Starting with Boston, where we just lost Air America,
WMBR 88.1FM (from MIT) carries Free Speech Radio News (Pacifica) on their nightly news weekdays at 5:30pm, and has several other locally produced progressive shows such as What’s Left and Radio with a View on Sundays. Until recently they had a weekly program called Gendertalk dealing with trans & queer politics & social issues, I think it was the only such radio program in the country for a while, but unfortunately that ended this fall.
WZBC 90.3 FM (from Boston College) carries Democracy Now! every weekday noon-1, and John Grebe’s locally produced Sounds of Dissent on Saturdays 11am – 1pm.
Both of these stations have enough power to be heard clearly throughout the entire metro Boston area. Boston has a bunch of other noncommercial stations with a variety of progamming, some of it progressive talk.
The Pioneer Valley in western Mass also has a collection of noncommercial stations that, while no match for Boston, is actually better than what you an find in most major American cities. In addition to a bunch of college stations and WHMP, the AM “progressive talk” station, a bunch of locals got together and set up Valley Free Radio last year: WXOJ-LP 103.3 FM Northampton, a nonprofit community radio station.
Out in the Berkshires, WBCR-LP at 97.7FM (Berkshire Community Radio, Great Barrington) has a host of progressive programming. WBCR started much like Valley Free, with a group of locals who got together and set up a community station. It’s a Low Power FM station, which despite the name, only covers south county, not all of the Berkshires. Unfortunately I don’t know of anything similar in north county.
On the outer Cape, WOMR 92.1FM Provincetown is a listener supported station that carries Democracy Now! and some other progressive news/talk programming.
A national network has its uses, but the true power of progressive media will come through developing more local sources, such as community radio stations, and linking them with each other to share programs and reporting. When I worked on Jesse Gordon’s campaign for Cambridge City Council in 2005, I was able to arrange three extended radio interviews for him on WMBR. If we didn’t have a community radio station here in Cambridge, I doubt that could’ve happened – Air America is not the venue for city & state level candidates except on rare occasions.
Please don’t spread the myth that there’s no progressive radio in Massachusetts! And if you care about progressive radio, get involved in a local community station, or if there isn’t one, get some folks together and start a new one.
I should also add that in western Massachusetts, progressive radio from neighboring states is an important part of the picture.
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In the Springfield area, you can get WHUS Storrs 91.7FM from Connecticut. WHUS carries a variety of progressive programs including Alternative Radio and FAIR’s CounterSpin. They also carry Free Speech Radio News weekdays at 5:30pm, like WMBR does.
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In pretty much all of western and most of central MA, you can pick up WAMC 90.3 FM from Albany, aka “Northeast Public Radio” (and affectionately known/teased by some as “the Alan Chartock radio network”). It’s NPR but with a lot of their own programming covering the northeastern US and the Hudson Valley area, and including one of my favorite media criticism/analysis shows, The Media Project. They’ve got a program on women’s issues called 51%, and… well, browse the schedule. Northeast Public Radio actually has one station in Great Barrington, but WAMC 90.3’s signal is so strong and 105.1’s so weak that unless you’re within a few miles of Great Barrington, it’s the one to tune to.
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What else of value leaks in from across our borders? Here in Boston it’s not a factor; it’s our stations the cross over into New Hampshire and Rhode Island.
one of the best NPR affiliates, nationwide
My unspoken assumption is that everyone who reads Blue Mass Group and lives within WBUR’s listening area, is already very familiar with WBUR 🙂
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(and there’s also a bunch of discussion of WBUR on the dailykos thread)
One doesn’t assign a high enough value to WBUR until one lives elsewhere for awhile.
… from lefinlowell who hosts the Friday segment of Thinking Out Loud on WUML, UMass/Lowell’s (mostly) student-run radio station. Admittedly it does not have a powerful signal but for those in the Merrimack Valley it should be easy to hear. This a…
http://www.wuml.org/…
I listen to WUML sometimes (it carries further than you think, BTW :), but didn’t realize Lynne had a show there. One of the many hidden gems in the greater Boston noncommercial radio landscape. (Possibly the best radio program I’ve ever heard was “Just Like You” on WBRS at Brandeis University in the late 90s, produced by an Israeli Jew and an Israeli Arab who became friends while attending Brandeis).
