Annoying things about NPR

Steve Kornacki begins talking thusly:

“Yeah, no, ...”

The way MEEshell Norris pronounces her name

The "both sides do it, so everyone sucks, therefore we aren't liberal biased" coverage. That, and the need to bring on former hacks from previous administrations, who have nothing to say or contribute in the present day.

R2: She retired years ago.

Science Fridays taking the spot of Fresh Air at the end of the week. Content is interesting, but that guy’s voice wrecks my nerves.

Linda Holmes.

It seems they are having pledge drives (begging for money) about once a month now (at least on my local NPR station they are.) It used to be NPR would only have pledge drives twice, maybe three times a year - no more than that. Now it's every few weeks and they have started sticking in requests for donations in between promos for shows. They are becoming relentless in their begging for money. I didn't mind the occasional two, three times a year drives but now it's become every few weeks. As for me, NPR is breeding a lot of resentment as this shows little respect for it's loyal listeners. And yes, I know they are more hard up for money than they used to be thanks to Trump and his henchmen but this is going too far.

Terry Gross annoys me too-- she's both smug and boring.

R5 is right,

R7: NPR is fine. They make their money by making member stations buy all the programming they air. Stations buy Morning Edition, All Things Considered, Fresh Air etc. So it's the stations that raise the money and get the grants and the CPB funding to then buy stuff from NPR, and PRI, APM etc. So I guess your local station is poor--or someone is putting their hand in the till....

R10 It's true my local station is in a relatively poor state.

The way Terry Gross says, EVERY SINGLE SHOW: "If you're just joining us, my guest is...." (And then 30 seconds later, she says it again when the break ends.)

That person is your guest whether or not I'm just joining you. And seriously, Terry, how many people are just joining you at that exact moment? The majority have been listening since the show started.

I know it sounds stupid, but I promise that once you notice it, it will drive you nuts too.

Vocal fry

-OP "begin their responses with "right" or "sure."" is a Jedi Mind trick that Millennials use to create faux agreement and feel-good as mandated by the hive mind.

"NPR voice" annoys me

This is good:

Nothing. We are fucking lucky to still have NPR.

Kai Ryssdal saying “This (pause) - is Marketplace... (play theme music)”

Ditto r13

Grossly overpaid Steve Inskeep's predictable response to any mildly surprising or discomfiting report: "Wow."

Endless and frequent interruptions by underwriters and now advertisers (The Shiastsu Massage Chair") on MORNING EDITION.

Lots of vocal fry. But have to admit, stopped listening to it precisely because of this, years ago.

r18 -- YES!!!

Terry Gross , like, uses the unnecessary word "like" constantly. Reminds me of a teenage girl, like the kind who like, says the word "like" all the time.

Windsor Johnston's sex robot voice. White guilt. Chewiness.

I love Terry Gross and annoyed she gets Fridays off.

*and am annoyed

R27: She doesn't get Friday off, most stations don't air the show that day for Ira Flatow. So they package it as Fresh Air Weekend so stations can fill the dead hours of Saturday and Sunday.

Jolly-jagging Saturday morning quiz and talent shows and their ilk. Klezmer music interludes. Rare-ingredient cooking shows and the hordes of Ira Glass wannabes with that voice inflection, you know the one?

I was involved as a contract engineer at a small local NPR station. Under Trump, in general, federal grant money has dried up, and begging is necessary to make up the shortfall. Tech budgets suffer when money is short. NPR gets theirs.

Complaint: vocal fry. I hate it.

Does Cokie Roberts still do her weak-assed rehash of the previous day's events? All she fucking did was repeat headlines from yesterday's newspapers. No insight, no real interpretation.

R31 I love when they bring Cokie Roberts on. Even the introduction for her is weak-assed and tentative, “As she comes here on some Monday mornings, here’s Cokie Roberts with headlines...”

If you’re just joining this thread, we’re talking about NPR annoyances.

One of the only things that doesn't annoy me about NPR is the begging for money. It's not like they have a choice. But they DO have a choice in how they train their presenters to speak. And in that, they choose wrongly, and have done so for years.

Yeah, the pledge drives are annoying but big stations like WNYC will always get their funding. Give money to small stations whose audience is surrounded by deplorables. Sometimes NPR shows are all there is except right-wing ranting, live stock reports, and religion. I give to Red River Radio that broadcasts over parts of the South and Texas.

