Andrew Phillips on air talking about Pacifica's announcement.
Below, Steve Brown's comment:
Overall, an embarrassingly whiney performance by Andrew, although I can sympathize with his frustration at having his programming decisions swept aside by Summer Reese. But if he doesn't like his treatment by the executive director, the sensible – the honorable -- thing to do is resign, not whine about it over the air.
It is clear that Summer’s programming decisions are designed to raise as much money as possible, as fast as possible (for Pacifica, not WBAI) -- before any WBAI Lease Management Arrangement occurs. Therefore, she will air the programs that can do this, and pre-empt those that cannot. Her focus is on cash, not content. And given that WBAI’s inability to raise cash is the cause of its present sorry state, her decision seems sound, albeit sad.
By the way, I did not "leak" anything to the Daily News, as Andrew kept saying. I merely reposted the email from our Pacifica National Board member, Cerene Roberts (at her request). The purpose of her email was to inform the WBAI membership – which is her job – about the public (I repeat, public) announcement of the Pacifica National Board regarding the leasing of WBAI. Daily News reporter Hinckley merely picked up this public announcement of the PNB from my email, and reported it – which is his job.
Steve Brown
Our comments:
We agree that Andrew has the right to feel frustrated at having decisions being made without him being kept in the loop. I disagree with Steve that the "sensible" thing for Andrew to do would be to resign. The sensible thing would be to register his complaint privately, not publicly, and to not overly react. At a time when WBAI's very existence is at stake, there is no room for the usual ego plays. What a shame, because we were glad to have Andrew back at WBAI, and saw it as a silver lining in the cloud that otherwise hangs over the station right now. There was hlope that Andrew would be able to improve the situation. But this is a time for everyone to be pulling together, not causing more sturm und drang.
Meanwhile the unofficial word is that Andrew has gone back to California for a few days, and none of the proposed program changes will be taking place. At this time. Stay tuned.
Steve Brown
Our comments:
We agree that Andrew has the right to feel frustrated at having decisions being made without him being kept in the loop. I disagree with Steve that the "sensible" thing for Andrew to do would be to resign. The sensible thing would be to register his complaint privately, not publicly, and to not overly react. At a time when WBAI's very existence is at stake, there is no room for the usual ego plays. What a shame, because we were glad to have Andrew back at WBAI, and saw it as a silver lining in the cloud that otherwise hangs over the station right now. There was hlope that Andrew would be able to improve the situation. But this is a time for everyone to be pulling together, not causing more sturm und drang.
Meanwhile the unofficial word is that Andrew has gone back to California for a few days, and none of the proposed program changes will be taking place. At this time. Stay tuned.
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