Torture & NPR

A couple of things about torture.

First, waterboarding is torture, no ifs, ands or buts. If my word isn’t good enough, consider former P.O.W. John McCain’s:

“All I can say is that it was used in the Spanish Inquisition, it was used in Pol Pot’s genocide in Cambodia, and there are reports that it is being used against Buddhist monks today,” Mr. McCain, who spent more than five years in a North Vietnamese prison camp, said in a telephone interview.

Of presidential candidates like Mr. Giuliani, who say that they are unsure whether waterboarding is torture, Mr. McCain said: “They should know what it is. It is not a complicated procedure. It is torture.”

Therefore, it’s distressing that a potential U.S. Attorney General won’t take a firm stand against waterboarding.

We must do better as a nation.

Second, NPR’s Steve Inskeep and Anne Garrels collaborated on a story that used sources who had been tortured. Instead of focusing on the torture, they focused on the resultant unsurprising confessions. It caused a firestorm of response, and FAIR issued an action alert. Garrels lamely defended herself, and it came off contrived.

We must do better as a nation.

Diminished Expectations Still Go Unmet at Red River Radio

It’s fundraising time at Red River Radio. Here’s my two cents.

First, they’ve made their goal the lowest I’ve seen in years: $200,000. And they’re still not meeting it.

Let’s do the math. With $200,000 to be raised over a pledge drive of 14 days, Red River Radio needs to get $14,285.71 in donations each day. After nine days, they had only raised $114,210, according to their website. That’s $12,690 a day. At that rate, and barring any large donations being held back for a contrived big finish, Red River Radio’s drive will end with around $177,660, about $22,340 short.

The past several pledge drives have also fallen short -- distressing news for the network which is undergoing digital modernization yet still needs massive infrastructure redevelopment. They need lots of money and they aren’t getting it.

What’s the cause? Simply put, people don’t listen as much as they once did and the general focus is shifting from reliance on public donations to corporate contributions.

Consider these quotes from publications by David Giovannoni’s Audience Research Analysis organization:

Reinvigorating Public Radio’s Public Service & Public Support: INTERIM REPORT 1 APPROACH.

Americans are listening less to public radio today than two years ago. Not coincidentally, their financial support of our industry shows signs of softening.

Reinvigorating Public Radio’s Public Service & Public Support: INTERIM REPORT 6 LOSING OUR GRIP.

Public radio is losing its grip on its own listeners.

Stations that generate almost half of all public radio listening have lost loyalty in the last year. MORNING EDITION, ALL THINGS CONSIDERED, and other programs generating 80 percent of all listening have lost their forward momentum or fallen back.

It doesn’t matter whether public radio has gotten weaker or commercial radio has gotten stronger. Either way, our listeners are listening less to us and more to them.

Reinvigorating Public Radio’s Public Service & Public Support: INTERIM REPORT 4 AN HISTORIC LOSS OF MOMENTUM.

After a 30 year run of virtually uninterrupted audience growth, public radio is no longer increasing its reach into American society or claiming larger shares of radio listening.

It’s not lost listening that portends ill for public radio. It’s the loss of upward momentum – the absence of growth on which we have traditionally relied – that threatens to ripple through our public service economy.

Public radio’s revenues have grown in lockstep with its audience for decades. Station managers could budget on the assumption of financial growth because their assumptions of audience growth typically proved true.

We can no longer assume we’ll have more resources tomorrow than we have today. At many stations, listener-sensitive revenues are poised to level or even decline; the projected gap between expectation and reality will approach or exceed the size of their Community Service Grants.

What’s the solution?

Red River Radio needs to change it’s programming to both increase ratings and boost audience loyalty. The program director should carefully analyze Arbitron data. Programs that perform well in similar markets should air here, replacing poorly performing ones here. That might mean grinding the sacred cows of opera, classical, Hearts Of Space and other programs into hamburger, but the network should find the courage to do it.

Christmas is the traditional time for “format change.” That gives them about two months to complete the analysis and make the changes, and it’s plenty of time. Bumped programming could go onto the digital channels.

Increasing productivity from the sales side would also help, but I can’t knowledgeably comment on how to do that. I do know about ratings and programming, though; I studied it for my degree and professionally.

Finally, I still think LSUS should pony up a sizable sum to rebuild the network. I’ve written about it before, so I won’t go over it again here. Dr. Vincent Marsala should personally champion the network in the legislature to secure increased funding, something he seems loathe to do.

Here’s an excerpt from email Dr. Marsala sent me:

“ ... we have been concerned about the needs of the radio station and for the past two years have included a radio station project in our capital outlay plans. However, it is unlikely that the state will fund such a project without substantial contributions from the public, if at all. Regardless, the project will stay on our capital outlay plan.”

As I said, the network needs a champion in the legislature to get that capital outlay funding. It might take a while, but trying is better than doing nothing.

