RKMBs Forums .::Robegories::. Media Franken's "Air America" Going Under Already

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Paul Mandral said:
Eugene, OR - KOPT 1450 AM

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rex said:

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Paul Mandral said:
Eugene, OR - KOPT 1450 AM

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There are ads for this station everywhere. Its probably the most advertized thing in Eugene right now.

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PJP said:
Schwarzeneger is not a B- Actor in Hollywood.......that's just silly......he was the first person to collect the now famous 20 million paycheck.

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Jeff Gannon said:

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PJP said:
Schwarzeneger is not a B- Actor in Hollywood.......that's just silly......he was the first person to collect the now famous 20 million paycheck.

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I was referring to Reagan, you #@%&.

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oh......then you're right.

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PJP said:
oh......then you're right.

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Jeff Gannon said:
Yeah!

Fucking liberal.

He CLAIMS to be Jewish and having fled the Holoucast. He CLAIMS to have graduated from Nothwestern University Law School. He CLAIMS to have practiced law in Cincinatti. He CLAIMS to have been part of the movement to lower the voting age to 18 (the 26th Amendment). He CLAIMS to have ran successfully for Cincinnati’s City Council and served for five successive terms.

He CLAIMS that in 1977, at the age of 33, he became Mayor of Cincinnati with the most votes in the city’s history. He CLAIMS that after a Democratic primary bid for Governor of Ohio in 1982, that he became a political reporter and commentator for the NBC affiliate in Cincinnati. He CLAIMS that over the next 10 years, Springer was the top rated news anchor in the city and the recipient of seven Emmy awards for his nightly commentaries.



But we KNOW that Springer's only accomplishments in life was to bring us white trash and transvestities on his syndicated TV show. So therefore that is all he's about. What does THAT guy know about politics?

Right?

Right.

FAR Right.

I mean, if a daytime talk show host could become a political pundit, what's next?? Cockaroach exterminators becoming the Speaker of the House??!!!

B-actors becoming Governor??!!!

Syndicated Gossip TV show hosts becomign politcal pundits as well??!!!

It boggles the mind.....

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AIR AMERICA RADIO INVESTIGATED AFTER BUSH 'GUNSHOTS'

The red-hot rhetoric over Social Security on liberal talkradio network AIR AMERICA has caught the attention of the Secret Service, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

Government officials are reviewing a skit which aired on the network Monday evening -- a skit featuring an apparent gunshot warning to the president!

The announcer: "A spoiled child is telling us our Social Security isn't safe anymore, so he is going to fix it for us. Well, here's your answer, you ungrateful whelp: [audio sound of 4 gunshots being fired.] Just try it, you little bastard. [audio of gun being cocked]."

The audio production at the center of the controversy aired during opening minutes of The Randi Rhodes Show.

"What is with all the killing?" Rhodes said, laughing, after the clip aired.

"Even joking about shooting the president is a crime, let alone doing it on national radio... we are taking this very seriously," a government source explained.

White House Spokesman Scott McClellan called the clip "very inappropriate and over the line."

AIR AMERICA President of Programming and co-COO Jon Sinton said in a release: "We regret that a produced comedy bit that was in bad taste slipped through our normal vetting process. We do acknowledge that it was an internal error and internal discipline will be enforced."

Rhodes apologized for the skit on Wednesday. "It was a bit,” Rhodes said. “It was bad. I apologize a thousand times."

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April 28, 2005 -- ALL-liberal Air America and talker Randi Rhodes apologized yesterday for a "bad taste" comedy bit in which President Bush was shot.

The Secret Sevice said yesterday it was looking into the incident to see if it constituted a threat to the president.

Rhodes opened her Monday afternoon radio show with an announcer blasting the president for his Social Security plan:

"A spoiled child [Bush] is telling us our Social Security isn't safe anymore, so he's gonna fix it for us. Well, here's your answer, you ungrateful whelp: [sound of three shotgun blasts].

"The AAARP — the American Association of Armed Retired People [sound of rifle being cocked]. Just try it, you little bastard."

"It was a bit. It was bad. I apologize a thousand times," Rhodes told listeners yesterday on WLIB (1190 AM), adding: "I'm not in charge of the bits."

"Our normal vetting process failed . . . and we regret it," Air America's Jon Sinton told The Post.

Informed of the bit at a White House press briefing, spokesman Scott McClellan said: "It sounds very inappropriate and over the line."

Secret Service spokesperson Lorie Lewis told The Post that "if we determine that questions need to be asked, we will attempt to get them answered, but at this point we have not made any inquiries to anyone connected with the show."

During Dan Quayle's vice-presidency, ex-WABC lefty Lynn Samuels was investigated by the Secret Service for saying "Too bad it can't happen here" while discussing a vice-presidential candidate getting beaten up in South America.

Yesterday, on her Sirius Satellite Radio show, Samuels drew the line at shooting:

"There are very few things that you absolutely, positively cannot do on the radio," she said, "and pretending to shoot the president is right up there at the top."

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The latest radio ratings are in, and they show continued bad news for Air America, the liberal talk radio network featuring Al Franken, Randi Rhodes, Janeane Garofolo, and others.


While it is difficult to pinpoint Air America's ratings nationally — it is on the air in about 50 stations across the country, and has been on some of them for just the last few months — it is possible to measure the network's performance in the nation's number one market, New York City. And in the new ratings, Air America hits an all-time low in a key demographic measurement.

