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Larry King's UFO Show

If you missed it, Larry King had his once-every-three-years UFO special on Friday night. LK featured a bevy of esoteric talking heads, including Stan Friedman, Jesse Marcel Jr., James Fox, Michael Shermer, Buzz Aldrin, Fife Symington, and, drumroll please, George "The Noor" Noory. You can find a transcript of the festivus HERE. Be forewarned that the transcript is awful and riddled with quotes being attributed to "Unidentified Male", which is actually indicative of the episode, itself, as it was a total clusterfuck, full of crosstalk, especially after esoterica's resident douche bag Michael Shermer showed up.

Running through stuff I saw that stood out to me ... Friedman, Marcel Jr., and Julie Shuster, on location in Roswell, kicked off the show to talk about Roswell. I want to hope and believe that Shuster's placement was a decision on the part of the program, and not her, as she was seated in front of a prop alien being lit by a strobe light (seriously). Wow. Way to denigrate Walter Haut's deathbed confession. Whoever thought that alien prop was a good idea for a background piece ought to be swiftly kicked in the grundel.

Also, Larry couldn't seem to get his act together with the cameramen, as he'd hold up a picture or a newspaper headline for the camera and it would take a good 3 minutes or so for the shot to change. It was cable access bad.

I actually changed the channel for a while and when I came back, James Fox and Michael Shermer were on with Friedman and Marcel. Shermer brought some toy aliens to, ostensibly, shit all over Ufology. He and Friedman were really going at it a few times during the show, which served as the lone highlights of the evening. Shermer would ramble on and talk out of his ass and make bold proclamations and then when Friedman would try and rebut his nonsense, he'd talk all over Friedman's response. He also kept dropping the term "probe", as an additional little dig at the UFO folks (what a clown shoe).

I missed Noory's grand entrance, but it looks like he and Larry only really exchanged pleasantries and spoke for probably less than two minutes. Larry did ask the hilarious and pertinent question of "what percentage [of C2C callers] are Kookyville ?" Noory estimated it to be ten percent. I'd say it is more like 33 to 40 percent, though I'm also including outright morons in that equation. (And let's not even start discussing potential Kookyville residents amongst the guests, the "science advisor", and Dr. Morgus.) I was fortunate enough to watch the show with a friend of mine, who is not a harcore esoteric cretin like me. His reaction to Noory was, "Is he wearing a wig ?" I had to explain The Noor's unfortunate reliance on a strange combination of "Just for Men" and shoe polish for his hair coloring needs.

We flipped back over to the show for the final 15 minutes and it just resembled a disaster scene. For starters, they mashed Larry King, Buzz Aldrin, Marcel Jr., Friedman, Shermer, Fox, Symington, and Noory around one table. Poor Stanton was so squeezed out, it looked like he was seated in the coat room. Everything ground to a halt as Buzz Aldrin rambled on endlessly, complete with a cheesy model, to tell some story that never really went anywhere. No one seemed to have a clue what he was talking about, including the folks who put up the graphics, and it ate up the bulk of the time I was watching at the end.

At the close, the final verdict was that Buzz and Shermer were anti-UFO, Friedman and the rest were pro-UFO. James Fox also embarrassingly just pimped his movie non-stop throughout the show and was the picture perfect cliche of the UFO guy with something to sell. (I will give him subversive kudos for managing to get on both this show and Nightline in the past week to schill his movie.)

All in all, it was an interesting hour, more so for the interpersonal dynamics of the show than the actual content. Way too many guests were featured and they could have done without Marcel, Shuster, Fox, and Noory and made for a much better showcase of views. Hell, a straight up Friedman v. Shermer episode would have been boffo. The lack of focus really became a hindrance as they tried to cover Roswell, Phoenix Lights, UFOs in general, and Buzz Aldrin into a 40 minute show replete with 8 or so guests and their requisite intros, outros, and ass kissing.

For all the people who appreciate any mainstream publicity for Ufology that they can get, I suppose it was a good thing. But I've a feeling this was yet another lateral step and that in two or three years, half of these faces and some new ones will return to Larry King and rehash the same conversation once again. The UFO topic should be a monthly one on King (and other programs), but will, sadly, instead be relegated to mothballs until the next flap or anniversary of note.

