MIRS launches new political podcast

There is a new political talk show in town, and for a political junkie like me that’s a great thing.

MIRS (Michigan Information & Research Service), the subscription only newsletter that covers the Capitol, launched an hour long podcast focusing on Michigan politics on Monday, and it will run weekly on Monday. The podcast is hosted by MIRS’ Editor Kyle Melinn. Panelists include MIRS’ Publisher John T. Reurink and Correspondent Susan Demas, who also writes for the Michigan Truth Squad.

It features discussion and interviews, and the best part is that even though MIRS is subscription only, the podcast is free.

I love podcasts, which are kind of like audio blogs. They are excellent for a slow day in the office because you can listen anytime you want and pause them anytime you want. Some podcasts are just recordings of radio shows, like the Stephanie Miller Podcast I subscribe to, but there are some great local ones, too.

One of my favorites that comes from a broadcast radio show comes from the Lansing City Pulse. The hour long show is broadcast on Wednesday evenings on 89 FM, the Michigan Sate University radio station, but its podcasts are archived on the City Pulse web site. The shows go all the way back to October of 2008, and they have filled some slow afternoons at the office. The show was, until last week, also hosted by Melinn and City Pulse Publisher Berl Schwartz. The show has guests that generally cover three areas: politics, the arts and the local Lansing area.

My favorite non-radio podcast is called “Two Guys Named Joe” put out about one a week by political consultants Joe DiSano and Joe Munem. One is a Democrat and one is a Republican, and they offer up lots of great inside information.

One of the newer but really good podcasts on Talk Lansing is “The Back Room: Michigan Politics” hosted by veteran journalist and radio host Walt Sorg. The show features a weekly rotating roundtable of mid-Michigan political activists that has included Ari Adler, former press secretary to the Republican leader of the Michigan Senate; Mark Grebner, Democratic political consultant and longtime Ingham County Commissioner; and Kathie Dunbar, Lansing city councilperson and head of the South Lansing Community Development Association.

Liberal talk comes to Armed Forces Radio

The military will finally get some relief from the constant barrage of hate and misinformation from the likes of the drug addled gas bag Rush Limbaugh when liberal talk is added to the Armed Forces Radio Network (AFRN).

A PowerTalk line up of some of the most dynamic liberal talkers will hit AFRN airways in mid- to late October, and it will feature Ed Schultz, Bill Press, Thom Hartmann and Stephanie Miller. The line up is part of the Dial Global personalities that will also include conservative host Neal Boortz.

The Armed Forces Radio serves about 800,000 American military personnel worldwide with programming and news, as well as their families, providing a link back home for the men and women of the Air Force, Navy, Marines, Army, Coast Guard and more.

Replace racist Schlessinger with a liberal/progressive talker

Now that rightwing talk show host “Dr.” Laura Schlessinger has given up her show after her racist tirade last week, perhaps WJR, the rightwing voice of the Great Lakes, can hire a progressive liberal talker and restore just a touch of balance and increase their ratings.

It makes no sense that the most powerful radio station in one of the most liberal cites in America in a Blue state has not a single progressive/liberal voice in the lineup. There are some excellent choices out there that thrive, despite being on fewer stations and on the lower power stations.

My choice is Stephanie Miller, but there are many successful hosts to choose from, like Thom Hartman – with Michigan roots – Ed Schultz, Randi Rhoades, Bill Press and many more.

Call or write WJR and ask them to restore some balance and fairness so they can again be called the “Great Voice of the Great Lakes.”

You can call them at (313) 875-4440 or toll free at (800) 859-0957; email them via their web site at http://www.wjr.net/contactus.asp or even snail mail at
News/Talk 760 WJR
3011 West Grand Blvd.
Suite 800
Detroit, MI 48202
General Information: (313) 875-4440

Vote for the top liberal talk show host of 2009

Like you, I love listening to liberal talk radio, when I can find it, but who are the best liberal talkers? The blog LTR: The Alternative Media Resource, is again running its annual contest to pick the top 10 liberal talk radio hosts.

