Brian jennings' talk radio book is less than some of its parts

 It's an inconsequential book. There's no new information, and it neither asks new questions; nor anything of its readers. (Plus, there are no pictures,  always a disappointment in a geezerly book about radio).

It's Censorship, The Threat to Silence Talk Radio by Brian Jennings and we waited until we could get it new at Amazon for $5.52. (Advice: don't pay retail for this dog!)

If it was so bad, why did we buy it, and read it? As always so you wouldn't have to, but also because Jennings has got himself on talk shows all over the country giving him and his book way more attention and credibility than they deserve. 

Jennings, 63, is a programmer and consultant whose radio career has spanned decades; there's no doubt he's heading for the barn. But before he settles into the slowed-down movement of stool softeners and the regaling of the young about The Glorious Land of Usta, (there's plenty of that, here) he's written that book he's always wanted to write.

The difference between Brian Jennings and the rest of us who'd like to write a book nightcapping our lives and thanking everybody involved is that Brian Jennings got his published by a real publisher. This  despite he's

a) unknown outside the radio miniverse (and a bit of a has-been at that)

b) there's no new information in his book!

Censorship is a poorly-edited collection of moldy conservative talk radio talking points drably written. It would, if written by a liberal, be self-published, but right-wing publishing has, er,  different standards than does the rest of publishing...

Granted, Jennings has left a mark on radio that's bigger than the average radio moke's. He's credited with inventing the all-conservative AM radio format, (at Seattle's KVI) and for discovering such radio talent as  Michael Reagan, Alan Colmes, Floyd Brown, Lars Larson, "Bra-strap" Bill Cooter, John Carlson, Kirby Wilbur, Juan "Lumpy" Impetigo, and Dori Monson.

(photo: Brian Jennings)

Censorship is the world according to Rush and Sean, Glenn and Laura. You know: liberals, despite America is "a center-right nation, and that they're loopy, stupid, and morally craven, control everything. They want to appease the terrorists (read Moslems); tear down the borders and turn all the child molesters loose. They hate freedom, Christianity, and free markets.

The only thing between America and utter chaos is talk radio which they're trying to shut down.

They own the rest of media including the networks, newspapers, the Internet, CNN, NPR and are (angrily, desperately) trying to "muzzle" talk radio using back-door tactics and tyrannical government agencies like the FCC to quash all free speech except pornography which they want to put in your neighborhood library.

Libs hope to achieve this through the re-adoption of the "Fairness Doctrine," a long-outdated FCC regulation that was dropped in the 1980's.

Jennings sets up the straw man and ploddingly knocks it down over and over. No matter that no one with any power or influence on the left favors reinstating it or has made any serious effort to do so. The Fairness Doctrine as an issue was trotted out by Rush in the 2008 election as an anti-Obama scare tactic and to let talk hosts led to claim First Amendment martyrdom. It had blown over by the time this book was released, yet Jennings is still getting on the air, and speaking at conservative confabs.

Jennings doesn't have to press his case with fancy arguments or literary flourishes, he knows to whom he's preaching, and what they want to hear. He got interviews from Larson, Reagan, John Carlson, Colmes, and Michael Medved; the rest of the research is in (email) "statements," the google, and Wikipedia.

So how does this guy nobody's ever heard of, typing Rush Limbaugh's lines from 1998, get a book deal?

First, the book was published by Threshold Editions, Simon & Schuster's conservative imprint of which former Republican operative Mary Matalin is chief editor. They publish Hannity, Glennn Beck, Karl Rove, Dick Cheney and such books as The Obama Nation, Jerome Corsi's attempt to smear Obama in 2008. He's the guy paid by Republican operatives to write the swift-boat book so devastating to John Kerry in 2004 (Threshold is owned, btw, by CBS).

(Ever wonder why some right-wing books shoot to the top of the NYT bestseller lists so quickly? It's because activist groups- conservative book clubs, institutes, think-tanks,  Republican Party divisions buy-up conservative books usually published by Threshold) by the case, and hand them out for free, send them to the troops, or just stack them in a corner. Corsi's book was a much-discredited, partisan hatchet job, like many on both sides of the political spectrum, but by strategic bulk-buying it onto the best-seller list, the right created the perception that it was credible, and got Corsi access to mainstream media. It worked in the 2004 election, inot so much in 2008. Bulk sales account for the sales successes of such authors as  Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter, Laura Ingraham, Glenn Beck, Newt
Gingrich, Sean Hannity, Dick Morris, and others)

Censorship's marketability was judged not by its content but by the slobbering name-dropping and endorsements of name-brand conservative talk hosts. Sean Hannity wrote the introduction; there are jacket blurbs by Rush, Mark Levin, Michael Reagan, Alan Colmes, and Lars Larson.

