone who listens is going to learn something, even if only because they stop long enough to ask questions.
We need more of this, not less.
TulsaManic
120K households is still $7,000,000 being soaked from water bills in an unauthorized tax on citizens.
I’m glad that Tulsa enjoyed DelGiorno. I’m glad that he was able to air things that the powers that be might like to keep hidden, but that doesn’t mean he belongs in Nashville.
DelGiorno is an ignorant blowhard where we once had intelligent radio that took our powers that be to task. If it weren’t for our now gone radio personalities we would have had a state income tax shoved down our throats.
Nashville has only one FM talk radio station and four hours of DelGiorno is four hours wasted. I am not alone in thinking he is an idiot, the WTN staff are embarrassed and try to steer him away from his bigger blunders.
One question. If DelGiorno was so big in Tulsa, why did he leave?
This isn’t the reason.. but it didn’t help.
http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?articleID=060822_Ne_A9_Radio35171
Pure hatred first showed itself in Tulsa media as the former local radio shock-jock Michael DelGiorno, a self-claimed though generally disputed religious and political “leader,†attacked Republican Mayor Bill LaFortune daily during his four-year term. The attacks were personal and vicious and inaccurate – and because, DelGiorno claimed, LaFortune was not “conservative enough†Tulsa now has an admittedly liberal Democrat Mayor in Kathy Taylor. He was factually in error - on the rare occasions when he used facts. His opinions are based upon his own agenda which harmed Tulsa. He has no training as a journalist or other college degree. He has no popular support in Tulsa beyond a few simple-minded party fanatics and a handful of stupid elected officials. Many of his opponents once worked with him.
I publish Tulsa Today at http://www.tulsatoday.com and have mentioned DelGiorno in several stories and editorials over the years. Those can be found by entering his name in the search box on any page within that site. We are an online news service established in 1996 serving over 130,000 page views and 45,000 unique readers per month with a free-lance staff overworked and underpaid. I have won two national awards as a First Amendment Advocate and publisher and have been published by many national and regional newspapers.
DelGiorno so inspired one Tulsan that the site http://www.michaeldelgiornosucks.com/ was established to monitor what that person believes to be racist hate radio. The audio clips posted clearly illuminate the nature of DelGiorno. The daily newspaper has also written about him which, with the search feature, can be found on http://www.tulsaworld.com.
Advertising declined on his station after the first gains from what many had hoped would be a true and open forum for substantive debate on public issues. That is not what DelGiorno does. He whores issues for ratings with superficial understanding. He can be witty and charming on occasions and he knows the radio business, but he is very easy to manipulate (just stroke his ego). Also, don’t let your sister or any woman you care about near him.
I am one his Tulsa critics and, as he was singing his own praises during a weeklong departure, he made reference to two people he would “love to beat until someone pulled me off of them.†Typical of DelGiorno to shout threats over his shoulder as he was headed out of town – I would have met him on the open field of public debate or in more direct nonverbal contests if he really had the brass.
A native Tulsan, my child was born in Chattanooga, I flew hot air balloons in Knoxville and I have many friends in the music business in Nashville. Sorry about DelGiorno, but we don’t claim him so don’t blame us. However, if you give him time he will hang himself. Some people believe Tulsa’s average IQ increased by 35 percent with DelGiorno’s departure.
Oh yeah. Don’t forget his libel suit. A public official finally got sick of the personal, hateful and malicious half-truths and outright lies DelJerko was spewing on the air – and sued. It was beyond the usual “fool,” “idiot,” “queer,” and “faggy,” vernacular he used regularly.
Usually, a public official is media fair game and libel accusations usually don’t get too far.
However, this case was so egregious, the courts have let the suit continue through the discovery phase and various dismissal motions and is set for trial this summer.
Whooo ha.
Also, Ninth Stage,he had previously “quit” (note quotes) the Cox station and was fired from the Clear Channel station in Tulsa, leaving behind a large posse of fellow professionals who are still hungry for payback from all his personal bullying and backstabbing.
