Dr. Laura wasn’t the only radio talk show host to lose a gig this week. Just the only rational one. The Los Angeles Times has the sad news about a fatwa-issuing Saudi Arabian talk show host who’s now out of work:
Dr. Laura wasn’t the only radio talk show host to lose a gig this week. Just the only rational one.
The Los Angeles Times has the sad news about a fatwa-issuing Saudi Arabian talk show host who’s now out of work:
Fatwa-issuing Sheik Abdel Mohsen Obeikan has a face made for radio
No more fatwas for Sheikh Abdel Mohsen Obeikan, the Saudi cleric and royal court adviser who earlier this year earned notoriety for rolling out an eyebrow-raising religious decree that called on women to give men breast milk to avoid illicit mixing.
Saudi authorities on Wednesday reportedly pulled the plug on Obeikan’s radio program “Fatwas on Air,” a daily morning show in which Obeikan would go on air and issue fatwas – religious rulings — to the public on various matters.
Taking the sheikh off air appears to come as part of Saudi king Abdullah’s recent clampdown on the nation’s fatwa bazaar.
In a bid to stop unauthorized clerics issuing odd religious decrees, the king has reportedly put out a royal decree authorizing only members of the Council of Senior Islamic Scholars to issue fatwas from now on.
With a resume like this, we don’t expect Obeiken to be out of work very long. According to what we hear, CNN’s search for Larry King’s replacement has been narrowed down to Obeiken and Ryan Seacrest.
You have to feel sorry for poor Ed Schultz. No one watches his television show. No one listens to his radio show. If it weren’t for websites like IHateTheMedia.com, no one would know he exists.
But Big Eddie has a solution for that problem. Socialize the airwaves. Give him as many stations as Rush Limbaugh.
You have to feel sorry for poor Ed Schultz. No one watches his television show. No one listens to his radio show. If it weren’t for websites like IHateTheMedia.com, no one would know he exists.
But Big Eddie has a solution for that problem. Socialize the airwaves. Give him as many stations as Rush Limbaugh.
The only problem with that theory is that no matter how many stations Ed was on, he would still have no listeners.
San Francisco activists are “encouraging” the new owner of KNGY-FM to bring back the gay-oriented programming it featured until recently.
What the hell is gay radio? All Barbara Streisand, all the time? Non-stop Cher? Show tunes? What?
To be absolutely honest, we’re not sure what “gay music” is, but San Francisco activists want it returned to the airwaves.
Yes, San Francisco activists are “encouraging” the new owner of KNGY-FM to bring back the gay-oriented programming it featured until recently.
The station’s new owners switched its call letters from KNGY to KREV and flipped its format from “gay” to Top 40.
You can’t blame the new owners for changing formats. Ratings for the gay format sucked so badly that it trailed even Air America’s San Francisco affiliate. They each had less than 10% of the audience of top-rated KGO.
Nevertheless, Bay Area gay activists and politicians consider the format flip an insult to the community and they’re encouraging the new owners to “rethink” the decision. County supervisor Bevan Dufty (another one of our favorite names) has even introduced a resolution to that effect.
The FM station can be found at 92.7, which, naturally, is on the extreme left side of the dial.
New York Times publisher Pinch Sulzberger frantically negotiating to save his left wing publishing empire. According to the latest rumors swirling around the Big Apple, the New York Times Company is stripping away more assets in an attempt to head off bankruptcy. If they were playing strip poker, you’d say they’re down to their skivvies.
According to a nearly gleeful report in the New York Post:
NYT Co. May Sell Classical Radio Station
Beethoven and Bach could become the latest victims of the New York Times Co.’s financial crisis. Rumors are raging that top suits have discussed putting classical radio station WQXR (96.3 FM) on the block to shore up the company’s dwindling cash stash.
The Times has already sold off its landmark headquarters building to escape killer mortgage payments. They’re threatening to shutter the Boston Globe because closing it is cheaper than operating it. Their share of the Boston Red Sox is also on the chopping block. And now it looks like classical music may be the latest victim of the Times downturn.
