#Barrington Broadcasting

[wat3rm370n]

Right-wing voices intent on spreading bird flu & misinformation.

All the usual suspects and their business interest backers are gearing up for a big push to oppose any public health deployment against the threats of avian influenza. These covid deniers and anti-vaxxers have never actually been satisfied with having successfully manufactured mild and The Great Barrington Declaration becoming public health policy all over the place (minus protecting the vulnerable part of course). Various right-wing covid minimizers are pushing all sorts of misleading things about the very real threats of H5N1.

Important Context Right-Wing Operatives, Anti-Vax Groups Already Working to Politicize Bird Flu Many of the same people who successfully politicized COVID-19 are gearing up for round two. Walker Bragman Dec 26, 2024 In May, REPPARE published a paper, which was subsequently shared by Bhattacharya, arguing that the WHO and the World Bank were overstating the threat of future pandemics. It specifically noted that “mortality from highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) types H5 and H7 has greatly declined over the past century.” Former Trump strategist Steve Bannon, meanwhile, has been politicizing bird flu on his War Room broadcast on the right-wing Real America’s Voice television network. Early on in the pandemic, Bannon and his business partner, Chinese billionaire fraudster Guo Wengui, were critical in spreading the idea that the SARS-CoV-2 virus leaked from a Chinese laboratory. Early on in the pandemic, the claim was used by right-wing media to provide cover for the flailing Trump White House. With the bird flu outbreaks, War Room has engaged in similar activity, pushing conspiracy theories about the virus—its origins and the expert concern over its outbreaks.

On the podcast Knowledge Fight which reviews what Alex Jones, the hosts often remarks that Alex Jones works for Big Covid, in that he promotes the spread. On the show they’ve played several clips in the month of December 2024 where Alex Jones wrongly claims that Peter Hotez is responsible for bird flu or other things, and that the avian flu news is some kind of plot against Trump. Many clips they’ve played you can hear him demonize doctors and healthcare workers in a way that’s very disturbing because historically these types of accusations have led to people being induced into violence against those with such accusations against them, indeed it’s a known social engineering tactic, one that appears to have been used in the covid pandemic by covid contrarians and monied interests. Back in July 2024 he played a disturbingly lengthy wildlife-killing-prey video for his audience and likened it to supposedly the hospitals doing this to patients, clearly he meant on purpose. In the December 24, 2024 episode of Knowledge Fight they play a clip where Alex Jones describes animal experiments not unusual in medical training. He doesn’t seem to be that concerned with animal rights, he merely uses the emotional disgust to stoke people to believe that doctors are being made to do this as part of their training as a type of hazing ritual, to weed out anyone who will be unwilling to commit atrocities on behalf of… "they". The “they” is described as a mafia-like organization of some type using doctors to hurt people who won't pay protection money. His description was a ham handed mobster movie narrative that reminded me of the comedy movie Nuns on the Run with Robbie Coltrane and Eric Idle. I don’t mean to make light of this because though it does seem comical, I think this type of rhetoric is actually quite serious, and that at least some in the right-wing audience do take it seriously.

[parkerbombshell]

Pulsebeat #371

Mondays 3pm EST bombshellradio.com Archival shows : bombshellradiopodcasts.com Pulsebeat a new release based punk, alt. whatever show out of Abingdon, Oxfordshire broadcasting Mondays 3pm EST bombshellradio.com #Punk #Powerpop P Pulsebeat #371       Track No: Time Artist Title 1 00:00:12 The Chuck Norris Experiment - You Go Boom! 2 00:03:19 The Detroit Cobras - There's A Light 3 00:05:26 The Sadies - More Alone 4 00:09:32 Rick White & The Sadies - Try 5 A8 00:13:07 IST IST - Repercussions 6 00:16:54 Swami & The Bed Of Nails - How Are You Peeling ? 7 00:19:13 Steak Blake - I Lie, See 8 00:21:49 Bad Drip - Roadhouse 9 00:26:34 The Courettes, La La Brooks - California 10 00:30:11 Dealing With Damage - M 11 00:33:06 The Bug Club - Lonsdale Slipons 12 00:36:10 The Muffs - Every Single Thing 13 00:38:32 Redd Kross - Born Innocent 14 00:42:21 Barrington Levy - Bounty Hunter 15 00:46:18 Charlie Chaplin - Principle 16 00:50:08 Aerial Salad - Chances     Read the full article

[chorusfm]

Ben Folds Announces New Tour

Ben Folds has announced some new tour dates. Emmy-nominated, multi-platinum selling music artist Ben Folds announces the return of his popular “Paper Airplane Request Tour,” performing solo shows across the US starting May 30, 2024. What initially began years ago as a request for songs as encores will once again be a central element in Folds’ shows when he engages audiences to make their song requests via paper airplanes. “The last time I did this on tour the response was overwhelming, with literally hundreds of paper airplanes with song requests being launched on cue from fans at the start of the second half of each of my concerts,” said Folds. “It’s the purest, most low-tech form of engagement that creates a special bond with my audiences.” Folds, who released his most recent album “What Matters Most” to critical acclaim, has been in studio in recent months working on his first holiday album targeted for release later this year. He’ll also be featured in a special PBS broadcast this spring that spotlights his ongoing “Declassified: Ben Folds Presents” concert series he curates as Artistic Advisor to the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center. MAY 30 – CHARLESTON, SC – CHARLESTON MUSIC HALL 31 – AUGUSTA, GA – BELL AUDITORIUM JUNE 1 – PEACHTREE CITY, GA – THE FRED 2 – PELHAM, TN – THE CAVERNS 4 – CHARLOTTE, NC – BELK THEATER 6 – SAVANNAH, GA – DISTRICT LIVE 7 – VIRGINIA BEACH, VA – SANDLER CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS 8 – ROCKY MOUNT, VA – HARVESTER PERFORMANCE CENTER 9 – PITTSBURGH, PA – 3 RIVERS ARTS FESTIVAL 11 – RICHMOND, VA – LEWIS GINTER BOTANICAL GARDEN 21 – LOWELL, MA – LOWELL SUMER MUSIC SERIES 22 – GREAT BARRINGTON, MA – THE MAHAIWE PERFORMING ARTS CENTER 23 – HAMMONDSPORT, NY – POINT OF THE BLUFF CONCERT PAVILION 25 – KENT, OH – THE KENT STAGE 27 – TOLEDO, OH – PERISTYLE THEATER 28 – POTESKEY, MI – BAY VIEW JOHN M. HALL AUDITORIUM 29 – KALAMAZOO, MI – KALAMAZOO STATE THEATRE JULY 30 – BOISE, ID – MORRISON CENTER AUGUST 2 – STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, CO – STRINGS MUSIC PAVILION 5 – BOULDER, CO – CHAUTAUQUA AUDITORIUM 6 – BEAVER CREEK, CO – VILAR PERFORMING ARTS CENTER --- Please consider becoming a member so we can keep bringing you stories like this one. ◎ https://chorus.fm/news/ben-folds-announces-new-tour-2/

[yorkcalling]

 York Minster to Host BBC Radio 4 Recording -Christmas Service With The Archbishop of York

BBC Radio 4 will be at York Minster on Tuesday 12 December to record a special act of worship for broadcast on Christmas Day morning.   The Dean of York, the Very Revd Dominic Barrington, will welcome all to the service which will include prayers, Bible readings, and a homily from The Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, as well as much-loved Carols and traditional music for Christmas Day…

[garudabluffs]

WAMC reaches its $1 million goal in one morning

WAMC/Northeast Public Radio completed its February Fund Drive on Feb. 13, 2023, raising over $1,000,000 to support the station's award-winning news and cultural programming. WAMC board and staff thank its listeners for their generosity and devotion to the station. With the help of the Locked Box fundraising prior to the drive, the on-air portion took less than three hours on Monday morning.

READ MORE https://www.wamc.org/news/2023-02-13/wamc-reaches-its-1-million-goal-in-one-morning

WAMC/Northeast Public Radio completed its February Fund Drive on Feb. 13, 2023, raising over $1,000,000 to support the station's award-winning news and cultural programming. WAMC board and staff thank its listeners for their generosity and devotion to the station. With the help of the Locked Box fundraising prior to the drive, the on-air portion took less than three hours on Monday morning.

WAMC's live fundraising was possible with the help of volunteers and WAMC staff fielding calls and online donations.

Proudly, the station partnered with community organization The Food Pantries For The Capital District, helping to provide over 45,000 pounds of food to those in need.

WAMC President and CEO Alan Chartock says, "Simply amazing. This public radio family fills my heart with joy and I am truly so grateful for the outpouring of support. We didn't plan to reach our goal so quickly, and then we all came together and did it. I'm beyond thankful for everyone who believes in WAMC."

Joe Donahue, the host of The Roundtable, adds, "The love you share with us each and every Fund Drive is just astounding. You filled the Locked Box and let us finish the on-air drive in under three hours. You helped feed the food insecure and made our radio community stronger. You are all heroes and we love you."

WAMC is a listener-supported station that relies on contributions to stay alive. Its Fund Drives occur three times a year: February, June, and October. Each drive has a $1 million goal to support the general operations of WAMC/Northeast Public Radio. WAMC broadcasts the highest quality programs from NPR, American Public Media, BBC World Service as well as a wide range of award-winning local programming.

If you're interested in finding out more about our Fund Drives, or donating or volunteering, please contact Amber Sickles at 1-800-323-9262 ext. 133.

WAMC/Northeast Public Radio is a non-commercial, public radio station and nonprofit organization that presents award-winning news and cultural programming 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. WAMC's listening area reaches parts of seven states, including New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Hampshire; as well as parts of Canada. With over 400,000 monthly listeners, WAMC ranks among the most-listened-to public radio stations in the United States. WAMC is a member of National Public Radio and an affiliate of Public Radio International. For more information on WAMC, please visit www.wamc.org or call 518.465.5233.

WAMC-FM 90.3 FM, Albany, NY; WAMC 1400 AM, Albany, NY; WAMK 90.9 FM, Kingston, NY; WOSR 91.7 FM, Middletown, NY; WCEL 91.9 FM, Plattsburgh, NY; WCAN 93.3 FM, Canajoharie, NY; WANC 103.9 FM, Ticonderoga, NY; WRUN 90.3 FM, Remsen-Utica, NY; WAMQ 105.1 FM, Great Barrington, MA; WANZ 90.1 FM, Stamford, NY; WANR 88.5 FM, Brewster, NY; WQQQ 103.3FM Sharon, CT; 103.9 FM Beacon, NY; 97.3 FM, Cooperstown, NY; 106.3 FM Dover Plains, NY; 96.5 FM Ellenville, NY; 102.1 FM Highland, NY; 97.1 FM Hudson, NY; 88.7 FM Lake Placid, NY; 106.3 FM Middletown, NY; 90.9 FM Milford, PA; 107.7 FM Newburgh, NY; 90.1 FM Oneonta, NY; 99.3 FM Oneonta, NY; 95.9 FM Peekskill, NY; 93.1 FM Rensselaer-Troy, NY; 92.9 FM Scotia, NY, 107.1 FM Warwick, NY, and online at www.wamc.org, www.facebook.com/wamcradio, www.instagram.com/wamcradio, and www.twitter.com/wamcradio.