While his story is that he was let out of his Journal Broadcast contract a year early to come to Nashville, there is great doubt about that, since his ratings were miserable and sinking with advertisers avoiding him and his station like they were radioactive.
While Nashville was labeled as an “opportunity,” it was also a case of not staying in Tulsa because he had no place to go.
So, DelGiorno was so “Big” in Tulsa, we had to flush three times.
He is more than a radio host, he is a phenomenon! Even after leaving T-Town Tulsans still obssess over him!
For David Arnett of all people to talk about whoring values . . . ha ha! And to steal a line from Oklahoma’s native son Will Rogers, David? Were you drunk when you posted here, Arnett?
Tulsa is kind of dysfunctional, and for a small town with an entrenched aristocracy Tulsa may be a different town than Nashville. I am not sorry he is gone, but think it is a shame that folk are chasing him all over the country to defame him.
Tim,
Thanks for posting a link to your rant-blog here. Readers interested in our tiff (few I suspect) can compare our two sites and judge for themselves who writes and who posts inflammatory opinions of other people’s work. I have met you and will be glad to meet again to talk with you about any issues you may have with my 25 year career in public journalism. Sadly, you just snipe.
No line from Will Rogers was stolen. His comment linked the IQ of one state to that of another with the movement of population one to the other. My comment was strictly on the increase in IQ (peace, joy, relief, etc.) felt by some in Tulsa as the city’s most inane shock jock departed.
Tulsa is not “kind of dysfunctional†except to the embittered angry impotent few. What entrenched aristocracy? This kind of a comment (emotional off-the-wall opinion fueled by a persistent desire to “stir shit upâ€) is the reason many reasonable people and most public officials will not talk with you.
All the best,
David
P.S. I defame no one and I never tell all I know. If DelGiorno felt he could win a case against me in court, he would have filed long ago.
Waaah, Arnutt, you make me cry! Just a few months ago you were hailing me as another ‘publisher,’ now I am a rant-blogger? At the GOP convention a few years ago you said I had ‘one of the good sites’ out there.
Sadly, you could not suck more as you hound MDG and attempt to ruin him in his new endeavor.
In the truest sense you have not plagairized Will Rogers, merely used the germinal idea of his famous line and replaced the subject, without attribution. You did not have whoopee with that female.
We are so happy that this poor representative of Christianity has left Tulsa. It is apparent either that the radio station in Nashville did not research his popularity in Tulsa or are truly simply looking for a “shock jock” to increase thier ratings. In either case, he will surly fail in Nashville as he did here. We are GLAD HE IS GONE. I only hope that he sees all these negative responses. By the way, I wonder if he is still gambling.
Delgiorno is a materialistic, prurient 19 year old spouting Bible verse. It is pretty disgusting.
BTW the only Gambling we have in Tennessee is the State Lottery.
I’ve met Michael personally a few times, even chatted with him on-air a couple of times. I’m still of the opinion that he did more good for Tulsa than harm.
I don’t know many personalities that would have actual rallies for the citizens when something was at issue, like MDG did. He brought a lot of people together for the common good, exposed innumerable antics at city hall, and taught me to pay attention to my local leaders.
I’m sure Nashville has MDG haters and lovers, just as Tulsa did. For those that have never heard him, give him a chance. You just might learn something.
I too have met Michael and appeared on his show. He treated me with great respect on the air and the his whole team could not have been more professional. Michael, like all of us is a flawed creature. But, he is also very talented and has more guts than anybody else in his league. He is not ashamed of his faith. Did he make mistakes? Yes. Could he be annoying? Incredibly so at times. But, he also did wonders for Tulsa and the legacy he left behind here is still moving and shaking the powers that be. Including Michael’s wife in this argument was an incredibly low class thing to do. Even the mob leaves leaves wives and children alone. Nashville should be thankful they have Michael. It won’t be a dull ride.
Because we thought that love would last forever.
That’s why it will never work.