According to a report last week, the company has $1.3 billion in debts and a relatively paltry $36 million in the bank.
You can’t feel too badly for The Times. They sold out to the extreme left many years ago. And now they’re willing to sell out to just about anybody.
The Los Angeles Times looked through a keyhole this week and surveyed the landscape of conservative talk radio in California.
They made gross generalizations, told lies of omission, and distorted reality to prove a point that’s unsupported by the facts. The story would have been far more accurate had it been headlined, “Local radio on the wane in California.”
“The economy’s downturn has depressed ad revenue at stations across the state, thinning the ranks of conservative broadcasters.”
In order to be more accurate, the Times should have said, “The economy’s downturn has depressed ad revenue at stations across the state, thinning the ranks of all local broadcasters and all formats.”
The Times continued:
“(B)ut for all the anti-tax swagger and the occasional stunts by personalities like KFI’s John and Ken, the reality is that conservative talk radio in California is on the wane. The economy’s downturn has depressed ad revenue at stations across the state, thinning the ranks of conservative broadcasters.”
To be more accurate, it should have read, “The economy’s downturn has depressed ad revenue at stations across the state, thinning the ranks of all local broadcasters.””
“For that and other reasons, stations have dropped the shows of at least half a dozen radio personalities and scaled back others, in some cases replacing them with cheaper nationally syndicated programs.”
“Casualties include Mark Larson in San Diego, Larry Elder and John Ziegler in Los Angeles, Melanie Morgan in San Francisco, and Phil Cowen and Mark Williams in Sacramento.”
Oops. Ziegler did leave conservative powerhouse KFI, but was immediately replaced by Kennedy & Suits, two other local conservative talkers.
Contrary to what the Times would have its readers believe, conservative talk radio is faring better than the struggling radio industry in general and certainly better than floundering libtalk radio.
Take the Los Angeles market, for example.
KFI-AM, Rush Limbaugh’s conservative Southern California affiliate, is the dominant talk station in the region. The January 2009 ratings show KFI with a 4.3 share, higher than even its pre-election ratings. It is now the third highest-rated station in the market. It features 11 hours per day of local talk programming and its local morning and afternoon shows have tremendous ratings.
KTLK-AM, Los Angeles’ libtalk station, has a barely measurable 0.6 share, its lowest in the last four months. Far as we can tell, KTLK’s entire schedule is nationally-syndicated.
Let’s review: Conservative talk is booming. Lib talk is evaporating. Local conservative talk radio is booming. Local lib talk radio is non-existent.
We’re used to seeing the liberal Los Angeles Times putting its wagons in a circle to protect its own, but this story would have been more appropriate in the comic section.
Perhaps, just perhaps, this boils down to a case of jealousy on the part of the Times. After all, its circulation has dropped from a peak of 1,100,000 to a current anemic 739,000. It’s shedding sections, pages, employees, and prestige at a remarkable rate.
Which seems to indicate it’s actually liberal media that’s struggling.
If the democrats have their way, the ACLU could go after Christain radio shows such as this one.
Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe, the most rational man in Washington, DC has given an impassioned speech on the floor of the Senate in defense of Christian radio.
“In a straight party-line vote, Democrats chose to adopt Senator Durbin’s Amendment 591, which calls on the FCC to quote, ‘encourage and promote diversity in communication media ownership…and to ensure that broadcast station licenses are used in the public interest.’ That’s a quote and essentially it makes an end-run around the Fairness Doctrine.”
“The ACLU and other liberal organizations could attempt to file lawsuits against anyone who presents a message that they deem to be counter to federal localism and diversity regulations,” Inhofe continued. “…the chilling effect that the mere threat of a lawsuit will have on religious broadcasters could be substantial.”
“This legislation is so incredibly vague and so potentially far-reaching that I can’t say with any certainty what the end result will be,” Inhofe said. “This is not good governance and it is not good legislative practice to cede such authority to any agency of our government, specifically when the right to speak freely over the airwaves will most certainly be impacted.”
