Monday, December 03, 2007

IMUS IS BACK-IT’S ABOUT TIME

Jim Taricani

Don Imus is back on the air, courtesy of WABC in New York. Locally you can catch him on 790am, the Score. It’s about time the big Don got back to do what he’s great at doing-making people think and laugh at themselves.
The dust up about his off-base and childish remarks about the Rutgers women’s basketball players was just that. Childish and uncalled for. But those stupid remarks did not warrant Imus’ dismissal and it certainly wasn’t the politically correct crime of the century. Take a look at any of the R-rated comedy shows on HBO and you will see and hear gay jokes, ethnic jokes, sex jokes and disconcerting remarks on just about any so-called off base topic in the universe.
As has been noted many times, black rappers debase women more often than Imus or anybody else for that matter, and you rarely hear anyone from the black community say boo about it.
Imus reminds us not to take ourselves too seriously. If we can’t laugh at ourselves once in a while, we are in sad shape.
There is a documentary on the air now about the legendary comedian Don Rickles. One of his standard jokes is to engage an elderly person from the audience in a conversation, and then tell them in a cutting voice to “go home and die.“
No one has ever asked Rickles to stop his act.
And no one should have demanded Imus be fired.
I, for one, will enjoy listening to this old rascal in the morning.
It sure beats listening to hyped up radio weather forecasts and sportscasters who actually think professional ball players should be taken seriously.