Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Sirius Signs Black Activist for Midday Talk Slot

Sirius Left (channel 146) launched a new talk radio show today – "Make It Plain," hosted by Mark Thompson – but in doing so, the satellite radio channel had to drop one of the leading national liberal talk show hosts.

Thompson, the first African-American to get a weekday slot on Sirius Left, is a veteran talker whose career included stints on WOL in Washington and more recently as the first African American host on XM.

To make room for Thompson, Sirius dropped Stephanie Miller and cut Ed Schultz’ show from three to two hours. Schultz, Mike Malloy and Thom Hartmann are the only lib talkers carried on both satellite services.

Sirius described their new lib talker as someone who will speak passionately about political, social, and economic issues from an African-American perspective. Their press release calls Thompson "an African-American broadcast pioneer, human rights visionary, and community leader, who launches with a powerful, high-profile and stellar lineup of guests from the African-American community." Make It Plain will air weekdays, 5 to 9 pm.

The rest of the Sirius line-up remains unchanged.

Bill Press, 6 to 9 am
Alex Bennett, 9 am to noon
Thom Hartmann, noon to 1 pm
Lynn Samuels, 1 to 3 pm
Ed Schultz, 3 to 5 pm
Mike Malloy, 9 pm to midnight

All EST

In addition to Schultz (noon to 3 pm), Mike Malloy (10 pm to midnight) and Hartmann (8 to 10 pm), Air America Radio (Channel 167) on XM’s weekday schedule includes the following hosts:

The Young Turks, 6 to 9 am
Lionel, 9 am to noon
Randi Rhodes, 3 to 6 pm
Rachel Maddow, 6 to 8 pm

All EST

Sirius currently has 7.7 million subscribers (XM has 8.6 million). Arbitron reported satellite radio ratings for the first time during their Spring 07 survey. Sirius Left recorded a cume of 59,100 homes and AAR on XM recorded a cume of 109,600 according to Arbitron. The combined Sirius and XM cumes are slightly less the cumes recorded on WWRL in New York and KTLK in Los Angeles.

However, ratings scored by lib talk hosts on satellite radio do not generate ad sales. Accordingly, satellite radio does not provide a revenue stream for lib talk.

Thompson told a reporter for Tennessean that he’s looking forward to his new show on Sirius.


"It means that our audience will still have an opportunity to hear me and to continue with some of the things we started. To be able to talk about all of the political and social and economic issues of the day from an African-American's perspective is still very important."

"We all in America, the different cultures, speak different languages. That is OK; diversity is a good thing. However, in talk radio, there aren't a lot of African-Americans broadcasting nationally, so this is an important opportunity to step up to bring diversity to what is a very real cultural institution in America, and that's talk radio.

"Black talk radio has always had its own special place when it comes to the African-American community. It's something we need to keep alive, and satellite radio is one of the best places to keep that going."

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is this guy doing a liberal talk show (as a liberal host) or an "Urban" talk show (as a Black host)? If it's the latter, he does not belong on the liberal channel but on a Black-targeted channel (along with people like Sharpton and Dyson). My town has an Urban talk station filled with race hate ("kill Whitey") and the politics of victimization. Liberals should not allow this kind of !@#$ to be passed off as liberal talk (although they often do just that - just as Sharpton and others condone the N-word when Blacks use it).

Anonymous said...

Freakin' ridiculous. Stephanie's show is great--and they're replacing it with four hours from some boring windbag. Wonderful. Maybe Sirius can get rid of that dreadful tool Bill Press and air Stephanie's show LIVE.

Anonymous said...

OK, what happens if/when the Sirius/XM merger goes through? The merger is looking increasingly likely. Does the combined service carry both current lib-talk channels (AAR from XM and other lib-talk from Sirius)? Or will there be one channel? If one channel will it be some hosts from column A and some from column B? Or will one of the current channels stay and the other disappear? If Mel Karmazin runs the combined show, will he boot AAR off the bird? (Can't say I'd blame him after the way AAR screwed Sirius.)

Unknown said...

>>(Can't say I'd blame him after the way AAR screwed Sirius.)<<

Huh? AAR screwed Sirius? By taking a better deal from XM? That's show biz, baby. And I doubt that Mel lost any sleep over AAR's move.

Anonymous said...

I listened to him for about 30 minutes. If you aren't interested in his show, you aren't interested in black culture. And if you aren't interested in black culture, you're an ignorant racist. I'm a gay italian, have a mexican boyfriend, grew up poor, work with special needs kids, blah blah blah. I don't require anyone's "direction to educate myself" on any particular topic; I've done quite well for myself. And frankly, having another black minister out preaching is incredibly BORING. one caller called him out on it and Mark goes, "I'm entertaining." in his dull, boring voice. It would have been FUNNY on stepahnie miller's show. I can't believe they killed her show for HIS. It's SOOOO friggin' boring. And he's BFF's with god, which is always pretty arrogant as well. He answered a call with, "May god bless you ..." UGH. Boring, arrogant and tedius. His show would work much better as an SNL spoof.

Anonymous said...