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[largemouthbassnation]

History of Bagnall Dam & the Lake of the Ozarks featuring Dwight Weaver

History of Bagnall Dam & the Lake of the Ozarks featuring Dwight Weaver

Can you imagine no Lake of the Ozarks? Well, once upon a time, there was no Lake of the Ozarks. Carissa Biele takes a look back at how the lake came to be…

Credits: Dwight Weaver- Historian & Lake Ozark resident for almost 50 years Old photos via a Dwight Weaver book File video shot at Willmore Lodge museum Carissa Biele- Reporter

KRCG 13 Website: http://www.connectmidmissouri.com/ Facebook: http…

[focusonthegoodnews]

Tasmanian Devils Born on Mainland Australia Offer Hope for a Species at Risk of Extinction

Tasmanian Devils Born on Mainland Australia Offer Hope for a Species at Risk of Extinction

Good News Notes: “Roughly 3,000 years ago, Tasmanian devils disappeared from the wilds of mainland Australia—instead only surviving on Tasmania Island, the landmass from which they got their common name. But now for the first time in millennia, a mama devil living outside of captivity has given birth to a litter of joeys, in this case, seven thumbnail-sized, hairless infants, reports Gemma Conroy…

[marcogiovenale]

bacon meets burroughs [compiled & coiled edit] / phil barrington. 2018

bacon meets burroughs [compiled & coiled edit] / phil barrington. 2018

Bacon Meets Burroughs[Compiled & Coiled Edit]During the recording for the 1982 film on William Burroughs (the resulting programme airing in the UK on 22nd February 1983), Arena followed him to the home and studio of old friend Francis Bacon, where he drops in for a cup of tea and a catch up. This meeting has never been fully broadcast, and the clip is supposedly shown uncut as the pair discuss…

[theculturedmarxist]

This is the second of four essays, to appear occasionally, on the “bubble of pretend” within which most Americans shelter their psyches. The thought binding these pieces is that we must come to terms with our crippled psychological and emotional states if we are to find our ways beyond them.

The first of these essays can be found here.

—P. L.

11 MAY—Just before Easter I ventured forth from my remote village to a lively market town called Great Barrington to shop for the holiday lunch—spring lamb, a decent bottle of Bourgogne. Easter is much marked in my household, one of the few feasts we allow ourselves, and it is a reminder this year of a truth that could scarcely be more pertinent to our shared circumstances: After all our small and large crucifixions, there is new life to come.

Great Barrington lies in the Berkshire Hills of western Massachusetts, a fashionable little burg dense—as you can tell simply by walking around in it—with righteous liberals. No place, you remind yourself, is perfect.

And there along the streets and avenues as I arrived were what I had anticipated: Ukrainian flags hanging off front porches, in shop windows, on flagpoles just below the Stars and Stripes. Somebody has painted the bit of board displaying their house number in the blue and yellow we all now recognize. Father, forgive them, I thought, for they know not what blood-soaked horrors and hate-filled killers they enthusiastically endorse.

Not in my lifetime have Americans purporting to be thoughtful intelligent people been so wide-eyed, so stupefied as those who are pretending to lead them and to inform them by seeking to bury them in ignorance.

We now read that investigators are diligently “documenting the catalog of inhumanity perpetrated by Russia’s forces in Ukraine”—a U.S. diplomat’s remark. Nobody stops to think that we will never see the results of these “investigations” and whatever we may eventually be shown will not be serious. Nobody stops to think the investigators are all from nations that are acting against Russia.

“Where else should they come from?” they shrug in Great Barrington.

Nobody notes that the essential question has been crudely removed from public discourse as these sham investigations get under way. The atrocities in Bucha, Mariupol, and elsewhere are beyond all dispute, but we must never ask who is responsible for them.

I hear the good citizens of Great Barrington quaking with rage as The New York Times convicts the Russian leadership, as our president describes the Bucha tragedy and numerous others that have followed as Russian war crimes not an hour or two after they come to light.

We read not long ago in The Times, all about the joint American–Ukrainian campaign to inundate Russian discourse with propaganda intended to demoralize the public. The government-supervised Times explains, “Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, a U.S.–funded but independent news organization founded decades ago, is trying to push its broadcasts deeper into Russia.”

U.S.–funded but independent. Priceless, and don’t miss the slide into passive voice to avoid the truth, a recurrent Times trick I have grown very fond of — “founded decades ago.”

Few of us have any experience of living under anything other than corporate domination.

Radio Free Europe was founded by a C.I.A. front Allen Dulles cooked up in 1949, the National Committee for a Free Europe. It received agency funding until at least the 1970s, when the funding function was transferred elsewhere in the Washington bureaucracy for the sake of appearances.

What RFE/RL is doing in Russia today is exactly what American liberals, in paroxysms of horror, accused Russians of doing during the 2016 election campaigns. But it is O.K. because we’re doing it, they say in the charming bistros along Railroad Street. We must fight for democracy with all the weapons at our disposal.

We are not reading in the corporate press, by contrast, that a new wave of brute censorship is now upon us, as social media such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube “suspend,” “cancel,” “de-platform”—whatever this radically antidemocratic business is called—dissenting writers and analysts who have taken the trouble to examine the facts on the ground in Ukraine such as we have them with professional disinterest.

We must defend democracy at home, too, the good of Great Barrington insist, just as we must in Ukraine.

Here I must interject a personal circumstance. Some weeks ago, after publishing several columns on the Ukraine crisis, here and elsewhere, Twitter “suspended” my account, @thefloutist. Twitter gave me the vaguest of explanations: I may have published material that was abusive or harmful—a nonsense any which way one turns it. Twitter Support offered me the opportunity to appeal this judgment. I did so weeks ago and have had not even the courtesy of a reply. I have to assume accordingly, I have been canceled, de-platformed, disappeared, choose your descriptive. Mine is “censored.”

O, say, can you see….

Since the Russiagate farrago overcame liberal America in 2016, there has been much debate as to whether our McCarthyesque circumstances are as bad as, similar to, or not as bad as things got during the Cold War decades.

This no longer seems to me the useful question. In various important ways we have passed beyond even the worst of the Cold War’s many dreadful features.

Our better reference is Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, wherein the English novelist pictured a society of incubated beings—programmed from birth, hooked on a happiness-inducing drug called soma, devoid of everything we now consider human, wholly incapable of connection, of responsibility, and, indeed, desiring neither. Infantile gratification is all that matters to those populating the World State Huxley imagined—such as anything matters.

We are not there yet, let’s not exaggerate. But we ought to honor Huxley for his prescience, for we are heading in the direction of his unlivable world of mind-deprived children watched over by a small, chosen, diabolic elite.

I am not surprised that it is Ukraine that brings us to what I consider a collective psychological crisis. After 30 years of post–Cold War triumphalism, Washington has decided to use Ukraine and its people in a go-for-broke attempt finally to subvert Russia. Stepping back for a better look, this is the decisive event in the imperium’s confrontation with the 21st century—its grand roll of the dice, its now-or-never moment.

Broke it will be when all this is over, however far in the future that will prove. A little like Cú Chulainn, the Irish hero who drowned swinging his sword in a rage against the incoming tide, we cannot win this one. And we are falling apart as the realization of our loss arrives subliminally among us.

Whoever wins the war in Ukraine, the non–West will win. Whoever wins, the 21st century will win, burying the mostly awful 20th at last. As for Americans, we have already lost. 

What of our condition, then? What has become of us, why, and what shall we do about it? If I am correct about America’s psychological crisis, its connection to the on-the-ground, in-our-faces crisis in Ukraine is not immediately apparent.

Huxley wrote Brave New World in 1931 and published it a year later. Let us take the cue. Let’s look back to consider the thoughts of a few people who, unlike most of us, took life seriously and so applied themselves to an understanding of their time.

Steve Fraser brought out The Age of Acquiescence in 2015. Fraser is among the best labor economists now active, an honorable man of the 1960s, and his subtitle tells us his line of inquiry: The Life and Death of American Resistance to Organized Wealth and Power. Why and when, Fraser wanted to discover, had American workers rolled over in surrender? What happened to all those fine New Dealers who, with good minds and strong hands, fought hard for the kind of society they knew was possible?

Labor isn’t our topic, but Fraser’s book has implications far beyond his specific interests.

Fraser situates himself “peering back into the past at a largely forgotten terrain of struggle.” The New Deal years, the battles waged against the anti–Communist paranoia of the postwar decades, the antiwar movement of the 1960s and early 1970s: The people animating these movements had memories and experience.

They remembered what American society could be in its potential because they had lived for and acted on that potential. They knew another kind of America was possible.

Most of us have forgotten all that. Younger people never shared that consciousness in the first place. Very few of us have any memory or experience of living under anything other than pervasive corporate domination and a government, in its profound corruption, that serves corporate capital and does as little as it can otherwise.

There is nothing to wage struggle for, in other words. Our relations with those who hold power over us are not very different from the relations Huxley’s children had with the sequestered elites who controlled their lives. This is the root of our prevalent assumptions.

The work of any social or political campaign worth mounting is now rendered too imposing even to attempt. It is best to acquiesce to power, contenting ourselves—as if we all live in Great Barrington—with finding the best olive oil.

Mass acquiescence leads us most of the way to an explanation of the preposterous support most Americans have for the criminal regime in Kiev. But we’re beyond Steve Fraser’s Age of Acquiescence now. Americans don’t merely acquiesce to all that the imperium imposes on the world—wars, interventions, collective punishments, assorted other deprivations. Americans actively embrace the conduct of empire.

Please pass the kale chips.

There is an obsessive-compulsive aspect to the flag-waving I encountered in Great Barrington during Holy Week—and numerous places since. A kindly neighbor in my village appeared at a birthday party the other day wearing a finely made cardigan of light blue, beneath which she draped her splendid person in a yellow pullover, also of the Villager sort. On the table before the old gent celebrating his birthday were cards in blue and yellow envelopes.

We are confronted with a collective pathology in search of a diagnosis. Herr Doktor Lawrence’s is as follows.

I have long taken the attacks of September 11, 2001, to mark the uncannily abrupt end of the American Century. Much has flowed from those shocking moments. It was on that day Americans were forced to realize that they were not, after all, immune from the depredations of history. The providential nation did not, after all, enjoy the protections of Providence. History, after all, allows of no exceptions.

In my interpretation, a belief system that had endured for nearly four centuries, taking my date from Winthrop’s landing at Salem Harbor in 1630, collapsed on September 11, 2001. It would be hard to overstate the gravity of that moment. Remember the endlessly repeated footage of the World Trade Towers as the planes struck and the buildings crumbled? This was the first sign of the obsessive-compulsive pathology that has since overtaken us. The collapsing towers were but an objective correlative, an outer manifestation of the psychological and emotional collapse that occurred in the American psyche.

Americans, suddenly, suffered an immense spiritual emptiness. And they have ever since desired almost desperately (and I am willing to edit out my “almost”) to fill this emptiness. They needed something to believe in again. This something has turned out to be authority—any kind of authority so long as it filled our shared void, so long as it reassured us that we were still a good people, a just people, a people still immune from the forces of history—above all, we wanted once again to understand ourselves as an innocent people.

Authority, right down to the spooks who betray us and our ideals by the day, give us our regular doses of soma, as Huxley may have thought of it.

All the notable events that have followed—the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the chest-thumping righteousness of our coup operations in Libya, and Syria, the Russiagate nonsense—those Rrrrussians spoiled our march to eternal liberalism—and now the proxy war in Ukraine—flowed, in my view, from the psychic injuries sustained as summer drew to a close 21 years ago.

Let us consider ourselves from another perspective.

Iris Murdoch, the minor English philosopher and second-rate novelist, published The Sovereignty of Good, a gathering of three essays on morality, in 1970. I would be pleased to observe that nobody reads this ridiculous book anymore and few take Murdoch’s philosophic ruminations at all seriously: Both of these things are true.

