Getting caught in Howard Stern’s snare in dispute over a border wall | Dom Giordano

Last week, the day after the Eagles lost to the Saints in the NFC playoffs, I noticed my Twitter feed was filled up with the most outrageous attacks I’ve ever received. My first thought was it was a continuation of some of the push-back I got for tweeting that the Eagles must keep Nick Foles in Philadelphia.

However, it wasn’t Eagles fans who were on the march. I had entered into Stern World. Howard Stern, one of the biggest media figures of the last years, was going after me because of the comments I made about Stern, who was trying to turn President Donald Trump against his position on getting the resources to build a steel barrier across much of our border with Mexico.

Stern had spent over 14 minutes on his satellite radio show replaying what I said about his comments on Trump, and then tagging his co-host Robin Quivers and others to defend himself and attack me as not worthy to talk about him.

The thing that seemed to infuriate him was that, in talking about him, I mentioned that I had traveled to the border, gone out at night with the Border Patrol in El Paso, Texas, and toured a remote area near the border where many people were easily able to enter our country.

I brought up Stern on my show because he has a relationship with Trump, and was trying to prove that Trump doesn’t believe in the wall but needed to continue the shutdown to appeal to his base of dumb supporters.

“You gotta know Donald a bit to understand what’s going on here,” Stern said. “The wall’s a simplistic answer to our problems with immigration. It’s something that, you know, morons can get behind because they’re, like, ‘Oh, yeah, if you build a wall, no one can get over it.’ ”

He went on to say: “The wall’s a problem because it’s a waste of money. Even Donald knows that.”

This line of attack against the wall is particularly annoying. Callers to my show almost universally say they want the latest technology and more staffing to secure the border. They also understand the $5.7 billion that Trump wants will not secure the entire border, but is a significant start.

Of course, the wall is not really about its effectiveness or its cost. It is a very major battleground for Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to keep faith with their bases.

A few weeks back, Trump almost capitulated and put off his demands on wall funding. He quickly realized that this is the one thing that could weaken his support.

Pelosi, in a major virtue signal to her base, has called the wall “immoral.”

In my view, Trump has compromised the most in this battle. He has moved away from demanding a concrete wall and suggested that he might accept less funding.

His most recent offer was to give Pelosi and the Democrats a three-year extension of protection for DACA recipients, often called “Dreamers.” Of course, they could use this concession to get even better status for the Dreamers. This seems to me to be a good area for a compromise.

However, Pelosi rejected this compromise and had not made a counteroffer other than to say Trump must open up the government and end the shutdown. It will be interesting to see how the public processes this.

The broader point of this whole indirect battle with Stern is that Trump comes from such a different background from other presidents.

I can’t imagine Stern claiming much connection with Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush or even Bill Clinton. My theory with Stern is that he might be at a stage of life where he wants to be more serious and use his own unique style to discuss things such as the wall. This is a good thing and might involve his audience in meaningful things.

His attacks on me, such as calling me “Dumb” Giordano, were kind of funny. My listeners felt that his attacks elevated me and my positions on the wall.

Stern even gave me a new responsibility. He told his national audience that, during my commercial breaks, I should take a turn guarding the border.

Howard, “you want me on that wall. You need me on that wall.”

Teacher-turned-talk show host Dom Giordano is heard 9 a.m. to noon weekdays on WPHT (1210-AM). Contact him at www.domgiordano.com. On Twitter at @DomShow1210