To: WAMC Northeast Pirate Network - 
I thought that you might be interested in thefollowing Usenet posting that popped up on the ny.politics and alt.culture.ny-upstatenewsgroups tonight, posted by a flat_hat@my-deja.com:

"A Bag of Air"
I was listening to Alan Chartock shoot off his politically correct fat mouth today and my blood started to boil yet again.  I was going to write something about this pompous, smarmy windbag who is constantly polluting our airwaves, but I decided to let him speak for himself.

For those not familiar with Chartock, he is a SUNY political science professor, a political commentator on Channel 13 in Albany, and a columnist for The Berkshire Eagle in Massachusetts, among several other things.  But most of all he is the executive director of WAMC Public Radio, based in Albany, but with transmitters from Poughkeepsie to Ticonderoga, and from Middletown to western Massachusetts and Connecticut.

He runs the station with an iron hand - cross him and you are instantly a non-person, as some former on-air personalities found out the hard way.

The guy has a huge ego - big enough to make himself the "star" of at least three programs (that each appear twice weekly), and to regularly appear in several others.

WAMC is supposed to be a public station airing a variety of views, but what we hear most is Chartock's opinion on everything.  I'll grant that he's a good organizer and fundraiser, but I don't think that a public radio station should so heavily reflect the views of one person.

Anyway, I digress.  What I started to say is that I will give you the opportunity to listen to this windbag and make up your own mind.  (If you hadn't noticed, MY mind is already made up.)

Click on the links below to hear Real Audio archives of this man telling us, again and again, 
how important and wise he is.  (If you are using web-based news instead of a conventional news client, the URLs may not appear as links.  If this is true, just copy them to the location bar of your Real Audio player.): 

"Me and Mario": A weekly show where Chartock sits at the great man's knee basking in his reflected glory.  This week's show: http://www.wamc.org/audio/meandmario/mm.ram
Last week's show: http://www.wamc.org/audio/meandmario/mm1.ram

"The Media Project": A panel discussion about the media that usually degenerates into food fights between Chartock and the other panelists.  This week's show: http://www.wamc.org/audio/media/media.ram
Last week's show: http://www.wamc.org/audio/media/media1.ram

"The Capital Connection": Soft-core interviews with high-ranking state politicians, all punches pulled.  All smarm all the time.  This week's show: http://www.wamc.org/audio/capcon/capcon.ram
Last week's show: http://www.wamc.org/audio/capcon/capcon1.ram

Happy listening!

Forwarded by TROY <troyguy@altavista.com>
Tuesday, April 18, 2000