Mary Louise Kelly makes a lot of mouth noises, cuts people off midsentence due to time, and sounds like a frog.

I can't believe so many of you are picking on Terry Gross, of all people!!!

She's a goddess. So well-informed about her guests and the subject matter. She asks great specific questions and it's clear her guestst are thoroughly engaged by her. As am I.

Full disclosure: This thread does receive partial funding from NPR and some of its affiliate stations.

Fart jokes on Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me. WHET class?

I hate the sound effect that makes the tiny studio audience sitting in a local bank on Wait! Wait! Don't Tell Me! sound like they're in the Roman Colisseum.

Alec Baldwin's "cultured voice" - that he uses for the CONSTANT promos for "Here's The Thing".

[quote]Mary Louise Kelly makes a lot of mouth noises

Could you be more specific/descriptive?

[quote]Kai Ryssdal saying “This (pause) - is Marketplace... (play theme music)”

Kai is not an NPR employee. All the variations of Marketplace (along with countless other pubic radio shows) are owned and produced by American Public Media - the production arm of Minnesota Public Radio. Former MPR CEO Bill Kling built a sizable public/private media empire during his tenure that at one time even included a for profit mail order retailer (Rivertown Trading) and many other side ventures. MPR is still the second largest producer of content for local public stations. Ultimately it's the house that untold millions of dollars in revenue from A Prairie Home Companion built.

The young black fella, what's-his-name, who took over for the old white lady, what's-her-name? He used to annoy me. Now I like him.

Kai Ryssdal is so fratty douchebro.

Terry Gross is also a good sport. Here she is in Mike Birbiglia's video in which she sends herself up and plays a bank robber.

Jonathan Schwartz. But he's gone now.

I love Paul Cavalconte, his replacement, who plays the same great music without all the aged and wandering chatter.

[quote]Mary Louise Kelly makes a lot of mouth noises, cuts people off midsentence due to time, and sounds like a frog.

Mary Louise, since the retirement of Diane Rehm, is probably the savviest and most demanding interviewer on public radio. I was thrilled when she was named Robert Siegel's successor. She has a gravitas her three more chipper co-hosts lack.

[quote]Jonathan Schwartz. But he's gone now.

I didn't know.

I'm glad.

[quote] without all the aged and wandering chatter.

Yes, I hated the wandering chatter too.

I used to live in a hellish area served by Red River Radio. Every other radio station was Christian rock. NOTHING BUT Christian rock and black gospel music. In the Deep South that's what rednecks and country black people listen to-- not country. Red River Radio made me feel like I was part of civilization. So yes, as much as it annoys me, I am grateful for NPR.

[quote]Mary Louise, since the retirement of Diane Rehm, is probably the savviest and most demanding interviewer on public radio. I was thrilled when she was named Robert Siegel's successor. She has a gravitas her three more chipper co-hosts lack.

But the mouth noises. What do you have to say about that?

[quote]So yes, as much as it annoys me, I am grateful for NPR.

Gratitude aside, mouth noises are unacceptable on the radio. So is vocal fry.

Love NPR

The only mild annoyance is when "sponsors" messages are as long as a standard commercial and they pretend it's not a commercial.

That, and I can't deal with listening during pledge drives

I'm Lakshmi Singh.

NYers will know what I mean.

Young reporters who start every other sentence with "I mean...". It’s not only NPR, I hear it on MSNBC as well. Where did these people learn to speak English?

Where can I get a grant for a one-hour recording of NPR mouth noises and dramatic pauses? Maybe a little klezmer thrown in somewhere?

No one has replaced the Car Talk brothers and their crazy giggling.

The Mary Louise Kelly mouth noises are almost like her mouth lacks moisture and her tongue makes these smacking noises as she talks.

[quote] I'm Lakshmi Singh.

I adore how bored she sounds when she's reading the news.

Jazz, I fucking hate jazz, give me more opera, classical, world music, anything except jazz. Also, I wish they would do some original drama like the BBC does, or at least air some of the BBC radio dramas, like a radio version of "Masterpiece."

That Ted Talk show is unbeaeable. Smug assholes oversharing.

I find Ari Shapiro annoying, specifically when he's interviewing people.

