("Front Page Magazine" is David Horowitz's slime column site.)
The "Liberal" Network
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=12815
By Lowell Ponte
FrontPageMagazine.com | March 31, 2004
SCHEDULED TO LAUNCH ON THE EVE OF APRIL FOOLS' DAY, the new "liberal"
network Air America Radio is to begin airing on stations in New York City,
Chicago, Los Angeles, Portland and, maybe, San Francisco, five liberal
cities where it can rouse the already-converted.
Several of its key programs can also be heard via XM Satellite Radio's new
"America Left" Channel 167, also launching March 31. (Air America's Vice
President of Programming Dave Logan was programming executive at XM.)
Its streaming internet audio might also be available at
airamericaradio.com.
Experts are betting that the new network will fail to make money and
disappear within a year, despite celebrity hosts such as comics Al Franken
and Janeane Garofalo. But this does not matter to its investors.
Pundits have claimed that it will offer the opposite view to talk radio
conservatives such as Rush Limbaugh, but this appears not to be Air
America Radio's primary mission.
A look at the people and corporate structures behind the new network
reveals that it will liberally lampoon and criticize Republicans and
conservatives, but do not expect to hear any principled liberal criticism
of Democrats such as presidential candidate Senator John F. Kerry. And do
not hold your breath waiting for its hosts to praise the Green Party or
invite Ralph Nader to appear as a guest.
The reason: Air America Radio was designed and built to advance the
Democratic Party, not necessarily liberalism. And if it proves
unprofitable, preparations are already in place for this network's
lucrative dismemberment shortly after the November election.
"I'd be happy if the election of a Democrat ended the show," said the
network's biggest star Al Franken, who reportedly has signed only a
one-year contract to do a weekday three hour show opposite Limbaugh. "I'm
doing this because I want to use my energies to get Bush unelected."
The idea to create a "liberal" radio network - as if National Public
Radio, ABC, NBC, CBS and the other left-leaning networks were insufficient
- came from Chicago businessman Sheldon Drobny, who said he was willing to
invest $10 million in the venture. In 2003 he created AnShell Media as
home for this enterprise and hired Atlanta broadcast veteran Jon Sinton as
its chief executive officer.
But Drobny became controversial after National Review's Byron York
reported on his writings for the small website MakeThemAccountable.com.
Drobny's rantings likened President Bush to Adolf Hitler and accused the
Bush family of links to Nazi Germany. These loony-Left notions, Drobny
acknowledged, came from his readings of conspiracy theories published by
former Trotskyite Lyndon LaRouche's organization.
Drobny defended his potential role as owner of this "liberal" network. "As
a venture capitalist, I'm not the one who does the programming," he said,
"nor would I interject my own opinion into programming." But his argument
that he who pays the piper would not call the tune was unpersuasive.
In 2003 Drobny and his wife sold "much" (but not all) of their ownership
of AnShell to a group formed by New York investor Evan Cohen, an
entrepreneur "who at the time was developing a pan-Asian radio network,"
and his classmate at Beloit College in Wisconsin David Goodfriend, a
former Clinton White House staffer.
The new holding company, with Drobny as part owner, is named Progress
Media, and its President is Jon Sinton.
[...]
Air America Radio's Chief Executive Officer Mark Walsh is more blunt. He
compares owning or leasing radio stations to controlling valuable
beachfront property.
If the liberal radio network tanks or goes bankrupt, notes National
Review's Byron York, "the group will still own the stations, which will
still be worth a lot of money, and can still be reprogrammed with
something more popular."
Or as Walsh puts it, "If people don't like the way you decorate the house,
you can change it."
That is why Progress Media is divided into two bankruptcy-bulwarked
separate entities, the radio network and the holding company for the radio
stations. Few other radio networks are set up on this cunning capitalist
model, the kind that liberals condemn when practiced in other industries.