But Murdoch’s arguments in favor of a moral clarity that lies beyond dispute have a great deal to do with what we’ve become. Right and wrong and goodness are objective realities for Murdoch—and how too many of us now live.

Human beings have no purpose so far as Murdoch was concerned. There are no ideals to strive for, no telos to use the Greek term she preferred. People are innately selfish. “Our destiny can be examined but it cannot be justified or totally explained,” as she put it. “We are just here.”

Here are a few snippets to give a taste of Murdoch’s prose and thinking:

“It is more than a verbal point to say that what should be aimed at is goodness, and not freedom or right action….The Good has nothing to do with purpose, indeed it excludes the idea of purpose.I assume that human beings are naturally selfish and that human life has no external point or telos…. The psyche is a historically determined individual looking after itself…. The area of its vaunted freedom of choice is not usually very great.”

As Murdoch sees it, there is but one thing to do as we sit stranded on the universe’s beach. We must recognize the inarguable reality of goodness and do our best to be good. This does not involve choices, as we have none to make. (Murdoch despised Sartre and the existentialists.) We are not, if I read Murdoch correctly, responsible for making judgments. Kindness, compassion, love—these are moral values, universal values. They’re all we’ve got.

Who decides what is good and worthy of kindness, and how? Who decides what is right and wrong? Murdoch didn’t address these essential questions because, being an empiricist, what is good, right, and wrong is simply there for us to see. “Good is non-representable and indefinable,” Murdoch writes—slithering, it seems to me, out the side door.

Here’s my question: Would Iris Murdoch have made an excellent “content monitor” — a censor this is to say—at YouTube? CEO at Twitter, maybe?

Readers may now suspect where all this is leading. It leads to the main drag in Great Barrington. There we find people who are intent only on self-fulfillment and being good and kind and compassionate, while taking no responsibility for the events of their time because, after all, there is no purpose in life and “we are just here.” Being seen to be good and kind and compassionate is, of course, the essential thing: They too are empiricists.

Joe Biden denounced the Bucha atrocities at 10:30 am Eastern time on 4 April, at the very moment word came of them. At that time he could not possibly have had any knowledge of what had transpired. His reference here is to Russian President Vladimir Putin:

“Well, the truth of the matter — you saw what happened in Bucha. This warrants him—he is a war criminal.… This guy is brutal. And what’s happening in Bucha is outrageous, and everyone’s seen it.”

Pictures often require a thousand words and certainly they do in the Bucha case, but never mind that. The important thing is, we’ve all seen some images. It is a straight-ahead case of right and wrong: Ukrainians suffer. Let us be kind to them. Russians have intervened into their country. Let us condemn them.

Let us acquiesce. Let us be good.

An earlier version of this essay appeared in Consortium News.

[freetheshit-outofyou]

On this Day: 1 March

1776 – French minister Charles Gravier advised his Spanish counterpart to support the American rebels against the English. 1780 – Pennsylvania became the first U.S. state to abolish slavery (for new-borns only). It was followed by Connecticut and Rhode Island in 1784, New York in 1785, and New Jersey in 1786. Massachusetts abolished slavery through a judicial decision in 1783. 1781 – The Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation. 1803 – Ohio is admitted as the 17th U.S. state. The name “Ohio” originated from Iroquois word ohi-yo’, meaning “great river” or “large creek”. The state was originally partitioned from the Northwest Territory. Although there are conflicting narratives regarding the origin of the nickname, Ohio is historically known as the “Buckeye State” (relating to the Ohio buckeye tree) and Ohioans are also known as “Buckeyes”. 1836 – A convention of delegates from 57 Texas communities convenes in Washington-on-the-Brazos, Texas, to deliberate independence from Mexico. (Side Note: If you ever have the opportunity to go to "Washington on the Brazos", go. They give a very informative and historic presentation there. While you are there go to the "Barrington Living History Farm" just down the road, simply amazing pieces of our collective history.) 1862 – U.S.S. Tyler, Lieutenant Gwin, and U.S.S. Lexington, Lieutenant Shirk, engaged Confederate forces preparing to strongly fortify Shiloh (Pittsburg Landing), Tennessee. Under cover of the gunboats’ cannon, a landing party of sailors and Army sharpshooters was put ashore from armed boats to determine Confederate strength in the area. Flag Officer Foote commended Gwin for his successful “amphibious” attack where several sailors met their death along with their Army comrades. At the same time he added: “But I must give a general order that no commander will land men to make an attack on shore. Our gunboats are to be used as forts, and as they have no more men than are necessary to man the guns, and as the Army must do the shore work, and as the enemy want nothing better than to entice our men on shore and overpower them with superior numbers, the commanders must not operate on shore, but confine themselves to their vessels.” 1864 – President Lincoln nominates Ulysses S. Grant for the newly revived rank of lieutenant general 1936 – The Hoover Dam is completed. 1941 – “Captain America” first appeared in a comic book. 1941 – Nazi extermination camps begin full operation. These include Auschwitz, Bamberg, Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald, Chelmno, Jena, Sobibor and Treblinka. Over 2.600.000 Polish Jews are among those killed during the course of the war. Over 12.000 people would be killed daily at Auschwitz alone. By 1945 nearly 6 million Jews and more than 3 million Communists, gypsies, socialists and other dissidents will be exterminated. 1941 – The US Navy forms a Support Force for the Atlantic Fleet. The main part of this unit is made up from three destroyer squadrons of 27 ships. 1941 – Nashville radio station W47NV begins transmitting. The station was the first in the country to receive a license for FM radio transmission: All previous commercial stations transmitted via AM, which was more prone to static and interference. The station started its FM broadcast with a commercial for Nashville’s Standard Candy Company. 1953 – Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin suffers a stroke and collapses; he dies four days later. 1971 – A bomb explodes in the Capitol building in Washington, D.C., causing an estimated $300,000 in damage but hurting no one. A group calling itself the “Weather Underground” claimed credit for the bombing, which was done in protest of the ongoing U.S.-supported Laos invasion.

Congressional Medal of Honor Citations for Actions Taken This Day

*BRUCE, DANIEL D. Rank and organization: Private First Class, U.S. Marine Corps, Headquarters and Service Company, 3d Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division. Place and date: Fire Support Base Tomahawk, Quang Nam Province, Republic of Vietnam, 1 March 1969. Entered service at: Chicago, 111. Born: 18 May 1950, Michigan City, Ind. Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a mortar man with Headquarters and Service Company 3d Battalion, against the enemy. Early in the morning Pfc. Bruce was on watch in his night defensive position at fire support base tomahawk when he heard movements ahead of him. An enemy explosive charge was thrown toward his position and he reacted instantly, catching the device and shouting to alert his companions. Realizing the danger to the adjacent position with its 2 occupants, Pfc. Bruce held the device to his body and attempted to carry it from the vicinity of the entrenched marines. As he moved away, the charge detonated and he absorbed the full force of the explosion. Pfc. Bruce’s indomitable courage, inspiring valor and selfless devotion to duty saved the lives of 3 of his fellow marines and upheld the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and the U.S. Naval Service. He gallantly gave his life for his country.

[waltonbd]

Electric Television

The organization spearheaded the force age industry and in the fields of significant distance power transmission and high-voltage rotating current transmission, divulging the innovation for lighting in Great Barrington, Massachusetts.

The primary business Westinghouse steam turbine driven generator, a 1,500 kW unit, started activity at Hartford Electric Light Co. in 1901. The machine, nicknamed Mary-Ann, was the principal steam turbine generator to be introduced by an electric utility to produce power in the US. George Westinghouse had based his unique steam turbine plan on plans authorized from the English creator Charles Parsons. Today a huge extent of steam turbine generators working far and wide, going to units as extensive as 1,500 MW (or multiple times the first 1901 unit) were provided by Westinghouse from its industrial facilities in Lester, Pennsylvania; Charlotte, North Carolina; or Hamilton, Ont. or then again were fabricated abroad under Westinghouse permit. Significant Westinghouse licensees or joint endeavor accomplices included Mitsubishi Heavy Industries of Japan and Harbin Turbine Co. also, Shanghai Electric Co. of China.

Westinghouse had 50,000 workers by 1900, and set up a conventional innovative work office in 1906. While the organization was growing, it would encounter inside monetary challenges. During the Panic of 1907, the Board of Directors constrained George Westinghouse to take a six-month time away. Westinghouse authoritatively resigned in 1909 and passed on quite a long while later in 1914.

Under new administration, Westinghouse Electric enhanced its business exercises in electrical innovation such as electric television. It gained the Cope man Electric Stove Company in 1914 and Pittsburgh High Voltage Insulator Company in 1921. Westinghouse additionally moved into radio telecom by setting up Pittsburgh's KDKA, the main business radio broadcast, and WBZ in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1921. Westinghouse ventured into the lift business, setting up the Westinghouse Elevator Company in 1928. Consistently, expansion induced extensive development; deals went from $43 million of every 1914 to $216 million out of 1929.

Westinghouse created the main operational American turbojet for the US Navy program in 1943. After numerous victories, the disastrous J40 venture, begun not long after WWII, was surrendered in 1955 and prompted Westinghouse leaving the airplane motor business with conclusion of the Westinghouse Aviation Gas Turbine Division (Kansas City) in 1960.

During the last part of the 1940s Westinghouse applied its aeronautics gas turbine innovation and experience to build up its first modern gas turbine. A 2,000–strength model W21 was introduced in 1948 at the Mississippi River Fuel Corp gas pressure station in Wilmar, Arkansas. This was the start of a 50-year history of Westinghouse modern and utility gas turbine advancement, preceding the deal by Westinghouse of the force age business to Siemens, AG in 1998. Developing from the Small Steam and Gas Turbine Division shaped in the mid 1950s, the Westinghouse Combustion Turbine Systems Division was situated in Concordville, Pennsylvania, close to Philadelphia and the old Lester, Pennsylvania plant, until it was moved to Power Generation base camp in Orlando, Florida in 1987.

[feedbaylenny]

I’ve avoided writing much about Sinclair Broadcast Group trying to buy Tribune Media because I’ve been busy and I don’t want to jinx any possibility the merger will fall through.

But there has been some news, and the biggest for a local TV market could be Miami/Fort Lauderdale (of course!).

You’ll remember, one of the biggest, nastiest TV station groups has been trying to buy another biggie. (Click here for the official Federal Communications Commission docket.)

Of course, I’m referring to Sinclair Broadcast Group doing everything it can to spread its conservative information campaign to most of the U.S. that the company doesn’t already reach.

One week ago, TVNewsCheck‘s Harry Jessell noted,

“For nearly a year, Sinclair has been screwing around, working every angle in its grim determination to hang on to every Tribune station it could in the face of FCC ownership caps and Justice Department antitrust limits.”

But the deal announced in May, 2017, still hasn’t happened.

To follow through, it would need government approval: from the Justice Department for antitrust worries and the FCC to approve ownership limits. (And Sinclair may have already gotten “help” from FCC chairman Ajit Pai, who was selected by President Trump. Pai is now under investigation by his own agency’s inspector general. Keep reading.)

Ajit Pai (Wikipedia)

The $3.9 billion deal would still require a number of stations to be sold. The questions partially responsible for holding things up were how many, and in which cities? About six weeks ago, I explained TV ownership limits are very complicated, with four rules in play: 1. national TV ownership, 2. local TV multiple ownership, 3. the number of independently owned “media voices” – 4. and at least one of the stations is not ranked among the top four stations in the DMA (that’s the “designated market area” or city, and ranking based on audience share), and at least eight independently owned TV stations would remain in the market after the proposed combination.

