NevadaBrad

Against my better judgment I spent some more time listening to KJFK today. I was surprised to hear some reasonable progressive talk radio for the first time. And on two different programs, no less!

Bill Press was actually having a calm discussion with a guest about Obama’s offshore drilling announcement. Of course, they were critical of the announcement and talked about the president’s motives and so on. I didn’t agree with their viewpoint but it lacked the vitriol that I’m used to hearing from progressive talk.

I also listened to Randi Rhodes on the way home. Aside from having a completely bone-headed caller, her show actually had some decent content. The caller argued that taxes are not really taxes, but rather an investment in America’s future. Randi agreed and provided several examples of things that we invest in with taxes, such as health care. Incorrectly, both Ms. Rhodes and the caller declared that the right wants to eliminate funding for interstate highways. They seemed to be saying that conservatives are against all taxes, which is just absurd. I believe that even the most extreme conservatives will argue that taxes should be collected for roads and military. Ms. Rhodes then went on to say that corporations get all sorts of tax breaks and that government is the answer to that problem. She thinks that tax breaks need to go to the people and the small businesses rather than big corporations. She does not seem aware of the fact that only people pay taxes, not corporations. If a company is taxed more then more taxes are passed on to the customer. She thinks that corporations control Washington, which I think we can all agree on to some extent. It quickly became obvious that everyone seems to agree on what the problems are. The difference comes in the handling of the problems. I believe that the left will make the problem worse if they implement their “solutions”. I’m sure they think the same about the right. But they’re wrong.

Just before I turned the radio off I heard Randi make an interesting statement. She thinks that if she would only take up the conservative cause then she would have as much money and as many listeners as the top conservative talkers. She certainly has a favorable opinion of herself. Maybe I need to listen more, but I had to laugh that should would dare compare herself to the unnamed conservative hosts. Ms. Rhodes then explained that she believes so strongly in her cause that she is willing to put up with lower and pay and ratings in order to share her brilliant progressive ideas with the world. She is quite the martyr.

Then again, she has literally dozens of listeners and I just have a goofy little blog that even I don’t read.

I finally did it. I turned on KJFK and took a listen. Fortunately, I have a limited amount of time to listen to the radio, which is a good thing when you’re listening to KJFK. It immediately became clear why listenership is low on leftie stations. The hosts were petty, condescending and mean and rarely did I hear an intelligent argument put forward. This was a stark difference from what you usually hear on conservative talk radio. Worst of all, the entertainment factor was about zero.

When I listened to the liberal talk station I heard basically the same thing over and over. The right is afraid. The reason they are afraid is because they are so full of hate. Almost every caller called in to repeat that fear comes from hatred and hatred leads to violence.

Let me throw out some examples of things I heard that seem to exemplify liberal talk radio. Unfortunately, I don’t have exact quotes because I was driving at the time, but I will make an honest effort to objectively paraphrase what I heard.

- Randi Rhodes wanted to know who is more like the Nazis – People who throw bricks through windows or people who don’t throw bricks through windows? (Answer: Republicans are Nazis because some person, presumably associated with the tea party movement, may have thrown a brick through a window.) She also explained that the tea party movement is the result of middle-aged and senior white men who live in terror because America is changing and they are being left out. Also, she does not like Rush Limbaugh.

- Cory Farley is losing faith in people because of the reaction over Obamacare.

- Bill Press related a story about an armored car accident that left $20 bills scattered all over the street. He then related that if he found money all over the street he would steal it and not give it back. On the bright side, I heard him having a fairly thoughtful discussion about Afghanistan with a guest (although I wonder if the discussion was as thoughtful during the Bush years).

- Thom Hartmann opined that the Republicans have been hijacked by violent extremists and that there is no moderation left in the party.

I was interested to hear Cory Farley express that most people are either idiots or evil because they oppose Obamacare (my words). And although presented in a flippant manner, I was shocked to hear that Bill Press has no problem with stealing and would join in himself if given the chance. Perhaps that’s why he likes Obamacare. Among all the ridiculous comments, what I never heard was any kind of logical debate or argument. The conservatives were constantly labeled as racists and hateful fear-mongers. For example, one caller called in to ask if what he had been hearing from his conservative friends about Obamacare was true. The answer from the host was basically this: of course it’s not true! They’re just a bunch of fearful, hateful extremists! Did the host address the question? Not at all.

