Inky on Air America Radio

I've been listening to Air America Radio since it's inception on March 31^st 2005. I haven't been listening to it as much lately because I don't have speakers at my office and I don't think I'm allowed to just sit here with headphones on. I also work in a field office of a construction site so I'm not gonna move the dial from the k-rock station to listen to The Al Franken Show and The Randi Rhodes Show from Noon until I leave.

And this morning, I read this article from the Inky on how "Liberal Air America Radio stuck in cellar" and I'm skeptical. Of the article that is, not the network. The network has grown from an initial five or so to sixty-seven as of today. So, over the course of the last sixty or so weeks, they've added a station a week. I know nothing about radio markets, but to be able to add a station a week? That sounds pretty good.

Gillin [the reporter] gets into the Franken v. Limbaugh thing.

Franken, best-selling author of such anti-conservative tomes as Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them and Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot, chose to go head-to-head with gabber Limbaugh in many markets. This, it turns out, was not such a good idea.

Limbaugh, still the giant among talkers, with 14.75 million listeners on 600 stations, has squashed Franken like a bug.

What's not noted is that most of Rush's 600 stations are tiny. Tiny stations in tiny towns scattered all over the place. Air America Radio reaches 80% of that 14.75 million potential listeners. And once again, this is after a little over a year. Radio takes forever to build. Rush has been at it for fifteen years spewing hate. Rush should, by his own standards, be in jail, the drug user he is. "Lock them up and throw away the key" was the phrase he liked to use about drug users. A guy who was kicked off of a tiny [ill-advised] gig on ESPN for spouting off some fuckhead comment about how Donavan McNabb is overrated because he's a good black quarterback. I remember watching that show and being dumbfounded. Dumbfounded that some fuckhead is stupid enough to say something like that, let alone on a very well watched Sunday night show about football where everyone knows that Donavan gets all this attention because he's a good fucking QB, not because he's black.

And then Gillin goes on to say

But while more seasoned hosts know how to shift the focus to other topics while awaiting the next election cycle, critics complain that Franken is still obsessed with bashing President Bush (when he is not baiting O'Reilly). In contrast to Limbaugh, who mocks his own pomposity, Franken comes across to critics as angry and not funny.

First off, who the fuck cares what stupid critics say? They're all just trying to drum up some attention to their stupid columns to get a bigger audience to get more money for more drivel. And secondly, Franken should be angry and bash Bush. Somebody's gotta do it. If the MSM refuses to engage this administration, how can you call out the only Liberal station for representing their audience? Franken is pretty mild-mannered at that [granted the MSM is just starting to wake up now]. I guess Gillin didn't take the time to listen to Randi Rhodes' show, which is on from 3p-7p here in Philly on 1340AM - WHAT. She's the one that made headlines by having Ralph Nader hang up on her on Day 1. She's the true star of the network, not Al and Katherine. She's the fifteen year talk-radio veteran who has gone head-to-head against Rush - in his home state - and beaten him. She's the one who's turning heads these days, not Al.

The Air America Radio network is new, good and growing. The conservatives have been slowly taking over for the past thirty years and lobbyists have been making it easier to do so. During Reagan's administration, they softened the broadcasting rules — repealing the Fairness Doctrine. You no longer had to give equal time to both sides of an argument. That opened up the floodgates for conservatives to overtake the AM airwaves - the Progressives and Liberals missed a chance here. Monopoly rules were softened. Vertical monopolies reporting 'news' like NewsCorp have moved in literally changing how 'news' is delievered to us every day.

Gillin's article missed a lot of stuff, but I do understand that there are space and time constraints. It also put a spotlight on the network, even if it was one that wasn't oh so favorable.

But don't take my word for it, go take a listen for yourself. 1340 WHAT here in Philly or head over to Air America Radio and stream it. My guess is that you'll be hooked from day one, just like I was. And if you either live to far away from Philly to make it to Drinking Liberally [Tuesdays @ Tangier 1801 Lombard] or are just too shy to come out, but are curious to hear the voice behind Atrios? He's a weekly guest on The Majority Report on AAR with Janeane Garafolo and Sam Seder. He's on tonight.

Comments

[Josh]

Albert, thank you for correcting some of the wild assertions in this article. I think the biggest problem with WHAT in Philadelphia is just the terrible reception. I know I can't get it in my car on the expressway.

As a Tivo-influenced listener however, I can't stand the ad content of the actual broadcast of the show and generally tune in the next day to the edited version hosted at Air America Place: http://www.airamericaplace.com/archive.php?mode=show&id=5

[trace]

I also have listened to AAR since its inception. Originally I came for Al Franken, but soon found that Randi Rhodes was simply incredible. Sadly, AAR decided to be greedy instead of trying to reach more listeners by signing an exclisive deal with XM over Sirius. Huge mistake on their part since with Sirius _and_ XM they were able to reach all of America. Sadly I can't hear Randi anymore from my car since WHAT has a simply horrible transmitter and my only other option is my Sirius. Air America Place is basicly the best place now...

[upyernoz]

i think gillin betrays her own biases in the article when she writes:

"In contrast to Limbaugh, who mocks his own pomposity, Franken comes across to critics as angry and not funny."

comes across as pompus and not funny to who? in my opinion limbaugh is the one who sounds really full of himself and franken regularly makes fun of himself.

i love her use of the passive voice here to express what is clearly an opinion. i'm sure there is someone out there somewhere who thinks limbaugh is mr. humbler whereas frankin is pompus, but there are no doubt other people who see things exactly the opposite way. by taking the actor out of the sentence gillin creates the impression that frankin = pompus is a universal impression. i suspect that she feels that way because it's hers.

[albert]

she kept referring to critics which reminded me of how the anchors on FNC constantly use the term some people say and then spout off their opinion on things instead of reporting the news, but to see actual news you're probably not going to FNC at first click.