Danehy

An open letter to Jimmy Kimmel about the glory days of tucson radio, fatherhood and that awful GOP healthcare bill

BigStock

Dear Jimmy,

I caught your show the other night. (I'll be honest; I don't watch you every night. Some nights, I just flip back and forth between MSNBC and Fox News, just to see how high I can get my blood pressure. In Trump World, it counts as exercise.)

Congratulations on having another child. You need to figure out what's causing that.

Thank God that the nurses and doctors were able to catch your son's condition in time and perform the operation that saved his life. He (and you) will be in my prayers.

The day after you delivered your heart-felt monologue, I had some of my players watch it on their phones. They were moved by your words and your tears, but they sensed there was something more to my urging them to watch. So, naturally, I had to tell them about the time you urinated on my bare leg while playing golf at one of Tucson's finest courses. I'll have to go on your show someday and tell that whole story. I'm pretty sure that the statute(s) of limitations on your various transgressions that day have long since expired.

I ended up telling them the whole story, about how our mutual friend Mike Elliott had carved out an unheard-of 28 share with his morning drive-time show on KRQ in the late 1980s. He got lured away by trunkloads of money, first to Orlando and then to Tampa, where he teamed up with you.

Mike always told me that he hated Tampa because it was Old South racist, so he eventually came back to Tucson and brought you along. By that time, the ratings for the morning slot were back down in the single digits and you guys set out to get KRQ back up to Number 1.

I remember the first time Mike asked me to join you guys on the air. Betsy Bruce was reading the news and there was something about Albania. At the exact same time, you and I started singing the song that Coach Ernie Pantusso sang on "Cheers" to help him pass his Geography class. "Al-ba-ni-a, Al-ba-ni-a, it borders on the Adriatic!"

Mike got a "Good God, what have I done?" look on his face and a friendship was born.

I told my kids how the ratings started going up steadily, albeit not rapidly enough for some of the suits. I also told them how you and Mike used to sneak into the offices at night and put hot dogs in your station manager's desk.

After you got fired and moved to L.A., I followed your career closely. I watched one-and-a-half episodes of "The Man Show." And I basically worshipped "Win Ben Stein's Money." I loved it when you won your Daytime Emmy and jumped down off the stage and tried to give it to Susan Lucci, who had been nominated, like, 135 times for her portrayal of Erika Kane on "All My Children" but had never won. (She won later that night.)

I was happy for you every step up the ladder of success and I'm thrilled that your son is going to be okay. But you have to know that you opened up a big ol' can of stinky-poo with what you said the other night. It sounded very level-headed and reasonable to me, but then, I'm level-headed and reasonable. Unfortunately, there are a whole lot of people who see health care as an us-against-them thing or as a limited commodity that can only be afforded by a fortunate few, like a fancy car or tickets to an Adele concert.

Not long after your talk, came a response from human sludge-pile Joe Walsh, who was a Congressman for about an hour-and-a-half. He used to rail about fiscal responsibility until it came out that he owed six figures in unpaid child support. Anyway, Walsh tweeted, "Sorry Jimmy Kimmel. (sic) your sad story doesn't obligate me or anybody else to pay for somebody else's health care."

Alas, that attitude is pervasive...and incredibly stupid. Along those lines, somebody who is intelligent could say, "Why should I pay taxes to help educate your dumb-ass kids?" Of course, the answer is that it's the right thing to do. Taxes are the price we pay for civilization. (Oliver Wendell Holmes said that; I just borrowed it.)

My (and your former) Congressional District is "represented" by a nice woman who, in another life, was this bad-ass fighter pilot. But, since she got to Congress, she has displayed the guts of a minimum wage movie-theater employee whose job it is to tell much-larger human beings to turn off their cell phones while the feature is playing. It's really a shame.

I thought that there was a chance that she would stand up for her constituents, but when the House leaders decided that it was time to pass crap legislation—any legislation, really--just so the heat would be shifted to the Senate, Martha McSally caved just so she could ride the bus to go see the Sex Offender in Chief. It's sad. In a perfect world, she would be banned from ever again using the word "integrity," even if she were doing so in an ironic manner.

Anyway, best to you and your family.

And because we're friends, I won't tell anybody that you went to ASU.