Neal Krasnoff: One of your bosses, William Kling, President of The Greenspring Company, a for-profit entity, already is the President of Minnesota Public Radio. At least I'll give him this amount of credit: he's not directly using tax money. But I ask this: why is WMNN, a commercial station, licensed to a non-commercial licensee?
Wendy replies: William Kling is not my boss. The new program "The High Ground" is independent of MPR and MNN and WMNN. The show pays for its airtime from MNN... I don't know the specifics of how MPR operates its business. We merely purchase the satellite and studio time. MNN has chosen to carry the programming on its station WMNN as an affiliate, but has zero input into our content. We say hi in the halls and that's it. If they don't like what we do and they cancel the show on WMNN we will still continue purchasing the studio and satellite time to send our show to other stations around the state. Neal Krasnoff: I am impressed by your want of an alternative to the "corporate" media - though Minnesota Public Radio, the licensee of WMNN, regularly broadcasts sponsorship announcements - which is to say commercials. From corporations? Wendy writes: And our little locally owned show is independent of big corporate broadcast entities, commercial and non-profit. It is a brave new idea to bring local content back to the many commercial radio stations around the state that now carry only national network programming and ignore local and state matters. Many times the people deciding what goes on those stations have never even visited the towns where the radio stations are located! Neal Krasnoff: What do you consider "extreme rightwing topics"? Wendy writes: anything that is carried for 15 hours per week on the Limbaugh show, or hannity, or Savage Nation, 24 hours per day on "The Patriot." Our little 3 hour show surely shouldn't be a threat to all that airtime. Why are you so concerned? Neal Krasnoff: Will the DFL Pro-Life caucus be welcome? Wendy writes: And the republican pro-choice caucus? to be frank, Mr. Krasnoff, I think the issue has been debated enough. I know how I feel, you know how you feel (bet you don't know how I feel). Will talking about it change your feelings? It won't change mine. Meanwhile, 9 million Americans are out of work since the late 90's (2.8 million in the past 2 years) and many of those jobs are gone forever. While Rush Limbaugh is still whining about President Clinton's BJ (do you suppose he's jealous?) and blaming a president who hasn't been in office for 3 years for the nation's problems, I prefer to focus on why our congress isn't creating jobs for my neighbor guy, my brother-in-law, the best man from our wedding, and another of my best friends... all hard working, trained, dedicated and loyal workers who've been out of work for more than a year. And, why is our congress still allowing U.S. computer companies to import workers from india on temporary visas when we have plenty of unemployed U.S. computer programmers willing to take pay cuts to get back to work??? Why is IBM shipping 4,700 computer programming jobs to India where they'll pay $10,000 per year salary instead of hiring skilled Americans? And why did congress not tighten our beef industry standards a couple months ago when 123 congresspersons were supporting such measures? Were they selling us out to their campaign donors??? Our food safety for donations? In our great nation built on the promise of Free Speech and a Free Press it never ceases to surprise me how the radical right wing want to shut up and shoot down the average guy who wants to discuss what's important to him/her. First Amendment, Mr. Krasnoff, our nation was built on it. And, God Bless America! Wendy Pareene "Wendy Wilde" So. Minneapolis REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
