Jay Severin will return to the WTTK airwaves Tuesday.
"He understands that we will not accept this type of commentary on our airwaves in the future. Based on this understanding, we have agreed to conclude Jay's suspension and he will return."
(photo: more rodential than consequential)
The weasel-toothed Boston Republican was suspended after he tried to salvage his flagging radio ratings by turning up the slime against Latinos: calling Mexican immigrants "criminaliens," "the lowest of primitives," "leeches," "women with mustaches and VD.'' During the swine flu scare, he called emergency rooms ''condos for Mexicans.''
Severin clearly went after publicity and listeners by invoking race-fear, and hatred of Latinos using swine flu to escalate panic and his own public profile.
(The first quarter's ratings from personal meters, (PPM's) show that Severin dropped to 14th place with a 3.6 share among the 25-54-year-old listeners. WRKO's Howie Carr, another conservative, was sixth with a 5.2.)
Dittohead audiences love hosts who dare mouth the trash talk they themselves have neither the courage nor the imagination to utter themselves.
As your "radio ethicist," we have noted:
With a liberal new president who's also black, this tactical race-baiting has become more popular than ever.
WTTK hoping the schmutz will fade, and they'll be able to get him back on the air and squeeze more work out of him and his bloated 7-year contract.
We received from a pissed-off advertiser on the ethically-challenged WTKK. After we and others posted their contact info, Tina Varinos didn't like hearing from citizens who connected her dental office with the mouthy, right-wing, scrotumnal meat puppet who is the signature talent on the station.
We answered that when you get down in the wallow with the pigs, you might get some on you.
In a Boston Globe story, an advertiser described their dilemma:
"The same power that makes Severin a good salesman cuts the other way," he said. "The association is favorable when such talk show hosts are popular, but there's a potential negative when they make inappropriate comments.
WTTK apparently re-instated Severin after getting a promise of some sort of humble posturing, and were able to re-assure advertisers he couldn't make them any more famous.
where do you get those pictures, Mike? The man truly looks like a rat.
Posted by: Sarge | May 30, 2009 at 06:00 PM
poor jay - don't know if he would have, but if he wanted to jump on the "sotomayor's a racist" bandwagon, he might find himself muzzled...
those in favor of having extremists hang themselves out to dry don't them to be muzzled - let them expose themselves.
Go, Jay, Go!
(again, don't know for sure what his position would be, but it's a fair guess, don'tcha think?)
Posted by: TJ | May 30, 2009 at 08:30 PM
Another mouthpiece for the Repugs bsck in place. He has assured himself a permanent spot in the panoply of name callers and nay-sayers to the most popular president since Reagan. Give him a week, and he'll be calling Sotomayor "a bean-eating hag with a mustache" as Neal Boortz did last week.
When will he appear on O'Reilly of Glen Beck as a victim of the vicious tactics of the far-left media?
Posted by: Mark C. | May 31, 2009 at 11:22 AM
Extremists flock to propaganda and listen to BS from these BSrs. I don't listen to them. Neither do most Americans.
Thank god.
But these people can generate extreme behavior from the extremists that listen. So, they are dangerous. Example? The recent murder in Kansas of the late-term abortion doctor. Another? Timothy McVeigh.
Extremism = violence.
Heard Megan McCain last week. She's the future of the Republican Party - if it has a future.
Posted by: joanie | May 31, 2009 at 07:45 PM
two words: Robert Byrd.
Posted by: woody held | June 01, 2009 at 03:35 AM
Two words: ancient history.
Posted by: joanie | June 01, 2009 at 07:30 AM
hee hee I like the comeback.
Posted by: Coiler | June 01, 2009 at 09:00 AM