Wishful thinking Anecdotal evidence from Tom Blumer that doesn’t mean much, in my humble opinion.

believe the blogosphere has been taking listeners away from talk radio, and that the pace of this shift is accelerating. I believe it’s true on the left and the right, as Air America, having gained no meaningful traction during the election season, has fallen back as well.
The logic behind the decline is simple:

* Five-plus years ago, people listened to Rush, Liddy, and the rest to learn things the mainstream media either would not report, or would not emphasize.

* Today, those who follow the blogs have 24-7 access to alternative information. Many of us can predict what Rush, Hannity, Franken and the rest are going to talk about even before the show starts, and we can feel pretty confident that we won’t learn much that is new. So, why listen? Since the left-of-center blogosphere is just as active, one would expect that many of them feel the same way about Franken, Imus (whose program has gone through a steep decline), et al.

Speaking only for myself, I can say that almost all of my current talk radio listening occurs in the car and not in the office. Five-plus years ago, the ratio was about 50-50. Even in the car, when I get the sense that a topic I’m current with is going to beaten up, I turn the radio off.

I sense I am not alone in this. Perhaps more than one tipping point has been reached.

Tom points to a story in today’s WaPo pointing out ratings for WMAL declined 30% from the last book.

But a quick survey around the nation shows that most talk stations are experiencing much more mild declines. And one quick qualifier… most program directors don’t just look at how a station fared from one book to the next. They also look at how stations fared as compared to the same time last year. WABC in New York, for instance, went from a 4.5 in the Fall ‘04 book to a 3.5 in the Winter ‘05 book. But their Spring ‘04 book was a 3.9 (can’t find the data on Winter ‘04, sorry). A 3.9 to a 3.5 is a much more mild decline.

If you want to just look at the Fall ‘04 to Winter ‘05 ratings, a quick sampling shows no real cause for alarm for talk radio folks.

WLS, Chicago 4.4 to a 4.2

KGO, San Fran 6.6 to a 6.5

KSFO, S.F. 3.3 to a 3.1

WPHT, Philly 4.1 to a 3.7

WMAL, D.C. 4.3 to a 3.7

WRKO, Boston 3.9 to a 4.1

WJR, Detroit 5.3 to a 6.3(!)

Most stations saw a slight decline, although a few stations were able to buck the trend and increase their ratings post election (nice job, program directors!). Having lived and died by the ratings before, I don’t see anything that gives me cause for alarm. If WMAL continues to slide for another two or three books, expect to see some changes. But I don’t think that will happen, honestly.

Blogs are great, don’t get me wrong. But sometimes I think certain quarters of the blogosphere thinks 5 years from now they will have replaced newspapers, talk radio, and the network news. It’s not going to happen. TV didn’t kill radio, cable didn’t kill network television, and the blogs aren’t going to kill off any other form of media. It will be another source, but not a sole source of information.

More thoughts at Michelle Malkin and Outside the Beltway.

In today’s New York Post, Air America host Randi Rhodes pulls out the typical liberal excuse.

“It was a bit. It was bad. I apologize a thousand times,” Rhodes told listeners yesterday on WLIB (1190 AM), adding: “I’m not in charge of the bits.”

Bullfeathers. The name of the show is “The Randi Rhodes Show”. You’re in charge of the bits, ma’am… even if you don’t actually produce them. If your name is on the show, you know exactly what’s running on your show. If you don’t… then you’re a freaking idiot.

Florida Governor Jeb Bush has signed the so-called “Castle Doctrine” bill into law. This law removes the duty to retreat if you are being attacked, and instead allows an individual who is being attacked to meet force with force.

Keep that phrase in mind. “Meet force with force.” Doesn’t mean “shoot anyone who looks at you funny.” It means if you are being attacked by someone with a gun, you have the right to fight back, rather than turning your back and trying to run away.

David Hardy’s collected a number of news stories about the new law, and one thing immediately jumps out at me: references by opponents of this law that Florida will now become more like “The Wild West”.

As I’m sure you know, homicides in the “Wild West” were actually fairly rare. When gun control advocates say that a pro-gun law would turn “blank” into the Wild West, you might let them know that’s not such a bad thing.

Conversely, I think it’s fair to say (as Tim Graham of the MRC said on my show earlier today) that gun control laws could turn “blank” into Washington, D.C. And we all know how little crime there is in our nation’s capitol.

