Have you seen today's Boston Globe?..

[Sid Schweiger]

>>Anyone who doubts that right-wing talk radio still has an influence need
only scroll up and see that otherwise intelligent  people have actually
bought in to the absurd notion that  borrowers who were victims of predatory
adjustable mortgage schemes are to blame for thecountry's current fiscal
woes, when fault really lies with the lack of regulatory oversight which
allowed lenders and investors to create the time-bomb mortgages that not
only set up borrowers for failure when adjustments and balloons came due,
but which caused a run-up in demand based on a false ability to pay which in
turn led to price spikes and artificially high prices, which led to more
poison-pill mortgages.<<

Because some people believe it doesn't necessarily mean that the idea was planted by a medium which reaches less than 10% of persons using radio.  To take the most obvious examples:  Rush Limbaugh's 12+ share in Boston was a 5.9 in the summer book, and his national figures aren't that much different.  Howie Carr had a 6.5.  Jay Severin had a 4.4.  Those kinds of figures don't speak "influence" because they're a drop in a very fragmented bucket.

And let's not forget that these are talk-show hosts, not political scientists, experts in government or holders of any other such expertise, although Howie Carr may come the closest because he has newspaper reporting on his résumé.  They are proof of the old adage about opinions' resemblance to a certain bodily orifice...everybody has one.


Sid Schweiger
IT Manager, Entercom New England
20 Guest St / 3d Floor
Brighton MA  02135-2040