Is Beck Going Belly Up?
While Delaware Liberal was supposedly imploding last week, real news was occurring as Glenn Beck was losing advertisers faster than Republicans lose voters. What’s all the hubbub about? Beck was on one of the Fox News TV chat shows and he called the President a “rasict”. I know, I know, this doesn’t surprise you as he was probably in one of his manic moments. No, the scary thing here is that Beck was a lucid as he could possibly be.
colorofchange.org quickly jumped on Beck’s ridiculous statement and started targeted Beck’s advertisers. Over 30 companies have now told Fox News not to air their commercials on Glenn Beck’s show.
Excuse me for a moment while I this feeling of schadenfreude passes.
Tags: Fox News, Glenn Beck
Before conservatives come streaming in to say Beck is not important, he is now the most popular Fox News personality.
Some places were reporting that Beck was forced to go on vacation last week although Faux News denied it. Was he back yesterday. The last count I saw he had lost 33 advertisers and I read some company (was it UPS?) is going to stop advertising on Fox altogether.
Something is definitely going on in the background. Although we’re hearing a lot more noise from the birthers/deathers/teabaggers than everyone else but that doesn’t mean they’re in the majority. Beck’s audience is still relatively small on TV compared to broadcast around 3M or so? Faux News is definitely in a conundrum – they make money from advertising and what do you do when your biggest stars loses money?
Personally I think he’ll end up on satellite radio like Howard Stern.
wait till you see the cover of his new book
“Is Beck going belly-up?” No. And, he already has a radio show.
And now a word from Air America…..hello…hello…hello?
Shorter cR: “Nanny-nanny-boo-boo.” Really, do you let your kids win arguments by saying, “But Dad, you do it, too!” No, didn’t think so. So stop using such a childish response. It makes you sound like a 10-year-old.
Yawn.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/showtracker/2009/08/glenn-beck-ignores-ad-boycott.html
Unfortunately, from what I ‘ve seen, most of the “boycotting” advertisers have simply shifted their ads to other FOX shows, resulting in little loss of revenue for the network. As sad as it is, right now Beck is one of, if not the, biggest draws over at Crazytown propaganda headquarters. From a financial standpoint, Murdoch would probably just underwrite Beck’s hour himself if he had to.
The only way Beck would get canned is if FNC were actually interested in being seen as a legitimate journalistic network, or if they had any decency whatsoever. I’m not holding my breath.
What Color of Change is doing here (with a few partners) is really admirable and their success here is fantastic. At the end of the day, though, what is left is Fox Noise with a popular show that they have a tough time selling ads for. Most of the companies that won’t support Beck will continue to advertise on Fox, so there isn’t all that much loss for Fox. It is very good that there are companies who don’t want to be associated with this kind of speech.
Beck will be around though — if anything because the model is very successful. It is cheap as heck (and apparently prtty easy) to draw an audience if all you ask them to do is to stew in their ignorance and fear.
Mmmmmm, ignorance and fear stew. Dammit, I hate commenting right before lunch.
Conservative talk radio and Fox News played a major role in destroying the GOP. Sensationalism, ourtageous claims, bigotry, hatred, racism, sexism, dishonesty and ignorance may draw a certain sector of society to the airwaves, but most find it to be what it is: disgraceful. While these white, middle-aged, males don’t officially speak for the GOP, there’s no denying they speak for the conservatism cause. The Beck’s, Hannity’s, O’Reilly’s, Limbaugh’s, Savage’s and Jenson’s of the world in many ways helped shine a light on what conservatism actually stands for. We should be thankful for their honesty. They helped begin the transition to the democratic party’s rise to power.
It would seem that reputable companies would not want to be associated with hate talk. It’s not good for business. And since most talk radio audiences are uneducated and of lower economic status, the point is kind of moot anyway.
I’m with Cassandra on this one: right-wing hate speech has been extremely profitable (left wing not so much; see Randi Rhodes, for instance).
In my market, there’s a local guy who got fired for some racist talk a few years back. Within a year, he was returned by the same station in the same time slow; seriously, they couldn’t find another “local” right winger who could bring in the ads and the audience the way this guy does.
Hate sells.
I give Color of Change credit: with the violent talk coming out of right wing radio and TV, you’ve got to be brave to want to be a target.
Racists to the left of me Racists to the right….
I just don’t watch or listen to this nut or watch Fox Noise