[quote]But the mouth noises. What do you have to say about that?

We have a new troll - the Mary Louise Kelly Mouth Noises Troll!

Frankly - I don't hear them or would give a flying fuck even if I did. Remember - I earlier praised Diane Rehm, who due to an chronic illness gave a whole new meaning to vocal fry - but she was still the most incisive and unforgiving interviewer in the mainstream media.

One of the NPR-affiliate guys in my town sounds a lot like Goofy. He brings out the kid in me as I laugh at him.

The magic thing, using his kids as props...

Sorry, that's "annoying things about NPH". My bad.

I can't bear Ira Flatow.

I don't know what he looks like but he sounds like every math/science club/audio visual aids dweeb I went to high school with. He sounds so unsure of himself yet talks on and on.

NPR, the place for people with a face for radio, and a voice for books.

Every goddamn person has some overly annoying accent, affect, lisp or vocal fry.

[quote]I'm Lakshmi Singh.

I'm Duane Brown

I'm Jack Spear

I'm Corva Coleman

To be honest it's a drive time party game for me. Guess the reader and imitate the grandiose vocal inflections as the NPR top of the hour newsreader identifies themselves. Unfortunately their newest team member doesn't quite have the same impact:

I'm Doualy Xaykaothao

[quote]I can't bear Ira Flatow. I don't know what he looks like

Now you do.

IIRC, Lakshmi Singh is frequently followed by the BBC Newshour with Rasia Iqbal, who, in the way of the Brits, pronounces it "Rah-SEE-ah"

And if noticed that some NPR reporters have extended the meme of overly romancing the pronunciation of Spanish place names to Mandarin.

YES, R36! JFC, when I'm trapped in the car (and am between Sirius/XM subscriptions) and that chick comes on, I simply lose the will to live.

R42, it's like my old friend described actor David Thewliss's voice to me years ago--imagine your mouth is super-dry, and each time you open your mouth, there's a dry, almost smacking sound coming from the movement of your dry tongue against your dry hard palate and your dry inner cheeks. Every word. Every sentence. Every news story. For three hours. Smack. Smack. Smack.

Then there are the otherworldly uvular clicks--like, how the FUCK [italic]dry[/italic] does your oral mucosa have to be for your gotdamn UVULA to click? Repeatedly?

Smack-click. Click-smack. Smack-click.

Then there's the voice itself, like a lady golfer/high school girls' basketball coach speaking with her chin tucked into her neck, through a turtleneck sweater pulled up over her mouth.

No, No. I just can't. She's even worse than MSNBC's girls' lacrosse team captain Kasie Hunt.

When they play a great song in between shows, and you get into it, then they cut it off for the next show to start.

R63, after getting used to it, I NEVER noticed Diane Rehm's voice, just as I forgot all about RFK Jr's vocal issues when he had his Air America radio show. I found both their vocal TONES quite pleasant, not even counting how brilliant they were.

But Mary Louise Kelly? A bridge too gotdamn far, man.

[quote]We have a new troll - the Mary Louise Kelly Mouth Noises Troll!

AND we have a humorless Mary Louise Kelly fangay.

Does anyone know if Leonard Lopate now has a talk show on another station?

His firing was really shocking. Not that I necessarily doubt the indiscretions but, I guess because we only knew his cultured voice and quick mind, the firing seemed to come out of nowhere, if that makes any sense.

I hate Joshua Johnson 1A. Seems it’s always on and he is just annoying as fuck. Same with Ari Shapiro talk about someone who is over hyped.

I went and listened to clip of Mary Louise Kelly's voice. She DOES have a mouth sound problem! Maybe it's the sound engineers' fault?

Vocal fry is now acceptable on NPR, especially WNYC in NYC. Too much coffee-clutching and valley girl speak. less news, more b.s. pop culture magazine chatter. No longer smart. It never ceases to amaze me that in the USA, many people who make a living with their voice & speech, never study voice or speech. BBC and other world reporters, radio talent and presenters are exceptional. In the USA they are former beauty queens or current bloggers. ugh.

Ira Glass is so whiny. I can’t deal.

[quote]BBC and other world reporters, radio talent and presenters are exceptional.

Really? The voices (continuity etc.) on BBC TV are horrendous.

R80 The BBC was better before they decided to go PC and have regional accents.

