Wednesday, April 13, 2005

Radio Free Springfield

Well, Springfield’s top radio talker looks at this blog. WMAY’s Jim Leach left a very kind comment to one of my posts. That’s assuming it’s really him and not one of ETK’s personalities emerging uncontrolled.

WMAY has the best local talk in town with pretty good to excellent on–air staff, especially for a market the size if Springfield.

I used to listen to Jim a lot when he did afternoons but I don’t get to listen as much now that he’s doing mornings. I have to be at work early and my AM reception is non-existent at my desk.

The thing I like most about Jim is how he forces callers to be factual even when leading up to a larger point. As someone who also did a radio talk show (20 years ago), I know how irritating it is to have a caller expressing an opinion or presenting “facts” based on flawed or completely inaccurate information. Jim doesn’t let callers get away with that.

Many (bad) talk show hosts just let the callers say whatever they want, virtually unchallenged. I know that sounds only fair, free speech and all, but good God there are a lot of falsehoods being perpetuated by talk radio. Well, the buck stops at Jim’s mic.

I’ve heard from a lot of people they think Jim is rude but it wastes everybody’s time when a caller gets repetitive or simply has no idea what they are talking about.

Predictably, the other reason I like Jim’s show is I happen to mostly agree with his views. (However, he’s totally wrong about the death penalty -wrong, Jim, wrong.) In a radio world dominated by conservative blather it’s nice to have another perspective.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Dave, thanks for the kind words. And, yes, it's really me. I didn't post just to troll for attention or nice comments, but I'm pathetically grateful for them all the same.