Monday, April 06, 2009

It's spring break in South Florida...

Unfortunately, that doesn't mean what the title conjures up!  I remember when I was in high school down here (Hollywood Hills High, class of '77, in case you were wondering...), in 11th grade, but looking a lot older than our 16 years, cruising the Ft. Lauderdale strip with my friends, looking for the hot college guys down here on spring break.  Ahh, the good old days, when the only thing you had to worry about was getting pregnant.  But I digress...


Now it's spring break, as in my 4th grader daughter is under-foot all week long!  

Today she went to the beach with the babysitter and her daughter but, after today's show, it was all about us.  

Thus the reason for the very late re-cap of today's Air America show.

What I had intended to be a few brief words on the loss of my former radio station, and the lone progressive radio voice in South Florida, became the whole first hour of the show.  Much of what I said was actually along the lines of my blog entries from Friday and Wednesday of last week.  That's part of the mourning process, I guess.  Venting and letting it all out.

But a big part of it was also challenging the listener to make the extra effort to find your favorite shows online and download them onto your iPod or other mp3 player and take them in the car, or listen via the computer as it's streaming live. 

I promise that, over the course of the next few days, I'll do the homework and post a comprehensive list of the progressive leaning shows, and the links from which you can listen.  

In the meantime, I plan on becoming more South Florida-centric over the coming weeks and months, to fill the void left when WINZ left the format.  Actually, to be completely accurate, that void has existed since I was let go from WINZ back in August...  Although they were a progressive station, there was truly no local presence on the station in the last seven months.  

To those who listen from places other than South Florida, I'll continue to sound off on other things that concern all of us.  And I hope you'll continue to let me know what topics and issues you'd like to hear about on Radio or Not.  We are in this together.


In the last two hours, we changed focus a bit.  I'm truly alarmed and frightened by the number of massacres that have taken place in this country in the past month.  

From the AP:
A string of shootings in the U.S. in the last month alone has claimed the lives of 53 people:

_MARCH 10, SAMSON, Ala. — A gunman kills 10 people and commits suicide in a rampage that spanned two dozen miles across the southern Alabama countryside. Police say Michael McLendon had struggled to keep a job and left behind lists of employers and co-workers he believed had wronged him.

_MARCH 22, OAKLAND, Calif. — A man pulled over in a routine traffic stop fatally shoots two officers and then kills two more in a gunfight in which the suspect was also killed. Relatives say Lovelle Mixon, 26, had been frustrated about not finding work and feared returning to jail.

_MARCH 29, SANTA CLARA, Calif. — A man shoots and kills his two children and three other relatives, then kills himself at a family housewarming party in an upscale neighborhood. Investigators don't yet know the motive of Devan Kalathat, a 42-year-old engineer at Yahoo.

_MARCH 29, CARTHAGE, N.C. — A man opens fire in a nursing home and kills seven elderly residents and a nurse who cared for them. Investigators say Robert Stewart, 45, apparently had targeted an estranged wife, a nurse's assistant who escaped by hiding in a bathroom.

_APRIL 3, BINGHAMTON, N.Y. — A gunman bursts into an immigrant center and kills 13 people before killing himself. Police say Jiverly Wong, a 41-year-old Vietnamese immigrant, was apparently upset about losing his job and about people picking on him for his limited English.

_APRIL 4, PITTSBURGH — A gunman wearing a bulletproof vest opens fire on officers responding to a domestic disturbance call, killing three of them. Police say Richard Poplawski, 23, had been upset about losing his job and feared the Obama administration was poised to ban guns.

_APRIL 4, GRAHAM, Wash. — A man fatally shoots his five children in their mobile home and then takes his own life in his car miles away. Relatives identified the father as James Harrison. A motive was not yet known.

After playing Cheryl Wheeler's If It Were Up to Me, I spoke with Paul Helmke, executive director of the Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence and to Bruce Tenenbaum, who wrote Gun "Nuts" for Huffington Post.  

Both guests made good points, in different ways.  I agree with Cheryl Wheeler... If it were up to me, I'd take away the guns.


6 comments:

SoloPocono said...

Hi Nicole,
I'm TRYING to find that clip of Cheryl Wheelers song?? Any ideas where I can find it? (Tried YouTube and her website-I can't even find it listed?)
elaine (who's actually going to TRY and start doing audio podcasts-might be awhile till I figure it out, but it HAS to be easier than typing with a dislocated elbow!! :)

RadioOrNot said...

Elaine,

I looked everywhere online to find the song so I could post it, but couldn't find it. I bought it on iTunes so I could play it on the air yesterday.

If you need help with the podcasting, just let me know. Maybe I'll post a "how to subscribe to a podcast" lesson on the blog one of these days...

Nicole

Cat said...

