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Glenn Beck is the new rush- except he's a "sober asshole"
We can relate with Radio Beat columnist Bill Virgin- news is pretty slow around Seattle radio land at the moment. Everyone's on vacation, nobody's getting fired or arrested. No big programming changes- all that'll happen in September/October, when the deadwood traditionally gets culled.
That's probably why he did the puff piece on the regrettable Glenn Beck, raised locally and is, as Virgin says, "nearly ubiquitous in the media world."
The conservative Beck, 42, is the host of his own show on CNN Headline News, and is syndicated on the radio by Clear Channel in some 200 markets like Aberdeen and Pasco, but not in Seattle, although he's been trying for years to wiggle in here. Virgin:
When he left the region at age 18, having graduated from high school in Bellingham, "I just wanted to get really good and come home," he says. Coming home, at least in radio terms, hasn't happened yet. "We are always interested and pitching in Seattle. It's the only market that has rejected me since the day I left it."
If you ask him, or his Clear Channel handlers, Beck is the next Rush Limbaugh. But to insiders, he's the next Rusty Humphries.
Beck's juice is really Gatorade- it looks like a refreshing treat, but it tastes like Scotch tape.
He's gotten where he's got, according to our sources, because he "is connected at the hip to Gabe Hobbs [Clear Channel Senior VP for News/Talk Programming]. His show has been going nowhere for a long time. There's a reason nobody ever picked him up in Seattle; because the show stinks, says our guy."
Another radio pro tells us: "The only reason he is on the air period, is because of the BIG WIG connection" [There are] no Clear Channel talkers in Seattle, hence, no Beck in Seattle."
(A big media company can decide they like you; buy you into a market, promote the hell out of you, and give you an advantage few newcomers have. Sean Hannity in Seattle is a good example. When he was starting out in syndication a few years ago, ABC Radio bought his way into KVI, who threw the inconveniently scheduled Medved in front of the bus, causing the Cultural Crusader to leave the local market until Entercom created KTTH. Sean Hannity, btw, is sucking ratings well below Medved's).
Last year WGST in Atlanta dropped Beck, and now WLAC in Nashville is moving someone into his early time slot in October. It's not clear whether Beck will be dropped, or moved to the wee hours. What makes this significant is both WLAC and WGST are owned by Clear Channel.
Is his corporate grip beginning to loosen due to failing numbers?
CC recently made a big deal when Beck picked up KXME, an LA station!, they shouted. Turns out it's really in Anaheim. And except for Beck- it's in Spanish and Spanglish! Wonder how his new audience will react to his quaint views on immigration?
Beck, who is a converted to Mormonism, makes on-air schtick out of his recovery from alcoholism. We're reminded of a saying in Alcoholics Anonymous, "Sober up an asshole- don't be surprised if you get a sober asshole."
His Christian love must have been down on the ranch with the President last year when he referred to survivors of Hurricane Katrina who remained in New Orleans as "scum-bags." According to Media Matters, he attacked victims of the disaster in general and the families of victims of the September 11 attacks, saying: "I didn't think I could hate victims faster than the 9-11 victims."
MSNBC's Countdown host Keith Olbermann honored him with third place in his "Worst Person in the World" award segment for comparing The New York Times' report on a Treasury Department program designed to track terrorists' international financial transactions to condoning the genocide committed by the Nazis during the Holocaust."
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