Why is Luke McCoy back on WCOA? Because Cumulus sees nothing wrong with Luke. All the talk about the controversial, conservative talk show host being more diverse is marketing spin. There is a study to prove it.
The Center for American Progress and Free Press released a statistical analysis of the political make-up of talk radio in the United States. And Cumulus, the owner of WCOA and one of the top 5 U.S. radio giants, comes out overwhelmingly one-sided. Nationwide, its talk radio format is dominated almost exclusively by conservatives – 100% in major markets.
The report —“The Structural Imbalance of Political Talk Radio†— charges that conservative talk hosts dominate the airwaves, not because of public demand or free enterprise but because of the corporate owners.
According to the report: In the spring of 2007, of the 257 news/talk stations owned by the top five commercial station owners, 91 percent of the total weekday talk radio programming was conservative, and only 9 percent was progressive.
The study reports the one-side nature of talk radio is due to breakdown of the public trustee concept of radio broadcasting (remember the public owns the airwaves) and the elimination of clear public interest requirement – which is why WCOA – Pensacola’s “news†station – has no news reporters (remember Don Priest?), only news readers.
Read:Â talk_radio