Media Curmudgeon

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August 26, 2009

Beck Not Worthy of Sanction

Liberal readers were outraged and conservative readers were supportive of my blog advocating that advertisers not pull their advertising from Glenn Beck’s program on the Fox News channel in response to a proposed boycott of their products.

The comments and debate have been filled with intelligent and emotion-filled arguments that seem to boil down to two positions: 1) Those who want to shut up Beck, O’Reilly, Fox News, and Rush Limbaugh and 2) those who don’t want advertisers to kowtow to boycotts or try to stifle free speech and believe the hate mongers are not influencing public opinion but are merely pandering to the entrenched prejudices of an angry, hate-filled, mostly white uneducated fringe.

So my question is this, if advertisers should cancel their advertising in the conservative Beck’s controversial television program, should Mutual of America cancel its sponsorship of PBS’s “Bill Moyer’s Journal” which recently replayed a documentary titled “Critical Condition” that clearly and persuasively advocates in favor of health care reform? Health care reform is a major, divisive political issue, with liberals generally on one side of the line in the sand (the left side, of course) and conservatives on the other side.

Right-wingers typically view Bill Moyers as a soft liberal, perhaps less strident than Beck, but idealistically and politically as much an anathema as Beck and O’Reilly are to the left. So why aren’t right wingers calling for Mutual of America to withdraw its support from “Bill Moyer’s Journal” and for other sponsors to pull their support from other PBS or NPR or MSNBC programming?

Perhaps conservative organizations are advocating boycotting PBS, NPR, and MSNBC programming they don’t like, but I have heard nothing about it. I suspect it is the tone of Beck’s stupid racist remark as much as his right-wing rabble rousing and hate mongering against Obama that is upsetting liberals, many of whom want to bring back the Fairness Doctrine in an attempt to muzzle conservative hate mongers such as Rush Limbaugh who are distributed on FCC-licensed radio stations.

However, Beck, O’Reilly, and Hannity are on Fox News on cable, which is not regulated by the FCC, so they would continue to bloviate even if the ineffective Fairness Doctrine were reinstated (something Obama is on record as being against, and rightly so).

I think the solution to the Beck and right-wing ranters problem was provided by an insightful comment I received from a conservative friend of mine who was the Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division in the George H. W. Bush administration:

“As Justice William O. Douglas once referred in a Supreme Court decision to the Communist Party of the US, the hysterical commentators are, ‘…the poor peddlers of unwanted wares; their goods remain unsold.’ Why bother elevating the focus on these ranters by suggesting they're worthy of sanction?”

Justice Douglas said it much more eloquently than I ever could. Glenn Beck’s or Bill O’Reilly’s or Lou Dobbs’ rants are not worthy of sanction.

Posted by Charles Warner at 2:21 PM | Comments (2) | Print |

Bruce Braun at August 26, 2009 3:42 PM writes:

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JesseKornbluth at August 26, 2009 3:25 PM writes:

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August 25, 2009

So Open Minded Your Brains Fall Out

Guest blogger Myer Berlow responds to guest blogger Bruce Braun:

"I feel that there is a danger of being so open minded that your brains fall out. When you call for intelligent debate you have a responsibility not to lob in a bunch of remarks that confuse the issues. But in a country where Sarah Palin is the best hope that Lincoln's party has, what can one expect?

You mention Nazis in the context of this discussion but fail to see the real relevance of Nazi strategy to what is happening today in terms of the "dissent" against health care. The Nazis used the "freedom of speech" protection of the Weimar Republic to shout down their opponents.

They took power through the democratic process which they despised and were able to succeed because they were willing to pervert the system. They disrupted meetings, they bombed their opponents and they used the mass media to carry their twisted version of the truth.

Your characterization of Chavez and Castro as anti-democratic is a bit deceptive. Are they any worse than the pro-American regimes that we supported that raped and killed nuns in El Salvador or tortured and killed dissenters by the thousands in Chile? Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson may have made mistakes but its unfair to libel them as being blackmailers.

I met Jesse Jackson in 1968 when he returned from Memphis with King's blood still on his clothing, and he is entitled to a few mistakes, but he isn't a gangster.

You speak of "intellectual elites" on "both sides." If Rush Limbaugh and Glen Beck are "intellectuals" you have a different definition of the word than I do. The definition was first articulated by Socrates who believed "one will do what is right or best just as soon as one truly understands what is right or best."

The right wing Fox news commentators are unconcerned with "truth" and the only beauty they care about is the color of money.

They are self-appointed and are rabble rousers at best. They care about their speech being protected not about the speech of others -- see this YouTube video.

