While Nantucket has been known to exist in a parallel universe, are the summering "locals" really willing to pay $25 to see the likes of civic disgrace Mike Barnicle?

From the Nantucket Independent, Barnicle's lecture will apparently initiate an all-moonbat series at Nantucket High School:

Mike Barnicle will kick off the 2008 Geschke Lecture series on July 7, 8 p.m., at the Nantucket High School auditorium. Barnicle will address the theme of this year's series which is "A Country At The Crossroads: Critical Issues Facing America."

Barnicle is a columnist for the New York Daily News and host of a daily radio program on WTKK-FM in Boston. He is a frequent guest, and occasional guest host, on MSNBC's 'Hardball with Chris Matthews.'

The series continues with: former Delaware Congressman and Governor Pete du Pont on July 16, NPR political reporter Mara Liasson on July 23, Washington Post foreign relations correspondent Robin Wright on July 30 and moderator of PBS's "Washington Week" Gwen Ifill on August 2.

Tickets are $25 for each lecture and are on sale at www.nantucketatheneum. org or at the Nantucket Atheneum, 1 India Street.

What are the odds his lecture will be stolen from someone else?

While Nantucket has been known to exist in a parallel universe, are the summering "locals" really willing to pay $25 to see the likes of civic disgrace Mike Barnicle?

From the Nantucket Independent, Barnicle's lecture will apparently initiate an all-moonbat series at Nantucket High School:

Mike Barnicle will kick off the 2008 Geschke Lecture series on July 7, 8 p.m., at the Nantucket High School auditorium. Barnicle will address the theme of this year's series which is "A Country At The Crossroads: Critical Issues Facing America."

Barnicle is a columnist for the New York Daily News and host of a daily radio program on WTKK-FM in Boston. He is a frequent guest, and occasional guest host, on MSNBC's 'Hardball with Chris Matthews.'

The series continues with: former Delaware Congressman and Governor Pete du Pont on July 16, NPR political reporter Mara Liasson on July 23, Washington Post foreign relations correspondent Robin Wright on July 30 and moderator of PBS's "Washington Week" Gwen Ifill on August 2.

Tickets are $25 for each lecture and are on sale at www.nantucketatheneum. org or at the Nantucket Atheneum, 1 India Street.

What are the odds his lecture will be stolen from someone else?

While Nantucket has been known to exist in a parallel universe, are the summering "locals" really willing to pay $25 to see the likes of civic disgrace Mike Barnicle?

From the Nantucket Independent, Barnicle's lecture will apparently initiate an all-moonbat series at Nantucket High School:

Mike Barnicle will kick off the 2008 Geschke Lecture series on July 7, 8 p.m., at the Nantucket High School auditorium. Barnicle will address the theme of this year's series which is "A Country At The Crossroads: Critical Issues Facing America."

Barnicle is a columnist for the New York Daily News and host of a daily radio program on WTKK-FM in Boston. He is a frequent guest, and occasional guest host, on MSNBC's 'Hardball with Chris Matthews.'

The series continues with: former Delaware Congressman and Governor Pete du Pont on July 16, NPR political reporter Mara Liasson on July 23, Washington Post foreign relations correspondent Robin Wright on July 30 and moderator of PBS's "Washington Week" Gwen Ifill on August 2.

Tickets are $25 for each lecture and are on sale at www.nantucketatheneum. org or at the Nantucket Atheneum, 1 India Street.

What are the odds his lecture will be stolen from someone else?

Sure enough, Rush's traditional enemies aren't happy with his new mega-deal. Some, however, are really taking things a bit too far.

Also, the Boston Herald has a piece on how the Rush story was broken and Matt Drudge's dubious "exclusive". I'll have more to say about this later today.

The Herald has the story here.

I've got the exclusive over at The Radio Equalizer.

As Entercom continues its brutal implosion on Wall Street, Pops (Entercom Chairman Joseph Field) has lost even more money on last week's open market purchase of ETM shares.

Yesterday, we made a rough guess that Field had lost at least $63,000 buying his company's sagging shares.

With ETM falling another 49 cents today to a mere $6.53 (1pm EDT quote), however, his paper losses are now likely in the $120,000 to $135,000 range.

Perhaps the Fields will think twice before pulling that stunt again. Wall Street was not fooled.

This morning, I walked into a local convenience store to buy newspapers and encountered an apologetic store owner explaining to an incredulous customer why his pack of Marlboro Lights would now cost a whopping $6.79.

That's because our embarrassment of a legislature just jacked up cigarette prices by a dollar per pack and gave shopkeepers absolutely no time to implement the changes.