The new Arbitron figures for Winter 2005, which covers January, February, and March, show that WLIB, the station which carries Air America in New York, won a 1.2-percent share of all listeners 12 years and older. That is down one tenth of one point from the station's 1.3 rating in Winter 2004, the last period when it aired its old format of Caribbean music and talk.

Air America debuted on March 31, 2004. In the network's first quarter on the air, Spring of 2004, which covered April, May, and June, Air America won a 1.3 percent share of the market audience. That number rose slightly to 1.4 percent in the Summer 2004 July/August/September period, and fell back to 1.2 percent in the Fall 2004 October/November/December period, where it remains today.

Those numbers are, again, for all listeners 12 years and older. Air America executives, however, often point to the network's performance among listeners 25 to 54 years of age, the preferred demographic target for radio advertisers. But in that area, too, Air America is struggling.

Between the hours of 10 A.M. and 3 P.M., for example, the daypart that includes Al Franken's program, Air America drew a 1.4-percent share of the New York audience aged 25 to 54 in Winter 2005. That number is the latest in a nearly year-long decline. In Spring of 2004, Air America's first quarter on the air, it drew a 2.2-percent share of the audience. That rose to 2.3 percent in the Summer of 2004, then fell to 1.6 percent in the Fall of 2004, and is now 1.4 percent — Air America's lowest-ever quarterly rating in that time and demographic slot.

The numbers are just as striking when narrowed to the specific period from noon to 3 P.M., when Franken's program airs on WLIB opposite Rush Limbaugh on WABC. Even though Franken once claimed to be beating the conservative host in New York, in the Winter 2005 figures, his program attracted a 1.9-percent share of the audience to Limbaugh's 3.2 percent in the 25 to 54 age group.

Franken's performance against Limbaugh in the most recent ratings is significantly lower than in Air America's first months. In Spring 2004, Air America's first quarter on the air, Franken scored a 2.6-percent share to Limbaugh's 3.2-percent share. In Summer 2004, he scored a 2.8-percent share to Limbaugh's 3.2 percent. But in Fall 2004, Franken dropped to a 1.8 percent share to Limbaugh's 4.1-percent share, all within the 25 to 54 age group.

That last number surprised some observers because it showed Air America faltering in October and November 2004, the period when the presidential election was reaching its finish and political passions were presumably at their highest. But even then, Air America's decline continued.

Air America's foot-dragging on repaying $875,000 borrowed from a beleaguered Boys & Girls Club in The Bronx has nothing to do with a probe of the club's controversial loans, city investigators said yesterday.

Officials at the radio network have repeatedly said Air America intends to repay the money, but claimed they put those plans on hold because of the city probe.

"We're waiting for directions from the investigators on how to proceed," Air America spokeswoman Jamie Horn said this week.

But the Department of Investigation said there is nothing to prevent the radio network from repaying its debt immediately.

"DOI has done nothing and given no instruction preventing payment of money owed to Gloria Wise [Boys & Girls Club]. Any statements to the contrary are inaccurate," said DOI spokesman Keith Schwam.

Martta Rose, a spokeswoman for Gloria Wise Boys & Girls Club, said the agency worked out a two-year repayment plan with Air America and expects to begin receiving the first installments next month.

Air America said it will make the first payment in September, "if not sooner."

A contract was approved by the club's board of directors and is awaiting final approval from Air America.

No interest in the Air America scandal?

Hugh Hewitt has a good piece on the mainstream media's apparent lack of interest in the Air America scandal. It appears that Air America, the liberal talk radio network, received in its startup period a six-figure loan from the Gloria Wise Boys and Girls Club in the Bronx. This is an organization that receives most of its funds from government agencies and is supposed to provide services to children and Alzheimer's patients. It is apparently stone broke right now, and Air America says that it will pay the money back–but not when.

Hugh is quite correct in noting that if a community service organization had funneled money to a conservative talk radio operation, the New York Times would have been all over the story and New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, who has oversight responsibility for nonprofits, would be threatening lawsuits and churning out press releases. But so far the Times is silent (maybe everyone is out in the Hamptons, and who wants to cover the tacky Bronx?) and Spitzer is motionless.

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the G-man said:...if a community service organization had funneled money to a conservative talk radio operation, the New York Times would have been all over the story and New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, who has oversight responsibility for nonprofits, would be threatening lawsuits and churning out press releases. ...

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the G-man said:

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the G-man said:...if a community service organization had funneled money to a conservative talk radio operation, the New York Times would have been all over the story and New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, who has oversight responsibility for nonprofits, would be threatening lawsuits and churning out press releases. ...

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Good for Spitzer:

State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer yesterday opened an investigation into the Bronx social-services agency that made $875,000 in bizarre loans to Air America radio, The Post has learned.

"We are looking into it in consultation with the city's Department of Investigation,"

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the G-man said:
This is the "MediaX" forum, not the "Government contracts" forum

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rex said:
Can you please keep this kind of shit in the fascist controlled political flame war forum?

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the G-man said:
Sorry, I forgot this is the now-facist controlled mediaX flame war forum.

Seriously, however, I agree that this thread should be more about the programming, economics and status of the show (the same as the threads about Howard Stern and Don Imus, for example) than about the politics of the stars. As such, I would have thought you'd appreciate my refusal to take the Haliburton bait.

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