no, NPR doesn't do conservative talk.
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Los Angeles Radio Ratings: October 2023
- Thread starter pjc1961
- Start date
Actually they don't have any actual talk shows. They have outside distribution deals with a couple of station produced talk shows, but they're not strictly political shows. They cover a broad range of issues, including international news.
All from the liberal point of view.
I never liked the "equal-time" rule, but if there were ever a place it should be required, it is public radio. I would love to see someone like Larry Elder take over the 3-6 pm slot on local KCRW in place of the boring "All Things Considered" and let a black man tell the audience what the real world is really like with non-government approved takes. Heads would explode all over town and the station would actually become somewhat relevant as it would trigger a real dialogue instead the constant monotony of inside the beltway bubble shibboleths that are otherwise the norm.
That's your opinion. They all speak with people who represent all sides. Even Matt Gaetz did interviews with them recently.
The government doesn't "approve" any content on any public radio station. They didn't under Trump, and they don't now. Trump wanted to control the VOA, but it didn't actually happen.
Larry Elder did interviews with liberal talk shows when he was running for governor. He's one man with one opinion. NPR doesn't do that kind of programming.
Juan Williams formerly a host on the Fox News show THE FIVE use to host ALL THINGS CONSIDERED in the early 00s.
It's funny KENNEDY whom is on the five on Fox news occasionally and on the Fox business channel prior to the woody show use to host mornings on Alt 98.7 and did a show with Brian Suits on Kfi after they showed John Ziegler the door.
And, in fairness, people on the left tend to think the center is too conservative.
That is not the reason for the dearth of progressive or liberal talk. It's audience size.
A number of larger broadcasters tried Air America on pretty good AMs in markets like LA, San Francisco, Miami, New York, Chicago, Portland, etc. Among them was Clear Channel who put it on over 10 stations, including a bunch of 50 kw ones. It got nearly no audience and even where it had initial appeal, it faded in a year or two.
Other stations have tried more liberal local formats and failed, too.
All were owned by "corporations" and all they wanted was a profitable format. They did not get that will liberal talk, so they switched. Nobody since has found the talents and the right presentation.
Yet those corporate owners have CNN and MSNBC and the post-prime talk shows on CBS and ABC and NBC and Saturday Night Live. Because a liberal approach works in the TV format, but has not worked in radio.
Half of all US radio stations lose money. Don't you think the owners of some of those unprofitable stations would not jump to get a syndicated format that gets audience and advertisers?
This is as far as politics can go. Unless a post has something to do with broadcasting we will be deleting it.
The problem with Kennedy is similar to the one that essentially all the Air America hosts had: they were not very entertaining. Too intense, very agenda driven and not fun to listen to. Kennedy has other areas she can talk about that make up for not being very "fun" so she stays around.
Since this is the LA board, I'll bring up Tom Leykis. For all of his personal failings, he wasn't a conservative, and he was successful.
Then there's Howard Stern. He wasn't specifically a political talk show host, but you knew where he stood.
My point is that not every liberal is a failure. The mistake of AirAmerica was trying to copy and mimic conservative radio. The same methods and approaches don't always translate. I had an owner try to take techniques used in the country format and try to apply them to other formats, and they failed. So copycats don't always work.
Here's what we know about conservative talk: It appeals to an older male demo. Not because there are no young conservatives. There are, and they've tried to make it in conservative talk radio. The talk demo doesn't want to hear from younger hosts, especially if they venture beyond the accepted narrative.
The other thing is we don't see a lot of FM conservative talk stations. There was a time when it was tried, but not any more, and you don't see a lot of FM simulcasts. The few I know of are WSB Atlanta and WBT Charlotte. So owners are fine with conservative talk on an AM because they don't have a lot of other options. But iHeart is not going to blow up one of its FMs in LA for either KFI or KEIB. Not gonna happen.
I had heard with air america if you wanted to run a certain show they wouldn't let you. You had to run all of air america or none of it. Very odd.
WSB and WBT have two things in common (the WBT FM is actually a rimshot) - both are in southeastern metros that are, compared to their counterparts, quite conservative, especially the latter.
