Do They Make It To the Conventions?
I'm not sure I would call this
"typical" problems with a new business.
In yet another sign of trouble for Air America Radio, the liberal talk network entering its fifth chaotic week on the air, co-founder and chairman Evan Cohen resigned Thursday, as did vice-chairman and investor Rex Sorensen.
The company also failed to make its scheduled payroll Wednesday, leaving its staff roughly 100 radio personalities, writers, and producers unpaid until Thursday.
"We're on a wild ride," said Jon Sinton, the network's president, acknowledging that Air America has suffered "the typical bumps and bruises faced by any start-up."
The week before, co-founder and CEO Mark Walsh resigned (he's still a "senior advisor") and programming chief Dave Logan was kicked to the curb.
I actually don't take much pleasure in seeing Air America appear to be imploding like this. Diversity of opinion and other opinions isn't a bad thing. Not that I listen, but then I don't listen to any political talk radio.
My step-father-in-law, who has some 40+ years of radio experience, and is fairly liberal, has hated what he had heard on the air. He feels that the problem has been that they have people on the radio that have no feel for the radio (a fairly typical complaint). Most of the personalities came from stand-up, sketch comedy or other more visual mediums; and they haven't been able to do radio.
I think the problem is that they rushed to get on the air. They so desperately wanted to be running during the Presidential election, that they didn't have things in place. The personalities they hired never had enough time to learn the job (or they were just too arrogant and cocky to think they had to work at it); it would appear that their finances weren't anywhere near the stable levels they should be; they couldn't or didn't aggressively pursue advertising sales for the shows to help with costs; and they failed to properly secure enough media markets (since they were eschewing a slow roll-out/expansion into other markets).
It may be a liberal talk radio network, but it is first and foremost a business.
Shocking, Absolutely Shocking
Michael
Moore lies, I'm sorry, it's
just publicity. Of course, it's all for a good cause -- his partisan views and wallet, -- so it's no big deal. All I can do is second what
Totten had to say about this, and anyone that wants to defend the crap.
Boy does that sound familiar. I've read the same bullshit again and again on other blogs and in the comments section on my own site. It's always one variation or another on the same theme. You're giving aid and comfort to the Republicans. Yeah, and get stuffed. Marc writes for The Nation. He's not a Bush shill. And so what if he were? Michael Moore is a left-wing Ann Coulter no matter who says so.
Some people just don't get it. When liberals criticize the wing-nuts on their own side it doesn't hurt them. It helps them. Defending liars and conspiracy theorists because theyÂ’re on your own "side" makes your side look insane.
Ask yourself … should conservatives run interference for Ann Coulter just because she's right of center? Or should they tell her to get lost? Ask yourself what would be honorable behavior from the folks on the other side of the aisle. Then follow your own advice. You'll feel better and help yourself in the bargain.
Crap is crap. I liked
Roger and Me whe I saw it, but I stopped buying into most of what Moore had to say in the mid-90s. Everything he has said sincemillenniummillenium has been self-serving, whacko conspiracy crap.
Protester Protests
At an anti-Iraq protest on
Case's campus in March, one of the organizers and founder of the Cleveland chapter of "
Not In Our Name," screamed at an ROTC student that he was a "murderer." Well, the student filed a harassment report for verbal assault. I'm guessing
this is the standard.
Abuse
Abuse includes, but it not limited to:
a. actual or threatened physical or mental abuse of any person on University premises or at functions sponsored or supervised by the University;
b. a singular situation involving an act of physical, verbal, or mental abuse directed toward an individual or individuals;
...
Harassment
Harassment includes but is not limited to:
a. conduct which intimidates, threatens or endangers the health or safety of any person;
b. behavior that intentionally or negligently causes physical, financial or emotional harm to any person;
...
The school agreed, and banned Kristopher Waller, who received his bachelor's degrees in history and religion from Case in January 2004, from the campus.
Well, now,
Kristopher organized a rally on
his behalf.
Well it's hard to realize it some times, but we are not in Germany in1933, and this time the US ruling class first came for the Arabs, Muslims,and South Asians, but now they are coming for those who disagree with this program of war on the world and a police state at home.For four years I have spoken up and struggled to stand with the people of the world.
