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Will Wilmington someday get Glenn Beck?

M

MikefromDelaware

I recently bought a new radio for work and can get WPHT in Philly, not great but clear enough to hear for a radio geek. So for the past two weeks I've been able to listen to Glenn Beck on WPHT. What a great show. I'd sure like to hear WILM pick up Beck's show. What I'd suggest would be that WILM air Beck from 9-12n, Limbaugh 12n-3p, Watson 3p -6p giving WILM a live and local program again during the afternoon drive (put Hannity on over night).

Of course WILM's cross town rival WDEL could air Beck from 9am-12n, Loudell's news, 1pm-2pm, Jerry/Rick, Al 2p-4p.
Any thoughts?
 
ABC would not allow Hannity to be bumped to evening. They already have made a concession allowing Levin to run after Savage.

Local live does not count for much when the local live show in question is terrible, and when you are talking about bumping a successful syndicated show with an established following (among listeners and advertisers). Not that a face off between Fatso and a "hostile reactionary" (a phrase coined by the Green Party of Delaware) trying to sound like Bill Cosby wouldn't be amusing.

Watson is a contender for the title of America's Worst Talk Show host. As long as Watson is around, even Robert Henson is out of the running. Fatso hired Watson because Watson made Fatso sound good by comparison. Fatso loved it when he filled in for Watson and people (including you) would say how great he sounded (even if a direct comparison to the untalented, uninformed and incompetent Watson was not voiced, it was obvious).

The only thing keeping Watson on the payroll is the EEOC and their affirmative action policies. It's certainly not talent.
 
Mr. Flintstone,

I'm not sure why you hate Alan Loudell so much (and I take the position that it's none of my business either, so it's fine with me), but he can't be blamed for this one. Alan started at WILM in 1987...Watson was already a veteran there by that point.

Blame him for keeping him there if you want, but he can't get the heat for hiring him.
 
Fred, Our ears apparently are on a different wave length, so we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. I find Allan Loudell's newscasts to be well done. I believe he's expanded the topic range of his interviews to cover a broader range of topics since leaving WILM and relocating to WDEL. I have found his intereviews while back at WILM and now at WDEL to be informative and generally interesting to hear. Allan's newscasts have a pleasant feel to them which is a nice change from the usual hype that is such a big part of radio.

I'd also have to disagree with your assessment that Watson is a contender for the worse talk show host. He does his "shtick" just as all talk hosts do. I had my own personal style when I did my show. I'm sure some listeners liked it and others didn't. John's style of show (where he interrupts the callers excessively, as least to my ear) isn't to my liking, but that's simply his style and it apparently works for him. I've worked with Allan and John while at WILM and have the utmost respect for their broadcast abilities, and I like both as people. They always treated me, a part timer weekend newscaster/talkshow host, always with respect and both would go out of their way to help assist me any time I needed it. I never was talked down to, was always treated as an equal, even though their knowledge of radio, broadcasting, and their years of experience, etc, far surpassed me as I have always been a weekend part timer, as you've put it, a hobbist.

Maybe when the ABC contract is up for renewal or expiration, then WILM might consider renogiating Hannity's show to the night shift and moving Watson to 3pm-6pm and airing Beck 9am-12n.

Chances are WDEL wouldn't take Beck, as they have truly gone live and local during the day and unless they changed their format to less local, Beck wouldn't fit, unfortunately. So I guess that means I'll have to put up with the static and listen to WPHT for Beck.
 
Interestingly enough, Loudell does better as a talk show host than as a news broadcaster.

He is a poor interviewer. People (including you) have commented on how knowledgeable Loudell is. That is precisely what makes him a poor interviewer. His interviewers should not be about him. Their purpose should not be to demonstrate how "knowledgeable" he is. Strangely enough, however, when he filled in as a talk show host he wasn't bad. He actually listened to callers, seemed interested in what they were saying and was often good at drawing them out. But in his news interviews he usually does most of the talking.

He is also a mediocre news reader who does not benefit from comparison to Peter McArthur. He'd sound better if he just would read his copy and stop trying to ad lib.