I don't believe they ought to be silenced but I believe that they ought to be seen as creating an advertising environment that appeals to people who believe a mixed race president is a Nazi and think that all the science they need to know is in the Bible.

When the news on Comedy Central is presented with more thought and concern for the truth than on a "news channel" we have indeed reached a new low -- watch this video.

Calling Fox News "news" is like calling the Jerry Springer show a source of relationship advice.

The absurdity of your position on Ted Kennedy is over the top. Kennedy may have missed roll calls but he had an excuse -- Brain Cancer. To ask that Massachusetts voters be represented in the Senate during the period after his death seems like a sensible alternative. I live in Massachusetts and I have no issue with the way I am represented by Ted Kennedy. I'd trade one percent of his time for 100 percent of most other Senators.

Ted Kennedy has more of his brain in tact than the non octogenarian CEOs who have tanked their companies. To point to corporate America as the model of efficiency is misplaced given our
present situation.

I'd like to see a situation where we don't have the greedy leading the ignorant in the name of freedom and democracy."

Posted by Charles Warner at 1:27 PM | Comments (0) | Print |

August 24, 2009

Don't Silence Loudmouths

Guest Blogger Bruce Braun jumps into the debate about advertisers' cancelling ads in controversial TV programs.

"Why is it that every time some loudmouth pops off with some sort of lame comment that, (depending upon your ideological or political point of view), there is a clamor to silence them?

Silencing takes the form of complete removal from any public discourse, boycotting or advocating the removal of advertising spends.

The self-appointed intellectual elites of either side of the issues and arguments believe only they are the vox populi and are the only ones capable of deciding what is best for our society.

If the founding fathers did not sincerely believe the American people were fully capable of separating the fly shit from the pepper of political discourse, there never would have been a First Amendment.

Let's be clear. Hitler and the Nazi's, Stalin and his army all took power by force and by stifling any sort of dissent. Dissenters were killed and the media state controlled. They were murderous dictators. Nothing more.

Unless I'm missing something, no one in this country has seized or shut down dissenting forms of media the way Hugo Chavez has in Venezuela and Castro has in Cuba.

Yet we have our supposed leaders like Nancy Pelosi using the term Nazi to characterize those who question her incomprehensible 1100 page healthcare reform bill. Buffoons such as Glenn Beck call Obama racist out of shear shock value. Jackson and Sharpton have made careers out of extorting money from corporations and effectively selling protection from boycotts for those the term racist could be hurled at, justified or not. Just watch any of these people and decide for yourself if they are nothing more than attention whores and self-promoters or are they really making intelligent and reasoned contributions to the dialog.

The question we should all be asking about these folks and their fellow travelers is what is their end motive? More power, prestige, ratings, money?

Ted Kennedy wants the MA legislature to reverse a law they passed in 2004, at his urging to protect John Kerry's senate seat, had he been elected president. Why reverse the law he championed? Ted says it is to insure the state has two votes for health care reform. Kennedy says voters are entitled to it. He fails to mention his illness has kept him away from Capitol Hill for most of the last 15 months. He has missed all but a handful of the 270 roll-calls taken in the Senate so far this year. Through no fault of his own, he is unable to carry out the job he was reelected to in 2006. Kennedy is not alone in this respect, just look at other past and present senators such as Strom Thurmond and Robert Byrd. Name any public company that has octogenarians in failing health in senior management roles. Ted thinks the citizens of MA should only be allowed to have a senator that is either him or someone Deval Patrick or Ted deems worthy. It could still be a Democrat but why not let the voters decide?

We all have the power to turn off the TV, buy or not buy certain products or to vote for someone other than the gerrymandered incumbents. Let's exercise that power without being coerced."

Posted by Charles Warner at 10:08 PM | Comments (2) | Print |

myer berlow at August 25, 2009 9:26 AM writes:

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arcdoc at August 24, 2009 10:53 PM writes:

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August 21, 2009

Advertisers Should Cancel Ads in Beck's Program

Guest blogger Jesse Kornbluth of Head Butler responds vigorously:

You have written that advertisers should NOT cancel commercials on Glenn Beck's hatefest of a show.

Let's set aside your confusion between Beck's right to free speech and his "right" to commercial support --- a "right" I'd sure love to have for any of my TV projects.

Let's just look at it from the advertiser's point-of-view.

Let's say I'm Peter Lewis, former CEO (and largest shareholder) of the aptly-named Progressive Insurance.

My company advertises on Beck.

I see Beck spewing garbage that strikes me as hateful --- seriously hateful, on the verge of hate speech.

