Part of my normal Sunday morning is listening to Marian Finucane's discussion programme on RTÉ Radio 1, which runs from 11 a.m. to shortly before 1 p.m. and is always interesting as a kind of combined social barometer and thermometer.
I have to admit that I don't care much for the last 20 minutes of the programme, which is always filled with unnecessary self-promoting announcements from the RTÉ sports department and then with a string of widely useless film reviews and TV tips.
So if Marian Finucane and her producer Anne Farrell are reading this, then I would urge them to scrap that part in future and let the discussion among the studio guests run the length of the whole programme.
It is often the case that time runs out for the really interesting discussion, and the one is bored with the mediocre reviews of dreadful films, usually American productions not worth seeing anyway.
But from 11 a.m. to 12.30 p.m. on Sunday mornings the Marian Finucane programme is the best one can find on the air waves in this part of the world.
(BBC Radio 4, which is often superior to RTÉ Radio 1, has no chance competing with Marian and fills their Sunday schedule with a whole string of boring and patronising programmes.)
As much as I enjoy the programme every Sunday, I have to state that today's discussion was by miles one of the best I have ever heard. Fuelled by the general anger over the 2009 Budget the emotions flew high, and at times the studio guests were shouting at each other in such rage that one could not really understand anything they were saying.
But I didn't mind. The programme exposed very clearly how serious our crisis is, and how deeply the anger over Fianna Fáil's incompetence to govern the country properly is felt by many people of all social classes.
And when the chattering classes of Dublin 4 begin to shout at each other in anger - live over the airwaves - then something is happening in this usually docile country of ours.
Well done, Marian! And well done, Anne! You have brought out the real emotions of your guests and thus showed us the real picture. Keep up the good work! And we will be listening.
The Emerald Islander
I have to admit that I don't care much for the last 20 minutes of the programme, which is always filled with unnecessary self-promoting announcements from the RTÉ sports department and then with a string of widely useless film reviews and TV tips.
So if Marian Finucane and her producer Anne Farrell are reading this, then I would urge them to scrap that part in future and let the discussion among the studio guests run the length of the whole programme.
It is often the case that time runs out for the really interesting discussion, and the one is bored with the mediocre reviews of dreadful films, usually American productions not worth seeing anyway.
But from 11 a.m. to 12.30 p.m. on Sunday mornings the Marian Finucane programme is the best one can find on the air waves in this part of the world.(BBC Radio 4, which is often superior to RTÉ Radio 1, has no chance competing with Marian and fills their Sunday schedule with a whole string of boring and patronising programmes.)
As much as I enjoy the programme every Sunday, I have to state that today's discussion was by miles one of the best I have ever heard. Fuelled by the general anger over the 2009 Budget the emotions flew high, and at times the studio guests were shouting at each other in such rage that one could not really understand anything they were saying.
But I didn't mind. The programme exposed very clearly how serious our crisis is, and how deeply the anger over Fianna Fáil's incompetence to govern the country properly is felt by many people of all social classes.
And when the chattering classes of Dublin 4 begin to shout at each other in anger - live over the airwaves - then something is happening in this usually docile country of ours.
Well done, Marian! And well done, Anne! You have brought out the real emotions of your guests and thus showed us the real picture. Keep up the good work! And we will be listening.
The Emerald Islander
1 comment:
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