Do the Beacon Hill Corruptocrats really believe this will generate $175m in additional revenue? Isn't it obvious Bay State smokers will find their smokes elsewhere? Cigarette smugglers must be doing handstands today.

This approach has failed everywhere it has been attempted, but we live in a state where politicians repeat the same foolish mistakes, each time hoping for a different outcome. In a year or two we will be hearing about how higher taxes led to FALLING revenues.

Back to that customer- how soon before he realizes there are cheaper smokes available by circumventing the law? How soon does widespread evasion become the norm?

I caught one local host briefly mentioning this TERRIFIC talk radio topic today before quickly moving on to Obama, Obama and more Obama. At this point, I'd rather hear about nearly anything else.

We have a serious problem with local hosts who are unable to fully develop compelling topics. Some Talk Radio 101 coaching is in order.

Last Wednesday, Entercom Chairman Joseph Field (David's generally retired father) made news by purchasing ETM shares on the open market. Insiders usually do this when they believe their company has been undervalued by Wall Street.

At prices between $7.35 and $7.63, Field bought 135,600 ETM shares, according to his subsequent SEC filing. That created a rare, minor buzz for the company and its ailing stock. That day, Entercom saw a gain of about half a point on heavier-than-average volume.

Since then, the owner of WRKO and WEEI has resumed its relentless slide, finishing today at $7.02, a new closing low.

We don't know exactly what Field Sr paid for each share, but he may have already lost as much as $63,732 on the purchase, assuming an average price of $7.49.

So here's the big question: who let Pops have the checkbook?

$63,000 buys a lot of fun in Atlantic City or Vegas and at least there would be some happy memories associated with disposing of the money.

Heck, handing out C-notes to random pedestrians on the streets of Bala Cynwyd would be more productive than this stunt.

So why did he do it? Does he really believe Entercom's decade-long slide into Wall Street oblivion will suddenly reverse course?

In a different economic climate, we might be willing to consider the idea that someone would purchase the company, but that's extremely unlikely as the radio sector continues to collapse.

Could it be that ol' Joe is just not grasping the severity of his company's decline?

The murder trial of former WRKO employee James Keown has gone to a jury, according to the Herald:

A former WRKO (680-AM) employee accused of poisoning his adoring wife to death with anti-freeze-spiked Gatorade scoured the Internet for ways to finish her off as “Kesyer Soze,” Kevin Spacey’s murderous monster in “The Usual Suspects,” prosecutors said today.

Jurors began deliberating more than two weeks of evidence and testimony this afternoon after James Keown, 34 - who would like the panel to consider that Julie Keown, a registered nurse, may have committed a slow, agonizing suicide - declined to take the witness stand on his own behalf.

Hello:

I didn't know if other people missed Moe Lauzier but WPRO 630 AM has Moe covering for Dan Yorke 2pm-6pm on July 2 and July 11, in addition to the week of July 14-18.

I found this information on Moe's website.

I heard him yesterday and it put a smile on my face to hear that familiar voice.

I guess Rhode Island stations get it. First Todd on WHJJ and Moe on WPRO.

I have been listening to the Rhode Island stations and given up on WRKO.

All the best,

Janet

After his asinine, pro- al-Qaeda comment on Capitol Hill, Rep Bill Delahunt (D-Venezuela) has once again embarrassed the South Shore, Cape, Islands and the whole of Massachusetts.

That didn't go unnoticed by talk radio hosts, who've correctly been pounding away at Delahunt all day. From Rush Limbaugh to Howie Carr, the former Norfolk DA hasn't received this much attention since his previous pro- Hugo Chavez meltdowns.

From Limbaugh's Friday program:

RUSH: There was an event on Capitol Hill yesterday, just give you an idea. Do you know how many hearings, by the way, the Congress, House and Senate combined have had on oil and energy this year? Do you know how many hearings there have been with the Big Oil execs and without, just exploratory hearings? They've had 40 hearings on oil and energy, and has anything happened? Yes, the price has continued to go up. Do you know how many hearings they have had on whether or not the United States tortures detainees? They've had over 60 in the House and Senate combined, over 60 House and Senate hearing, and there was another one yesterday. It was the Constitution civil rights and civil liberties subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee. Massachusetts representative Bill Delahunt was questioning David Addington. David Addington is chief of staff, former counsel to Vice President Cheney. Addington, a very private guy, does not show up in public. He was forced to show up at this hearing. They asked him the typical stupid questions, and he just stuck it to these guys by not bending over forwards and grabbing the ankles like Republicans usually do or anybody else does when they face a congressional committee. This did not sit well with Bill Delahunt, who said this.

DELAHUNT: Oh, I can understand why he [the President] doesn't talk about it.

