The other matter, he does NOT tow the line of talking points.
He may have trouble getting both advertisers and support from the right wing establishment (GOP/Koch Brothers/Wall Street).
He dared to credit Obama for making the call to take out Bin Laden. He also questions the absolutes on gun ownership and says no to corporate welfare.

Don't get the wrong idea, Savage is a right winger, but he will not play along with the other propagandists.

he believes in this crazy conspiracy where Obama is killing off everyone that was on the team.

And he doesn't kiss the ass of the other right-wing talk show hosts. That article I linked to he says Hannity is a nice guy but is past his prime or something like that.

He certainly tries to be unique...but he's also a complete asshole. He has had some awful things to say about the LGBT community.

and if the races were switched he wouldn't have gotten away with it.

As I said, he does not tow the line enough to a replacement for Rush.

seems like I read somewhere that his fox show is getting yanked in favor of one that they think will somehow appeal to younger viewers.

And now this.

Sucks to be him. How must it feel to be replaced by Michael Fucking Savage Weiner?

He sounds like a limpballs replay. Why pay twice for one set of noise.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/08/12/is-megyn-kelly-pushing-sean-hannity-out-of-fox-news-prime-time.html

Yes it looks like Hannity will be sunsetting very soon. I predicted a long time ago he'd be one of the first to fade...he's fucking BORING. Even if you listen to the right-wing shows he's very boring compared to the other programs.

I'm sure he'll always have a radio or some TV gig...but he'll never be a very big player again in right-wing media. Good. He's a douche.

And Hannity has strong numbers:

http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/tag/cable-news-ratings


He beats out lots of people on his own network - Greta, Cavuto, Baier, Shep....in fact he's second only to BOR.

And he beats out everybody at MSNBC and CNN.

So I don't think its that he's too boring to have viewers...I think its more of a Beck thing.

Beck had good numbers at Fox...but no advertisers. So he got jettisoned.

I think Hannity has been lumped in with Limbaugh, and a lot of the advertisers he put a stop order on commercials running during Limbaugh's show did the same thing for Hannity spots. And this may have bled over to his tv ads. I'd be curious to see what kinds of ads are running in his time slot - if its just promos for other Fox shows, he's got a problem....and could be jettisoned.

If you listen to his radio show, and look at his Arbitron numbers, they suck compared to Rush. He's never had huge Arbitron ratings and now they are pathetic. His TV presence is much better than his radio presence.

However, even his TV show is aging slowly but surely. 18-49 is the biggest TV demo for agency buying anymore and then 25-54. MSNBC can deliver decent 18-49 and ties with FOX News. Yes Fox beats everyone in the overall TOTAL and 25-54/35-64.

Hannity is probably the highest paid (with maybe the exception of O'Reilly) at FOX News. If his salary, plus his staff's salary, are huge and he's been bleeding advertisers, he's screwed.

Wow !! this guy broadcasts from the Planet Zoingo !!

The mentally unstable will be propelled to even greater outrages.

get some funny costumes and work for a living . The idea of any of them in tights is as repulsive as the shit that comes out of their mouths.

Michael Savage .

...originally Cumulus was planning to dump rushbo and hannity. The reason was that their shows are produced by Premiere networks that is a subsidiary of Clear Channel; Cumulus' prime competitor; especially in the eroding world of hate radio. Cumulus is paying big bucks to clear those two shows and wants to renegotiate the deal...using Hucklenutz as a bargaining chip...Weiner/Savage just tagged along for the ride.

Recent reports indicated that Clear Channel had blinked and was ready to deal with Cumulus but then this morning comes out a report that hannity wants to pull his show off of Cumulus stations altogether. Real confusing and indicitive of the ugly that's going on inside the radio industry as the few remaining corporates; who overpaid for stations and talent, try to cut losses as their industry loses more and more money.

The clock is ticking on hate radio as its audience gets older, few major advertisers want to be associated with the crazy and corporates like Cumulus and Clear Channel have to deal with billions in debt and decreasing revenues. Stay tuned...

The big syndicators and the big talk stations are really a mess. If you look at what Clear Channel and Cumulus paid for those big AM stations that are slowly and continually bleeding ratings and revenues, it is staggering. Clear Channel is trying to garner as much as possible from Cumulus (and others) for their big syndicated talk shows while those stations are losing revenue and ratings. In turn, Cumulus, can't just create new talk show hosts over night and if they do replace Rush and Hannity the odds are lower ratings and revenues anyway.

