air america wins talkers magazine poll, dr.laura naked, sean hannity threatens rush, mike reagan falls on his tongue, michael savage hunted down & killed

It’s not scientific and it’s always controversial. No, we’re not talking about Intelligent Design, we speak of the 2005 Talkers Magazine Talk Host Survey.

It’s from the ubiquitous Michael Harrison’s trade journal that every year, through a mysterious and sometimes dubious process of interviews with listeners and radio professionals; tea leaves, nepotism, (or incest) and intrigue comes up with a top 15 spots in talk radio in the country ranked by audience size.

The spots this year are taken by 26 talkers and there are a few minor, though depressing, surprises.

The headline across the right-wing blogosphere is that no Air America talkers are on the list. Radio Equalizer Brian Maloney waxes adamant that this, of course, means the failure of Air America which only recently celebrated its first anniversary.

It took a over a year for Bill O’Reilly, Michael Medved and others to show up on this list and we think it’s premature to chalk Air America’s absence as failure.

The top 5 make for a very discouraging commentary on the taste and entertainment threshold of the consumers of talk, not to speak of any assumptions you might make about their politics.

Designated GOP Liar Sean Hannity is within shooting distance of Rush Limbaugh. Not too surprising, Big Pants’ peccadilloes (drug addiction, trading his 3rd wife in on a CNN anchor, talking about blowjobs on-air, farting while talking to Lynn Cheney) might very well finally had some effect on the values crowd who make up so much of his audience.

The well-scrubbed Hannity, whose on-air personna is that of sexy het altar boy is, so far, squeaky clean in the morés dep’t. (Oh, how good it would do us to see him caught with his penis in a somehow compromised location).

Michael Savage has zoomed there up to #3, catching up with Howard Stern who won’t be, he says, a contender next year when he goes to satellite radio. If nothing else signals the decline of our American culture, it’s the rise of Michael Savage.

The evil scold Dr. Laura Schlessinger, (See her perky self naked as Sean Hannity’s ambition,) has hung in there at 5th place, proving that sado-masochists really are a viable market.

Michael Medved has dropped down to 11th place (from 9th last year). This is unfortunate, as the neoconservative Medved is at least literate. It might be because he doesn't to this day support the 1964 Civil Rights Act. He must be hanging his head in shame that talkers like Bill O’Reilly, Laura Ingraham and Michael Savage kick his ass.

Dropped below the tropic of cancer is Michael Reagan, the half-witted adopted son of Ronald Reagan pere and Jane Wyman. He was at the level of his incompetence as a playboy racer of motor boats, but just had to demonstrate the Peter Principle to became one of the most ungrammatical, ill-spoken, slow-studies on talk radio. He has a reading disorder and no cliché filter. 

Also missing is misinformation guru Matt Drudge (KVI Sun. 7-10p) whose talk show show reaches hundreds each Sunday night with such revolting regular guests as Luciane Goldberg, the Republican pit viper who helped set up Monica Lewinsky. (The post-menopausal Goldberg shamelessly flirts with the peculiar 40-something Matt, which can bring up some very disturbing images for some of us more imaginative listeners).

Here’s some official blatherWatch spin to justify the salacious, misleading headline: Air America wins by not being on this list with all these pathetic, reactionary losers.

Here’s the whole list:

The 2005 Talkers Magazine Talk Host Survey*
1. Rush Limbaugh 14.75+
2. Sean Hannity 13+
3. Michael Savage  8.75+
3. Howard Stern 8.75+
4. Dr. Laura Schlessinger 7.50+
5. Laura Ingraham 5+
6. Jim Bohannon 3.75+
7. Neal Boortz  3.5+
7. Mike Gallagher 3.5+
8. Clark Howard 3.25+
9. Glen Beck 3+
9. Don Imus  3+
9. Bill O'Reilly 3+
9. Doug Stephan 3+
10. Dr. Joy Browne 2.75+
10. George Noory 2.75+
11. Kim Kommando 2+
11. Michael Medved  2+
11. Dave Ramsey 2+
11. Jim Rome 2+
12. Bob Brinker 1.75+
12. G. Gordon Liddy 1.75+
13. Jerry Doyle 1.5+
13. Tom Leykis 1.5+
14. Bill Bennett 1.25+
15. Jim Cramer 1+
15. Dr. Dean Edell 1+
15. Phil Hendrie 1+
15. Rusty Humphries 1+
15. Tony Snow 1+
                                 *in millions

Comments

[be_a_rockstar2]

Blatherwatch Host writes:"If nothing else signals the decline of our American culture, it’s the rise of Michael Savage"

And if nothing else signals the tangled web that money weaves, it's the fact that Mike Webb advertises Rock Star (over and over and over), a beverage who's company is lead by Michael Savages KID! That's right, Russell Goldencloud Weiner is the "founder and CEO" of Michael Webbs "rock star" drink!

"...I was very fortunate to have been raised by two of the leading herbalists in the world, Dr. and Mrs. Michael Weiner, Ph.D. My father has authored 20 books on health and nutrition, published in more than ten nations..."---Russell Goldencloud Weiner
http://www.rockstar69.com/new_html/company.html

It's a very strange world...

[Brian Maloney]

It's even stranger when you consider Webb's leading the anti-union drive at his station, with a letter to staffers urging them to dump AFTRA! The vote is coming up.