It also seemed clear that they never want to miss a chance to by hypocrites. Just to pick one small example, I heard a discussion about how spitting on a politician is a federal crime and the person who did it should be put in prison. I don’t recall any outrage over Cynthia McKinney assaulting a police officer (is that a crime?). But if you spit a little when you pronounce your P’s you should probably just be sent to the electric chair. Except the death penalty is bad. But since you spit when you talk to a politician we’ll make an exception.

So, it is painfully clear that the left is trying to focus on the racist, fear-mongering, spitting tea party so that no one will talk about Obamacare. They are hoping that between now and the November elections America will forget what our politicians just did to us. The lefties lack the ability to understand some simple concepts. THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH RACE! And the only thing we fear is having all of our rights being taken away. Even if you disagree, can you please acknowledge that it is indeed a terrifying thought to have your basic rights stripped from you? Instead of stoking the flames of hatred why don’t you try to explain why the actions of our government will not lead to fewer freedoms?

I think the bottom line is this: the libs attack people because they can’t win a debate on issues. But people are smart and they see through that tripe. That’s why people like Limbaugh and Beck are so successful while leftie hosts enjoy a generally small audience. Although the lefties brand conservative hosts as bigots and fear-mongers DON’T BELIEVE IT! Hannity uses a good biblical quote to summarize his views: “Let not your heart be troubled.” Glenn Beck constantly tells people that violence is not an answer to our problems. His message is that we need to be educated and then come together as a nation. Washington is leading us to a very dark place and we’ve got to help each other survive. This is what people tend to believe. Although the skies are cloudy now, the storm can’t last forever. Eventually the sun is going to come out.

So, I’ve done my duty – I tried listening to the other side. I would love to know if there is something I’m missing. Am I listening to the wrong hosts? Or at the wrong time? Or on the wrong day? If anyone has some advice please let me know.

I recently received a visit from Captain Obvious. It seems that both KJFK and KBZZ are owned by Americom Broadcasting. Oddly enough, Americom also owns four highly rated music stations, including Sunny 106.9. I’ve been trying to figure out why a company that owns so many successful stations would insist on trying to keep two unsuccessful talk stations alive. The music stations are acting like life support for KJFK and KBZZ. Unfortunately, there’s no hope of the talk stations being revived because the brains have been removed.

Michael Savage was mercifully removed from 99.1 FM Talk’s lineup and has now appeared on KBZZ from 3p-6p. Savage is lined up against Bill Manders on KOH and Lars Larson on KKFT. The full announcement can be read on KBZZ’s web site.

Savage is a tough one for me to understand. He didn’t last long on KKFT – about 9 months, I think. If I remember correctly he was on KOH for about 5 years. So, if the length of time Michael Savage lasts on a station is relative to the stations popularity then he should be on KBZZ until the end of the week. If he’s lucky. Michael Savage was ranked 3rd on the 2009 Talkers 250. According to Savage, “I guess people love my show because of my hard edge combined with humor and education”. I have another theory. First, we know that no one ever listened to Air America. We also know that, at least in Reno, Michael Savage is not successful on “conservative” talk radio stations. So, if conservatives aren’t listening to Michael Savage and no one is listening to crazy-lefty radio stations then we can safely deduce that the only people listening to Michael Savage are the crazy-lefties who think Savage is typical of conservative talk radio and they are trying to collect incriminating evidence against conservatives.

Just for the record, I listened to Michael Savage for a short while when he started on KOH. I also own a copy of The Savage Nation and have even read it. But then I wised-up and never looked back.

Speaking of programming changes, I also see that Cory Farley jumped from KBZZ to KJFK. Pros: KJFK is probably more in line with Farley’s politics, KJFK needs to fill up the programming now that Air America is deceased, KJFK has more listeners. Cons: I can’t really think of any. I mean, if Cory Farley switches stations and no one’s around to hear it, well, you know how it goes.

As I’ve mentioned before, Cory Farley can be downright hilarious. But when he talks about politics he’s unfunny and mean (kind of like how I am all the time). Given the dismal situation that Americom’s talk stations find themselves in I am interested to see how these changes affect their ratings. One things for certain – there’s nowhere to go but up.

I got so worked up about Harry Reid and all the people who donate money to him that I neglected my radio reviewing duties. Before I continue with the radio stuffins I’ll give you a couple little games to play. First, check out Harry Reid’s 2005-2010 top 100 donors at OpenSecrets.org. If you’re looking for an easy game, try spotting the personal injury lawyers that donate to Harry Reid. If you’re looking for a challenge, try figuring out why the list shows a $14,400 donation from “US Senate” and $13,200 from “University of Nevada”. I know that the University receives a lot of private donations, but as a state school what right do they have to being making these kinds of political donations? As for the US Senate, I’m certain that he’s not donating to himself through the senate. I mean, I’m pretty sure he’s not, right? Anyone?