WBUR's On Point Features Right Wing Radio Report

WBUR had an excellent discussion of the study I wrote about from the Center For American Progress. It was on their NPR show On Point hosted by Tom Ashbrook.

The show’s blurb:

“Last week in the firestorm debate on immigration reform, even conservative stalwarts finally blinked at the full-blast power of rightwing talk radio. ‘Talk radio,’ said Mississippi's Senator Trent Lott, ‘is running America. We have to deal with that problem.’

“Problem? Not the way fans of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity and Michael Savage see it. This, they say, is democracy in action. And hallelujah their guys have the biggest megaphones. Maybe too big says a new report. But who's to say?”

Guests were Mark Lloyd, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress; Horace Cooper, Senior Fellow at the American Civil Responsibility Union; and Paul Waldman, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America.

There was very good discussion and debate about the state of commercial political talk radio, examples of many conservative host’s hate-filled diatribes, listener call-ins and contemplation about a new Fairness Doctrine.

One point made was that NPR and public radio programming is the balance to right-wing speech on commercial radio. However, no one really took that seriously. It’s just not true for a variety of reasons explained in the show.

Go listen. It’s good!

Right Wing Programming Stifles Shreveport Airwaves

A new study is out from the Center for American Progress called “The Structural Imbalance Of Political Talk Radio.” It’s a quantitative analysis of conservative and progressive viewpoints on political talk radio programming in the United States.

And it’s bleak if you are a progressive.

First, though, here’s some background form the report:

“Despite the dramatic expansion of viewing and listening options for consumers today, traditional radio remains one of the most widely used media formats in America. Arbitron, the national radio ratings company, reports that more than 90 percent of Americans ages 12 or older listen to radio each week, ‘a higher penetration than television, magazines, newspapers, or the Internet....’ Among radio formats, the combined news/talk format (which includes news/talk/information and talk/personality) leads all others in terms of the total number of stations per format and trails only country music in terms of national audience share. Through more than 1,700 stations across the nation, the combined news/talk format is estimated to reach more than 50 million listeners each week.”

That’s the raw size of the issue, and then there’s these frightening conclusions:

• Our analysis in the spring of 2007 of the 257 news/talk stations owned by the top five commercial station owners reveals that 91 percent of the total weekday talk radio programming is conservative, and 9 percent is progressive.
• 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.
• 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.

As with everything else, Shreveport is worse. The study references KEEL and KRMD. It found that KEEL airs 11 hours of conservative talk radio every day with 0 hours of “progressive” programming. KRMD airs 7 hours of conservative programming balanced by 0 progressive hours. So, all told, Shreveport talk radio listeners get 18 hours of conservative opinions per day balanced by nothing.

It seems to me that this is a chance for public radio to bridge the gap locally. Both Red River Radio and KSCL could easily provide such progressive programming as Democracy Now!, Counterspin, or selections from Air America hosts. As well, the Public Radio Exchange is a treasure trove of progressive content.

Balancing the ubiquitous and often violent, hate-filled conservative diatribe served daily here with progressive viewpoints would be a great public service. And isn’t that what all radio, but especially public radio, should be about?

But it's such a small 600-pound gorilla!

NPR’s Guy Raz did a sneaky thing with statistics on Morning Edition. He noted that the U.S. defense budget is at a historical low, only 3.7 percent of gross domestic product. “We actually spend significantly less on defense today than we did at any point over the past sixty years,” he reports.

The trick is the comparison. If you stand next to an elephant, you’d seem pretty small, too. Putting the very large defense budget next to the vastly larger GDP makes it look small, but in terms of dollars, it’s at a historical high. According to Congressional Quarterly, “total national defense spending is larger now than at any time in history,” and “Bush’s request for fiscal 2008 stands historically large.”

U.S. military spending, Wikipedia notes, “is larger than the military budgets of the next fourteen biggest spenders combined, and nearly seven times larger than the official military budget of China. The United States and its close allies are responsible for approximately two-thirds of all military spending on Earth (of which, in turn, the US is responsible for the majority), and spend 57 times more than the six front-defying nations combined (Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Sudan, and Syria).”

Federal military spending is over 50 percent of the total budget. Even before the so-called war on terror that percentage was similar. That sort of militarism harms our government, our democracy, our culture and each of us personally. But perhaps we are addicted to the money because it “accounts for the majority of federal spending in nearly every state.”

Don’t let Guy Raz’s sneaky diminution of military spending fool you. Listen to this old hippie instead. (Edited 03/28/07 to remove annoying Flash.)

Gore can't get a break at NPR

NPR gets a few raspberries from Media Matters for its coverage of Al Gore and global warming. Media Matters contends that NPR took part in right-wing smears and attacks on Gore.

