Neither of those accusations are true, but at least the first one’s just absurd hyperbole instead of outright falsehood.

As for Air America, I’ve come to terms with its epic suckiness. They had a couple decent shows when it really counted (I credit Morning Sedition with keeping me from going into massive organ failure after the ’04 election), and now that I don’t feel all alone in a world gone mad, I’m kinda glad I don’t have the temptation to waste my media time having my opinions validated.

Yes, I’m aware of the irony of saying that in a liberal blog comment thread. But the radio playing in the background is teaching me all about a part of the world I know nothing about!

Okay, fine, it’s actually playing “Backstabbers” by The Dramatics. Still more substantive than listening to Mark Green interview David Frum.

He is also very politically very wise and hire some smart people to help him. Although I would have liked him to be more aggressive early on, which would have saved a lot of trouble now.

You didn’t read Franken’s book (Lies & The Lying Liars)? You should have. Several million of us did. It was one of the oasis at a time when the mainstream media was obsessed with pissing on liberals and marching in lockstep with Bush. It was also the first salvo in the fight versus Bill O’Reilly, and Franken led the first serious charge vs. Bill O that Olbermann picked up.

The book was funny but also well researched and it wasn’t boring like his radio show, which, like much of what Air America has done, did not garner much of an audience. You think a radio show gave him “gravitas”? That’s just not right.

Again, it was a talk radio show without callers. That’s madness.

Franken is senator because he’s been a notable public figure for almost three decades. He’s been a consistent supporter of liberal/Democratic causes. He embraced the blogosphere and he’s generally smart about dealing with people.

His comedy sure didn’t help him, it was used against him and is a big reason why the vote was so close when it should have been an easy seat for any Dem, besides a clown, to win in 2008.

And that book? I didn’t read it but it looked pretty thin. Without the book, though, his comedy acting alone probably wouldn’t have gotten him the Air America gig. But the book, from what I understand, was just more comedy, which might amuse people but isn’t a reason to take him serious.

The radio show did it for him. It gave him a serious public “face” (voice). I listened to it quite a bit, yes, it was boring radio punctuated by a rare joke, but it wasn’t nearly as boring as NPR and it was usually more informative (at the time I was still flipping the dial back and forth but NPR’s corporate/Republican sycophancy finally lost me for good).

That boring, day after day after day boring, serious radio show gave Franken the gravitas to counter his clowning enough that he was able to RUN FOR SENATOR straight out of the box. And it was the national gravitas from the Air America radio show, not his national clown face or funny book, that brought in a lot of national support.

Sorry, a clown who wrote a funny book couldn’t have beat Coleman even with Obama’s coattails.

It was the AIR AMERICA RADIO SHOW that did it for Franken.

That doesn’t even really scratch the surface because it doesn’t include the right wing think tanks (like AEI*) that have been set up as welfare recipients of billionaire’s foundations.

But hey, IOKIYAR, right?

*Apparently the right wing AEI is on speed dial for NPR.

They just hired Montel Williams, for chrissake.

And most importantly, Minnesota Democratic Senator Al Franken wouldn’t be Minnesota’s Senator without Air America.
Yes, the crappy radio show he did (and it was – I’ve never heard of talk radio that doesn’t freaking take phone calls) was far more instrumental than him being a bestselling author and nationally known satirist. Come. On.

If lefties aren’t on the radio they lose the possibility of reaching out to a considerable number of thoughtful righties (who vote!) who would be willing to listen and consider the strong political talk from informed, passionate lefties.

Many of those people would never read a lefty website or listen to NPR. But many will listen and give a fair hearing to lefty positions, most of which they already agree with but have been conned into working against.

If you’re a truck driver working for a corporation, Ed Schultz has your back. If your a stay at home mom worried about your kids health and education, Thom Hartmann is fighting for your interests. If you’re a frontline grunt, both Randi Rhoades (a veteran) and Rachel Maddow (who does her war homework every day take your concerns deadly seriously. Even cynical Mike Malloy was sticking up for Obama (even while stewing in his perpetual skepticism.)

What’s ironic is that of that list, only one, Maddow, actually still has a connection to Air America but all of them are ‘aired’ on my local ‘Air America’ station.

It’s never been about Air America, it’s about having at least one alternative to the 10 right wing radio stations on the air from coast to coast.

That takes a line up that can talk for 24 hours 7 days a week. Air America provided a platform for affiliates to fill up air time with lefties and also provided a staging ground for independent lefties to fill in around the corners.