Michael ruined himself in Tulsa and could have ruled Tulsa media for decades. Tulsa’s politics and media are stacked to benefit a very few and there were an enormous number of topics and viewpoints that he helped get out into the open that I’m convinced would never have been discussed if it weren’t for him. The town had many dialogues that would never have existed without his stirring things up. HOWEVER…..his ego, his hypocrisy, and his hate-mongering were too much for all but a few of his core supporteres. Make no mistake, I am a conservative Christian, so I understand that typically ‘hate-mongering’ is simply mainstream media code for someone being a Christian and speaking his mind, but in Michael’s case the rants against minorities, gays, and anyone who disagreed with him left a very sour taste in the mouth of all but a handful of Tulsans.
http://www.kotv.com/news/local/story/?id=141876
Tulsa City Councilor Bill Christiansen has settled his defamation lawsuit against former Tulsa radio talk-show host Michael DelGiorno. Christiansen’s suit accused DelGiorno of making false statements during his talk show on KFAQ, when he said Christiansen had committed a felony.
The radio station must retract the statements made by DelGiorno and apologize to Christiansen as part of the settlement. DelGiorno left Tulsa in April for a job with a station in Nashville, Tennessee
I am so glad that DelEgo is gone. He was nothing more than a hypocritical , self-promoting, ego-maniac. He is divorced from first wife, Denise and spews nothing but judgement for thojse who are divorced.
He is a gambler and an adulterer. He slept with his best friends wife and a tape was made of it! He is a jackass and is not welcome in our fair city. He has lost a major lawsuit–old station paid for it, his house foreclosed upon, a smoker-yet he rants about smokers and people hate him. He is so full of crap and he treated those around him like crap.
He disrespected my daughter when she worked as a hostess at a local upscale restuarant. I only wish that I had been there. He would have lost his life as I would have gouged out his eyes and made love to his bloody skull!
Good luck Nashville. He won’t be there long as he will hang himself with his hypocracy and lies and questionable character……….
Semper Fi
James L. Hartman, USMC Retired
I cannot believe all of the hypocritical statements that I see above. Do we all not fall short? Have none of you sinned?
I met Michael today. He is one of the most courteous people I have ever had the pleasure of meeting.
I am going into the Air Force as a broadcaster. I wrote him a letter explaining how much work it took to get this position and how I feel that GOD is allowing this work in my life. He didn’t respond, and I got a little discouraged, but found out that he was setting up at a car show today for a few hours, so I thought why not meet him.
I went up to him, he introduced himself, and I told him that “my name is Prentice” his eyes lit up and he gave me a hug right off the bat and told me that my story was very inspiring. He seemed just as excited to meet me as I was him. In fact, he gave me his personal number and asked me to join him and Gwen in studio this week.
He is the reason that I am on the path to conservative talk radio, and he has his moments, but do you NOT have them as well?
Some advice from the book of Matthew..
“Judge not, that you be not judged.
2 For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.
3 And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?
4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove the speck from your eye’; and look, a plank is in your own eye?
5 Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye
Might not “judge not lest ye be judged” apply to DelGiorno who is not only judgmental but hypocritical?
Also, much of my complaint is simply that he is ignorant and repetitive - those, I believe, make for bad talk radio. Avoid these failings and you will do well in radio. Fall into that habit and you’ll not avoid other charges.
A good example of good radio is G. Gordon Liddy’s show. He is not a hypocrite. He will tell you of his foibles and failings where DelGiorno does not and never mentions the incidents above. Liddy is repetitive but the cycle is days in length. DelGiorno is like a chihuahua - he yaps all day about the same thing without depth or insight and in a cycle of five minutes.
Best wishes to you Mr. Parton. I suggest that there are better models for you than MDG
To each his own. From my experience, you either love him or you hate him, and there is not much “in between” when speaking of him. I love him. You hate him. The world keeps spinning.
I apologize to the person whose comment should be where this comment is. It was flagged as spam and I only noticed it as I hit the irrevocable delete key. Please try again.
It may have been multiple links or the word socialist (take away the “so” and “t” and you have the name of a drug often appearing in spam messages) that caused it to be flagged as spam - I don’t know.
Please please please get him off the air in Nashville, because of him my talk radio adiction is depirved. (can’t listen, just to bad)……
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