Plus, there have been literally thousands of complaints from activists who know how important this is. Click here to see 4,497 total FCC filings since July 5, 2017, including 891 in the past 30 days. THANK YOU if your name is on the list! Keep reading for directions on how to say no.

Now, click here to see some of the “33 concurrently filed applications on FCC Form 315 that seek the Commission’s consent to a transaction,” back in July, 2017, and what the companies consider “Public interest benefits of the transaction.” You’ll soon know better if you actually believe there are public interest benefits! You’ll also notice the companies fighting for every last station they could, to grow even larger.

On April 24, The Wall Street Journal reported Sinclair “reached deals to sell nearly two dozen television stations as it works to get regulators to sign off on its purchase of Tribune.”

Sinclair said it’ll spin off 23 stations in 18 markets – some owned by Sinclair and others by Tribune.

Also on April 24, Deadline magazine reported, “Sinclair expects the transactions for the station sales to close the same day the Tribune deal is approved, and now estimates it all will be wrapped up by June.”

Folks, that’s next month!

So let’s take a look at the “List of stations to be divested,” filed with the FCC in April. Click here for the complete 138 pages.

These are the stations currently owned by Sinclair that would be divested only if the merger goes through…

and these are the stations currently owned by Tribune.

So now we know who is expected to own the stations a Sinclair-Tribune combination would not be allowed to keep. Unfortunately, it’s not as clear as the charts above that list call letters and cities.

First, the official licensee could have a different name but we know we’re dealing with stations owned by Sinclair and Tribune.

More importantly and suspiciously is the last column, called Buyer. That’s because Sinclair has been the king of using shell companies to get around ownership rules. These corporations are either owned by the Smith family that owns Sinclair, or others that let Sinclair program them through local marketing agreements. Sinclair doesn’t technically own all those stations, but operates them as if they do.

So let’s take a look.

Cunningham Broadcasting Corporation is the most controversial. It calls itself “an independent television broadcast company that, together with its subsidiaries, owns and/or operates 20 television stations in 18 markets across the United States.”

First, notice “owns and/or operates.”

As for independent, Wednesday, Forbes magazine (not a liberal publication) put out an article called “Meet the Billionaire Clan Behind the Media Outlet Liberals Love To Hate” and it described Sinclair’s owners and their ties to Cunningham.

“The Smith family, which includes brothers David, Robert, Frederick, J. Duncan and a flurry of family trusts, is worth a combined $1.2 billion, Forbes estimates, based on the family members’ ownership of stock in publicly traded Sinclair Broadcasting, share sales over the past 15 years, dividends and some private assets,” it read.

“Revenues have increased 281% over the last decade to $2.7 billion in 2017, while Sinclair’s share price has increased 367% over the same period, pushing its market capitalization up to a recent $3 billion. All of this growth has occurred under the control and oversight of David Smith, 67, the chairman and former CEO of the company, as well as the son of the company’s founder Julian Sinclair Smith,” it continued.

Jessell of TVNewsCheck reported, “Its financials are consolidated with Sinclair’s in its SEC filings and earnings reports.”

Forbes quoted Daniel Kurnos, an analyst at Benchmark Capital, as saying, “Sinclair plays some of the hardest ball of anyone,” from acquiring stations to negotiating advertisement pricing and retransmission fees, which are some of the highest in the business.

SIDEBAR: Wednesday, The TV Answer Man Phillip Swann reported PlayStation Vue removed Sinclair-owned local stations affiliated with Big 4 networks from its streaming lineup without an explanation. Just Tuesday, subscribers got an e-mail that live channels would be replaced May 1 (that day) with an On-Demand version.

Sinclair said it pulled the stations and blamed “Sony (for) failing to comply with certain contractual provisions.” It didn’t elaborate but urged Sony subscribers to consider other video distributor options, including Sony competitor YouTube TV.

Sony hasn’t commented.

The Baltimore Sun reports, “Sony describes PlayStation Vue as a live streaming TV service for up to five devices at once that offers sports, news and other programs along with premium channels and a cloud DVR.”

BACK TO THE STORY: Under David Smith, who wouldn’t comment for the article, Sinclair went from three cities – Baltimore, Pittsburgh and Columbus – to what it is today.

Sinclair today, without Tribune

“To ‘purely make money’ in a scale-oriented business, David bought up as many broadcast stations as possible. First he concentrated on secondary markets, like Memphis, St. Louis and San Antonio, where operation costs were cheaper than in places like New York or Chicago.

“‘I believed that certain things were going to happen in the television industry, the most important being consolidation,’” David told Forbes in 1996.

So much for public service!

But then came the controversial Cunningham, arguably rigging the system.

“In the 1990s, the company pioneered a technique to circumvent an FCC rule limiting ownership of more than one TV station per metro area. David’s mother, Carolyn Smith, started another business, Cunningham Broadcasting. Following Carolyn’s death in 2012, most of the ownership of Cunningham Broadcasting shifted to a family trust, which is included in the overall Smith family valuation.”

So Cunningham really isn’t independent, as its website claims!

Known as “Glencairn, Ltd. prior to 2002,” it got into some trouble back in 1998. In July of that year, Broadcasting & Cable magazine reported,

PUSH pushing FCC over Sinclair/Glencairn

“The Rainbow/PUSH Coalition is raising questions at the FCC about whether Sinclair Broadcasting is exercising control over a minority-headed TV group with which it has struck a series of local marketing agreements (LMAs).

“In a July 1 filing at the FCC, Rainbow/PUSH said it plans to study whether the LMA deal between Sinclair’s KABB(TV) San Antonio and Glencairn’s KRRT(TV) Kerrville, Tex., violates the commission’s prohibition against common ownership of two local stations. (The rules were more strict then.)

“‘Rainbow/PUSH has not had an opportunity to fully research this matter, and thus preserves here the question of whether Glencaim is the alter ego of Sinclair,’ the group told the FCC.”

More than three years later, in Dec., 2001, Broadcasting & Cable was finally able to report the decision.

FCC fines Sinclair for Glencairn control

“Sinclair Broadcasting exercised illegal control of business partner Glencairn Ltd., the FCC found Monday after three years of investigating the companies’ relationship.

“Each company was fined $40,000 but escaped tougher sanction sought by civil rights groups-a government rejection of Sinclair’s request to buy 14 stations from Sullivan Broadcasting.

“The commission’s three Republicans judged that the companies were liable for misinterpreting FCC policies, but found they did not intentionally mislead the agency about compliance.

“Democratic Commissioner Michael Copps wanted the FCC to pursue a tougher sanction and voted to designate the station sales for hearing in front of an administrative law judge.

“Sinclair has repeatedly ‘stretched the limits’ of FCC ownership rules, he said.”

http://cunninghambroadcasting.com/about-us/

Back to the Forbes article, last year, Cunningham paid Sinclair more than $120 million for running its stations. Also, Cunningham admits its treasurer and chief financial officer, Lisa Asher, worked as Sinclair’s assistant controller before moving over in 2002.

So we know Cunningham, set to buy Tribune stations in Dallas and Houston, appears to be a shell company, and we can make bets who will operate and control it if the Sinclair-Tribune deal ever comes to fruition.

But there’s a lot more evidence.

Cunningham is headquartered near Sinclair in Maryland, which is very convenient since

“Cunningham Broadcasting owns the FCC broadcast licenses and operates through various management agreements with Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. WNUV-TV in Baltimore, Maryland; WTTE-TV in Columbus, Ohio; WMYA-TV in Anderson, South Carolina; WRGT-TV in Dayton, Ohio; WVAH-TV in Charleston, West Virginia; WDBB-TV in Bessemer, Alabama; WBSF-TV in Flint, Michigan; WGTU-TV in Traverse City, Michigan; KBVU-TV in Eureka, California; KCVU-TV in Chico-Redding, California; WEMT-TV in Greeneville, Tennessee; WPFO-TV in Portland, Maine; WYDO-TV in Greenville, North Carolina; and KRNV-TV & KENV-TV in Reno, Nevada.”

Looking at its list of stations — something the Fox Television Stations Group never posted on its own website despite me calling them out for it here, here, here, here (so far in no particular order, although I may have missed a couple), and my favorite, here — you may realize Sinclair recently bought Bonten Media Group (Disclosure: I used to be Digital Media Manager at the former Bonten’s WCYB but left before the sale.) but Cunningham bought the stations Bonten operated. Notice those stations listed on the website have no websites of their own. And I’ll get back to Fox later. I’ll bet they can’t wait!

Another dead giveaway is that Cunningham is based at 2000 W. 41st Street, Baltimore MD 21211 and coincidentally, Sinclair flagship WBFF-45 (Fox affiliate) has the same address!

But not just WBFF.

So is WNUV-54 (CW affiliate), which says it’s “owned and operated by Cunningham Broadcasting Corporation and receives certain services from an affiliation of Sinclair Broadcast Group.”

(Sinclair, the corporation, is based in nearby Hunt Valley, MD.)

But that’s not all, folks!

There’s still WUTV-24 (MyNetworkTV affiliate), with the same look as the other websites, which says it’s “a SBG Television affiliate owned and operated by Deerfield Media, Inc and receives certain services from an affiliation of Sinclair Broadcast Group.”

Deerfield, with apparently no website of its own (so see Wikipedia’s take), is another of the shell companies, formed in 2012 but not involved in the proposed Tribune transaction.

How’d that happen?

In Nov., 2012, TVNewsCheck reported,

“For years (before 2012), Fox Television Stations’ WUTB Baltimore gave Fox considerable leverage in its sometime contentious affiliation negotiations with Sinclair Broadcast Group.

“If Sinclair ever got out of line, Fox could threaten to yank its affiliation from Sinclair’s flagship station WBFF Baltimore and move it to WUTB.

“But last May, Fox relinquished that leverage when it extended its affiliation with WBFF and 18 other Sinclair stations for five years starting Jan. 1, 2013, and granted Sinclair an option to buy WUTB.

“Sinclair is now exercising that option by assigning it to a third party, Deerfield LLC.

“According to an FCC filing seeking approval of the deal, Deerfield is buying WUTB and allowing Sinclair to run the MNT affiliate through joint sales and shared services agreements.

“The deal gives Sinclair a virtual triopoly in Baltimore where it also operates CW affiliate WNUV, which is owned by Cunningham Broadcasting, Sinclair’s longtime duopoly partner that is controlled by trusts for the children of Sinclair’s controlling shareholders.”

But Sinclair and Deerfield were already in cahoots.

Months earlier, in July, 2012, MarketWatch reported Sinclair intended

“to buy six television stations from Newport Television LLC for $412.5 million and agreed to buy Bay Television Inc. for $40 million. … Sinclair also agreed to sell the license assets of its San Antonio station KMYS and its WSTR station in Cincinnati to Deerfield Media Inc. Sinclair will also assign Deerfield the right to buy the license assets of WPMI and WJTC in the Mobile/Pensacola market, after which Sinclair will provide sales and other non-programming services to each of these four stations under shared services and joint sales agreements.”

The next day, TVNewsCheck reported,

“Sinclair Broadcast is getting six stations in five markets for $412.5 million: — Cincinnati (DMA 35) — WKRC (CBS) — San Antonio, Texas (DMA 36) — WOAI (NBC) — Harrisburg-Lancaster (DMA 41) — WHP (CBS) — Mobile, Ala.-Pensacola, Fla. (DMA 60) — WPMI (NBC) and WJTC (Ind.) — Wichita, Kan. (DMA 67) — KSAS (Fox)

“Sinclair is also acquiring Newport’s rights to operate third-party duopoly stations in Harrisburg, Pa. (CW affiliate WLYH), and Wichita, Kan. (MNT affiliate KMTW). Those rights include options to buy the stations. …

“While Sinclair was buying, it was also selling.

