BNM Writers
Thom Hartmann Still Enjoys Engaging In The Scrum
“Progressive radio has deep roots. It has been around a long time, but nobody had really done it nationally like [Rush] Limbaugh had.”
Thom Hartmann is one of the most recognized voices of progressive talk in the country and probably one of the most intelligent. His weekly show is syndicated by Pacifica and is heard on SiriusXM and terrestrial radio, including KPFK in Los Angeles, the largest FM in the U.S.
His noon-3 p.m. eastern eponymous program features Hartmann’s look at the news of the day from a progressive perspective.
The show was quick to adapt to the pandemic in 2020, having a live set-up for remotes, but Hartmann brought it into his home and upgraded to commercial-grade Internet.
Hartmann returned to the studio after a year, but adds “we’re being very careful.”
Even though his talk show started in 2003, it’s safe to say Hartmann is a radio lifer. He’s been on the air dating back to the late 1960s.
The seed was planted as a child.
“When I was 8 or 9 years old, I got really into electronics,” Hartmann told BNM.
It quickly became more than a hobby for the budding broadcaster, who got a 100-milliwatt transmitter kit. He hooked it up to a turntable in his parent’s living room.
“[I] created a radio station for the five houses nearby where three of my friends lived,” Hartmann said.
By the time he was 13, Hartmann had his ham radio license. Still a teenager, Hartmann’s first radio gig was as a weekend country music disc jockey at WITL in his hometown of Lansing, Michigan. He was just 16 years old, the same age he started college.
Hartmann also took to radio at Michigan State University.
There were a handful of stations in Lansing for Hartmann to “spin the hits.” Eventually, he returned to WITL, evolving to newscasting for the next seven years.
However, in 1978, he left the state and radio to concentrate on a co-owned small business.
“I’ve been a serial entrepreneur,” he said.
Other fields would follow, including founding an advertising firm and launching a travel agency.
Progressive Talk
Hartmann would find his legendary voice with an op-ed piece in 2003 indicating progressive talk radio was a viable business mode.
“That became the first business plan for Air America radio,” he said. “There were still a lot of skeptics out there and I wanted a proof of concept.”
Living in Vermont at the time, Hartmann got a radio station in Burlington to let him do a couple of hours on Saturdays to test his theory.
“America is 50-50, Democratic, Republican, and talk radio is not an intrinsically or inherently political medium,” he said. “It’s just a tool. It’s neutral.”
Within six months his show was picked up by a national network—now defunct I.E. America Radio—owned by the United Auto Workers in Detroit. More than two dozen stations formed the initial group of affiliates for Hartmann’s broadcast, and Sirius, where he remains to this day.
During his time away from radio, Hartmann started a community for abused children in New Hampshire. His wife Louise spearheaded the project that was “designed to blow up the big institutional model of how children were too badly damaged to foster care,” whose only options were “children’s jails or state mental hospitals,” he said.
That led to a 1978 school for children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Hartmann wrote books about psychology, including best sellers on ADHD.
He got himself officially on the roster of psychotherapists in the state of Vermont.
“It was more like a professional credential than a way of making a living,” Hartmann recalled.
Although he supervised the clinical staff, Hartmann said he never practiced as a therapist.
The program lasted into the 21st century.
That love of electronics helped cut corners for Hartmann, who could assemble a studio in his living room for his show in Vermont.
When Air America began, the largest affiliate (KPOJ), located in Portland, Oregon, asked if he’d do the national show there and a local morning show specifically for them.
His youngest daughter had already moved to Oregon, so, Thom and Louise moved and were joined by all of their children. Hartmann still broadcasts from Portland.
While liberal radio is not the prevailing popular choice among the masses, some on the left side have broken through. Alan Berg was one Denver host, heard on KOA and across 29 stations. He was murdered in 1984 by a neo-Nazi, the basis for the film Talk Radio.
Michael Jackson, who died earlier this month, also found success with his liberal views.
“Progressive radio has deep roots,” Hartmann said. “It has been around a long time, but nobody had really done it nationally like [Rush] Limbaugh had.”
Time for TV
Although Hartmann would be part of the Air America lineup, “I never chose to be an employee. I always owned my own show.”
Hartmann hosted a daily, one-hour program, The Big Picture. He took it to Washington for the RT news network when Barack Obama went to the White House. The international broadcaster also hired Larry King and Ed Schultz to build a quality television network.
But when Donald Trump got elected, RT, formerly known as Russia Today, took an active role in supporting the new president.
“The summer of 2017 I exercised a 90-day early termination clause in my contract and went back home to Portland,” Hartmann said. “It was a great experience and I learned a lot about doing TV from it.”
His radio show does continue to simulcast on TV through Free Speech TV on Dish Network, DirectTV and numerous cable systems.