The book is riddled with call-letters, names and quotes by local station managers, and program directors. It's filled with name-mentioned industry network poobahs, talk hosts, and producers: not to mention radio-insider pundits like Michael Harrison of Talkers magazine, and NTS's Al Peterson. 

Yes, larding the text with tedious name-dropping ensures that the book will be boring, but also that Jennings will get on the radio all over the country! In this, his last professional gasp, Jennings calls in the chips he's had out all these years. He appeared on Rush and Hannity, Dori Monson, Alan Colmes, and many, many others.

Unfortunately, it doesn't look like Jennings book was bought in bulk by anyone --nor did his many pimp-out appearances sell the book. It's rankings are so low they don't show up on any sales rankings.  The Amazon selling price sank down to single digits within a month or two.

Comments

[Corporate Suit]

Brian Jennings has chunks of guys bigger than you in his stool.

[sparky]

Is that a compliment?
I need to go look for brain floss now.

[jesuschrysler]

Corporatized Suit- Obama's stimulus plan is providing good paying jobs with benefits. There's no better time than now for you to move on to a better career, and give up the shitty job of examining Brian Jennings poo.

[joanie]

He probably got published because the pickings are pretty lean out there right now for anything conservative. The bloom is off the rose as they say. Publishers like Regnery are probably willing to try anything.

The only people buying conservativism anymore are the 5 million watchers/listeners to Fixed News and most of them have never seen the inside of a book store. If Rush, Hannity or Billo didn't say it, it didn't happen.

[Mark C.]

Corporate Suit, that is the kind of incisive debate points I'd expect from a scared old suit in a dying industry. Have anything to offer to counter what Michael put his name on to say? I thought not. You probably used to blow Jennings when he worked in Seattle. Booklines says book has sold 331 copies... that's pretty sad. Probably half of those were promotional.

[M.Steele]

Is this the thinking that will take down the papers? To take on the roll of ideological foil will marginalize you. Is that what news stations desire? When I tried to find a station in South Carolina recently for local opinion I came across stations with syndicated shows. When I came across one station with a local voice, there were a myriad of ideas.

[Pacobelle]

"Brian Jennings has chunks of guys bigger than you in his stool."

Yeah, and those chunks of stool all appear in his book!

[pranked]

while Brian Jennings was wowing the oldsters at the Radio Reunion Club with tales of his triumphs in the 90's, AM radio programming passed away and was survived only by a heavy spot load. Not enough people knew about AM to have a funeral.

[Corporate Suit]

I never worked for Brian Jennings, but yes there was a time when I might have performed that act if asked by The Great Man. Others were, and they did, I'm sure. They were the lucky ones.
Brian Jennings is simply one of the greats in radio. I have never understood why he has not been nominated for the Radio Hall of Fame. Hood doesn't qualify to pick through his stool, much less his life's work.

[mrogi]

Limbaugh, Hannity, Savage, O'Reilly, Beck, Levin, and Coulter enjoy a combined radio & TV audience of 60 million plus 15 New York Times # 1 Bestsellers. Conservative is alive & well & doing booming business.

[joanie]

Sure you're not counting some of these people twice, Einstein?

[Drew]

The republican party is on the skids, but the people who are fighting to be the Supreme Voice of The Party are gaining popularity? Geeeez Mr Ogi, by next week, you'll be counting illegal aliens (how ironic is that), the unborn, bacteria, and these guys

[Drew]

Hey, I'm really sorry...that photo of Bill-O at an awards banquet given by the Fraternal Underworld of Conservative Kranks slipped in there.

[Drew]

Ann Coulter, eh? We know she's not on tv, so I checked to see where she was on ray-dee-oh, and it appears that Mr O-Gee threw her in to make his number of mentally deranged talkers look like a real bunch of gangsters. And why is this purveyor of hate and fear NOT doing her own screech-a-thon? Maybe because she doesn't know the first thing about radio. For those of you who need the reminder (Mr. O-Gee, I'm sorry, but you really do), here's Adam Corolla taking her to school

[Queens Hunter]

Corolla-a real gentleman in the liberal sense.

[Drew]

Coulter- a real gentleman. Well, more in the "man" sense.

[Drew]

You can tell a lot about a book by the person who does the "forward"- and who better an expert on censorship than Sean Hannity? If he can't shout over his liberal guests, he just has their mics turned off.

[blech]

Mrogi always used to write in that KIRO was the number one station in the market, too.

