We had a little FBLA blogger meeting last night and one of the things that came up is that we really don't do enough items about radio in LA. So here goes:

KFI the conservative talk station with Rush Limbaugh and Dr. Laura share the same floor as KTLK - LA's Air America. The studios are in Burbank across the street from Dimples and next door to where Jay Leno films his show. The two polar opposite stations are right next to each other on the forth or fifth floor. Which could be a metaphor. Can we all co-exists in harmony? Or are both political parties pretty much the same?

Does this make us want to do a rendition of "Ebony and Ivory"? Not really.

The great thing is when you come off the elevators - KFI is on the left.

A reader wrote in to tell us that Warren Olney invited Amiri Baraka to speak on To The Point today about the whole Jesse Jackson/Barack Obama "balls brawl."

Olney never mentions that Baraka is a controversial figure regarded by many to be an anti-Semite -- an oversight that irks our reader. The reader, of course, blogged about it, and wrote Olney an e-mail, which prompted this response:

continued...

We just got word that Marc Maron is going to be on Pat Morrison's show on KPCC at 2pm talking about George Carlin.

We'd say it's NSFW...but it really depends on where you work.

Like if you work at Pacifica Radio - don't sweat it.

First of all - we don't want to offend drug addicts by lumping them in with...ahem - Lumpy Limbaugh - or as we like to call him, Jabba the Yutz. So we won't. But this is what he said about our Antonio Villaraigosa on his radio show:

I shook [Clinton's] hand, he left, comes back [with] the mayor of Los Angeles," he told listeners. "I thought it was a Secret Service agent, maybe a shoeshine guy. Turns out he gives me his card, I said, 'Oh, my gosh, it's the mayor of Los Angeles.'"

Then Villaraigosa looked at Limbaugh's card and said,"Oh my gosh, it's the ambassador to the 17th century."

Since Randi Rhodes quit - her old time slot will now be filled with rotating guest hosts.

Air America announced:

...Marc Maron and Sam Seder next week; followed by Ron Reagan and Ron Kuby as guest-hosts on subsequent weeks of "American Afternoon," airing 3-6pm ET.

We submit that Marc Maron can read the phone book and make it funny, informative and suddenly make a lot of sense. Not even the phone book. Any phone book. Like the one that comes with the iPhone. Serious. He's that good.

We have an anonymous tip that we must add. It reads,"I love Marc Maron...I have a man crush on him".

Indeed.

This clip from yesterday's Larry King Live, confirms what we have been reporting, that Air America was trying to get out of Randi Rhodes' contract and that's why the video of her calling Hillary Clinton 'a fucking whore' surfaced 10 days after the event.

We got an email:

Not sure if you care about this at all but here some info on the Rhodes situation...

She's going to be signing a deal with Nova M Radio in the next few hours for about the same money Air America was paying her. She will broadcast Monday afternoon on all Clear Channel affiliates and several other stations. The folks at Air America don't miss her one bit, in fact she's widely hated among everyone who has actually met her. She has moved from New York City to West Palm Beach, FL and she will broadcast from the WJNO studios.

If you have any need to use that or pass it along, go right ahead. Please withhold my name and info.

Thanks Deep Throat!

UPDATE: from another tip:

We should mention that when she used the term 'fucking whore' to refer to Hillary Clinton she was at an Obama event. Classy.

Air America had suspended Randi Rhodes after she called Hillary Clinton 'a fucking whore' in a stage appearance. And now she has resigned:

Air America Media was informed last night by Ms. Rhodes that she has chosen to terminate her employment with the company. We wish her well and thank her for past services to Air America.

So she's going to San Francisco:

UPDATE: John Scott, Program Director of Green960, speaks out:

"We have been very frustrated the past few days in our efforts to rectify the Randi Rhodes Situation (her suspension by her network, Air America Radio). It is our understanding that today (April 9th) she is no longer an employee of Air America. So we are bringing her back."

Our money was on her going to XM/Sirius where lunatic potty mouths are embraced...but ok.

See FBLA's exclusive with Rhodes' ex-writer comedian Barry Crimmins.

Randi Rhodes is in trouble for calling Hillary Clinton a 'fucking whore' as part of a stand up performance she did in San Francisco. Last word was that Air America suspended her for the YouTubed gaff.

In fairness to all stand up comedians, Randi Rhodes is not one. Nor was Michael Richards. Just so that's stated for the record.

Barry Crimmins, who is a stand up, satirist and author, was a writer for Rhodes from March 2004 until the summer of 2006. The time when, arguably Rhodes was the most poignant and funny she's ever been.

Crimmins talked exclusively with FBLA about the suspension.

FBLA: What you think of this ordeal?

BC: I looked at the video. She was inarticulate. It was in a club, obviously people were drinking. It didn't seem like people were particularly aghast. As far as Hillary being a 'whore' - I criticize her a lot but that's not the word I would use. And something no one is talking about is that she said this in San Francisco where many sex workers are unionized and she used 'whore' as a pejorative.

But as far as what she was doing up there, it looked like something that was not well put together. She was stringing together lines that she has used on the air and ad-libbing around them. That's where the inarticulate language came in. I've seen people do a lot worse - she was getting laughs. I think they'll use the whole 'it's just not funny' excuse but she was getting some laughs.

But she's a rep for sacred Air America - an allegedly progressive talk show network that's now policing what its employees say on a Friday night in a bar. Next comes a memo forbidding on-air discussion of the ACLU.

There are two forces at work here: One is selling Hillary Clinton as feminist martyr, even though she's running with assurances that she'll be the perfect tool of the patriarchal war machine - not to mention a prime beneficiary of said machine. This is where some might apply charges of prostitution. Anyway, this played right into the endless "Hillary as gallant, little victim" stuff. She was the favorite with big time connections and now she's The Little Engine That Could or Rocky, who also lost to a black guy with a weird name.

So ten days later, Force One From Victimhood meets meets Force Two From WEB 2.O - YouTube. This all falls in the lap of suits at perpetually failing Air America - suits apparently looking to dump a big contract.

FBLA: Did you write for her during the whole shooting Bush controversy?

BC: I wrote that sketch. Jeb Bush had just pushed through legislation making it OK for Floridians to shoot people if they felt threatened. This didn't exactly make me feel comfortable as a performer whose been known to occasionally make audiences a tad nervous. Anyway, this bit was meant to satirize both Jeb's law and W's raid on Social Security. It was meant to sound like an old codger firing a warning shot because he felt threatened -- sort of a "get off my land!" deal. Instead, it got produced with a burst of automatic weapon fire. This was wrong, I should have caught it, someone should have caught it - we didn't.

I did give them the perfect escape line, which they didn't use. The line was, "We're sorry - we forgot how seriously this administration takes fictitious threats."

But seriously, I don't want Bush to be shot. I want him to live and face the judgment of history and know that he will forever be the measure of puniness.

In any case, it seems to me that calls to fire Randi are excessive. Her livelihood's at stake and Americans have lost enough jobs lately.

I once lost a great radio gig for no good reason and I wouldn't wish that on anyone - even if they were guilty of off-duty inarticulate speech.

FBLA: Thanks Barry! We're such fans of what you do!

For more about Crimmins - visit his site.