C2C's Roswell special

Keeping the Roswellian theme going, on last Friday's C2C (7.6.7), The Noor touched down in Roswell, New Mexico for the high holy Ufological holiday that is the Roswell festivus. I have mixed feelings about this one. For starters, it came about only a few short hours after C2C dropped the bomb on the Coastriders forum, so there was already an underlying tension there, thus giving me a slightly over critical eye. But, in looking at the episode in retrospect, it kind of sums up a lot of both the problems and strengths of the show right now.

As far as the strengths go, the episode featured a grand total of 12 guests, which is pretty impressive. It was also, obviously, broadcast on-location in Roswell, NM, which is some nice ambition from C2C, who seem to usually be content with mailing it in. And Noory did a great job as the emcee of the evening, keeping the flow going and really more presiding over the affair than doing much in the way of interviewing. Richard C. Hoagland was also surprisingly entertaining as co-host (more on that later).

Now, for the problems. One, the show was only 3 hours, as they actually ended the episode with a one hour replay of the wholly unrelated Travis Walton interview from a couple of years ago. I hope that this was for technical / satellite reasons, because I find it hard to believe they couldn't get four hours of material out of the 60th anniversary of Roswell from Roswell. That place had to be crawling with kooks, liars, nuts, true believers, contactees, and genuine decent normal folks too (though a small minority). Also, there were surely tons of UFO "personalities" in town that would cut off their pinky toe for five minutes on C2C, so cutting the show short was a big faux pas (again, unless it was a technical thing).

Second, I'm chagrined by Hoagland being the special co-host for the evening. It comes off as completely disingenuous of him to even be in the state after he beat his chest, proclaimed that he "doesn't do UFOs" and crapped all over Ufology last Summer. He actually used this Hoagy-ism during the episode while trying to spin some convoluted reason for being there. (Something having to do with his belief of impending disclosure) It comes off as Hoagland trying to have his cake and eat it too, (i.e. crapping all over Ufology and then co-opting it when it suits him), but isn't that what we expect from him by now ? His hypocrisy is so blatant that I found myself more amused by it than angered.

Which leads to me where I am torn on the Hoagland issue. As much as I loathe the concept of him even being on the Roswell festivus, I really enjoyed his performance. I just can't help it ... I love the guy. There was a sublime hilarity to the whole thing, as I was left wondering how he'd manage to spin Roswell into something having to do with himself, how he'd interract with The Noor in a co-host role, and what twisted RCH machination he would throw into the Roswell mix.

And, of course, he didn't let me down. Somehow, he commandeered the final hour of the live show and had a pretty interesting exchange with both Richard Dolan and Steve Bassett. The interplay between Dolan and Hoags was intense as hell and worthy of catching if you missed it. That was probably the best hour of the whole special. Some speculated that this was Hoagland's tryout for the Sunday night gig on C2C (which would be cool for a few weeks but grow old fast) and all I can say about that is that he probably went to the anti-binnall school of radio hosting, as his questions took up more time than the guests answers and he had no problem interrupting the answers to re-assert his points. That said, his questions were far more thoughtful and engaging that we usually get from the textbook interviews on C2C.

The rest of the special, prior to that, was a mishmash of embarassing moments, like Noory brown nosing E-level celebrities Dean Haglund and Chase Masterson, or just irrelevent guests appearing for no apparent reason other than that they happened to also be in Roswell that weekend. (I'm looking at you, Louis Turi). On the bright side, Jordan Maxwell made an all too short pop-in to reveal that the "powers that be" threatened to eliminate him after his infamous disappearance from C2C a few years ago. Rosemary Ellen Guiley and Roger Leir also showed up and gave updates on what they were up to.

Therein lies the crux of my annoyance with the special ... aside from the first half hour which featured Stanton Friedman and Jesse Marcel Jr., the episode was less a celebration of Roswell and more a look at what these conferences are really like, with little discussion of the actual reason they are all there (Roswell) and lots of back patting, networking, and plugging of upcoming books, appearances, and specials. That, of course, is less C2C's fault and more the fault of esoterica, in general, which seems to have a case of perpetual "butterfingers", considering how often it drops the ball in big moments.

For the most part, the C2C Roswell special was a fun episode, low on serios content, but high on entertaining moments (some of which were cringe worthy, but still memorable). If not for the lack of a final hour to the live show, it would be amongst the better episodes of the year. As noted at the beginning, the episode sums up a lot of the pros and cons of C2C nowadays : a bit too fluffy and embarrassing at times, with lots of potential for awesomeness but, sadly, falling short.