Once you get out of the top markets (which I realize we’re talking about), in the southeast, conservative talk on FM becomes quite common and successful. Raleigh/Durham, Greensboro-Winston Salem, Jacksonville, Greenville/Spartanburg, etc come to mind. Some midwestern cities like St. Louis, Indianapolis, and Kansas City as well.
Not what I heard. Maybe at the start they thought they could force full coverage, but when they did not instantly get ratings and stations became harder to sign up, I believe they stopped that if they ever had required it.
The established networks at the time did not require carriage of their full slate. A new network with no track record would have been stupid to try that. Of course, beyond the air "talent" that was way too intense and not entertaining enough, Air America's lack of radio management experience was the other major part of their failure.
For a while, when he was on the Howard Stern station and his shtick involved things like "show your tits in traffic".
Leykis was great on WNWS in Miami in the early to
Edit: should be "mid 80's" and not "70's".
There, I agree. And, while the topics were 80% or more non-political, he was entertaining. Stern could talk about a spilled cup of coffee and his fanbase would find it highly entertaining because his style was fun to listen to.
That's the factor that people did not understand about Limbaugh. You did not listen because of just his conservative perspective. You listened because you were part of his "club" and enjoyed how he said things... you actually talked to him while he was on the air and found his style entertaining.
Nope. The failure was being too intense and not at all entertaining. The high rated conservative shows were fun, entertaining, amusing as well as topical. The shows were a chat with your friends. Air America hosts, except, maybe, for Randi, were stiff and way too serious... more like right off the campaign trail instead of like friends at a weekend barbecue or guys of a like mind chatting at lunch or at the local bar.
This applies almost universally, and is a good point. So many stations in the earlier days of Top 40 thought you could imitate WABC in Topeka, yet the mentality was so different that the energy level, rotations and the rest just did not work.
We see loads of them as simulcasts in smaller markets where they are on anything from a full signal to a translator or Class A. They don't show in the books because translators are never shown separately for commercial stations and nearly all simulcasts do SLR.
There are many more, but they are not listed. A few did not work, like the Clear Channel San Diego simulcakst, but those were few and often had additional explanations such as in the KOGO case, a better signal from the LA affiliate in much of the market.
Never say never. KFI's revenue is so strong that they may find a need to put it on FM. However, dropping right now a Black formatted FM for a white conservative approach would be terribly hard to sell through so it won't happen.
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I remember an oddball exception regarding "talents" Hannity and M. Levin leading to a dust-up with the Hannity distributor and a station in the Philadelphia market, I think it was. This was when Levin was just getting started. They both originated from WABC (AM). The Philadelphia station wanted nothing to do with the Levin show but wanted Hannity. It lost both as they would not take Levin, leading to Hannity moving to a lesser signal in the area.
I'd suggest former president Gary Krantz had a lot of radio management experience. He encountered a lot of infighting and the never-ending problem with money. I'm reminded a bit of Pacifica.
These 24-7 networks always run into money trouble. Stations need them in dayparts they can't sell, and the network can't do much better. There have been several 24-7 sports networks that have faced the same issue.
Wow! Was he on that early. Leykis would have been about 14 to 19 years old then.
How true.
I love it ... 'The Stern Station'. If it wasn't for FCC he may still be on it. Then where would KNX-FM be? Howard in the morning, all-news the rest of the day ...? It's funny how one event sometimes leads to other significant outcomes.
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He had success with, principally, two smaller station groups, like MJI. But not what was needed for running a network. He joined Air America about a year after the network went on the air, and lasted for what seems to be 11 months. In the middle of that, the net had that loan scandal involving one of the scouting kids clubs and soon after declared bankruptcy.
I don't think anyone could have fixed that organization. The founders had no clue about radio, and the infighting you mention was likely too much for anyone. Unfortunately, with a good "coaching PD" they could have made it if they had inserted a lot of fun and human interest stuff an a lot less doomsday preaching on the air.
I have not looked, but listening to some old Randi airchecks would show one person, who with a bit of lightening up, could have been big in both centrist and more liberal groups. I recall thinking more than once, "if she'd stick to that kind of thing, she would get big and younger numbers." But that was nearly 2 decades ago.
Thanks David
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