Posted on 02/06/2010 12:25:41 AM PST by raccoonradio
Talk radio helped energize Scott Brown's Senate campaign. Will it doom the Democrats in 2010? The right loves to rant against the "liberal-media elite," but there's one key media sector where the conservative id reigns supreme: talk radio. It's a format long marked by an abundance of influential red-staters (Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Sean Hannity) and precious few blue voices of comparable potency — an imbalance exacerbated when Air America folded last week. And this disparity could pose big problems for the Democrats in the 2010 elections, in which Republicans hope to emulate Scott Brown's recent Senate triumph.
Talk radio was huge for Brown. Yes, the dearth of exit polling in the Brown-Martha Coakley contest makes it hard to quantify its exact impact. But if you listened to Boston talk radio during the race — commercial talk, as opposed to the sedate stylings of NPR affiliates WBUR and WGBH — you know that this segment of the airwaves was, overwhelmingly, Brown country: a source of hope and good cheer when things looked grim, and a high-volume ally as the Brown juggernaut headed down the home stretch.
Consider, for example, the love lavished on Brown by WEEI, the sports-radio powerhouse that doubles as a source of conservative commentary. On primary day, Gerry Callahan, half of the duo behind its morning drive-time Dennis & Callahan, tossed Brown this softball: "Does it make any sense to you that people follow this far-left agenda, and want another far-left loon like [Senator John] Kerry, like [Congressman Barney] Frank, like [Congressman Edward] Markey, like the rest of them?" And shortly before the election, Glenn Ordway, host of the afternoon drive-time Big Show, and three Big Show associates (Pete Sheppard and former New England Patriots Fred Smerlas and Steve DeOssie) appeared in a video in which they gushingly endorsed the Republican. (Brown "believes in a country that's sovereign," Smerlas explained, sort of.)
The question now is: is there any way for other liberals to avoid the sort of total talk-radio drubbing that Coakley suffered? It's unlikely that any Democrat will win the messaging battle there outright. But with talk radio and the GOP poised to collaboratively whip the nation into an aggrieved-populist frenzy, liberals need to be thinking about how to play effective defense. And Coakley's loss offers some clues.
Phoning it in Amid Boston talk's unceasing pro-Brown drumbeat, Jim & Margery, Jim Braude and Margery Eagan's morning drive-time show on WTKK, was an anomaly: a broadcast that seemed more sympathetic to Coakley than her opponent. Even so, says Braude, Brown called in repeatedly out of the blue, just to say hello (and, presumably, to get some free exposure). This was Brown's strategy with a number of talk stations — and the antithesis of Coakley's aloof approach. (Among other things, she apparently spurned Dennis & Callahan.)
Harkening back to Braude's earlier career as a champion of liberal ballot initiatives, he claims the lesson is simple. "Democrats should start dialing," he says. "Most if not all conservative talk-show hosts are paper tigers. It's also hard for any human to completely eviscerate someone who talks to them, and most talk-show hosts are human. And in my experience, after I called a show, I'd get e-mails saying, 'You know, I hate everything you stand for — but I gotta give you credit for having the courage to come on.' "You don't cede territory to the opposition," adds Braude. "You can't eliminate [the criticism]. But you can mute the crap you have to take."
But is it really plausible that someone like Braude's conservative colleague Michael Graham — who authored the forthcoming Tea Party ode That's No Angry Mob, That's My Mom: It's Time for a Conservative Revolt (Regnery) — would give even a semblance of a fair shake to a Democrat running against a Scott Brown imitator this fall?
"I have to do compelling talk radio — that's my job," answers Graham, who says he repeatedly invited Coakley on during the campaign's home stretch and received no response. "I can't get left-of-center people to come on my show, because they know they can go somewhere else and get softball questions. If Coakley had come on, I wouldn't have asked her, 'When did you get that swastika tattooed on your forehead?' I would have asked, 'Tell me how this Obamacare thing is supposed to work?' "
Braude and Graham have a vested interest here, since more guests means more listeners. But they're not the only ones urging Democrats to take a page out of Brown's phone-happy playbook.
"The Coakley campaign and the Democratic party allowed [talk radio] to get out of hand," says Democratic media consultant Michael Goldman, who made a late-game appearance on Dennis & Callahan to defend Coakley's positions. "They basically said, 'That audience is for Brown anyway — why waste our time?' That was a mistake. They should have been on there every day, pounding back.
"The lesson the Democrats have to have learned here," adds Goldman, "is never again to allow the reinforcement of a whole series of untruths or partial truths, without someone representing the other side."
Monitoring the medium Chastened hindsight is 20-20, of course, and it's comforting — if you're a frustrated liberal — to think that the solution might be as simple as more talk-radio assertiveness. But if Democrats are going to venture into innately unfriendly broadcast territory in hopes of blunting the GOP's advantage, they need to be sure that the candidates — or their on-air surrogates — are taking a prudent risk.
"It depends on the relationship they've developed with the host, and it depends on their ability to wing it in hostile situations," says Michael Harrison, publisher of Talkers magazine. "If a [politician] is charismatic, diplomatic, and smart — if they're good at debating and can do it without creating hostility — by every means, they should go out there. But if you don't have what it takes to stand up under that type of pressure, they should stay away."
There is, of course, another option for liberals worried about talk radio's power this fall. They can try to battle against the medium rather than working with it — by monitoring on-air rhetoric, publicizing it when it gets especially nasty, even applying commercial pressure on the outlet in question. "Locker-room humor doesn't sound quite so funny outside the locker room," says Democratic media consultant Dan Payne. "Put that slightly off-color one-liner in print, maybe, and send it off to a show's sponsor." But this approach — which resembles that used by Media Matters for America — brings its own dangers, especially if it's used as a default rather than in extreme cases. After all, while complaints about indelicate language might shame a pundit or outlet, they could also end up reinforcing stock conservative caricatures of liberals (PC, effete, loony-left) and their elite-media allies — and increasing conservative wrath.