I call Progressive and complain. I learn that I'm not the only one distressed by Beck. In fact, our customers are complaining.

Is it your point, Charlie, that Progressive, having placed its commercials on Beck's show, is lashed to Beck's mast? In for a penny, in for a pound? Bound to its contract to the bitter end?

What, may I ask, are Progressive's rights?

Is Progressive limited to diplomacy with this maniac?

Once upon a time, at the height of the Vietnam war, I wrote an op-ed in the college paper urging graduating seniors not to give money to our alma mater until it took a position on the war. The university's idea of a good speaker at the opening of the JFK School in 1966 was Robert McNamara --- the administrators were tone-deaf. So did my essay get any notice? You bet! I got invited to speak with a dean in 24 hours. And a few years later...

Samuel Johnson wrote, "No man is a hypocrite in his pleasures." In American media, that pleasure is money -- Fox News may or may not care about its conservative politics, but we may be certain that Rupert Murdoch looks at the bottom line. So why not hit Fox where it lives? If Beck's show is so damn important to Murdoch, let him pay for it.

Yeah, democracy thrives on dialogue, on the rough-and-tumble exchange of ideas. If a company values that exchange, why support Beck instead of Rachel Maddow or Bill Moyers?

Posted by Charles Warner at 8:59 PM | Comments (0) | Print |

August 20, 2009

Get Real Blodget; News Corp. Won’t Fire Glenn Beck

In the lead post today (August 19) on Silicon Alley Insider, Henry Blodget wrote a blog titled “News Corp. Should Fire Glenn Beck.”

I’m a regular reader of SAI and think that Blodget often has penetrating insights into and analysis of internet and media companies. However, I think his emotions got the better of him when he wrote about Glenn Beck’s stupid remarks about Obama being a racist. News Corp. not only is not going to fire Glenn Beck for his remarks, his bosses, Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes, head of Fox News, are probably going to give him a raise for generating so much publicity.

Plus, knowing that Ailes is an arch-conservative Republican operative (he worked as the media advisor for the Nixon campaign in 1968), he probably agrees with Beck. If Ailes disagreed with Beck’s remarks, he would have publicly reprimanded Beck or fired him immediately and he would not be actively negotiating with Don Imus to do mornings on Fox Business News.

When Imus made his racist remarks about the Rutgers women’s basketball team being “nappy headed hos,” MSNBC fired him. CBS also fired Imus, but waffled so long that it appeared to be kowtowing to Al Sharpton’s protests. It’s never good public relations to give in to the camera ravenous Reverend Sharpton, because it encourages his blackmailing techniques. Fox News won’t make that mistake and defended Beck’s right to voice his opinion – in other words, supported him.

What Ailes and News Corp. want are ratings, as pointed out by Jeff Bercovici in his blog on AOL’s Daily Finance titled “Sorry, Fox News boycotters -- Glenn Beck's not going anywhere.” Controversy gets ratings and with all the current publicity, Beck’s ratings will spike up at least for a while, maybe permanently.

Those who hate Beck, want him fired, and are urging advertisers to cancel commercials in his program should keep in mind that Beck’s racist remark was stupid. Anyone with any brains at all and who watched the campaign coverage of Obama knows he doesn’t hate white people – his mother was white and he adored her. He doesn’t hate the white culture – his white grandparents raised him and he adored them.

What Ailes, Fox News, and Beck are doing is attributing their own motives, values, and opinions to other people – in psychology it’s called projection. By projecting their prejudices and racism on Obama, Fox News’s intention, therefore, is meant to appeal to racist people – Fox News’s and Beck’s loyal audience – the same people who make Fox News the highest rated news channel make WWE professional wrestling the top rated entertainment program on cable TV. They seem to like and identify with overblown personalities spewing rage.

Thus, I’m sure Roger Ailes and Fox News are delighted with Beck. He reflects their values: ratings, rage, and racism.

Posted by Charles Warner at 8:59 AM | Comments (1) | Print |

Bruce Braun at August 24, 2009 4:08 PM writes:

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August 19, 2009

Advertisers Should Not Cancel Ads in Glenn Beck’s Program

Last week commentator Glenn Beck lost several advertisers in his Fox News program after he said President Obama was a racist with a “deep-seated hatred for white people or the white culture," according to the NY Times.

According to THR.com “Color of Change, an African-American online political organization … has been spurring advertisers to stop supporting the show.” And that “Procter & Gamble, Progressive Insurance and SC Johnson all said their ad placements during the broadcast were made in error and that they would correct the mistake.”

