DanielSonenberg.com

How depressing. I was out running around the back bay w/ my martian-looking Sony headset radio, and I kept tuning and tuning the thing and only finding ESPN Radio where Air America was supposed to be. In the mists of morning, the owners of the station, Nassau Broadcasting, finally followed through on their promise to abandon liberal talk radio and replace it with generic, mindless sports radio. And don't get me wrong - I am a sports radio fan! But ESPN Radio, with its loathing of baseball (I swear, tune in early July when absolutely nothing else is going on, and they'll still find reasons to spend most of their breath yammering about basketball) and its horrific institutional sense of humor, is beyond pointless. I had actually just discovered that I liked the latest crusty morning host on Air America, Lionel (of The Lionel Show), but truth be told, they brought this on themselves. Every time you got used to a host they'd get pulled or rescheduled. And of course Al Franken had to jump ship - ran off to pursue a stupid senate campagne. Isn't it interesting that the moment he switched from host to candidate, the very moment, he became an intolerable bag of wind?

Anyway, it depresses me deeply, although I have to admit that since Al left, and since they messed repeatedly with the morning format, I had been listening less and less. I have absolutely no use for Tom Hartman's pretentious mid-day program (I mean how many times can you quote Hobbes on AM radio in a given week?) that replaced he of the Oy-oy-oy show. I'll survive. I'm just sorry to see another thing in Porltand not last.

I like Air America Radio, and yes, because basically when they preach to the converted they're preaching to me. I like Al Franken's biting wit and generally moderate stance on things, and I like Randi Rhodes' more radical and ranting approach. But over the last year and a half or so I've grown particularly fond of Jerry Springer. It's odd, given his television show, that he would emerge as the most reasonable of radio talk show hosts, but that's exactly who he is. Not a particularly great debater, or blessed with an acerbic wit or incontestable command of the facts, Jerry's great asset is that he really listens, and he is actually capable of entering into a dialogue with his callers. He seeks out alternative perspectives, even conservative ones, and treats people with respect. He'll change his mind on the air, and he has a completely endearing kind of self-deprecating humor. He's a mensch, basically, and I like having him on in the car or if I'm having a late run around the bay. (He's also a Yankee fan.) So imagine my surprise when yesterday I tune in the radio and Springer on the Radio is completely gone - wiped clean from the face of the earth. It seems to have been replaced by a show hosted by Sam Seder, a guy with a typically caustic and abrasive radio voice who's always indignant, and always right. And yet on Air America's website there's no mention of the change. None of the local affiliates indicate that anything is different. I called 870 the Voice here in Portland and they didn't return my call. Are we just not supposed to notice? Isn't it a bit inappropriate for a radio station that's been carping - and rightly so - about the current administration's obsessive secrecy and totalitarian tendencies to be so non-forthcoming? Truth be told, they actually did this when they put Jerry Springer on the radio too. There used to be a show hosted by Liz Winstead and Rachel Madow, and I seem to recall I was equally alarmed at Air America's technique when they made that shift too. Please people, give me some advance notice. Or mention it on the web. Something. Don't just try to rewrite history like in some Milan Kundera novel, you know?