The bulk sales bit ain't something Bl'am made up. You can spot them on the NYT bestseller list because they have an * after the title.

[Van Ronk]

I read recently that the problems Ann Coulter's last book had with sales was because the conservative groups who do the bulk book buys are mad at her for some of the things she has said in the last year or so. Some say they felt they needed to put distance between them and her. Others say she is being punished. Whichever her book is selling like ice in Alaska.

[woody held]

BJ's fears about the fairness doctrine are way overblown. After all it is just a few minor, unimportant politicians such as Nancy Pelosi, Dianne Feinstein, Chucky Schumer, and Dick 'Senator Turban' Durbin who have expressed strong support for it.

Gimme a break, none of those people have any juice, the Fairness Doctrine is going nowhere.

[Mark C.]

Talk radio, Rush especially, is playing directly into the hands of Obama and the Democrats. Why would they want them out of the way?

[joanie]

Missing Ryder. Where are you, Ryder? Doing okay?

Fairness Doctrine? Why should radio have a level playing field? That's not how rethuglicans operate. If they don't fix the game, they never win.

[sparky]

I checked out this book over on Amazon...among the people who wrote glowing reports of it include Rush, Lars Larson ( barf) and Mark Levin.

The one person who gave it an unfavorable review was subsequently flamed by other reviewers. About what I expected. Free speech is fine as long as it is THEIR free speech. Anyone who disagrees must be slapped down.

[Drew]

Republicans and their conservative enablers don't fight for anyone's free speech but their own. Their idea of "free spech" is where they are the only ones doing the talking. Another group tried this in the 1930s and almost got away with it.

[sparky]

Ok, now I know who Brian May is...I didnt know his name, just knew him as the guy who YELLED in his commercials.

[KS]

There is well-founded paranoia purveyed in the book by Jennings. This will come to pass - there is the 1st Amendment that liberal progressives believe doesn't apply to opinions other than theirs.

The Demothug party is going taking the highway to hell, if they keep trying to pass worthless pieces of shit legislation like the Climate Bill and public plan Health Care Reform and the capper - Amnesty for illegal aliens. OK, sorry that I diverted you from lamenting the death of Michael Jackson.

I lament the death of Billy Mays - who liked to yell his endorsements, he was a good promoter and will miss him promoting his products which are good.

Obama is choosing to run DC Chicago gangsta style, ripe with corruption. That is getting old pretty quick. I sense that some of you are getting fed up with it, but won't admit it.

[KS]

"Corolla-a real gentleman in the liberal sense."

Maybe so, but Coulter needed to be put in her place maybe not quite as harshly as he did. When she pulls stuff like that, she gives conservatives a bad name.

[Phil]

Nobody read this book except the talk radio hosts that Jennings mentions. Nobody has reviewed this book except Hood. Jennings has something to hold in his hand has he pitches his consulting business, and promotes his legacy.

[KS]

Gangsta Government - Change that you can count on from PrezBO.

[Coiler]

Gangsta-Is that the best a white guy can come up with?

[joanie]

What is the problem with klueless? Is he in therapy? If he isn't, he ought to be.

[woody held]

The problem is that he is way too intelligent for the rest of you. Conservatives might get 'therapy' for a bad knee or bad back. When it comes to mental issues, we solve them and move on. We do not need some quack telling us how to think. Only liberals need that.

The good thing about Obama's rush to socialism is that the effects will be noticable by 2012. Within 6 months he as already nationalized the auto industry, blew almost a billion on a scamulus package that was supposed to have kept unemployment from climbing past 8 percent, and in July will attempt to nationalize the health care industry. There is every chance that by 2012 Americans will have decided that they have already had enough.

[woody held]

oops should have been 'almost a trillion' not billion.

[sparky]

I guess if you keep telling yourself that over and over, it makes you feel better....

[KS]

You lib progs are a bunch of ridiculous sheeple. You think you are expert at defending the indefensible, but you are too laughable to comment further - you too Sparky.

[sparky]

"but you are too laughable to comment further - "

You know, if joanie had said that, immediately there would have been blowback from you guys that she was "running away" from an argument.

Interesting....

Chucks laid it all out for you earlier, KS. We disagree. This is a liberal blog, and yet, over and over, some of you are outraged that we would take a liberal point of view. Why is that?

[KS]

Not running away from an argument, just getting tired of y'all not directly answering questions/ charges and obfuscating (changing and confusing the topic). As for this blog being predominantly liberal - that's only you - anyone can comment. I get the idea that you'd like to see fewer non- liberal progressives.