That's why, in the end, the Democrats' best hope may be a strategy of cautious engagement. Brown's cultivation of Eagan and Braude didn't win their support, exactly, but it earned their respect, and gave Brown a (free) chance to convince liberal voters that he wasn't a nut or a buffoon. Comparable Democratic efforts to cultivate the right will probably result in some awkward monkey-dance moments. But if worried liberal pols can balance the discomfort with self-deprecating grace — and offer forceful rebuttals to GOP talking points while they're at it — that's a sacrifice worth making.
What makes that guy think Air America balanced anything in Media? One nights showing of Glen Beck equals WEEKS of AA ratings... LOL
here was my response to the lefty Bos Phoenix article:
Coakley did appear on WBZ and on a New Bedford station, and made comments she probably shouldn’t have (about Catholics and health care,
and Curt Schilling, “Yankees fan”). You failed to mention Howie Carr whose popular WRKO show may have been a factor in the Brown win. It helped
define his image and his issues.
WTKK on election night was like a Brown rally, complete with Michele McPhee having what sounded like a rock-concert-good time. Given how
rare a win for conservatives is in this state, could you blame her? WWZN,
meanwhile, which runs some liberal talk, had college sports on instead.
Talk radio may not be totally the reason why Brown won but it may have been a factor. I remember the days when Jerry Williams was on WRKO and he took on issues like seat belt laws, Congressional pay raises, New Braintree and a prison, and so on, and helped to make a difference with activism and simply entertaining radio.
The truth of the matter is that Democrats avoid talk radio programs because they are unable to defend their positions. They rarely if ever have to defend them to anyone. They live in an insulated world.
Every liberal argument ends the same way..
OH YEAH? WELL F YOU! *click*
The truth is that the biggest enemy of the dims is the truth!
True, though Coakley did appear on WBZ’s Dan Rea show. Rea is conservative but says he welcomes all views—”I don’t care what you think just so long as you’re thinkin’”—and it’s more calm than other shows, etc. She figured she would be safe there, but let loose the Schilling comment. She wouldn’t dare go on the Howie Carr show. Howie and his producer,
Nancy “Sandy” Shack, said they called numerous times but were
told no, or were ignored.
But, yes.
I do remember one time when Laura Ingraham had on someone from Lawyers Against the War.Laura asked him nicely if we were better off with Saddam out of power. He refused to answer. She asked him again politely and he still refused; finally, he hung up but later called her producer back and swore at him.
Can’t defend positions.
You gotta love the BS here--I LIVE here, ok, and NPR is LOVED by so many...and that gets half a sentence so the writer can push his position.
How much more interesting this piece would have been had he talked about what Coakley said when she DID go on the air (no jobs for Catholics in hospitals), and why she and the other democrats here are so hard to find on the radio.
The writer misses the most obvious issue--the success Brown had with talk radio, compared to the HUGE majority the democrats have in the State House. Why this fear, this boo-hooing over mean ol' talk radio...in a state where dems have overwhelming power?
Too tough to write about. Let's go with the "Republicans are evil and dastardly and poor widdle dems who control papers, TV, the State House are victims" crap.
BTW, Jim and Margery are the most devastatingly dull duo on radio.
Once a month, while talking politics with my best friend, one of us will go silent and say, "I miss Jerry." I used to rush home after high school to listen to him.
Silly liberals just don’t get it. The “peasantry” of America isn’t conservative because talk radio is successful...talk radio is successful because the American “peasantry” is conservative.
This is an article talking about tactics when the strategy has failed. Kind of like German commanders in Stalingrad talking about how best to counter the Soviet snipers after they’ve already made the huge strategic blunder of allowing themselves to be tied down in an urban battle. The article doesn’t even discuss issues. Just how to handle talk show hosts. Pretty worthless from a political standpoint when it’s the issues that have driven the voters crazy.
Everything they touch starts turning into Detroit.
A good part of talk radio’s appeal to conservatives is the convenience of listening while working (or driving to work). Somehow, there’s a disconnect in liberal-land. Fewer of them seem to need to be able to concentrate primarily upon teh task at hand whilst lending an occasional ear to the voice in the background.
And the simplest explanation?
Because the newspapers and TV “news” media are ALL LIBERALS. ergo, there’s nowhere to get the truth except in talk radio...and Fox News.
Hey moon-bats, don`t let the truth get in your way.
Air-America and it`s ilk fail because they are boring. Just try listening to that boob Alan Colmes at 10:00pm on a Saturday night. His show suks, that`s why he got that prime slot.
Hmm, he doesn’t mention Howie Carr. I guess he doesn’t like Howie (why give him free publicity), who comes on at 3 right after Rush. Howie had Scott Brown on a lot. He also invited Martha, but she didn’t return phone calls.
“Fairness doctrine” here we come.
Big Brother don’t like back talk.
Yes, since there was no exit polling, liberal pundits have now free license to freely conjecture the actual reasons for Croakley’s loss........first thought? Grab the nearest enemy —— talk radio..
The reason liberals do not listen to talk radio or liberal TV commentators (Olberman) is because they do not want their beliefs challenged, even from those on their side.
Liberals are so stubborn in their thinking that they are disinterested in facts because those facts may conflict with their thinking. Conservatives are always looking for facts to support their thinking.
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