The contest is pretty simple. Just go to the blog, and pick your top 10 from the list provided. The polls are open now until midnight on Christmas Eve. The results will be announced on the blog on January 1, 2010. So vote today.

Last year’s winner was Mike Malloy, followed very closely by Air America host Sam Seder and –one of my favorites – Thom Hartmann. In the early voting MSNBC and Air America host Rachel Maddow has an early big lead at 63 percent. She finished fifth last year. My favorite, Stephanie Miller, finished fourth last year, but is in sixth to date with a respectable 25 percent of the vote.

If nothing else, you will discover a great blog that does an excellent job of covering liberal talk, and it has links so you can listen to a wide variety of liberal and progressive hosts. Unfortunately, that’s the only way many of us can find quality talk radio.

Here in Michigan we live in a state that has been blue since 1992, but for some unknown reason there is only one station in mid- and Southeast Michigan that carries liberal and progressive talk on a regular basis.

We already know conservative hatemongers enjoy an unfair monopoly on talk radio, thanks, primarily, to media consolidation that has five mega companies owning almost off the 257 talk radio stations in the country. There are 10 hours of conservative talk for every one hour liberal talk. That’s not only unacceptable, but it makes no sense.

Rightwing WJR declines to carry SOS address in favor of State of Oakland County address

I will be watching Governor Granholm's State of the State address on PBS at 7 p.m. tonight, but if you are not fortunate enough to be close to a TV, try listening to it on NPR.

Amazingly, you will not be able to hear it live on Michigan's most powerful and most rightwing radio station, WJR. The great conservative voice of the Great Lakes is unbelievably carrying the state of the county address of Oakland County Executive and Republican gubernatorial candidate Brooks Patterson. Yes, you heard it right: the most powerful radio station in the state is carrying Patterson's speech on airwaves owned by the public instead of the Governor. Unbelievable. If there ever was a reason for the Fairness Doctrine I can think of no better illustration as this outrage as the reason why.

Even funnier is the station's management reason for it? Get this: Patterson had is hand up first.

It never ceases to amaze me that WJR continues to cling to its rightwing lineup despite broadcasting from a state that has been blue since 1992 and located in one of the most Democratic cities in America. Did they not see the result of the last election?

The have all the national hatemongers on the air, like Rush Windbag, Sean Haity, "Dr." Laura and Mark Levine, and the local line-up is also rightwing. Paul W. Smith subs for Windbag on occasion; I can't believe this guy is from my hometown of Monroe. Bill O'Reily wannabe Frank Beckman was voted one of the most biased reporters, columnists and commentators in Michigan.

But I almost fell out of my chair when I read the headline from Detroit News columnist Neal Rubin: "WJR: No vast right-wing conspiracy." He was correct, however, when he said "WJR-AM (760) leans so far to the right it almost topples over."

Really? If there is no conspiracy then why are there no non-rightwing voices on the station? Rubin falsely claims "Liberal equivalents have historically struggled." That’s' because they are not on as many stations as rightwing tools. When they go head-to-head liberal formats do as well or better.

The likes of Ed Schultz, Stephanie Miller, Bill Press, Randi Rhoades and Thom Hartman are very successful, and I will put them up against anyone.

Let's let WJR program director Steve Stewart how insane it is to bump the Governor for the head of just one of Michigan's 83 counties, and while you are at it, also ask him why there is no balance on WJR.

You can call them at (313) 875-4440 or toll free at (800) 859-0957; email them via their web site at http://www.wjr.net/contactus.asp or even snail mail at
News/Talk 760 WJR
3011 West Grand Blvd.
Suite 800
Detroit, MI 48202

Obama Radio Nation 2009 features best talk show hosts in the nation

If you are a fan of progressive talk radio like I am, you will get to enjoy both the best liberal talk show and some of the best radio hosts in the country and a great inaugural event.