We'd be glad to engage you in civil debate if you would not level bogus or irrelevant claims. Otherwise, we'll go on putting the rest of the story (truth) out there, refuting your claims, etc. in the attempt to straighten out your twisted minds - it's fun for some of us - like mental jujitsu. Woody seems also to like this approach.

[M.Steele]

“mental jujitsu” KS? The visual of the one legged man in an ass kicking contest just flashed before me.

[joanie]

we solve them and move on

Then tell him to solve it and move on.

[woody held]

"I guess if you keep telling yourself that over and over, it makes you feel better....
"

It has nothing to do with making me feel better. It does not make me feel better to see the country going to hell.

The Obama admin said in January that passage of the 'stimulus' would mean that unemployment would go no higher than 8 percent. It is now at 9.5 percent and still rising.

It especially does not make me feel good knowing that my job could be one of the ones killed off by Obamanomics. Barely a day goes by that there are not worried discussions in the lunch room at the plant where I work.

[sparky]

Yes the crappy economy is ALL Obama's fault. He should have been able to take over in January, snap his fingers and POOF! everything should have been perfect. Because it isn't he is such a loser, a sham, a faker, and boy oh boy, come 2012, the American public will come to their senses and return the glorious Republican Party to its rightful throne.

Yeah, right.

For almost 8 years, we sent billions to Iraq every month. Where was your outrage then? What have we gotten for the trillion we have dropped over there, besides a bunch of dead kids, a shitty economy, and an even shittier reputation around the world, just when we could use a little help? But that doesn't matter because Obama won in November by a HUGE margin and you guys no longer get to call the shots.

Obama has a bigger mess on his hands than he realized. Yes, that was naive on his part. But your side provides no other answers--it just wants to make sure that Obama is not successful, even if that means you lose your job in the process. That will show HIM, huh!?

KS is correct, I am frustrated at Obama for continually holding out his hand to offer bi-partisanship. The Republicans in Congress and the Senate keep slapping it away, stomping their feet and whining like 5 year olds that they aren't getting their way. It is pathetic.

[FluffyLove]

Man this blog is not the same since the days of mercifurius and duffman.

[Tony]

MSNBC.COM: BREAKING NEWS: Minnesota Supreme Court paves way for Democrat Al Franken to take Senate seat

[KS]

"I am frustrated at Obama for continually holding out his hand to offer bi-partisanship. The Republicans in Congress and the Senate keep slapping it away, stomping their feet and whining like 5 year olds that they aren't getting their way. It is pathetic."

False. You are parroting the left-wing talkers like Rhodes, Malloy, Olberfurher and the liberal progressive blogs. You are lazy for not researching further, but doubt if you care as you are a hyperpartisan. Obama doesn't give a rats a$$ these bills are bipartisan or not. He says one thing and his actions have indicated the opposite. If he did, he would not have signed the Stimulus, as no GOP's in the House voted for it and only 2 in the Senate.

The true story is that Pelosi is negotiating these bills (ie Stimulus, Budget and Climate Bills)behind closed doors and excluding Republicans and only limited participation by the GOP in the Senate. The GOP has come up with alternative plans for each of these and many have been voted down in committee or in the full house or senate. GOP has tried to insert amendments (that would have made legislation more bipartisan) but they were voted down by the Dem majority. Y'all keep distorting and taking this blog down in the sewer.

[Coiler]

how many pages were in the "alternative plan"? Were they all blank?

[M.Steele]

The President’s endeavor is to marginalize the Republicans. Notice how he took on Rush at the very beginning, it was his strategy all along to paint the republicans as far right blowhards. Although, this is no far left cabal, it is a well thought out strategy to secure the votes from the middle. By holding out his hand in the name of bi-partisanship, and the Republicans smacking it away, the republicans move further to the right. The further to the right the republicans seem, the more visible the real powerbrokers become. These middling’s are the red state or conservative Democrats. Once these Democrats are drawn out, which I believe is occurring at this time, he can cleave them from the ranks of the party of no. And when he does that he can some very contentious bills passed.

[sparky]

I dont listen to Randi. Those alternative plans you brag about were promoted by Senator Boner and there were no details...just a proclimation that we should go back to doing what Bush did. Yeah, that worked. The "details" are to come "later." They have no plan, other than to try to make such a mess of things that perhaps the voters could be fooled into thinking that they should have stuck with the Republicans. The last election should have put that notion to rest.

[Tony]

GOP leaders complain that the phone calls and White House invitations have slacked off — perhaps because Obama’s early efforts to woo Republicans yielded few votes.

