Talk radio survey measures the fair and the unbalanced

So whaddaya think? Are liberal talk hosts are more likely to let you on the air if you disagree with them?

To hear conservative talk hosts like Bill O'Reilly or Sean Hannity tell it, you wouldn't think so.

But you'd be wrong.

A survey released last week by Research 2000 President Del Ali tested how six nationally syndicated radio talk programs handle incoming calls among listeners who want to become callers.

They chose 3 progressives and 3 conservatives:  Liberals Stephanie Miller, Randi Rhodes and Ed Shultz; and conservatives Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham and Rush Limbaugh.

Big Eddie Shultz, (KPTK, m-f, 12-3p) won the prize.

The Best: Shultz was the easiest to get on the air with regardless of view point for the simple reason that the show is the only format of the six that does not ask the caller what they want to discuss. In fact, the only question the screener asked our ten callers was simply where are you calling from, radio call letters and your name. The only other interaction reported was the screener was polite enough to let the caller know when he/she would be on the air with Ed Shultz.

The Worst: Sean Hannity. None of our callers with a different point of view was able to get on the air with the host. Two of our callers with dissenting view points were told by the screener that "I will pass it on" and disconnected. A third caller with a different view was told that the host would not have time to take the call today, however, if the caller would give his name and number to the screener, the Hannity program would call him back first thing the next day. We gave the screener our number. The next day, there was not a returned call within the first two hours so we decided to call in and received a recording that stated, "Calls are not be accepted from this number" The fourth and fifth calls with a dissenting point of view were put on hold during the first hour and those callers were kept on the line for remaining two hours until the show completed, never getting on the air without feedback from the screener.

The rank order was:
1 Ed Shultz
2 Randi Rhodes
3 Stephanie Miller
4 Laura Ingraham
5 Rush Limbaugh
6 Sean Hannity

and was based on the on-air accessibility to the host by callers with both liberal and conservative points of view. Each program was called ten times- 5 with a point of view that agreed with the host and most of the callers and 5 that didn't.

While hardly professing that the following results are quantitative with the standard 95 percent confidence level or 5% margin for error which is standard within the scientific polling community, Research 2000 decided that it would be an interesting endeavor to find out how six nationally syndicated talk radio programs handle incoming calls among individuals who wish to engage in the live talk show over the air. The results to say the least are interesting enough to report in the hopes that "ALL" talk radio hosts and formats in the future will make it less restrictive and more accessible for potential call in guests regardless of whether or not they have a differing point of view.

We were surprised that as many as 1 in 5 callers with dissenting views was successful getting on the Rush Limbaugh show. But the caller went through three screeners before getting on the air with the flatulent blabbermeister.

The other 4 callers with dissenting view points were told politely that the host would not be taking calls on either the subject matter or a dissenting point of view. BOLDOne of the rejections included "open-line Friday" in which the host states that "open- line Friday" is open to all subject matters, not necessarily different views.    

There was no significant differences between the Laura Ingraham, Stephanie Miller and Randi Rhodes shows in terms of getting on the air if one had a dissenting view point. In all cases, callers with dissenting views were able to get on the air with the host. However, the wait on hold was longest for the Laura Ingraham show and that averaged 35 minutes to one hour and ten minutes. For Miller it was 35 minutes to 50 minutes and for Rhodes it was 30 minutes to 45 minutes.The difference between number 2 and 4 are slight and the rank order is based purely on the amount of time one was on hold.

Screening and a 7-second doesn't help Culture Warrior Bill "Ted Baxter" O'Reilly keep out the riff-raff. Of course the surveyors might have been afraid of a "little visit"  from Fox Security to do a little O'Reilly First Amendment  "enforcement." In March, he threatened just that and hung up on Mike from Orlando when he mentioned just the name of OReally's arch rival, MSNBC's Keith Olbermann's name on the The Radio Factor saying: "Mike is- he's a gone guy. You know, we have his- we have your phone numbers, by the way. So, if you're listening, Mike, we have your phone number, and we're going to turn it over to Fox security, and you'll be getting a little visit."

Michael Medved, (KTTH m-f, 12a-3p) seems to love the challenge of a good debater, and constantly calls for people who disagree with him on any given issue. He takes on his share of goofballs he can toy with and humiliate, providing entertainment for the large sociopathic segment of his audience who get off on listening to a Yale debater squish the deluded, the halt, and the lame.

The survey recommended talk hosts have a 7-second delay and not screen callers, as Schultz does not.

Talk radio is entertainment. Screening- producers and talk hosts will say- weed out callers who might bog down the procveeings- like the longwinded ones, the repetitious, the echoing choir, callers with frustrating foreign accents or speech impediments, the annoying slow talkers, the "er, uh, you know," types; or callers who might make the host sound stupid.