The pressure on marketers to cancel advertising on TV programs that an interest group finds objectionable brings back memories of the Reverend Donald Wildmon’s protests in the late 1970s against television shows that he thought promoted immoral lifestyles. He spoke against such programs as “Three's Company,” “M*A*S*H,” and “Dallas” and urged his fundamentalist followers not to buy products from companies that advertised in the targeted programs.

His efforts failed miserably because consumers weren’t going to stop buying Tide, Charmin, Prell, Colgate tooth paste, or Fords because Wildmon didn’t like “M*A*S*H.”

As David Ogilvy said in the 1960s, “the consumer is not a moron, she’s your wife.” Consumers are smart enough to understand that advertising is independent of programming and does not constitute an endorsement of the content. An advertiser that runs commercials on professional wrestling on TV is not signaling that it endorses stupidity and violence.

It is ironic and a sign of the changing times that in the 1970s the conservative, evangelical Mississippian Donald Wildmon pressured advertisers to cancel advertising in popular entertainment programs he considered immoral, and that an African-American group today is pressuring advertisers to cancel advertising in a conservative opinion program.

But the larger question it seems to me is about the ethics of urging advertisers to use their economic power to influence the agenda on the public debate.

As much as I despise racist remarks, right-wing hate mongers such as Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Ann Coulter, and over-the-top liberal hate mongers such as Keith Olbermann, and as much as I feel these venomous snakes are poisoning the TV atmosphere and polluting the public debate and debasing the agenda on issues of public importance, I don’t want to silence them. I don’t want to restrict their freedom of speech.

Restricting their freedom of speech would be worse for the country in the long run than the damage their poison does in the short term. And we don’t want to go down the slippery slope of having advertisers decide which speech or which political opinion to support.

If we encourage advertisers to withdraw their support from conservatives such as Beck and O’Reilly because some people don’t like their views, then it follows that we should encourage advertisers to withdraw their support from liberals Olbermann and Rachel Maddow because some people don’t like their views either.

Furthermore, the idea of free speech has two concepts imbedded in it. Free in one sense means people should feel free to voice their opinions, whatever those views are. Free in another sense means that people should have access to information and opinion at no charge – that ideas should circulate freely in an open marketplace of ideas so that people can freely compare ideas and embrace the ones they like (that confirm their own biases).

Thus, for free speech to flourish and for the marketplace of ideas to be stocked with a plethora of competing ideas, we need Fox News, CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC, Talking Points Memo, the Huffington Post, and yes, even Rush Limbaugh.

Remember, if it weren’t for Fox News and Bill O’Reilly, we wouldn’t have Stephen Colbert and probably even Jon Stewart to make fun of conservatives.

Most national advertisers are smart enough and sensitive enough to public opinion and sensibilities to understand where to place their advertising for maximum effectiveness. Most of these marketers know what type of content is relevant and conducive to influencing a product’s liking or purchase. If pressure groups try to get advertisers to use their economic power for reasons other than advertising effectiveness, then they unwittingly encourage Pandora to open her box of unintended consequences, especially the potential limitation of free speech.

And advertisers that bow to pressure to expand their advertising criteria beyond branding and buying tacitly admit that they are willing to use their economic power to influence the content of the national debate. Therefore, they should not cave in to pressure.

They should say to pressure groups something like this: “We disagree completely with and abhor Mr. Beck’s remarks, but we wholeheartedly defend his right to say them in a society that honors free speech, and we will not pull our advertising at this time. We hope Mr. Beck will refrain from making racist remarks in the future. We will also continue to place advertising in Rachel Maddow’s TV program.”

In the long run consumers will respect courage and the upholding of a basic value such as free speech more than kowtowing to pressure groups. However, an advertiser that does not cave in must frame and communicate its decision in terms of upholding free speech and at the same time denounce inappropriate remarks. By doing so, an advertiser would signal to Beck and Fox News that it will not continue to advertise in a program or on a channel that has a pattern of racist or other hateful remarks and signal to pressure groups that it does not support inappropriate, racist comments.

It’s OK for advertisers to try to influence the tone or decency of the public dialogue, but not its content or agenda. It’s a fine line, but advertisers must try to walk it thoughtfully.

Posted by Charles Warner at 10:33 AM | Comments (2) | Print |

Media Curmudgeon at August 20, 2009 11:48 PM writes:

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me.yahoo.com/a/zhD1kg0zo5dVWYzWkESwy4BNU61otfo- at August 20, 2009 5:01 PM writes:

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August 12, 2009

O’Reilly, Beck, Olbermann, and Maddow: Venomous Snakes?