"I think that in the beginning they seemed a lot more willing to go in and engage with us," said House Minority Whip Eric Cantor.

Gee Eric, I wonder why he's not paying ya'll as much attention anymore. . .

Could it be your obstructionist ways? Could it be the way he watered down his stimulus package and all he got was 2 Republican votes, both of which were in the Senate? Could it be the way you all are dogging his Supreme Court nominee, even when you know she's going to pass anyway? Could it be your whining about EVERY LITTLE THING he does without offering any REAL solutions? President Obama is a busy man and he has many people tugging on his coat reminding him what he promised them he'd do. He doesn't have the TIME (nor probably a desire) to play games with you crybabies anymore.

Indeed, look at the games you guys are playing with health care, trying to take out a public option when even REPUBLICAN constituents favor it?
Rather than be part of bipartisan solutions, Congressional Republicans have been content to sit on the sidelines saying no and whining. Polling shows the American people are tired of the Republican Party of No banking on failure instead of working with President Obama and Congressional Democrats to move our country forward.

[sparky]

What a pathetic state this Repub party is in. The Vanity Fair story today about Sarah P. has the McCain campaign describing her as the "little shop of horrors" and "diva" and "whack job" and as having a casual relation with the truth, among other disasters. And Sanford is the unbelievable gift that keeps on giving. He keeps digging himself a deeper hole. He gives this rambling interview with the AP where he says Argentina Maria is his soulmate, that it's a love story, but that he will try to fall back in love with his wife!! She needs to dump him.

And then he describes his additional transgressions as happening when he was out of the country with the boys to "blow off steam". I would bet that's not all that was blown. The S.C. atty. gen. is now investigating these new revelations.
A caller to Thom Hartmann this morning said " I don't care who my politicians are screwing, as long as it isn't me."

Love that.

[KS]

Palin, Sanford and Ensign are pinatas from the GOP for stepping in it. Dodd, Pelosi, Boxer, Reid and Waxman are likewise for the Dems out of sheer contempt. Looks like reality after the honeymoon is starting to sink in - read on.

(Source: Drudge Report)

The latest Rasmussen daily tracking poll shows that President Barack Obama for the first time has a negative approval index — more Americans disapprove of his job performance than approve.

Rasmussen is founder and CEO of Rasmussen Reports and co-founder of the sports network ESPN. He has been an independent public opinion pollster for over a decade, and his reports are cited by most major news organization.

"The raw numbers of pretty straightforward — 31 percent of Americans strongly approve of the way Barack Obama is handling his job, 33 percent strongly disapprove," Rasmussen said.

"Before the last week we never had a circumstance where the number who disapprove outweigh the number who approve. So we're in new territory. Right now the approval index at minus two is as low as it's been.

"What we've seen in the last month is a growing number of people who strongly disapprove, and we're seeing it at a time when the president's honeymoon is coming to an end and people are beginning to look at the policies that he's promoting."

The closeness of the approve/disapprove numbers are "yet another indicator of how evenly divided our nation is," he added.

On specific issues, Rasmussen disclosed:

"When we talk about healthcare reform and the proposal the president is talking about, the country is fairly evenly divided. But those who have strong opinions tend to oppose the plan more than support it.

"On the cap and trade legislation [to reduce carbon emissions], 42 percent believe it's going to hurt the economy. Only 19 percent believe it's going to help.

"The takeover of General Motors is strongly opposed.

"Right now those things are weighing the president down. What's going to tell over the next year is how the economy performs. If a year from today, GM is doing great and throwing off profits and getting the taxpayers their money back, people will say we were wrong, the president was right, and it's great for him. But if GM is back asking for more bailouts, the president's numbers will be substantially weaker than they are today…

"If the economy responds negatively over the next year, it is going to hurt the Democrats in 2010.

"What the passage of legislation will actually do is bring ownership of the economy and economic performance more and more into Barack Obama's camp.

"Just over a month ago, 62 percent of Americans said that no matter what's happened in the last six months, George Bush is still more to blame for the economic mess than Barack Obama. That number fell to 54 percent, and the more of Obama's policies that are put in place, the more the blame or perhaps the credit will shift to the current president."

Rasmussen also found:

The country is evenly split between those who approve of the way Obama has responded to the disputed elections in Iran and the repression of demonstrations that followed, and those who disapprove and believe he has not been aggressive enough.

More Americans strongly oppose Obama's healthcare plan than strongly support it.

About 30 percent of Americans favor a single-payer healthcare system, but a majority will oppose it.

"Americans like the idea of healthcare reform in theory, in the abstract," Rasmussen said.