So Randi Rhodes has apologized for a bit that seems to have advocated violence against the President. Good for her. Now let’s see what Air America does. President of Programming Jon Sinton says “internal discipline will be enforced”.

As opposed to Air America enforcing external discipline? This is gobbledy gook.

As a talk show host, I’m of the opinion that the more you can say the better. At the same time, you have to be aware of the limits of decency. Not “decency” as defined by the government, but decency as defined by fellow human beings.

The skit that aired on the Randi Rhodes show was in such poor taste that I can’t see how she could keep her job. If I or any other talk show host had aired a skit that advocated violence against Air America’s President of Programming (much less the President of this country), the hosts on Air America would be demanding my resignation. Should the liberal host of the Randi Rhodes show be able to operate under a different standard?

It would be easy to blame this on the unhinged Left, or to say that as ratings decrease, the level of rhetoric from hosts increases… but none of that really matters. What matters is the action Air America chooses to take now.

I opened up the Washington Post today and saw this ridiculously biased poll on the front page. I was going to blog about it, but fortunately Michelle and Jim have done my work for me.

Had a great time at the Nationals game last night. It was my first time seeing a game in a “cookie cutter” ballpark, and the experience wasn’t as bad as I’d thought it would be. Yes, there’s not much to look at, but that’s okay. It makes you pay more attention to the action on the field.

We took the Metro to RFK Stadium, which is apparently what a lot of people do.

Our seats were in right field, with a pretty good view of the action. My only complaint was that we were right underneath the large scoreboard, and there’s not a lot of other signage around the ballpark. It was very difficult to tell who was batting without being able to see the scoreboard. But the view was great (althought the pic’s a little fuzzy).

Mike Aitken (one of the “boys in the back” at NRAnews.com went to the game with me, and his girlfriend showed up and took a picture of us with my cameraphone.

One of the things with a new team is the lack of a built in fan base. There were plenty of Phillies fans in attendance (and I saw a large number of Red Sox hats as well… either transplants or bandwagoneers) including some students from the University of Maryland.

The delightful train ride into the park turned into a hellish traffic jam trying to get out of the park. It took a good half hour to simply get into the Metro station. Maybe if the Nats had won it would have been a more jovial atmosphere.

All in all a good time, although it’ll be tough to take the kids to the ballgame unless it’s on a weekend. I’m taking them to a Single-A Potomac Nationals game on Thursday, however… so expect more baseball blogging in the future.

I love my wife. I called her today being a typical selfish husband and asked if I could go to the Nationals game tonight (coworker can’t go, giving away tickets).

She said yes.

Yes. Even though it means dealing with the twins all evening, she said yes.

Now the question is… what treat should I buy her? Suggestions are welcome in the comments.

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New baby pictures are here.

Catherine’s really getting big. And I think she’s going to keep her red hair, which would be awesome. She also loves to sleep, as evidenced by the fact that 90% of the pictures we have of her are with her eyes closed.

James, on the other hand, doesn’t sleep as much as his sister. He’s also a clingy little monkey. At least he’s starting to lose his resemblance to Mr. Magoo.

And lest Andrew be ignored, here’s his latest heavy-metal pose. He never fails to crack me up.

As for the older kids… Harrison doesn’t really like to have his picture taken, and if you think there’s any way I’m putting pictures of my beautiful 18-year old daughter up on the internet… you’re crazy.

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If this were my kid, he’d be written out of the will and be forced to pay for his college. Not to mention the fact he’d be walking on foot for as long as he lived under my roof.

Ungrateful punk.

The latest accusation thrown at prospective UN ambassador John Bolton is that he was mean to a woman in Moscow 11 years ago.

I was shocked and devastated to learn that this woman, who apparently never filed any sort of complaint against Bolton at the time, just happens to be a founding member of “Mothers Against Bush”.

Someone with a partisan axe to grind is going after one of President Bush’s appointee’s? I’m shocked. Shocked, I tell you.

A new study by the CDC says a littlel extra weight won’t kill you. In fact, it’s better to be a little overweight than a little underweight.

But don’t expect the CDC to actually use this study.

CDC Director Dr. Julie Gerberding said because of the uncertainty in calculating the health effects of being overweight, the CDC is not going to use the brand-new figure of 25,814 in its public awareness campaigns and is not going to scale back its fight against obesity.

“There’s absolutely no question that obesity is a major public health concern of this country,” she said. Gerberding said the CDC will work to improve methods for calculating the consequences of obesity.

