Posted on 12/16/2012 2:34:02 AM PST by raccoonradio
Howie Carr thread for the final 2 weeks of the year starting with his Sunday Boston Herald columnm
I actually look forward to observing Princess Fauxcahontas as she interacts with the squaw caucus in the Senate, to which we have sent two floozie-doozies ourselves, Soozie and Olympia. Feinstein, Boxer, Warren, Snow, Collins, Lucy, Ethel ... ya gotta love it.
Right after the election, except for a botched introductory press conf with the governor, she seemed to disappear. Or at least, after the barrage of ads where we were hammered,
hammered on why we should vote for her, we hardly heard
from her, suddenly. It actually felt good—I only wish the
next 6 yrs will be like this. It prob won’t.
OK, HC list members, I don’t see a column in the Herald
today from Howie but he did do a couple extra columns
in the past week or two. I THINK he’s on today, but don’t expect him on again after this till after the New Year. Fill ins and
best ofs...Michele? Colonel Hunt? Avi Nelson? (Former fill in host Todd Feinburg has turned up some overnights at
WBZ as has ex-RKO host Jen Brien...and former fill in host
Jeff Katz who had a two year run at Talk 1200 has been
filling in recently for WIOD in Miami.
Radio news: 6 months after launching the Harbor “adult
hits” format, Clear Channel’s WHBA FM 101.7 (sold to
them by Occupy-lovin’ Stephen Mindich—yeah so much for
eeeeeeeeeeevil corporations, as long as the check clears
right? $14.5 million reasons to be happy all with George
Washington’s pic on them)...is now Electronic Dance
Music as “Evolution 101.7”. You might like if if you’re
a bit younger than I am (51) but hey some of it may be OK.
The rumors of News Talk 96.9 switching to a music format may have led Clear Channel (96.9 is Greater Media) to scoop them with this. So...does 96.9 go to “adult hits” or
something else? Re-tooled talk? We’ll find out maybe even
later today. Or after new year’s.
Merry Christmas!
Howie is on today and then off til after New Year's. Avi will be filling in for Kuhner on Monday so that can only mean mcscreamer is filling in for Howie, ungh, unless Hunt is doing Monday and mcscreamer in Wed/Thurs/Fri, ick!
“Merry Christmas!”
And to you as well.
Former MA house speaker Tom McGee has died at 88
Former MA house speaker Tom McGee has died at 88
>> There will be tales about his 1983 face-to-face meeting at Revere Beach with then-speaker Thomas McGee, the man he would oust from office in 1985. There will be tales, no doubt, of his oratorical and debating skills, his good-natured ribbing of former governor Michael Dukakis, and his regular poker games on the North Shore.
I've never heard anyone so happy to be rid of John "Live Shot" Kerry, LOL. Howie was actually singing (or trying to).
Sounds like unfortunately McScreamer will be filling in every day for Howie until 2013. I think afternoons will be quiet around here until Howie returns.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, raccoonradio! Thanks so much for your Howie Carr pings throughout the year... ;-)
nutmeg
Merry Christmas and all the best to you and yours in 2013, FRiend! :-)
And you too!!!
As I've posted today, Ted Kennedy Jr NOT running for Senate after all, woo hoo!
McScreamer in for Howie today.
Also it looks like WTKK prob will change to music format soon as another host has left: Michael Graham. Most likely not offered a new contract because...of what looks like a format change. btw I was on Graham's Facebook--he has been filling in for VB on Fox 25--and here's a shot of VB's desk. (Doug "Virgin Boy" Goudie of Fox 25 morning news was Howie's co-producer/sidekick, and briefly hosted The Pit on WRKO)
McScreamer on again
or try Jeff Katz on WIOD Miami
http://www.iheart.com/live/569/?autoplay=true
let’s see who’s on for Graham—now gone—at 96.9
john and jeff
new format for 96.9 prob by new year’s? Sue Kaplan of their weekend money show tweeted “radio show caput, last show will be Sunday”
John and Jeff in for Graham who said on his blog he’s outta 96.9
Anyway:
There’s a new ex-sheriff in town
Howie Carr
Friday, December 28, 2012
Cabral lands $150G-a-year gig
I guess you might say the outgoing High Sheriff of Suffolk County, Andrea Cabral, is a “people person.”
The $124,000-a-year High Sheriff will soon be the $150,000-a-year secretary of public safety, succeeding another dodgy hack named Mary Beth Heffernan.
In celebration of her pay raise, Andrea gave an interview to NECN yesterday in which she said the following of her current job:
“You’re in the people business. You’re constantly managing people. The people who are incarcerated live there. And you’re constantly looking out for the people who do the very tough job of working there.”
As I said, she’s a people person.