ADDINGTON: But you gotta communicate with Al-Qaeda. If you do -- I can't talk to you. Al-Qaeda may watch C-SPAN.

DELAHUNT: Right. Well, I'm -- I'm sure they are watching, and I'm glad they finally have a chance to -- to see you, Mr. Addington, give --

ADDINGTON: I'm sure you're pleased.

RUSH: You need me to translate this for you? Delahunt said, "Oh, I can understand why the president doesn't talk about it." Addington, "you gotta communicate with Al-Qaeda. If you do, I can't talk to you, Al-Qaeda may watch C-SPAN." I can't tell you what we're doing about Al-Qaeda. Not here. Delahunt says, "Yeah, well, I'm sure Al-Qaeda is watching, and I'm glad they finally have a chance to see you, Mr. Addington." A number of people have inferred from this that Delahunt would not be disappointed if Al-Qaeda took Addington out now that they know who he is. Delahunt has said, "I didn't say 'they.' I didn't say finally they had a chance to see you, I said finally I've had a chance to see you." Okay, let's see if that's what he said. Let's listen to this again, now.

What amazes me about this is that Delahunt represents one of the Bay State's most conservative districts. Yes, there are a few moonbat towns down here, but it's not a place where conservative sentiments must be kept hidden (like Cambridge, P-Town, Berkeley, Seattle, etc).

ALSO BLOGGING: Hub Politics.

Earlier today, I contacted Dr Laura to get her views on the Gloucester pregnancy pact mess. Here's my piece with the results.

Sounds like the name of a circa-1950s rock band, doesn't it?

Here's the issue: we can blast Howie Carr all we want for phoning in his show (meaning putting very little effort into it), but around here, government corruption means there is an endless amount of low-hanging fruit to be picked.

Why should he try? It's so easy here.

That's not to say we can't make criticism of Howie stick: it's as simple as calling him out on his inability to develop these great topics.

Kicking off today's show, he ran recorded soundbites on the toll-takers theft scandal, but within moments, had moved into other topics. As he jumped all over several potentially great issues, none were properly developed. The result was a mess.

I'm guessing several professional programmers have tried to work with him on this over the years, but he wasn't willing to listen.

Pick your number one topic, develop it and move on to the others later. You've got four hours, so time isn't the issue.

At least Howie tries to cover local issues, unlike Vay Cay Jay, who either believes he's above them or hasn't bothered to get up to speed since moving here from Sag Harbor.

After spending part of the week in New York City, I'm now back home in New England. On Tuesday, I was at the FOX News Channel, where I did my bit for the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy.

Because Amtrak service has been curtailed beyond Mystic this week, I drove to New London to catch the Northeast Regional (no Acela this time, it hasn't gone north of NYC this week and I had no desire to repeat my last experience). Oddly, hardly anybody was riding the normally-packed trains, the service outage scared most of them away.

During the drive to New London (civic motto: where your "private property" belongs to politicians), I listened to quite a bit of talk radio. Impressions:

WRKO: The Felon was struggling to get through the show as usual. Lately, there's a tone of desperation apparent at times, as though he knows the vanished audience has defeated him. This wretched show should have been put to sleep a long time ago. Why does it continue?

WTKK: As he addressed his latest flap, Imus actually had a bit of entertainment value, a rarity these days. He's doing well for WTKK, but for how long?

WPRO: As he dug into the issue of an non-deported illegal alien who kidnapped and raped a Providence woman and the resulting political fallout, John DePetro was doing a great job. Unlike the nervous wreck he often appeared to be while at WRKO, he's in his element at WPRO.

I also liked the fact that WPRO still has a functioning newsroom that can deliver updates to the hosts as they develop. It sure exposes WRKO for the two-bit operation it has become.

I only had one small complaint: he needs to quickly reset his topic after returning from each break. Anyone tuning in after the hour has begun isn't going to have a clue about the issue at hand.

Driving the length of Rhode Island, it quickly becomes clear why WPRO has migrated to FM. Their 630 AM signal is lacking in many areas.

WHJJ: Another nice surprise was hearing Todd Feinburg filling in at WHJJ, which is largely syndicated and poorly marketed these days. Todd was clearly enjoying having a chance to be back behind a local microphone.

On the late evening drive home, I caught Michael Savage with a female guest who was talking to the audience in Spanish, a truly surreal experience.

That was followed by a host whose voice I didn't recognize, who gave a lifeless, sadly low- energy take on the Gloucester pregnancy pact. In 20 minutes of listening, he never identified himself or the program.

Only during the next break did I learn who I was listening to: a former actor who decided to play radio and convinced a syndicator this wretched program should go national. It's used by the firm as a "must carry" add-on: if a station wants a more-coveted show they own, it's required to run his as well.

