They have just posted some tallies to the WBAI website. As expected, the return of Null, reimportation of Christine Blosdale, and questionable premiums has yielded considerably higher figures, but it also raises some questions.
First, the totals:
February 13 - 17
Total in pledges: $32,520
February 18 - 22
Total in pledges: $114, 450
That adds up to $146.970
Which leaves $297,335 to be raised before meeting the goal.
At this rate, and operating from a nadir of morality, they ought to be able to cover currently outstanding bills, but then it starts all over again, and there are limits...
My 2 questions:
1. Since his return, Gary Null seems to have discovered Fascism in America and either filmed it, written about it, or both. Whatever it is, he is good at selling it to WBAI's gullible. The tallies show a total of $14,800 raised under the name of Fascism Inc.
I guess that's a wholly owned subsidiary of Null enterprises, so I think we ought to be told how much money he makes on this deal. He did not kiss Null's behind out of any love for WBAI, everything he does on its air is for his own benefit, you can be sure of that.
2. A whopping $19,800 is attributed to Monique Guild consultation.
I have not heard those commercials, but I did a quick Google and came up with a smiling blond whose FaceBook blog is as disorganized and silly as a Pacifica meeting.
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| WBAI's savior? |
From her blog, I gather that Ms. Guild is a "Futurist, Business Intuitive, and Wealth Builder." I assume that she is selling consultations, which is not an uncommon ploy for opportunists who use WBAI for their own interest.
Here is a link to Monique Guild's blog. Tell us what you think is going on.
Yeah, I looked her up as soon as Blosdale mentioned her. She might be one of Blosdale's PR clients. I think that she is a typical self-promoter from Hollywood. She had a number of small roles. She believes herself psychic. She is from Louisiana originally. I don't make fun of people's cherished beliefs, but it seems that she is doing Creative Counseling Light for the rich business execs, who can afford her fees. Take a guy, who makes six or seven figures at a job that does nothing for him and s/he might even hate. Wife kids, mortgage other payments. No way out. Along come this interesting and charming woman, who will explore your dreams and creativity, and might find happiness for you by connecting you to your old dreams and getting you to start doing things you used to do or dream about twenty years ago. I learned this from Count Cagliostro and use it to seduce younger women. Get them to pursue their inner dreams that would give them direction and build their courage and get them to grow. You always wanted to fire a gun? Here! know how to use it? You used to play Basketball a while back. Let's go shoot some hoops! Of course you can!
ReplyDeleteOf course it gets monetized in our modern urbanized, alienated, and mercantile modern world of ours. People would not need shrinks and consultants and psychotherapists taking their money if they had a few true friends they can trust and talk to. People end up taking cooking and art classes hoping to meet someone instead of going out and meeting people, and there is a whole industry that makes money off peoples loneliness. If someone asks you to teach them something - chess, read their cards, show them how you draw, and you do it for them, You are one kind of a person. If you transform this experience into a lesson and charge money, you become something different, something less. I have the misfortune of enjoying a hobby, where there is enough folk hoping to make money off it, and they act fake and like spiders in a bottle and view others with suspicion as potential competitors. Truly pathetic. A prime example of how the entrepreneurial spirit can corrupt and that there are places where money-making does not belong. We live in an age of impotence. We have people going to strip joints paying money to watch naked skin that you can not touch or anything else. If they had an ounce of character, they would cross the border into cartel infested Tijuana, Mexico, got to self same strip joint and you can get anyone dancing on that stage for anything you can talk the girl into. You need money, but not as much as you think. Of course 99% choose to blow their cash on the sanitized US version of cabaret entertainment and we get the pathetic 1% that blows 200 Grand of their company money on strippers and champagne, where with that kind of wealth you ought to be able to get any Hollywood starlet or a real model. This is underscored by a little known fact that professional shrinks, counselors, and life coaches have the mandate to get the patient to accept, be content, and live functionally with their limitations, as opposed to aiming for true self-transformation and growth, where people can break out of their self-isolation and get what they want. The goal is self-acceptance and most shrinks won't venture much beyond that. Those who preach self-transformation are typically either charlatans or self-delusional talkers, but THAT hasn't changed since the Shamans at the dawn of history, when they led the humanity to watering holes and greener pastures that existed in their imagination. So, in the final analysis, if you get a douche bag like that corporate wonder who blew 200K on strippers, what harm will come if he gives a grand or two on Monique Guild for a bit of personal attention and conversation with himself as a subject? Who doesn't like talking about themselves?
Thanks. So are we saying that a very small audience of aging leftists, members of the so-called 1%, are spending almost twenty thousand dollars to consult a Hollywood virtual pole dancer? And doing it to support a station that is dying from self-inflicted wounds?
Delete"Hello, Miss Guild? This is Tom from the Bronx...." :)
Chris, this is off-topic, but who is the person who has done a copy-cat of your site here: wbai-now-and-then.blogspot.com/. They seem to also have a Facebook page called "WBAI listener" that is getting a lot of traffic. Total management suckup.
ReplyDeleteRobert Knight and Pamela Somers started that blog, hoping to attract traffic aimed at my blog. I don't know if they are still doing it, but it was originally a spot where they parked their smears and lies in order to discredit me. Knight has licked Reimers' behind from the start, which is how he became salaried and was given the 5 PM Mon-Thur. time slot. They are apparently now working on his reinstatement, hence the management love. Somers is his shill, they have in common a vicious nature, serious delusions, and a total disregard for the truth.