But I digress. The real reason we’re here today is to catch up on what’s going on in the world of radio. Since this is the season of State of the Union and State of the State addresses we’ll call this the State of the Stations post. We have much to discuss since the last rating schedule we reviewed was for Fall of 2008. Since then the Spring 2009 and Fall 2009 numbers have been released. Arbitron still only lists four stations as talk format with only KOH and 99.1 listed as “News Talk”.

KBZZ (1270 AM) – After a dip in ratings in the fall of 2008 The Buzz made a nice little rebound. They climbed up to 2% in SP09 from 1.6% in FA08. But then they plummeted to a horrendous .4% in FA09. This ties them for last place among all stations of any format. The main personalities all seem to be in place, so I’m not sure why they’re doing so poorly. They still seem to be chasing the most uninteresting types of talk radio – maybe people have just decided to move on. Who knows? Who cares?

KJFK (1230 AM) – There is no doubt that having a huge error in their slogan has hurt KJFK. On their web page their slogan erroneously proclaims KJFK to be “AM with IQ”. Proclaiming the slogan thus when they clearly meant it to read “AM with LOW IQ” shows sloppiness, which is an unattractive attribute. Nevertheless, KJFK also showed a substantial drop in ratings. After dropping from 1.7% in FA08 to 1.6% in SP09, they dropped to a painful 1%. This drop not nearly as substantial as what KBZZ suffered, but it’s certainly not good. Of course, Air America has been embattled for years and recently stopped broadcasting completely. KJFK primarily featured Air America programming before and I’m not sure what they’re going to do now. The Air America announcement could mean one of two different things. First, it could mean an improvement in KJFK ratings now that some of the crazies are not on their station anymore. Second, it could mean their certain demise. KKFT and KKOH offer far more interesting programming, so without a major leftie operation to provide programming I’m not sure how appealing KJFK will remain.

KKFT (99.1 FM) – After dropping from an outstanding 2.3% in FA08 to 1.4% in SP09, KKFT has slowly resumed marching upward. KKFT’s FA09 ratings are listed at 1.5%. With the exception of the bump in FA08 their ratings have been fairly steady and generally trend upwards. That said, KKFT seems to be entering adolesence. The station seems to be groping for a new identity, but it’s not clear what they are trying to achieve. The addition of Michael Savage was the first sign that things were about to get wonky. Last week the station replaced Michael Savage with Rusty Humphries – not a move that I expect will help. They also did a major scramble not long ago. Dr. Laura was bumped to the middle of the night and Tom Sullivan took her place. Dave Ramsey was moved from Saturday night to Sunday night. Tammy Bruce was eliminated entirely. There were other changes, as well, but I’ve included the changes that disappointed me the most. Tom Sullivan has actually been very enjoyable, but I miss Dr. Laura. Tammy Bruce and Dave Ramsey were great and I miss being able to listen to them. I hope KKFT finds its voice soon. Quality of programming seems to be going the wrong way.

KKOH (780AM) – KOH experienced the same bump that KKFT experienced. After rising to a phenomenol 13.6% in FA08 they sank back to 10.4% in SP09. From there they increased slightly to 10.5%. KOH continues to dominate the Reno market due to very solid programming. With Rush, Hannity and Levin the station features excellent national shows. Bill Manders offers a local program that thumps any other local programming. Part of the appeal of KOH is that I always know what I’m going to hear when I turn on the station. Changes are made rarely and are almost always for the better. Although I view KOH as a Goliath and I’m looking for a David to come along and humble them, I can certainly respect the appeal of the station.

THE BOTTOM LINE: Both KBZZ and KJFK seem to be in a tailspin and things are not looking good for either of them. Although KOH still crushes KKFT (for reasons discussed previously), KKFT continues to hold its own. Until KKFT gets settled I expect it to be a very slow ascent.

There was something else that I found interesting. KBZZ had a substantial dip in FA08. KJFK remained mostly static in FA08. Both KOH and KKFT had a nice bump in FA08 that was not seen on any of the other Reno stations. (A couple music stations had a bump, but nothing that seemed unique among their normal trends.) People obviously flocked primarily to KOH and KKFT for election news and information. I would have expected KJFK to get a similar bump. This is not good news for KJFK – they seem to be stuck with the same audience that they’ve always had. Listeners to not trust them to get information, even in an election that swung for their candidate. On the bright side, I think the bump is further evidence that KKFT is being taken seriously as a force in the Reno market for serious new and talk.

