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?

What happened to the Marshall Fannin Blog?

A few of you may have noticed that Monday one of Shreveport-Bossier’s most controversial blogs, The Marshall Fannin Blog, disappeared. Since then, traffic to this blog has more than doubled due to people searching on the term “Marshall Fannin.”

Before the blog went down, Marshall had posted that there would be a “major announcement” on the site at noon Monday. This also came after some really juicy posts about the state’s Democrat and Republican parties.

I e-mailed Marshall asking what was up, and he at first told me he wanted to bring it back, but then said that he wasn't gonna do it. So it goes.

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.