There’s an old saying in Massachusetts politics about the two major problems facing every sheriff.
First problem is, you’re dealing with the absolute dregs of society.
The second problem is the inmates.
Why anyone would want to be a sheriff is beyond me. The only positive aspect is that it’s a Group 4 public safety job — you get to retire sooner, with a bigger kiss in the mail.
That’s assuming, of course, that you’re not lugged and sent off to Club Fed, like two sheriffs appointed by Pee Wee Dukakis (a third Duke sheriff was merely fined by the State Ethics Commission).
Like all of the above, Andrea is quite the extinguished, I mean distinguished, public servant. She was picked up on waivers a decade ago by Ralph Martin, the Republican district attorney of Suffolk County. Ralph quickly ushered Cabral into the Corner Office, which was then occupied by Jane Swift. Andrea said she’d switch to the GOP, and soon she was the new High Sheriff. When Ralph took a powder a few years later, Andrea began hiring his erstwhile coat-holders, with big pay raises.
They called it the Ralph Martin Re-employment Act of 2002.
Being a woman whose word is her bond, Andrea waited all of four months or so before switching back to the Democratic party.
It’s been a rocky ride, this last decade. I just wonder if she thinks that a secretary of public safety is a “constitutional officeholder.” That’s what she claimed of the sheriff’s position when she was trying to wiggle out of paying a $300,000-plus settlement she owed to a whistle-blower who won a civil suit against her.
And I wonder if she’ll be hiring any ex-cons to do outreach to the “people who are incarcerated” in the state prisons.
After all, she is a people person.
Unless you’re the Craigslist killer who commits suicide in one of her jails.
Or a guard who’s charged with raping a female prisoner in her cell. Or a C.O. who’s addicted to Oxys.
Or one of the two C.O.’s put on paid leave last winter while under probe for possible overtime abuse.
Good luck, everyone in Public Safety.
Howie Carr list ping (see article above in this thread)
Special Sat column ping (latest on WTKK is apparently
Eagan and Braude do a farewell show on Wed 1/2 and the
format changes sometime after that)
Talk radio’s not dead, just moonbats’ radio
Saturday, December 29, 2012 by Howie Carr
WTKK wouldn’t be turning off the lights next week if I could have just gotten over there back in 2007. No brag, just fact. And by the way, I’m still damn sorry I didn’t make good my escape from the AM band.
But here in Massachusetts, in the halls of justice, the only justice is in the halls. And you wonder why I dismember so many state judges. Payback is a bitch, you hacks.
Still, WTKK’s failure is not the end of talk radio in Boston. Nature abhors a vacuum, and having no talk station on FM is a gaping hole. Less than 20 percent of the radio audience ever listens to AM radio — and it’s a mighty old audience, too. They don’t call it “Ancient Modulation” for nothing.
Even without me, though, WTKK should have been able to survive, and thrive. All these new domain names that Greater Media is buying up — as a blog poster put it recently, the one GM should have grabbed was 969ToxicTalk.com.
Who the hell cares what the moonbats think of you? Do you think I care? Do you think Jerry Williams cared? Well, maybe a slight bit more than I do, but not much. Who the hell wants to go to their la-di-da cocktail parties anyway? I make enough money to buy my own beer if I want some.
Harry Truman used to say, “If you give people a choice between a Republican and a Republican, they’ll vote for the Republican every time.”
Here’s WTKK’s epitaph: “If you give listeners a choice between NPR and NPR, they’ll pick NPR every time.”
Sorry, Jim and Margery, nobody was giving up “All Things Considered” for you guys. Then there was Doug Meehan — again, I hate to brag, but there aren’t many local TV people who’ve made the transition from TV to commercial talk radio. Me and Dan Rea, and that’s about it.
Then there was Michael Smerconish — did you know that he once interviewed Obama? If you didn’t, just wait two minutes and he’ll tell you again. He’s a “moderate,” which is like being in the middle of the road, and we all know what’s in the middle of the road.
Road kill.
Last summer, Clear Channel pulled the plug on Rush Radio 1200, WXKS, the third talk station in town. Rush Limbaugh, the 800-pound gorilla of talk radio, was suddenly up for grabs. I’ll bet you anything he was shopped to WTKK first, because they have one of the best signals in the city, on FM, and WRKO’s signal is — well, please, don’t get me started on that. My head will explode. Again.
And yet GM chose to stick with Mr. I-once-interviewed-Obama.
Michael Graham’s a good guy, he’ll land on his feet. But I get the feeling management was always looking over his shoulder. You can’t operate like that. If you’re always worrying about a misstep, you turn into Mark Sanchez.
