AIR AMERICA RADIO...TURN ON, TUNE IN, DROP A BRICK ON BUSH

After just two weeks on the air, Air America Radio, the fledgling liberal talk-radio network featuring Al Franken, Janeane Garofalo, and that really loud woman from Florida, appears to have encountered serious cash-flow problems.

Stop the presses!!! There's nothing more exciting than half a story from a third hand source!!!!

Insiders tell SLUDGE, that the reason the network was pulled off the air this morning in Chicago and Los Angeles, the network's second- and third-largest markets, was because, the owner of both stations, Arthur Liu of Multicultural Broadcasting, said, the network bounced a check and owes him more than $1 million! The run-on sentence, tortured grammar and the exclamation point clearly means it's true!!

Only it isn't.

Normally we'd let this go because "habitual liars" like Drudge are laughable, and ridicule is our business.

But Arthur Liu --- not funny. He lied to us, he ripped us off and now we're chasing him down with a pipe wrench. It's a metaphor.

Here's what really happened:

This Liu-ser was ripping off our boss Evan Cohen big time (he can't do that, that's our job). Evan found out about it and he stopped payment on a check to keep Liu-cifer from ripping him off even more. You can touch Evan for the occasional meal or drinks but a million bucks is crossing the line. And if we ever get low on cash, we can always call Barbra Streisand. Or any of the
Baldwins. Except Stephen.

So we got screwed, Liu'd, and tattooed. How Liu can you get? In Liu of payment. Liu'd and lascivious behavior. These write themselves. What we're getting at is that we hate him.

So now everyone's saying we're going down the dumper in Chicago and Los Angeles, but what they don't tell you is that we're still on in Portland. And we OWN Portland. And let's not forget Riverside and Plattsburgh. And New
York. And streaming on the internet. And XM. And Sirius. Actually we're fine.

So cool your jets. Air America Radio isn't dead, we're in court and we're going to slam Liu's head in a car door. Another metaphor. We hope to be back on the air tomorrow or the next day in those markets.

In the meantime, why don't you give Arthur a call at (212)966-1059.

Arthur Liu, I wouldn't show your face around here.

Or Riverside. Or Plattsburgh.

DEVELOPING……
.

I dredged up the old thread from page three instead of making a new one. I'll take my thanks in small bills, please.

US liberal radio flames out in LA, Chicago over billing dispute

NEW YORK (AFP) - A liberal radio start-up touted as a counterweight to right-wing talk radio has been yanked from the airwaves in two of its top markets amid an acrimonious billing dispute, according to network representatives.

The broadcaster that rents air time to Air America in Los Angeles and Chicago pulled the plug on the network in those two cities Wednesday, just two weeks after its much-ballyhooed launch.

Executives with Multicultural Radio Broadcasting Inc., which owns Air America affiliates WNTD-950 AM in Chicago and KBLA-1580 AM in Los Angeles, claims Air America bounced checks and fell behind on its payments, and now owes it more than one million dollars.

Air America, for its part, filed suit against Multicultural Wednesday in New York state Supreme Court, charging it with breach of contract and seeking an injunction forcing Air America back on the Chicago station.

"MultiCultural Radio Broadcasting's conduct in this matter has been disgraceful," said Evan Cohen, Air America Radio chairman in a statement posted on the network's website Thursday.

"To shut off a broadcast that listeners rely on without warning and in the middle of discussions is the height of irresponsibility and a slap in the face of the media industry."

Executives for the fledgling network say they have withheld payment for air time they purchased in Los Angeles in February, prior to its March launch.

They contend that Multicultural re-sold that airtime to third parties, essentially "double-dipping," and that the network should be credited for that block of time.

The network has also used its remaining radio stations in New York, Minneapolis, Portland, Oregon, and its website as platforms to attack Multicultural and its owner Arthur Liu.

Jean Heinemeyer, general manager of Multicultural's New York station, said the station has been flooded with calls from irate Air America listeners over the past 36 hours.

And he lashed out at a tongue-in-cheek Air America "press release" in which the network was going to resolve the matter, vigilante-style, by putting a crowbar to Liu's head.

"It's more than sophomoric," said Heinemeyer. "It's disgusting and frightening."

The release was removed from the site Thursday.

Blatham I don't have to read the book to know exactly what it says.

Bias is unavoidable, and not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself. What is avoidable (and does minor or great damage to profitable discourse) is lousy process - lazy scholarship, insular data sources, faulty reasoning.

Oh and Blatham, sometime I'll write a profile. Not that you believe me, but I do know what good journalism standards are.

I have found the writer in question to be so biased that his scholarship and reasoning became flawed,

I didn't realize a personal opnion needed evidenciary support.

I have found the writer in question to be so biased that his scholarship and reasoning became flawed,

That's okay. I'm enjoying the few who post here who actually can see both sides of an issue and discuss it without being insulting. I like that a lot.