Carr Vs Entercom Litigation, Boston Globe, Talk Radio Salaries

WHO'S SERVING WHOM?

In Talk Radio Suit, Boston Globe's Partisan Agenda Clear







Is the Boston Globe capable of covering any story without a political agenda, or one that serves the New York Times, its corporate master?

Today, both of those self- interests were stamped all over a mini- hit piece on Boston talk radio star Howie Carr, who is in the midst of a nasty legal battle against his even nastier employer, Entercom Communications. After growing tired of the miserable atmosphere inside WRKO-AM, Carr signed a deal with WTKK-FM, a rival station owned by Greater Media.

For background on the case, see the Howie Carr file at our other site.

When the station tried to block him from leaving, Carr filed suit against Entercom, which led to a countersuit from the company. And after the resulting public flap generated a wave of negative publicity for WRKO, the firm began to fight back on the PR front, as well.


That brings us to today's mini- hit piece against Carr carried in today's Globe. In just a few paragraphs, the paper manages to attack the supposedly hypocritical host, making clear he's a "conservative" earning a great deal of money, while serving New York Times corporate interests as well:

WRKO paid 'servant' Carr $790,000


Howie Carr has protested that WRKO-AM is treating him like an "indentured servant," trying to force him to remain at the station when he is ready to bolt to WTKK-FM this fall.

But indentured servitude never looked so good: The conservative talk show host made $790,000 in salary and incentives last year, according to industry executives who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

And, had he hit all of his bonus targets, he could have earned north of $900,000.

Anonymous "industry executives" know Howie Carr's salary? How? Outside of Entercom's corporate vault, this hasn't been public information, so even if an "executive" thought he knew the figure, hard copy verificiation likely wouldn't exist.

Of course, that points fingers right back at Entercom itself, an arrogant outfit that has been known to play dirty when under fire. (Yet another disclosure reminder: your Radio Equalizer has twice worked for the company in past years, including at WRKO)

It's not just a partisan shot taken here, it's also about business. With the New York Times owning a piece of the Red Sox baseball team, its pro- Entercom coverage has been raising eyebrows for some time. That's because Entercom holds the rights to air Sox games on its network of New England radio stations, including WRKO.

Most Boston Globe coverage of Entercom's legal battle with Carr and other recent missteps, including the hiring of convicted felon Tom Finneran to host an ill- fated morning drive show, has generally avoided including critics. For example, our own sister site, SaveWRKO, now generating thousands of daily page views and covered in several other Boston publications, has been ignored by the NYT- owned broadsheet.


In early 2006, your Radio Equalizer disclosed the salaries of Al Franken and several other Air America Radio employees. As a result, one could argue that we are no better than the Globe.

At the time, however, there was an investigation underway into taxpayer funds that were diverted from an inner- city charity to the liberal radio network. This site felt that Franken's relentless push for increasingly- bloated salaries contributed to the company's push to cover up its role in the scandal.

By contrast, the Globe is merely taking a cheap partisan shot at a conservative, while sucking up to its corporate parent at the same time.

RELATED: Media Nation adds up Howie's likely total wages.


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