We don’t think the Democrats really want to outlaw religious broadcasters. We suspect they’d be satisfied if they could merely outlaw about seven of the Ten Commandments, pass legislation that Reverend Wright be given equal time on all current religious broadcasts, and have Obama’s inauguration officially designated as the Second Coming.
By now you’ve probably heard that the Senate approved an amendment a few days ago to outlaw the “Fairness Doctrine.” Republican Senator Jim DeMint’s amendment passed by a comfortable margin of 87-to-11.
Although one would think it’s important to know which senators cast their votes in favor of censorship, we can’t find a single news report that calls out their names. So we’ll do it:
Senator Jim DeMint’s amendment to kill the Fairness Doctrine was pretty straightforward.
But an aide to DeMint said Senator Dick Durbin’s amendment requiring “diversity” in radio ownership will “impose the Fairness Doctrine through the back door by trying to break up radio ownership.”
The Democrats can disguise it, rename it, and repackage it any way they want. But DeMint’s aide called it “an attempt to break up companies like Clear Channel and hurt their syndications and therefore putting many local radio stations out of business that depend on those syndicated shows for revenue.”
The measure passed by a vote of 57-to-41 without a single Republican vote.
Censorship is like the Rasputin. You can poison it, shoot it, stab it, and drown it, but it won’t die as long as Democrats are running the show.
Bill O’Reilly’s giving up his day job. He’s leaving “The Radio Factor” and passing the baton to Fred Thompson.
Thompson has an incredibly serpentine career path. Actor. Senator from Tennessee. Actor. Presidential candidate. Actor. And now, radio talk show host.
The Washington, DC-based “Fred Thompson Show” will focus on politics and pop culture. He’ll have guests and take phone calls. It will premiere on more than 125 stations March 2.
One one hand, we’re not really sure if the slow talkin’ southerner will be a very compelling radio host. On the other hand, his wife Jeri Kehn is hot.
If there’s anyone who could use a nice, cold brewski right now, it’s the poor guys struggling to survive in the radio business. But Budweiser’s not buying a round for the house.
According to Radio Daily News, Budweiser beer, owned by brewing giant Anheuser-Busch, has informed radio stations that they won’t be paid for 120 days after its commercials run.
To make matters worse, Bud also told stations that they must maintain the current level of “value-added” promotions (things like personal appearances, on-air mentions, etc).
A few years ago, radio stations would have laughed at Bud’s draconian conditions. But with advertising revenue rapidly drying up, broadcasters are expected to meekly acquiesce.
Anheuser-Busch is currently under investigation to determine if they “donated” to Al Sharpton’s various “charities.” Our guess is that Sharpton didn’t have to wait for 120 days for his money.
Chalk up another vote against the Fairness Doctrine – this one from religious broadcasters.
“If I happen to say declaratively that the Bible tells me that Jesus is the way, the truth and the life, and nobody comes to the Father but by Him,” said Christian talk show host Janet Parshall, “I am not interested in giving equal time to Buddha, Hinduism, or L. Ron Hubbard.”
We generally think political speech is the target of the Fairness Doctrine, but the only broadcast license that’s ever been revoked belonged to a Christian station. In 1964, a Pennsylvania Christian station carried a program on which the Reverend Billy James Hargis criticized author Fred Cook. When Cook was refused a chance to respond, he reported the station to the FCC. The station’s license was eventually revoked.
Can’t wait to hear Teddy Kennedy’s response to the Ten Commandments.
By now you’ve probably heard that the Senate approved an amendment a few days ago to outlaw the “Fairness Doctrine.” Republican Senator Jim DeMint’s amendment passed by a comfortable margin of 87-to-11. 
Senator Jim DeMint’s amendment to kill the Fairness Doctrine was pretty straightforward. 
If there’s anyone who could use a nice, cold brewski right now, it’s the poor guys struggling to survive in the radio business. But Budweiser’s not buying a round for the house.
