[Scape]

The market can also decide to switch off is my point. It has become a laughing stock as it is the radical right and the moderate left on air. Shultz is not a decent counter to someone like Rush. It's like Sean and Alan again. What a joke.

[hwacker]

Scape wrote:

The market can also decide to switch off is my point. It has become a laughing stock as it is the radical right and the moderate left on air. Shultz is not a decent counter to someone like Rush. It's like Sean and Alan again. What a joke.

Switch off then, I like Rush and Sean.

[Scape]

I have more options now, but it's only been recently. I like Malloy and Hartmann.

[BartSimpson]

Scape wrote:

The market can also decide to switch off is my point. It has become a laughing stock as it is the radical right and the moderate left on air. Shultz is not a decent counter to someone like Rush. It's like Sean and Alan again. What a joke.

Erm, the 'moderate' left was not represented by Err America. I tuned in a few times only to hear drivel like a uniform wage proposal (everyone gets paid the same no matter what work they did), rabidly pro-abortion propaganda, anti-family, anti-Christian propaganda, and etc. I could only stand so much.

And Err America went bankrupt because not even liberal audiences cared to tune in to it. And why should they?

The attraction of talk radio to conservatives is that we get to hear a different point of view than we get in the newspapers and the network TV news.

What's the attraction to liberals to listen to liberal talk radio when they hear nothing they can't already hear on CBS, CNN, NBC, ABC, HNN, and in the pages of almost every major paper in the US?

If there was any actual conservative TV network then talk radio would probably come down a bit in success.

[Scape]

The rabid right have been dancing on Air America's grave since inception that's nothing new. They still are around but the management has managed to have a fair chunk of the talent to walk. Rhodes, Malloy and now this Shultz guy are a few examples.

As for a conservative not wanting to tune into a progressive station so what? You see progressives lining up for Rush or Sean? No. Your argument is absurd Bart.

[hwacker]

Scape wrote:

The rabid right have been dancing on Air America's grave since inception that's nothing new. They still are around but the management has managed to have a fair chunk of the talent to walk. Rhodes, Malloy and now this Shultz guy are a few examples.

As for a conservative not wanting to tune into a progressive station so what? You see progressives lining up for Rush or Sean? No. Your argument is absurd Bart.

Walk ?

they didn't get any money

for libs thats a huge thing, they are cheap remember.

[BartSimpson]

Scape wrote:

As for a conservative not wanting to tune into a progressive station so what? You see progressives lining up for Rush or Sean? No. Your argument is absurd Bart.

Conservatives are the primary audience for talk radio because they do not have other major media outlets to turn to for opinion and discussion. Liberals do not have to go to talk radio for discussions of opinions that they're inundated with in the major media.

My argument is not absurd, you're just refusing to see my perspective is all.

[Psudo]

hwacker wrote:

Psudo wrote:

I also dispute that liberals are cheap. When a liberal perceives a social injustice, he's stereotypically inclined to throw money at it. Have you not heard of George Soros?

Soros, he's one screwed up liberal.

Be that as it may, he's dished out plenty of his own money in pursuit of his goals. He's not being 'cheap'; quite the opposite, he's using money instead of good logic.

kwacker wrote:

name one good liberal commentator on Airhead America ?

Name one good South Korean politician. If you can't, it's more likely to be because you've never studied South Korean politics, not because there aren't any.

I've never listened to Air America, so I can't offer any opinions. That doesn't mean good liberal commentators don't exist, just that I'm ignorant of them.

Scape wrote:

You have to admit though that talk radio has a serious right wing bent to it and it has been that way for quite some time.

I agree. I don't see any systematic or institutional force causing that bias, though, so I don't see how systematic or institutional force can fix it either. It's a free market; if a liberal commentator is interesting, they'll get audience. Adding regulation mandating content will do more to squelch entertainment -- and, thus, audience size -- than provide diversity.

In your example of Sean and Alan, Fox News put them together. What similar force in radio is picking and choosing unbalanced partners in fallacious claim of bipartisanship? Instituting the Fairness Doctrine will cause that kind of problem, not solve it.

