I'll just add my .02 here, for what it's worth. Keep in mind that I don't read Ian's blog and I haven't seen or heard anything about the Tillman controversy so I know nothing about that.
IMHO, Ian is pretty intelligent and he can conduct an interview better than lots of folks on radio. He's not the greatest I have heard, but he's far from the worst. My biggest problem with Ian is that he just doesn't seem onboard with the original C2C program format. I mean, he likes cryptozoology and he'll talk about a few conspiracies (witness his recent JFK show and his promises of an upcoming RFK show), but that's about it. I have nothing against people who like comic books, but I stopped reading them when I was a kid and I just don't find that topic particularly interesting. And maybe I'm off-base here, but I find it hard to believe that a really high percentage of the C2C audience is that interested in comic books. I dunno... maybe I'm wrong about that. And I enjoy shows about rock stars once in a while -- I lost a good part of the hearing in one ear because I like R&R so much for god's sake -- but enough is enough. I'll listen to just about any show that has R. Gary Patterson, but other than that, I wish Ian would cool it with the R&R shows. Too much of a good thing gets old pretty fast. And that show with Jesus as his guest, while it might have been charming in other contexts, just was not C2C fare...
The thing that is different about Ian, as compared to George, is that Ian will challenge his guests when those guests make unusual or controversial comments. Nothing wrong with controversy, as far as I am concerned -- that's what makes talk radio in general so interesting. Art used to challenge his guests as well. So I don't mind Ian calling someone on the carpet, and that includes Steve Quayle. I used to like Quayle a lot and always made sure to listen to any show he was on -- even if it was with George. But he really has become a one tune jukebox. I'm not even saying he's wrong, but enough is enough. If we will within a couple of months be at the point where gold has become valueless and the only currency is ammunition, then I'll do pretty darned well in that new economy.
But we have heard it all before, and, for my part, I'm glad we did. I hope this doesn't sound utterly ridiculous, but based on C2C guests -- including Steve Quayle -- I took all of my retirement money out of equities in late April and that saved me a TON. While everyone else around me watched their retirement funds reduced by ~45%, mine declined by only 2% and that's only because bonds tanked at the same time as equities (that's not supposed to happen) and real estate was also down, though not nearly so much as equities. So I'm glad we have guys like Quayle. I paid attention and they saved my ass.
But I don't think that means that Quayle should expect to get a free ride and that's what he's used to on C2C because he is always on with George. Unless I am mistaken, that interview with Ian was his first, or at least his first in a very long time. And I really didn't think Ian was ridiculously confrontational -- it seemed like he wanted to engage in a dialogue and Quayle wasn't having any part of it. He wanted to say what he wanted to say and he didn't want to be challenged. He wanted to be interviewed like he is when he talks to George. I think it was stupid for Ian to apologize the following week because it did not seem to me that an apology was warranted -- it's a TALK SHOW, not a SOAPBOX.
One more thing -- and this is not just a jab at Quayle, but lots of other folks, like that disclosure guy (uhhh... how could I forget his name? It's right on the tip of my tongue. Oh well, probably a mini-stroke -- I'm getting to be about the right age...) -- but how many dinners with generals and TOP OFFICIALS can these guys have? I swear to god that every time I hear guests throw around the "inside scoop" they received from a general or a senator or a UN ambassador, I just want to hurl. I almost always look askance at newspaper articles or television reports that display an over-reliance on "unnamed sources." I do understand that anonymity is sometimes required, but since when does a reporter or a guest get to use those kinds of sources as the ONLY evidence upon which they base their claims? Quayle seems to be the worst offender in this regard. Or maybe not... It could be that I am just in my normal pre-Christmas bad mood...