A year after the launch of the Air America radio network, ... [View All]

[jefferson_dem]

...progressive talk is making progress

By Mark Jurkowitz, Globe Staff | March 31, 2005

It's morning drive time in Boston, and talk-show host Stephanie Miller is blasting away, criticizing the forces pushing to have Terri Schiavo's feeding tube restored, mocking Fox News Channel pundit Bill O'Reilly, and attacking Senator Rick Santorum, the Pennsylvania Republican. A year after the left launched a major effort to combat Rush Limbaugh and conservative dominance of the airwaves, liberal talk is taking hold here and in scores of other cities.

While the big talk stations WRKO-AM (680) and WTKK-FM (96.9) remain strongholds of conservative voices, such left-of-center hosts as Miller, Ed Schultz, Al Franken, Randi Rhodes, and Janeane Garofalo are luring listeners to what is billed as ''Boston's new progressive talk radio network."

That network consists of two ratings-challenged stations -- Framingham's WKOX-AM (1200) and Medford's WXKS-AM (1430) -- that operate with sunrise-to-sundown licenses. But the mere fact that the network exists prompts analysts to deem the embryonic experiment in liberal talk a promising, if qualified, success.

''There's obviously a niche that was not being filled, and they found that niche," said Scott Fybush, editor of the publication NorthEast Radio Watch. ''The question now is: Can they grow it?"

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http://www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2005/03/31/message_received?mode=PF