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You also need people financially and ideologically committed enough to get into that market and find that niche.
According to some folks NPR fills that niche. Most of the 'liberals' I know get their ideology from other venues, like periodicals or seminars & lectures. Back in my youth there were some left leaning talk radio shows, but I cant remember them retaining a audience past the 1970s.
Talk radio was developed big as a low budget air filler by commercial radio. During the 1970s & 80s radio became dominated by the large companies & those were uninterested in leftist oriented format. Their marketing research told them advertising revenue lay with the likes of Limbaugh, Liddy, ect...
I really got into radio when I was 15-years-old, probably a late developer in this regard.. . . Back in my youth there were some left leaning talk radio shows, but I cant remember them retaining a audience past the 1970s. . .
Pacifica counts, no? They have some talk-ish shows nowadays, anyway, and you certainly can't accuse them of being right-wing...This was 1978 in Houston, Texas, and I don't remember any left leaning talk shows.
There was Al Franken's "Air America", which apparently was deeply unsuccessful.
The 1960s produce a political party to the left of the Dems, it isn't a serious national force (maybe 1 or 2 legislative seats) but it focuses on building up its state/local level infrastructure while using high profile propaganda campaigns for national office to keep a national presence. That organiation, lets call them The Freedom Democrats, make a conscious effort to build up a presence in radio.A more populist left-wing Democratic Party that hangs on to its working-class identity. Once the GOP replaces the Dems as "the party for the working man," it becomes harder for left-wing voices to really get into traditionally rural and working-class spaces like radio.
You also need people financially and ideologically committed enough to get into that market and find that niche.
There was Al Franken's "Air America", which apparently was deeply unsuccessful.
I didn't discover 90.1 Pacifica Radio till 1989!Pacifica counts, no?
I didn't discover 90.1 Pacifica Radio till 1989!
even though it had been in Houston since I think early '70s (and one of only five Pacifica stations nationwide)
They're all across the board! This guy I know said he once tuned in and they were playing this weird arhythmic drumming. Well, I for one live and die for arhythmic drumming.Never heard of it . . .
Any quirky, offbeat, or just really good stations or programs you've heard about?. . . and I live in Houston