AAR rumors: This time, Cincinnati

[LTR]

http://ltradio.blogspot.com/2004/12/rumor-liberal-talk-coming-to.html

Rumors are flying on the Radio-Info boards about Clear Channel's possible flip of a station in that liberal hotbed of Cincinnati (just kidding about the 'liberal hotbed' part). The rumor centers mostly around WSAI (1530), which has a powerful signal that blasts much of the midwest after dark. The station is currently programming Clear Channel's "Real Oldies" format, which consists of the usual 50's-60's fare, mixed with standards from the likes of Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett.

Another possibility involves sister station WCKY (1360), a 5000 watt station currently airing a sports format as "The Homer". In this scenario, The Homer moves with their sports format to 1530, and 1360 picks up Air America.

The flip supposedly will happen around January 1, 2005.

You can follow the banter here:

http://www.radio-info.com/mods/posts?Board=cincinnati

Again, these are rumors, so take with proverbial truckload of salt.

[VolcanoJen]

1. I already have Sirius, but that would be freakin' awesome.

GO Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky radio!!

[Eurobabe]

5. hey jen

i have XM and get it too, do you still love me? ;)

[VolcanoJen]

15. I didn't think you could get AAR on XM.

But what do I know... ?

[liberalnurse]

13. Just wondering......

Does this station reach Dayton,Ohio? I too have Sirius but it would be excellent if Dayton could get a taste of Liberal Radio.

[LTR]

14. If it is WSAI

It's a pretty strong signal, and should reach Dayton, though with maybe a little bit of static.

Here's the estimated signal coverage:





I happen to know the nighttime signal travels farther than that. I can get it up in Wisconsin.

[liberalnurse]

16. Oh, the odds are definitely in our favor!

I am Amazed....you got a map!

Thankks....I'll bookmark this.

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

2. Want some irony?

WSAI is the home of Dusty Rhodes, the Hamilton County Auditor (yes, our county auditor is also a disc jockey) and sometime-Democrat. Think Zell Miller and you've got a pretty good handle on Dusty. I think it would be ironic as hell if he were bumped off the air to make room for real Democrats.

On Edit: It would be incredible if we got Air America. I stream it at work all day, but have never heard the night-time or weekend shows (I have dial-up at home and ilistening isn't worth the hassles).

[mosin]

4. Emerson "Dusty" Rhodes

That's the way to strengthen the Hamilton County Democratic Party, belittle one of the few Democrats to actually hold office long term in the county. Dusty has been a good steward of the county's money as auditor. Now we have two-term Portune and new-comer Owens, and Dusty deserves a bit of the credit for single-handedly maintaining the Democratic Party's credibility in the county for years.

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

6. Dusty is an 'effin moron

In the 2002 Election, he held joint press conferences with Steve Chabot and Phil Heimlich -- taking sides against the Democratic Party's endorsed candidates. He's never done the first damned thing for the Democratic Party in Hamilton County.

Maintained our credibility? He's done everything in his power to undermine it -- you clearly don't know jack about the HCDP.

[mosin]

9. We'll just have to disagree.

In my experience, Dusty's been very helpful to Democratic candidates in Hamilton County, at least to the ones I've worked for. If you want to tell me a Republican candidate he's endorsed, I might change my mind. Standing with a few Republicans on the right side of Issue 7 (light rail) in 2002 doesn't count.

(Of course, I think he's a terrible DJ.)

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

10. Why doesn't it count?

We had Jean Siebenaler running in 2002, and Dusty is out making campaign appearances with him. Greg Harris was running against Chabot, and Dusty is appearing on the podium with him. The hell is doesn't count!

This year we had a Presidential Candidate, a Senate Candidate, two Congressional Candidates, three candidate for the Ohio Supreme Court, a State Senate Candidate, eight candidates for the State House of Representatives, two candidates for County Commissioner, one for Clerk of Courts, one for Recorder, one for Treasurer, one for Prosecutor, and one for Coroner.

