> John Adams wrote:
>
>> On Tuesday, November 18, 2003, at 07:25 PM, Chuck0 wrote:
>>> How much money is being wasted on syndicated programming like Gary
>>> Null's worthless show?
>> Wrong question--ask this instead: How much are they making by running
>> it? There's almost certainly fundraising going on around it, and it's
>> almost certainly pulling in more than is going out.
>
> That's a very valid point, but what about the intangible number of
> people who get turned off from a Pacifica station because of crap like
> Gary Null?
Yeah, what about them? It would have been much, much smarter to do the deal to sell the commercial frequencies and buy educational slots, move WBAI and KPFK down the dial, and use the extra money replacing Gary Null. (I mean, he's right-wing talk radio fodder in Arkansaw--are people really that backward in the Big City?)
> I know that there have to be people who stop listening to Pacifica
> stations because they don't like this program or that program.
I fielded one particularly horrendous call to KPFT during the early 2001 fundraising drive from someone who loved the music but hated the "faggots". I was very nice to him, hung up, and threw something against the wall. The morning host at the time said of me that I "killed 'em with kindness"--I liked that.
> The other ironic thing about my late adoption of Pacifica stations in
> my listening habits is that one of my good friends helped spearhead
> the Save Pacifica campaign.
You know, I have very mixed feelings about that campaign.
I was very much on the edges at KPFT, but I'd read all the Save Pacific stuff before moving to Houston and, when I got there, I did not see what I was led to believe I'd see. Much of the complaining that I read in the little tabloid paper was along the lines of "They eliminated _my_ show and replaced it with some other similar show--isn't that awful? Those bastards!" I didn't see any signs of a "reign of terror" (one of the rhetorical flourishes I heard quite a lot)--the front door was perpetually unlocked or propped open and, even though I'd mentioned to the staff there that I'd been reading about the problems with Pacifica and had concerns about the station, I never felt unwanted or pushed away--quite the contrary.
Of course, I liked much of what they were doing with the station. I'm sure that showed, even when I made criticisms. The new schedule seems to be a backward step--all those long talk talk talk shows, all morning. Better, I think, would've been to add local news--I gather the new management has done this--and push PSAs and community announcements during the music shows, especially during the weekend shows (which were and still are somewhat resistant to politics). I'd rather deliver a little less political content to a lot more people, particularly an audience that wasn't the choir. This is the strategy of many of the independent stations, such as the one in Little Rock and the one here in Atlanta, and it's effective.
What I told the management there at the time--and this still seems like the right course to me--was that I'd add between half-an-hour and an hour of news and public affairs programming during the day, but that I wasn't entirely sure where I'd take the time from if it were to be in a big chunk. While no one could have mistaken the station for commercial radio, it wasn't always obviously a Pacifica station, either. Still, at a time when most Pacifica stations were floundering, this one was increasing its audience, not losing money, and providing a lot of progressive programming, both political and cultural. It needed adjustments, not an overhaul--something that apparently can't be said of some of the other stations.
I have one particular bone to pick over that whole campaign, though, an apparent dishonesty which bugs me to this day, regarding Juan Gonzalez's on-air resignation.
That happened during the KPFT fund drive, during which some live parts of Democracy Now! were being pre-empted by earlier shows and fund appeals. In particular, I remember that day featuring a replay of the earlier Democracy Now! piece on the Death Row at Huntsville, Texas. I was in the office, taking pledge calls, and listening to the show. If there was actual censorship--someone turning Gonzalez off--I didn't hear it (having been censored myself, both on radio and on public access television, and being a fairly skeptical listener, I tend to notice these things). It was a surprise resignation, you know, which makes it difficult to plan not to broadcast it.
Within minutes after the program ended, I started getting calls demanding to know why Juan Gonzalez had been censored. This raised two questions in my mind.
First, if he'd been censored, how did these people--local listeners, many of them--know about it? They couldn't have heard it if it were censored. The best answer I had was that they'd gotten phone calls from other people in the Save Pacifica campaign telling them about it. In any event, it was quick action--the calls started literally within minutes.
This raised the second question: Was the resignation timed to make it appear that Gonzalez had been censored? If it was planned by anyone for political effect, it would have had to have been Gonzalez, who I cannot believe was unaware of the fund drive and the pre-emption of portions of the show. If so, it was an effective political stroke, but also a cheap shot.
I heard and read for some time thereafter about this "act of censorship"--I don't think it was any such thing.
All the best,
John A