BBC talent generally knows how to pronounce Standard British and most speak additional foreign languages and can pronounce names, places, etc.

[quote]The BBC was better before they decided to go PC and have regional accents.

and moving to the fucking Midlands was the last straw, quite frankly.

[quote]The BBC was better before they decided to go PC and have regional accents.

along with calling England "The UK" - fuck that shit.

[quote]Does anyone know if Leonard Lopate now has a talk show on another station?

Lenny is now on WBAI in NYC. The station has been losing money forever, but Lopate has a large salary plus a producer. Most on-air talent work for free as a labor of love. Lenny and his ego aren't very popular there.

BAI was always a radical radio station, but its new Pacifica masters seem to think it can be another NPR. No. The pledge drives are sad; the old rad supporters are dead and it's not uncommon for hours of money beg to end up with nothing. Young people don't give a shit about radio. Well, BAI had a good run.

[quote]I went and listened to clip of Mary Louise Kelly's voice. She DOES have a mouth sound problem! Maybe it's the sound engineers' fault?

Maybe it's the water fountain's fault she never uses it?

I have a gigantic Norse cock.

I live in Dallas; my station is KERA. I was a lifelong listener of public radio until the last 7-8 years. I miss the news and reporting; I don't need to hear everyone joking with each other, trying to prove how funny and cool nerds think they are.

Anyway, it could be a coincidence as I now very seldom listen, but every time I tune in to this station, it seems that they're having a pledge drive. Their CEO, Maryann Alhadeff, has a salary of over a half-million dollars per year ($505k+).

I looked it up on Charity Navigator. Below,is a link if you want to check out your own station's CEO pay.

Lakshmi Singh is a gift.

Maybe, R87, but ya got no lips.

While I love BBC, sometimes I get famished for the blonds.

Inskeep's guffaws, Ryssdal's smarminess, Ari Shapiro 's queen voice, Richard Hake's dyslexia, Elsa Chang's fake empathy, Ira Glass's dreadful diction.

Love and lust for Scott Horsley (Horse-hung). That deep commanding voice, the way he says ,"My pleasure!" when thanked for his story. He'd be fun in the sack. And he's cute.

I miss Todd Zwillich from The Takeaway. Very smart, good interviewer, good voice. And a face made for TV.

Paul Cavalcanti is smart and funny and such a relief from The Gasbag.

If you are just joining us, we are talking about NPR interviewers who talk over their guests and make you want to fucking scream while you are driving your car.

Yaaasssssss! WEHT Todd Zwillich?? Loved his voice and demeanor and was pleasantly shocked when I googled him to discover he's as sexy and handsome as any CNN reporter. I hope he's making his way to CNN or MSNBC.

Did Leonard Lopate ever do an interview to defend himself? My god, one minute he was there (for 20 or so years) and another minute he was gone forever!

At least that serial harasser John Hockenberry is gone. Who knew?

The sports show is torture.

The “sure” thing has crept its way into so many interviews, it has to be the work of some fuckhead junior producer who put it on the prep script, it’s everywhere!

It's only fairly recently that I've had the feeling that field reporters, when being interviewed by a "regular," are on a script. For example, they'll mention a story point, seemingly in response to a question, and right away have a clip to play to validate what they just said.

“This statistic/fact/number might surprise you...”

(From linked article)

During a recent long car ride whose soundtrack was a medley of NPR podcasts, I noticed a verbal mannerism during scripted segments that appeared on just about every show. I’ve heard the same tic in countless speeches, TED talks and Moth StorySLAMS — anywhere that features semi-informal first-person narration.

If I could attempt to transcribe it, it sounds kind of like, y’know … this.

That is, in addition to looser language, the speaker generously employs pauses and, particularly at the end of sentences, emphatic inflection. (This is a separate issue from upspeak, the tendency to conclude statements with question marks?) A result is the suggestion of spontaneous speech and unadulterated emotion. The irony is that such presentations are highly rehearsed, with each caesura calculated and every syllable stressed in advance.

In literary circles, the practice of poets reciting verse in singsong registers and unnatural cadences is known, derogatorily, as “poet voice.” I propose calling this phenomenon “NPR voice” (which is distinct from the supple baritones we normally associate with radio voices).

This plague of pregnant pauses and off-kilter pronunciations must have come from someplace. But … where?