In a blog last week titled “Murdoch and Immelt: Business Is Business,” I wrote:

Thus, Fox News and MSNBC have huge investments in their stars O’Reilly, Beck, Olbermann, and Maddow. They created these venomous snakes, they have long-term contracts with them, and most importantly, they depend on them for ratings, which have gone up, in part, because of the feuding.

In response to the blog, which was distributed via Jack Myers’ Media Biz Bloggers, I received an e-mail that read in part: “I watch Bill O'Reilly frequently, and I dispute your characterization of his [sic] as nasty. It is an opinion program, and in my judgment O'Reilly tries to be fair, frequently giving air time to people who oppose his views. I don't see any attempt at balance at MSNBC, which in my opinion is in the pockets of liberal Democrats.”

In response to the same blog posted on the liberal Huffington Post, I received several comments:

”Among sensible viewers the views of Olbermann and Maddow are not sniping. They are digging up real news all the time. Maddow's expose of a rightwing website encouraging protests against healthcare reform, which she gave last night, should be THE featured article on the Huffpost this morning.”

“Keith and Rachel behaving as they do is absolutely vital. For far too long the misrepresentations, poisonous invective, and outright lies of the Faux News crew went unchallenged. Someone with a big public signature MUST debunk these creeps.”

“…how wrong it is to include Maddow in the ‘venomous snakes’ category. It's very rare that Maddow calls out another cable news person, and she never attacks the way Olbermann does. It's only been within the past week or so that she called out CNN and their coverage of the birther stories -- which she started out as a response to Campbell Brown's absurd statement that only CNN does real journalism.”

“Say what you want about Maddow. She approaches her job with integrity -- yes -- with a liberal viewpoint, but she doesn't spew outright lies to try and bolster her argument. (She doesn't have to.) She may use sarcasm and humor to maker her point, but I don't see what's wrong with that. Give[n] the state of the nation, sometime I think we can either laugh or cry. And I'd rather laugh.”

For conservatives who watch Fox News, it’s perfectly OK to call Olbermann and Maddow venomous snakes, but for liberals who watch MSNBC, it’s OK to call O’Reilly and Beck venomous snakes, but a gross injustice to call Olbermann and, especially, Maddow venomous snakes.

It’s called confirmation bias when conservatives watch Fox News and liberals watch MSNBC. Both cable networks confirm the biases of their viewers. This situation is no surprise, of course, and we would expect each group to defend their star personalities/opinionators, even though it is inconceivable to me that there are not only viewers who actually believe that Fox News is “fair and balanced” but also that there more than twice as many of them than viewers who believe that Olbermann and Maddow are similarly inclined.

I probably used the term “venomous snakes” as much to pick a fight as believing that it was a completely accurate description of all the commentators I mentioned. However, I do believe that O’Reilly, Beck, and Olbermann are venomous or poisonous. And ever since the poets who wrote the book of Genesis used the image of a snake as the embodiment of evil and temptation, the slithery reptiles have been associated with both sins in my mind.

Thus, because I believe the manner in which O’Reilly, Beck, Olberman, and, yes, sometimes Maddow, conduct themselves poisons the debate and dialogue about important issues. These commentators make ad hominem attacks their stock and trade. They don’t explain or try to shed light on complex issues such as health care reform or education or the government’s stimulus efforts to resuscitate the economy, too often they limit themselves to attacking or making fun of individuals.

Rachel Maddow makes her attacks more satirical and a little less nasty than O’Reilly, Beck, and Olbermann (Hannity, Limbaugh, and Lou Dobbs could be added of course0< but Maddow is the cleverer, lighter transition to Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert.

Colbert wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for the all-too-easy-to- ridicule Bill O’Reilly, thank goodness. And politicians and other self-righteous, pompous public figures set themselves up for ridicule by the clever, sarcastic Jon Stewart. But as much as we love these two comedians, they, too, do not dignify the debate on issues of public importance. And that’s a problem.

Most comedy is based on two underlying elements: surprise and anger. To know what the public face of anger is, just watch O’Reilly, Beck, Olbermann, Maddow, Hannity, Ann Coulter, Lou Dobbs, Stewart, and Colbert (or listen to the angriest of them all, Rush Limbaugh). They are all very, very angry at liberals, conservatives, politicians, Obama, government, taxes, or the world.

No one wants to watch normal, well-adjusted, happy, rational, reasonable people on TV; they’re boring – like C-SPAN or the “News Hour with Jim Lehrer” on PBS. Watching David Brooks and Mark Shields discuss the issues on the “News Hour” doesn’t confirm any biases; they are too reasonable and boring. And America needs much more of this type of dignified, respectful, tolerant dialogue and debate.