It is a big Catch 22 for both of those two. Look for a huge influx of sell-offs coming from major groups and I guarantee you'll see more local and regional players in the next 10 years regarding radio.

...this is a textbook case of how "deregulation" can destroy a once vibrant industry. The combination of a talent drain...thousands of very talented and experienced radio people have been let go in recent years just when this morally bankrupt industry needs them the most. Instead, Wall street and the banks are looking for the same asshats who dug the big financial holes to somehow come up with a way out. Absolute lunacy.

You're right that we'll start seeing the corporates dump stations; especially in the smaller markets. The problem is there won't be many buyers out there willing to take on a business that has been losing money and its long term prospects aren't too good. We'll start seeing AM stations go dark and even more "belt tightening". Thank goodness for internet radio that has risen as a major alternative and will only grow bigger in the years ahead.

What else do you think. The right wing has invested millions in media. They control the radio media, because the own all the companies that do the broadcasting. I live in Terre Haute, IN and it is a HUGE Democratic county and town here, but only right wing radio is available. Look at Washington, DC. 99% Democratic base, yet right wing radio is only to be found there. RIGHT WING TALK IS FORCE-FED EVERYWHERE because of ownership.

seem to get younger ones. so as older ones die off they aren't being replaced with the later generations as they get older.

i'm guessing the same is true of Hannity's radio audience.

WABC in New York city is a "small radio station"?

Take the top 10 radio markets in the US according to Arbitron.

1. New York City - Yes Savage is on WABC. His show is only carried two of three hours and that's between 9pm and 11pm when listening is much lighter than any drive times. Plus, it is VERY difficult to get AM signals in most houses/apartments in NYC making it even harder. In car listening to radio in large cities is where you win the ratings.

2. Los Angeles - No affiliate.

3. Chicago - No Affiliate.

4. San Francisco - KSFO. This is his home flagship station. It was the 17th ranked station in the last PPMs.

5. Dallas/Ft. Worth - KLIF-AM. This is the 33rd (and lowest ranked) station in Dallas/Ft. Worth metro.

6. Houston - KSEV-AM. This station doesn't even show up in the Arbitron Houston ratings. It is a suburb station and at sundown powers down to 1,000 watts directional. Savage is on after sun down so no one can barely hear it.

7. Washington DC - WMAL-AM. This is a decent sized station but was ranked #16 in the last month of PPMs. Savage is on for only 2 hours from 9pm to 11pm. They also drop power at sunset to 5,000 watts directional.

8. Philadelphia - No affiliate.

9. Atlanta - No affiliate.

10. Boston - No affiliate.

So to summarize in the top 10 radio markets he's not on the air in 5 of them. In two markets he's on either stations that are the poorest ranked or not ranked at all in the ratings meaning basically no one listens to them. In the remaining three markets Savage is on AM stations with relatively low ratings and he's on in late evenings when radio listening is relatively poor. And with AM signals in big cities it is hard to listen at night in many homes/apartments.

My point is that Savage is NOT a power house in talk radio. He's mostly on smaller AM stations, in evenings, overnights or weekends, in mostly remote areas of the country.

before he spent $1,000,000 (according to him) to get out of his "Talk Radio Network" contract. I.e., he WAS on stations in many of the listed media markets. The loon station 990 WNTP here in Philly used to have him in a slot until they swapped him out for Dennis Miller in the 10 pm slot. He's currently on the rogue FM station here WWIQ 106.9 along with the usual vomit-inducing lineup all in one place.

Before he appeared on WABC, Savage was running on WOR in NY. I think they ran him from 6 pm - 8 or 9pm or something like that. I have been a heavy listener of NY talk stations down here for the past 35+ years, so I have heard them come and go up there.

Like Levin and Mark Gallagher, his show was shopped around as a standalone that stations could pick up, plug-in (including during graveyard times) and drop whenever. Then when Savage signed onto Cumulus, everywhere he originally aired was removed and Cumulus is now back-filling him.

After his fallout with TRN he has never been even close in affiliates. And after the Rush debacle with Sandra fluke don't look for many new affiliates anytime soon.