As a part of Case Western Reserve University's Catalyst Students for Social Justice and other groups on campus I have fought for workers rights and a better wage for workers on campus. I have fought for women's rights, stopping violence against women, women's liberation and for gay and lesbian rights. I have most vocally fought against the detentions and roundup of Arab and Muslim immigrants, and the war on the world that has been unleashed thus far on the people of both Afghanistan and Iraq. I helped start Cleveland Not In Our name Youth and organize many protests against the war, and I am a member of the national Interim Steering Committee for the Not in Our Name project.
Together with a growing number of youth, I refuse to accept that this capitalist hell is the best of all possible worlds. Imperialists wars, the police murders of black youth, to the widespread rape and degradation of women show that this system cannot do anything good. As a part of the Revolutionary Communist Youth Brigade, I have raised my sights to a world without any of these injustices.
He goes on even further for quite a bit. Eventually he gets to the point. There would be a rally in support of him. It took place yesterday, with a crowd of about 20 or so, and
Waller spoke once again.
"I was outspoken while a member of the student body, but now that I am no longer paying tuition, they banned me from the campus," Waller said before the protest. "This whole country is turning into a police state with the Patriot Act and Homeland Security designed to shut down protesters."
As
Jerry Ritcey noted, though
I wasn't aware Patriot Act or the Department of Homeland Security had any regulations regarding ex-students at private universities. And, as Buffy Summers once noted, don't non-student usually populate the non-campus?
Case's decision/overreaction might also have a little something to do with that little
gunman-shooting-up-Weatherhead-incident last year on the campus. You tend to want to minimize risk of violence and confrontations, especially with disgruntled ex-students.
The article notes that Waller lives in
Bay Village. Considering the
median income in Bay Village is around $70,000, and Waller is a local, "
well-known Cleveland activist and member of the Revolutionary Communist Youth Brigade," it doesn't seem like he would have the money or the desire to earn the income necessary to live in an area where the
average house costs around $168,000. I'm guessing this man devoted to helping the downtrodden of the world lives at home with his folks. I'm guessing he can help a lot of the unfortunates while living in a community that is 97% white.
Honestly, I think Case is wrong to ban this idiot. I am amused, though, that he was banned for harassment. A creative use of their codes. Safe to say, not the manner those who pushed for them wanted.
Giving Credit
Not a big Russell Crowe fan. Hate his singing even more -- unless it's the theme to "
Fightin' Round the World." The wife loves him, and even went with friends to see his band in concert a couple years ago. So with a nod to her, I have to admit this is rather
decent of him
Tough guy actor Russell Crowe was so upset by a fire-bombing at a Jewish school in Montreal, Canada he called to offer a donation to help rebuild its library, a school spokeswoman said.
Crowe is in Canada to film Cinderella Man, a film directed by Ron Howard about the life of boxer James J Braddock, who defeated world champion Max Baer in an upset match in 1935.
"It was a huge morale boost for the school community," said Shelley Paris from Montreal.
The United Talmud Torahs elementary school was fire-bombed earlier this month and police said a note with anti-Semitic comments was found on the outside wall of the gutted library.
The only thing left to say, "
Makin music, makin' songs and fightin' 'round the world!"
Kentucky Derby Thoughts
That was a
great race in the mud. Smarty Jones took the race in the stretch and just pulled away from Lion Heart on the sloppy track. I found myself excited in the race and actually jumped from my chair when Smarty Jones pulled even with Lion Heart. I jumped and yelled (
You don't suppose that second Mint Julep had much to do with your enjoying the race do you? Maybe.) much to the amusement of Angie, who bounced and half jumped with me.
Tapit was a complete disappointment. Should have stuck with my
first impulse.
Pre-Kentucky Derby Activities
What a day. We had another mostly sleepless night. Angie just kept waking up screaming and coughing. It seemed like a cold, except this would be her second cold plus an ear infection in just 4 weeks. No fever, but a nasty, body wracking cough and lots of phlegm. We managed to get in to see the doctor in the morning, but I had to stay home. We were supposed to get our DSL hooked up in the morning.