Don't know if the survey's recommendation would work for everyone, but there's no arguing the success in a short time Big Eddie around the country.

Comments

[Trip]

As if any of this is a surprise to anyone.

What's left to talk about with the right-wingers anyway? They've completely screwed the pooch on the whole "running the country" thing, they're utterly discredited, corrupt to the core, morally bankrupt and "wholly without merit".

Most Americans understand we're just running the clock down until we can vote in some real leadership, and take the keys away from them.

Why bother calling in to tell them they're full of shit?

Wait until November when you can really tell them how you feel, when it really matters.

[Dan]

PLEASE SAVE US !!! FROM THE SYIBLEHEAD RADIO SHOW CANT KIRO PUT BACK ON DR RUTH!!! SAVE FROM THE HEAVY BREATHING AND LIP TICKING SOUND SHE MAKES SAVE US FROM THE SYYBLHREAD!

[sparky]

so sorry your radio only gets one channel...

[sparky]

About a month ago I called Stephanie Miller on my way to work at about 6:30 am and I was on in less than a minute. My call was short..she only lets you talk about 30 seconds but it was fun. People who have a dissenting view are given more air time so the team can ask questions. Most of her early morning calls are just quips from listeners so maybe that makes a difference in how long you have to wait to get through. In the past I have called Dave Ross, who sounded like he was multitasking while I was talking, and once I called Erin but she preferred the sound of her OWN voice. I have also called Tom Hartmann and Mike Webb and both were very attentive and pleasant.
I only call if I have an unusual angle to something they are talking about..

[Michael B.]

The experiment itself is a worthwhile and interesting idea. However, there are so many factors other than the perspective of the caller that comes into play when a screener puts through a call.

At the very least the same person should have called each program twice, once as an agreeable caller, the second time as a disagreeing caller. This way we could ascertain if they were treated as they were because of their point of view or for some other reason (Format, topic, timing, entertainment value, number of calls received etc. etc.)

Is there anyone out there who designs experiments or scientific polling who could elaborate or offer feedback on this?

[Willis]

I used to be a producer/screener, and I know the show was better for it. To put it bluntly, talk radio attracts a lot of very weird (or should I say "eccentric"?) people - a lot of whom can't really express themselves in a timely, consice or clear manner - which makes for BAD radio (at its best), and Horrible radio (at its worst).

[David Tatelman]

I discovered a long time ago that when I called Dori Monson I would be put on hold and then somehow accidentally disconnected. I concluded that he uses his caller ID to block callers he doesn't like.

[Michael B.]

Michael Medved (770am 12-3) almost exclusively takes disagreeing calls and disagreeing guests.

[TomF]

I used to produce and screen for a national program. Two factors that often escape callers:

1. The show is not a democracy and is not subject to free speech rules. The show's producer is trying to build an organic information product in real time that will appeal to the show's core audience. (Sometimes this means keeping a good caller on hold for a long time, until they fit into show flow -- if you have a funny or sweet "kicker" question to end an hour with, for example. And sometimes the opportunity to air a waiting call doesn't arise at all, so the board is dumped at 59:30. Sorry about that. It's no conspiracy, though; it's producing. Think of the calls as spices around the stockpot. You'll use some heavily, some lightly, and decide against others.)

Some show formats thrive on debate, others on validating the host. Clearly Hannity's audience mostly agrees with him, so it does not want to hear callers picking fights with Hannity. They undoubtedly have research to support this. Other hosts pick fights for a living. The show is about the host and his "brand personality," and the calls are there to support it.

We used to get callers complain that we were "censoring" them by not allowing them on the public airwaves. They were advised to get their own stations.

2. Callers are evaluated on presentational quality. You may have a great point to make. But if you are long-winded, heavily accented or otherwise hard to understand, contentious to the point of being tiresome, likely to freeze in fear when you get on, or simply say "uhhhh" too often, you won't get on.

In my experience fewer than one in ten callers A) had a good question or comment, B) fit the show's format, and C) could speak quickly, clearly and well. We dinged the vast majority of callers who got through. Those we set up for air when time was tight, we often warned that if they started a third sentence they would be cut off. On my show we needed questions, not speeches.

If Stephanie Miller puts people on within 30 seconds, perhaps she doesn't have that many calls to pick from. I get the impression from listening to NY Vinnie on KIRO at 700p that nobody is calling in, because he either vamps painfully or rushes incoherent callers to air and keeps them on too long.

[sparky]

I have no idea how long people have to wait to get on to talk to Stephanie..this was 6:30 in the morning...still dark out.....
On most mornings, easily 20 people talk to her in the time that I listen..but they are short bits and are meant to add the "spice" to the comedy of the show.
I never confuse her with a serious issues show...

