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The Right Time For The Left And Talk Radio? By Jon Eekhoff

April 21, 2004

The right time for the left and talk radio? Anger has fueled right-wing radio for many years. Rush Limbaugh tapped into this anger years ago; it brought him wealth, fame and political power. Many other right-wing pundits have followed in his mighty footsteps hoping to find their own supply of white-male-rage to lift their ratings.

No one has done it like Limbaugh. He is articulate, entertaining and popular. I have passed many a long road trip yelling at the radio as Limbaugh broadcasts from high on top of his white tower to all the ditto heads across America. This uncontested access to millions of voters has long been a sore point for the liberals of America.

Finally the left has paid Rush the ultimate compliment, if you can't beat him, join him.

Air America (the left's answer to Limbaugh and pals) kicked off its first broadcast on March 31st. Since that time it has lost its two largest markets (LA and Chicago), sued those radio stations and won and is now back up and broadcasting in limited markets across the US.

Anchored by Al Franken, Air America hopes to gather the same kind of support as Limbaugh, but will it work? As much as I would love to see it succeed, I think Air America will have an unsuccessful run at Limbaugh. Not because Air America's on-air talent is not articulate, entertaining and popular, but because anger does fuel talk radio and liberals just aren't angry enough.

Oh, we are angry now, but how long will the anger continue? If President Bush gets reelected we are guaranteed four more years of anger, but if he continues to bungle the war in Iraq and the economy continues to tank, we will have a new president and what will Al Franken have to talk about then? Bashing Ann Coulter and tweaking Bill O'Reilly works when there is an audience of angry liberals, but the anger of the masses is based on a feeling of powerlessness and if Bush is gone who will become the focus of our rage?

The beauty of Limbaugh is that he never tires of enemies, conspiracies and "inside" information; there is always a new adversary right around the corner. His ability to spin seemingly harmless information into end of the world scenarios has kept him on top for close to 20 years. Like Don Quixote he creates imaginary liberal windmills to tilt while fighting for all that is good and pure in America. His willingness to stretch the truth has now become commonplace in most conservative media circles, unfortunately the liberal media has not been and never will be as adroit at telling fibs as the right.

Facing off against Limbaugh will be Franken. Mr. Franken is witty, at times thoughtful and surprisingly annoying to conservatives. In the end he is a one trick pony. He doesn't have the paranoid mind of Limbaugh and he doesn't have the meanness of many of the conservative radio hosts. He sticks to the facts and provides very witty observations, but as Voltaire said, "A witty saying proves nothing."

Being constrained by factual information just might be the downfall of liberal radio. Who wants to listen to facts, when just down the dial is an entertaining, angry fictional account of the news? I am not saying that liberals can't lie; there is plenty of evidence to the contrary. ("I never had sexual relations with that woman.") What I am saying is that we just aren't as good at it.

President Bush has told some real whoppers (tax cuts for the working class, WMD, Iraq = Al Qaeda, the war in Iraq is over, I'm a compassionate conservative…) and aside from his trademark smirk he seems to sincerely believe he is telling the truth.

When Clinton was lying you could see the guilt on his face. He knew he was lying. When Bush lies he truly seems to believe he is telling the truth. It is the same with the media. The conservative media boldly lies and makes no apologies. Fox news calls itself "fair and balanced" and provides the most biased right-wing news possible. They don't pull their punches.

Air America has a daunting task in front of it. The AM dial is full of entertaining conservative voices, voices that Middle America trust. The loyal audiences of conservative radio (retired folks, truck drivers, farmers, people who spend time traveling) are not going to be people interested in liberal radio. They already have their source for "news".

Liberal radio needs a new audience; an audience that I don't think exists. It is an audience of progressive thinkers with lots of extra time to listen to the radio.

How will Air America to carve out an audience of loyal ditto heads? How will Air America tap into a permanent source of liberal rage? These are questions that will be answered, but unfortunately, I fear, the answers are not going to be encouraging for Air America.

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Jon Eekhoff is a teacher in Western Washington, and one of the 5 greatest basketball players to hail from Lemoore, California.