'Radio Free' Montone: Hold The Weiner... Jokes

By John Montone, 1010 WINS

If you're one of the millions of listeners who wakes up each morning to 1010 WINS, you're likely familiar with the voice, and tone, of the station's intrepid reporter John Montone.

Best known for his no holds barred, man on the street reporting, Montone has been getting in the faces — and ears — of New Yorkers for what seems like an eternity.

Montone is ready to add to his repertoire and bring his unique reporting style to print.

So please take a look and listen to John's new venture: Radio Free Montone — a weekly blog where Montone takes you behind the scenes of news radio in New York City, and gives his observations on reporting in the greatest city in the world.

NEW YORK (1010 WINS) -- We have all heard a news anchor say something like, "The President will make an important announcement." Then an hour or maybe even a day later, "And now, the President's important announcement," followed by...

"You have just heard the President's important announcement." In the news biz we call this "The train's approaching the station. Here it comes, comes comes -- train's at the station -- there it is is is. The train's leaving the station. Bye bye train. Bye bye.

It is predictable, not very informative or interesting and yet we do it in our day-to-day news coverage. We do it over and over again.  "Disgraced former Congressman Anthony Weiner is planning to announce he's a candidate for mayor."

"Disgraced former Congressman Anthony Weiner is at this very moment announcing he is a candidate for mayor."

"That was disgraced former Congressman Anthony Weiner's announcement that he is running for mayor."

And then there's reaction to the news that disgraced former Congressman Anthony Weiner is running for mayor. "Bob from Staten Island tells 1010 WINS he could never vote for the disgraced former Congressman."

Whew. A 24-7 news machine is in a constant feeding frenzy, devouring a diet of fresh information but sometimes all we have to offer it are leftovers.

So it is Weiner, Weiner, Weiner and more Weiner?  As I was driving in to begin my shift at 3:45 Tuesday morning trying to convince myself that the three-day weekend of afternoon naps, sunset and beverages was history and coax myself back into the work day blur of shower, coffee, hit the road and write the story mode, I was dreading having to talk about the woes of Weiner yet again.

My editor told me his poll numbers were down, but I had used "shrinkage," referring to another poll last week or was it the week before?

I would have to substitute "soft" and "limp." And, said my editor, power brokers in the Democratic party were urging Weiner to ... oh no, not again…"pull out."

Even as I uttered those words over the airwaves, e-mails, Facebook posts and Tweets came in. Enough, John! Enough! No more Weiner jokes!

On this day our listeners and followers and friends were right. So I tore up pages of my notebook containing the stories I had written and searched my source copy again for anything original -- a quote that might put the entire sordid affair into some context.

Finally, there it was -- my nugget. A few well-chosen words that explained why we continued to resort to fairly obvious phallic references and penile puns when reporting on Weiner. So let's give props to Governor Cuomo who said of the scandal and its news coverage, "We laugh because if we didn't laugh we would cry."

Got a problem? Mouth Off To Montone! For more 'Radio Free' Montone, click here.

In:
• John Montone