Steve Young

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DEMOCRATS UNWILLING TO PUT THEIR MONEY WHERE THEIR LACK OF MOUTHS ARE
Conservative Talk Radio Slams Democrats... and Dems Just Take It
by Steve Young

Oct. 16, 2003 -- LOS ANGELES (apj.us) -- Talk Radio defines "Liberal" as evil and anti-American and the Liberals become "Progressives."

Talk Radio spews venom 24/7 on and about any Democratic politician walking upright and then with a straight face says that Democrats demean Conservatives.

Talk Radio splits America in half then claims that those who don't buy their views lock, stock and barrel are unpatriotic.

Talk Radio makes Schwarzenegger their candidate promoting him and spend their entire shows demeaning Davis and Bustamante, then desecrate the Los Angeles Times for "lack of ethics" because they ran true stories on Schwarzenegger's alleged misogyny.

Talk Radio says that CNN (O'Reilly called them all "morons") is a liberal arm of the Democratic Party and FOX News Channel is fair and balanced.

Talk Radio says the Hollywood's zillionaires should "Shut Up And Sing," then unashamedly campaigns for one of Hollywood's biggest money makers.

Talk Radio brags impartiality by bringing on adversarial views then interrupts and disparages them as soon as they voice their adversarial view.

And who's to blame for all of this?

Get ready for my October surprise.

Not Talk Radio.

Not Talk TV.

Not even Rush Limbaugh.

I place the blame full square on the Democratic Party -- and their unwillingness to stand up to the Right's barrage and their own complete ignorance of how to retaliate.

The Democratic Party and their money-people (and there are plenty of them) refuse to put their money where their lack-of-mouths are. Oh, there's been the talk of an aspiring Liberal Talk network with a buzzed about early 2004 kickoff. One bank-roller of big-time conservative talk, a self-admitted liberal Democrat, says that the proposed Liberal network has barely enough to put on one show, let alone a network.

But even if they had the money, it's the demeanor -- not da dough -- that stands in the way of Liberal Radio success. The people behind the business of Talk Radio have called so-called Liberal Radio bad business. They say it won't work. The rationale has always referred to the failure of Mario Cuomo or the new, now old, Phil Donahue. At best, those attempts must be considered "soft."

But even going into hand-to-hand, bite-for-bite combat against the FOXes and Clear Channels is not a strategy that would work.

Hiring arrogant hosts will not do the trick. You can't out-O'Reilly O'Reilly

Interrupting conservative guests (if they even accept invitations) won't bring on the audience. You can't out-Hannity Hannity.

How about treacherously brutalizing and proposing extermination of your opponent? Nah. You can't out-Savage Savage.

Liberals are just not as angry as conservatives were and still are. Conservatives had no voice and Rush, and then the legion of imitators, provided it -- big time. Face it: conservatives own anger and liberals are just too comfortable to "not take it anymore."

So it is that if Liberal Talk is to succeed, or even break even, it needs to take a much more devious tack that is, in fact, sitting in front of their face, a face that seems to have no eyes. And the cost will be a hell of a lot less than creating something out of nothing, which is what the syndicated liberal voice is now.

The answer resides in team work. Teaming the Right with the Left.

Think I'm kidding? Have we forgotten the comedy team of Franken & O'Reilly?

Franken wrote a book taking advantage of O'Reilly's face and other conservative pundits' words, then gave us his take on the truth of it all. Agree or not, there's no denying it brought in the bucks. I don't know if Bill yet understands that he is Franken's cash cow -- that the more he rips Al, the more Al sells.

If I didn't know better I'd say Bill and Al are in cahoots.

Here's how the Franken Hypothesis would work for Liberal Talk Radio.

Simply replay the recent show tapes of Rush, Hannity, O'Reilly, and the others, warts and all, on Liberal Radio. But instead of letting their comments and facts go unchallenged or allowing them to lower the mike volume of the dissenting guest or letting them have the last word, the liberal talk show host gets to go Mystery 3000 Theater on them, finally able to comment and confront them, directly and uninterrupted. No longer will the conservative hosts be able to get away with endless diatribes, half-the-facts innuendo, and just-in-from-NewsMax headlines.

More importantly, not only will the liberal audience finally get the thrill of responding vicariously through their hosts, but conservative fans will listen to so they can defend their heroes. Conservative talk hosts will respond and in affect promote the new network

Would it last? O'Reilly still doesn't miss a chance to rip Franken. Of course there are no guarantees, but if anyone caught the Bill & Al show at the Book Expo on C-SPAN, the potential laughs would be too good to not to give it a shot.

I know there will be doubters, but for those liberal billionaires who think it wouldn't work, repeat after me: "FOX lawsuit."

Steve Young is an award-winning television writer, director/writer of "My Dinner With Ovitz"", and author of "Great Failures of the Extremely Successful" (Tallfellow Press -- check out the web site at http://www.greatfailure.com). He writes a regular column for Jewish World Review".