Newsgroups: alt.rush-limbaugh,alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
Subject: Re: Conservative Chronicle Commercials
From: kmitche@eis.calstate.edu (Kenneth Mitchell)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 03:32:59 GMT
Organization: Calif State Univ/Electronic Information Services

nate@psygate.psych.indiana.edu  Nathan Engle writes,
 
>    Well, I noticed today that Rush has updated his CC spot (the one I was
>criticizing a while back for using conspiracy theory style arguments about
>liberal papers which allegedly buy columns and then shelve them so that
>other papers can't get them.
 
>    Today Rush's commercial was more specific, saying that this is
>something that happens in markets with 2 newspapers. That explained to
>me a lot about my previous objections, but it still left me a little
>confused.

Nathan, there's nothing to be confused about. It happens. 

Remember that Rush's "adopted home town" is Sacramento, CA. As a
Sacramento resident (I used to llisten to Rush when he was a local guy on
KFBK) I can assure you than in THIS two-paper town, columns DO get bought
and shelved. But it's not a "liberal" conspiracy (well, maybe it is) but a
fairly straightforward business deal. 

The real culprit is the McClatchy newspaper syndicate, which owns about 40
papers nationwide. Locally, the Sacramento Bee is the McClatchy paper, and
they've been trying to drive the competition, the Sacramento Union, out of
business for several years. All the typical stuff; hiring away the popular
writers, buying the best comics, buying all the good columns, so that the
Union won't be able to run them. For example, the Bee has, in the past
year, taken Ann Landers, Miss Manners, Calvin & Hobbes, and a dozen other
comics away from the Union. They can do it because of their multi-paper
buying power; Universal Features, for example, will sell a strip to
McClatchy and ALL the McClatchy papers run it. It's a good way to kill the
competition; the Anchorage AK TIMES just went under after years of
competition from a McClatchy competitor. 

Here in Sacramento, the BEE owns the rights to EVERY major column, liberal
or conservative. And just as Rush says, they print most of the liberal
ones and print perhaps one conservative column per week. The Bee will tell
you with a straight face that it's because nobody wants to read the
conservative columns, which is a load of BS; they bought them because the
Union had them, and now that the Union can't get them, feel no particular
pressure to run them.  (It sort of goes without saying that the Bee is so
far to the Left, they think Clinton is a right-winger, while the Union is
nearly that far to the Right.)  The Bee endorses every democrat, every
liberal cause, thinks Jane Fonda and Tom Hayden are model citizens, etc.
The Union, the paper of Mark Twain, is conservative to the core. (After 21
years in the military, moving every 3 years, this is the first town I've
EVER lived in that had two such different papers. )

Anyway, believe it or not, it happens; it is happening here. And frankly,
the Conservative Chronicle is well worth the $39.00 per year that I paid
for it. Yeah, I probably COULD get the various papers where these
columnists are printed, but I'd run up one HELL of a big bill for
subscriptions to a dozen different papers. Either that, or spend a LOT of
time at the library trying to dig them all up. This is cheap and
convenient; the only drawback is that I'm reading columns about 2 weeks
behind the times. 

Ken Mitchell
kmitche@eis.calstate.edu

Newsgroups: alt.rush-limbaugh,alt.news-media,alt.fan.dan-quayle