But I live in Framingham an can’t get the MIT station or the BC station worth a damn. And BUR is part of the CPB enterprise that is going farther and farther afield with each wingnut that is added to the CPB by W. Obviously I can’t get the western MA stations or the outer Cape station which even when I work in Chatham I can’t get (I’ve tried).
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That said, I will have to stream AAR or play old podcasts unless and until they re-enter the marked or I decide to fork out the dough for XM.
I’ve never had any problems listening to WMBR in Framingham, though WZBC is spotty there – it reaches further north, but I think Worcester-area stations on similar frequencies start conflicting with it in the west around Natick. Of course if you’re streaming online, all these stations have web streams.
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It is true that not all of Massachusetts is covered by stations that have some progressive news & talk, though that was always true (and if you live in Athol, you can’t get any FM radio, as far as I can tell).
but it doesn’t for me.
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I spend hours in the car commuting and granted, I couldn’t get AAR for maybe half my drive (to and from the Cape), at least I could get it for half. Now, nothing.
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And I agree with liandro below. An hour or two of good programing does not a progressive station make.
NOT FALSE
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The loss of a national network of progressive talk is not going to be made up by a few hours of Pacifica News and an hour of Democracy Now, and hour here or there of other progressive stuff,as good as they are. I listen to most of that, and have for years, but broadcast Air America has the potential to set the agenda and frame the debate in ways local or intermittent programming never can.
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It’s not a question of whether we have more progressive air than other communities. Of course we have–it’s Boston/Cambridge, after all. It’d be a disgrace otherwise. Should we have more local progresive programming, even stations? Of course–here and in every community.
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But it’s a tired distraction to think this modest amount of programming we now have or any increase we can obtain in the critical near future, can replace the impact of national free progressive talk.
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Further, as noted, we are Boston/Cambridge, the bluest of the blue, the most progressive and justly proud of that. To not have easy access anymore to the news and information, the intellectual, emotional and moral support of Air America–against an ever increasing, not diminishing, dominance of mainstream media by rightwing bonkjobs and propaganda, and a neutering of public radio–is a profound loss, and to state otherwise is insulting and infuriating.
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Organize away, those who can. It’s never not a good idea. But the organizing that will truly advance the causes and principles we all believe in will be the kind that brings Air America back to eastern Mass.
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Without those same five damn commercials and PSAs running constantly, of course. It’s a mystery to me, too, why the network and affiiates don’t seek out sponsorship from progressive organizations of all stripes, especially the well funded groups like Sierra Club, Greenpeace, Doctors w/o Borders, Physcians for This and That, and the hundreds of others. 501(c)3 non-profits cannot indulge in political advocacy by charter, but 501(c)4’s are free to, as I understand.
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Or from corporations that seem to profit from leveraging the LGBT community on networks like Logo–think Subaru.
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It’s equally a mystery to me why support is not forthcoming without begging (hell, beg!) from some of the major liberal philanthropist billionaires like Soros, and other private citizens like Al Gore.
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So near, and yet…so what?
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I’m gonna call off-topic on this one. We already have a thread about the loss of Air America and how to get it back. Nowhere did I argue that because we have all of these community stations (and the progressive talk AM in the pioneer valley), that means we don’t care that we lost the Air America station here in Boston. I’m very strongly not interested in turning this post into a discussion of that strawman – it would be frustrating and generate nothing useful. I’m giving you a low rating not because I think this is a bad comment, but because I really hope you’ll repost it where it belongs and would love to see it removed from this post.
I won’t miss BosProgTalk all that much, or Air America, as currently constituted. And that’s kind of a mean thing to say, since they pumped this blog on some of their on-air promos. Of course, it’s not the station, it’s the content that they were getting from elsewhere:
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1. Al Franken: Very, very dull show. He talks through his nose, always sounds like he’s bored. A tough slog.