“Obama Radio Nation 2009" is a three-hour live show and national radio broadcast from Lisner Auditorium at George Washington University, located just three blocks from the White House, hosted by the nationally-syndicated progressive talk-radio host Bill Press. It will be broadcast live on progressive talk-radio stations around the country, and C-Span will carry it live on TV. It will give people the opportunity to see and hear some great entertainment, and it will make you wonder why it’s so hard to find them on radio stations.

It will feature my favorite host, Stephanie Miller, as well the country's leading progressive talk-radio hosts Joe Madison, Randi Rhodes, Ed Schultz, the Rev. Al Sharpton and Mario Solis-Marich. It will be a celebration of the inauguration of President Barack Obama and the role progressive talk radio has played nationally in this historic occasion and the rousing Democratic election victory.

The show will also feature a "house band," giving the show a feel akin to a more lively "Prairie Home Companion.

The comedy styling of Saul Anuzis

I enjoy laughing and comedy. That’s why my favorite radio show is the “Stephanie Miller Show.”

Usually it’s not a good thing to generalize, but. Liberals are actually funny. Conservative's lame attempts at comedy almost always fall flat. For examples, we just need to look at “comedians” Rush Limpbaug and Ann Coulter or the Faux attempts at the Daily Show rip-off, the Half-Hour News Show. Limpbaug and Coulter are hilarious if you are a racist homophobia.

In addition to my daily doses of Stephanie to make me laugh, I also have Michigan’s Republican Party Chair Saul’s Anuzis’s daily dose of spin via what he calls “Articles of Interest” on his “blog.” It’s not really a blog because he does not allow any comments. I guess I can’t blame him because of the crap his staffers write, but he should not call it a blog. But I guess if I wrote that stuff I would not want to have to try and defend it. You find the kind of humor there that makes you say, “is he for real.”

Today, he is enjoying the fact that Kalamazoo businessman Jon Stryker is under investigation by the U.S. Justice Department. This is the same Justice Department that fired U.S. attorneys because they refused to investigate and make up charges against Democratic politicians. The same Justice Department that for the first time in history has been politicized and used as a weapon by the bushies. Nixon used the IRS to go after his enemies, but Bush used a department that is supposed to uphold the law to go after enemies. I guess former Nixon aide John Dean had it right when he used the title “Worse than Watergate” for his book about the Bush Administration.

And why do Anuzis and the GOP hate Stryker? What is his crime? He contributes to Democrats. In his daily does of BS, Anuzis claims that Stryker “spent more than $5 million of his own money buying a majority in the Michigan House of Representatives.” I hope Anuzis keeps believing that was the reason.

But the funniest line from Anuzis is this one, “”After spending millions of dollars to buy Governor Jennifer Granholm’s re-election…” That’s’ one of the sickly, funny lines. Hey Saul, did you forget who your candidate was in 2006? Your candidate's only qualification for the job was that he inherited millions of dollars from his family’s pyramid scheme. He spent millions of those inherited dollars trying to buy the seat.

Stryker is a rarity among Democrats who happen to be rich; he inherited his business that makes him rich. Almost every conservative billionaire has inherited their money.

The hatred of billionaire philanthropist George Soros if a perfect example of the misguided GOP hatred. Here is a man who escaped Nazi-occupied Hungary as a teen with nothing but the clothes on his back, and he managed to become a billionaire with his wits and hard work. He gives millions to charity, he helped end apartheid in South Africa by giving money for scholarships to black students there and he helped end Communism by funding dissident movements behind the iron curtain. You would think he would be a hero to the right and a model of what they say they stand for. No. Why? Because he contributes to liberal causes, he's the devil and evil. They call him the liberal sugar daddy.

Contrast that to the conservative sugar daddy – the one they hate to talk about - Richard Mellon Scaife. He got his money the old fashioned way, he inherited it by being a principal heir to the Mellon banking, oil, and aluminum fortune.

