Feel Good Story of the Day

[Valin]

Power Line:

Steven Hayward

September 25, 2015

 

If you’re an old FM radiohead from southern California, and especially if you slum it around the low end of the dial, down below even where the NPR stations lurk, you will be familiar with KPFK, the flagship station of the very left-wing Pacifica Radio. I tune in from time to time just to get a good chortle over their latest Chomskyite Zinnsanity. Well, KPFK and other Pacifica stations are apparently in a death spiral because no one listens to them.

 

When I say “no one listens” this is almost literally true. The Guardian’s recent story about Pacifica’s troubles included this tidbit:

 

 

The LA Weekly reported last year that during an average 15-minute period just 700 people listen to KPFK for at least five minutes versus 8,000 and 20,000 respectively for LA’s other other public radio stations, KCRW and KPCC.

 

 

There are more people reading Power Line at any given moment than listen to KPFK. But the really fun part is contained in the Los Angeles Times op-ed from a disgruntled KPFK personality about how the Pacifica station is circling the drain precisely because it embraced Bernie Sander-style “worker management,” which the Times calls “death by democracy.” There have been heavy layoffs of staff, and lately a 50 percent pay cut across the board. Pacifica is reportedly $2.1 million in arrears to their biggest star Amy Goodman. The Times op-ed tells the story without a trace of irony:

 

(Snip)

 

In other words, KPFK is failing precisely because it manages itself according to the nostrums of the syndicalist left. Democracy Now! indeed. Who doubts that no one will learn the obvious lesson?

[Valin]

Things Still Not Pacific at Pacifica
Steven Hayward
October 4, 2015

An update to our earlier notices of the mayhem at leftist Pacifica Radio and flagship station KPFK, courtesy of the Pacifica-in-Exile folks, who sent out a press release a couple days ago detailing the ongoing implosion of the enterprise:

Dominos Topple: Third On-Air Resignation at KPFK In Three Days

 

Berkeley – On Wednesday, Yatrika Shah-Rais became the third veteran programmer to resign on-air at Los Angeles radio station KPFK. Shah-Rais, the former music director of the Cultural Center in Los Angeles, announced her departure one day after Betto Arcos announced the airing of his final show, and two days after Derek Rath resigned on-air, all three of them long term producers of the station’s Global Village series. Former Doors drummer John Densmore called into KPFK during Arcos’ final show. You can hear Shah-Rais’ goodbye here. GM Radford is said to have tried to prevent the live on-air Global Village broadcast Wednesday morning.

(Snip)

 

 

 

 

There’s lots more, and you can read the whole release here. I haven’t had this much leftist schadenfreude since the Berlin Wall came down.