A Billionaire Newspaper Owner
We're in a hurry posting this. We covered these topics and more on this program. I plan to update this Web page with more of what we did. Check back for the updates.
The next regular WBAI LSB meeting will be held on Wednesday November 13, 2024, at 7:00 PM. That meeting will be held on ZOOM, even though ZOOM compromises privacy and security. That will be the final meeting of the 13th WBAI LSB, and it will be my final LSB meeting as a member. I term out this December.
Some years ago the WBAI LSB voted to hold its regular meetings on the second Wednesday of every month, subject to change by the LSB, so we have the following schedule:
These meetings are set to begin at 7:00 PM.
WBAI has a program schedule up on its Web site. The site has gotten many of the individual program pages together to provide links and such, so check it out.
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Here is WBAI's current Internet stream. We can no longer tell if the stream is working without testing every possible stream. Good luck.
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WBAI is archiving the programs! WBAI has permanently switched to yet another new archive Web page! This one is more baffling than the previous one. For some time I was unable to post archive blurbs, then I could, and then I couldn't again. Now I can again and there are a whole bunch of archive blurbs up there now.
This is a link to the latest version of the official WBAI archive. The archiving software appears to have been at least partially fixed. To get to the archive of this program you can use the usual method: you'll have to click on the drop-down menu, which says Display,
and find Back of the Book on that menu. We're pretty early in the list, so it shouldn't be too difficult. Once you find the program name click GO
and you'll see only this Back of the Book program. Management has fixed some problems that we'd been having with the archives.
For programs before March 23, 2019, we're all out of luck. The changes that took place once WBAI Management took control of the WBAI archives seems to have wiped out all access to anything before that date in March. You'll have to click on the same drop-down menu as above, which says Display,
and find Specify Date
, it's the second choice from the top. You are then given a little pop-up calendar and you can choose the date of the program there. Then click GO
and you'll see a list of programs that aired on that date. For those previous programs you can get the audio, but nothing else, since I can't post anything to those pages anymore. Good luck.
Since the former General Manager banned Sidney Smith from WBAI he's not alternating with us on the air. As of November 2020, Back of the Book airs weekly.
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Program Note:According to FCC regulations §399. Support of political candidates is prohibited on WBAI, No noncommercial educational broadcasting station may support or oppose any candidate for political office.
Yeah, this is a problem, and that's why we are not able to mention things like the political conventions that have gotten a ton of attention all over the world. We can't even suggest that certain politicians should go to jail. If we're still around on November 9, 2024, we'll be able to mention all of this political stuff again.
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The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times have pulled back from endorsing any presidential candidates. Washington Post owner billionaire Jeff Bezos who got rich from Amazon was reportedly worried about printing an endorsement because his other businesses have many federal government contracts. One member of the Washington Post opinions department, Robert Kagan, resigned over this sudden chance of course. A recent editor of the Washington Post, Marty Baron, called the decision to not make an endorsement, cowardice, with democracy as its casualty,
and said it was, Disturbing spinelessness at an institution famed for courage.
Leaders of The Washington Post Guild said they were deeply concerned
by the decision not to endorse a mere 11 days ahead of an immensely consequential election.
Meanwhile at the Los Angeles Times, which is owned by another billionaire named Patrick Soon-Shiong, Mr. Soon-Shiong reportedly also blocked a planned presidential endorsement. Mariel Garza, the former editorials editor at the Los Angeles Times, resigned as a result of the endorsement being quashed saying I am resigning because I want to make it clear that I am not OK with us being silent,
and she added, In dangerous times, honest people need to stand up.
Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial writer Robert Greene and another editorial board member Karin Klein, resigned on Thursday. Ms. Klein said, The board was not the one choosing to remain silent. He [owner Patrick Soon-Shiong] blocked our voice.
This is what happens when you have media being bought up by rich guys who are cowardly because they might lost some of their billions as a result of doing the right things.
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First is Anastasia: The Autobiography of H.I.H. the Grand Duchess Anastasia Nicholaevna of Russia written by one of the most famous of the women claiming to have been Anastasia. The real Anastasia was murdered along with the rest of the Romanov family on July 17, 1918, by the Communists who had recently taken over the Russian Empire to establish the no less awful Soviet Union. It is interesting to look through this book and see someone trying to present herself as someone whom was not. The book touts itself as, This is an invaluable historical record.
It is a fraud, as determined after all of the women claiming to be Anastasia had died, from DNA evidence along with the discovery of the remains of the entire Romanov family, including Anastasia and her little brother Alexei.
We also talked about the Catholic Legion of Decency that trapped a teenaged R. Paul to swear an oath that he'd abide by their restrictions. Subsequently R. Paul was very concerned as a teenager that he wanted to read The Communist Manifesto a book banned by the so-called Legion of Decency but he didn't want to commit a mortal sin and break his oath, which he very reluctantly took. R. Paul read The Communist Manifesto from the English edition of 1888, edited by Friedrich Engels, but he didn't read the last paragraph in the hopes of not going to Hell for breaking his oath.
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There are a lot of issues that are considered hazardous to talk about on the air at WBAI, even though the gag rule was lifted in 2002. However, there is the Internet! There are mailing lists which you can subscribe to and Web based message boards devoted to WBAI and Pacifica issues. Many controversial WBAI/Pacifica issues are discussed on these lists.
One open list that no longer exists was the WBAI-specific Goodlight
Web based message board. It was sometimes referred to on Back of the Book as the bleepin' blue board,
owing to the blue background that was used on its Web pages. This one had many people posting anonymously and there was also an ancillary WBAI people
board that was just totally out of hand.
In June 2012, I ended up having to salvage the bleepin' blue board, and so I was the moderator on it for its last seven years, until it got too expensive.
Sometimes we used to have live interaction with people posting on the Goodlight Board
during the program.
Our very own Uncle Sidney Smith, whose program Saturday Morning With the Radio On used to alternate with us, has a blog these days. You can reach his blog here.
There used to be a number of mailing lists related to Pacifica and WBAI. Unfortunately, they were all located on Yahoo! Groups. When Yahoo! Groups was totally shut down in December 2020, all of those mailing lists ceased to exist. One year earlier their file sections and archives of E-mails, had been excised leaving only the ability to send E-mails back and forth among the members. Now it's all gone. Older Back of the Book program Web pages tell a little more about those lists.
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