[Dana]

Listening to Dori rant about the cost of transportation etc. reminds me of the saying, He knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.

He is a truly ignorant person.

[Scrilla]

TomF--here! here!

Everyone who writes in this blog and does not work in the biz...reread TomF's comments above. Twice.
It's about compelling (entertaining) radio.

BlatherMikey: why don't YOU do this locally? Obviously unannounced. For whatever purpose it serves, it would at least separate the real producers from the..."screeners."
To be fair, I reccommend all on the same day.

[Blowhard]

It's a radio show! Your calls are "grist for the vocal mill" as Larry King used to say.

You are there to help them DO THE SHOW, i.e. entertain the audience to whatever end the hosts choses to use you.

[Dan]

great news for to night late night , For Kiro am 710 NO STYBLEHEAD RADIO ! Thanks Frank for the save !

[KS]

It's funny that the author mentions Olberface as Bill O'Reilly's chief rival, when O'Reilly never mentions his name, while Olber obsesses over him every time he is on. He seems desperate to get better ratings at the expense of mocking others, without promoting any positive ideas of his own which makes for boring TV in my opinion.

Medved is probably the best at taking on guests and callers with an opposing point of view. There are a number of things I disagree with him about. I have listened at one time or another the six that were rated (Hannity, Schultz, Limbaugh, Rhodes, Ingraham, and Miller) but not interested in hearing any of them, because they are either left-wing or right-wing kool aid drinkers and usually do not present pros and cons for both sides, just their side.

[merciful one]

While hardly professing that the following results are quantitative with the standard 95 percent confidence level or 5% margin for error which is standard within the scientific polling community,

ACTUALLY, he might be able to narrow this quantitative gap by trying the following:

A.) Use a different set of 10 callers (5 conservative, 5 liberal) & try the experiment again on the same hosts. If the results are the same (or close to the same), then the thesis - that conservatives block-out dissenting views & liberals do not - is made more quantitatively reliable.

B.) Use the same set of 10 callers on different hosts. Again, narrowing the quantitative gap of the thesis.

C.) Repeat A & B a few more times a piece. Further narrowing the gap.

Pass it on.

OH! I almost forgot:

D.) Just for shits-n-giggles EVERYONE should constantly call up O'Reilly and mention Olbermann. It wont narrow any results - I just want to hear more about this "FNC security force".

[Nate]

David Tatelman writes:
"Michael Medved (770am 12-3) almost exclusively takes disagreeing calls and disagreeing guests."

Yeah, and they're ALL total straw-people with straw-arguments. Since when has Lyndon LaRouche had a cohesive argument?

If the world were made-up of Medved callers/guests, I would be GOD

[Seabeck]

Occasionally, Tom Leykis (remember him?) would run an hour where he would not have any calls screened. What a hoot!

[TomF]

Sure, they're "straw people." Setting up callers with weak arguments is another way of validating the host, and therefore the audience who is inclined to support him.

I don't know if you ever listened to Tom Leykis when he aired in the Seattle market, but his call flow was screened very carefully and consisted of only two types: young (under 35) men who agreed with everything he said, and incoherent, airheaded women who hated him but expressed themselves so badly that they were dead easy for him to tear apart. (Which spectacle was a mainstay of the show, and made frustrated under-35 men very happy.) Leykis wouldn't last two minutes in a real Oxford Union style debate, but he was always noisily triumphant in his debates with stupid "straw women" callers.

It's all produced -- like pro wrestling, except one opponent doesn't know it's fixed.

[Andrew]

The ratings for those six shows probably rank in the reverse order.

It's possible that more liberals call those highly rated talk shows to complain and argue than conservative who just want to say "me too", and that they have to wait in a long line with other outraged liberals.

Think about this, are you more inspired to call in to a show when you agree with the host or when you think you know something that the host doesn't?

[Rodman]

Let us not forget the King of the No Screen -- Art Bell, soon to be broadcasting Coast to Coast from the high desert of the Philippines with his new young wife.

[joanie]

I know I'm not supposed to interject politics into this riveting discussion, but I'm going to! This is worth the read and it seems to be flying of under the radar.

U.S. Building Its Largest Embassy in Iraq"

Sorry B'M :)

[joanie]

Am listening to Mike Malloy on-line and he's hot tonight! With McClelland and Rove's departure, he's having his dessert! It is fun radio!

[sparky]

oooh i bet...Rove isnt really leaving but I know what you meant...
Stephanie Miller should be really good tomorrow morning!

[joanie]

I do understand about Rove . . . Malloy took McClelland to the cleaners!

Also, Sparky, you'll love this: Malloy keeps playing a clip where Bush is talking to a school and he's calling it a "maggot" school - means "magnet." I"m crackin' up!

