IS THIS THE END FOR CONSERVATIVE TALK?

[Pratte4Life]

Most of the big libs I know actually get most of their news not from the likes of NPR or MSNBC, but from Comedy Central.

 

[argentarius]

As far as liberal talk failing in Pittsburgh, let's just keep it mind that it really wasn't given much of an effort. 1360 is hardly a powerhouse, no matter what programming. They had Lynn Cullen locally and carried Thom Hartman. Alan Colmbes was on at night, but there was no one outside of McKeesport that can get the signal at 10 PM. But never tried the "big guns" of progressive talk like Ed Schultz or Randi Rhodes or even Stephanie Miller. In addition, they did not carry a strict progressive format. The PM drive was Doug Hoerth, certainly not a left political talker, and the 6-10 PM slot was Clark Howard. Bad signal, second rate programming is not a fair shot at progressive talk.

 

[Parttimer]

I've never understood why someone hasn't carried Schultz here. He's by far the best show of the liberal talk genre.

Having said that, if the issue for conservative talk is that people are getting tired of name calling and all-politics-all-the-time, the lib shows are just the same thing from the other side of the aisle. I shared an office a few years ago with a guy (strangely enough, a CMU graduate, even though we were working in Florida) who streamed Air America all day. Al Franken's show was the worst, it was 3 hours a day of "George Bush is a liar." Very little entertainment value, which was odd for a stand-up comedian.

Glenn Beck used to do PM drive at WFLA in Tampa, and his show bore absolutely no resemblance to what he does now. On day when he was following a day baseball game, since he couldn't predict exactly what time the game would end, he would come out of the game and go to the the top of the next hour doing a drive-off-the-road funny parody of a competing station in the market.

Randi Rhodes was also very entertaining in her days at WJNO in West Palm Beach.

I think the time has come to change it up and bring some fun back to the business.

 

[doowopvault]

The sad fact is, when you heard one conservative talk show....you've heard them ALL. I will recap all the Conservative talk shows for the week...right here, right now..."HE'S UN-AMERICAN, HE'S UN-PATRIOTIC, AMERICA IS A CHRISTIAN NATION, HE'S A COMMIE, HE'S A SOCIALIST, MILITARIZE THE BOARDER, PEOPLE WANT HANDOUTS....there you go, no reason to listen.

 

[stevensonair]

I'm of the opinion that in many cases "liberal" talk has failed because of a combination of lack of signal, lack of promotion, and a lack of investment in talent that is entertaining first and liberal second. It could also be argued that like many other concepts that could work, given time and investment, there's no immediate reason for the major broadcasters to pursue it.

 

[PT]

There's plenty of liberal talk, except it's on different medium; television. Like all programming, it's about demographics. The liberal demographic tends to have access to television during the day, the conservative demographic tends to have access to only radio during the same timeframe. Read whatever political reasoning into it as you will.

 

[FreddyE1977]

I think this election has proven that the Liberals don't really need talk radio.

They were very effectively able to target their voters using social media.
That would appear to be the wave of the future.

 

[KeithE4]

The sad fact is, when you heard one conservative talk show....you've heard them ALL. I will recap all the Conservative talk shows for the week past twenty years...right here, right now..."HE'S UN-AMERICAN, HE'S UN-PATRIOTIC, AMERICA IS A CHRISTIAN NATION, HE'S A COMMIE, HE'S A SOCIALIST, MILITARIZE THE BOARDER, PEOPLE WANT HANDOUTS....there you go, no reason to listen.

Fixed. ;D

(The "He's" can refer to either Bill Clinton, Al Gore, John Kerry, or Barack Obama.)

 

[Boss Radio]

There's plenty of liberal talk, except it's on different medium; television. Like all programming, it's about demographics. The liberal demographic tends to have access to television during the day, the conservative demographic tends to have access to only radio during the same timeframe. Read whatever political reasoning into it as you will.

Who are these liberal daytime TV talkers?

 

[uncamark]

There's plenty of liberal talk, except it's on different medium; television. Like all programming, it's about demographics. The liberal demographic tends to have access to television during the day, the conservative demographic tends to have access to only radio during the same timeframe. Read whatever political reasoning into it as you will.

Who are these liberal daytime TV talkers?

I suspect he means "The View" and Ellen DeGeneres. Even though they're primarily apolitical (well, outside of "The View"'s opening panel segment).

 

[PT]

There's plenty of liberal talk, except it's on different medium; television. Like all programming, it's about demographics. The liberal demographic tends to have access to television during the day, the conservative demographic tends to have access to only radio during the same timeframe. Read whatever political reasoning into it as you will.