It’s that time again. More mindless blabbering about radio stuff. Since the last time I travelled this path I’ve done some thinking. Reader Rick posted a comment and asked the following questions:

Can you provide me with ratings for the weekday drive time?

Is Bill Manders so popular that KKOH continues to support and keep his program active?

Where does Bill Manders stand in the ratings?

I dug around quite a bit but couldn’t find any specific information to answer these questions. This type of detail is included in the reports that must be purchased (usually through a subscription). My curiosity does not lead me to pay money for this information. At least not right now. Or maybe ever.

Anyway, while thinking about this topic I came to the realization that I’m not a fan of local talk. “Reno’s Morning News” (Breakfast Club) may be great. Bill Manders may be King of Reno. But, personally, I’m just not a big fan of local talk. Like sushi or Macs, it’s not my thing. I used to like local talk. I loved Brian Maloney when he used to be on KOH. I also loved Ira Hansen when he was on KOH. I think Rusty killed it for me, though. He did a lot of good for our community, but that’s when I started to fall out of love with local talk. Even Ira Hansen, whom I loved on KOH, did not appeal to me as much when he reappeared on 99.1.

I only mention all this to identify that I am not impartial when it comes to discussing local talk. I suspect that Bill Manders is extremely popular. He’s been on KOH for a long time and KOH is usually pretty sensitive to programming the most popular (e.g. profitable) shows. If anyone would like to provide more specifics about the topic I would love the information.

The spring numbers are available, so I’ll be posting them along with my usual commentary shortly.

I just realized I never followed-up on a comment I received a while back. For a myriad of reasons it slipped through the cracks.

Anyway, in answer to my question about where Ira Hansen went, Mike at Lucid Enterprises provided the answer. The bottom line is that he quit to focus on his plumbing business.

You can read additional details here: http://www.lucid-enterprises.com/news001.htm

Well, it’s that time of the decade again. It’s time to go through and give my biased, uneducated analysis of the Reno radio market. Today’s information will be pulled from Arbitron’s ratings published February 2nd, 2009, which reflect ratings for Fall 2008. For the sake of consistency, I’ll include all the same stations I’ve discussed in the past, but really I only care about three specific stations.

KBZZ (1270 AM) - KBZZ had a nice little ride going from 1.7 to 2.1 to 2.4 before plummeting back to 1.6. We’ll see what happens when the spring 2009 ratings come out. I don’t really care about this station for reasons I’ve discussed in the past, so I’ll move on…

KJFK (1230 AM) - KJFK has stayed fairly static. Their market share seems to flutter between 1.6 and 1.7. Even if one subscribes to a liberal point of view, the personalties on this station are so extreme that it loses all entertainment value. It’s like listening to a liberal version of Michael Savage all day, every day.

KKFT (99.1 FM) - KKFT had a very healthy .7% increase between the spring ’08 and fall ’08 ratings period. Their most recent share sits at 2.3. There are several things that make KKFT’s rise amazing. For starters, they are competing against a mammoth 50,000 watt AM station that has been around longer than any other station in Reno. KKFT operates on an extremely modest 410 watt FM transmitter located in Washoe Valley. Michael Savage, who was previously on KKOH, was recently added to their evening lineup. I can’t imagine this will help them, but then again some people like Savage. I think.

KKOH (780 AM) - After some tiny fluctuations in KOH’s market share they now show a gain of 3.3 market share to put them at 13.6. They are still number one in the Reno market with ratings almost double that of the next closest station (Sunny 106.9 at 7.8, in case you wanted to know).

Both KOH and 99.1 FM Talk showed extremely healthy gains this time. KOH had an increase of a little more than 24%, while 99.1 FM Talk’s gain was more than 30%! Is it because it was election year and more people were listening to talk radio? If elections make talk radio more popular, then I find it interesting that KJFK showed no significant gain.

Other than Savage, none of the stations have made any significant changes worth discussing. I’ve already discussed my thoughts on Michael Savage.

Huge congratulations to Jerry Evans on the success of his station. I hope it continues!

We’ll be back to talk about this again when the Spring 2009 numbers come out…

As the country prepares for a brutal assault waged by the enemies of freedom, tragic news strikes a little closer to home.

I feel as though I’ve been cheated on. As though I walked in the room to find the one I love with another man. I’m speaking, of course, about the additon of Michael Savage to 99.1 FM Talk‘s lineup. This change is particularly damaging because it seems that the scales are beginning to tip back to KOH. KOH will now feature Mark Levin from 6p to 8p, the same time slot that Michael Savage will be on 99.1.