2. Randi Rhodes: Unlistenable. If she pounded Quaaludes for a week straight she’d get down to “shrill”. And mixes up her facts like a Cuisinart sometimes.
3. Stephanie Miller: Sounds like Lily Tomlin doing an imitation of what Miller’s supposed to be doing. Only not as funny.
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On the other hand …
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4. Ed Schultz: I kinda like Ed; he does good interviews with folks like Harry Reid; he sounds just like Rush Limbaugh, which is really neither here nor there; not a cultural liberal, which is too bad. But he counts.
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5. Rachel Maddow: I like her. Damn smart. Getting warmer.
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As for the rest, I never listen to the radio at night, except for baseball. Just not part of my rhythm.
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In any event, wasn’t AAR supposed to represent the Jon Stewart side of things — really well-produced, satirical, clever, original? Lots of funny skits? Fun to listen to? It’s not. I wish I felt differently.
…why these radio stations are shutting down (or according to Kos, replacing the progressive talk programming with Latin music)?
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I don’t, and I couldn’t really figure it out from reading anybody’s posts. But I happened to be listening to Limbaugh talking about it awhile ago, and he was saying something to the effect of, “Ha ha, no wonder they went down, the liberals don’t get that talk radio isn’t about politics or getting people elected; it’s about business and entertainment, period.” Since I completely agree with the accuracy of that statement taken at face value, I’m wondering if anyone can fill in some of the details of the business decisions that went down here.
Sponsors don’t care about politics, but they do care about ratings. And there aren’t many (in this market, anyway) who want to hear what air America has to say.
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It’s not personal, it’s business.
There was no marketing/advertising in the Boston area, there were constant changes in the lineup, and the signal strength was terrible. They didn’t advertise like they have in other metro areas. Did you ever see a billboard or taxi ad like in NYC? Some of my most liberal friends didn’t know they existed. Early on, Clear Channel decided not to support progressive radio and try to make AM 1200 and 1430 viable. Someone like Randi Rhodes could have dominated the 3-6PM slot, but not with a shitty signal and no marketing. I know a lot of people here find Randi shrill, but she’s not more shrill than jackasses like Howie Carr and Jay Severin.
🙁
I agree with you that Franken’s show was dull and Randi’s was awful – I listened to it once, partway through, and never wanted to hear it again. And I won’t personally miss the Air America AM because I rarely listened to it, I found more value in other stations. However, I do miss it in the abstract sense that it was helpful to a lot of other people and I think it served a useful purpose for parts of the new progressive movement in terms of bringing people together, getting people in the habit of thinking about these issues, etc.
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My purpose in this post, though, was not to talk about whether we miss Air America or not. We’ve already got a post about that frontpaged. I took an aside from the daily kos post as an opportunity to promote the progressive & community radio we do have, separate from Air America, on local stations scattered all across our state. These are some of my favorite radio stations (for their music programming as well as their news & public affairs shows).
…stunk. Actually, Rhodes had a decent one-hour show, but it was basically three hours of the same one-hour show. At least Stephanie Miller and Ed Schultz were entertaining–and entertainment is what it’s about first.
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Even Rush Lamebrain used to be entertaining. That pretty much ended about a decade ago, though. It it weren’t for his marketer, he’d be off the air by now.
…AAR had a moderately entertaining host in Thom Hartmann. Unfortunately he was on in the same slot as Franken, and was only available over Internet streaming. His first hour is also available over Sirius–which is odd, since I had been led to believe that AAR had an exclusive with XM.
But I LOVE Stephanie Miller. I also like Franken (he especially has great regular guests). Randi I only like when I need cathardic ranting during an angry spell.
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Ed’s OK, sometimes I have to shut him off but if he’s on in the background or in the car I usually can stand it – until he starts talking sports or hunting. Just not my thing. Maddow rocks, Young Turks is pretty good.
on Miller. She was the best thing about having the station. I don’t care for Ed; he too conservative. I don’t mind Franken as I like the regular guest thing, too. Oh well. It was good while it lasted.