O’Reilly, Beck, Olbermann, and CNN’s Lou Dobbs are not not dignified or tolerant. They do not respect opposing points of view. They tend to attack people, not ideas. Maddow is the most dignified and the most respectful. Her discussions with conservative Pat Buchanan are typically a model of polite conversation.

Stewart and Colbert can also do a reasonably polite interview, but usually with a touch of sarcasm, that always lets us know where they stand. And, so, they too become personalities/opinionators. More polite, a lot funnier, but, essentially in the same league with O’Reilly, Beck, and Olbermann in poisoning and skewing the debate about issues of public importance.

President Obama is taking his message about health care reform to the people in public forums where he will likely have a polite, dignified debate on the issue because he knows there will not be a polite, dignified debate on the cable news or comedy channels or in Congress -- and shame on them.

Posted by Charles Warner at 3:31 PM | Comments (2) | Print |

Registeredguest at August 13, 2009 6:44 PM writes:

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Bruce Braun at August 12, 2009 11:55 PM writes:

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August 6, 2009

Talk Radio Is Not That Bad

Guest blogger Neil Derrough writes about talk radio, and he has the executive and journalistic background and expertise to discuss the subject. Neil was the general manager of CBS owned KCBS-AM when it switched to an all-news format in 1967 and rose through the CBS Radio and Television stations divisions to become the president of the CBS Television Stations Division in the 1990s. Here’s what Neil writes:

As I observe the discussion of news and journalism today I’m struck by the amount of criticism aimed at talk radio. It seems to me that much of this contempt comes from the more traditional media or as some would call it, the mainstream media. As with any form of media, some of the criticism is richly deserved. The tune-out factor for so many of the rants that fill time with unsubstantiated points of view on talk radio is often appalling. However the attempt to marginalize this variety of information is suspect.

For a little background, I as must fall back to my beginnings at the start of this forty-year news cycle. In the early sixties a few AM radio stations were plugging away with a hybrid of a talk and music format. Because of the so-called Fairness Doctrine a lot of the talk that stations aired was pretty dull and watered down. Only when a station dared to stray into opinion and hoped not to get caught by the bosses did the programming become more lively.The banality of much of the talk programming created by trying to comply with the Fairness Doctrine, and the dynamics of the 1960’s drove CBS to make a wise business decision. They changed several of the CBS radio stations into an all-news format in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Other broadcasters later embraced this format and soon advertisers began to support the immense appetite for news and information. Because of the CBS News reputation at that point their creditability helped the all-news movement establish high journalistic standards.

The Fairness Doctrine was rightfully revoked and soon after came Rush Limbaugh. Let me try and make clear that I am not going to support or criticize Rush. But, there is a need to acknowledge the significant influence that Rush has had on where we are to today with talk radio. The avalanche of talk radio hosts that have evolved since Rush came on the scene is a phenomenon that has created the climate that surrounds present day talk radio. It’s also where the standards started to slip and talk radio too often went over the line. Some of the companies that own these stations look at it as only a business without the benefit of a journalistic history.

The point I started out to make before I got into a history lesson is that talk radio is a major factor in today’s media mix. And it annoys the hell out of a very vocal crowd. The attempt to marginalize it often is purely political and ignores the evolution of the importance of the significant audience that has the right to depend on the options provided by talk radio. It’s also important that this audience be a part of the national discussion of today’s issues. To characterize that audience as mindless and. often much worse, is a political tactic that is being practiced at the highest levels and should be understood for what it is.

I submit that there are often discussions with authors, scholars, politicians, and other experts that contribute to our better understanding of the important issues we are facing today. I get so tired of the implication that NPR is the only place you can get reliable information on the radio. If listeners are discriminating in their choices, they can avoid the ridiculous rants by hosts that in my view deserve to be ignored, and get more detail with real give and take than much that’s provided by the mainstream media.

So the critics and politicians should relax, live with it, and try and tolerate the availability of a different point of view.

Posted by Charles Warner at 4:28 PM | Comments (0) | Print |

Talk Radio Is Not That Bad

Guest blogger Neil Derrough writes about talk radio, and he has the executive and journalistic background and expertise to discuss the subject. Neil was the general manager of CBS owned KCBS-AM when it switched to an all-news format in 1967 and rose through the CBS Radio and Television stations divisions to become the president of the CBS Television Stations Division in the 1990s. Here’s what Neil writes:

As I observe the discussion of news and journalism today I’m struck by the amount of criticism aimed at talk radio. It seems to me that much of this contempt comes from the more traditional media or as some would call it, the mainstream media. As with any form of media, some of the criticism is richly deserved. The tune-out factor for so many of the rants that fill time with unsubstantiated points of view on talk radio is often appalling. However the attempt to marginalize this variety of information is suspect.

