Air supply for talk radio
Talk shows should come with nutrition labels. Or at least with ingredient lists. What to put on them?
Well, for that we can turn to beauty products. Putrefied water and lots of chemicals you never heard of and can’t pronounce. Oh, wait. That’s purified water.
Start the talker ingredient list with hot air. Then ask yourself “what are the minimum daily requirement of lies, deceptions, misstatements, calls-to-arms, old-time religion, false alarms, science bashing and ads for miracle cures, superfoods, debt consolidation loans, payday loans and thought-free thinktanks?
As usual, the federal trade and federal communications agencies are behind the times. The FTC has established no standard for the above ingredients. The FCC lets anyone say anything as long as it’s not bathroom wall grade obscenity.
Most of it is yelling fire in a sparsely populated theater: “The socialists are coming. One if by land, two if by air.” It’s almost always by air. They’ll confiscate your guns. They’ll bankrupt the country, they’ll let people with brown skin overrun your neighborhoods and impregnate your daughters.
All the while, they’ll try to sell you the American Dream. Build your own business. Live independently. Own it and zone it.
They’ll teach you how to “save” your “soul,” mostly by sending in donations.
Of course, there’s no way to provide those labels. But they could announce the figures before each program. Maybe on one of those speeded up things that are the audible but not understandable versions of fine print.
Talk radio revived the flagging a.m. radio business, but now it’s killing it. Station owners don’t have the money to build and maintain the staffs that locally focused, non-political programming requires. They’re too busy putting their money in collecting more stations.
There are technical reasons a.m. can’t reach the wide audiences they once did, but some can be overcome with a little help from regulators. There are reasons a.m. inherently can’t provide the sound quality of FM, Satellite and cable radio. But sound problems can be at least partly improved. That too requires spending money.
Ultimately, as the Rush Limbaughs and Sean Hannitys outlive their audiences, they will fall off the rating charts. And then what’s left? Dead air? In some cases, that would be health food instead of sugar and fat. But that’s a hard sell to commercial clients.
SHRAPNEL:
--So, trump is going to hold a big shindig at the Lincoln Memorial on July 4th, featuring a speech by what he called “your favorite president, me,” and a big fireworks display. This is a campaign rally so the Democrats will have a chance for a counter-program. It will be called the Annual Macy’s celebration on a river in New York, will be bigger than trump’s and no politicians will deliver “elect me” speeches.
NOTE TO NEW READERS: this space intentionally declines to capitalize the “t” in “trump.”
TODAY’S QUOTE:
-“Abraham Lincoln once posed the question: “If you call a dog’s tail a leg, how many legs does it have?” and then answered his own query: ‘Four, because calling a tail a leg doesn’t make it one.’ Abe would have felt lonely on Wall Street.” -- Warren Buffett in his annual letter to shareholders.
I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®
Comments to: wesrichards@gmail.com
© WJR 2019 (except the quotation.)
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