Posted on 08/23/2002 10:39:14 AM PDT by AmericanInTokyo
[EXCERPTS]
Shock Jocks Fired After St. Pat's Sex Stunt
NEW YORK, 11:03 a.m. EDT August 23, 2002 -
Opie and Anthony are over and out.
The New York-based shock jocks, under fire from angry Catholic groups for broadcasting a live account of a couple allegedly having sex in St. Patrick's Cathedral, had their nationally syndicated show canceled Thursday.
"Based on recent events, the Opie and Anthony Show has been canceled, and will be replaced by other programming beginning Friday," Waced by programming to be determined separately by each station. He didn't know what WNEW would air in its time slot, and the station referred all inquiries to McClintock.
The pair had been pulled off the airwaves on Monday, three days after the sexual stunt was aired.
.....The FCC had been flooded with hundreds of complaints about the show.......
The decision to sack the shock jocks and their highly rated afternoon drive-time show was hailed by William Donohue, head of the 350,000-member Catholic League.......
......Donohue said his group would back off its call for the FCC to pull WNEW's broadcast license and fine Infinity.
"It's over," he said. "I'm satisfied."
FCC spokesman David Fiske said Friday that its investigation of the incident would continue.
"The fact that they've made a management decision with a station doesn't affect the conduct of the investigation," Fiske said.
....... Charges of acting in concert were still pending against Opie and Anthony producer Paul Mercurio, 42, who provided a running account of the encounter via cell phone.
The Opie and Anthony show was nationally syndicated in 17 markets outside New York City, including Cleveland, Dallas, Las Vegas, New Orleans and Washington, D.C.
It was the second firing in four years for Greg "Opie" Hughes and Anthony Cumia. The pair was canned in 1998 by a Massachusetts station after announcing on April Fool's Day that Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino was killed in a car crash.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.com ...
Good riddance (to those two idiots)! The tiger has roared!
Congratulations, Freepers. The Freep was successful.
Mission accomplished in less than ONE WEEK!
They'll be hired again, and this won't hurt them much, if at all.
Now that's something to laugh about. I pray that no other station hires these slugs.
Notwithstanding, though, this sends a message. Broadcast this garbage and facilitate these public crimes, and you can fully expect to be fired or have your station fined after a grassroots outcry. It is time to keep drawing lines than surrendering in the Great Culture Wars in America. Chalk up another victory and chalk up a point for decency by the Bush Administraiton thru the FCC for the line they took, which no doubt pressured the station and it's sponsors!
The SCUM in America keep pushing the envelope. The sheeple have become so saturated and used to it they just roll over and accept it and the boundaries get pushed more and more into depravity. However, a backlash can be guaranteed of others who won't put up with it. There are a lot of Freepers in that category; you saw their quick work right here! ;-)
Eagles Up. Good work. Mission Accomplished.
The big liberal nihilist leviathans of media in our day and age be brought down with a good sucker punch or two!
It is great to not only realize you are conservative, but that you also have POWER and NUMBERS as a group, and can pack quite a punch when you have to! ;-)
Enjoy!
O&A NEWS FOR 08/23/2002 IT'S OVER, SO COME RALLY FOR THE GUYS!! Friday, August 23rd, 2002 Around 3pm, if you can make it, gather 'round on 57th and 7th, in the courtyard outside the Brooklyn Diner to show your support for Op and Ant!
No one knows what the hell is it's going to accomplish, but it should be one hell of a send off!
Remember, Friday, August 23rd, starting around 3:00pm in the city...
Say farewell in style! Edit by FMHummercash: Remember folks, we only need 13 people to make this an official rally.
If you ask me they have been trying to get fired for at least a year so that they could go somewhere else. They hate Infinity and want to take on Howard Stearn, but Infinity won't let them.
August 23, 2002 -- An unholy sex stunt at St. Patrick's Cathedral has gotten shock jerks Opie and Anthony exorcised from New York radio. In a brief, one-line statement, WNEW-FM said it was doing away with its top-rated, nationally syndicated duo.
"Based on recent events, The Opie and Anthony Show has been canceled, and will be replaced by other programming beginning [today]," the statement said. A source said the station is working out money issues with the trashy talkers, who signed a three-year, $30 million deal in June 2001 with WNEW and its parent company, Infinity Broadcasting. Their show was heard by 10 million people daily in 19 radio markets around the country. The canning came the same day the Federal Communications Commission announced it was launching a formal investigation into the duo and WNEW for last week's "Sex for Sam" contest that resulted in two of the show's listeners being arrested for having sex in St. Pat's. The listeners, Loretta Lynn Harper, 35, and Brian Florence, 37, were taken to the storied church by one of the show's employees, Paul Mercurio, who gave Gregg "Opie" Hughes, Anthony Cumia and their listeners a live account of the sacrilegious sex act. "I am deeply disturbed about the reports of an incident involving WNEW-FM and a radio contest involving sex in public places, and I have directed the FCC's Enforcement Bureau to proceed immediately with a thorough investigation of the matter," FCC chairman Michael Powell said in a statement. The firing doesn't necessarily get WNEW off the hook with the FCC. The agency wants to know who signed off on the contest, and all the station's records concerning the first two "Sex for Sam" contests, where entrants have sex in public places to win a trip to the Samuel Adams brewery. "The agency would consider penalties up to and including the radio station's broadcast license," said FCC commissioner Michael Cop. A transcript of the show shows the hosts absolutely knew what was going on.
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