So the wife took the kid while I waited. Quickly getting impatient, I called SBC to see what the status of our order was. Imagine my surprise when I learned that they didn't have an order for us. Best Buy never submitted an order. We went through Best Buy because it was essentially the same deal and rebates, as if we had gone through SBC, but with an additional $140 in Best Buy gift cards. This meant a trip to Best Buy if I still wanted the rebates, but I couldn't leave until I heard from the wife.
I took out my frustrations on a tree out back that needed pruning. I may have hacked a little more than necessary from the tree. The wife finally called, sounding a bit frazzled. She said that Angie has
bronchiolitis, and they had just finished a breathing treatment -- involving putting a mask over her mouth and nose to get the medicine into her for 15 minutes. Our little 22-month old did not appreciate that, and the wife and a nurse spent the entire time restraining her while she screamed and cried the entire way through the ordeal. Felt bad for missing the appointment, and the wife having to go through that; but selfishly kind of relieved I didn't have to watch it. Luckily, it isn't doesn't appear too severe, so we are able to give her the medicine at home in a syrup form.
Waited until the wife got home with Angie, and made her some lunch. Then I left to drop off the prescription at Target and hit Best Buy -- armed with the order information, receipt and notes from my conversations with the SBC reps.
Ended up spending over 45 minutes at Best Buy to get this straightened out. Idiots. The sign-up was in my wife's name, since the SBC phone bill is in her name. When you go through sign-up you enter your home number a couple times to verify that DSL service could be provided. It could. Near the end of the process, they asked for contact information if there was a problem. The form says "Contact information," to include the name, e-mail address and phone number. So my wife obliged, and gave them her name, e-mail and work phone number. Turns out, even though we had used our home number at least twice earlier in the process, when the order gets submitted they used the work number. So, when they started processing the order, they found it a business number and didn't match with the address. Of course no one contacted us about the problem, they just discarded it.
Why? I don't know. The Best Buy people and the SBC people they had the phone pointed out the problem saying it should be the home number. Implying it was our fault. I asked them why it didn't ask for the home number for DSL service, instead of contact information. Considering a Best Buy rep was typing in the order for us last week, she even told us to give the daytime contact number.
This caused the Best Buy person to peer closer at the order in deep study before looking up and saying, "Hmmph. You're right, that doesn't make sense. I'll have to pass a note along about that."
No one had an answer as to why we were never contacted about the problem and why the order seemed to have disappeared from records.
Then, I was speaking on the phone directly with an SBC rep about setting our date for DSL, which has now been pushed to May 11. The absolute topper to this absurdity was the SBC rep then trying to cross sell us a Cingular Wireless cell plan.
I recovered from my shock, and was somehow polite enough to say something like, "Not today, in light of how this has gone, and the delays in the DSL service. But we'll keep it in mind for the future." Really, I just felt like screaming, "
Are you f***ing nuts? After all this crap, you want to cross-sell? You moron, what makes you think I want to let idiots be my cell phone provider when you can't get a DSL order right and don't bother to tell us there's a problem?"
Best Buy was worse. No real apologies for what happened. No make nice gift, for the screw-up. We've bought a laptop, camcorder, DVD player, VCR, software and numerous CDs and DVDs there in the past. No more. After we get and use the gift cards, they won't be getting our business any longer. They aren't worth the hassle, when the Circuit City at the other end of the strip mall is so close in price. The people are nice enough, but they are clueless and their customer service after the fact is beyond useless.
This was driven home even further by what happened at Target. Target's pharmacy was out of the medicine, and immediately called our house. They spoke with the wife and told her that they could contact the grocery store at the other end of the strip mall they resided, and see if they had it. They did, and rather then just have me pick up the prescription and take it down to the grocery store, they walked the prescription along with Angie's insurance information down to them. The wife called me to let me know, and I was able to pick up the prescription at the grocery store instead. The wife's comment, "I love Target."
What a difference in customer service and care.
Angie is already responding well to the medicine. She only woke up once during the night. Lots of snot, but she is definitely feeling better.
