Liberal Talk Radio Takes Off

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Which radio programs do you listen to?

Democracy Now has always been a staple in my life. Although I'd listen to Democracy Now and then I would be like, "I really wish this segment on Myanmar was not 35 minutes long, but maybe 20." I needed a little break to hear some domestic news. And I listen to NPR here and there.

What do you think of NPR? Everyone talks about Air America as an antidote to Rush Limbaugh and right-wing talk radio, but in a way, it's an antidote to the sometimes somber tone of NPR.

Well, that's a big thing. Our goal is to take the smart Howard Stern listeners and to take the NPR listener who is getting some sort of interesting information, and then it can go off into some crazy string theory. It's like, "Oh, my God, good-bye. Bleah!" One of my dearest friends is one of the hosts of All Things Considered, and in an interview with The Washington Post I said, "You know, I like NPR, I just wish they wouldn't do 12-minute stories about a hybrid between a kumquat and a banana." And she sent me a gigantic, beautiful basket of kumquats and bananas all mixed together and it was absolutely a riot.

What was the difference in motivation for launching Air America and creating The Daily Show?

The Daily Show is a satire of the medium, as well as the media makers. It really takes on news and how they make the news one big shiny object to get people to stare at it. After watching the news on CNN, I've basically learned more than I ever needed to know about Laci Peterson and her unborn child and how it floated and lived, and then when I'm done with being completely sickened by that, I hear more than I ever needed to know about Kobe Bryant and the woman he had sex with in a hotel room. So then I'm 20 minutes in and I've learned nothing. That was the motivating fodder for The Daily Show. These are called "24-hour" news channels, and they're struggling for news. The graphics department of CNN, I think, has got the biggest budget at CNN. And Fox has those newscasters at the top of the hour who look like exotic dancers: "I'm Laurie Do and I'd like to do you, but before that, I'll give the news." It's like, "Oh, my God, what is going on?"

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