That's twenty-three opportunities that Dusty had to help out a Democratic candidite. So which one did he help?

That's a trick question. The correct answer is "None of the Above".

And at the November 22nd meeting, when the discussion turned to the future of the Hamilton County Democratic Party, Dusty left the room and didn't come back.

Yeah, we'll just agree to disagree.

[AngryOldDem]

3. This is great news

Al Franken vs. Mike McConnell. Love it.

[Philostopher]

7. Same way Columbus got its AAR affiliate.

Clear Channel had a low-grossing station in Columbus they decided to do a trial with, and apparently it must be doing okay -- haven't heard anything about them changing its format.

I was wondering if this wouldn't happen in either Cinci or Dayton before the middle of '05. Either way it'd be cool for me, up here -- I can only pick up the Columbus AAR affiliate for about three blocks after I leave my house, then some knuckle-dragger wingnut starts bleeding in over it.

We're talking Sirius after Christmas anyway, but it still would be cool to have that option in the other vehicles -- and at work. The temptation to take in a cheap AM/FM radio and listen to it at my desk while my fReepish boss listens to Limbaugh and Hannity in her office would be incredibly strong.

C'mon -- they're losing ad revenue on a significant portion of the listening public that's either going over to digital/satellite radio or listening to music stations. Clear Channel is all about the Benjamins, and I guess they may just have to suck it up and admit there's plenty of Dems in this area -- as there are in Columbus -- who got Benjamins they ain't touching.

[LTR]

8. Liberal talk is pretty much a win-win format

No matter where it is.

And no, it doesn't matter how many liberals there are in the market. Let's face it, a station in Idaho could probably succeed with Air America. It's just an outrageously cheap format to run, and the rare syndicated format that brings a desireable advertiser-friendly audience (younger, college educated) to the barren AM dial.

Considering that the format is all-barter, meaning that it's offered virtually for free, with just some ad time held back by the network, and that they don't even have to field a full staff to run the station, they could make money with even less than a 1.0 share. Which loosely translates to about 1% of all listeners in the market over the age of 12. Regardless of where they may be, red or blue state, I think they could find enough people to support the station. I keep saying, someone should put this format in a place like Salt Lake City. I honestly believe that could be a prime market for the format.

Hell, if a hardcore conservative talker like KSFO can do well in a market like San Francisco...

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

11. Didn't Rush get his start in the San Francisco market?

I mean, really...

[LTR]

12. Actually, Sacramento

Not far away, though.

Michael Savage hosts his show from San Francisco, though.

[Philostopher]

17. I don't know if the Columbus station runs AAR 24/7.

I just know they have Franken's show on early afternoon, and Stephanie whatsername (Miller?) midmorning. It won't come in at all in the evenings, so I don't know what the format is after midafternoon -- may or may not be all AAR.

It probably wouldn't be too difficult or expensive to get a local program or two -- hell, WHIO and WLW have their own home-grown wingnuts to stir up shit about local candidates and make people paranoid not only about Democrats in general but about their own neighbors, and I can't imagine a local lefty talk show would be any more expensive to produce than canned AAR programming. Cinci's already got a real gem of a liberal talk team -- Jene and Jerry Galvin are articulate and hysterical, and they at least used to have some time on WLW in the mornings (haven't listened to 'LW in years). I'll bet they'd jump at the chance to do a little narrowcasting to an appreciative audience in this part of Ohio.

[LTR]

18. Nobody's really running AAR 24/7

Though the Eugene, OR, Atlanta, Ga, and (soon) Santa Fe stations may be doing it.

What many affiliates are doing is airing the strongest shows in liberal talk. That means that they may slot in, say Ed Schultz or Stephanie Miller, or even a local show. I think this is a smart move, since it creates a 'dream team' of sorts, instead of rising or falling due to AAR only. This will make the format much stronger. And I think somebody like Miller will do better than, say, 'Unfiltered'. It also gives a somewhat different approach.

Remember, AAR is not the only game in town.

