Air America, et al..

[Steve West]

You wrote:
>
>Liberal/Conservative has not been the thrust of the point.

No, of course it wasn't.  But it seems to have evolved into that.

>
>I believe that the only way that talkradio can return to civil disourse is
>to start realizing that there are indeed people who see the world
>differently than we might.  Reaching different conclusions, etc.
>
>Be it right  *OR*  left.


And therein lies the problem.  Short of legislating some sort of opposing 
viewpoint requirement into the talkradio dialogue, how are we going to get 
these stations - of both viewpoints - to make sure that the other side gets 
to be heard?

You guys probably know I've been a big vocal opponent of the so-called 
'fairness doctrine', because I believe as I did when it was in effect, that 
it forced radio stations to do bland radio out of fear that one side might 
come out as the winner (and back in the day the fear was that a whopping 
fine would ensue if the discussion was lop sided)... with AM radio already 
on the ropes, if they kill off the talk shows trying to make things 'fair', 
I'm not sure who wins.

And, some talkers would argue that things are 'fair', because, first, when 
conservative talk radio gained momentum in the late 80s, they argued that 
the rest of the media was biased to the Left, and now its because of Air 
America and the 'progressive talk' format taking hold nationwide.  I'm not 
sure that's a correct assumption either.

So... I think we've got a serious problem where meaty discussions are 
turning into shouting matches where generalities rule and facts seem nowhere 
to be found - and its moving from the talk radio world out into mainstream 
society... Heck, I saw two women get into it about President Bush at a 
Kroger grocery store the other day.  Sheesh!  While its great that 
everyone's informed, aren't we who are broadcasters shirking our 
responsibility to report facts and not get everyone angry to the point of 
coming to blows?

>
> >>conservatives are
>evil and liberals are untrustworthy... this latter two being what it
>probably appears to be to some readers, not an exact quote.  I'm dealing
>with this on my Radio-Info boards.<<
>
>However, I would agree, that seems to be tfoundation of many of the
>discussions on radio-info.com .

Addressing that - it's been my experience as moderator that there is a group 
of rabble-rousers whose sole purpose in life is to create dischord.  Ban 
them and they return after registering a different email address.  I know 
with me it's NOT my intent to allow the discussions to depart from radio.... 
but in the case of the Boston board, there are three talk stations in the 
market (4 if you count the WXKS-AM/WKOX AAR simulcast as two different 
signals) and it's difficult to ban the entire subject of talk radio when 
it's so prevalent on the air.