Missoula’s Progressive Talk Radio Goes Off the Air

I just found this;

AM-1690 to change hands in April

We are sad to announce that WWAA-AM/1690, Atlanta's Air America affiliate, has been sold to the owner of WMLB-AM/1160. 1160-AM is a music format, and rumor has it that the new owner may not be a big fan of the progressive talk programming we presently enjoy at 1690-AM. We've also heard that Clear Channel (which carries Air America in some other parts of the country) will get Air America for our Atlanta market, where they have 24 affiliates. Whatever happens, 1690-AM will remain the same until sometime in April. We'll just have to see how this plays out; will post new information as it becomes available.

http://www.airamericaplace.com/boards/index.php?showtopic=8084&st=195

Why is every AA sale some type of vast conspiracy? On many Clear Channel stations that carry it, AA has only been a free placeholder until CC could either find a paying format or make money off the sale. They know "if you build it, they will come ( advertisers )" isn't likely to happen if it hasn't already. Many AA stations have been on borrowed time since day one, even with leftist donations keeping them above water and the libs know it.

Obviously this indicates the need to reinstate the "fairness doctrine".

Oh how right you are. KXXT, 1010am in Phoenix went dead on 2-28 and you should have heard all the cry babies calling in on the last day. One would have thought their religion was dying. In reality a Christian broadcasting operation took over the frequency and some of the last day callers to Mike Malloy were saying they believed that Err Amerika was being silenced (obviously by the evil Bush admin), since there is no way there could be a demand for that many Christian broadcasters in the Phoenix area. Malloy agreed with the callers and stated that it is was the evil Christians silencing the Lib talkers. Malloy hates anything Christian so it wasn't much of a stretch for him to agree with that conspiracy theory. I look for some of the local nuts to actually raise this issue in Congress since they are in disbelief that went willingly since the management had been telling everyone what a fantastic financial success they were having. Every day it was a new "Conspiracy" and of course it was 24 hour BUSH BASHING. People cannot listen to that day in and day out unless one is a rabid left liberal who still thinks they are going to regain control of the political system. We are all such buffoons because we vote against our own "good".

Getting people to listen wasn’t the problem – liberal talk radio was a huge hit in Missoula from the beginning. With all those listeners you have to wonder why they couldn't attract advertisers. Something isn't adding up here. My guess: the listernership wasn't as strong as they are claiming. Management is in full CYA-mode.

Identical story down here in Phoenix - no one could understand why such a sucess would be sold out from under the Err Amerika management. When it was announced a couple of months ago the station manager said he would have a new frequency for Phoenix in no time. Here is a copy of theie announcement last night (since pulled from web)

a message from air america phoenix February 28th, 2006 Dear Friends of Air America Phoenix, Thank you to the staff, the listeners and the clients for all you’ve done in the past 17 months. You helped take an unrated, unprofitable AM radio station and pushed it to a tie for 3rd place out of 25 AM stations in Phoenix. You took that same AM station and made it profitable in less than a year and even after the sale was announced you stood by Air America Phoenix and we kept on making money even when our future was in doubt and we didn’t know when our "plug" was going to be pulled. In fact, the last month we were on the air was the 3rd best month we’ve had financially! Air America Phoenix has now disappeared into the ether and Phoenix is left with multiple Christian formats, some in English and others in Spanish, several "brokered’ time stations (you know the radio stations selling you vitamins, good bowel movements and financial advice) a bagful of right wing "Conservative Talk stations" featuring Rush, Sean, Laura, Bill Bennett, Savage, Medved and all of their local imitators, three "Sports Talk" stations that live off the largess of their sister stations in the big corporate clusters that dominate the dial in Phoenix. Is anyone enjoying Tony Snow on KTAR…did anyone ask for him? And there are 3 "nostalgia" stations on AM and another on the FM dial. (The inside radio joke on nostalgia is that listeners are "dying" for it!) CBS’ new "Free" FM is another station loaded with sophomoric chatter, but without the interruption of overplayed songs! Free FM is a continuous loop of bad FM morning show humor 24 hours a day! CBS should have stood by Howard Stern and they will regret the day they didn’t! Phoenix has 60 odd radio signals on the AM and FM dial and the best of those signals are owned by four companies; CBS, Clear Channel, Bonneville and Sandusky, they play it safe and considering the level of investment, it is certainly understandable. Innovation and change has to come from the smaller clusters and the one and two station owners. Will they innovate? Take a chance like we did with KXXT? Probably not, they never have and they never will, like the classic definition of insanity they "continue to do the same thing over and over expecting different results"! Only a special company like James Crystal would let me take the chance, Thanks, Jim! Over the past 4 months I have tried to raise the money to buy a new station for Air America Phoenix. We made offers on 2 stations; one didn’t have an adequate signal to insure success and the other was laughably over priced. I have talked to more BS artists and rich guys who pretend they want to get "involved" and "progressive" venture firms that live in the world of "new media" and think that good old terrestrial radio, the kind that everyone has access to and is free 24/7, is so "over"! When I finally put together the right banker and the right investors, we were out of time! I’m mad at myself for wasting time with the charlatans, the BS artists and the dreamers. I’m also worn out and I have to publicly apologize to the love of my life, Jan, for being so damn grumpy and short since last fall. Baby, you have been just great, thank you! I need to thank all the great network people; Al, Mike, Stephanie, Sam and Jeanine. And of course my friend Ed Schultz who was the first on and signed! And Randi…I always love you more! This has been the single best experience I’ve had in broadcasting, better than being number one in Boston! KXXT has simply been the best. The people I’ve worked with at AA Phoenix have been the most dedicated, hard working and they wouldn’t leave when I tried (twice) to throw them out of the building. I love you all and as Jan says we are a family! Thank you for all you’ve done! Robert J Christy General Manager, Air America Phoenix, 1010 Talk KXXT SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS

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