[Philostopher]

19. Cincinnati would have some good folks, if Clear Channel asked them.

Jene and Jerry Galvin, as I mentioned before, are a real hoot on air -- I remember when we had a lefty show on WLW for about thirty seconds in 1995, a guy who went by Carmen Guzman who was canned when Clear Channel and Jacor merged. They found out he was in Methadone treatment and had some history, and they dropped him like a hot potato -- he was vicious, let me tell you, and he always had stats to back up what he said, or articles, or references. Too bad his prior life choices bungled his career. For all I know he's still in the business and just working somewhere on the left coast, where being in a Methadone treatment program probably wouldn't preclude your having a career in lefty talk radio.

Anyhow, Cinci could probably muster a few decent progressive talk shows, if that's the way they format the CC progressive stations. Leave it to Clear(ly Conservative) Channel to place ad revenue over ideology -- I guess in this case, it's something that could work in our favor, especially if they do local shows.

But it's not even confirmed yet, so we'll see. I'd love to see it happen -- I think there will be plenty of 'viral marketing' opportunities for those of us on the left, if we get the chance to push this station here.

[VolcanoJen]

20. I remember Carmen!!

Such controversy when he was on the air... which, as I recall, was for about a minute. I never knew the real reason behind his dismissal, but I always figured his days were numbered from the moment I first heard him. It was good radio, honestly.

Are Jene and Jerry Galvin on-air currently? If so, when could Cincinnatians listen to them?

[Philostopher]

21. Somewhere around here, I still have a T-shirt.

It says "I'm with double digit!" with an arrow pointing, of course, to the right. I called in and explained to "okay, I grew up Jewish and I have no idea what this 'Jesus peas' or whatever it is thing is about" Carmen that it was a mutation of Jesus Pete or Holy Pete, and it just got slurred into that.

From what I understand, the fact that he was a recovering heroin addict was Jacor's excuse for sandbagging him. I think they just didn't like him, and got too much guff for having somebody who was as rabid as he was on the air. The thing was, he was like a liberal Limbaugh who actually told the truth -- I'm sure it steamed a lot of people.

It looks like Jene and Jerry still had a show on in Cinci -- WVXU had them on at five Saturdays and ten Sundays in early November (that's the last reference I could find on Google), the show is called "It's Those Stupid Galvins Again." Don't know how political the show is, being on 'VXU, but then I don't see how Jene and Jerry could resist injecting some liberality into the show. Don't know if it's still on -- if it is, and you catch it, let me know how they're doing!

Jene sat in for somebody once about ten years ago, I can't remember what station it was on, but he was talking about Steve Chabot's combover, and he announced he'd give $50 to anybody who could prove to him that if he grabbed hold of any given hair on Chabot's head and gave it a firm yank, Chabot wouldn't spin like a top all the way across a bridge and into Covington. I remember I had to pull over on the shoulder on 52 halfway to New Richmond because I was laughing so hard -- he said that, then took callers.

[LTR]

22. There's supposedly an article in today's Cincinnati Enquirer about it

Can't find a link. Anyone got it?

Says that WSAI will flip to AAR before the end of the year.

[LTR]

23. Found the article

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041205/ENT/412050337/1091/ENT&template=printpicart

Air America coming to WSAI

Dusty Rhodes says he'll soon be dumped for Al Franken and Janeane Garofalo.

The Hamilton County auditor, who moonlights as morning DJ on WSAI-AM (1530), says Clear Channel will drop the oldies music to put on the liberal Air America talk lineup by year's end.

Rhodes, who helped bring the Beatles to Cincinnati Gardens as a WSAI disc jockey in 1964, anchors the '50s and '60s format that replaced Nick Clooney and big band music two years ago. The "Real Oldies" lineup has included local rock veterans Jack Stahl, Marty Thompson and Dan Allen.

Forty stations carry the Air America shows with Franken, Garofalo, rapper Chuck D., Lizz Winstead, Katherine Lanpher and Mike Malloy. Adding 50,000-watt WSAI-AM pains Rhodes. "As a Democrat elected in this county, I don't want my party to be seen as the Al Franken party," says Rhodes, who turns 65 Monday.