A primary cause of NPR voice is the sheer expansion of people broadcasting today. Whereas once only trained professionals were given a television or radio platform, amateurs have now taken over the airwaves and Internet. They may not have the thespian skills necessary to restrain the staginess of their elocution, leading to “indicating,” or overacting to express emotion.

By now, however, people trying to sell something — whether it’s a pair of jeans or a presidential candidate — know that consumers (and voters) are ever skeptical of faux sincerity. To subvert our suspicions, then, these salespeople reveal the ostensibly “genuine” cracks in their facades. How could I be deceiving you, the catch in the voice, the exposed seam in a sweater or the actor cracking up during an outtake asks, when I’m vulnerably baring my … flaws?

Speaking on (the more traditionally velvet-voiced) Alec Baldwin’s WNYC radio program “Here’s the Thing,” the most influential contemporary speaker of NPR voice, Ira Glass, the host of “This American Life,” said his own colloquial broadcasting style had anti-authoritarian roots.

“Back when we were kids, authority came from enunciation, precision,” Mr. Glass said. “But a whole generation of people feel like that character is obviously a phony — like the newscaster on ‘The Simpsons’ — with a deep voice and gravitas.”

For his more intimate storytelling, Mr. Glass “went in the other direction,” he said. “Any story hits you harder if the person delivering it doesn’t sound like a news robot but, in fact, sounds like a real person having the reactions a real person would.”

Nonetheless, the preplanned responses of NPR personalities sound somewhat counterfeit when stacked against the largely, if not completely, unscripted monologues that open rawer podcasts, such as Marc Maron’s “WTF” and Brad Listi’s literary “Otherppl” podcast. Mr. Listi, for instance, frequently allows for lengthy pauses in between sentences that convey, without stage directions, the process of someone thinking aloud.

Mr. Glass found inspiration in Susan Stamberg, who began hosting NPR’s “All Things Considered” in 1972. “She seemed like some Upper West Side, New York lady leaning into the microphone, mensch-ily talking into the radio,” he told Mr. Baldwin.

(more at link)

Who woulda thunk r89 that Lakshmi Singh was, for the most part, a down to earth, chubby Caribbean Hispanic woman with a slight lisp. I always pictured her as the journalistic equivalent of Padma Lakshmi. An exotic creature with a speaking voice to match.

r100, very interesting article. This stood out to me:

[quote] How could I be deceiving you, the catch in the voice, the exposed seam in a sweater or the actor cracking up during an outtake asks, when I’m vulnerably baring my … flaws?

You hear this especially when they transition and start a new story. The announcers use this seemingly conversational, hestitant-stumbling kind of speech. It's very distracting and makes me not want to listen.

Again from r100's article, Ira Glass says:

[quote] “Back when we were kids, authority came from enunciation, precision,” Mr. Glass said. “But a whole generation of people feel like that character is obviously a phony — like the newscaster on ‘The Simpsons’ — with a deep voice and gravitas.”

I'm Generation X and I imagine he's talking about me. Yet I find that with traditional newscaster voice, it's easier to focus on the content and not get distracted by the personality of the speaker.

Greetings,

I'm afraid Ofeibea Quist-Arcton would scare the upspeak right out of me.

In local news, I fucking hate motherfucking Michael Krasny on KQED. Bitch pronounced "cache" as "cake".

[quote]NPR, the place for people with a face for radio, and a voice for books.

Hey, I resemble that remark (though not a full on employee of NPR).

Cokie Roberts is who started using "disconnect" as a noun.

Live, from NPR News in Washington, I'm Dave Mattingly.

Dave always sounds bored by the sound of his own name.

Let's do the numbers!

Funny, I’m always annoyed by the way their brainiac guests answer questions with “So,...” and end the answers with “right?”

And EVERY fucking thing is about race or immigration. Or trans.

R40, that is an auditorium named for a bank. It's the size of a smallish theater.

Zoe Chase and her egregiously Midwestern accent. It’s like an SNL skit, and I suspect it’s an affectation.

R112 It doesn't look like a smallish theater, my High School Auditorium was larger.

I sort of get a kick out of Shay(sp?) Stevens, who has a beautiful voice but must be dyslexic. One can pretty much count on her fumbling something. I hear her only at midnight and 1am, when she does the brief updates.