A friend of mine is a manager for one of the national radio rep firms...they basically don't even bother to try to sell syndicated talk (mostly conservative) as he says it's "futile."

is that local stations are finally getting up off of some money and actually going back to hiring a few "locals" for shows.

Ever since Raygun's deregulation, wealthy regressives bought bundles and bundles of stations to play their canned RW syndicated talk programming, effectively saturating the airwaves with the drivel, while offering station managers programming-on-the-cheap. No need for those stations to go through the hassles of negotiating contracts with local hosts. All they needed was a station manager/engineer (who held the license) and 3 "producers" competent enough to slap the station ID cart in when they were supposed to and pay attention to breaks to run local commercials or news feeds.

Thankfully, this era of pre-programmed manufactured outrage has run its course and maybe we can get back to the "over the back fence" chatting about issues, whether local or national.

I hope you're right. I have various friends who own local stations. They tend to "do it right" when it comes to programming, promotions, marketing, sales, etc.

Philadelphia could also hear Savage on WOR (pre-Oct. 2012) and now WABC, 50 kW Clear Channel Class A stations whose signals stretch as far as Philly and RI.

Boston can hear Savage from Providence station WPRV, whose signal has been heard as far north as Newfoundland at night.

this is not the same as a city grade station. Most people in a metro don't listen to stations in other metros. I'd be willing to bet that you won't find WABC in any Philly PPm ratings or WPRV in any Boston ratings. While a handful of people might listen that way it is not the norm.

any less controversial than Limbaugh or Hannity?

Like Limbaugh, Savage was also driven from television for controversial statements. And worse than Limbaugh, Savage has been banned from entering another country, Great Britain.

Savage, during the Michael Newdow controversy, even suggested Newdow and liberals like him should go to concentration camps.

I guess Savage's abhorrent statements sometimes get lost in all the others.

with a loyal local (San Francisco) following. And by broadcasting from the "hot bed" of liberalism, he projects "street cred" as a transplanted NYer railing against the "evil Socialists". He also rails against his own kin gasbags, including Limpballs and BecKKK.

What's hilarious is that when former Home Secretary Jacqui Smith banned him (and he screamed on and on about that) and later lost her election, the parade of succeeding Home Secretaries and the later Tory government, kept the ban in place!

San Francisco + Street Cred

Yes, it must be utter hell living in San Francisco.

He can rail on about Nancy Pelosi and "teh gays" and all manner of "debauchery".

And this from a guy who fled there to hang out in the communal Haight scene (including hobnobbing with his peers like Dennis Hopper). I.e., he came of age with the original "hippies". Then off he went to exotic locales like Fiji after his Hawai'ian stint, to study "ethnobotanicals".

He's a piece of work.

He's really taking one for the team living in San Fran. I'm sure he's barely surviving.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2013/08/limbaugh-to-reup-hannity-to-split-with-cumulus-source-170639.html



And RBR is right, Savage IS really toxic. Remember the controversy over calling autism a fraud? Or his history of racist and misogynist hate speech that makes Rush Limbaugh sound like Mr. Rogers?

Savage as a lead-in for Mark Levin is going to be REALLY awkward, as the two have trash talked each other...





As for Savage being on small stations, you are wrong since he's on a bunch of strong-signal stations before and after going to Cumulus. Some of his biggest affiliates past and present:
- KFAQ Tulsa (50 kW class A)
- KFMB San Diego (the station carried Savage on tape delay at night during the TRN era; although 5 kW daytime its signal actually ups to 50 kW at night thus can be heard all over California at night!)
- KKOH Reno (50 kW class B, day/night; I can hear that station in the Bay Area at night)
- KLIF Dallas (5 kW day/night)
- KNEW San Francisco (when it was on 910 it was 10 kW daytime) during the TRN era 2003-2009
- KPRC Houston (5 kW day/night)
- KSFO San Francisco (5 kW day/night) - recently re-acquired the show after a near decade long absence
- KTRB San Francisco after KNEW dropped the show, 2009-2010 it's a 50 kW class B
- KSTE Sacramento (21.4 kW daytime) during the TRN era, circa 2003-2012
- WFTL Fort Lauderdale (50 kW day, 25 kW night)
- WOR New York City (50 kW class A) during the TRN era

YOU SAID:

As for Savage being on small stations, you are wrong since he's on a bunch of strong-signal stations before and after going to Cumulus. Some of his biggest affiliates past and present:

>> Actually I'm not wrong, I'm very right. He's mostly on smaller stations, smaller markets, mostly AM (which is mainly dying in most markets and now even in larger markets,) and at non-drive time periods with lower overall AQ listening. I don't care about what stations he USED to be on...I'm talking about the present day Savage Weiner nation.

