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Politics : Impeach George W. Bush -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (41500)	8/24/2005 12:14:21 PM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93284

Air America's gradual descent is curiously out of sight Web Posted: 08/24/2005 12:00 AM CDT San Antonio Express-News The way the media celebrated the creation of Air America last year, you might have thought it was the radio equivalent of the discovery of penicillin. During the spring of 2004, you would have been hard pressed not to read or hear about the achievement. "The kingdom of right-wing talk radio now has a band of left-wing insurrectionists in its bosom," wrote Time magazine's Richard Corliss. Air America's ubiquitous spokesman, comedian Al Franken, promised to take the fight against President Bush and a conservative-dominated media to America's airwaves. Newsweek hailed Franken as "The Democrats' Top Gun," beneath a photo parodying Bush's appearance aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln. This was technological sliced bread. Liberals and talk radio — who would have thought of it, other than listeners of National Public Radio? But Air America's fight hasn't gone so well. Several Air America founding executives bailed out of the enterprise, including its founding chairman, Evan M. Cohen. Multicultural Radio Broadcasting, a radio station owner and former Air America business partner, yanked the network's programming from Chicago and Los Angeles over a financial dispute. Lizz Winstead, a former Air America morning show host, sued the network for nearly $300,000 in back pay. Despite some initial success, ratings have been underwhelming, even with an unpopular president who makes an inviting target and an unpopular war generating political discontent. In the fall of 2004, in Air America's home market of New York City and with the presidential election inflaming liberal passions, Franken's show trailed his on-air nemesis Rush Limbaugh by a substantial margin. Since then, the ratings picture has gotten worse. Air America supporters have their explanations. Some are entirely reasonable — building a radio network from scratch is bound to entail pitfalls. Some demonstrate a disturbing arrogance — ratings don't matter because Air America listeners are too sophisticated for plebeian radio, choosing webcasts and podcasts instead. But Air America and its minions are having a much tougher time explaining how the network pocketed $875,000 intended for poor kids and Alzheimer's sufferers in the Bronx. That revelation stems from an audit by New York City's Department of Investigation into the Gloria Wise Boys and Girls Club. The city determined the organization to be a "non-responsible" agency and suspended funding. Why "non-responsible?" As the New York Sun reports, the agency is accused of making "inappropriate transactions" beginning in early 2004, including the transfer of said $875,000 to Progress Media, the former parent company of Air America, and its chairman, Cohen, who also happened to be a board member of the Gloria Wise Boys and Girls Club. Air America's defense is, in effect, "It wasn't us." When Cohen bailed out of Air America in May 2004, a new ownership group took over the network. "The current owners of Air America Radio have no obligation to Progress Media's business activities," reads the network's official statement. Multicultural Radio Broadcasting, Air America's former business partner, thinks otherwise. It has filed suit against the new ownership, claiming the transfer of assets in May 2004 was merely a sham to deceive creditors. Unlike the personal foibles of Bill Bennett, Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly, and in contrast to Air America's celebrated start, the network's financial impropriety has received scant attention in the mainstream media. A handful of bloggers, led by syndicated columnist Michelle Malkin, have put the issue in the public eye. Conservatives, however, have just as keen a sense of irony as liberals. If conservative moralizers deserve their comeuppance, why shouldn't the Enron-like scandal of liberal do-gooders taking money away from needy minority kids and old folks merit equal treatment? Perhaps because the American media are not so dominated by conservatives as Air America's promoters suggest.