Who are these liberal daytime TV talkers?

The question really should be who isn't? But that's not my point. My point is that different mediums reach different audiences and program that way to be successful.

 

[uncamark]

There's plenty of liberal talk, except it's on different medium; television. Like all programming, it's about demographics. The liberal demographic tends to have access to television during the day, the conservative demographic tends to have access to only radio during the same timeframe. Read whatever political reasoning into it as you will.

Who are these liberal daytime TV talkers?

The question really should be who isn't? But that's not my point. My point is that different mediums reach different audiences and program that way to be successful.

Maybe you can just tell us what daytime TV shows not on either CNN, MSNBC or Fox News Channel are political, outside of topics brought up in the opening segment of "The View." Because they aren't--and you seem to have forgotten that Bill Cunningham has a TV show now, but that isn't political, either.

 

[promixcuous]

The essential roadblock to liberal talk radio is that liberals/progressives usually have better things to do with their lives than to sit around and listen to talk radio.

We typically would rather actually be out and about living and enjoying our lives, playing air guitar, doing the gangnam style dance, eating dorito tacos at taco bell, bitching about the Pirates, etc, etc.

The conservatives have too much paranoia to do that, and conservative talk is the perfect diet to feed that beast. So many things to fear, so little time.

Well, conservatives need to do something while hiding in their doomsday shelters.

 

[KeyTimes950]

The essential roadblock to liberal talk radio is that liberals/progressives usually have better things to do with their lives than to sit around and listen to talk radio.
We typically would rather actually be out and about living and enjoying our lives, playing air guitar, doing the gangnam style dance, eating dorito tacos at taco bell, bitching about the Pirates, etc, etc.
The conservatives have too much paranoia to do that, and conservative talk is the perfect diet to feed that beast. So many things to fear, so little time.

Well, conservatives need to do something while hiding in their doomsday shelters.

I know you who ridicule those to your right won't believe this, but conservatives I know also would rather be out and about living and enjoying their lives. They want to go to church knowing they can worship their God without any fear of the Internal Revenue Service because someone preaches as our forefathers did in times prior to the era of Lyndon B. Johnson. (He is responsible for the change in federal tax law that prohibits endorsements of political candidates from the pulpit and limits speech about what Martin Luther would have called "the other kingdom" by tax-exempt houses of worship.) They want to go to school knowing they can learn about the heritage this country has had dating back and beyond battles fought here in the Pittsburgh region. They want to go shopping and not wonder when the day will come that a wheelbarrow full of dollars is needed to pay for a normal week's groceries (even if Giant Eagle seems to have put off any price hikes until after the holidays). They want to believe they are making a difference in this country, where storeowners and shopkeepers who register their firms as individual taxpayers aren't rounded up among those "millionaires and billionaires" who should "pay their fair share" because they make more than $250,000 a year. (It is a category in the tax code, look it up.) And, by the way, I do listen to conservative talk radio -- and to quite a few other stations each day. It isn't "know your enemy" (at least not yet) but it is the sort of balance we should be trying to find in the media -- and have always had in this country, where newspapers started out as political organs, rather than neutral arbiters of information.

But what do I know?

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

I know you who ridicule those to your right won't believe this, but conservatives I know also would rather be out and about living and enjoying their lives.

And that makes them different from liberals how? Don't liberals also want to enjoy those same personal pleasures?

What makes Conservative Talk so obnoxious to parts of our population is the way the "Pied Piper" style talkers have the $30,000, $40,000 and $50,000 per year citizens thinking what Conservatives push for and lobby for will be good for them.

Most of of things you mentioned that conservatives want to the pleasure of enjoying are also goals of liberals that I know.

Maybe the $250,000 per year income level as some kind of dividing line between people with drastically different taxation schemes needs to be indexed on up a bit higher to account for inflation but I don't hear Conservative Talk Radio advocating that kind of change.

You are being much too sympathetic to a business person "who owns a store as an individual and makes $250,000" per year. Everyone I know who owns his own business who makes that kind of income has their business incorporated. By the time they drive a vehicle owned by their corporation, have season tickets to the University Football and Basketball games purchased by the corporation, and bury a number of other "perks" in the accounting of the LLC or the corporation, you cannot put the owner of his own store who claims (admits to) an income $250,000 per year up against the engineer or economist of manager working for wages of $250,000 per year. They are not apples to apples comparisons. Conserative Talk Radio never deals with the sweet deal that business owners have when it comes to having their true income taxed.