Ed’s OK, sometimes I have to shut him off but if he’s on in the background or in the car I usually can stand it – until he starts talking sports or hunting.
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I don’t particularly care about sports (broadcasting or talk over the radio) or hunting, but it appears that Ed Schultz knows that he has to appeal to a diverse crowd in order to get ratings. Ranting about lefty politics exclusively is not necessarily the way to ratings nirvana.
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Don’t forget that Shultz gave Mike Rogers (of gay outing fame) a soap-box over the last few months, when nobody else would.
sattelite radio…originally made the decision to get XM when I heard they would be the exclusive outlet for Air America, yet once I had it installed I noticed a funny thing…I didn’t care for Air America radio all that much. Since I kind of jerry-rigged the thing in my car instead of putting down the big bucks for a proper installation, it’s not easy to change the station…I found myself listening mostly to XM-PR or BBC World Service, and now I pretty much leave on the BBC-World Service, which is almost like having WBUR only without the Boston/NPR part.
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I believe Air America will go down as an experiement that failed…a lot of people predicted it wouldn’t work, and they’re right. Liberals, unlike wingnuts, aren’t interested in listening to some jackoff echoing their predjudices back at them. We’re not dittoheads, we prefer thinking and hearing different stories and points of view.
…Sirius for its OutQ service, and stayed for its “talk left” service.
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Among a few other things, of course. But not Howard Stern. Talk about boring–his show is about as dumb as Don “I’m an ass in the morning” Imus’s.
The back and forth about whether or not there is technically any progressive radio shows in Bostom misses the point. The benefit of having it on 24/7 (even though there were signal issues at night) was that if you were in the car, or wherever, you had access to an informative show with news on the hour, Whether it was the Turks (not my favorite), Stephanie Miller (entertaining), Al Franken (great regular guests), Ed Schultz (more middle of the road but a good interviewer), or Randi’s rants, it was reinforcing to get someone’s enlightened, progressive take on events any time during the day. That is what is going to be missed.
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Yes, you can stream another station on the internet when you are home, tethered to your computer, but not having it during drive time with commentary on current daily news events is a real loss when you are sitting in traffic on the expressway or the Pike.
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The best chance is to try to get another of the lower rated stations to pick up the format. It was getting at least measurable ratings in the Arbitron book while some stations don’t even get that.
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Let’s hope someone who is willing to add a local progressive show and make a significant promotional effort will change to a progressive format. In the case of some stations, it would improve their ratings.
When you can’t even get support amongst progressives … it’s a sad thing …
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My program … the Keri Rodrigues Broadcast … airs EVERY SINGLE AFTERNOON … in DRIVE TIME … for 3 hours a day … and I’m a pitbull democrat who had Deval as well as every other statewide candidate on once a week during election season.
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It’s the #1 Arbitron rated afternoon drive talk show in Bristol County and the surrounding areas … we’re talking Taunton, Attleboro, Fall River and New Bedford … beating all the conservative Boston stations which easily reach down here … as well as the conservative Providence hosts that beam into the market as well.
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No love outside the 128 belt. And the guys from Blue Mass Group have been on my show three times. And now you guys are talking about college radio programs?!?!??!
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The progressive radio movement dies when you don’t support it. Luckily the people who live “down south” support my show because it’s good radio — not simply because it’s progressive. Air America is tanking because it’s not good radio — and they don’t understand the art of broadcasting. It’s not just any liberal getting behind the mike … I like to think ratings require skill.
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But then again … I’m just some jerk from Fall River …
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Oh … and this jerk will be a guest on Alan Colmes in January … hope you tune in …
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Keri
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for Keri’s show being totally awesome, having been a guest more than once. It’s too bad that the station’s signal doesn’t really make it up to greater Boston. She’s got a blog too.
next month! 🙂
If you write this all up in a post, I’ll front-page it so that folks know that reports of MA progressive radio’s death have been greatly exaggerated.