And as for ‘favorite’ hosts falling off the air, well, that’s part of what made Air America valuable, it provided a window for great hosts to show if their were commercially viable or not. Some great hosts weren’t able to get the advertisers to back them. That’s the breaks in a capitalist system.

Frankly, I’d give a the Oliver Willis show a listen. Find some advertisers and a radio station and go national (or local), buddy.

FYI, being commerically viable is tougher than it sounds. Limbaugh was a failure for a long time at the start and even had to resort to begging his listeners to call in and encourage his owners to keep him on the air.

Even now there are rumors that Limbaugh gives his show away for ‘free’ just to keep his national presence up. Those stations then get a free three hour block (no content creation costs) that they can sell local commercials for. Apparently Limbaugh can then get a kick back from those commercials. Or, you could become a Limbaugh “member” directly, by Murdoch’s Journal’s standards, Limbaugh is begging for money.

From what I understand, many of the Air America affiliates are completely profitable. Though not until the 7th paragraph does Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal writer point out that Air America is “is on the path to profitability[,]” but not before slamming Minnesota Senator Al Franken as a “comedian[.]”

The article doesn’t even get to the main fact that Air America “may soon launch a membership program, with top donors getting access to Air America talent and tickets to special events” until the second paragraph.

Excuse me? Many of the successful radio hosts have special, “membership program[s]” where you can pay extra to get extra.

Rush Limbaugh, the mulit-millionaire radio host, has a “members only” program that appears to have a “RUSH 24/7 membership fee” attached to it. What am I missing? Is Rush ‘Begging “for Cash”? (Well, in the broader sense, yes, one could say that multi-millionaire Limbaugh is ‘begging “for cash” with his pay-for-membership program but it wouldn’t be completely honest and wouldn’t have passed the former editing standards of the WSJ’s business section.)

The lefts greatest failure has been writing off radio and television. The rights (mis)use of those tools has been part of it’s greates strengths and crucial to it’s dominance over these last decades.

As for NPR? I stopped listening to it years ago. NPR has a grotesque right wing slant and it rarely, if ever, does investigative journalism (other than re-reporting the investigative journalism of newspapers, something even Randi Rhoades did with more context and with more supporting documentation).

What’s particurlarly perverse about the Murdoch/Drudge/WSJ piece is that it’s deliberately trying to pick a fight between NPR and AirAmerica. The piece by Sarah (Drudgebait) McBride even conflates AirAmerica’s consideration of launching a Limbaugh-like membership program with a government bailout just before it points out that “National Public Radio stations have been stepping up recruitment of ad-sales professionals to drum up corporate sponsorships.”

But of course the right wing tilting NPR is looking for corporate sponsorships. Considering the corporate bootlicking and Republican pimping that NPR was doing for years during the Republican Bush administration (the biggest reasons I stopped listening), there are going to be a lot of corporations that are willing to buy some good will and corporate cover from NPR (anyone remember ADM?).

While right wingers understand the importance of buying newspapers so that they can print propaganda drivel that’s unthinkingly parrotted by left wingers, the right wingers know that the power of radio trumps newspapers manifold more times than print. And national TV stations trump all of that. That’s why Murdoch created FOX noise and bought himself the formally credible Wall Street Journal.

There are so many levels of irony to someone who wants newspapers to die linking to a right wing propaganda newspaper that’s written to falsely slam left wing radio which was has been one of the critical media tools* in disseminating a counter narrative to the right wing narrative that gripped the country from 2001 through 2006.

*While the internet has been crucial in changing the media power paradigm, both Air America** and a handful of TV shows have been part of that crucial mix. Saying otherwise is the kind of ignorant that will mean Republican gains in 2010 and possibly a Republican President in 2012.

**”Air America” is a subsection of ‘lefty radio.’ The top tier lefty radio hosts may be ‘aired’ on an ‘Air America’ affiliates but they don’t have any connections with Air America outside of that.

Ed Schultz was never part of Air America. Mike Malloy isn’t part of Air America. Thom Hartmann has left Air America.

More importantly, Rachel Maddow wouldn’t have her own show on MSNBC if she hadn’t gotten her start on Air America.

And most importantly, Minnesota Democratic Senator Al Franken wouldn’t be Minnesota’s Senator without Air America.

And that’s a good thing, because it indicates that Dems are more likely to read, organize, and plan through the web than they are through a dead-end medium like radio.

Buh-bye.