We all know by now that Berthold Reimers has severe problems with the truth; he moves in a fantasy land of his own and will say anything to give the appearance that things are going well, when they aren't/ We heard him on the air a couple of times recently, telling us that WBAI is doing remarkably well—on one occasion, he went so far as to predict that, financially. it would soon leave the other Pacifica stations in the dust.
Here, posted this evening, Thursday, April 24, 2014, is a staff memo from Tony Ryan that shoots holes in Reimers' optimism (click on it to enlarge it):
IN SHORT...
The thousandth thousandth thousandth reminder that these ‘leftist/progressive’ chowderheads can’t manage anything at all – yet, of course, it’s taken a vast capitalist conspiracy to bring them to their knees.
ReplyDelete[shakes impotent fist at the merciless heavens]
– Damn you, Koch Brothers!!!
Q: How many feckless, clueless ideologues does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: No one knows, we’re all still waiting, whistling in the dark as they form committees, hold elections, debate the ‘issues’, then hold more elections, then seek legal representation, then ….
~ ‘indigopirate’
Considering the fact that even Verizon gives advance notice, this is yet another case of secrecy slapping these bozos in the derriere. Will they ever learn? Of course not. What, one wonders, ARE their priorities?
DeleteThey seem to me to literally be incapable of logical thought. Perhaps that’s in part because their ideology, their belief-structures, are faith-based. Yet (and I’m speaking as an agnostic/atheist/something-of-that-sort) religions – all religions – are sometimes capable of very clear thinking and the very careful and exacting consideration of both pragmatic/practical and moral questions.
ReplyDeleteNot these folks. It seems to me impossible to attempt to describe them without appearing to randomly throwing insults in their direction.
They (with rare exception) seem to live in a very small alternate reality, some etiolated and degenerate remnant form of the progressive and leftist thinking of a century ago, no longer meaningfully capable of application to a post-industrial time.
So they degenerate into big-endian v little-endian squabbles, and there seem to be no Gullivers available to piss on them.
It wasn’t inevitable that the whole Pacifica ideal would degenerate into this, but at some time it *became* inevitable, and we’re long past that now.
Perhaps it’s a helpful reminder, in a sense, that some errors, some choices, do indeed prove to be fatal.
Not news, I know….
~ ‘indigo’
It is this seeming, total lack of logical thought that gives rise to suspicions of deliberate destruction.
DeleteIt’s possible, of course, that there are indeed some folks in all this mad scheming who’d like to see, say, WBAI sold, etc, as there’s been so much speculation.
DeleteThere’s no coherence, though, not on the whole, and so many of these people are literally paranoid… they see plots everywhere, they see *reasons* everywhere, for everything.
They have no appreciation for the roles of chance, chaos, there are no random or quasi-random events in their little worlds.
They have no appreciation of the ironies of existence, which is part of their delusional attempts to see the world as rational and mechanistic in ways that it simply isn’t.
They’re gobsmacked, for example, that a democracy, any democracy, of any form, at any time, has a strong tendency to reduce politics to pandering – the Greeks knew that, it isn’t a revelation.
They can’t make sense of themselves, yet they want to insist the world make sense, for their benefit.
Perhaps that simple-mindedness is part of the reason they have no comprehension for the ambigutties, the ironies, and the subtleties of the arts – they thing anything not explicit is a lie, a cheat, a deception.
So the world passes them by as they snarl in impotence at the world.
You’re absolutely right that Pacifica’s foundations were not of this simple-mindedness.
These are overwhelmingly crude, simplistic minds, and cruder and even more simplistic sensibilities and emotions.
Therein, of course, lies the screamingly obvious paradox as to what the original ideals have come to.
Not the fault of the founders, not the fault of the ideals. They were of course imperfect, but heaven knows nothing of so squalid, so sordied, so pitiful a level as this mess.
WBAI and Pacifica did some good work, once, and they were a place where some fresh talent learned and then moved to the wider world.
Those are good things.
Let the rest, in time, be forgotten, as it inevitably and deservedly will.
~ ‘indigopirate’
hmm...I wonder if Reimer, Ryan and Haskins still got paid?
