How the hell does Michael Savage stay on the air?

[IndianaJones]

I just heard more racism on his show for about 15 minutes than I have heard on the radio my entire life.

[muntrv]

1. Millions of racists in the USA tuning in. The klan never went away.

[calimary]

2. Evidently he has enough of a following. And what does THAT say about

this country?

:scared:

[Captain Angry]

3. He is profitable.

That is the only reason anything is played on commercial air.

He brings in enough sponsorship money to keep the station profitable during his airtime.

Keep in mind, you are not the customer when you listen to the radio. You are the product. You are sold to his sponsors. That is why ratings are important. Higher ratings allow a station to charge its sponsors more per second.

Keith isn't on the air because he's good. He's on because enough of us watch that MSNBC won't replace him with "When pedophiles attack." Same with O'Reilly, same with Rush, Imus, etc.

[KharmaTrain]

15. Profitable? Not Quite

Savage is carried in most markets outside the "money" times...in the evening and overnight hours. I doubt that many of his affiliates are able to sell his show and that the ads you hear are mostly for what is termed "cleareance"...advertising placed as part of a larger network-wide buy and there were spots available during his airtime.

A couple years ago, a relative was hired to try to sell this show...she's one hell of a good salesperson (no scrupples) and didn't last at this gig more than 2 months...she said that she had to sell without them hearing the show or else they'd never take her call again.

Radio audiences during the evening...especially during TV prime time has all but vanished. Savage makes noise that gets attention, but he surely doesn't make money.

[Captain Angry]

16. My point was that his show brings in more revenue than it loses.

If they had something different that a sponsor would pay more for, it would be on the air.

I know people that listen to that show. When I get into their car and it's on, I ask politely if we can change the station. If no, then I roll the window down so I can feel the air (and drown out the sound of that radio.)

[ikojo]

21. I suspect his show is sold as part of a package

deal...if they take "show x" then they must also take "show y".

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. Not about ratings

but about agenda

[FiveGoodMen]

5. Agreed that the RW would bankroll a show just to catapult the propaganda, but...

If no one was tuning in, it wouldn't be worth it to them.

We have a lot of worthless motherfuckers in the US. There's just no getting around that fact.

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. right, but it has nevre been about ratings

never.

It is about propaganda and the big lie

Savage just happens to be one more in the continuum of folks that if the market had a role, as in a real role, would not be on the air or his presence woudl be severely curtailed

Why you will see more and more progressive stations flipped to sports

[FiveGoodMen]

14. I think we're agreeing.

My sub-point is just that propaganda wouldn't work without a receptive audience. If a racial slur falls in the forrest...

[judaspriestess]

6. michael Wiener

why doesn't he just go by his real last name?

[rockymountaindem]

7. Because he's a self-hating Jew

I'm sure everybody here already knows that, but I just felt like saying it. If I ever :scared: see him in person I'll be sure to bring it up.

[muntrv]

9. Sounds like David Horowitz.

[Virginia Dare]

Or that POS on Fox...his fake name escapes me right now..n/t

[tabasco]

20. Also Leslie "Wolf" Blitzer.

Why are they ashamed of their names?

[ben_meyers]

22. Or Randi Bueten

What's the deal with that?

[tabasco]

27. Or Jeff Christie?

Well, we know the reason for that name change. "Rush" was trying to cover up his homosexuality.

http://pssht.com/biography/rush_limbaugh.html

[Virginia Dare]

10. delete..n/t

[Melynn]

23. Because he is a liberal who is playing a right winger on the radio

Or so one of the theories about Mr. Wiener goes. I don't know if I believe that or not. He seems pretty extreme.

[BellaB]

11. For several reasons

1 is he brings in money and advertisers to the parent corporation.

2nd is this country has that thing called free speech. Along with that right is another right: the right NOT to listen.

I practice that right all the time. If I hear something stupid, or that riles me up and there is realistically not much I can do, I either walk away, turn the channel, or simply turn it off. I hate to say it but all of the boycots I have read about on here have done very little to change anything. In theory they are a great thing, but like many things in life, theory does NOT equal real life.

[Dukkha]

12. because the Fairness Doctrine was repealed

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1638662,00.html

When Senator James Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican, told a radio host last week that he had overheard Senators Hillary Clinton and Barbara Boxer discussing a "legislative fix" for the dominance of conservatives in talk radio, the reaction on the right was predictably shrill. Here were hated enemies of conservatives plotting to silence their powerful voices.

[tiptoe]

13. Perhaps some sponsors are racist, anti-public, pro-privatization, pro-outsourcing to non-Americans?

* HAS to open up "global markets", since the American people are being "sold out as laborers" and thus "turned off" as consumers and markets for the privatizing "globally-focused" "American" corporate interests he serves, and * HAS to resort to subverting democracy and obviating the public will via election fraud: ...via American-VOTER suppression, American-VOTER disenfranchisement and via riggable electronic voting equipment.

* says "Blackwater protects people." By "people" * means private, corporate employees and interests, NOT the American PUBLIC, whose democracy he's defiled, and NOT the Iraqi PUBLIC, whose democracy he's willing-to-defile via privatization.

Election fraud by the parties currently in power makes sense for the corporate interests they serve, not for the interests of American public. The unaccountable BILLIONS stolen via (illegal-)war-profiteering, and via corruption in Iraq -- billions which now sponsors the insurgency there, along with "looted" explosives bunkers (courtesy Rumsfeld), an under-sized, "lean American military" (courtesy Rumsfeld) which prolongs the war-fraud and necessitates/enables an unaccountable Blackwater, and a disbanded/disarmed Iraqi army now-become insurgents (courtesy Bremer)...and, at home, via the likes of "governor" Arnold Sh*tzenegger's complicity with Ken Lay to STEAL $9Billion from Californians during its (Pete-Wilson-"de-regulated") gamed "energy crisis", paralleled by his complicity in subverting California democracy through RE-certification of electronic "voting" machines that democratic Secretary of State Kevin Shelley had previously DE-certified for use in four CA counties.

[Tonight: "Hello...this is COMCAST. Comcast would like you to know, if you would like to continue to receive the California channel after October 18, you will have to setup a digital receiver..." (Last week it was "If you would like to continue to receive the TV Guide channel after October 9, you will have to set up a digital receiver...") The Neocon "whirlwind" forges on: Digital cable now being "shoved down the throats" of Americans? Why do I suspect a future avenue of "electronic voting" fraud to be via two-way digital TV, with "privatized democracy" (oxymoron?) being overseen by the cable company?]

"How the hell does Michael Savage stay on the air?"

Billions of $ floating around for propagandizing.

[Mz Pip]

17. San Francisco values

:sarcasm:

Don't hear Orally mention Savage when he rants about the wackos in good old San Francisco.

Mz Pip
:dem:

[GrpCaptMandrake]

19. No, but the SavageWeiner

does call Falafel Boy "The Leprechaun."

[bullwinkle428]

25. That mental image is just screaming for a Photoshop job!

"They're always after me traditional values!"

[GrpCaptMandrake]

28. Somebody call SwampRat! n/t

[UTUSN]

18. K&R #2 for "good question"!!1 n/t

[Xenotime]

24. All the more reason for the legislative fix

[ben_meyers]

29. You mean like repealing the 1st amendment

and letting the government decide who gets to speak? Which agency will you put in charge of that?

[neutron]

26. I could see this country

morphing into a Nazi Germany in a flash.
Mainly because the lowest common denominator are TV droids
who actually make voting decisions based on TV commercials.