Only a phony would pretend to be "progressive" on the air, then participate in union-busting behind the scenes.

Then, he threatens to sue anyone who criticizes him.

[Matt]

Air America will not show up on the list. The simple fact is that ratings are embarassingly low and that time will not help, since they are dropping in every market as time goes on.

[Sparky Anderson]

oh wahhhhhhh Brian....I notice YOUR name wasnt on the list!
Wait! It wouldnt be because you were...FIRED!!!

The righties only wish that AA is failing....a sure sign that AA is right on target!

[David]

Wow, I learn so much from this column. Russ farted on Lynn Cheney? Tell us more. And Matt Drudge has a talk show? Who knew? Thank you once again for watching Hate Radio so that I don't have to!

[David]

Wow, I learn so much from this column. Russ farted on Lynn Cheney? Tell us more. And Matt Drudge has a talk show? Who knew? Thank you once again for watching Hate Radio so that I don't have to!

[Scrilla]

Rusty Humphries embodied everything that's bad about radio in a single, diminutive, loathsome package.

[Scott]

The more the right attacks AA, the more we know they are truly worried. Remember the initial spin?

AA won't last six months....

AA won't make it on in the top ten markets...

AA won't ever break the 25 station plateau...

AA will never win ANY time slot anywhere...

Franken will quit in three months...

All proven wrong by time. The righties HATE a level playing field. They can't STAND it. They want a world where we only hear THEIR views.

[Scrilla]

Scott!? Been researching?
Let's be honest, lefties hate other views at LEAST as vehemently as righties. Your posts are exhibit A. DailyKOS is B.

[Scott]

Scrilla is there ANY subject on which your response isn't-

"Well you guys do it too?"

Is that all you got?

The difference here by the way is that while I am not a fan on you righties, I have never walked around trying to minimize the impact that the lies of Faux News has. Nor have I predicted an end to Lush Flimbaugh. It's one thing to dispise another person's views. It's a totally different thing to dispise those views and then try to minimize them by lying about their impact.

[Sonya]

You lowered yourself and your cause even lower by linking to a porn site with the stolen pictures of Dr. Laura. Her privacy was violated by those pictures and she sued the pornographer who took them. Puting them up here was not fare to her or to those who look up to her. You'd better be careful, she has the money to close this mean site down

[Scrilla]

Not so much Scott...YOUR chief argument seems to be "look how we lefties keep it ethical, yet we're SUCH victims."
The entire negative portrayal of the current struggle for democracy in Iraq is a pretty big impact of the LEFT media.
Franken lies. Rhodes lies.

[Scott]

Somehow Scrilla this has gone from a thread about Air America's reach to your commentary on the left's "negative portrayal of the current struggle for democracy in Iraq." Excuse me but I just spit up my coffee when I read that. Now I am just plain laughing.

First of all Scrilla, you have an interesting debate tactic. When you are losing, you just try to hijack the thread in a different direction. Well that only works if nobody notices. Well we noticed. NEXT?

And secondly, to call the abomination that's going on in Iraq a "struggle for democracy" ??????? Give me a break. It's a struggle for oil.

If you want to talk about struggling for democracy, let's try to build a democracy right here in the good old USA first shall we?

[Scrilla]

Scott, any discussion of AA that you use to launch into a GENERAL critique of EVERYBODY to the right of you MUST be refuted with an example of unmitigated DAMAGE by the left wing media. It's not a detour, it's an answer.
Just be honest; FrankenFraud, you and DailyKOS hate dissent. Your reliance on ad hominem attacks is as transparent as your politics.
"Scrilla is there ANY subject on which your response isn't-

'Well you guys do it too?' "

Scott, is there any subject on which your argument isn't "The left plays fair at all times and the righties are the locus of evil throughout the world?"
If so, please link.
Your petulant partisanship brings nothing to the table in regards to Seattle radio. Wouldn't you have a wider audience with your fellow travellers at DailyPOS ?

[Scott]

Ah Scrilla I have seen the light. I suppose that if I were petulantly partisan for the right you'd be okay with that?

What a joke.

Since you can't stand the truth, I will take the thread back on point. AA is a thorn in your side and the side of all right wingers. We get a chance to hear an opposing view on AA. Because that scares you to death, you constantly lie about AA's status, HOPE for its demise, predict its demise, do anything you can to hope you can make it go away. Well all the evidence goes against your position Scrilla. But hey, as a republican, you don't need no stinkin' evidence do you?

[Scrilla]

I love dissent. As long it stays in the world of fact and it doesn't resort to personal attacks.
I have no problem (or interest) with AA. There's nothing broadcast on AA, posted on DailyPOS or proferred by the likes of you that I would ever suppress.
It just continues to amuse me that you paint yourself as a teller of truth.
If there was a conspiracy, AA wouldn't be broadcasting. If it's viable, if it gets LISTENERS, it will succeed. If not, people like you will gin up a post facto conspiracy.

[Scott]

Scrilla for someone who claims to have "no interest" in AA, you sure spend a great deal of time talking about it.

And since when are republicans interested in facts?

Further, since when do republicans shy away from personal attacks?

Listened to Sean Hannity or Rush lately? Personal attacks are all they do.

[Scrilla]

Good dodge.