Along with his 9/11 DVD he has a DVD that says that the Moon landings were a hoax, he says that “Abu Ghraib must have seemed like a country club,” and that, “slaves were the Wretched Refuse of Africa, or we might call them Africa's Black Trash.” He's a proponent of Holocaust Denial and other opinions cherished by right wingers.

In a Report to the Listener on September 10th, iGM Indra Hardat apologized to the listeners for the station having effectively promoted Hufschmid. This was a display of more integrity on the part of WBAI management than I've seen in a long time.

Note: as of the date of this newsletter no one in the faction currently in charge has called Mr. Hufschmid a racist. The reason why this is noteworthy is that the faction, especially their political arm the “Justice & Unity Campaign,” has a habit of calling people racists on a regular basis. The fact that they have not been able to call Hufschmid a racist, because doing so would make some faction members look less than perfect, shows what a cynical use of the serious issue of racism the faction makes. The next time you hear faction members denouncing someone as a racist remember that they couldn't call Hufschmid one.

The PD had been invited to this meeting, but he was invited by faction members and so he cast no aspersions upon the invitation. The PD started out telling a factually inaccurate history of WBAI claiming that former GM Valerie Van Isler had ended certain Management abuses of Staff, when in fact our former Union which covered everyone, UE Local 404, had ended those abuses in 1987, Van Isler only became GM late in 1990.

The PD said that Air America is actively trying to get WBAI's audience, but he doesn't think they can because of the commercials on Air America. He also said, “It's not about putting on your friends. Any Program Director who just puts on his friends is committing suicide.”

The PD also said that the Program Council

There was a short discussion of the on-air delay system and why it's needed.

In response to a question the PD said that he had been doing two jobs at WBAI for the past four years, but that now he can focus on other things. He said that he would like WBAI to go out once a month to present remotes on forums. The PD said that he thought that the requirement in the Program Council Agreement that producers be given two programs' notice before they're removed from the air is “insane.” He was invited to come again.

Interesting were the obvious attempts by some attendees to get themselves radio programs.

Note: On August 21, the PD hosted Wake Up Call and spent about 90 minutes personally attacking purged producers and a non-faction LSB member who was named on the air. All three are demanding equal time to reply.

This meeting, at 10:30 on a Saturday morning in August, was attended by only 23 people.

At this meeting there was no cockiness. There was a discussion of the now infamous Painful Deceptions DVD. Faction members were amazingly liberal in their assertions that Hufschmid's background shouldn't even be considered. Some said it was a free speech issue and some said that if we considered Hufschmid's other public views that we'd end up screening guests for their agreement with WBAI producers. (No, really, people said that.) A producer said that he didn't like being called “black trash” by Hufschmid, but offering the premium doesn't mean we endorse what the person who provides the premium says, just as is the case with the cures for cancer that we offer as premiums. One person did say that the Hufschmid DVD premium had hurt our credibility. The PD said that the entire issue over Hufschmid was politically motivated. I guess that's all that the faction needs