R114, it goes back farther than that. Many more rows. Check out the "Installations" tab at the home page of The Griffin Company here.

R116 That still looks like a high school auditorium, not a legitimate theater.

Ofeibea Quist-Arcton, Dakaaaaaaaaar!

R111: Now that's an absolute lie! But please continue to make shit up about what NPR talks about.

If you are just joining us, we are discussing Ofeibea Quist-Arcton, who is a radio journalist, correspondent, commentator and broadcaster from Dakar. She works for National Public Radio, reporting on queer and trans issues in West Africa.

Once you notice Windsor Johnston's very sharp use of the letter S it will drive you crazy.

She almost whistles it.

I appreciate having NPR. I wish the weekend shows on my local station were better. Not in to NPR “comedy” shows.

Does ANYONE enjoy NPR "comedy" shows? They are unbearably lame. If Metafilter ran an entertainment network, I'd imagine it would look like the NPR weekend lineup. "

I love Wait Wait, especially Paula Poundstone.

Heyyyy, it's Shereen Marisol Meraji.

R119, maybe it’s just WNYC. And I might be exaggerating slightly, but not much.

Like Windsor Johnston’s sharp “s”, once you notice it, it’s all you hear. There might be stories about a coyote in Central Park or an interview with a Coen Brother, but there’s probably a 50/50 chance that what you’re about to hear is about race (specifically black, because they never address Asians) or immigration. The attention given other “liberal” agenda items is pitiful. Once in a while there will be a story checking in on GAY rights (but they call it “LGBTQ”) or women’s reproductive rights.

It’s like listening to Tumblr half the time.

Come back, Tod Zwillich!

Todd

Speaking of their lame weekend comedy shows, I can't bear Sufira Eisenberg (is that her name?) and her lame trivia contest.

[quote]Like Windsor Johnston’s sharp “s”, once you notice it, it’s all you hear.

I don't listen to NPR, so I purposely sought out this Windsor Johnston. She was every bit as sssibilant ass you dessscribe, I noticed. And then I realized she was sssimply the announssser introdusssing Windsssor Johnssston.

They were both sssibilant AF.

If you’re just joining us, Cokie Roberts is here, as she is some Mondays, to help us with the news headlines of the week. Cokie, help us out.

I went to high school with someone who was the Voice of NPR couple of years ago. They got rid of her because of vocal fry, I believe.

You buhLEEEEEVVV, R132?

I love Cokie Roberts and her explanations of the news.

It's my favorite segment on NPR

This thread has really made me laugh... I don't even listen to NPR that much, but you've hit on all of it.

[quote]Then there are the otherworldly uvular clicks--like, how the FUCK dry does your oral mucosa have to be for your gotdamn UVULA to click? Repeatedly?

This killed me.

R129, hi it's me, Ophira Eisenberg. I consider myself the funniest and most charming doyenne ever of female comedians. I'm also the most interesting person you will ever know, and the best game show moderator ever.

While it's true that I don't write the lame questions, you are supposed to be so enchanted by me that you don't even notice.

Welcome Back. If you’re just joining us, I’m Audie Cornish and this is All Things Considered. Gene Demby is here to file a report on Avocado Toast: Millenial Hipster Treat or Cultural Appropriation? We begin with Gene’s interview of a young Honduran woman who remembers her grandma making “Pan Con Avogate” daily for breakfast back in Honduras as part of their family tradition.

Interviewee: Right. So here’s the thing...

Hey there, I'm NPR Health Corishpondin Rob Stein and I have some draw-dropping noosh about gene editeen from ChinChin provinch in Shyna.

R92, you wrote, Inskeep's guffaws, Ryssdal's smarminess, Ari Shapiro 's queen voice, Richard Hake's dyslexia, Elsa Chang's fake empathy, Ira Glass's dreadful diction.

Love and lust for Scott Horsley (Horse-hung). That deep commanding voice, the way he says ,"My pleasure!" when thanked for his story. He'd be fun in the sack. And he's cute.

I miss Todd Zwillich from The Takeaway. Very smart, good interviewer, good voice. And a face made for TV.

Paul Cavalcanti is smart and funny and such a relief from The Gasbag.