Scaife is the class act that bankrolled the conservative hit magazine “The American Spectator,” and he also financed the so-called” Arkansas Project” that paid people to come up with dirt on President Bill Clinton.

For an excellent story on that you should read “Blinded by the Right: The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative” by former American Spectator writer David Brock, who now operates the web site that Bill O’Reily calls the “Left Wing Smear site Media Matters.” All they do at Media Matters is post his words and actual videos.

No wonder billo hates them.

Report says consolidation gives conservatives unfair advantage on talk radio

It’s pretty obvious to everyone that conservatives have an unfair monopoly on talk radio, but the media reform group the Center for American Progress just released a report that conforms that there are 10 hours of conservative talk for every one hour liberal talk, thanks, primarily, to media consolidation that has five mega companies owning almost off the 257 talk radio stations in the country.

The report says each weekday, 2,570 hours and 15 minutes of conservative talk are broadcast on these stations compared to 254 hours of progressive talk—10 times as much conservative talk as progressive talk. While progressive talk is making inroads on commercial stations, conservative talk continues to be pushed out over the airwaves in greater multiples of hours than progressive talk is broadcast.

Many radio stations with liberal and progressive hosts or formats are flipping or, changing their formats, despite good and even better ratings than the format they once had. This began to occur shortly after the November election where we saw the success of Democrats in taking control of both the U.S. House and Senate, and many people point to the emergence of talk radio – such as the start-up company Air America - as one reasons by getting information out on Republican misdeeds and outright incompetence. In the battleground state of Ohio, WTPG in Columbus was enjoying its highest ratings since the old days of Top 40 hits with a new progressive format, but some six months ago the station inexplicably flipped and ratings have not been as good.

Some local communities are fighting back. A progressive station in Madison, Wisc. suffered the same fate, but a grassroots effort that included petition drives, demonstrations and publicity stooped the flip. A new web site called Nonstop Radio has sprung up to help them and other flips.

The trend in conservatives dominating the radio waves is even occurring in urban areas where the population always tends to be liberal and democratic. A separate analysis of all of the news/talk stations in the top 10 radio markets reveals that 76 percent of the programming in these markets is conservative and 24 percent is progressive, although programming is more balanced in markets such as New York and Chicago.

Many experts say the reason is the repel of the Fairness Doctrine in 1987 under Ronald Regan. The explosion of conservative talk radio is attributed to the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine by the Federal Communications Commission. The Fairness Doctrine was a regulation—formally implemented by the FCC in 1949, but dating back to the early days of broadcasting—that required broadcasters to devote airtime to important and controversial issues and to provide contrasting views on these issues in some form.

The report says the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine is a factor, but it’s only one reason and not the biggest. The report concludes the “gap between conservative and progressive talk radio is the result of multiple structural problems in the U.S. regulatory system, particularly the complete breakdown of the public trustee concept of broadcast, the elimination of clear public interest requirements for broadcasting, and the relaxation of ownership rules including the requirement of local participation in management.”

“Ownership diversity is perhaps the single most important variable contributing to the structural imbalance based on the data.” A quantitative analysis of all 10,506 licensed commercial radio stations reveals that stations owned by women, minorities, or local owners are statistically less likely to air conservative hosts or shows.

In other words, ownership consolidation of all radio stations by just five major companies is the problem. There is no local ownership in local radio stations, and no local input or understanding of the local market. For example, Clear Channel owns 145 stations and 86 percent are conservative, and Citadel owns 23 stations and all of them are conservative. That lack of local control has led to the inexplicable imbalance in the urban areas, and a perfect example is our own WJR, the Great Conservative Voice of the Great Lakes.