Watson's style works for him? Based on what? Certainly not the Arbitron numbers. He gets few callers and the majority of his calls come from about a half-dozen people (who apparently don't mind being interrupted).

You have heard Beck's show and you like it. You apparently are not much of a fan of Hannity. Audience numbers suggest you are in the minority. Clear Channel just signed Hannity and they agreed to take Levin, too, in order to get Hannity away from WDEL. Hannity's show is hot. Hannity is on over 500 stations (many of them Clear Channel stations). I know of none which don't clear the show live. In fact, ABC-owned WJR recently pushed back Mitch Albom's local show (previously syndicated and carried on WDEL) to take two hours of Hannity live. All things being equal, maybe a good local show can compete with a syndicated show. Maybe Watson is not as bad as Henson, but there's no way Watson can compete with or compare to Hannity (or even Beck, which is a solid performer but not as strong as Hannity). Heck, Watson didn't even do that well against Dr. Laura.

WDEL is local and live because they have no choice. No strong syndicated competitor exists in either Rush's or Hannity's time slot.

Watson and Loudell were hardly ever there when you were as a weekend part-timer. Even so, it's amazing how gracious these guys were to you when full time staff got "the stare," "the silent treatment" and even had things thrown at them. Nothing wrong with having a hobby. As you pointed out, you were smart enough to realize early on you weren't likely to make much of a living in radio. So, you came in occasionally and worked in radio for fun. It's understandable that you don't think of radio as business (or even don't care about the business side). It's fine that you do "wish list" program schedules based on your personal favorites. Just don't be surprised when the people who make their living programming and managing radio stations don't operate that way.
 
I enjoy Hannity's show when Hannity has someone like Newt Gingrich or Rudi Gulliani on as guests, but when he has someone he doesn't agree, like Ariana Huffington or some other liberal, then he get's like Watson and interrupts so much that it's not an interesting or entertaining debate or discussion for my ear. It's almost like he's afraid that the lib will actually make a good point and he'll lose the discussion. That to me is poor interviewing. Hannity's show always seems to be in a "crisis" mode, like the world is coming to an end. Hype. I don't want Hillary as President, but do I think our nation will vanish or become a third world nation if she becomes President? No, that's just hype and hyperbolt. To my ear, that makes his arguements less convincing. Plus Hannity spends alot of time talking about his guest appearances, etc, which are of no interest. From what I understand, Limbaugh is #1, Hannity is #2, and Beck is #3 nationally. If that is correct then Beck's show must be a heavy hitter too just as Rush and Sean's.

The thing about Glenn Beck that I like is he doesn't only talk politics, he's also a registered Independent and will bash the Republicans too, whereas Hannity is basically a mouth piece for the Republican party. It might as well be Tony Snow's show, now that he's Bush press secretary, why bother with the middle man of Hannity. Glenn Beck has a sense of humor and I've had some laughs while listening. Can't say that I've ever laughed during Hannity's show. Those are just personal likes and dislikes for my ear. I'm probably in the minority point of view as Hannity's show is #2.
 
Will Wilmington someday get Glenn Beck?
They can receive it but they don't get it. ::)

MikefromDelaware said:
I enjoy Hannity's show when Hannity has someone like Newt Gingrich or Rudi Gulliani on as guests, but when he has someone he doesn't agree, like Ariana Huffington or some other liberal, then he get's like Watson and interrupts so much that it's not an interesting or entertaining debate or discussion for my ear. It's almost like he's afraid that the lib will actually make a good point and he'll lose the discussion. That to me is poor interviewing.


From what I understand, Limbaugh is #1, Hannity is #2, and Beck is #3 nationally. If that is correct then Beck's show must be a heavy hitter too just as Rush and Sean's.
Click to expand...

I'd say Hannity doesn't qualify as an interviewer at all. He does political argument and brings in opponents. I don't like Hannity's act but he does it better than Gallagher, O'Reilly, et al - and certainly better than Watson.

Beck is smart enough to see that interest in ideology-driven partisan political talk is waning and he seems to be moving in the direction of NJ 101.5.