I’ve been wrong about some hosts in the past. For example, at one point I referred to Lars Larson in a way that was not entirely flattering. He is now one of my favorite hosts, even though I struggle with his opinion on the Compean/Ramos situation. (I don’t disagree with him, I just have a difficult time forming a solid opinion because his arguments are good but they go against what everyone else says. Thinking for myself is hard.) I find that you often have to listen to someone for quite a while before you really get a feel for what they’re about. Another good example of that would be Glenn Beck. I’ve been listening to him for years and it’s only within the last several months that I’ve begun to get a feel for his depth. He likes to act goofy, but he’s extremely intelligent and dead-serious about the topics he cares about.

Michael Savage is the opposite. When you first listen to him you you enjoy hearing someone speak so bluntly about topics that matter. But then it’s gets old. He starts to sound like a bitter person who no one wants to be around because he brings everyone down. I think I gave him a pretty fair shot. I listened regularly for  quite a while when he first came to KOH (as long as I could take it) and I read his first book. His ideas are actually very good. I think most people would agree with most of his opinions. Unfortunately, he is just plain unpleasant to listen to.

So, KOH owns me from 6p to 8p. Mark Levin is the bomb. I’m sorry FM Talk. We can’t keep seeing each if this is how you’re going to treat me.

As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve got sort of a man-crush on 99.1 FM Talk. That doesn’t mean I’m blind to the faults of the station. I hate to be critical of their advertisers since I certainly want all those who support the station to be successful; however, I have a bone to pick with a couple of them.

First, the ad for Clearwire. I have a Clearwire modem, so I speak from experience. Clearwire is a lot like satellite internet service. It’s okay if there are absolutely no other choices but I certainly wouldn’t use it if I had a choice. Clearwire is outrageously expensive compared to cable or DSL and minor things can completely kill your signal. My worst experience with Clearwire occurred recently when the credit card they had on file expired. They used a robo-call to ask me to call them back, leaving no useful information about why. I finally realized the problem when I tried to connect to the internet and was prompted to make a payment. Robo-calls are an automatic deal-killer for me. And this was on top of the fact that the last time I called them about a service problem they never called back.

I will state that my problem is with Clearwire and not the advertiser that runs the ad – I believe the business is J&S Satellite. You should patronize them – just avoid Clearwire.

Second, the abomination known as The BBQ House. I was not a fan of their old ads. I’m not a fan of their jingle (“hot sauce!”). But the “Joe the Plumber” ad sealed the deal. I don’t get the Australian/N’awlins accent. As a matter of fact, I’m not sure about most of what is said in the commercial because I turn it off as soon as it comes on. I’m trying to think of a more irritating campaign, but nothing is coming to mind.

Let me put this in perspective. If I went to vote and was given a choice between Obama and this ad I would be seriously torn. Destroy the country and possibly the world? Or hear that blasted ad one more time? I think I’d probably write-in Carrot Top. Yeah, it’s that bad.

And then Ira came back like winged mustang bursting through the clouds riding a rainbow that led to our beloved 99.1 FM Talk. He warmed our hearts and tickled our fancies and then, like Tessie, he was gone in a flash leaving everyone wondering whether he was every really there at all.

Ira’s return was much-hyped and eagerly anticipated. It seems strange that he slipped away without any warning or explanation. Or maybe I just missed the announcement.

We had a pretty good thing going on in radio for that little while. Two local hosts on competing stations during the same time slot. It was even more interesting because of their contrasting hosting styles. Bill Manders tends to have a lot of interaction with callers. Ira tended to have very intellectual monologues and seemed to almost be distracted by people calling in. I’ve come to appreciate both styles, but I will admit that the quality of local callers is not always stellar (in fact, rarely terrestrial).

So what happened to Ira? Did Bill put a hit out on him? Did John Farahi finally shut him down? At first you would occasionally hear Lars Larson when Ira wasn’t on. It started happening more frequently, then it became permanent.

Ira’s web page hasn’t been updated since March. No trace of Ira’s name can be found on the KKFT web page. I can’t find any news stories or blog stories about what happened. Strangely, Ira’s biographical tag at the end of his columns still lists that “his radio talk show can be heard Monday through Friday from 3 to 6 p.m. on 99.1 FM.” And that’s as recently as four days ago.

If Ira made an announcement that he was ending his show I would love to know what went down. If anyone has any information please let me know.