WJR is 100 percent conservative, and all of its hosts, with the possible exception of sportswriter Mitch Albom and maybe the guy who does the Handyman show, are right-wingers. It’s no surprise that WJR is owned by Citadel. It’s a perfect example of the lack of local input or understanding of the local market. Detroit is one of the most liberal cities in America in a Blue state, yet there is no non-conservative voice on the most powerful radio station in the state. To me that’s not only unacceptable, it’s bad business and against the law for WJR to use the public’s airwaves free and ignore the political region they operate in and broadcast nothing but rightwing views.

Anyone who has ever watched Faux “News” for comic relief and to see what the other side is doing has recently seen hatemonger Sean Hanity screaming about how bringing the Fairness Doctrine back is an attempt to silence him and Rush Blowhard. I have no idea where he got that ridiculous talking point, but it is simply not true. In fact, the Center for American Progress says the Fairness Doctrine has never really been repealed.

From a regulatory perspective, the Fairness Doctrine was never formally repealed. The FCC did announce in 1987 that it would no longer enforce certain regulations under the umbrella of the Fairness Doctrine, and a 1989 a circuit court upheld the FCC decision. The Supreme Court, however, has never overruled the cases that authorized the FCC’s enforcement of the Fairness Doctrine. Many legal experts argue that the FCC has the authority to enforce it again—thus it technically would not be considered repealed.

The report does offer some recommendations to bring some fairness and balance back to the airwaves that belong to the public. “Restore local and national caps on the ownership of commercial radio stations. Ensure greater local accountability over radio licensing. Require commercial owners who fail to abide by enforceable public interest obligations to pay a fee to support public broadcasting.”

In the meantime, I will continue to listen to Air America and Stephanie Miller on my computer when I’m working, and when I’m in my car and in the right geographic position to pick them up I will listen to Ann Arbor’s WLBY 1290 and Detroit’s WDTW 1310. I suggest you do the same and support their sponsors.

A shameless plug for my favorite national radio show

For those of us who enjoy our political commentary mixed with comedy, parody and humor we will get a treat next week by being able to see as well as hear the “Stephanie Miller Show” on MSNBC.

The show can be heard from 9 a.m. to noon Monday through Friday on the radio at its regular time, but beginning Monday, April 30 the show can also be seen where the former Don Imus show aired. The show will be seen from 6-9 a.m. Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday next week. Producers are not saying whether this is a full-time stint, if it’s just for the week or if it’s just a fill in for the rightwing hack that’s filling the slot now. The show will air on the radio at its regular time during the TV stint.

The biggest difference, in my opinion, between liberals and conservatives is conservatives are somewhat lacking in a sense of humor. This show proves it, and there is nothing on the right that is close to this. By the way, what ever happened to that fake news show on Faux News that was supposed to be the right wings answer to the “Daily Show with John Stewart?”

It may be a shameless plug, but I highly recommend this show. If you can’t watch the program listen on AM 1290 WLBY in Ann Arbor, AM 1310 WDTW out of Detroit or listen to the web cast.

If you have never heard the show before a quick listen will get you hooked.

Still time to listen to Stabenow interview on the Stephanie Miller Show

In case you missed it Friday like I did because I was working the House Office building, you can still hear the interview with Sen. Debbie Stabenow on the hilarious, entertaining and informative Stephanie Miller Show.

The show saves the highlights of the last show on the web site, but I don’t know how long they keep it up. So hurry and listen to it. Stabenow, only one of the 23 lawmakers who had the foresight to vote against the Iraq resolution in 2002, talks about the current Iraq resolution against the U.S. escalation of the Iraq civil war occupation.

Sen. Stabenow to guest on Stephanie Miller Show

U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow will be a guest on the Stephanie Miller Show Friday morning, Feb. 23.

The show airs from 9 a.m. to noon, and for those who have never had the opportunity to listen to the show, it’s three hours of hilarious comedy with liberal political commentary mixed in.

Unfortunately, if you are in your car the only station that carries the show is WLBY-1290 AM out of Ann Arbor, and it has a rather weak signal. However, you can go the show’s web site and listen live.