The New Republic

On page B1 of today's Wall Street Journal there appears an article by Sarah
McBride that is headlined "Texas Station Interrupts Commercial
Interruptions." The experiment starts with Dallas classic-rock radio station
KZPS. So what does the innovation really entail? "...Regular 30-second
and 60-second advertisers wont be part of the lineup." McBride continues:
"The Clear Channel Communications Inc. station plans to weave in mentions
of sponsor, no more than fifteen seconds at a time, throughout the regular
programming--a setup that is more akin to public radio than traditional
commercial broadcasting...The Clear Channel...initiative...aims to boost
audience ratings by cutting the amount of advertising on each of its stations."

The public radio analogy irritates me. Maybe Ms. McBride doesn't listen to
it much. But in Greater Boston we have two public stations: WBUR and
WGBH. They are not at all high-brow. They, and the whole PBS oligarchy,
are what the great culture critic of mid-twentieth century America, Dwight
MacDonald, called mid-cult. (You can buy any book of his with real
intellectual gain...if you read it.) In any case, there are many
weeks during the year when the stations do almost nothing else but
advertise for themselves. That is, irritating people with irritating
voices with an irritating message--intended to make the listeners feel very
good about themselves and their growing minds and oh, so tolerant but really
orthodox views--take over the air waves cajoling you into making
contributions. There was a clever incentive this year to give and give
early: whenever the station reached its financial goal the non-stop
advertising would stop. Frankly, I didn't give. PBS to me is the
Palestine Broadcasting Service. Sorry, I can't help it.

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