Bart wrote:

Err America went bankrupt because not even liberal audiences cared to tune in to it.

Scape wrote:

As for a conservative not wanting to tune into a progressive station so what? You see progressives lining up for Rush or Sean?

The greater point is that progressives aren't interested in progressive radio, at least not on the scale that conservatives are interested in conservative radio. Progressives, by and large, prefer other mediums. Which is fine, since conservatives have abandoned other mediums as "liberal-controlled".

I don't know anything about the managerial problems at Air America, but I don't think expert management would have provided success either. Progressives are not, as far as I know, looking for any new medium to portray their views; their views are prominently available through TV: the news networks (Fox excluded), Jon Stewart, SNL, etc. Their experimental media isn't as profound a success as Rush's because their ideology isn't as repressed as Rush's was. Neither human managerial talent nor government legislation can change the underlying landscape of market forces.

[commanderkai]

Scape wrote:

The market can also decide to switch off is my point. It has become a laughing stock as it is the radical right and the moderate left on air. Shultz is not a decent counter to someone like Rush. It's like Sean and Alan again. What a joke.

Moderate Left? Scape, I guess if you see Air America as the moderate left, then you must be around Noam Chomsky on the left-right scale.

[hurley_108]

I can't speak for American talk-radio listeners, but judging by the talk radio on CHED, Canadian (or at least Edmontonian) talk radio listeners are conservatives who have about a 30-second attention span and are uninterested in hearing more than one point of view on an issue - theirs.

[Scape]

Psudo wrote:

Scape wrote:

You have to admit though that talk radio has a serious right wing bent to it and it has been that way for quite some time.

I agree. I don't see any systematic or institutional force causing that bias, though, so I don't see how systematic or institutional force can fix it either. It's a free market; if a liberal commentator is interesting, they'll get audience. Adding regulation mandating content will do more to squelch entertainment -- and, thus, audience size -- than provide diversity.

...

Their experimental media isn't as profound a success as Rush's because their ideology isn't as repressed as Rush's was. Neither human managerial talent nor government legislation can change the underlying landscape of market forces.

You just answered your own question and I think there should be credit for Rush in that he has developed the conservative talk to that level there just hasn't been one for the left... yet.

I have listen to the Alan Combes show when he takes calls and for every third listener it's someone calling him gay or trashing him because he is a liberal. Alan is the butt of jokes on Fox and it isn't because of Alan that Sean has ratings but having someone to butt plug does make for entertainment and that's the reason why he was there not as some would argue to present a fair and balanced show. However, this and also having MSN Jon Steward et al as representing progressives is a mirage as there is no legitimate representation. The best way to harm an idea is to weakly defend it and it is not the MSM or the comedy networks intent to be the voice of the progressive movement.

[Zipperfish]

Maybe the Liberals tend to be less bombastic than the Conservatvie talk show hosts and are therefore less entertaining.

[hwacker]

Zipperfish wrote:

Maybe the Liberals tend to be less bombastic than the Conservatvie talk show hosts and are therefore less entertaining.

BINGO, dull, boring.

liberal radio will never happen,

The only reason combes show works is because he takes calls from people on the right, if it was only lefties it would be a good show to fall asleep to.

[xerxes]

Just to jump in here, there is also the issue of time around. Rush et. al. have been around for years where Air America is still relatively new and still struggling to make inroads.

That said, I think the whole idea of a liberal counter to conservative talk radio was a bad idea. Radio is old school, the internet is the future of widespread political discourse and that's already being borne out. The liberal websites out there are far more organised and effective as tools for mobilising like-minded individuals than their conservative counterparts are.

[hwacker]

xerxes wrote:

Just to jump in here, there is also the issue of time around. Rush et. al. have been around for years where Air America is still relatively new and still struggling to make inroads.

That said, I think the whole idea of a liberal counter to conservative talk radio was a bad idea. Radio is old school, the internet is the future of widespread political discourse and that's already being borne out. The liberal websites out there are far more organised and effective as tools for mobilising like-minded individuals than their conservative counterparts are.

Go ahead and surf while your driving, post the crash will ya