[joanie]

"Transcript
President Bush's Remarks on Economic Competitiveness (Thanks to Parkland Magnet Middle School for having us)"

[sparky]

dear GOD I wish he would leave the schools alone...that was very painful to read.

Sorry I missed the "maggot schools" on Malloy last night. I was watching Oprah on South Park..

[Steve]

You folks keep talking about Tom Leykis in the past tense. Unfortunately he's back, ruining four hours every week night on KISW.

[sparky]

Oh you have just made PiR very happy....

[Andrew]

You can conveniently access the KIRO feed in Windows Media Player without having to mess with that crappy liquid audio web page or KIRO's crappy website by opening this url: mms://wmc1.liquidviewer.net/KIRO

[Andrew]

The neat thing about opening the stream in WMP is that in the playlist you can place a three or four minute song ahead of the KIRO stream, and when a commercial break begins you can start up that song and when it ends the KIRO stream starts back up and the commercials are over with.

[sparky]

yes, but, sometimes silence is golden, Andrew :-)

[Andrew]

Before I would mute it but then I'd forget to unmute it after two minutes. I'm genuinely interested but I'm also hard at work and I can't remember to do everything. I suppose you could have a two minute track of silence but I like music.

[Fremont]

That school transcript is one of the more pathetic things I've read from bushit! "The iPod, interestingly enough, was built on years of government- funded research in microdrive storage and electrochemistry and signal compression.

Isn't that interesting? I find it interesting." How in hell did the man who said "Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?" graduate from Yale?! Smoke and mirrors....

[Fremont]

Hey, thanks, &rew....especially the part about muting the wretched commercials...

[Andrew]

I have a reoccuring nightmare where McGruff the Crime Dog and and a Big Brother Big Sister of America are dropping a ten pound coffee cake on my foot.

[Andrew]

How about this, instead of a two minute silent track or song you drop in that clip of Dori getting tazered.

[joanie]

Someone called in to Mike Malloy and said the whole bit about the IPod isn't true. It was privately developed. He went into detail about which company and country did what but was very clear that there was no public money nor research invested.

I would guess that most stuff has some derivation in space-age technology. But, he was very clear that the IPod doesn't owe a thing to government-funded research.

[joanie]

I guess if you are rich enough, you can buy a degree from any prestigious college!:)

[Fremont]

"I guess if you are rich enough, you can buy a degree from any prestigious college!:)"
And there, in the proverbial nutshell, is the problem with ejikashun in the you ess aaa!

[Fremont]

Give it up, Sparks and Joans! You can't teach them anything that money can't buy! Your careers are useless...(except for the Toyota SUV, which I HAD to mention because it is so not green)

[Fremont]

&rew, Sparko and Joano are thinking about opening up a free clinic to assist people with "coffecakefoot", I hear.... (Another great line from &rew! I'm using your lines in my daily chores, BTW...just changing the author to "Fremont". Hope ya don't mind...)

[sparky]

it sounds icky, whatever it is

[Fremont]

"Someone called in to Mike Malloy and said the whole bit about the IPod isn't true."
TAKE IT BACK, JOANS, IT IS TRUE!!! Are you telling me that Bush lied??!!

[Eric t]

Greetings ignorant liberal fools! Where would one begin to attempt to enlighten such a sorry batch of uneducated idiots such as yourselves? How about English 101? Can you diagram a sentance and put it in the form of a intelligent thought? No? Oh I'm sorry, I should have started with an easier lesson for ignorant libs like you! Go ahead lead blog, rip me for what you percieve to be fallacies! You are the fallacy. God bless you and America! Lets nuke Iran. We need to show the world that we have the balls to use our weapons. Only then will they respect us! You unwilling are pussies and need to step aside. Otherwise, we will take you out with them.

[Andrew]

that guy typed "Where would one begin to attempt to enlighten [you]? How about English 101"

and yet also typed "Lets nuke Iran"

[joanie]

"I am the egghead. I am the commander. I am the decider."

I love it! Anybody know the chorus line?

[KS]

Eric T is well off the deep end. He would have got alot more mileage if he had stated Howard Dean
lied !!

On Iran - I agree with Thomas Friedman, sadly - who said that it would be better to not attempt to nuke Iran because of the demonstrated incompetence of the Defense Chief when it comes to conducting a military strike.

[joanie]

KS, I agree with Friedman as well on this but I'll never forgive Friedman for believing that this administration could conduct any war on the up and up. Friedman has danced around alll his previous pronouncements and his credibility isn't very high with me anymore.

[Moose]

Hey Eric...How about Spelling 101 for you...It isn't 'sentance', or 'percieve'..."i" before "e" except after "c"...go get your lunch from mommie and off to school with you..