Lord we must have drinks - I completely agree and don't get me started on Rachel Martin - she is the worst. Personally, I love Mary Louise Kelly (a persistent and focused interviewer without being obnoxious; she also writes books which are nothing like her on-air persona) and Audie Cornish (who I've met and she is bright, intelligent, funny, and warm).

I googled for a Scott Horsley pic and I think you're right.

Whenever I hear Scott Horsely's name, I always neigh like a mare.

Well, that's not what Scott H-H H-H-H-H-Hhhhhorsely said on NPR this morning!"

My husband laughs every time.

My very favorite is hilariously named Kat Chow. If your name we’re Katherine Chow, why would you choose “Kat” as your nickname, when there are so many other choices for Katherine?

Were, god damn it, were!!

R141, also, she sounds like the type who would read you for filth if you made any remark about her name whatsoever.

Imagine working for NPR around such joyless people that everyone has to pretend that's not even a slightly funny name, even if you were giving a like-minded coworker a ride home, you couldn't say 'Have you ever found Cat Chow in the breakroom [snort!]?' for fear of being fired and publicly Lopated on grounds of xenophobia.

Elenor Beardsley, Paaaris

Ofebia Quist-Arcton is an absolute joy to listen to - actually, she's "always a pleasure".

NPR's foreign correspondent coverage is unmatched in the US - only CBS News has overseas corespondents who I think are actually intelligent and know the regions they cover.

It's the foundashinnnnn of all my beliefs, R133

Soraya Sarhaddi NELLLLL ... sssssoooonnnn, NPR News, Berlin

[QUOTE]Elenor Beardsley, Paaaris

The fact that their Paris correspondent has the thickest Texas drawl this side of LBJ is actually kind of amusing. You have to wonder how it affects her French. It's even more amusing because she's from the Carolinas and not Texas.

Haha R147 has me fucking rolling. She falls down through like 4-5 notes and slows waaaay down when saying her last name. I love it.

Mary Louise Kelly talking through her nose, Ari oozing bottom, and that new gal Ayesha Rascoe trying to not sound ghetto. I love me some NPR.

I do hate the scripted Q&A with field reporters though. Mary Louise is notorious for trying to ask the questions as if the reporter doesn’t have an answer prepared. So cringy.

FYI - Mary Louise sounded particularly clicky and dry mouthed today. Oh the noises she makes.

There's a White House repoter on the NPR podcast who's borderline autistic. She interrupts the other repoters during their discussions with sound effects ("Ding ding ding!") and weird non sequiters. She thinks she's hilarious but she's actually awful. She interrupts Stege Inskeep and Mara Liason routinely when they're at their most serious and professional.

She's super annoying.

Mush mouth Gene Denby shouldn't speak so quickly. He has marbles in his mouth.

Tamara Keith

R151

Not a radio voice.

Gene. Marbles.

LaDINO USA.

The exaggerated "authentic" Latino accents... Too much.

Super annoying.

Code Switch. "Be easy."

Code Switch is THE epitome of NPR at its most annoying.

A super liberal elementary school teacher in Brooklyn was criticized for teaching students about a dance that miners in South Africa made up and perform in rubber boots.

I'm like, why the hell are they even teaching something like that? Math, science, reading. Not dancing in galoshes.

So offensive. Yeah, let's go with that.

Gumboot dance. Yeah, that's art.

The loooong and loud electronica music interstitials on Marketplace. Wastes at least five minutes per episode. Crazy.

R161m the long musical interludes during Marketplace - an entire program of annoyance. Super smarmy Kai Ryssdal (who sounds like a used car salesman at a beach resort trying to pick up the 'babes' he meets at a tiki bar). He's sounds perpetually bored by the subject/topic he's covering. If not bored, definitely distracted, wanting to do something other than conduct an interview. I hate how everyone is always, "Hey Kai", "Hey Kai", Hey... " So casual, off-the-cuff, hip! No you're not - you're middle-aged public radio employees and it's embarrassing to hear you sound faux-hip.

I loathe Ryssdal with the heat of a thousand suns.

R131, she's known to her friends--of whom she has many--as "Coke-Head" Roberts.

R151 anyone who interrupts Steve Inskeep is jake by me.

I feel bad for Ayesha Rascoe. She's smart, but that voice (the diction, really) is appalling.

