Is There A More Moderate, More Mellow Belling?

The usually-conservative AM-radio talker Mark Belling lined up yesterday with Al Sharpton.

I nearly drove off the highway when I heard Belling say that Sharpton was right in condemning the double-standards surrounding Paris Hilton's early release from the Los Angeles County jail.

And Belling had earlier praised Joanne Weintraub's long Tuesday feature in The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel about "The Sopranos."

He read most of the story and then engaged callers in a reflective discussion of why the show has been so popular.

Talk radio can reach a broader audience when it shelves partisan or hard-edged politics in favor of entertainment, family, sports or other common-ground matters.

I'm not saying there is a left/right analysis of The Sopranos. People watch it for great writing and character development to which they can relate, regardless of the contradictions between everyday lives and those of fictional mobsters.

What I found interesting was Belling's fair treatment of an erudite piece in a publication he often mocks as "The Sentinel Journal," and rips for what he perceives as left-leaning editorials and columns.

Maybe we're hearing the emergence of mellower Mark who is beginning to see the light?