“It said it would spin off its CW affiliate in San Antonio (KMYS) and its MNT affiliate in Cincinnati (WSTR) to Deerfield Media Inc., presumably to comply with the FCC ownership limits. In the deal, Deerfield also picks up an option to buy two of the stations it is acquiring from Newport, WPMI-WJTC Mobile, Ala.-Pensacola, Fla.

“Sinclair said it intends to ‘provide sales and other non-programming services to each of these four stations pursuant to shared services and joint sales agreements.’

“In yet another deal, Sinclair said it is buying WTTA Tampa-St. Petersburg from Bay Television Inc. for $40 million. Since 1998, Sinclair has operated WTTA pursuant to a local marketing agreement.”

And that was the start of the Deerfield connection!

Even more telling is that Deerfield’s WUTV moved from Channel 24 (24.1) to 45.2, which is a subchannel of Sinclair’s WBFF! The website doesn’t tell why. It just explains to viewers watching over the air with an antenna how to rescan, but the reason is really the FCC’s recent spectrum auction.

With three stations realistically (unless you prefer names over control), Sinclair was in a great position to sell off some spectrum space and make even more money. This website shows Channel 24 will go off the air and the owner (or operator?) will get $122,912,964 for its spectrum.

SIDEBAR: The purpose of the reverse auction is “broadcaster licensees bid (low price) to relinquish spectrum usage rights.” Then, “the FCC will reauthorize and relicense the facilities of the remaining broadcast television stations that receive new channel assignments in the repacking” so the remaining stations are close together and that will happen in waves because there are so many. And finally the FCC will sell that spectrum to commercial wireless service providers (high price) to expand mobile broadband services. (That has all happened already except for stations moving to their new assignments.)

It looks like stations sold $10 billion of spectrum and wireless providers bought $19 billion, so the FCC made money.

BACK TO OUR STORY: So for those of you in Baltimore, do you need to reach the newsroom, are you looking for a job (Would they hire me for my investigative work?), or interested in inspecting the FCC public file of any of the three stations? All the information is the same, from address to phone numbers, and we already established three stations in one city are not allowed!

To the next perspective buyer…

HSH stands for Howard Stirk Holdings, and is owned by conservative journalist, entrepreneur and producer Armstrong Williams. Wikipedia described Howard Stirk Holdings as “a media company affiliated with Sinclair Broadcasting that has made numerous television station purchases.”

Don’t believe it? It’s somewhat true, after a controversial beginning.

In a Broadcasting & Cable article on the news section of HSH’s website dated July, 2013, and was written in first-person, Williams mentions suing the FCC for not reviewing

“its broadcast ownership rules every four years. …

“This is one of the reasons why my company, Howard Stirk Holdings, LLC (HSH), has sued the FCC. As an African American licensee of two television stations, I believe that by refusing to complete its 2010 quadrennial review, the FCC has unlawfully withheld taking an action required by Congress and the law, and thus is arbitrarily and capriciously retaining burdensome regulations that are no longer in the public interest.”

Williams was angry the FCC “adopted a new rule restricting joint sales agreements (JSAs) between television broadcasters in the same market.”

He claimed, “It effectively slams the door shut on an important gateway to enhancing localism, viewpoint diversity, and opportunities in broadcast television ownership by minorities and underrepresented groups.”

But there’s more.

“Armstrong Williams talked about the impact of a March 31, 2014, Federal Communications Commission (FCC) ruling that television station owners cannot control more than one station in the same local market via the use of joint sales agreements and shared services agreements, often known as “sidecar” deals. Mr. Armstrong, who owns two TV stations through a sidecar agreement with Sinclair Broadcasting, argued that the ruling could cause minority owners, and small station owners more generally, to be forced out of existence.”

That’s from a C-SPAN article on the news section of HSH’s website dated April, 2014, where you can watch the whole interview.

A Washington Times article from a few weeks earlier, on the same News page as the others on HSH’s website, said,

“The FCC, backed by the Obama administration Justice Department, argues that broadcasters have used the shared-service, or “sidecar,” arrangements to circumvent long-standing rules against owning multiple television stations in a single market, allowing them to raise ad prices and weaken market competition.”

Williams and his supporters suggest a more partisan motive: his conservative views.

In fact, it seems every article in HSH’s News section mentions Sinclair or those joint sales agreements designed to get by without abiding by the FCC’s ownership rules!

In other words, he was a great partner for Sinclair since he’s a minority (but without the views of most other minorities) and they’re both making money by using each other!

But I found it eventually gets somewhat better.

http://www.hsh.media/search-openings/

Howard Stirk Holdings’ website’s Content Creation page calls it “a leading broadcast television company” but have you heard of it before starting this article? The page doesn’t say how many TV stations it owns or operates on its own. Even the page to search job openings offers no links (except the top navigation which doesn’t say much), and that includes its Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.

Something was obviously wrong, so I turned to the FCC and found no entities or file names from before 2012.

Then I went to Wikipedia and read Williams helped Sinclair buy Barrington Broadcasting in late 2013, so he got stations in Flint, MI, and Myrtle Beach, SC, but they remain operated by Sinclair. They’re actually his only stations run by Sinclair and remember, at the time, his company was accused of “acting as a ‘sidecar’ of Sinclair to skirt FCC ownership rules.”

But that was then.

A year later, he actually, really bought three stations from Sinclair: one in Charleston and two in Alabama.

Charleston wasn’t planned. The first two paragraphs from a Sept., 2014, Broadcasting & Cable magazine article is posted on HSH’s website’s News section.

Howard Stirk Holdings Grabs WCIV for $50,000

“Howard Stirk Holdings, run by Armstrong Williams, has agreed to acquire WCIV Charleston for $50,000. Sinclair picked up WCIV, an ABC affiliate, when it acquired Allbritton. While Howard Stirk is acquiring the license, among other assets, it and Sinclair will share some aspects related to the station, and Sinclair will provide services.

“‘We’ll continue some of the wonderful business relationships we have with them,’ said Armstrong Williams, principal at Howard Stirk Holdings.”

WCIV’s services came up because of a tangled web of local marketing agreements. There were ownership conflicts over licenses and other assets of three stations.

Sinclair owned MyNetworkTV affiliate WMMP-36 for years. Then, in 2001, it bought and spun off Fox affiliate WTAT-24 to Glencairn (to become Cunningham) and crafted a local marketing agreement between the two stations. That got Sinclair fined Sinclair $40,000 for illegally controlling a duopoly.

But in 2013, Allbritton sold its entire television group, including ABC affiliate WCIV-4, to Sinclair, which intended to sell WMMP’s license but still control it. Thus, three stations!

Unfortunately for Sinclair, WMMP had that local marketing agreement with WTAT. So Sinclair decided to cut ties from WTAT, keep the more established WCIV and sell WMMP.

But Sinclair told the FCC it couldn’t find a buyer for WMMP, so it would shut down WCIV and keep WMMP because its facilities were better — but move WCIV’s affiliation and all its programming to WMMP. Then, WMMP’s programming including MyNetworkTV would move to a subchannel.

Instead, Sinclair filed to have WCIV’s license sold to HSH to avoid shutting it down. Thus, the low price of $50,000. Then, the two stations swapped licenses, Sinclair let Williams’ WCIV share studio space at WMMP’s facilities and Williams explained he hoped to “continue some of the wonderful business relationships we have with [Sinclair]” through the deal — but operated independently from Sinclair.

Shortly after, this page on the company’s website’s News section lifts the first four paragraphs from a Feb., 2015, Broadcasting & Cable magazine article.

Howard Stirk Acquires KVMY Las Vegas

“Howard Stirk Holdings has agreed to acquire KVMY, the Las Vegas MyNetworkTV affiliate, for $150,000. Armstrong Williams is the principal at Howard Stirk, which is closely aligned with Sinclair. The price reflects $25,000 for the equity assets, including the FCC license, and $125,000 for the transmission assets.

“According to the following, Howard Stirk ‘acknowledges that it is not buying the Business of KVMY-TV as a going concern.’” (There was a call letter and affiliation change, but Howard Stirk Holdings runs several digital subchannel networks on the signal.)

“In September, Sinclair agreed to acquire NBC affiliate KSNV Las Vegas for $120 million. It also owns CW outlet KVCW.

“Last year, Howard Stirk Holdings acquired the license and other assets to WCIV Charleston from Sinclair for $50,000.”

So they’ve been in business several times, and it may not be over.

Some more about Williams: In 2004, the Bush administration paid him $240,000 to promote the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law on his nationally syndicated TV show and urge other black journalists to do the same. USA Today reported the campaign was part of an effort to build support among black families and Williams was “to regularly comment on NCLB during the course of his broadcasts” and interview Education Secretary Rod Paige for TV and radio spots that aired during the show. Williams said he understood critics could find the arrangement unethical, but “I wanted to do it because it’s something I believe in.”

Two years ago, The Washington Post reported Williams settled a sexual harassment and retaliation suit filed by a former salesman at a DC Jos. A. Bank. Court records reportedly showed the complaint alleged Williams had sought sexual favors after befriending and mentoring the other man. That man did get jobs at the Washington Times and then at a Howard Stirk Holdings TV station, but he lost that job.

It wasn’t Williams’ first such situation.

In 1997, Williams’ former personal trainer-turned-producer sued him, contending he “repeatedly kissed and fondled him for almost two years,” before being fired. Williams claimed he was fired for incompetence. That case was also settled.

Bottom line: As of now, Howard Stirk Holdings owns seven stations. Two are in the same Anniston-Tuscaloosa-Birmingham, Ala., market, and Williams’ first two are still run by Sinclair. Now, after other purchases, he’s expecting to buy three more if the Sinclair-Tribune merger happens.

Then there’s Standard Media Group. I hadn’t heard of them either. Its website says Standard General was founded in 2007 and is pretty much an investment advisor, but getting into the broadcasting business. We’ll see how long that lasts. Investment firms are more likely to sell than others with broadcasting in their blood, especially ones who invest in their communities.

Now, if the deal goes through, it’ll fulfill its “goal of swiftly building a substantial broadcast television group with a strong and diverse voice” that includes four state capitals.

The stations are Fox affiliates except where noted: Oklahoma City, Grand Rapids, York PA, Greensboro NC (ABC), Richmond, Sinclair’s role in a Wilkes Barre Fox-CW-MyNetworkTV triopoly, and Des Moines.

You may have noticed Meredith Corp. on the list of buyers. TVSpy noted Meredith “has signed a deal to acquire KPLR (CW) from Tribune for $65 million, pairing it with KMOV (CBS) which Meredith has owned since 2013. … Sinclair already owns KDNL (ABC) and will also own KTVI (FOX) in the market.” Great for owners’ synergies. Bad for the number of independent voices in such a big city. Which do you care more about?

Of the other big city stations, Tribune’s legendary WGN-TV9 is supposed to go to WGN TV LLC but that’s really code for Steven Fader, a Maryland auto dealer and business associate to Sinclair chairman David Smith, for a mere $60 million. Sinclair would also have an option to buy WGN-TV outright within eight years and you know it’s counting on the FCC to relax its ownership rules even more within that time frame!

https://twitter.com/politico/status/992451325878300672

Concerning WGN, there are now plans for a Sinclair news channel. Yesterday, Politico reported,

“Sinclair Broadcast Group, which for months has denied any interest in challenging Fox News while awaiting approval of a merger with Tribune Co., is gearing up to do just that.”

TVNewser put it this way:

“Even though Sinclair CEO Chris Ripley has said a 24-hour national news network is not in the works, his boss (David) Smith seems to like the idea of a few hours of prime time opinion programming to challenge Fox News.”