Prior to taking the helm at Air America (also the name of the Central
Intelligence Agency's airline), Mark Walsh was the top Internet advisor to
Senator John F. Kerry's campaign.
And just before that he was the first Internet Chief Technology Advisor of
the Democratic National Committee, as well as a donor of $250,000 in 2000
to the Democratic Party, making him one of the top 400 fat cat political
party donors in America.
During his 49 years Walsh has been a TV newsman in West Virginia and a
highly paid executive at Home Box Office, General Electric, America
Online, VerticalNet, the New York Times Digital Company, Impulse Radio and
several other enterprises. So why is this Harvard MBA and wealthy
businessman a Democrat?
"I am a lifelong Democrat," Walsh told Business Week in 2002. "My mother
took me to a rally for then-candidate John F. Kennedy in 1960. Hubert
Humphrey was a family friend. I've just always been a DNA-level Democrat
and love the party."
Now, imagine that you are a principled liberal talk host and that this guy
is your boss. Are you going to say anything that might incline liberal
listeners to vote Green or for Ralph Nader instead of for Democrat John F.
Kerry? Not if you value your job. Not when you know that your boss arrived
trailing clouds of glory from positions with the Kerry campaign and the
Democratic National Committee, and that he remains closely allied with
both.
No dummy, Walsh knows that a sugar coating of comedy will be needed to
sell his hard-to-swallow, hard-to-stomach political views.
[...]
Air America's staff of nearly 100 will include 11 full-time writers, most
of whose work is to produce jokes and comic bits. They have been recruited
from Comedy Central's The Daily Show, CourtTV, Oprah Winfrey's cable
channel Oxygen, and elsewhere.
The aim, says President Jon Sinton, is not to sound like a liberal version
of Rush but more like the repertory companies of Don Imus or Howard Stern.
It is certainly not to sound dry and boring like National Public Radio or
raving lunatic Leftist like Pacifica Radio, although the leftward slant
will point in the same direction.
And on this liberal network, the medium will be part of the massage.
Directing its entertainment programming is Lizz Winstead, co-creator of
Comedy Central's The Daily Show.
At her urging, nearly every show on Air America has at least two hosts.
Inexperienced in hosting talk radio, for example, Al Franken will be
backstopped by veteran co-host from Minnesota Public Radio Katherine
Lanpher. Both co-hosts, says Air America's web site, "have a mean streak
a mile wide." (But she will not receive equal billing on "The O'Franken
Factor," a title meant to tweak Fox News Channel star Bill O'Reilly.)
Franken reportedly wanted to call his program "The Liberal Show," but
network bosses preferred to de-emphasize the "L" word. These same
executives originally wanted to give their entire network the deceptive
name "Central Air," as if it were centrist.)
[...]
Network CEO Walsh was "family friends" with Minnesotan Vice President
Hubert Humphrey.
[...]
One test of its liberal integrity will be whether, and how sharply and
often, Air America Radio voices criticism of Democrats up for election.
Another will be whether this network opens its books so that America can
see which wealthy and powerful special interests, foreign and domestic,
are bankrolling it - reportedly to the tune of $30 to $100 million.
Liberals demand such disclosure of other corporations, and so a network
that declares itself liberal should set an example of openness.
Odds are that this network will have no sacred cows, but it will have lots
of sacred bull.
Mr. Ponte hosts a national radio talk show Saturdays 6-9 PM Eastern Time
(3-6 PM Pacific Time) and Sundays 9 PM-Midnight Eastern Time (6-9 PM
Pacific Time) on the Liberty Broadcasting network (formerly TalkAmerica).
Internet Audio worldwide is at LibertyBroadcasting .com. The show's live
call-in number is (888) 822-8255. A professional speaker, he is a former
Roving Editor for Reader's Digest.
full: http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=12815
On Tue, 30 Mar 2004, Vicki Mercer wrote:
> Should be interesting . . .
>
> http://www.airamericaradio.com/
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