Friday, August 05, 2005

Talk Radio

I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but an observation that a fellow commenter named CJ made once on a PoliPundit thread does make one suspicious. CJ noted that when you do a Google search on something and if there is a political angle to the topic, liberal web sites tend to be listed first. And Al Gore is a consultant to Google management. Do you think? Naaah!

As we all know, conservatives dominate talk radio. In fact, Rush Limbaugh pioneered modern talk radio 17 years ago, and has - according to some people - revitalized the AM radio band. Since then, there have been numerous others who have taken to the airwaves. The successful ones are all conservative. They became the vanguard of the alternative media, which later spawned Fox News and the Blogosphere. So, you would think that if you typed the words "talk radio" into a Google search and executed it, you would get links to the conservative sites first. Or will you?

Let's try it out - if you do, you'll get this result

Interesting, isn't it?

Someone told me that Google uses an algorithm that includes the number of views of web pages when it produces its results. If that's true, there must be a lot of interest in Air America for it to place so high.

That interest in Air America isn't shared by the MSM, in the wake of the scandal embroiling the company. Right-wing bloggers are all over the story (see, for example, here), but the MSM has shown little interest in it. Given the other problems that the ratings-challenged* network has, they might be reluctant to put another straw on that camel's back. But if any other organization was caught diverting funds from disadvantaged children and Alzheimer sufferers, you've gotta believe that it would be a Page One story.

Air America only has itself to blame for being in their pickle. After all, they could have gotten a loan from Jon Corzine.

But that's for another column.

PS - Captain Ed continues his coverage of Air Scamerica here.
PPS - if you do a Google search on the words "Air America radio ratings" you get this article first.

Gotta go for real, now - my black helicopter is picking me up.

PPPS - The NYS Attorney General finally gets off his duff* on the matter.

*[Ed. note: Registration required for access to this article, or use BugMeNot.]

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