For a little background, I as must fall back to my beginnings at the start of this forty-year news cycle. In the early sixties a few AM radio stations were plugging away with a hybrid of a talk and music format. Because of the so-called Fairness Doctrine a lot of the talk that stations aired was pretty dull and watered down. Only when a station dared to stray into opinion and hoped not to get caught by the bosses did the programming become more lively.The banality of much of the talk programming created by trying to comply with the Fairness Doctrine, and the dynamics of the 1960’s drove CBS to make a wise business decision. They changed several of the CBS radio stations into an all-news format in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Other broadcasters later embraced this format and soon advertisers began to support the immense appetite for news and information. Because of the CBS News reputation at that point their creditability helped the all-news movement establish high journalistic standards.

The Fairness Doctrine was rightfully revoked and soon after came Rush Limbaugh. Let me try and make clear that I am not going to support or criticize Rush. But, there is a need to acknowledge the significant influence that Rush has had on where we are to today with talk radio. The avalanche of talk radio hosts that have evolved since Rush came on the scene is a phenomenon that has created the climate that surrounds present day talk radio. It’s also where the standards started to slip and talk radio too often went over the line. Some of the companies that own these stations look at it as only a business without the benefit of a journalistic history.

The point I started out to make before I got into a history lesson is that talk radio is a major factor in today’s media mix. And it annoys the hell out of a very vocal crowd. The attempt to marginalize it often is purely political and ignores the evolution of the importance of the significant audience that has the right to depend on the options provided by talk radio. It’s also important that this audience be a part of the national discussion of today’s issues. To characterize that audience as mindless and. often much worse, is a political tactic that is being practiced at the highest levels and should be understood for what it is.

I submit that there are often discussions with authors, scholars, politicians, and other experts that contribute to our better understanding of the important issues we are facing today. I get so tired of the implication that NPR is the only place you can get reliable information on the radio. If listeners are discriminating in their choices, they can avoid the ridiculous rants by hosts that in my view deserve to be ignored, and get more detail with real give and take than much that’s provided by the mainstream media.

So the critics and politicians should relax, live with it, and try and tolerate the availability of a different point of view.

Posted by Charles Warner at 4:28 PM | Comments (1) | Print |

Bruce Braun at August 6, 2009 6:03 PM writes:

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August 5, 2009

Murdoch and Immelt: Business Is Business

According to a Los Angeles Times story by Joe Flint, News Corp.’s Rupert Murdoch and GE’s Jeff Immelt met in June to discuss the vitriolic on air sniping back and forth between the Fox News Channel’s nasty conservative Bill O’Reilly and MSNBC’s nasty liberal Keith Olbermann.

Here’s what Flint wrote:

The on-screen and behind-scenes feuding between rivals Fox News and MSNBC, which has erupted in recent months like two kids squabbling, has gotten so loud that their parents are trying to tell them to knock it off.

Rupert Murdoch, chairman and chief executive of News Corp., which owns Fox News, and Jeffrey Immelt, chief executive of General Electric Co., which owns MSNBC, met up at the Microsoft CEO summit in Redmond, Wash., to figure out how to defuse tensions between the two channels, according to people familiar with the situation.

Apparently any cooling-off agreement that Murdoch and Immelt might have made hasn’t trickled down and stopped the vitriol. Both cable TV channels continue to allow their hottest personalities (O’Reilly, Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, and Glenn Beck) to escalate, not tone down, their on-air insults and feuds.

The situation brings to the fore several business, journalistic, strategic, and entertainment issues.

First, continuing the on-air spats reinforces the fact that Fox News and MSNBC are not in the news business, they are in the entertainment business. The most important element in the entertainment business is storytelling, and the fundamental element in a story is conflict. The second most important element in entertainment is star quality. An entertainment company cannot succeed without either great stories or popular stars, and a hit requires both.

Therefore, Fox News and MSNBC, as purveyors of entertainment, require a constant infusion of stories full of conflict, delivered by popular stars. With the ready-made conflict of a political campaign over, new conflict needs to be either found or invented.

It takes a fair amount of time and lots of promotion and exposure to create a star, and these elements require the commitment of significant resources, the most valuable being air-time in the form of prime time, hour-long exposure and on-air and off-air promotion.

