Laura Ingraham Lockout Personal, Not Political

HOLD YOUR FIRE!

Fighting Ingraham's Battle, Activists Waste Valuable Time







At a time when conservatives face important political battles heading into November's election, one radio host would have the right waste valuable resources fighting for her lucrative syndication contract.

After playing her hand much too aggressively while courting a rival broadcast outfit, Laura Ingraham has found herself locked out at the Talk Radio Network, which has handled her show since an abrupt exit from Westwood One nearly five years ago.

While your Radio Equalizer certainly doesn't expect Ingraham to back down from her contention that she's done nothing wrong, attempting to drag the entire conservative movement into her contractual dispute is ridiculous.

Whether directly from Laura or via her lawyers and friends, this represents a profound misuse of the right's collective energy. Especially dubious are any assertions that the Talk Radio Network, a reliably conservative syndication outfit for many years, has shut her down for ideological reasons.

Not only is this absurd, it's frankly embarrassing. Already, some respected names on the right have been pulled in to this misguided "cause".

Today's Washington Post piece by Howard Kurtz underscores the silliness of this would-be crusade:

Laura Ingraham, the most popular woman on political talk radio, has been off the air for two weeks, and not by choice.

Ingraham's syndicator, Talk Radio Network, barred her from her Washington studio after talks about a new contract hit a snag, and some of her fans are mounting a campaign to get her back.

"The fact is, they took her off the air," says Eric Bernthal, her lawyer. "There's no doubt in my mind they did it as a tactic in contract negotiations."

Ingraham said on her Web site: "Rest assured, this absence is not of my choosing, nor is it health or family related. I am ready, willing and eager to continue the conversation we started seven years ago about politics and the culture. (Heck, if cancer couldn't keep me off the airwaves for long, nothing will.) . . . I would never voluntarily abandon you during such a critical time for our country." She declined a request for comment because of a confidentiality clause in her contract.

Neither Mark Masters, chief executive of Talk Radio Network, nor a lawyer for the company responded to requests for comment. Ingraham's five-year contract -- she previously worked for another radio company -- expires in September, and she is contractually barred from negotiating with other syndicators until later this summer.

Bingo! That's the apparent source of the dispute: early negotiating by Ingraham with Citadel- ABC stations based on earlier thinking that Sean Hannity's program would soon be leaving their stations. That alarmed Masters, who locked out Ingraham in a defensive move.


In a business where so many left- wing executives have moved to dilute conservative talk radio in order to suit their own partisan agendas, the last thing right- leaning activists need is a misguided crusade against a company that has done nothing to deserve it.

Ingraham has every right to push for the best deal she can within the conditions of her contract, but should leave the rest of us out of it.


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