If your new radio can pick it up, you might like Salem's 950AM - especially Medved and Praeger.

According to Talker's magazine audience estimates (which not everyone accepts but are the only ones publicly available) the audience rankings are:

Rush Limbaugh (WILM)
Sean Hannity (WILM)
Michael Savage (WILM)
Dr Laura
Laura Ingraham (WNTP)
Neal Boortz - Mike Gallagher (ex-WILM)
Jim Bohanon (WILM) - Bill O'Reilly (WPHT, WCOJ) - Clark Howard - Doug Stephan
Glenn Beck (WPHT) - Jerry Doyle
Bill Bennett (WNTP) - Dr. Joy Browne (WCOJ) - George Noory (WDEL) - Dave Ramsey (WILM, WCOJ)

Based on this, WILM would do better brining back Mike Gallagher, except Clear Channel owns and distributes the Glenn Beck Show.

But unless Watson does something really - really dumb and gives management an excuse to fire him, he's probably safe.
 
Unfortunately, I still can't get either Salem's 560 or 990. There's just too much interference from equipment and the steel building, etc. I used to listen to Dennis Prager (on 990 WNTP) during lunch out in my car a couple of years ago. He was interesting to hear. I've read a book by Michael Medved, but haven't caught his radio show. Basically on AM I get 800 WTMR, 1150 WDEL, 1210 WPHT, 1290 WWTX, 1380 DELDOT, 1450 WILM. I can also get 90.9 WHYY-FM for the NPR programming.

Thanks for the listing of the "pecking order" of talkers.
 
Whoops, typo. Yes, Salem's WNTP is 99. Previously Wibbage 99.
WFIL is all brokered preachers. They don't even carry Janet Parshall any more (guess some pulpit-pounder showed up with a bag of tax-free cash). It's not worth listening to but I'm surprised you can't get, since they are so low on the band. I've gotten a really good signal from them the other side of Harrisburg (and it was the only Philly station for which I could get a good signal).

What kind of radio did you get?
Have you tried an external antenna, ground and/or Select-a-tenna?
Surprised you can't get 99. Wibbage used to talk about Delaware as if they thought they had listeners there.
 
The radio is just a Panasonic boom box. I did run a wire from the AM antenna inside the boom box which helped. This same radio at home pulls in the AM stations quite well for a boom box. The bigger problem is I'm in an industrial location in a steel building so plenty of interference, plus the lab equipment I use, etc adds to the interference on AM. 560, 740, 950, 990, don't come in, 1060 just barely, 1150 clear, 1210 mostly clear, 1290, 1380, and 1450 clear.

FM is far better. I can get most Philly stations other than WXTU and WRTI, but I can get very clearly WXCY so that covers Country (no classical or jazz though), WDSD is still a no show also, but 94.7 WRDX comes in very clear also.
 
It's a shame somebody who enjoys radio so much has to deal with such reception problems at work.

Some of those boom boxes do surprisingly well (at very low cost). I have a 15 year old Sony that pulls in AM stations surprisingly well. If you can run your antenna wire outside, you might get decent reception. Otherwise, maybe a computer techie can tell you how to get around the block on audio streams. It is strange the company will let you use a radio at work but they won't let you listen online, especially since AM stations embraced streaming because of workplace reception problems like your's. Maybe the suits just want everybody listening to the elevator music on JBR, since that's supposed to make you more productive (and the company doesn't have to pay for Muzak).

One possibility: I use a great little program called Replay A/V (from Applian.com) which works like Tivo for Internet radio. I can set it up to record programs on my computer and listen to them whenever. Like Tivo, they have a media guide and you can just click on the show you want (or set it up manually). If you have an mp3 player, you can transfer the shows to it and take them with you. If you like two (or more) shows broadcast at the same time, it can even record both (all) of them because it can treat the audio streams as file downloads. It can also download podcasts.
 
Replay A/V sounds great!

I also cannot listen to streaming radio at work. My company bans it because of bandwidth issues. It really slows down the system if many people are listening on-line.

