The lunatics are taking over the asylum at KPFA

From Doug Henwood. His excellent show, Behind The News, on Pacifica affiliate WBAI is probably in peril too.

No doubt many of you are sick of the whole Pacifica mess, but this is really important: if these layoffs go down, it’s gonna be 9/11 and chemtrails. From the excellent historian of Pacifica, Matthew Lasar: How the KPFA Morning Show almost killed me (and why I want it to live) | Radio Survivor.

Pacifica to cut 25% of KPFA unionized staff, and irony of ironies, there will be picket lines outside KPFA.

This isn’t about budget cuts that must happen, it’s about a lunatic fringe at Pacifica that is bound and determined to kill the few good shows KPKA has left and replace them with what Lasar calls “their soap box routines on, a program that I generically call the 911Truth-Vitamins-Cure-AIDS-Zionists-Control-the-World-Who-Really-Built-The-Pyramids Show.”

Look, there can be genuine disagreement as well as reasoned discussion about 9/11, and parts of the official story certainly make no sense to me. But Pacifica, rather than focusing on politics, the economy, and organizing (as a good leftie radio network should, especially now) has instead gone into Looney Tunes land, embracing the most extreme of conspiracy theories along with seriously deranged junk science. At a time when a left alternative on the radio is sorely needed, they’ve abandoned their mission, and the ongoing destruction seems almost purposeful.

Their five stations are in major metro areas and would probably sell for several hundred million. Who would get the money if Pacifica went bankrupt and sold the stations? Just wondering. And while one should never underestimate the ability of the far left to shoot itself in the foot, the collapse of Pacifica at a time when it should be surging seems highly suspect to me.