Posted on 10/14/2007 11:01:18 AM PDT by raccoonradio
Howie Carr live thread for the week of Oct 14. Including his Sun 10/14 Herald column.
The show is still up in the air; meeting is supposedly being held tomorrow. Greater Media wants Howie to do mornings for them but Entercom still feels he is their property, etc. Todd Feinburg has been filling in in the meantime. If I hear anything I'll pass it along.
aksi on the Herald’s site/Jessica Heslam:
“He could simply have waited until September 20, 2007, by which time his agreement with Entercom would have expired. Carr cannot now say that what he did had no legal effect under the agreement that he signed with Entercom five years earlier,” van Gestel wrote in today’s memo.
“And he cannot now twist the language of that agreement to mean something that it does not,” Van Gestel wrote.
“Carr is not, as he argues in his brief, ‘in essence, (subject to) a lifetime employment agreement’ with Entercom. And wherever he legally finds himself, it is of his own conscious doing. He has not, as he publicly claims, been placed into some form of high-paid indentured servitude by this court.”
The judge also denied a motion by the Entercom Communications-owned WRKO to ban WTKK from talking to Carr, and making public statements about the possibility of him joining their station, because it could hurt WRKO’s advertsing sales.
The judge said Entercom “has definitely failed to show irreparable harm.”
Attorneys for both sides had argued their cases before van Gestel yesterday at a hearing. Carr has been off the airwaves since last month.
One can only assume that Howie sought the advice of a lawyer (a good lawyer) before having signed that contract five years ago.Two judges now have declared the clause(s) in question to be legally binding on both Howie and RKO.Could it be that Howie got lousy advice from his lawyer five years ago or was he not paying attention when said lawyer explained the "we're allowed to match any competing offer" clause to him?
And....although I like Howie a lot I must point out that Howie has always said that "if someone claims it's not about the money,you know that it is" and now *he's* claiming that it's not about the money.
http://www.bostonherald.com/blogs/news/messenger/index.php/2007/10/16/howie-to-appeal/
Howie, WTKK to appeal.
>>“While we respect Judge Van Gestel’s ruling today, we believe that it provides ample grounds for appeal and that is our next step,” Carr’s spokeswoman, Nancy Sterling, said in a statement...WTKK may also appeal. “We are very disappointed with the court’s ruling and are reviewing our options, including the possibility of an appeal,” a spokeswoman said in a decision.
Entercom meanwhile states Howie belongs to them for the next 5 years.
yes—Howie may have gotten lousy legal advice 5 yrs ago
Option3: Go back on WRKO and play classical music. Ratings will go in the toilet and WRKO will have to foot the bill.
It’s the same judge that issued both rulings. Next stop: State Appellate court.
Yes, it’s partly about the money - but Howie really hates it there. It sounds like the contract that he signed 5 years ago is a standard Entercom one. Scotto said that he signed the type. Don’t forget that today’s RKO is a different station that it was 5 years ago.
there’s a lot more discussion on this on the Boston board
at http://www.radio-info.com
The consensus seems to be that Howie got lousy legal
advice and that the “right to match” in his contract
is iron-clad, and perhaps that he’ll have to crawl back
to ‘RKO with his tail between his legs. Even though ‘RKO
has been doing nice things like having its employees
vandalize the Wikipedia pages of former employees
despite having a “non-disparagement” clase
(see Miller, Scott Allen). Or putting felons on the air.
The Wed. re-ping, with a Howie Herald column
Age slows us all down except for licensed geezers
by Howie Carr / Boston Herald 10/17/07
Mrs. Jane Berghold, age 76, finally stopped giving interviews yesterday afternoon, a day after driving her 1991 Oldsmobile into Brockton Hospital and killing a 58-year-old doctor and a receptionist, and injuring four others.
Her son, Peter, was answering the phone at the family’s Rockland home. The cops took away the driver’s license of his mother, a former Ted’s Carpet Land employee, at the scene. But having no license means little these days. So I asked Peter Berghold, did he think his mother will drive again? He paused before answering.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know how that will play out.”
I’m sure this is a very sad time for the Bergholds as well as for the families of the dead radiologist and receptionist. But wasn’t this all very preventable, if the problem of elderly drivers hadn’t been allowed to get so far out of control?
“I tried to slow down and the car didn’t, it just kept going,” Mrs. Berghold told the Herald. I asked her son to elaborate.
“From her perspective she’s not quite sure what happened,” he said. “She was driving into the hospital parking lot, driving very carefully, she said, because she’d never been there before. She made a left turn into a parking space, and the next thing she knew she was in the hospital covered with broken glass.”
Why wasn’t her husband driving? Because he’s 81 and has stopped driving - which 600,000 elderly people do every year, although many more resist.
I know, old drivers don’t want to give up their car keys because too often the next step is the nursing home. Children don’t want to take away the Olds because that’s a good way to get written out of the will. The politicians are afraid to tighten the licensing restrictions because old people vote. Gerontologists don’t want to lose a customer - I mean, a patient. Cops on the scene may go easier on a weeping old-timer; ditto the clerks at the Registry when somebody shows up blind as a bat for the vision test.
Google the phrases “elderly drivers” and “death” some time and you’ll read the same news story over and over again. Certain phrases recur - “remorseful,” which is what the elderly driver always is. Then there are the “emotional pleas,” offered by the lawyers to keep their wrinkly clients out of the can. And most of the time, they work. Consider the 89-year-old who fatally mowed down 10 people at the Santa Monica Farmer’s Market.
Ten dead. Cause of accident: “pedal error.” The sentence: probation.