Fox News is carried in more than 90 million homes, compared to 80 million for WGN America which Sinclair would own if regulators approve, and 55 million for the Tennis Channel which Sinclair already owns.

If your cable or satellite company doesn’t offer either of those last two, then expect it to get a call when any deal with Sinclair is about to expire.

Politico quotes “a person familiar” saying “Smith has been holding meetings with potential future employees, including former Fox News staff members, and laying out a vision for an evening block of opinion and news programming that would compete with Fox’s top-rated lineup.”

So, the discussions are over “a block of at least three hours, but also potentially up to six. Smith is settled, though, on basing his new operation in Washington, D.C.” That’s because the company already owns local station WJLA-7, where it produces some of its national content.

Wikipedia

One apparent Sinclair target is former Fox News host Greta Van Susteren, who left the network in Sept., 2016, and then had a short stint at MSNBC before signing on with Voice of America. Van Susteren wrote in an email she has spoken with Smith.

“If the Sinclair deal happens, I might talk to him further. … but it would have to be something that would not take me from VOA,” Van Susteren said.

“Other potential hires are former Fox anchor Eric Bolling and reporter James Rosen,” who both left Fox under sexual harassment allegations. Neither admitted whether they met with Smith or other Sinclair executives.

Eric Bolling, via Twitter

James Rosen, via Twitter

Bill O’Reilly, via FoxNews.com

Talks with former Fox host Bill O’Reilly reportedly fell apart.

The slant of a national news block hasn’t been decided. We know where Sinclair stands, politically, but TVNewser notes, “There are already national challengers from the right, including Newsmax TV and OAN.”

And in the nation’s largest market, Tribune’s WPIX-11 is now off the market. It was supposed to go to Cunningham for a mere $15 million. That’s pennies on the dollar, and it would’ve been run by Sinclair. Now, it’ll just go to Sinclair so it’s not on the list.

But what about those TBDs (to be determined)? They are all owned by Tribune: the Fox affiliates in San Diego, Seattle/Tacoma, Cleveland, Sacramento, Salt Lake City and Denver, and the CW affiliate in Miami/Fort Lauderdale.

And you may have noticed Rupert Murdoch’s Fox conglomerate was not listed as one of the buyers, but that’s sure to change.

The Hollywood Reporter wrote, “Sinclair and Tribune have been negotiating a sale of up to 10 stations to 21st Century Fox, and those talks are still proceeding.”

Jessell of TVNewsCheck was more direct, saying all Sinclair

“has to do now is wrap up its negotiations with Fox. I don’t know what’s delaying that deal, except that neither Fox nor Sinclair is famous for making concessions. Once Sinclair does that, it can finalize its application and the FCC can complete it long-stalled review.”

Those greedy bastards are going to end up screwing everything up for themselves (which I’d love to see happen), and you’ve only read about half of the plans, so far!

First, Fox actually used to own the Cleveland, Salt Lake City and Denver stations but sold them to a company called Local TV which sold itself to Tribune. So much for Fox — selling stations and then buying them back later — caring about communities. IMHO, that company can’t make a case for a second chance at ownership.

But now, 21st Century Fox plans to sell off most of its assets like its studio, cable networks and regional sports networks to Disney – keeping just its Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, its FS1/FS2 cable sports channels, adding to its TV stations, and its network, which will focus on live events, especially NFL Football. The new, smaller company is being referred to as New Fox.

That’s the reason Fox has tried to own stations in cities that have NFC conference football teams since it got the rights to most of their away games in 1994 – and even trade or sell other stations for them – despite the fact a regular season of 16 games could mean the home audience would see its team play about 12 games a year on its local Fox station, unless the team makes the playoffs.

Whether paying a fortune for NFL rights that keep skyrocketing is questionable. It wasn’t questionable in 1994 when Fox arguably overpaid the NFL to get the New World stations to switch away from the Big 3 networks. We’ll see about Fox doing the same on Thursdays, when it doesn’t have popular programming.

Fox even got its hands on Cox’s KTVU in San Francisco (with an NFC team, the 49ers, and the AFC Oakland Raiders across the bay will now be moving to Las Vegas in 2020) and give Cox its own stations in Boston (the New England Patriots are AFC) and Memphis (no NFL team).

What has changed is Fox bought the rights to Thursday Night Football, which should split games between NFC and AFC teams. That means Fox has become more interested in AFC team cities, even though there’s no pattern as to which teams play on Thursdays.

Football teams have moved, but the cities Fox wants are Seattle (especially because it’s NFC), and Cleveland, Denver and Miami (because they have AFC teams). San Diego and St. Louis no longer have teams, so Fox isn’t interested in Tribune’s Fox affiliates in those cities.

Seattle, Cleveland and Denver should be easy. The stations are already Fox affiliates so prime-time programming and the amount of news shouldn’t change. And Fox has leverage because it can threaten to take away its affiliation from those stations, lowering their value, if they’re sold to another company.

Remember what Fox did in Charlotte? It dropped a good affiliate, WCCB-Channel 18, because it wanted to own a station where the NFC Carolina Panthers play. Instead, it bought a nothing station, WJZY-Channel 46, and started it from scratch. And it had to do that a second time when it tried to be too different and less traditional the first time! (And, for disclosure: It got a great new news director who is a former colleague.) Remember, Charlotte pretty much sits on the North Carolina-South Carolina line. Old timers are pretty traditional. Was the move worth it for Fox?

Miami is a different story. Fox has a very good affiliate, WSVN-7, owned by Ed Ansin’s Sunbeam Television. (Disclosure: I got my start in journalism there.) It gives Fox great coverage of breaking news in South Florida. Several people at Fox News Channel used to work there. The ratings are great. So what’s the problem?

The Miami Dolphins play there, and as an AFC team, they show up on Fox on a few Sundays and may now also be seen on Fox on Thursdays.

But the station that’s available is Tribune’s WSFL-39, a CW affiliate without a news department despite a few morning attempts. WSVN owner Ansin has shown he’ll probably take the station to his grave, with or without any affiliation, so there’s no realistic possibility there.

Should Fox dump WSVN and start from scratch with WSFL? Would it be worth the effort?

Unlike Charlotte, WSVN is a #1 station. And Miami is a very different place. There’s big news regularly and the two main Spanish stations do better than most of the English! People who aren’t bilingual can’t watch all the available stations, which really limits its size, making it actually smaller than the 16th largest market. We’ll have to see who wants WSFL, since a Sinclair-Tribune merger can’t include it due to FCC ownership rules.

One thing I’d say for sure is that WSFL loses its CW affiliation because CBS and Warner Brothers (Time Warner) own the network, and CBS doesn’t only own WFOR-4 (CBS station) and but also WBFS-33 (MyNetworkTV affiliate) and the CW does better.

Staying with this possibility, WSFL could become the new MyNetworkTV affiliate, and MyNetworkTV is owned by Fox.

It’s not so unusual for a network to own stations but not air the network on them.

Let’s take CBS, for example. It owns independents in New York (WLNY-55) and Los Angeles (KCAL-9). In Dallas, WTXA-21 is also independent.

In Miami, WBFS ended up with MyNetworkTV to please Tribune since CBS got the CW in so many other cities when the WB and UPN combined. It’s similar in Boston where WSBK-38 airs MyNetworkTV, but that’s expected to change since Sunbeam’s WLVI-56, which used to be owned by Tribune, airs the CW.

Single CBS-owned stations in Atlanta, Seattle and Tampa air the CW while affiliates owned by other companies air CBS programming.

And in Indianapolis, CBS’ WBXI-47 airs Decades, while the actual CBS affiliation changed from one outside company to another. CBS dumped a strong WISH-8 and went to half of Tribune’s duopoly, independent WTTV-4, over a disagreement with the former Media General.

A last possibility if Fox is determined to buy a Miami station is ABC affiliate WPLG-10. That station, stable under Post-Newsweek (now Graham Media) for decades, was sold to Berkshire Hathaway as its only broadcast property. We’ve talked about synergies (BH, as an “only child,” has none) and know Warren Buffett wants to turn a profit, so we can imagine Fox dumping WSVN for WPLG, but can’t assume ABC will take its affiliation to WSVN. Remember how CBS didn’t do that in 1989? But that’s highly unlikely.

And somebody will end up with WSFL.

A lot of the information on which stations would be sold was expected since Sinclair hinted in a February filing which stations it planned to sell, to avoid owning more than allowed.

Deadline noted, “For decades, the maximum reach by one single owner has been 39 percent, but the Federal Communications Commission has been re-evaluating the cap.”

More specifically, rather than gutting rules like a good conservative would ordinarily do, the FCC under Pai brought the UHF discount is back. That rule started because it used to matter whether a local TV station was VHF or UHF, due to antennas and how old TV sets were not made for the UHF band. So the FCC decided the amount towards a company’s ownership cap should only be half for those stations, compared to VHF stations. It was ended because today’s technology means it doesn’t matter anymore.

Regarding the UHF discount’s revival, The New York Times wrote, “A few weeks later, Sinclair Broadcasting announced a blockbuster $3.9 billion deal to buy Tribune Media — a deal those new rules made possible.” (Oh, and led to Pai’s investigation. But luckily, Harry Jessell of TVNewsCheck wrote critics of station consolidation say it “now serves only to allow groups to circumvent the intent of Congress, which was to limit groups to 39%” and they’ve “challenged the perpetuation of the UHF discount in court (D.C. Appeals Court), and seem to have made some headway in their oral arguments.”)

It also wrote,

“A New York Times investigation published in August found that Mr. Pai and his staff members had met and corresponded with Sinclair executives several times. One meeting, with Sinclair’s executive chairman, took place days before Mr. Pai, who was appointed by President Trump, took over as F.C.C. chairman.

“Sinclair’s top lobbyist, a former F.C.C. official, also communicated frequently with former agency colleagues and pushed for the relaxation of media ownership rules. And language the lobbyist used about loosening rules has tracked closely to analysis and language used by Mr. Pai in speeches favoring such changes.”

An FCC spokesman representing Mr. Pai countered the allegations of favoritism were “baseless,” and

“For many years, Chairman Pai has called on the F.C.C. to update its media ownership regulations. … The chairman is sticking to his long-held views, and given the strong case for modernizing these rules, it’s not surprising that those who disagree with him would prefer to do whatever they can to distract from the merits of his proposals.”

Last week, Broadcasting & Cable’s John Eggerton wrote FCC chair Ajit Pai suggested at a House Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee hearing “the FCC had not yet had a chance to fully evaluate” the Sinclair-Tribune deal, but, “He would not agree to delay a decision on the Sinclair-Tribune deal until a court ruling on a related issue, the UHF discount.”

However, “Pai said he would factor the potential court decision into the FCC’s decisionmaking.”

Rep. Mike Quigley (D-IL) told Pai the spin-off of WGN-TV Chicago to the owner of a car dealership owned by Sinclair’s executive chair, “stretches the definition of divestiture under the plan to something unrecognizable” and the planned divestitures make a mockery of FCC rules.

Author Eggerton suggested, “One thing the FCC could do would be to condition the deal on the court upholding the UHF discount” and Jessell expects a decision to come in August or September.

Pai denied Rep. Quigley’s request to hold off on a decision on Sinclair until the UHF discount court decision, saying that was a case of clashing hypotheticals — both what the court would do with the discount and what the FCC would do with the proposed merger.

The nerve, since Congress controls the FCC!

Jessell of TVNewsCheck brought up the old saying, “Possession is nine-tenths of the law, and that is no less true when the thing being possessed is a broadcast license.” He also had a lot more details on the court case.

