20 February 2011 That vast American radio desert

Morning Edition

All Things Considered

Fresh Air

The Diane Rehm Show

On The Media

On Point

Talk of the Nation

Talk of the Nation Science Friday

A Prairie Home Companion

Weekend Edition Saturday

Weekend Edition Sunday

Car Talk

Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me!

BBC World News

All Songs Considered

JazzSet

Marian McPartland's Piano Jazz

Mountain Stage

The Thistle & Shamrock

The Grateful Dead Hour



There were once great portions of this nation not served by commercial radio stations. Driving from A to B meant enduring many square miles of radio wasteland, with only random static and muddy garble issuing from the tinny dashboard speaker. Local radio stations, mostly AM, often broadcast a mix of farm futures, local bulletin boards, hourly news, and locally programmed music of a genre determined by the station owner. With broadcast power averaging 1000-5000 watts the reach of anyone station was not that great. Night service often dropped off to 500 watts of power if the station was not a sundowner – shutting down transmission at sunset.

There were vast holes in broadcast coverage areas when no music or news could be heard and even larger marginal areas that offered the overlap of multiple stations fading in and out of deceivability as sigal strengths wavered.

In some regions, skip reception was possible as the 50,000 watt transmitters from major regional stations bounced off the ionosphere and back into the antennae of AM radios in thousands of cars. The “skip” would also waver in and out of reception as the receivers crawled along old two-lane roads and newer interstate highways. Of course, “skip” only worked at night. The later the hour, the more likely a skip.

FM stations were a product of the major cities and were – still are – limited to line of sight reception. So close proximity was required to listen to them.

Much of my pre-PBS radio contact was with local stations that rarely played music I cared to listen to. I had then, and have now, no interest In the schedule of local church services, no interest in local bake sales, high school athletics or dozens of other items that fill local AM radio broadcasts. I have no use for the right wing talk radio shows that have taken over large segments of the AM day, offering bigotry, xenophobia, and outright lies spun by the GOP’s propaganda networks. I also have no desire to listen to country-western music, soft rock, disco, grunge, metal, or any of the nationally programmed auto-broadcasts that guarantee the listener that one radio station’s music will be a clone of the nationally scheduled noise.

My first routine contact with a NPR/PBS station took place in the late 1980’s while working a job that offered a 110-mile round-trip to and from work as a benefit. I suddenly found music that I enjoyed being programmed, intelligent new columns, honestly researched news programming, and a place to actually preset a radio button instead of ignoring them.

The list at the beginning is programming that I listen to while driving and at home. None of that programming is available on commercial AM or FM radio where I live today. It may as well not exist for my listening purposes unless I have access to NPR/PBS radio.

Of course, NPR is under continual attack by the GOP, teavanagelists, teahadists, and all the others who listen to hate radio and cloned, canned, music simulacrum. The forces of teabaggery repeatedly attempt to remove all funding for PBS and NPR so that intelligent commentary and real, varied music will not trouble the minds of those who might actually recognize truth in journalism if they happen to overhear it. This year, the financial problems of our nation have allowed tea baggers to gain sufficient presence in the House of Representatives to really jeopardize the NPR/PBS network. The forces of censorship, opposed to anything that does not trumpet teavangelism and hatred, are poised to force a government shut-down if they are denied their plans by the more intelligent and progressive members of Congress.

We are at grave risk of losing something very necessary.

That great American radio wasteland is still there. It has grown even larger, burrowing into the major cities and forcing the smaller stations out of operation. Traveling in the dark hours, you’ll find it from one end of your radio dial to the other. Just as decades ago, you can’t miss it. But unlike the past, it is no longer silent.