“Probably between one third and one half of my calls are coming from Free Speech TV and YouTube,” Hartmann said.
His show is not currently heard in New York City, although he was on WBAI in the past.
But with internal strife at WBAI, Hartmann said the station has “devolved into a disaster scenario.”
Conservative Nation
Despite being a leading progressive talker, the country’s airwaves are predominantly filled with right-wing narratives.
Hartmann pointed to President Bill Clinton signing the Telecommunications Act in 1996, lifting the cap of stations by an owner.
Clear Channel and Cumulus grew exponentially following the government’s ruling.
“Ownership of these stations was pretty overtly conservative,” Hartmann said.
Beyond that, the longtime progressive host has seen it firsthand: “Radio, as a whole, is a very conservative industry.”
He said that does not refer to politics, but the cautious nature within the business.
“No program director ever got fired for putting Rush Limbaugh on the air,” Hartmann said. “When something’s a winner, everybody wants to jump on it. But nobody wants to take chances, and nobody wants to be the outlier.”
Radio faces a challenge from online platforms and podcasting becomes a more accessible option for listeners to find their content.
But Hartmann isn’t worried about the future of his beloved business.
“Most radio is consumed in people’s cars,” he said. “Radio is still alive, well and strong in rural parts of America, and in cities where you have long commutes.”
However, in the smaller towns where people aren’t staying in vehicles for long stretches, “radio’s dying,” he said.
Not only does Hartmann welcome listeners and guests from the other side of the aisle, he
encourages it, but admitted it is getting harder to find conservatives to engage in debate.
“It’s damn near impossible,” he said.
As for right-wing-slanted callers, Hartmann doesn’t shy away from them either.
“If a conservative caller calls into the show, someone wants to disagree with me about something, they go to the front of the line,” he said.
As a ratings ploy, Hartmann said those interactions are the drama listeners enjoy.
“But people aren’t really fully informed about an issue until they’ve heard a couple of different sides of it,” Hartmann said.
Prior to the pandemic, Hartmann would make it a point to listen to his conservative brethren.
“I loved to listen to Michael Savage and Mark Levin. I listened to Limbaugh for years,” he said. “I’m a big fan of talk radio. I also learn from it. Not just politics; a lot of my radio technique I learned from listening to Limbaugh and Michael Savage, in particular, who, in terms of politics, he’s nuts, but in terms of radio he’s a genius.”
Thom Hartmann Program
Hartmann has used their template for creating his host-driven show, building a relationship with the listeners by sharing his opinions each day.
He typically highlights the top handful of topics and a 10–15-minute rant with as much information and his views will follow. Hartmann will then take as many calls as necessary on the given topic, usually resetting at the top or bottom of the hour.
“We keep the whole thing fairly tightly focused,” Hartmann said. “My show’s only as good as the host.”
Hartmann said liberal hosts need to move away from just doing interview radio, because host-driven is “the most popular medium,” and doing it effectively means “willing to be absolutely honest with your audience and yourself.”
It was Hartmann’s first mentor, Chuck Mefford, former owner at WITL, who told his protégé, “In radio, when you open that microphone there’s only one person on the other side.”
But on the same side, listeners will find Randy Rhodes and Stephanie Miller are among the other progressive stars. Still, Hartmann knows his competition comes from conservative talkers.
“Frankly, I think most people, if they listen to good talk radio, can really get into it,” Hartmann said. “It’s just there’s not that much good talk radio out there anymore. Now a lot of it is just screaming and yelling.”
Hartmann’s midday slot is also home to Buck Sexton and Clay Travis for Premiere Networks, and Dan Bongino on Westwood One.
“I used to debate [Bongino] almost every week when I was in D.C. But not anymore,” Hartmann laughed. “He’s a big deal now.”
He doesn’t think the loss of Limbaugh will make a difference in his audience. Instead, he’s certain the Trump presidency had a better impact. Show hosts historically perform better when an opposing party is in office, acting as the de facto foe.
Hartmann, though, has no problem criticizing a Democrat, including the 46th president.
“I will criticize Joe Biden when I think he’s doing something wrong or stupid,” he said.
Like Biden, Hartmann is a septuagenarian, but has no plans of retiring.
“I enjoy what I’m doing. I’m not that old yet. My brain still works really well,” he said. “I think engaging in the scrum on a daily basis is one of the things that keeps it working.”
Jerry Barmash has been a fixture in New York radio for decades with anchor stints on WABC Radio and Bloomberg News. Jerry was also heard on WINS, WCBS and Wall Street Journal Radio. As a media writer, Jerry’s pieces were featured in Broadcasting & Cable, NY Daily News and Watercooler HQ. Jerry also hosts the interview podcast Here Now the News. He’s on Twitter @JerryBarmash and can be reached at jerrybarmash1@gmail.com.
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