R162 bullseye

R47, Schwartz and Cavalconte are not on NPR, they're heard only on New York Pubic Radio's WNYC. Paul doubles on their Classical WQXR.

Speaking of Inskeep, he just praised noted alt-right bonehead Erick Erickson for being "reasonable" in doubting Buzzfeed's breaking news about Trump instructing Cohen to lie.

Melissa Bloooooock always sounds like she’s about to lapse into a coma.

Hopefully WNYC will change. The culture there seems hysterical.

So they've never really come up with a real replacement for Leonard Lopate, have they?

They have, as of about two months ago: Allison Stewart. She's okay, a bit giddy, and she talks too fast, so that her words are a bit mashed up. I think of the various interim people they had for about a year I most liked Jonathan Capehart, a gay journalist who had sometimes subbed for Lopate. A few of the interim people were very obviously chosen for "diversity" and not because of skill.

R124 I do too! Paula makes that show.

The way some of the journalists pronounce their names after they spoken in a completely different dialect during their piece - Adolfo Guzmen Lopez and Lakshmi Sing come to mind as the biggest offenders. And to whoever mentioned the Kai Rizzdols music at the end of market place.

I’ll take any of them over AM radio.

Yes, but that's a low bar.

[quote]r46 Terry Gross is also a good sport. Here she is in Mike Birbiglia's video in which she sends herself up and plays a bank robber.

[italic] [bold] Fresh Air 2: 2 Fresh 2 Furious[/bold] [/italic]

!!!

I think she's smart and funny. I don't understand dislike for her. Of course I also like Elizabeth Warren and I know lots of other liberals don't.

It annoys me that when they have people sharing their personal stories (on whatever show it is), the conclusions are so tenuous, so often relying on "maybe".

"Maybe it was the light, or maybe it was the time of day, but it occurred to me this may be something I should look into further. Or maybe it was something else entirely."

[italic]Why am I listening to you??

R165, I'm with you about Ayesha. She sounds like a kid in high school. Or middle school.

It's "LaTHino USA" said really fast. Not "LaDINO USA" lol.

This morning, Rob Stein's speech defect was apparent in his report on "gene-edited babies."

I WANT TO like Ayesha.

R111 That's an awful millennial thing.

They made a point they consider brilliant, and then say "Right? So..." God shut the fucking fuck up.

R151/R153, Tamara Keith is the worst.

The class privilege and virtue signaling.

I bet Air America would do well in these times. The railings would be through the roof.

I laugh so hard to myself every time this threads gets bumped. I can’t get over that damn Mary Louise Kelly and the frog in her throat.

I can't stand all the story-teling This American Life knockoffs. The Moth. Snap Judgement (Someone thought adding intrusive sound effects and louder background music would improve that genre. It does not.) Then there is that boring pointless TED talk show.

I listen to the Planet Money podcast and some of the voices are so fried I picture these young women as having chain smoked since they were toddlers.

All of the NPR podcasts have promos for the other podcasts and some insert an extra episode that is just an episode of one of the newer podcasts that is still trying to build an audience. Ugh.

I enjoy Wait Wait, and On The Media (Brooke Gladstone has good insights). I don't understand why anyone still contributes to NYPR after learning the executive salaries, though.

I'm a left liberal who wants to see CPB, PBS and NPR fully fucking funded by the government again. You do know the reason the government yanked funding right - because those agencies did HONEST reporting and the honesty of it made Republicans look VERY bad. Which was in fact VERY true.

NPR is so smug and self-satisfied. But whatever. To each xis own.

Only one mention of me here? I AM SORAYA SAHARDI NELSON damn it.

I hate various hosts of course, but what really rubs me the wrong way about NPR is that they all insist on using this affected and grammatically abhorrent phrasing of "an historic...". The word "an" should only be used before words that begin with vowels or vowel sounds. Whenever I hear them say "an historic event/occasion/whatever" it sounds like nails on a chalkboard to me, or like a retarded person who can't figure out grammar.

"My very favorite is hilariously named Kat Chow. If your name we’re Katherine Chow, why would you choose “Kat” as your nickname, when there are so many other choices for Katherine?"

You don't understand. Kat is her middle name. Her first name is Purina.

I swear I heard the UK correspondent (forget his name) pronounce England as “Eng-ger-LAND.” Jesus. He’s awful.