In retrospect, Jay Severin’s the one who caught a break. He’s working for Glenn Beck’s new Mercury radio network. They’re online. He’s getting a paycheck from Beck, from Clear Channel (he had a year’s contract left at WXKS) and maybe, just maybe, from Greater Media.
I don’t know about his listeners, but anybody collecting three paychecks for one job is among the best and the brightest.
In case you’re wondering, by the way, sports radio is not talk radio. It’s pom-pom, cheerleader radio. Sis-boom-bah, rah-rah-rah. Jocksniffing uber alles.
Sports host number one: “I want to have Tom Brady’s baby.”
Sports host number two: “I want to have two of Tom Brady’s babies.”
If he were alive today, Jerry Williams would be rolling over in his grave.
As for you moonbats, you’ve won. Temporarily. In two years, I’ll be on FM, one way or another, and Michael Graham and Jeff Katz and the Andelmans will be there, too. Don’t forget, according to the election returns, only 51 percent of the American public is brain dead.
One last thing: Gov. Patrick, come the new year, you’re going to need a new radio outlet, and guess what.
I’m the only game left in town.
Hey, nutmeg!
I’m not a big McScreamer fan either. I have really tried listening but can’t. Will be glad when Howie gets back.
Hope you had a great Christmas!
Looking into crystal ball for 2013
by Howie Carr
Sunday, December 30, 2012
First prediction for 2013: Carrnac the Magnificent’s prognostications for next year will be much more accurate than 2012’s.
They couldn’t be much worse. Let’s get right to the mistakes.
Mitt Romney didn’t win, nor did Scott Brown. The stolen Gardner Museum paintings weren’t recovered. A Massachusetts congressman did bite the dust, but his surname didn’t start with “T,” it started with “O” and it was redistricting that put a merciful end to John Olver’s below-average career, not the voters.
On the subject of Lt. Gov. Tim Murray, Carrnac’s crystal ball clouded up. Crash himself did not make a “very special personal announcement, but the State Police did: that he wasn’t going 65 mph when he crashed his state Crown Vic on Interstate 190, he was speeding at 108 mph.
Enough with the corrections, onward to 2013. It’s going to be another busy year, as the state must replace a host of political hacks, from Stat Smith to John Kerry.
In the end, Mumbles Menino will not run for re-election. This FDR impersonation of his, riding around in the back seat of a car, waving to the voters, will wear thin quickly in the new year.
His entire family will implore him to run again. Likewise the sleazy cast of characters around City Hall — the developers, assorted fixers, contractors, real-estate lawyers and pinky-ring union bosses who have grown fat and rich these past 20 years.
But the bottom line is, you can’t deliver the State of the City address via Skype.
Mumbles won’t resign, but he won’t seek another term, and the next mayor, like Elizabeth Warren and Deval Patrick, won’t even be a native of Massachusetts.
Ed Markey will not, repeat not, be the next U.S. senator from Massachusetts.
Back to Tiny Tim Murray: He will spend more money out of his campaign account on lawyers than on his doomed 2014 campaign for governor.
Another Crash prediction: He will continue to stonewall (get it?) on releasing his damning state cellphone records from that icy morning of Nov. 2, 2011.
Once again, we will not learn the identity of the Boston-area bigwig who took up with Michelle Robinson, the hooker whose lips have been sealed by Judge Mark Wolf.
Whitey Bulger will not stand trial this year. That’s a retread from last year; Carrnac was on the money on that one, and he’ll be right again in 2013.
Opening day headline: Hub scribes unanimous: BoSox to win World Series.
Aug. 25 headline: Sox eliminated from pennant race, 21 games under .500,
U.S. Sen. Granny Warren will not be assigned to the Committee on Indian Affairs.
A Kenyan will win the Marathon. (Doesn’t Carrnac deserve a layup now and then?)
There will be a bad smell out of Everett this year, and not just because of the casino referendum, which the voters will approve by a 25-1 margin. It will turn out that crooked state Rep. Stat Smith wasn’t just marking those “absentee” ballots for himself. Don’t you think the feds would have thrown more than a few “misdemeanors” at him if he wasn’t playing ball?
The state gas tax will be hiked into the stratosphere, and the governor will feign sadness.
Uncle Omar will be granted asylum, after which he will immediately quit his job at Conti’s Liquors and go on SSI.
Mike McLaughlin will cop a plea, name names, point fingers and thus get to keep his state pension (but not at his fattened-by-federal-money $360,000-a-year Chelsea Housing Authority salary).
Over-under on number of state legislators bagged in the next round of probation-department indictments: three.
Thus sayeth Carrnac the Magnificent. But remember, as the late Cosmic Muffin used to say, “It is a wise man who rules the stars, but a fool who is ruled by them.”
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