You never hear Conservative Talk Radio discussing the fact that today's "Primary Care Doctor", your own personal family doctor if you please, has to bust his/her hump to make more than about $130,000 per year. But you hear a lot on Conservative Talk Radio about how the AMA (all doctors in the mind-set of Conservative Talk Radio) is opposed to Obamacare. They never mention that the surgeons and other specialits who make $450,000 and up are fearful that a new and improved medical system might steer some of the speciality bucks in the direction of the Primary Care folks.

I suspect Liberals will be about as happy about some future date when church contributions are no longer a tax deduction as Conservatives will be when they feel they are free to have their church become a legitimate political tool. It is not just Conservatives listening to Conservative Talk Radio who bristle over the tug-of-war between government and church. I assume you do understand that abortion clinics would have failed financially years ago (as opposed to failing because they were outlawed) if they had not been supported financially by Liberal churches.

Your post seemed to have an aroma that said: Conservatives are such nice people, and Conservative Talk Radio helps them be such nice people. But Conservative Talk Radio really doesn't do much to convince non-conservatives that there is anything nice about conservatives.

Don't mis-understand what I just wrote. There are nice Conservatives in this nation. There are nice Liberals in this nation. There are irritating, grumpy, nasty Conservaties in this nation. There are irritating, grumpy, nasty Liberals in this nation.

The problem that many of us have is that Conservative Talk Radio paints a picture where all people of all stripes are anything but nice people. That is not healthy for this nation would be my response.

Why to broadcast stations licenses "In the Public Interest" feel they can be a part of this genre that pains all people of all stripes and something other than nice people?

 

[KeyTimes950]

I know you who ridicule those to your right won't believe this, but conservatives I know also would rather be out and about living and enjoying their lives.

And that makes them different from liberals how? Don't liberals also want to enjoy those same personal pleasures?

What makes Conservative Talk so obnoxious to parts of our population is the way the "Pied Piper" style talkers have the $30,000, $40,000 and $50,000 per year citizens thinking what Conservatives push for and lobby for will be good for them.

Most of of things you mentioned that conservatives want to the pleasure of enjoying are also goals of liberals that I know.

Maybe the $250,000 per year income level as some kind of dividing line between people with drastically different taxation schemes needs to be indexed on up a bit higher to account for inflation but I don't hear Conservative Talk Radio advocating that kind of change.

You are being much too sympathetic to a business person "who owns a store as an individual and makes $250,000" per year. Everyone I know who owns his own business who makes that kind of income has their business incorporated. By the time they drive a vehicle owned by their corporation, have season tickets to the University Football and Basketball games purchased by the corporation, and bury a number of other "perks" in the accounting of the LLC or the corporation, you cannot put the owner of his own store who claims (admits to) an income $250,000 per year up against the engineer or economist of manager working for wages of $250,000 per year. They are not apples to apples comparisons. Conserative Talk Radio never deals with the sweet deal that business owners have when it comes to having their true income taxed.

You never hear Conservative Talk Radio discussing the fact that today's "Primary Care Doctor", your own personal family doctor if you please, has to bust his/her hump to make more than about $130,000 per year. But you hear a lot on Conservative Talk Radio about how the AMA (all doctors in the mind-set of Conservative Talk Radio) is opposed to Obamacare. They never mention that the surgeons and other specialits who make $450,000 and up are fearful that a new and improved medical system might steer some of the speciality bucks in the direction of the Primary Care folks.

I suspect Liberals will be about as happy about some future date when church contributions are no longer a tax deduction as Conservatives will be when they feel they are free to have their church become a legitimate political tool. It is not just Conservatives listening to Conservative Talk Radio who bristle over the tug-of-war between government and church. I assume you do understand that abortion clinics would have failed financially years ago (as opposed to failing because they were outlawed) if they had not been supported financially by Liberal churches.

Your post seemed to have an aroma that said: Conservatives are such nice people, and Conservative Talk Radio helps them be such nice people. But Conservative Talk Radio really doesn't do much to convince non-conservatives that there is anything nice about conservatives.

Don't mis-understand what I just wrote. There are nice Conservatives in this nation. There are nice Liberals in this nation. There are irritating, grumpy, nasty Conservaties in this nation. There are irritating, grumpy, nasty Liberals in this nation.

The problem that many of us have is that Conservative Talk Radio paints a picture where all people of all stripes are anything but nice people. That is not healthy for this nation would be my response.

Why to broadcast stations licenses "In the Public Interest" feel they can be a part of this genre that pains all people of all stripes and something other than nice people?

Kindly re-read the post to which I replied. The writer presumed that those listening to conservative talk radio are paranoid. Also, I do listen to a wide variety of voices. And I do not think a person's politics necessarily reflect their attitude.