Thus, Fox News and MSNBC have huge investments in their stars O’Reilly, Beck, Olbermann, and Maddow. They created these venomous snakes, they have long-term contracts with them, and most importantly, they depend on them for ratings, which have gone up, in part, because of the feuding.

During a recession in which most media companies’ ad revenue is declining, newspaper and magazine advertising revenues are falling off a cliff. Therefore, if the print divisions of large conglomerate media companies such as News Corp. are to survive, they need the revenue from the Web and TV businesses to keep them afloat.

News Corp. in particular needs the Fox News revenue because its main Web business, MySpace, is not doing well – revenue is off – and Murdoch’s current pet project, the Wall Street Journal needs lots of money while it is in the process of a make-over in preparation of going after The New York Times.

If there is any doubt whatsoever in anyone’s mind that Rupert’s strategy is to attack the weakened Times, one only has to read the house ad on page A8 of the Monday, August 3, print edition, the headline of which reads: “All the news that’s fit to read. Every day.”

To compete with the Times Murdoch desperately needs O’Reilly and Beck’s ratings and ad revenue generation, so he’s not likely to tone them down. Immelt, for his part, probably understands Murdoch’s needs and, I suspect, is sympathetic. MSNBC’s profits are a mere pimple on GE’s income statement, so they are not vital to GE’s survival. Immelt’s concern is whether Olbermann’s and Maddow’s sniping becomes so outrageous that it affects NBC News’s credibility and, thus, GE’s credibility, which is very important to Immelt.

Immelt’s problem is that if it appears that he has muzzled Olbermann and Maddow, then it becomes “corporate interference” which, in turn, means that if he can influence Olbermann and Maddow, he can influence Brian Williams and NBC News and steer them clear of criticizing GE. Such interference would become a huge story that every self-righteous journalist, columnist, and blogger (in other words, virtually all journalists, columnists, and bloggers) would jump on and eviscerate Immelt.

So, Immelt is not going to say anything to MSNBC or its starts, and Murdoch is not going to tell Roger Ailes to muzzle anyone (Ailes runs the highly profitable Fox News and the profitable Fox Television Station Group). The only thing Rupert might say is “keep it up,” which they are doing.

I suspect that when Murdoch and Immelt met they reassured each other that the vitriolic on-air feud among their valuable stars would not affect their personal relationship, the relationship between NBC and Fox on Hulu, or on any other business relationships they had.

The one thing we can be absolutely certain about in regards to these two industry giants is that above all else they know that business is business.

Posted by Charles Warner at 8:33 PM | Comments (0) | Print |

August 2, 2009

Media Health Care Coverage Is Unhealthy

Most of the dinosaur media’s coverage of the government’s effort to reform the nation’s broken health care system is inadequate and unhealthy. Much of the news coverage concentrates on strategy – the horserace – not on the issues. Many media organizations are covering the health care debate like they cover a presidential campaign.

The worst coverage, of course, is on the cable news channels, which no longer cover serious news or news seriously. They have become video versions of People magazine in the ultimate irony – vapid celebrities reading poorly written copy about vapid celebrities.

This era of cute, air-head news readers was put in bold relief by the tributes to Walter Cronkite and the elevation of comedian Jon Stewart to Cronkite’s long-vacant pedestal of being “the most trusted man in America.”

Stewart is good. We can trust him to pull the wings off of political gadflys, which in the current age is a necessity. But we also need comprehensible coverage of the health care debate. Where are we to turn to get health care news we can really use, if not to cable television or the broadcast networks? In The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, or the Washington Post?

The broadcast and cable media, by their short-form, sound-bite, linear access nature, cannot cover a complex subject adequately, so don’t expect them to do so. Similarly, don’t expect general assignment reporters or non-experts to cover the story adequately.

Here are some sources that I have found or that have been recommended to me that shed some light on the health care debate:

• Jacob Weisberg on Slate


• Ezra Klein on the WashingtonPost.com


• Josh Israel and Aaron Mehta on the Center for Public Integrity


• The Economist.com

I’m sure there are many more Web sites and publications that have good coverage, but I think the lesson I learned in looking for useful health care debate coverage is that you won’t find healthy coverage on cable or broadcast news (with NPR as a notable exception, although it tends to emphasize the horse race aspect), you have to go to the internet and search for expert coverage on blogs or major publications’ Web sites.

Contrary to popular belief, blogs are more trustworthy, more comprehensive, more thorough, and more helpful, than TV. To be informed, turn off the tube and go the Web.

Posted by Charles Warner at 11:20 AM | Comments (0) | Print |