In other words, the CDC didn’t get the results they wanted, and so they’re going to disregard the study. They’ll probably change the parameters of the next study (i.e. “work to improve methods for calculating the consequences of obesity) so they get the results they want.

And taxpayers paid how much for this study?

Remind me again when kids start sleeping through the night? Actually, don’t. It’s much too depressing to think that far ahead.

Well, this isn’t cause for alarm for conservatives. Just an informal gathering of liberal billionaires. Kind of a billionaire picnic.

George Soros told a carefully vetted gathering of 70 likeminded millionaires and billionaires last weekend that they must be patient if they want to realize long-term political and ideological yields from an expected massive investment in “startup” progressive think tanks.

The Scottsdale, Ariz., meeting, called to start the process of building an ideas production line for liberal politicians, began what organizers hope will be a long dialogue with the “partners,” many from the high-tech industry. Participants have begun to refer to themselves as the Phoenix Group.

The Phoenix Group. Rising from the ashes of their 2004 failure. And what exactly will the Phoenix Group be doing?

One source at the DNC with direct knowledge of the agenda said that the Phoenix Group had three specific goals at the outset. It wants to create liberal think tanks, training camps for young progressives and media centers.

Think tanks for academics, training camps for the young’ens (Hey kids, head on down to Uncle George’s Krazy Kamp for Left-leaning Kids!), and media centers for journalists to educate the masses the Soros way.

And billions upon billions of dollars to enact this agenda.

Boy, aren’t you glad McCain/Feingold took the big money out of politics?

Those that can, do. Those that can’t, teach.

Verizon’s CEO needs to take a refesher course in customer service.

In an interview published Saturday in the San Francisco Chronicle , [Ivan] Seidenberg seemed to suggest the company’s wireless customers were becoming too demanding.

“Why in the world would you think your (cell) phone would work in your house?” he asked. “The customer has come to expect so much. They want it to work in the elevator, they want it to work in the basement.”

Why would I expect my cell phone to work in my house? Because I’m paying a great deal of money to talk on the phone.

By the way, Verizon is the company that runs the “Can you hear me now?” commercials. I’ll have to check to see if all of the commercials feature outdoors locations.

I guess because I’m in D.C. now, but the ten year anniversary of the Murrah Bombing isn’t something that I’ve thought a lot about. I was one of the lucky ones… I didn’t know anyone killed or hurt in the bombing. It’s been easier for me to find closure, especially now that Tim McVeigh is dead.

I don’t think closure will ever come to those most closely affected, and for them I say a prayer today.

Received a very polite email from a member of the Chronicle op/ed pages in response to an earlier letter I sent addressing my concerns about this paragraph in today’s opinion section:

An NRA commentator and talk show host complained that when he worked in television and radio news, he wasn’t allowed to give his pro-Second Amendment opinion. Isn’t the absence of opinion what NRA members claim to want in their news media?

In the email I received, there was a slightly different version (and a more accurate version) of what I actually said.

I was at the panel discussion Sunday and heard you say that as a talk show host and commentator you could now give your opinion, whereas you couldn’t while working in radio and TV news.

For the reader, I identified your view as pro-Second Amendment. I hope I was not wrong to make that assumption.

Maybe it’s me, and maybe it’s nitpicky… but those really are two different statements.

**Update**

I was re-reading the op/ed piece and the email and noticed something else that’s a little odd. Remember, I never said anything about not being allowed to express my 2nd Amendment viewpoints in the newsroom. The op/ed writer said “For the reader, I identified your view as pro-Second Amendment…” Yet earlier in the same sentence he’d already identified me as an NRA commentator and talk show host. There’s no need to identify my view as pro-Second Amendment, and by adding that phrase into what I supposedly said, it paints me as saying something I did not.

Does this really mean anything at the end of the day? I suppose not, at least not to anyone other than me. But it’s annoying, it’s inaccurate, and I believe it paints a very unprofessional portrait of my time in the newsrooms of Oklahoma City.

It’s not uncommon for politicians of every political philosophy to take emotianally charged events and use them to their political advantage. But usually, they get their facts right.

This is not one of those times.

Arizona currently has a bill working it’s way through the legislature that would allow gun owners to carry their firearms inside bars and restaurants. SB1363 as introduced, would allow gun owners to bring their firearms into establishments that serve alcohol so long as they don’t consume any alcoholic beverages, and so long as the establishment does not prohibit such an action.