Note: In addition to Cincinnati, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. are heavily rumored to be picking up Air America before the end of the year. This will bring the total number of affiliates for the network to 43, unless other stations in other markets follow suit.

Also, AAR will be on a pretty powerful frequency. WSAI booms out 50,000 watts on 1530 AM, a signal that on good nights can cover almost the whole midwest and into the south. Perhaps this is an experiment for Clear Channel, as a way of gauging interest in other markets. WSAI gets into neighboring markets such as Dayton, Indianapolis, Louisville and others.

http://ltradio.blogspot.com/2004/12/cats-out-of-bag-liberal-talk-coming-to.html

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

24. Woo-Hoo

I sent an e-mail to Air America asking for confirmation, but didn't hear back. I sent the info to Greg Korte at the Enquirer, who forwarded it to Kieswetter -- who's back covering TV and Radio.

What in the hell was that all about, anyway? Kieswetter covering political news in West Chester Township?

It's great to get the good news confirmed. I normally don't listen to AM radio (other than when the Buckeyes are playing), but it looks like I'll have to change my preset buttons.

[LTR]

25. Sounds like he's covering local media news

After all, this does concern a radio station more than it does politics.

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

26. He's back...

His column in the Sunday paper was on the theme of "What did I miss?" He covered Radio/TV for at least ten years, then was suddenly yanked to the 'burbs in favor of syndicated stuff. Even though Kieswetter likes "Survivor" far more than any rational person should, he's still a good observer of the media.

[VolcanoJen]

27. Article from today's Cincy Post!!

http://www.cincypost.com/2004/12/07/radio120704.html

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

28. That's great news, but...

I e-mailed Rick Bird ([e-mail]) to tell him the Air America actually beat Rush Limbaugh in the ratings last summer in New York (and crushed him among younger listeners) -- not bad for a station that had only been on the air for three months. And that Al Franken's compilation of comedy bits from the early days of the show has been nominated for a Grammy. And the man who I worship like a pagan god -- Steve Earle -- also received a nomination for "The Revolution Starts Now."

I don't think he'll run a correction, mind you, but it's good to let them know that we're paying attention.

[LTR]

29. First host announced: Jerry Springer

Yes, THAT Jerry Springer.

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041209/ENT/412100327

http://ltradio.blogspot.com/2004/12/jerry-jerry-jerry.html

TV talk show host Jerry Springer will debut a three-hour weekday radio talk show here in January.

The former Cincinnati mayor and TV anchor will launch a 9 a.m.-noon call-in show on WSAI-AM (1530) when the Clear Channel station switches from oldies music to liberal talk. He wants to syndicate the show nationally from Cincinnati, he said.

"There is clearly an opportunity for new voices to be heard today around the country," Springer, 60, said today. "There is so much going on in the world today, and to be part of that dialogue will be fun."

Darryl Parks, operations director for Clear Channel's four AM stations here, said the station had been negotiating with the former politician for months.

(more)

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

30. A step in the right directino for Jerry...

but he has to dump the show -- and I mean now and not next year. I know a host of dedicated Democrats who despise that show and simply will not support him as a candidate. He probably should have done it in 2003 -- and then perhaps by 2006 people would have forgotten about it.

He needs to sh*t or get off the pot.

[Philostopher]

31. Especially since he's so damn good at interviews and commentary.

I watched that Barnum and Bailey excuse for a show one time and felt sick. What a waste of talent -- do you remember the daytime interview show he used to do? He was so good at interviews. He really wandered off the beam, didn't he?

[maryinohio]

32. Fantastic!!!!

Wow - I can't believe it! To actually hear AAR in Cincinnati! Maybe there is hope for us!
Clear Channel must have done a study and found enough support for it here. I'm surprised, though. I've lived here in Cincinnati most of my life and I do not know many progressive people.
People are influenced by what they hear, so hopefully this has an effect on us here.