When they aren’t mistaking the gas pedal for the brake, they “become confused.” That’s from a British Columbia story about a 71-year-old who killed six pedestrians in August. “The next thing he knew,” the story went on, “people were lying on the ground.”
On Monday, in Bakersfield, Calif., an “elderly driver” was killed when she ran a stop sign and drove into the path of an 18-wheeler with the right of way. In Baltimore Saturday, an 81-year-old slammed into the rear of a stopped delivery truck, killing himself and the 24-year-old truck driver. In Muncie over the weekend, a 94-year-old unlicensed driver described by neighbors as “a terrorist behind the wheel” severely injured a moped rider. In 1993, at the tender age of 77, this guy took out another moped and sent two people to the hospital in a helicopter.
The elderly always ask why is everybody always picking on them, when it’s really those young whippersnapper teenagers with the backwards baseball caps running into trees at 3 a.m. and then having all their hoodlum friends set up a “memorial” with teddy bears and empty 40-ouncers and Marlboro hardpacks - those punks are the ones causing all the trouble, sonny, and don’t you forget it.
Actually, though, according to a recent study by Carnegie Mellon University and the AAA Foundation, the traffic death rate for those between 75 and 84 is the same as for teenagers. For drivers over 85, the fatality rate is quadruple that of teenagers.
Want some more? You can find hundreds of these yourself on the Internet. This is from West Nyack, N.Y., last month. At the Foster Grandparent program, a woman was killed when an 86-year-old volunteer parking her car suddenly hit the accelerator instead of the brake. Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.
The 86-year-old said “I am very, very sorry” Not as sorry as her victim, though.
Did someone ask about the charges? There aren’t any. The incident was described by police as “an unfortunate accident.”
If you haven’t heard this one before, rest assured you’ll be hearing it again.
She died a healthy and hale 98 when her heating system leaked carbon monoxide. (Being half in the bag all the time, she probably didn’t recognize the symptoms.)
>say something nasty on the air
>and get fired?
I think if he goes back, he can say damn near anything he wants... *That* would be interesting.
Though that would upset sponsors and he may have a tough time moving to another station like WTKK (if the idea is, “OK,
go back to ‘RKO, say something nasty—do a DePetro if
need be—and get fired”...problem is, it would scare
sponsors away at ‘TKK...
I suggested Howie call Grace Ross (former candidate for gov.) a fat lesbian and call fat Matt a fag.....that should get him fired instantly,,,,it worked for Depetro (former morning guy on RKO),,,,it'll work for Howie!
I don’t think swearing,etc. would deter his sponsors, they will follow him....Look what Howard Stern did before he moved to Sirius - his ratings were through the roof...
I want MY Howie BACK, he’s the checks-and-balances on New England politics.
maybe you’re right!
in today’s Globe:
http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2007/10/17/judge_carr_has_to_stay_at_wrko/
they talk about yesterday’s decision and also say that Howie may have to pay back some damages
(lost ad money?—WRKO couldn’t say exactly how many sponsors have fled WRKO with Howie off
air/poss. moving)
and I had to laugh:
>>”Talk radio is a different animal,” Fishkin said. A host disgruntled with the station “might make for good radio. It’s about getting the viewer interested
Viewer? It’s radio, pal Smiley
And:
>>in the world of talk radio, WRKO could see its ratings jump if Carr liberally criticized that station while on the air.
Funny to see “liberal” and Carr in same sentence!
My Father said Carr was once a ‘liberal’
But seriously, if he criticized WRKO when on it, it would be HUGE [something he may not want to do, therefore]
But
You’d have the under-30 crowd tuning in in droves.
Todd’s OK but he does tend to ‘drone-on’ and doesn’t get the mass of great callers we were used to with Howie.
maybe he was thinking of Howie’s predecessor in that slot,
Jerry Williams, who was a liberal that later re-branded
himself a populist/muckraker, etc.
Stand Corrected - You’re Right - Jerry Williams was the ‘liberal’
no prob! I started listening to Jerry in the mid 80s and
I was glad on certain days when I tuned in and I heard,
“Good afternoon New England, this is Howie Carr of the
Boston Herald and I’m filling in for ‘the Dean’ today...”
That was how it all started. Jerry was good. Howie
is even better.
The Thu. re-ping.
from DevalPatrickWatch.com:
Tomorrow, Deval Patrick will formally endorse Barack Obama for President.
Did anybody really expect anything different?
Gov. Deval Patrick tomorrow will formally endorse Barack Obama for president, giving the Illinois senator key support from the nation’s only black governor and a huge boost among influential Bay State campaign donors.
The move comes after months of quiet deliberation by Patrick, who has been torn between Obama and New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, whose husband appointed Patrick to the top civil rights post in his administration in the 1990s.
I think this was the predictable choice. Obama’s campaign for president has been loaded with fluff and lacking of substance... basically, a larger scale version of Deval’s gubernatorial campaign. But does Obama really want to be compared to Deval Patrick now?
Let’s face it, Deval has been a disappointing governor. His first weeks and months were plagued by scandals and mishaps. He promised an end to “politics as usual” (the same way Obama is now) only to demonstrate he can be as crooked as an entrenched politician. Even the far left-wing that so enthusiastic backed his fluffed-up campaign have been scratching their heads.
Obama’s campaign has pretty come right out of Deval’s playbook. The more you put the two together, the more Democrats will see that the idealistic rhetoric Obama is echoing in 2007 is as meaningless as Deval’s back in 2006.
Bill Clinton campaigned for Deval last fall when he was running for governor. What a kick in the teeth for Hillary.
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