Left In Lowell

I know everyone’s getting a kick out of (or thumping me for, take your pick) the concept of liberal blog talkers going on FOX news radio (online streaming and Sirius XM, not the regular airwaves). Well, it’s happening in three and a half hours at 2pm, and if you want to listen in, you can do so here or on Sirius. You can also vote at that website as well, voting begins when the show ends at 3pm EST, online and via text message.

The format and the concept is interesting, and if mainstream media really does want to get serious about user-generated content, I’m not interested in standing in the way. The conventional press could use the fresh perspectives. Today, I get the honor of interacting with another liberal blog talker, Julie Pippert of MOMocrats (podcast here), and at a minimum, you should all want to tune into that!

As most of you know, I'm one part of a trio of Mass bloggers calling ourselves Left Ahead! who, most every Tuesday at 2:30, can be heard live-streamed at BlogTalkRadio, a website which facilitates citizen online webcasting by giving hosts a call-in number and taking care of the technical side of streaming and archiving. We've had guests ranging from state candidates to issue advocates to other bloggers (Elias and sco come to mind) to talk about the issues facing Massachusetts voters.

Well, BlogTalkRadio is teaming up with FOX News Radio for a "Battle of the Blog Talkers" on FOX Across America hosted by Spencer Hughes and carried on FOXNewsRadio.com and Sirius XM Radio. From October 6th through the 9th at 2-3pm, four liberal and four conservative BTR hosts will battle it out (with listener voting via web and text) for two slots each side on the Friday, Oct 10th show, and one winner from each “side” (liberal and conservative) from Friday’s show will get the chance to join Spencer in co-hosting a special FOX News Radio Election 2008 series live from 8 to 9 a.m. EDT the week of October 20th.

It turns out these people are weird (insane? silly?) enough to invite me to participate.

It so happens that I’m slotted for the Monday, October 6th show (2pm), up against fellow liberal blogtalker Julie Pippert of MOMocrats. Listeners will vote for whoever they think did the best that day, and the winner will move on to the Friday slot with three other winners from the right and left to the Friday show, from which winners of each side (by listener vote) will move on to the week of October 20th morning show.

It’s sort of Survivor meets talking heads. If you talk good enough, they might not vote you off the island.

On another note, we’ve been assured (repeatedly) that liberals will get a fair shake on the shows. The format calls for uninterrupted time for each contestant.

I know it’s sort of Crossfire-esque. On the other hand, it’s sort of like a mini debate club event, and just maybe a lot of fun. That is, if I can keep from talking a 100 miles a minute. I hope I can count on your listening, and your vote (if you think I did the best anyway!) on Monday afternoon!

Coming up in a few minutes (2:30pmEST), the live broadcast of Left Ahead where we will talk with Michael J. Widmer, who heads up the no-on-1 people. You can listen live (or catch the archive later at our website).

T-minus zero minutes. Listen live (or catch the archives later).

Today we’re doing ENDA (read up here) with two guests of opposing viewpoints regarding the lack of language to include transgendered people. Both guests are frequent commenters at BMG, Laural and Migraine.

Left Ahead this week is today, 2:30 pm (in 5 minutes) and we’re talking today with Mr. Richard Howe, Jr., where the topic will likely focus on the special election primary scheduled for next Tuesday!

I’m ‘podding and packing, should be interesting.

Podcast starts…*swish* *gong* rightnow… (to borrow from C&J)

Today’s Friday the 13th, but I’ve never really had a problem with it (I think that if you try hard enough to believe you’ll have an unlucky day, you make it happen yourself). But anyway, tune in to the show at 10am, we’ll have Victoria Fahlberg, Executive Director of the immigrant advocacy group, One Lowell. We’ll talk about the upcoming ONE Lowell World Cup, an amazing soccer tournament and cultural festival happening right here in Lowell, and about the issues facing immigrants to Lowell and the US.

Tonight we start our podcast at 8pm, and Jamie will be on at 8:30 or so. We at Left Ahead endorsed Jamie last week, though that won’t stop us from asking the tough questions. (You hear that Jamie? The tough questions!) We will try to wring as much detail on the issues we ask about as we can (since all we bloggers do is complain about the lack of such in the MSM). You can listen live to the stream, or can catch the archive afterwards! Links to do either will be found at Left Ahead.

Our Left Ahead weekly podcast is online and you can listen here. It features me being late (I was absorbed in accounting and taxes, then couldn’t find my call-in number, ug), Mike, Ryan and I talking about the special MA-05 and this weekend’s candidate forum, and some ranting about ballot initiatives. Also, our new weekly segment Blog of the Week, where we highlight our favorite blog posts.

In case you honestly can’t get enough jabber from me on my Friday WUML program, I’ve been dragged in–er, joined with Ryan and Mike to start a weekly audio podcast called “Left Ahead.” Our first “webisode” is available for easy listening.

Predictably, the first ‘cast is a lot of navel-gazing and talking about bloggers and Teh Media. Never fear, that’s typical for a first go on these things. It’ll get less meta pretty quick (we get bored talking about ourselves all the time anyway).

All I can say is, I don’t remember and cannot be blamed for anything I said earlier in our conference-call-style conversation; I was completely drunk. Just kidding.

Drunk political blogger podcasts. Hmm. That idea could catch on!