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How the Voice of St. Louis became a big mouthpiece for the radical right. [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2023-07-11
Rush Limbaugh has been on KMOX for more than 26 years.
It was the worse thing that could of happened to what used to be in my opinion the best news station in America. KMOX was known as a 50,000 watt clear channel station heard throughout the Midwest. In fact, since the St. Louis Cardinal broadcasts were heard 3 or 4 states away, many of the listeners throughout the Midwest are Cardinal fans. (Clear channel means that no other station in the US was on the same frequency.)
CBS bought KMOX, and began the process of getting approval to build a 50,000-watt transmitter tower. When completed, it gave the now a signal that could be heard at night through much of the U.S. In the early days of radio, KMOX broadcasts had been picked up in Scotland, New Zealand, the Arctic Circle and South Africa. In 1955, Robert Hyland Jr. became KMOX's general manager, a role he held for nearly forty years. It was Hyland who leveraged KMOX's relationship with the Cardinals, signing many lucrative advertising contracts with local businesses. Hyland made the decision in 1960 to eliminate the station's afternoon music programming, the last of the non-talk shows. That made KMOX the first full-time talk radio station in the country, helping keep KMOX dominance in the St. Louis radio market for many decades. On February 29, 1960, Jack Buck hosted the first "At Your Service" program, which included an interview with former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. That program, like the sports and talk shows that soon followed, pioneered a format for radio featuring news maker interviews, guest appearances, and calls from listeners
They had fantastic talk show hosts. Many of the most well known sports broadcasters were on KMOX. I can’t even remember the midnight talk show host’s name from the old days, but his sign off was “and all you know, via radio.”
Then:
During the 1990s, the Federal Communications Commission's regulations on the ownership of multiple radio stations were eased, beginning with the introduction of duopoly rules, which allowed a company to own two stations in each radio market. On February 2, 2017, CBS Radio announced it would merge with Entercom.[23] The merger was approved on November 9, 2017, and was consummated on the 17th.[24][25] The Entercom acquisition ended KMOX's 88 years of CBS ownership.
Yes, Congress and the courts don’t have problems with enabling monopolies, don’t you know?
The Clayton Act addresses specific practices that the Sherman Act does not clearly prohibit, such as mergers and interlocking directorates (that is, the same person making business decisions for competing companies). Section 7 of the Clayton Act prohibits mergers and acquisitions where the effect "may be substantially to lessen competition, or to tend to create a monopoly." “During the 1990s, the Federal Communications Commission's regulations on the ownership of multiple radio stations were eased…”
”Now let’s talk about Rush Limbaugh. I guess it’s just a coincidence that he came to KMOX around 1994. Which is why at that time I knew things in this country are changing for the worse. I just didn’t know how bad until tRump, Fox and the “Fake News” stuff.
This was the ruination of Broadcast Radio and TV News stations like KMOX, Broadcasters like Walter Cronkite, Edward R. Morrow and David Brinkley. And for what reason, you ask?
Rush Limbaugh was ‘very important’ to KMOX. His death forces a big decision. "Rush Limbaugh was very important to KMOX radio," Milhaven said, adding that the Missouri native was a "ratings bonanza." Posthumous media reports have estimated Limbaugh's audience at 15 million people a week.
Yes, money! Can you imagine how much money that’s worth? And they are still milking it, now.
Rachel Nelson, a spokeswoman for Premiere Networks, the iHeartMedia (NASDAQ: IHRT) subsidiary that employed Limbaugh, said in a statement that it plans "to provide the millions of loyal listeners with the voice of Rush Limbaugh for long term," and will utilize guest hosts including Mark Steyn, Todd Herman and Ken Matthews. "With over 30 years of audio, Rush has a definite view on current issues of the day," Nelson said.
Great, now they can broadcast him forever!
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