Howard sees further evidence of the network's struggles in that "they are approaching their second anniversary and still do not permit Nielsen to publish their ratings." And their rumored acquisition bodes ill for whatever credibility may remain:

Acquiring Imus would be a desperation play for eyeballs. While Imus suffered a devastating blow as a result of his "nappy-headed hos" remarks, losing his top-rated radio program and the MSNBC simulcast, he still has a smaller but significant fan base. However, for a business network to hand over the prime morning hours as the stock market opens to a shock jock with no business credibility tells you that they no longer consider business news their mission. They are grasping for any viewers they can round up.

"Remember," Howard urges, "this is the network that interviewed New York's Naked Cowboy on their first day of broadcasting. They haven’t come very far since then, have they?"

Racism, misogyny and homophobia come pouring out of the mouths of [Sasha] Baron Cohen's unsuspecting dupes, and in a time of political correctness, when the slightest suggestion of bias on the lips of a public figure gets raked over the media coals, there was something fantastically liberating (and frightening) about seeing the national id so baldly exposed.

Presumably Ansen's thinking of someone like Don Imus, who was "raked over the media coals" not after he showed "the slightest suggestion of bias," but after years of wallowing in racist, homophobic and misogynist schtick with the tacit approval of his multitude of pals in the media elite.

In a media environment where the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage and Ann Coulter have wildly lucrative careers, there's no shortage of opportunities to get what Ansen calls the "national id" exposed--and celebrated.   What Borat provided--in the wake of the 2006 election's repudiation of Bushism--was an opportunity to see such creepiness ridiculed and scorned.  That's what makes the film, as Ansen rightly notes, a cultural landmark.