It was an experiment that obviously failed.
Turns out that former federal prosecutor and CIA attorney John Loftus and upstart liberal talk radio network Nova M Radio were just not a very good match. Loftus' weeknight show has been canceled by Nova M, with the final show airing this past Friday.
Loftus was signed by the network last November, and his show debuted in late February. Since then, Loftus was moved from his 8-9PM ET perch to later in the night, following the Mike Malloy show at Midnight. Listener reaction has been far from overwhelming. In fact, they really hated the guy.
Turns out that, while Loftus is a highly intelligent man who has written books and has a vast knowledge of middle east affairs, he was a bit too hawkish on a potential war with Iran, among other things (I'm walking a fine line here in trying to prevent Israel/Arab flamewars from breaking out in the comments section, so don't even think it!). Many people didn't like Loftus' Liebermanesque approach to world politics. Let's just say that his show mixed with Nova M's Mike Malloy like oil and water. It just didn't work.
Meanwhile, Nova M is still hard at work developing other programming, particularly on the weekends. Pollster John Zogby is on the air Friday evenings at 6PM with Jeff Farias with "Pulse of the Nation." Among other weekend offerings are Ernest Hancock's "Declare Your Independence" and a new show from frequent Malloy caller Herb 'Sarge' Phelps that will concentrate heavily on the aftermath of Hurrican Katrina.
Incidentally, as reported here the other day, Nova M Radio has video highlights of their birthday bash from last week. You can find those on their YouTube group.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
John Loftus gets the boot
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Eureka, CA 
6 comments:
I hear Marc Maron is still available and I'm sure Sam Seder could be yanked from his upcoming Sunday Afternoon Wasteland at AAR without much difficulty. :)
First Newcomb. Now Loftus. Seems like if Drobny had run AAR at any point, they'd have been in even worse shape.
The strategy in libtalk appears to be : Hire your friends. Dump them when it doesn't work. No surprise. These are political types, not business types were are talking about.
Is it really so hard to find and develop libtalk talent? Well, maybe. All my time in radio, almost everybody I ever worked with was politically authoritarian (despite their own self-interest). Maybe they have to hire stand up comedians, comedy writers, doctors, lawyers, pollsters and political operatives because so few liberals work in local radio (let alone sell radio or manage radio).
Sarge's new show is The UnreportedNews.Net Radio Show.b
Want to know the background to the termination of John Loftus. The only place you will find it is on
http://talkshowratings.blogspot.com
with my letter to Mike Malloy, Shelby Drobny's reply, John Loftus's tirade against me, my reply to John Loftus and Shelby Drobny's reply as to why John Loftus was terminated!
Enjoy!
Hey, thanks for the update! You can find out the whole deal at talkshowratings.blogspot.com.
This is kinda what I thought Drobny's rationale was for ditching the show. And hopefully everything will work out for all.
Thank god that carzy neocon is gone! nova m deserves better.
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