First there’s “NPR's Harris faulted Gore's global warming ‘facts,’ while getting ‘facts" wrong.” That story points out factual errors from science reporter Richard Harris, shown at left. Further, host Renee Montagne says “some scientists” question Gore’s data and conclusions but doesn’t name a single one. In fact, on the NPR website, the headline is “Gore on Climate Change: Scientists Respond,” although not a single named scientist is mentioned.

The Harris gaffe is mentioned again in “Myths and falsehoods about global warming,” a good summary of the right’s attempt to debunk good science. This article relates Harris’ reporting to the larger right wing effort to portray Gore as an exaggerator through “false comparisons and misrepresentations of his claims.” This is noted again in “Media revive, retool, and create anti-Gore smears and attacks.”

I didn’t vote for Gore in 2000, but enough is enough. He’s not going to run for President again, or likely any national public office. He’s performing a valuable public service educating people about global warming, and, if you have a beef with that, attack the arguments fairly. Ad hominem arguments don’t cut the mustard.

Cooper Manor Pics, Competition for Morning Edition and World of Warcraft

A few things to blog about today.

First, check out the set of photos I took at Cooper Manor last Monday night. Kenny and The Flesh opened, followed by Black Helicopter and Brooklyn’s manic noise merchants Magik Markers.

To the left is the Markers’ Elisa Ambrogio playing her metallic red Strat with a Maker’s Mark whiskey bottle. The noise she generated was astounding. Click and look close at her eyes. That’s not “red eye.” That’s the Rock and Roll devil spirit shining out. The Markers summoned Papa Legba.

Kenny and The Flesh elevated the violence level. Eric, pissed at his malfunctioning drums, destroyed his whole kit in the middle of the show. He slammed, beat, slashed, poked and kicked and that was the rhythm section. You don’t know what to think when you see a band like this. There’s always going to be a surprise.

Black Helicopters were a nice surprise. They played loud drone rock from back in the day, reminding me of my old outfit, Chevrolet Stegosaurus, and also Too Many Douglasses. Just good straight-ahead rock with no frills.

I enjoyed all the bands. I missed Green Milk From The Planet Orange and Yip Yip last night, but I had seen Green Milk before. Tonight at Cooper Manor, 122 E. Dalzell, you can catch Church Of The Snake from Hot Springs, AR, and Clipd Beaks from Oakland, CA.

Competition for Morning Edition

There’s good news for public radio listeners looking for alternatives to corporation-friendly, über-branded NPR News: PRI And WNYC(R) Radio Announce New Morning Drive Time News Program For Public Radio.

Essentially, Public Radio International, WNYC, New York Times Radio, The BBC World Service and WGBH, all stalwart names in public broadcasting and journalism, are teaming up to create a morning news show to “reinvigorate morning drive time with a dynamic and lively new two-hour national news program.” How tasty does that sound?

Here’s more:

The program will represent an entirely new sound in public radio’s morning drive time. Departing from the highly-packaged format -- with pre-recorded interviews and long features -- that has become the medium’s hallmark sound, it will bring a wholly live, open, and unprecedented personality-driven format to public radio's renowned news and information programming. Up-to-the-minute local, national and global news will be delivered by a charismatic host – to be announced later this year --- and a vibrant team of national and international contributors. The breadth and unique capabilities of the show’s media partners will allow in-depth news coverage and live reports from the field from within the US and around the globe, with BBC reporters and analysts joining in on the discussion. The show will launch as a multi-platform program, and will be interactive and engaging, inviting listeners to respond immediately to news and participate in editorial decision-making, as well as to build a significant online community around the broadcast.

I particularly like the multi-platform approach which means it will be available over this new medium, the Internet, hopefully both streaming and as a podcast. And though it’s way too soon to speculate how listeners will participate in editorial decision-making as claimed, I think it can be a real exercise in participatory democracy.

Can you imagine stuffy NPR doing something like this? Me either. I also think it’s a safe bet that Red River Radio won’t carry it, despite the fact it could save them beaucoup coin by not paying for the increasingly tiresome Morning Edition.

The new show will be produced in Manhattan and is scheduled to launch in 2008.

I first heard about it from this NPR Check post. People are looking for alternatives, which is a good thing.

World of Warcraft

Here’s my latest World of Warcraft character, Anchovy, a dwarven hunter, and her pet, Charlotte, a green recluse from Duskwood. She also has a wolf from Dun Morogh named Pellegrino. The realm is Muradin. You got some Horde? Bring it, bitch!

Conservapedia! ROFLMAO!

I am shamed for National Public Radio.

The network actually lowered itself to cover Conservapedia and to take it seriously! Conservapedia thinks Wikipedia and Google are biased: "Tired of the LIBERAL BIAS every time you search on Google and a Wikipedia page appears? Now it's time for the Conservatives to get our voice out on the internet!"

There's a good critique of the coverage at NPR Check, Wickipedia v. Wackopedia. For extra fun, check out Conservapedia's entry for Liberal.