I still have a 15-transister GE radio that my parents gave me in 1966! Back then radios had a great AM section. When I worked in Center City Philly, I was in the middle section of a third floor office complex (the building was an entire city block big), surrounded on all sides by metal walls. Yet that radio could pick up all the Philly AM stations loud and clear, when the folks with window sided offices could only get KYW or WIP. Not even my Grundig with w wire antenna worked as well. So Mike, instead of looking for the newest radio, dig out the oldest you've got and give it a try. The old radios with better AM sections might solve your problem.
 
Hey, Tux...

Picking up Philly AM radio in a Wilmington office building is more problematic than picking up Philly AM radio in a Center City office building. You are right, current AM radios are not as good but there is also a lot more interference for AM radios to contend with. I've gotten a GE SuperRadio and C. Crane's CC Radio Plus, both of which are designed for the best possible AM reception. Plus a Select-A-Tenna and C. Crane's Twin-Ferrite AM antenna. The SuperRadio and CC Radio are so good to begin with the Select-A-Tenna and T-F provide only modest improvement, but attached to regular radios they make a HUGE difference (I can listen to 1010 WINS on my stereo system, which barely gets WCAU with its own antenna).

In high school, I had a Zenith tube AM-FM table radio and I could get all the Philly AMs on the far side of Cecil County (last time I drove out there, I hit the car radio scan button and it only stopped twice - nothing from Philly or Wilmington). In Detroit, I could listen to Chicago AMs during the day. I just checked on E-Bay and I see a guy in Marcus Hook, who has an estate sale business, has one for sale for $9.00. Now you've got me really curious to see how that radio would work with today's AM environment and if it's really as good as I remember. Or maybe it would be like a Twilight Zone episode and I'd turn it on in the afternoon and hear The Rockin' Bird or Taylor Grant.

Anyway, if anybody else gets the urge, there are a lot of vintage radios on E-Bay and Radio Shack still sells any tubes you might need. It's never too late to get that Zenith Trans-Oceanic.
 
Fred, Thanks for the great tip.

Like you, I often wonder whether those old radios were really that good or if I am just having "flashbacks". My parents had an old Breuster table top radio with AM and a SW band. A great radio for DXing as a kid. The trouble was it had 14 volt tubes, not the standard 12 or 6. After the cat knocked it off the table one day, we could never find tubes for it. If I can find that old radio, I'll try e-bay for tubes.

On the old radios, I know my old GE transistor is as good as I remember. WABC airs a Saturday night oldies show, so I get to relive my memories using the same radio I listened on to Music Radio 77 in the 60's and 70's!
 
AM reception can be strange. One morning (well after sunrise) I was sitting in my car in the parking lot at New Castle Airport killing time between live shots, and hit the scan button. I was getting New York, Harrisburg, Washington - even WSBA in York like they were local.

Central PA seems great for AM reception. Last time I drove to Harrisburg I was getting good signals from Harrisburg, York, Lancaster and who knows where else. My scan button stopped six times for Rush. I was even getting WTOP's Frederick, MD repeater very well. The midwest is also great. Driving West, my scanner stops for WJR, Detroit around Youngstown, and in Detroit it stops for WLW, Cincinnati. And this was a more recent vintage Ford POS car radio.

When I was in college in East Lansing, MI, I got great nighttime signals from Class A New York stations (Cousin Brucie, Yankee games with Mel Allen and Red Barber) but I couldn't get squat most of the time from KYW or WCAU. WBZ came in great and I had several friends (radio geeks and normal people) who were addicted to Dick Summer (who is now running his own small ad agency here in Chester County) - using my Zenith or a VW car radio. I used to drive south of campus to the university experimental farms, which got me far away from any interference sources. There was a small hill that was a great place for DXing.

WBZ also came up in great during the day in North Central Maine when I was up there during summers (I had a Halicrafter AM/SW then).

For the record, fringe stations with a listen-able signal become completely buried in buzz saw noise when they turn on IBOC.

If you have never checked out the C Crane catalog, it's fun to look at - even if you don't buy anything.
 
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