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| A Breath Of Fresh, Dead Air | ||||||
| Listening to Air America Radio, the liberal radio network that debuted two weeks ago in select cities across the nation, is like hearing a broadcast from outer space. �The hosts of the station live in some alternate universe where the opposite of practically everything we know holds true, and they take pride in pumping out propaganda and concise catch phrases in proving points to their dumb-and-dumber listening audience (if there even is one). �Despite all this, the folks over at Air America think they are onto something big, something that will become a huge success. �I hate to burst your bubble, guys, but Air America will not be a success. �Instead, it will be an utter failure. �Read on to find out why. | ||||||
| According to Al Franken, comedian and talk show host on Air America, "We are flaming swords of justice! �Bush is going down, he is going down, he is going down. �And we're going to help him." �Mark my words: Air America will, for all intents and purposes, be dead before the election in November. �Why is this, you may ask? �Why not give it a chance? | ||||||
| Quite simply, radio is market driven, and by the nature of this station alone, it has already alienated itself from most potential advertisers that would keep it in business. �You see, commercial radio is free to the public for a reason: the commercials you hear are from companies who have paid good money for that airtime, and studies have shown that people do buy products from advertisers that they hear on their favorite radio station. �According to a recent Los Angeles Times article entitled "Talk Radio Takes A Turn To The Left", several advertisers have already signed on for the long haul. �I find this statement interesting, since when I tuned in to listen to the station on April 19, during afternoon drive, one of the biggest listening times, I heard nothing but public service announcements and a spot advertising a "George W. - You're Fired" t-shirt. �The only spot that I heard that was from an actual bona fide paying advertiser was for XM Radio, which already has Air America on its lineup. �Where are all these advertisers that they claimed were in it for the long haul? �Surely they could not have been referring to PSAs! | ||||||
| Another reason Air America is destined to fail is that at best, it is quite amateurish. �The hosts have absolutely no experience in radio, and not one of them knows how to actually broadcast. �Let us consider the nightly show, "The Majority Report" with unfunny comedienne JaneaneGarofalo and Sam Seder, who is described on the Air America website as a "writer, director, and actor" (I think a more appropriate title for him would be "waiter", since that is what most struggling writers, directors, and actors are) and "sycophant" of Garofalo's. �Since when did these people become political experts? �The Web site even goes as far as calling Garofalo an "activist"! �Anyway, I listened for about a half-an-hour to this sorry disgrace for a radio show, and I came to the conclusion that these people don't even belong on college radio. | ||||||
| For one thing, they complained on air about the fact that the New York station was broadcasting both the pre-delay feed and the post-delay feed. �For those who don't know, a pre-delay feed is put in place to give the broadcasters time to dump cuss words or indecent material, and is usually anywhere from 6 to 8 seconds. �It kind of defeats the purpose when both of them are broadcasting at the same time, doesn't it? �Garofalo referred to it as either a "seven minute or seven second delay", which proves that she really knows what she is doing. | ||||||
| As far as the content of the show went, Sam Seder constantly accused President Bush of "stealing 700-million dollars to plan for [the administration's] role in Iraq," and was met each time with guffaws from Garofalo. �How did he steal the money? I wondered. �Unfortunately they never actually addressed how he "stole the money" or delved any further into the topic. �You see what I mean by "concise catch phrases"? �Meanwhile, Garofalo's answer for the Iraq war was ludicrously simplistic and equally hare-brained as Seder's: "Oil," she said. Note that this comes from the same woman who likened President Bush to Adolf Hitler and called the current administration the "43rd Reich". | ||||||
| Of course she had to have learned something from the one of the best of the professional truth-twisters, Al Franken, who misquoted Arnold Schwarzenegger on the Tonight Show last year saying that the action star "liked" what Hitler did with the way he "spoke and presented himself."� Schwarzenegger had actually said that he did not like what Hitler did with his charismatic speaking abilities. �Franken has other memory issues too, it seems, as evidenced on CNN's Crossfire earlier this month. �After G. Gordon Liddy asked Franken how many radio stations he would be on, Franken incredulously replied with the following answer: "I am on six or seven...Or eight." �Couple this with the little check bouncing episode last week which got Air America pulled off the air in Chicago and Los Angeles (it has since returned to Chicago), and one might question Franken and his cohorts' business strategy. �Oh, who am I kidding, bleeding heart liberals don't need a business strategy! | ||||||
| So, how much longer will Air America be on the air? �My prediction is that it will fade from the spotlight in less than six months, and will be off the air completely within the year. �The clock is ticking. | ||||||
| Copyright Gerry Wachovsky, 2004, and Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved. | ||||||
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