That was a lot of talk radio listening in one dose, wasn't it? Overall, I believe the Providence stations sounded far superior to their Boston counterparts. Remember when the Hub was a nationally-recognized center for compelling talk radio?

Here's my theory.

It's no secret that one or two local talk hosts have had their spring ratings hopes pinned firmly on Neil Entwistle's shirt pocket.

But the proceedings were fairly straightforward, with the preposterous defense theory of Rachel's own murder- suicide providing the only real talk radio hot button.

Now that Entwistle has been sentenced to two life terms, there are two remaining discussion topics:

-- Will our demented Supreme Judicial Court overturn the decision on a technicality? In Massachusetts, that is always a possibility.

-- The biggie: the Bay State's lack of a death penalty has once again allowed a sick murderer to escape true punishment.

That's an easy topic for some, but what about hosts who were hired because their views matched those of management? We have several in Boston and they are once again out of sync with the average talk radio listener.

... And have updates coming today.

As a dozen of you quickly let me know, Howie's apparently off this week, meaning Vay Cay season (WRKO edition) has officially begun.

Has somebody ever attempted to count the incredible amount of time off Howie and Vay Cay Jay have managed to secure in their contracts?

The upside for SaveWRKO: we'll have a great time griping about the lousy fill-ins. Will it sink to new depths this year?

Ten minutes before Howie's show kicks off, let me guess what he's up to:

1) Brushing up on his Fung Wah jokes

2) Firing up the Dead Pool after George Carlin's passing.

Will she return, or won't she? I've got an exclusive update here.

Forget Entercom's seeming strategy of riding the coattails of Boston sports victories- Wall Street couldn't be more unimpressed with the owner of WRKO and WEEI.

After reaching a fresh, 52-week low earlier in the week, ETM shares sank even further during Friday trading, falling to just $7.49 before recovering slightly to $7.60 at the close.

We've talked about the -85% five-year performance of Entercom shares, but what stands out most now is its shrinking market capitalization: now down to a mere $240m.

In theory at least, that's what it would take to purchase ALL of the company's common shares. A few years ago, some of its largest stations individually might have been valued near that figure. Yet the company owns more than 100 outlets nationwide.

While there's no question radio is in trouble overall, Entercom is quickly joining Citadel at the top of the endangered species list. Is federal protection in order?

Why waste afternoon drive on weekend-style pet talk when the 6pm hour could be filled with these great local stories:

1) The shocking Gloucester High "pregnancy pact" where an entire group of very young girls conspired to get themselves knocked up. How did Time Magazine scoop the entire local media on this huge story?

2) Two men who participated in a DNA sample drive on the Cape want their data back, now that Christa Worthington's killer has been convicted (at least in theory).

Tuned into Howie's final hour today and quickly realized it was a mistake to do so.

Yes, during afternoon drive in the nation's tenth-largest market, Carr is killing time doing pet talk!

Is it that hard to find and develop real radio topics?

No wonder Vay Cay Jay is winning the ratings war, the other team has forfeited the game.

Need I say more?

WEEI/WRKO ASSISTANT PROGRAM DIRECTOR

06/17/08

DESCRIPTION

Sports Radio WEEI 850AM and Boston's Talk Station WRKO 680AM has a very rare opening for an Assistant Program Director to work directly with the VP/AM Programming and Operations.

Responsibilities include, but are not limited to: The daily operation of WRKO, including managing the producer staff, both full time and part time and creating and maintaining a weekly program schedule; attending all pre-show and/or post-show meetings with talent; hosting weekly one on one meetings with each producer on both stations; being the liaison to all network/syndicated programming on both stations; coordinating all programming content from all outlets and researching potential new programming; being responsible for all weekend programming on both stations, including local and paid content; working with sales on all paid programming on WRKO; recruiting new talent for local shows on WEEI; all intern scheduling and recruitment; being liaison to sales for all copy and aircheck approval; planning and executing all live remote broadcasts; training of all producers, full and part time, and any additional support staff; working with the Director of Digital Content to ensure that web is updated; involved in the recruitment process of future full time talent; public file reports; help with research of new technology; help recruit board ops/producers for satellite EEI*s in Providence, Worcester, Springfield and any additional market that EEI moves into.

The right candidate will have at least 3 years major market experience with the ability to deal with big time talent both on and off the air. Please send resume and cover letter to bostonjobs@entercom.com

No phone calls please. ENTERCOM IS AN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY EMPLOYER.

CONTACT INFORMATION

Human Resources
WEEI/WRKO
20 Guest Street 3rd Floor
Brighton, MA 02135
bostonjobs@entercom.com

No mention of coffee-making skills, is there?