Other C2C Stuffs

The Week That Was

I heard Ian Punnett's return to the formal Saturday night edition of C2C and it was probably one of the best interviews I've heard on the program in quite some time. Jim Marrs was the guest and Ian was really engaging him with some interesting questions. Some folks thought IP was taking it too hard to Marrs, but I thought it was excellent stuff and not the usual softball 101 type stuff we're used to getting when Jim is on the program. Ian continued his streak of excellence, despite the time slot change. Kudos to IP.

I don't remember much about Noory's Sunday show with Mellen-Thomas Benedict, except that he opened the show parroting the same party line that Ian did the night before : Don't believe the Internet, Art really did retire to spend time with his family. As I said last week (on the Internet, ironically enough), I believe the official reasons's given for Bell's latest retirement, but with both hosts pushing it so hard, it actually made me more suspicious than I was before. Plus, if you don't have the balls to call out the specific sites or at least give a vague idea of who you are talking about, you end up crapping all over all sites, including people like me who are in your camp on this issue, thus confusing everyone.

John Rhodes on Monday was pretty good, but I only gave it a halfhearted chance. I heard some of Jerome Corsi's appearance on Tuesday, but it was like listening to a diet version of Alex Jones. Most of the same material, minus the wild charisma of the Bulldog. I skipped the rest of the week, but I heard that Wednesday's guest JoAnn Parks was a bit of a nutter, talking about how she communicates with her pet crystal skull named Max (seriously). To make matters more hilarious, Hoagland managed to call in with some kind of "science advisor" questions. You slay me, Hoagie.

The Week That Is

The only episode really worth noting is Wednesday's "Tribute to Art Bell". This heavy handed retirement stuff is already wearing thin (what with Noory's "Art Bell Memories" Open Lines on Sunday). Other than that, it's a fairly light week, with a rebroadcast tonight (from 2.28.4 with Brian Green), Archbishop James Long on Monday to discuss exorcisms, Craig Hines talking about ancient manuscripts on Tuesday, the Bell thing on Wednesday, TBA on Thursday, and Open Lines on Friday.

Odds and Ends

The big news of last week went off with a whimper on Thursday evening, as C2C pulled the plug on the Coastriders forum. Despite lots of lamentations from the membership and a variety of methods used to express their disgust with the move, the forum was still coldly eliminated. And while I am still not happy with how everything went down, I'm kind of over the whole story by now. There's nothing we can do, at this point, but move on.

I will respond to a point that was coming out of C2C when people contacted them re: the Coastriders closing. The response was something like, "C'mon, it's only a message board." I just wish they'd take that tact on a uniform basis, instead of endlessly falling all over themselves to kiss the cyber posterior of "John Titor", who is a total message board creation and made most of his "amazing" posts @ the old Art Bell forum.

As I said, though, I'm over it. I may have made a few people @ C2C miffed with last week's binnall report (actually, I know I did) and for that, I am sorry. I tried to be even handed in my approach, but I stepped on a few toes in the process, which I regret. This was more of a personal story for me than one that I could cover as an outsider, try as I might, which is a huge annoyance to me.

The silver lining to the dark cloud was the fact that we've got 50 something new people who joined up over @ www.theusofe.com and the place has really had quite a party atmosphere in the last week. I hope all you left over stragglers make the jump soon.

Next week, we'll talk about the Art Bell Tribute Show, C2C's Ouija Board experiment and any other fun stuff that comes up in the next 5 or so days.

BoA : Audio, Season III

Now is your chance to suggest a guest for BoA : Audio, Season III as we are just in the conception and germination phase of the project. Obviously, I can't guarantee to get your guest suggestion on the show. Sometimes it takes months to pin these folks down, some of them don't want to do interviews, some of them just don't get back to you at all. It's a crap shoot, but I will do my best to take a shot at someone if you want to hear them on the show.

So ... send in your guest suggestion to tbinnall@hotmail.com and I'll see what I can do.

End Notes

1000 apologies for the lateness of this week's bulletin. As I said at the beginning of the column, the lethargy really kept me from doing much all weekend, but I'm hopeful that that will pass soon. Also, I hope everyone who enjoyed our stuff @ the Coastriders has found us in one of the various locations where we post the column.

Plugs : Tomorrow @ binnallofamerica.com, R.Lee's Trickster's Realm. Tuesday, Lesley's Grey Matters. Wednesday, Khyron's The K-Files. Thursday, Hot Newz. And, Friday, I try and get it together and put out a new binnall report.

binnallofamerica.com ... unfiltered esoterica. Until next week, this is binnall, wishing you a stress free week, and signing off.

7.15.7