Danny Goldberg on the demise of Air America and political media strategy

[JHB]

Full article at:
http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2010/01/air-america-rip-guest-post-from-former.html
I think that the New York Times got it exactly wrong this morning in declaring that “the enduring legacy of Air America’s failure is that political media from either side of the aisle is more successful when run as a business instead of a crusade.”

That very attitude is what has hobbled the growth of liberal talk radio but conservatives have never thought about media that way and they still don’t. The week before Air America shut its doors the Rev. James Dobson announced that he was starting a new radio show with his son Ryan, a thirty-nine year tattooed surfer who shares his father’s ultra-conservative views. On Dobson’s Facebook page he asked his supporters to fund the new show. “Your participation will be greatly appreciated, especially during this time when startup costs will be very expensive. The budget for the first year, including the costs of radio airtime, will be about two million dollars."

***
In the early nineteen seventies the Washington Post and New York Times were instrumental in helping expose the Watergate scandal and publishing the Pentagon papers. Conservatives felt that liberals had an advantage in setting the agenda because of the influence of New York and D.C. newspapers on the national media. In 1976 Rupert Murdoch bought the New York Post and it has lost money every year since, the total loss estimated to be more than half a billion dollars. In 1983, the Rev. Sun Myung Moon created the Washington Times, which has also lost money every year. Widely published reports place Moon’s losses at over $1 billion on the Times and other political media including a purchase the venerable wire service UPI. These money losing properties have put dozens of conservatively slanted stories onto the national radar screen, altered the framing of every important political issues, and nurtured virtually every right wing pundit who now thrive as TV talking heads.


***
Many progressives blame the current political climate on the Obama administration, and I disagree with a number of Obama’s decisions including his Afghanistan policy. But why should progressives expect any President to lead the way on our issues given the nature of our political system? At the outset of the Obama administration there were dozens of columns reminding progressives that Franklin Delano Roosevelt had told the liberal activists of his day to “make” him initiative progressive programs by mobilizing public opinion. Instead, most of the modern left spent the last year talking to itself while conservatives convinced millions of people that global warming is a hoax, that torture in required to keep America safe, that non-millionaires in Canada and Europe have worse health care than their American counterparts. The right wing could never have convinced 45% of Americans that the Democrats wanted death panels if their outreach was limited to Sarah Palin’s Facebook page and the three million people a night who watch Fox’s highest rated shows.

Perhaps the major liberal money people have become confused because focus groups and polling are very useful tools in predicting short-term public reaction to political messages. They can tell you if a particular TV spot will turn off swing voters two weeks before an election. But long-term political ideas have a more complex creative path. Conservatives understand the need to focus on both long and short-term political communication. Or maybe media advisors and consultants who advise labor unions and an assortment of progressive groups on media strategy are culturally uncomfortable with the crude language of AM talk radio and other mass culture, and who are often so nervous about losing control of "their message.” Whatever the reasons, the theory of leaving political media to the marketplace has enabled a status quo in which one third of the American public are never exposed to progressive ideas or even to facts that are incompatible with the right-wing narrative.
------------------------

Robert Parry at ConsortiumNews.com has been beating this drum for quite a while now:
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/021909.html
The Right has followed a three-decade strategy of building and maintaining its own media infrastructure – and though some right-wing outlets might stumble, most of them are sure to survive with hefty subsidies from wealthy right-wing foundations and business interests.

By contrast, the American Left largely has stayed on the sidelines of what the Right calls “the war of ideas.” The Left has invested far less money in media institutions and think tanks than the Right has.

In essence, liberals and progressives have counted on mainstream journalists to somehow soldier on for the truth even as right-wing anti-journalism groups have targeted those same journalists. (I know this because I was one of those mainstream journalists in the 1980s and 1990s.)

Over the years, there has been a profound short-sightedness in the Left’s media strategy. But even today, there is little indication that the liberals and progressives have learned any lessons. Instead, there remains a lot of wishful thinking that somehow a few independent Web sites will manage to counter the right-wing media behemoth.

[roseBudd]

1. I never expected Liberal Radio to work because.......

Liberals read!

I don't listen to anyone talking on the radio. Radio is for music.

I did listen to Howard Stern for 10 minutes every morning before he went to satellite

[madrchsod]

2. air america was a failure because the business model was wrong.

if liberal radio is dead why is big ed,mama,bill ,thom ,and others doing well? they may not be as big as right wing radio but they are gaining listeners and advertisers.

[hlthe2b]

4. Danny Goldberg was instrumental in starting AAR's long demise..

While I don't necessarily disagree with everything he's written here, he massacred AAR programming the moment he walked in the door, including anything remotely innovative. Goldberg is a big part of any blame to be had.

[bluethruandthru]

3. This is exactly right!

We on the left have played too nice. We sat back and watch as media deregulation happened giving a handful of corporations control over most of our electronic and print media outlets. We haven't propped up liberal talk outlets the way the right has with their stations. But..maybe most importantly - we've told the truth. One of the main reasons Rush, Sean, Billo, Glenn and all the others have succeeded is because they lie. They make up the most outrageous lies and repeat them over and over and get themselves worked up into a frothing rage..and that makes for good entertainment. People love watching and listening to it and soon...they believe it. Why would Rush get so angry if what he was saying wasn't true?
Liberal talkers inform and discuss. That's not nearly as exciting so audience numbers are much smaller.