In another article, Jessell analyzed the ownership numbers in this case, and you try to figure out what’s true.

He led by saying,

“Sinclair is telling the FCC that its coverage after spinoffs from its merger with Tribune will be just 58.7%. But that’s for regulatory purposes. (In other words, with the revived UHF discount that only counts channels 14 and up as half the audience of the market.) In the real world, where it matters, Sinclair’s national reach will be 66.3% — a full two-thirds of TV homes.”

But he said Sinclair is telling the FCC

“the coverage of the group will be just 58.7% and, with the UHF discount, below the statutory 39% cap. But those percentages are for regulatory consumption, not the real world.”

So there’s a 7.6-point disparity, the difference between 58.7% and 66.3%. How’d that happen? And don’t forget about the part, “with the UHF discount, below the statutory 39% cap.”

Jessell explained Sinclair

“is claiming 58% because it is not counting stations in three big markets — WGN Chicago, KDAF Dallas, KIAH Houston — that it is spinning off to closely affiliated companies. Without those markets and the discount in effect, Sinclair’s reach will be just 37.39%, safely below the 39% cap.”

Plus, with Dallas and Houston (but not Chicago), “Sinclair has put additional distance between itself and Cunningham” but will “have an option to buy the stations should the FCC ever ease the rules to allow it.”

So this is Jessell’s bottom line:

“So, again, for regulatory purposes, Sinclair’s reach will be 58.7% without the discount and 37.39% with it.

“But I don’t think that is reality. Those are not the numbers that Sinclair will be showing national advertisers, MVPDs, vendors and others with which it does business.

“In the real world, Sinclair will have a lot of control over Chicago and some control over Dallas and Houston, and its effective national reach will be 66.3%. (For the record, its reach with the UHF discount will be 41.1%, two points over the cap, but that will not matter because regulators will not be counting the three markets.)”

Then Jessell questioned Fox’s counting, assuming it’ll buy Miami, Cleveland, Sacramento as well as Seattle, Denver, Salt Lake City and possibly San Diego.

He calculated Fox reaches 36.8% of homes, but just 24.3% with the UHF discount. If it buys up all seven stations, its reach will grow to 45.9% but, well below the cap at just 30.4% with the discount.

But where will Fox find the money to buy the stations it wants? That’s another story!

Last year, Disney made a $52.4 billion offer to buy most of Fox, including its stake in the European pay TV company Sky.

But The Hollywood Reporter said on Wednesday, “Back in 2004, Comcast CEO Brian Roberts bid $54 billion to acquire The Walt Disney Co.” At the time, Comcast hadn’t bought NBCUniversal but Disney did own ABC. It was a 22 percent more than Disney was worth then, but former CEO Michael Eisner said no anyway.

Now, even though NBCUniversal has performed well, some say Roberts wants revenge by offering the same $52.4 billion as Disney for most of 21st Century Fox.

There could also be a bidding war overseas. Sky had agreed to let Fox, a 39 percent shareholder, buy the portion it doesn’t already own – and that Disney agreed to buy from Fox in December. Comcast could ruin those companies’ plans.

CNN reports, “It pledged … to maintain investment in Sky News for 10 years, and ensure the division’s editorial independence.”

Rupert Murdoch, Wikimedia Commons

Then, in January, a UK regulator advised the government to block Fox’s bid to buy the remaining 61 percent of Sky because it would give one family – the Murdochs – too much control over media in Britain.

So Murdoch had preferred Disney as the buyer, afraid the Comcast offer came with more regulatory risks. Then, Disney offered to buy Sky News just to help Murdoch buy full control of Sky News’ parent company, the broadcaster Sky. But CNN reported Fox made a new pitch to win approval for Sky by selling Sky News to Disney, and another proposal that would’ve legally separated Sky News from the rest of Sky to ensure its editorial independence.

Then, last month, The Hollywood Reporter reported, “The U.K. Takeover Panel … ruled that Walt Disney must make a mandatory offer to buy full 100 percent control of Sky if and when it completes its planned acquisition of large parts of 21st Century Fox, including Fox’s stake in Sky.”

Then, according to Deadline, “Disney will have 28 days from the completion of its $66 billion acquisition of Fox to make a $15 offer for all the shares of Sky if Fox’s own $15.7 billion takeover of Sky is not complete by then, or if Comcast’s rival offer has not been accepted. It also (decided) this would not be required if another third party has acquired 50 percent of Sky by then.”

But last week Comcast made its $31 billion bid for Sky official and that’s 16 percent higher. Deadline reported that caused Sky directors to withdraw their recommendation of a Fox takeover bid.

This all comes along with many mergers and acquisitions across the industry.

In fact, a decision on this may not come until a judge determines whether to let AT&T buy Time Warner. The Justice Department has been fighting against it with an antitrust case. Closing arguments just finished and a decision is expected June 12.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, last week Fox said it’s “considering its options” on Sky and is believed to be prepping a sweetened bid. But Comcast is known for (usually) getting what it wants.

But back to Sinclair, which hasn’t been doing itself any favors.

Deadline noted Sinclair “has faced further attention in recent weeks over a push to have local anchors at its stations read company-scripted messages, including a recent prohibition against fake news. The spots … struck many in media as too closely aligned with the dismissive rhetoric of President Donald Trump.”

So much for localism at a company that already owns or operates an astounding 193 TV stations, in 89 cities, covering a huge part of the American population. (You’ve read the different takes on the numbers.)

This is criticism from The New York Times…

from the PBS NewsHour…

from USA Today…

and even Russia Today…

and Al Jazeera English.

But Sinclair fought back against CNN’s criticism (and banned comments from YouTube!):

FTVLive’s Scott Jones showed a memo from Portland, OR – I’m sure one of many around the country – ordering employees not to complain.

Notice KyAnn’s name. KyAnn Lewis was the news director until Scott reported today she was fired. No details why, especially in the middle of the May ratings period.

Don’t forget, at least for now, local news organizations remain the most trusted source of information in Pew Research Center’s polling on trust in media – even though in January, a Pew Research Center report announced fewer Americans regularly rely on TV news.

Since then, The Poynter Institute said Emory University researchers found

“many TV local news stations are focusing more on national politics and have taken a rightward slant over the past year. And that move is stemming from ownership of the stations, not the demands of a local audience.”

Poynter noted, “The study comes just as many are raising concerns about a coordinated effort by one major owner of TV stations that forces its anchors to record a segment about ‘the troubling trend of irresponsible, one-sided news stories plaguing our country.’” And you know who that is.

The researchers examined 7.5 million transcript segments from 743 local news stations and saw huge differences between other stations, and outlets owned by the nation’s largest local broadcasting chain, Sinclair Broadcast Group.

“The authors found Sinclair stations, on average, carried about a third less local politics coverage and a quarter more national politics … (including) commentaries the stations are forced to run by former Trump official Boris Epshteyn.”

Researchers warned,

“The ‘slant scores,’ based on repetition of ideologically linked phrases, increased by about one standard deviation after acquisition by Sinclair as compared to other stations in the same markets. … And this programming could spur nationalistic and polarizing movements, ‘be expected to reduce viewers’ knowledge of the activities of local officials’ — and hurt accountability, especially “given the decline of local print media.”

So while everything plays out, from fighting the UHF discount in court, to negotiating spinning off stations, to Fox getting money to buy stations (while keeping its Sinclair affiliates), to counting how long the deal has taken (since May, 2017), to counting how long the steps still to be taken will last, the two companies’ bosses have no public complaints or worries.

Sinclair president and CEO Chris Ripley:

“After a very robust divestiture process, with strong interest from many parties, we have achieved healthy multiples on the stations we are divesting. …While we continue to believe that we had a strong and supportable rationale for not having to divest stations, we are happy to announce this significant step forward in our plan to create a leading broadcast platform with local focus and national reach. The combined company will continue to advance industry technology, including the Next Generation Broadcast Platform, and to benefit from significant revenue and expense synergies.”

Tribune CEO Peter Kern to employees:

“There is no reason to assume that this change won’t be for the better. … So try to focus, as you have always done, on the business at hand—delivering outstanding local journalism and great content for our audiences and communities, collaborating with your colleagues, and driving results for our customers.”

Of course!

Click here for a look at many other Sinclair sins, from must-runs, to forced network preemptions, to the script the local anchors where you may live were forced to read, plus John Oliver’s take on the man in charge of Sinclair holding more licenses than anyone else to broadcast over the public airwaves (at least in TV) despite being “charged with committing a perverted sex act in a company-owned Mercedes” in 1996, according to The Baltimore Sun — and also how to have your say and influence the FCC to deny Sinclair the chance to buy Tribune. Plus, get updates from StopSinclair.com.

Other stories of interest: Big changes when Sinclair bought Seattle station Veteran reporter fired after report on climate change April 18 report DOJ days away from clearing the deal Sinclair ABC station with no news fires commentator for threatening Parkland teen Sinclair president/CEO email after forcing anchors to read the script Top journalism schools voice displeasure with Sinclair Sinclair allows paid ads attacking it, but sandwiched inside its opinion Sinclair boss Smith’s response to criticism: ‘You can’t be serious!’ Confessions of a former Sinclair news director Trump: “So funny to watch Fake News Networks … criticize Sinclair Broadcasting for being biased” Cincy Councilman says he’s boycotting local Sinclair station Nick Clooney: ‘I have no idea what these folks are doing for a living, but it isn’t news’ Sinclair Chairman Claims Entire Print Media Has ‘No Credibility’ Sinclair’s “Terrorism Alert Desk” segments are designed to gin up xenophobia Tom DeLay: Why Trump should block the Sinclair merger Sinclair TV boss donated to Montana congressman who attacked reporter

Enough of big media controlling everything from corporate headquarters! This is what happens when it does. Locals should be in charge of local programming, following the rules of the FCC for using OUR public airwaves!

OK, since you read everything, I’ll give you John Oliver here!

Please, if you like what you read or watch here, subscribe to CohenConnect.com with either your email address or WordPress account, and get a notice whenever I publish.

Media mega-merger may be moving closer, impacting Miami I've avoided writing much about Sinclair Broadcast Group trying to buy Tribune Media because I’ve been busy and I don't want to jinx any possibility the merger will fall through.

[upperpeninsulabreakingnews]

Editorial: #MeToo "Cherry Picking" was the slang for older bosses going after young reporters at TV-6 News in Marquette, MI: Former TV-6 reporters preyed up on by former executives at WLUC TV-6 News - In fact I had to take one young reporter to get an abortion in Wisconsin after she had affair with TV-6 executive

Editorial: #MeToo “Cherry Picking” was the slang for older bosses going after young reporters at TV-6 News in Marquette, MI: Former TV-6 reporters preyed up on by former executives at WLUC TV-6 News – In fact I had to take one young reporter to get an abortion in Wisconsin after she had affair with TV-6 executive

#MeToo U.P. Breaking News Editorial 11-29-17 11:45 a.m. ET: I witnessed “cherry-picking” at WLUC TV-6 Newsroom – even had to take one young TV-6 reporter to get an abortion

By Greg Peterson U.P. Breaking News Owner, News Director 906-273-2433

With today’s firing of Matt Lauer – This reporter has decided to come to the defense of former WLUC TV-6 news reporters – all young females with their first…

[dulwichdiverter]

The life of Leslie Howard

Words Mark Bryant

The actor Leslie Howard, who went to school in Dulwich and who lived in the area for nearly two decades, is probably best known as the gentlemanly Ashley Wilkes in the Hollywood blockbuster Gone with the Wind, which celebrates its 80th anniversary this year.