You have to remember...there isn't one ad agency or marketing department that buys programming based on the signal strength of a radio station. DO you really think they care about 1100 WTAM in Cleveland or 700 WLW being non-directional clear channel 50Kw stations? Nope. They care about ratings and market size. So let's talk turkey. See below.

- KFAQ Tulsa (50 kW class A) SMALL MARKET Ranked 66. 13th ranked station. National advertisers don't care.
- KFMB San Diego (the station carried Savage on tape delay at night during the TRN era; although 5 kW daytime its signal actually ups to 50 kW at night thus can be heard all over California at night!) OK decent size station and market.
- KKOH Reno (50 kW class B, day/night; I can hear that station in the Bay Area at night) MARKET RANK 126. National doesn't care.
- KLIF Dallas (5 kW day/night) One of the last rated stations on a ranker in Dallas. BArely audible in half of DFW.
- KNEW San Francisco (when it was on 910 it was 10 kW daytime) during the TRN era 2003-2009. SAVAGE ISN'T ON KNEW ANYMORE.
- KPRC Houston (5 kW day/night) SAVAGE ISN'T ON KPRC ANYMORE.
- KSFO San Francisco (5 kW day/night) - recently re-acquired the show after a near decade long absence YES AND THEIR RATINGS SUCK.
- KTRB San Francisco after KNEW dropped the show, 2009-2010 it's a 50 kW class B WHO CARES?
- KSTE Sacramento (21.4 kW daytime) during the TRN era, circa 2003-2012 NO LONGER.
- WFTL Fort Lauderdale (50 kW day, 25 kW night) DUDE WFTL doesn't even show up in the Arbitron PPMs. They fall below the minimum listening requirements. The signal is awful, especially at night.
- WOR New York City (50 kW class A) during the TRN era NOT ON WOR ANY MORE.

During the TRN era (the 2000s up to Oct. 2012) Savage was during the afternoon drive time in the West Coast, 3-6pm PT/6-9pm ET. (Used to be 4-7pm before around 2005 or so.)

Under Cumulus, Savage moved to 6-9pm PT/9pm-midnight ET.

I should have organized my list better instead of a haphazard "past/present" list by station.

So let's break it down...Savage has affiliates in the big market areas (let's say the Top 25 markets as ranked here) but does have some notable omissions and is usually on the lower-rated, weaker-signal stations. (I know this from my times sneaking a peek into Savage's show and the wonders of the TuneIn app!)

The TRN era:
- Atlanta: Used to be on the powerhouse WSB until Jan. 2011 when the station replaced him with RedState.com editor and perpetual misogynist Erick Erickson; Savage then moved to WGST, whose weak nighttime signal hardly gets outside downtown Atlanta. WGST briefly changed to sports in fall 2012 but restored its RW talk format earlier this year without Savage.
- Baltimore: WCBM (the local Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannity affiliate whose ratings are competitive with 50-kW rival WBAL)
- Boston: WRKO (an Emmis station with a 50 kW signal; popular local host Howie Carr used to be the lead-in to The Savage Nation)
- Chicago: WIND (a Salem station; dropped the show in 2011) then WJJG (Savage moved to this weak-signal brokered-time station WJJG later renamed WCKG that's got a weak signal in downtown Chicago for the remainder of his TRN days. WCKG wrote this long open letter to Savage after he left TRN. EPIC awesomeness.)
- Cleveland: WHK (a weak signal Salem station that dropped his show in '08 after the autism remarks) The GM at the station called Savage a "knucklehead"! As a result Savage's show could only be heard from a Canton station inaudible in downtown Cleveland.
- Denver: KLZ (a three-letter heritage station whose ratings have been in the toilet)
- Houston: KPRC (guess who KPRC has now in Savage's former timeslot? Former Twin Peaks star JANINE TURNER! Yes Janine Turner is a right wing crank.)
- Los Angeles: KGIL (which changed to music in 2009; Savage hasn't had an LA affiliate since then)
- Miami: WFTL (I understand their ratings & signal situation yet the station boasts about serving Miami - its website says "Fort Lauderdale, Miami, West Palm Beach" under its logo. Yes their ratings suck.)
- New York City: WOR (three-letter powerhouse station)
- Pittsburgh: WPGB (an FM station owned by Clear Channel)
- San Diego: KFMB
- San Francisco (his home market): as a Bay Area guy i'll tell ya, it's a loooong story:
--Savage got his start in radio filling in for the liberal Ray Taliaferro's overnight 1am-5am show one day in 1994 on the 50 kW blowtorch news/talker KGO (then owned by ABC Radio, I think that's what Cumulus Media was called back then).
--Then in 1995 he became a local host on KSFO (KGO's sister station), which converted to all conservative talk all the time.
--By 2000, Savage signed a syndication deal with Talk Radio Network. He continued to broadcast from KSFO.
--In 2003, KSFO dropped his show over a contract dispute. Savage's new Bay Area affiliate is Clear Channel-owned KNEW 910 (the call letters have now gone to AM 960).
--KNEW dropped his show in 2009, after which the show moved to sports station KTRB, another 50 kW blowtorch.
--However, KTRB went bankrupt the following year, and Savage had no proper Bay Area affiliate, even though his show could be heard on Sacramento station KSTE whose signal reaches the area pretty well.
--In 2012, Savage signs a new deal with Cumulus and is consequently returned to KSFO.
- Tampa: WWBA (whose signal shrinks to 1 kW at night and this station never really was that popular anyways)
- Washington, DC: WTNT (seriously...its signal shrinks to 25 WATTS at night!!! No good fo a 6pm ET show start.)