Nicole, I am sorry to hear about the loss of your progressive station in Florida.

I'm in Pennsylvania and haven't had much in progressive talk here ever.

I was so grateful for Air America. I started listening only a few months after the station launched and it's become a part of my daily life. First thing I do in the morning is load up my iPod with AAR podcasts and anything else that I can find online.

I think one of the problems with progressive radio, or maybe it's just Air America, is that they aren't listening to us. The hosts that we really want to hear are often replaced with hosts who are perceived as more popular nationally and the owners of these stations hope these hosts will bring in more $$.

I understand that radio stations have to make money but the few progressive stations that remain can't do business in same way that the conservative stations do. They have to start listening to what their audience wants. Sam Seder is a prime example of a host that had a great following and despite all of the emails and phone calls his show was replaced with Lionel. Lionel? Really?

I am grateful to AAR for introducing me to you and I am grateful to you for offering your podcasts. Hopefully, with your help, I'll find more.

One of my favorite shows is The young Turks (www.theyoungturks.com) which is an online live video show. But I podcast the audio show so that I'm not tethered to my computer.

I am looking forward to your list of online progressive shows. Maybe if AAR decides to keep you as a regular host I'll be able to re-subscribe but as of right now I am heartbroken to say that this month I will be ending my AAR premium account and podcasting other progressive shows.

I agree with you, we, the listeners, have to take back progressive radio and although it may not be as easy as turning a dial on the radio, we can all help each other to find the progressive shows that are available and hopefully, in time, the station owners will get the message. However, by that time it might be too late for them. As technology is allowing us access to so much more, and we are not confined to listen to what they tell us that we have to hear, all radio stations could be shooting themselves in the foot.

Thanks for all you do.
Cat

RadioOrNot said...

Cat,

Thanks for the thoughtful post. I promise to assemble the progressive talk primer... hopefully later this week. It'll be of help to all of us in progressive-talk-challenged cities (which are, unfortunately, the majority of US cities these days!).

I'm on Air America again today, and I'm very thankful that AA keeps asking me to fill in on their air. Who know what will happen down the road, but I'll always keep RadioOrNot.com going.

Thanks for checking it out... and thanks for listening!

Nicole

SoloPocono said...

YEEEHAAA!!! Nicole-unfortunately I missed most of your show today-but recorded to listen to it when I'm done with this. (I dislocated my knee AGAIN-it happens fairly frequently with my genetic disorder- My usual 2 hour sleep "periods-the only way I've slept for 5 yrs because of dislocations, fractures, frequent stomach problems, etc.-turned into *3* hrs today because I hadn't slept in over 36hrs). Anyways, I was woken up by a call from a PA Reps office asking me to testify for the PA Congress next month in the comittee hearings and for the whole Senate--in regards to Medical Cannabis!! It's a medication that if approved, could possibly give me some "normalcy" back to my life!! (Not to mention possibly save my sight!! ;). Hopefully "Cat" will also see this-we need ppl to CALL, ESPECIALLY PA Senators who STILL think that medical marijuana is just an excuse for us to get "high". (sigh) As a former healcare professional-now on disability, as well as a patient in need, I am REALLY excited about *possibly* being able to get through our Republican Senates thick heads and educate them in a subject I've been researching for quite awhile. Others with NPS have been able to get most, if not all, of their lives back--including George McMahon-an NPS patient who is one of the 5 remaining US GOVERNMENT SUPPLIED Medical Marijuana Patients in the "Compassionate InvestigationalNew Drug Program" and is one of the LUCKY few to actually receive 200 "joints" from the SAME US Government who says this is a "non-therapeutic, dangerous substance"!!
Sorry-this is a rather emotional issue for me because of the potential of getting my life back-and what that means to me.
Re: Podcasts: I'm trying to find a site to host the audio I want to put on my blog. "Blogger" seems to allow uploads of video files-but not audio. YES, I *know* I could just add a back ground and do it that way-but I wouldn't know where to begin for that. Downloading and playing podcasts are no problem. When I used to work as webmaster for a local yoga ashram-I also would upload them-but it was to our own servers-and I just can't afford my own website right now, so am looking for a site to host the audio. Let me know of you have any ideas!!
Thanks!!
elaine

Cat said...

Just a quick follow up on my previous comments...

It seems that I'm not alone in my dismay with Air America. They brought Montel Williams in to cover the 9am to 12pm slot instead of using some of the talent that they already have available. (Nicole Sandler, Sam Seder, Marc Maron, etc.)

Another big name that, based on the blogs I've been reading, is not what the AAR audience is tuning in for.

Pathetic.

In response to Elaine:
Thanks for keeping us informed. I will definitely call my senators on the subject of Medical Marijuana.

I'm all for ending this so-called war on drugs and legalizing for medical use is at least a start.