Last week, the state House of Representatives had its floor debate on the legislation. Rep. David Lujan (D-Phoenix) offered an interesting reason for his rejection of the bill.

“The shooting death of Brandon Falkner outside of a Scottsdale club is an example of what happens when you mix guns and bars,” said Rep. David Lujan, D-Phoenix, who dedicated his opposition to the memory of Falkner

Rep. Lujan is referring to the tragic shooting of former ASU defensive back Brandon Falkner by ASU running back Loren Wade during an argument outside of a Scottsdale nightclub last month.

There’s only one problem. The only person who visited a bar that night was the victim, Brandon Falkner. He was unarmed. Voting ‘No’ on this bill would have made it illegal for Falkner to be carrying a firearm the entire evening, and therefore illegal for Falkner to have the means to protect himself when Wade confronted him.

According to police interviews, Wade drove from his residence to the nightclub and confronted Falkner. He was no where near the nightclub until he decided to confront Falkner. Wade was drinking, but in his home. Not in a bar and not in a restaurant that serves alcohol. Voting ‘No’ on SB1363 wouldn’t have prevented Wade from using a gun to confront Falkner. But an ‘Aye’ vote would have allowed Falkner to arm himself, had he chosen to do so.

So if Rep. Lujan truly wanted to dedicate his vote to the memory of Brandon Falkner, he would have voted ‘Aye’. Instead, he used this horrible tradegy for political points, and even screwed that up.

Actually, this is just a perfect example of making up stuff.

An NRA commentator and talk show host complained that when he worked in television and radio news, he wasn’t allowed to give his pro-Second Amendment opinion. Isn’t the absence of opinion what NRA members claim to want in their news media?

I challenge the Houston Chronicle editorial board to find the quote where I said I wasn’t allowed to give my pro-Second Amendment opinion as a reporter. I simply never said that. The op/ed piece goes on to say

Isn’t the absence of opinion what NRA members claim to want in their news media?

I don’t know what “the NRA” wants. I know what I want. I want accurate information. And if a reporter is expected to also do analysis or commentary (as so many of them are these days), I want a newsroom where there’s diversity of thought and opinion, not just color and gender.

How sad that the Houston Chronicle, which actually had decent and fair coverage of the NRA Annual Meeting, chose to simply “make it up” when it comes to their editorial about the bias against guns in the media.

A story in the Houston Chronicle features yours truly talking about media bias. A fairly good job by the reporter, although I kind of take issue with this paragraph.

Edwards, who acknowledged he also has some biases, said there should be more stories about gun owners who successfully defend themselves, and less coverage of celebrities such as Michael Jackson and Britney Spears. The talk show host also suggested that news organizations should have full-time firearms writers, just as they do for topics such as education and politics.

It wasn’t that I “acknowledged” I have some biases… I flat out admitted it. Of COURSE I’m biased. So’s Bob Scheiffer. So’s Brian Williams. As human’s, we’re biased. And as journalists today we’re expected to be both reporters and analysts (something that another panelist discussed extensively). If we’re expected to analyze stories in addition to reporting them, your bias is going to show through. That’s why I also discussed a need for intellectual diversity in the newsroom, something the reporter doesn’t seem to agree with.

“The media risks becoming irrelevant if it doesn’t change,” said Edwards. He also accused news organizations of lacking “intellectual diversity.”

It’s not an accusation. It’s the truth. And if reporters don’t see it they’ve got their head in the sand.

The hotel has lost the laundry I sent out today. The laundry in question includes the only suit I brought with me, as well as three quarters of the dress shirts that I brought.

I was joking around about wearing a loincloth on Saturday’s show when Ted Nugent’s on. At this rate, it might the only clean article of clothing I have left!

**Update**

No need for the loincloth. They found my clothes. I really don’t even want to know where they were.

Greetings from sunny Houston, Texas! That’s the view from outside the convention center. The view from inside is great as well. We’re a little higher up than we were last year and have almost a bird’s eye view of the convention floor.

Travelling to Houston today for the NRA Annual Meetings. I’ll be posting tomorrow.

If this piece of art didn’t feature President Bush, would it still be considered art?

I don’t think so. If a student had made this, and it featured another student, you’d be looking at police charges. So why is it that the “artistic community” is so shocked by the Secret Service taking an interest in this.

The Secret Service might also want to take a look at what Michelle Malkin has found.

The liberal hate is only going to further marginalize the Left.