Liberals just ain't havin' a very good week.
First, the Massachusetts Senate seat that had been theirs since 1921 (except for a long-past six year period) slips from their grasp, sinking their 60 vote super majority.
And now, their beloved national radio network, Air America, has declared it will cease operations.
The Al Gore founded and funded liberal radio network, started with great fanfare in 2004, aired its last new programming today.
Charlie Kireker, one of Air America's principal owners and its chairman, said in a memo to employees Thursday that the company was done in by "a perfect storm" of plunging ad revenues, intense competition, high debt and poor prospects for new financing.
A search for new investors, he said, has been fruitless.
(Apparently, those elements haven't affected other radio networks.)
Now some might see these two occurrences as unrelated.
Especially liberals who are desperately seeking any excuse for their Massachusetts loss.
But the fact is, the cause for both is exactly the same: Not enough people cared for the message of the new progressives to support the program.
The left has long been putting forth the idea that their ideas and programs are superior to any one elses, and that if you disagree, you're just too stupid, uneducated, or prejudiced to understand.
That elite superior attitude has finally come back and bitten them in the ass.
Two coastal pockets of liberalism, the California / Washington corridor, and the Boston Washington corridor, do not a nation make.
Because, the bulk of the country, commonnly called "Flyover Country", continues to lean strongly conservative.
Conservative in issues involving the economy, education, national security, and entitlements.
Those "Flyover" folks in Missouri, Nebraska, Kansas, Texas, Idaho, and the other states, still believe in, and practice, the values that have made America great.
The folks in those two coastal pockets of liberalism simply don't respect the "great unwashed" citizenry of the center of the country.
And now, the bulk of the country is rejecting the liberal message with vigor.
The liberals are already blaming everything but their message for Air America's failure: the bad economy, the lack of a "fairness docctrine", etc.
If those excuses are valid, then we should quickly expect to see Rush Limbaugh and his "Excellence in Broadcasting" network fail as well, along with Sean Hannity and Michael Savage, et al.
Not bloody likely.
In comparison to the staunch, multimillion followings of those commentators, Air America didn't hit the mark or even come close.
The fact is that Air America was pretty much in trouble from the start.
The company had difficulty lining up affiliates and attracting a sizable audience.
It filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy-court protection just 30 months after its inception and was resold to an investor group in early 2007 for $4.25 million.
Even now, the network has only 100 stations, its largest distribution system since inception.
It's Washington, D.C. flagship, WZAA (1050 AM), has long struggled for listeners, even in a predominantly left leaning town.
Even after the O-man's election, people in Washington didn't listen.
The liberal audience has been so small that Arbitron, which compiles radio ratings, was unable to detect any listeners for WZAA during several weeks in December.
As is the case in most of the liberal endeavors, it came down to a simple "do as I say, not as I do" equation.
They apply it to legislation, exempting themselves from laws teh rest of us have to follow.
They apply it to taxation, exempting their cronies from taxes the rest of us are expected to pay.
And, they obviously applied the same logic to supporting their radio network.
Apparently, even the liberals couldn't stomach the message on a sustained basis.
“Sometimes I need what only you can provide -- your absence.” --- Ashleigh Brilliant
“The absent are always in the wrong.” --- English Proverb