This show is a joke perpetratrated on Sirius Left listeners by Alex Bennett. If you say you don't like the show, Bennett and Thompson categorize you as a racist. That means XM must be racist for having the audacity to cancel Thompson and their subscriber base must be the same because the show had invisible ratings. Sirius has since relented and put one hour of Stephanie Miller back on the air but that is not good enough. They should restore her entire show. And it doesn't matter where. If they insist on keeping Thompson, then dump the self righteous and intellectual fraud Alex Bennett or the anything but intellectual but thinks anything that amounts to a minor inconvenience in her own life is a political issue with the extremely annoying voice Lynn Samuels. Call Alex during his show and tell him that you want Stephanie back even if it is at his expense.

Anonymous said...

I think the bad guys in this are easy to identify: Sirius management and Alex Bennett. For whatever reason, Sirius decided they wanted to drop Stephanie Miller, and Alex Bennett eagerly supported this decision because her show is broadcast live on terrestrial radio opposite his, making him look very bad in comparison. Bennett bad-mouths any personality he feels threatened by, as often as he can. He's even begun criticizing Rachel Maddow, which puzzled me until I saw the rumor that she was being considered for an MSNBC show (and not Alex, who has been kissing Tucker Carlson's ass for years).

As for Mark Thompson's show, although I was initially critical, I have found myself really enjoying the difference he brings to "Sirius Left". It's a refreshing change from Bennett and Lynn Samuels. And any show that has Dick Gregory as a regular guest has, at least, got my attention...

Anonymous said...

Put Stepahanie Miller back on daytime programing.Give Thom Harman two hours, and get Big Ed back on for three hours. Cut Mark Thompson. . .boring and arrogant.

Anonymous said...

See history shows that the liberal part of politic is nothing but a good old white boy group just like republicans. Cause when people attack things they don't understand and that they don't want to know about african, african american culture and views on society. So stop crying white boys. We are here to stay. POWER TO THE POEPLE!!

Anonymous said...

Mark Tompson or whatever his name is this week, is not a Liberal Radio talk show host like Stephanie or ED. He is a racist, religious radical, that cuts off any discussion about critizing Obama. He has no trouble calling Bill Clinton a racist...I will not renew my subscription if this boring host with a narrow minded Black only and "god bless you" host remains.

Anonymous said...

Mark's show today in response to Sen. Obama's Father's Day sermon was provocative and intelligent. I am a white conservative male who agreed with every word of Bill Cosby's rant a couple of years ago about young black men in America... yet as Sen. Obama shadowed Cosby's points I had to agree with Mark Thompson that he was pandering to guys like me. His question: 'how would that church congregation have reacted if a conservative African-American like Clarence Thomas had given that sermon?' Brilliant! I am going to listen to Mark again, even if he wants to 'kill whitey'...

Anonymous said...

What's with this Mark Thompson?
As far as I'm concerned Stephine Miller and gang had a Hell Of A Better Show then this new guy !!
Stephine Miller and Lynn Samuals are the main reason that I listened to 146! Due to the fact that you have dropped Stephine and put in this boring liberal talk host I will not be listening to that program ! I agree with a previous Blogger that he is extremely boring ! Viva Stephine Miller !!!

A faithful Canuck

Unknown said...

Mark Thompson claims to be an ordained minister but is in full favor of late term abortions. Figure that one out. Thompson also has taken on a Muslim name to appease a potential black following on the air waves. Thompson continually has conspiracy theories about whites missusing black people, whites controlling whites, and whites spreading the AIDS virus to an unsuspecting black populace. Always the victim mentality, Thompsons show can be taken with a grain of salt as it is nothing but a whine and poor-pitiful-me show. The producers have put Thompson in as filler as Thompson cannot go head to head with the likes of Mark Levin or Hannity or even Michael Reagan. It is a look at he far left victim mentality and after a few minutes it all has become the same blah, blah, blah. Dick Gregory and Obama are his proclaimed heros........go figure this one out. I will not take you long.

Anonymous said...

what a joke....the fagg0t spaghetti snapper (gay Italian)that put down Mark Thompsons ....I'm still laughing....I'm white(CAUCASION!!!) and republican I enjoy listening to the truth from a man like Mar thompson....thanks amrk for the real deal....Mike ...the staright anglo white republican that also thinks the republican clowns running for president are embarrasing...looks like you got my vote President Obama

Anonymous said...

Good Lord...this guy is a hot mess of contradiction! It is clear that he is only trying to "entertain" and not to have intelligent discussions. If he thinks his righteous black indignation can pass for entertainment he is very wrong. His lack of respect, knowledge, and his talent for vacillating between freedom fighter and VICTIM is truly amazing. Screaming and yelling at your callers and calling them "Tom's" is both juvenile and contrary to everything this guy claims to be. He does not foster a sense inclusion at all. In fact he thrives at driving a huge wedge between those of color and everyone else. He is nothing more than an insecure guy who wants attention for yelling over the airwaves and creating controversy - not tolerance. I believe we have much better representatives and talent out there than this mess of an entertainer.

Anonymous said...

What a joke. This guy has no talent and appears to be just another radio hack who couldn't make it in the real world. Pathetic.

Anonymous said...

So you're responding to an eight year old post? The Thompson announcement was in 2007!

Anonymous said...

Yes Mark, I am.