Cincinnati isn't in the top 25 markets, but a fun fact? In Jan. 2012, Clear Channel-owned WKRC replaced Savage with the lighter financial advice show hosted by Dave Ramsey. Savage got a triple sucker punch as a result:
- His new station WQRT played his shows on an 18-hour delay in the noon to 3pm timeslot already dominated in the area by RUSH LIMBAUGH AND BILL CUNNINGHAM - and the station folded into a Christian format just months later.

In the Savage Nation's Cumulus era, Savage has yet to have an affiliate in these areas among the top 25 PPM markets:
- Atlanta
- Boston (WRKO is keeping Jerry Doyle, the former Babylon 5 star and Savage's TRN replacement, in the time between Mark Levin and Coast to Coast AM)
- Charlotte
- Chicago (whose Cumulus talk station WLS instead carries the last hour of Sean Hannity and first 2 hours of Mark Levin during the 8-11pm CT time when Savage is on)
- Denver
- Los Angeles (whose Cumulus talker KABC chooses a delayed presentation of Mark Levin in the 6-9pm PT slot)
- Minneapolis (seriously Savage does NOT have any affiliates in the entire friggin' state of Minnesota!)
- Nassau and Suffolk Counties, NY (WABC's signal gets weaker in eastern Long Island)
- Pittsburgh
- Portland, OR
- Puerto Rico (yes it's counted in the PPMs)
- San Diego
- St. Louis

(Source: http://www.michaelsavage.wnd.com/wp-content/themes/savage-theme/affiliatesmap.php)

Baltimore (WCBM) and Detroit (WJR) delay the show to the 11pm-1am snooze slot.

New York City (WABC) gets to hear only the first 2 hours so that WABC can carry at least half of its locally produced John Batchelor show. After WABC picked up Savage WABC could no longer play all 4 hours of the syndicated Batchelor.

Savage's affiliates in Houston (KSEV) and Phoenix (KFNX) don't even show up in Radio-online's PPMs!

And I had NO IDEA KLIF's ratings were THAT bad - 0.1 - in DFW! But news/talk is getting less popular as a format; Savage's Cumulus affiliates KSFO San Francisco, WABC NYC, and WMAL DC have 2-2.5 shares on average. In their markets NPR or "all news" stations are more popular!

And he's about to lose Philly now that his Philadelphia affiliate WWIQ is going to revert to corny "Christian contemporary" music (believe it or not Savage is actually an agnostic now, Google it!)

As the Chicago radio GM suggested to Savage: "Broadcast earlier in the day so stations can run your show ANYTIME." If Savage does replace Hannity on the Cumulus Radio Network, Savage would get the East Coast afternoon drive time 3-6pm ET thus a ratings advantage like he used to have in his TRN days as his show was live 3-6pm PT.