Ad libs with a limited vocabulary...

If there were advance announcements of Friday morning's "Report To the Listener," they must have been made during one of WBAI's many presentations of dead air. I heard of it because I happened to tune in the morning tangle of audio gropes and heard the gee whiz kid, Haskins, mention it.

For once, Berthold Reimers was on time, but iPD Mario Murillo spent the hour on the phone from his car, unsuccessfully searching for a parking space. Also  in the cast were Andrea Katz, who has kept a very low profile for the past several months, and a guest of Reimers, the lady who runs CCNY's WHCR-FM. It was she who arranged for WBAI to rent a studio there.

As usual, hardly any concern was shown for the remaining diminish group of WBAI listeners, but compliments and platitudes were exchanged between the participants who, as it turned out, had been singularly dormant. Burning questions, such as where WBAI stands, financially, were not answered, but Haskins injected his false optimism whenever he could.

There were calls, but people obviously hadn't a clue as to what was going on, so they were off topic, asked irrelevant questions and were fluffed off. Murillo tried to bring up the programming work he has been doing and, in all fairness, let me note that he has indeed not sat idle by, but he has a South American agenda which gets  first priority. He apparently likes being heard on the air and it would seem that he doesn't really mind that totally inappropriate, mindless shows continue being aired.

I should add that Murillo has not responded to my question regarding the airing of false, sensationalized "news," such as Geoff Brady wallows in. I sent him an e-mail link, to make it easier, but that is also ignored. In fact, if you go to WBAI's poorly designed, error-ridden web site (mishandled by Andrea Katz's brother, Alan) you will find a curious listing of WBAI's "management" that leaves out the GM as well as the iPD.

Murillo mentioned that Doug Henwood is returning—which I see as a right step--but he gave no indication of who will get the boot—that is worrisome. There also were no updates on the various fundraising projects that have come and gone, such as the Africa Trip and Daultin Anderson's big church bang. Granted, they did say that the church  was "fun" and that some 300 people attended, but Anderson had announced grander expectations: he predicted that over 2000 churchgoers would show up. At one point, he even said that they would be fed. The absence of details and Anderson's own failure to give the event more than a passing mention on his program, the following day, leads to all sorts of speculation that, perhaps, this "lord" did not so readily find a way to heal this dying radio station.

Enough about Anderson's WBAI ministry's weekly two-hours of worship, here's another example of radio at its worst. It's a one hour panel discussion on an artificial subject, seemingly recorded on a not-so-smart phone in need of repairs. There is a hum throughout and the device is equipped with a volume compensator that thrusts the room noise at you whenever there is a moment of silence. One has to strain to hear what is being said, but these are black theater people (real and imagined) who are trying to justify the presentation of inferior productions. The excuse is that white critics don't have a sufficiently clear understanding of black people's problems and psyche to write valid reviews. Of course, they eliminate the fact that many theatrical works created and performed by black have had successful runs, been revived, made into movies, awarded trophies, etc.

These panelists are mostly fringe people whose work has not captured many imaginations, but my point is that the discussion is based upon defensive assumptions and the technical quality is embarrassing. This ought never to have been aired, yet it was heard twice. Listen to this fragment and see if you agree:

Apropos the kind of pap that scares off listeners, we have Kathy Davis, whose homespun sub-Reader's Digest "philosophy" is painful to hear. She has a sweet voice, but there is nothing behind it that warrants a hug. With Robert Knight out of the way, this "charming" lady saw her opportunity to take over the hour and a half he himself had wasted every Thursday at midnight. At first, she veiled it as a tribute, running some of his outdated, seriously biased blather, but that wasn't working, so she opened the mausoleum door ajar and let in one of Knight's companions. That, apparently was not working either, so somebody (Mario or Reimers, or both) told her that the program was too stale to do the station any good... fresh voices and subjects were needed. That also isn't working. This week Knight's friend was on again, interviewing Ray McGovern, a well-known former CIA analyst turned activist. This is a man whose accounts are often outrageous, but probably true—he spent many years on the inside with regular access to the clowns at the very top.

The recently revealed data on U.S. torture activity has brought Mr. McGovern into the spotlight again, so he is much in demand for interviews. Thus, his on-the-phone WBAI appearance was not in any way a scoop. He had interesting things to say, but Pauline, the lady who performed the interview, left important stones unturned. On the fragment that follows, you will hear some follow-up listener calls that drain the sugar out of sweet Ms. Davis. The first one is from a listener who dares to question the one-sidedness of the interview—Kathy rudely gets rid of him and goes on to a call from a lady who lavishes compliments on her, but makes the mistake of mentioning her nemesis, Alton Maddox! That, as we heard the week before, turns Ms. Sweetness sour.... well, listen:

Getting back to stagnation, poor radio, technical embarrassments and mishandling of phone calls, we have Bob Fass, who each week underscored the reason why he ought to have retired from WBAI years ago. The dead air that eventually shocks Bob into consciousness is not fabricated.

Here, too, we listen as callers either drone on with redundancy or arouse Bob's ire. He hates to be told that he is anything but the wonderful legend, as advertised, so when he has made uninformed assertions regarding a fatal Rikers Island incident, he is not at all pleased to hear from a gentleman who wants to set the facts straight. Bear in mind that this caller is courteous and respectful, and that he does not disagree with the outrage generated by this death. He just wants Bob to have the facts and be able to discuss this intelligently.

A one point, Bob tries to tell the man that he is not at all ignorant of the procedures, because—don't you know—he "I played the warden in The Three-Penny Opera."!!! That was over half a century ago, but had it been last week, Bob's use of it would have been just as laughable. Now the question becomes, how much did the late Kurt Weil know about prison regulations, and how do rules differ between London and New York? That fat lady who has started her song... could it be Lotte Lenya? Listen...