ReplyDeleteYes, I am sure that they are still getting paid. In a way, they remind me of an adult making a living by running a pyramid marketing scheme staffed by teen-agers selling something or other door to door and hoping to become millionaires. And if you are waxing poetic at their inability to pay Verizon, Indigo, then you haven't seen anything at all. Consider that Heinrich Himmler, head of the Nazi SS in 1944 has handed his derriere on a platter to Martin Bormann, when he needed an abortion (illegal in Nazi Germany) for his lover, his secretary. Himmler needed an equivalent of $800.00 dollars for a back-room abortion. Himmler's household did not have that kind of money, and he went to Bormann, of all people. Bormann cornered Himmler and quickly got the truth out of him, as to why he needed the money, he then authorized a small personal loan to Himmler from the special emergency fund to help out the Nazi officials in need. From that incident on and until the end of the war, Bormann was able to successfully blackmail the head of the Reich security. And you are gushing over some aged out hangers on not being able to pay their phone bill...
ReplyDeleteChris, the collapse of Pacifica from its noble beginnings was something common and foreseeable. I am meaning to write a long post on this, and I will when I get a chance.
I simply find it amusing that they can't manage to pay their phone bill, even in order to be able to raise money.
DeleteJust like the Nazis, isn't it?
~ 'indigopirate'
(Just A Listener)
ReplyDeleteI have to laugh because when I read Chris praising the "Report to Listeners" last week I thought
"Just wait, they worked hard to sound competent today but it's just an act".
Well here we are. While they were on the air telling listeners everything's fine, the disconnect warning from Verizon was probably sitting on Reimer's desk.
No Tony, telling the listeners there is no money to pay the phone bill won't stop me from considering a donation. Lying to them about the station finances and the reason for the lost phone service will stop me cold.
Really, is this crew different than Bernard White and Rojas telling everyone they have the station running better than ever while they're borrowing money from Pacifica, running up stacks of unpaid bills and doing who knows to line they're own pockets before everything blows up?
I had the same thought JAL, while not paying such an important bill shows a warped sense of priorities, not being up-front about this serious arrear compounded that neglect, but lying about it is was the worst offense. They are selling the listener-supporters a mirage.
DeleteWhat's really tragic is that Summer Reese, who isn't even employed anymore, has paid herself. And she's making a ridiculous $105K a year. Talk about self-dealing.
ReplyDeleteThese people are so grossly incompetent, it boggles the mind. They are incapable of managing the most basic, mundane tasks. They can't even maintain a website and keep the phones on, something that small, impoverished radio stations in developing nations are able to do.
ReplyDeleteAnother example: They are utterly confounded by the complexity of sending out premiums. It doesn't matter which faction is in charge; none of them can master it. Essentially, this task is: write or print out out a mailing label, put a book or a DVD in an envelope, affix the label to the envelope, seal and mail. Then repeat 1000 or 2000 times. It isn't that hard. When I was 18 years old, I did a temp job for about a week doing a nearly identical task, sending out glossy brochures and various inserts for some company. I had no experience and no motivation, but I was able to manage it and I got about 500 mailers out per day. The guy next to me did about the same. So 2 teenage goofballs were essentially able to do 1000/day, and at that rate, we would have gotten all the WBAI premiums out in a day or maybe two. But a salaried full-time staff, including a specially designated "premium manager" can't accomplish this in 2 days, or in 2 weeks, or in 2 months. I understand that premiums can go unfulfilled for a year if not longer. That's the level of incompetence. They can't mail things and they can't pay the telephone bill.
I truly cannot wait for the station to be leased, and for these people to be sent packing. They should never be allowed near anything valuable ever again.
Phones are back, bill was paid.
ReplyDeleteSorry, Linda, but you're misinforming, albeit probably innocently. The bill may have been paid, but the phones in the studio are still dead as of 10 AM Saturday.
DeleteAnd all these years I thought "Off The Hook" was the title of a fine program about technology, hosted by "Emmanuel Goldstein"!
ReplyDeleteIt is, Justine—this was just a real-time re-enactment. Call it reality-radio.
Deletewhy is the sound on wbai so choppy?
ReplyDeleteBecause WBAI is run by imbeciles who have yet to grasp the correlation between radio and audio. You might also ask why they didn't pay the phone bill and thus allowed the studio phones to be disconnected. If they listened to the station, they might have realized that many of their programs rely on telephone communication with guests and listeners.
DeleteThere are no logical explanations for much of what Berthold Reimers and his crew do. His resumé emphasizes experience in the accounting field, but important bills get pushed aside—remember the transmitter rental bill?
The sound has been abominable for a long time now—the choppiness you hear today is is just radio unlistenable's latest wrinkle. I predict that it will all be over soon.
At this point the Berthold Reimers & Co. at BAI bears a fair resemblance to the Oral Roberts and the Bakkers, except those guys were more competent swindlers than Reimers & Co.
ReplyDeleteWell either we could sell hard narcotics over the air or perhaps have a bake sale,...a very big one.
ReplyDelete