DeleteYou can still see their nastiness and desperation surface on the BlueBoard, under various handles and IPs. Somers was banned from there when she went after R. Paul for not heeding her insistence that I be banned.
Nice people, the kind WBAI would never have allowed itself to attract in the early years.
A "business intutitive"? As savior of WBAI?
ReplyDeleteYou can't make this stuff up!
You're so right, Justine. If this ongoing saga has a moral, what would it be?
DeleteWere I not past the starting point to 90, I'd turn this all into a book—I hope somebody with a genuine appreciation for absurdity and good command of language is already taking notes for a tragicomedy. The significance of Pacifica has gradually morphed from an important, groundbreaking broadcasting concept to a shameful model of abuse and ego-driven ineptitude. I think the story lies in that transition. No imagination required, just the facts, ma'am.
I checked the Facebook entry WBAI Listener. Of course, it was not common listeners, but STAKEHOLDERS in BAI. I mean journalists, producers, including Bernard White and Andrew Phillips. Each one of them has about 1500 Facebook friends. I am guessing there are 3000-5000 networking academics, artists, journalists, media people, activists, organizers, politicians with facebook accounts tied to BAI and Pacifica. If each one of them donated $100 bucks, you would have half a million, but that['s just the bare minimum. If they had a real sense of community, think of the free advertising, PR, publicity, grant applications and fund raising that could have been provided gratis to BAI and Pacifica. But for some reason, this magic is missing.
ReplyDeleteSocial Networking gave me a better glimpse of BAI factions. There is the black separatist afro-centric faction, friended to Bernard White, which shows an upward spiral with Al Sharpton, who has a photo of him and Obama eating fried chicken at a diner. There is a surprising network of Latinos who friend each other almost exclusively. The there is the network of progressive professional journalists with nationwide recognition - Scahills and Parentis, who network with each other and with some of the members of the previous two factions. Surprising to me, was who was absent from the networks. There were no common listeners. These were all beautiful people promoting themselves and their careers - artists, academics, activists, some of them hard core, journalists and media workers. Missing even from the WBAI Listener Facebook entry were the REGULAR LISTENERS, people not involved in producing content. I found Berthold Reimers, and his network of friends reflected his professionalism and his family and his self-image as a professional. Andrew Phillips is more influential producer than I thought, based o his content. I am not surprised that he quit while he was still ahead, and he would have been a solid asset to BAI had he stayed and may have even brought in more grant money than expected. Bob Hennelly was nowhere to be found, which leads me to believe, that despite him having been volunteer at BAI, he was a total outsider to BAI hired by Summer Reese. Gary Null us barely present. He only networks with the most influential journalists, I suppose he hopes to attract to his network. Armand De Miele, never mentioned here, has no affiliation with BAI crowd. I think that someone has accused him of being an economic opportunist, like Null, long before Null's role became known. Summer Reese and Christine Blosdale are also, totally missing, even from Andrew Phillips' network. Most surprisingly, Democracy Now! is totally absent. I can see Amy Goodman avoiding the limelight, but NONE of the Democracy Now staffers have any association with any of the BAI/Pacifica crowd. Not even contacts with the nationally prominent journalists, and the Democracy Now staff you would think are progressive and activist enough to have SOME association with the BAI crowd. The only exception was Juan Gonzalez and another Latino staffer, who were both networked with the other BAI Latinos. I have a possible explanation, but will hold it back to see what the others think. It should be noted, that based on his contacts, Juan Gonzalez networks with other journalists and other contacts outside BAI to cover local NYC politics.
Very interesting, BB—thank you for that. I make it a point to stay away from Facebook, because I don't trust it and much as I like having friends, I have no interest in gathering around me the superficial kind. I registered when it was new, but soon realized that it was a mistake—unregistering was a major project, and I still can't be sure of having totally freed myself.
DeleteLSB board member, Frank Lefever, who is what one might call a compulsive joiner, used to constantly urge using Facebook to promote the failed WBAI programs. When he boasted of having several thousand "friends," I cringed.
Thanks again—I hope we get comments on your research.
I heard Gould being featured during an interview with Blosdale - I guess the 19,8 was the quid-pro-quo for the publicity.
ReplyDeleteBit of an accuracy problem there, Booser Bear. Andrew Phillips has 383 Facebook friends. "including Bernard White and Andrew Phillips. Each one of them has about 1500 Facebook friends".
ReplyDeleteSo Andrew Phillips is among his own friends? Is there any meaning to all this?
DeleteBernard White, 1500 or so friends, Mario Murillo, 1500 or so friends, Basir Michawie 2600 friends, and Don Rojas 2200 or so friends.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous, you haven't got anything else to add besides the friend counts?
Null on a rant today how the 'little punks' going after him are really going after BAI -- "my lawyers are pitbulls.,,They don't lose...I will pull out all the stops...Our journey begins now." Then, it was back to the usual snake oil, nostrums and pro-dictator (Chavez) blather.
ReplyDeleteLast I heard, Nulls lawyer is his own brother, who does all the litigation free of charge for him.
ReplyDelete