But he was also a wartime radio broadcaster of British propaganda and the director and star of a number of patriotic wartime films, notably The First of the Few, about the designer of the famous Spitfire fighter plane – which itself has links to Dulwich.

He was born Leslie Howard Steiner at 31 Westbourne Road (now Westbourne Drive), Forest Hill, on April 3 1893, the first child of Hungarian-born stockbroker’s clerk Ferdinand “Frank” Steiner, and his English wife Lilian.  

Shortly after his birth the family moved to Vienna, where a sister Dorice and a brother, Alfred, were born. Dorice later founded Hurst Lodge School in Ascot, whose pupils included the actress Juliet Stevenson and the future Duchess of York.

On their return to London, Frank anglicised his surname to Stainer and soon afterwards Leslie and his two siblings were baptised at St Chrysostom’s church in Peckham.  

In 1903 another sister, Irene (later a celebrated casting director for MGM and others) was born and, in 1904, Leslie attended Belvedere House preparatory school in Upper Norwood.

The family  eventually settled at 45 Farquhar Road by Crystal Palace Park – only a short distance from Dulwich – and lived there from 1907 (when Leslie was 14) to 1910. It was a convenient location as Leslie’s widowed maternal grandmother ran a lodging house at “Woodbury”, 2 Jasper Road, close by.

In September 1907 Leslie was sent to Alleyn’s School. Here he was a near contemporary of the future novelist CS Forester (1899-1996), who was at Alleyn’s around this time.

As his daughter, Leslie Ruth Howard, says in her book A Quite Remarkable Father (1959): “The young Leslie went to school, which he loathed and at which, due to shyness and his afflicting near-sightedness, he was never much good.”

However, he began to write short stories and one-act plays and dreamed of becoming a writer. He later said: “As a boy the possibility of being an actor never even occurred to me... I wanted to write.”  

Unfortunately, when he announced that he wanted to be a full-time writer his father had other ideas. Unlike fellow Old Alleynian CS Forester, whose father supported him for six months to get him started, Frank wanted Leslie to get a proper job and took him out of school in April 1910, shortly after his 17th birthday.

As a result, after a brief spell as a junior clerk in the purser’s office of a Thames steamboat company, he commuted daily by train to central London to work as a bank clerk for Cox & Co.  

By this time the family had moved to “Allendale”, 4 Jasper Road, next to Leslie’s grandmother. Leslie’s uncle Wilfred Noy, a film director working for the Clarendon Film Company in Croydon, lived next door.

According to Leslie’s daughter, “It was a peaceful neighbourhood of large, ugly red-brick Victorian houses mostly set back from the road, with short carriage drives and pleasant gardens.

“Jasper Road, where the family found themselves, looked over a green valley where trees hid similar houses,  and circled a hill on whose summit stood the Crystal Palace.”

Leslie’s mother, who had always been interested in the theatre, set up the Upper Norwood Dramatic Club (UNDC), for which  Leslie was honorary secretary as well as playwright, actor and musician. By 1912 the UNDC was appearing regularly at Stanley Halls in South Norwood.

While working at the bank, Leslie continued writing and performing in his spare time with some success. In 1913 his story The Impersonation of Lord Dalton appeared in  The Penny Magazine, and his play Deception was reviewed in The Stage. The following year, after the outbreak of World War One, he appeared in a crowd scene in his first film, The Heroine of Mons, directed by his uncle Wilfred.

When he was 21, he volunteered for the army and was commissioned in 1915 as a second lieutenant in a cavalry regiment stationed in Essex. Here he met and married a local girl in the spring of 1916 and was dispatched to France shortly afterwards. However, in May that year he was sent back home suffering from shell-shock.

Deemed unfit for military service, he decided to become a professional actor and changed his name to Leslie Howard. His uncle Wilfred also helped him get a role (his first credited film part) in The Happy Warrior and after acting in various provincial theatres he made his first appearance on the London stage in February 1918.  

At about this time his parents and siblings left south-east London and settled in a large house in West Kensington. As a result, Howard, his wife and their young son, Ronald (who was born in Norwood in April 1918), also left and moved in with them.

In the 1920s Leslie went to the USA and began appearing in films, notably Berkeley Square, which earned him an Oscar nomination for best actor. In 1934 he was in an  NBC radio play, Without Benefit of Clergy, with another Old Alleynian, Clive Brook, and starred in The Scarlet Pimpernel and Of Human Bondage.

Two years later came The Petrified Forest with his friend Humphrey Bogart (Bogie and Bacall named their daughter Leslie Howard Bogart), followed by Pygmalion in 1938, which earned him another best actor nomination. Leslie’s youngest brother, Arthur also appeared in this film.

Leslie’s last Hollywood film, Gone with the Wind (1939), was ironically greatly admired by Goebbels, and Hitler himself was a fan of Leslie’s co-star Clark Gable, later even offering a reward for his capture and transportation to Germany alive.

With the outbreak of World War Two, Leslie returned to the UK. He joined a Ministry of Information “ideas committee” for propaganda projects and made National Savings films with Noël Coward.

He also bought a house in Surrey and, helped by  his friend and neighbour Jonah Barrington, the radio correspondent of the Daily Express, he listened to radio broadcasts from Poland as the Nazis invaded.  

By coincidence it was Barrington who coined the nickname “Lord Haw Haw” for the infamous former Dulwich resident William Joyce, who by this time was broadcasting Nazi propaganda to the UK.

By a further coincidence, not only was Leslie later mentioned by name in some of these broadcasts, but the house he lived in when at Alleyn’s School (45 Farquhar Road), was only two doors away from Joyce’s own home (41 Farquhar Road) before he left for Germany in 1939.

Leslie broadcast propaganda himself, notably  appearing on the novelist JB Priestley’s popular BBC weekly programme Postscripts, and later alone on Britain Speaks. These talks were broadcast to north America throughout the London Blitz, in an effort to persuade the (then neutral) USA to support the Allies.  

In addition, he acted in the Ministry of Information’s first full-length feature film, 49th Parallel and produced, directed and acted in a number of  patriotic anti-German propaganda films himself.

These included “Pimpernel” Smith, which was set in Nazi Germany and allegedly inspired Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg to mount his real-life rescue operation in Budapest that saved thousands of Hungarian Jews from Nazi concentration camps. The casting director was Leslie’s sister, Irene, and his son Ronald, by then 23, also appeared in the film.

Another film, regarded by many as his best, was The First of the Few, whose title (suggested by Leslie) refers to a line in Churchill’s famous speech about the RAF’s role in the Battle of Britain: “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few”. In the film, which has a number of Dulwich links, Leslie plays RJ Mitchell, the designer of the Spitfire fighter plane.

Mitchell’s wife is played by future Dulwich resident Rosamund John (1913-98) who, from 1950, would live in Alleyn Park with her second husband, Old Alleynian  politician John Silkin (the third son of Lewis Silkin, 1st Baron Silkin, and a younger brother of another Old Alleynian politician, Samuel Silkin, Baron Silkin of Dulwich).

In addition, one of the real-life test pilots involved with the development of the Spitfire (and on which David Niven’s role as the fictional RAF squadron leader Geoffrey Crisp was partly based), was Old Alleynian wing commander George Hedley Stainforth (1899-1942). Sadly Stainforth was killed on active duty the year the film was released.    

Leslie started shooting The First of the Few in the summer of 1941. The following year the Ministry of Information commissioned him to direct a recruitment film, The Gentle Sex, about women serving in the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS). Leslie was also the narrator.

Once again future Dulwich resident Rosamund John starred, as one of seven girls from different walks of life who join the ATS. In Leslie’s final film, The Lamp Still Burns, John was cast in the lead role as an architect who becomes a nurse.

In April 1943, shortly after his 50th birthday, Leslie was sent to Lisbon on a British Council lecture tour of neutral Spain and Portugal, which some claimed later was really a top-secret mission for Churchill to dissuade General Franco from joining the Axis powers. Some even thought that he had been mistaken for Churchill himself.

Whatever the truth, when flying back to Bristol from Lisbon, the civilian airliner he was travelling in was shot down on June 1 1943 by Luftwaffe fighters over the Bay of Biscay, and he and all the other people on board were killed.

.......................

Dr Mark Bryant lives in East Dulwich and is the author World War II in Cartoons and other books.

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Barrington Patterson Wife, Children, Death, Parents, Ethnicity, Wiki, Age, Biography, Career, Net Worth & More

Barrington Patterson Wife:- Barrington Patterson was a former English kickboxer champion and West Midlands, campaigner. He was a mixed martial artist. He won the bronze medal in kickboxing at the 1996 W.A.K.O. European Championships in Belgrade, Serbia & Montenegro. He won the title of the 2002 W.I.P.U "King of the Ring" MMA Veterans title. Here we discuss Barrington Patterson's Wife. Who was Barrington Patterson's wife?

Barrington Patterson Death Cause

Barrington passed away on 22 March 2022 after a cardiac arrest. His wife confirmed his death news by Twitter.  At 6am this morning my beloved husband had a massive heart attack @OFFICIALWMAS worked for over an hour to save him unfortunately it wasn’t to be our hearts are broken 💔 — T j patterson (@Traceyjayp_) March 22, 2022

Barrington Patterson Wife, Children

Barrington Patterson was a married man. His wife's name is Tracey Patterson. His wife's professional details are not known. His children's status is also not known. In this blog, you can get the all details of Barrington Patterson Wife, Children, Death, Parents, Ethnicity, Wiki, Age, Biography, Career, Net Worth & More. 

Barrington Patterson Parents, Siblings

Barrington was born to his parents in Coventry, United Kingdom. His parents' names and professional details are not known. We don't know whether he was the only child of his parents or not. 

Barrington Patterson Wiki, Age, Biography

Barrington was well known as an English former kickboxer and mixed martial artist. He was better known by his full name Barrington Renford Patterson. He took birth in Coventry, United Kingdom. He was born on 25 August 1965. He was 56 years old as of the time of death.  He had a Virgo zodiac sign because of taking birth on 25 August.  He had British nationality. His religion is not known. His education details are not found anywhere on the internet. 

Barrington Patterson Ethnicity, Nationality

Barrington's ethnicity is not known. He was born in Coventry, United Kingdom where he was raised so he holds British nationality. 

Barrington Patterson Height, Weight

Barrington's height and weight are not available anywhere on the internet. 

Barrington Patterson Career

As an actor, Barrington appeared in the television documentary The Real Football Factories which was broadcasted on Bravo in 2006. Danny Dyer's Deadliest men series was based on Barrington's life. "One-eyed Baz" autobiography was published in 2010 and is based on Patterson's life. He achieved many awards as a professional kickboxer. Patterson made his mixed martial arts debut in October 1999 at an It's Showtime event. He won 4 matches out of 8 matches in mixed martial arts.

Barrington Patterson Net Worth

Barrington was a former English kickboxer champion and West Midlands campaigner so he made a good net worth. His net worth is approx $1.5 million.  Read Also: Alex Sykes Wiki

Barrington Patterson Social Media

Instagram Twitter Facebook Linkedin FAQ About Barrington Patterson Q.1 Who was Barrington Patterson? Ans. Barrington Patterson was a former English kickboxer champion and West Midlands, campaigner. Q.2 What was Barrington Patterson's Age? Ans. Barrington Patterson's age was 56 years as of 2022. Q.3 What was Barrington Patterson's nationality? Ans. Barrington Patterson's nationality was British.  Q.4 What was Barrington Patterson's ethnicity? Ans. Barrington Patterson's ethnicity is not known.  Q.5 Who was Barrington Patterson's wife? Ans. Barrington Patterson's wife's name was Tracey Patterson. Read the full article