Milwaukee Talk Radio

Bruce Murphy nailed it in his summary of the Milwaukee talk radio tempest, Why We Went after Talk Radio:

Conservative talk radio is a different animal entirely. Both Sykes and WISN afternoon host Mark Belling, the two top rated such hosts in town, have expressly declared they are entertainers and not journalists, and have no obligation to present both sides of an issue. Their appeal arises precisely from a lack of good will toward certain segments of the community...

Following the national format used by Limbaugh and the others dating back to the 1980's, these formerly effective mouthpieces built an audience on two bases, the extreme right wing, and undecideds who were looking for intelligent political commentary to guide their decisions.

The last four years through a variety of techniques from providing an alternative progressive radio voice to public exposure of these charlatans the base diminished.

Murphy notes, relying on Dan Shelley's original article, "Secrets of Talk Radio", that the hosts of right-wing talk radio have no intention of engaging in rational dialog.

The nice thing is that the audience for Sykes and Belling is diminishing to the point where no one listens to them, except the true believers and those of us looking for an occasional chuckle or fodder for our blogs. 

Comments

[Duke]

"The last four years through a variety of techniques from providing an alternative progressive radio voice to public exposure of these charlatans the base diminished."

Typical Soglin, as though saying it in public makes it so. He seems to forget the poster child for "progressive," aka liberal talk radio, Air America, that came and went while Sykes and Belling were still honking away with their national on-line audience increasing every day.

[janeofdane]

Excuse me? Air America is still alive and well and has the Jones Network (Stephanie Miller, Ed Schultz) and Nova M (Mike Malloy, Randi Rhodes) following in its progressive talk format footsteps. Air America host Rachel Maddow now splits her time between the radio network and her own show on MSNBC. Former Air America radio hosts, Sam Seder and Marc Maron now host an afternoon online video show (VODcast)on Air America media.

Didn't AAR just add a couple of affiliates in northern Illinois? With any luck, the AAR signal now reaches the Milwaukee.