Here's a great piece from former CJ TV writer Howard Rosenberg. It's Keith vs. Bill every night on cable. Is it news? Is it entertainment? Maybe it's infotainment or just noise?
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/la-et-comment7-2008jun07,0,6590521.story

Also, Dan Rather blasts corporate news in a speech this weekend.
http://www.freepress.net/node/41347

Sour grapes? Maybe, but Dan has a point when he talks about the mergers, the cut backs and the push for every last dollar. It's an interesting read if you can get past the politics.

We're all ratings driven. That model has worked well for the most part, but what happens when the really important news isn't sexy? The cable landscape is all about meaningless arguments and the lifestyles of the rich and famous. If a story is boring, it's likely that it won't be told, no matter how important. If there's no video or hint of scandal, chances are we won't see the story.

Acia Johnson's story is incredible!. She lived in a world of crack, domestic abuse, violence and repeated social service investigations. Although her family life was a train wreck, she somehow managed to thrive. She was 14, an A student, a good athlete, and the primary care giver for her 3 year old sister.

Police say that Acia and her sister died when her mother's lover, drunk and enraged, torched their home after an intense fight on the morning of April 6th.

How could this senseless tragedy have been avoided? Is there no effective safety net for children like Acia? Did she and her little sister ever really have a chance? It breaks my heart to think about how many kids are living similar lives.

Congratulations to Boston Globe reporters Kieth O'Brien and Donovan Slatt for a great job of reporting. They give real insight in to Acia and the challenges she faced. This story will stay with you.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2008/06/01/a_girls_life/

Plenty of topics on the table this morning. It's all but over. Or not? With a decision made about Florida and Michigan, it looks like the Democratic nomination belongs to Obama. Can he win? Some questions about race won't go away and we'll talk about them this morning.

Also, we'll get your thoughts about the report on last year's accident at Kentucky Kingdom. Will you send your kids this summer?

Talk show host are going crazy about Scott McClellan's new book. Disloyal? Absolutely, but there's the more important question of substance.

Finally, here's an interesting read for people concerned about media and it's future. I don't think the New York Times or the major network news divisions are going away any time soon, but consider this.
http://www.slate.com/id/2192382/pagenum/all/#page_start

The newspaper business appears to be in the tank. The Washington Post lost $77000000 in print advertising last year, and made up only $6000000 with on line ads. And the large broadcast companies continue to slash personnel and programming as revenue declines.

Cataclysmic change is in progress for many of your favorite media sources. I'll write more about this later.

MUST READ

In 1984, Joanna Connors was a 30 year old reporter for the Cleveland Plain Dealer when she was raped by a stranger. Since then, she's raised a family and built a career while trying to bury the memory--but she says it won't go away. Now, nearly a quarter century later, she writes the biggest story of her life. It's a story of survival, crime and punishment, race and class, unintended consequences, fear, denial, hope, courage, and recovery.

This story had a tremendous impact on me, and I suspect it's one you won't soon forget.


Imagine having to walk down those roads again and unearth those feelings. How scary would it be to go public with such a painful private issue?

Life isn't so much about what happens to us. It's about how we handle what happens to us. These kind of stories are all very different and very much the same. I solute Ms. Connors for having the courage to recount her difficult journey through this ordeal so honestly.

http://www.cleveland.com/beyondrape/

Granted, this is interesting to only a few of us who have too much time on our hands, but I thought this article was fascinating.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/18/magazine/18rebranding-t.html?_r=1&bl=&ei=5087&en=83eb4c2fe9254961&ex=1211256000&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all

It might be fun to see a list of all those brands that have mysteriously disappeared. BTW, What happened to Gainesburgers?

There are far too many topics to fit in to one show this weekend. The news from GE is this week's big story, and I'd like to hear your thoughts.

We'll focus on politics as our old friend Scott Jennings joins me to chat it up about all the races. Also, Chris Thieneman and Anne Northup are both wanting your support in Tuesday's Republican Primary, and they stop by to talk issues.

Here are 2 stories that talk show hosts pray for. Time constraints will probably keep us from discussing them on Sunday, but both are intensely interesting.

How about this story from Thursday's CJ?
Kentucky High School Sports: Ballard's Mockbee a mom on mound


Or this can't miss topic from the New York Times?
Olympic Dream Stays Alive, on Synthetic Legs

Both articles raise tons of questions that go far beyond the stories.

Hope you'll join me Sunday morning on 84WHAS or WHAS.com.

Thanks so much for your e-mails. I've given up trying to answer them all, but please know how appreciative I am. Your support has meant so much to me during this time of transition.

Billy Reed writes about the WHAS change on his site

http://billyreedsays.com/2007/12/04/loss-of-joe-elliotts-show-an-insult-to-all-of-us/

and Joe Arnold weighed in on his blog

http://www.beloblog.com/WHAS_Blogs/NewsBlogger/2007/12/thoughts_on_joe_elliott_show_c.html

I'll keep you updated, and I hope you'll join me Sunday morning on the radio.

It's time to start, or restart, the Joe Elliott Blog. The plan was to utilize this site last year, but we scrapped it in favor of the WHAS page. Things have changed, and this is the new place to keep in touch.

So much has happened over the last 2 days. WHAS canceled our weeknight show, but I've agreed to continue to do the Sunday morning show for "the foreseeable future. We'll see how it goes.

I've been overwhelmed and deeply touched by the outpouring of support and good wishes since my dismissal, and I can't begin to tell you how much that means to me.

Fourteen years is more than forever in broadcasting. During that time, management gave me the freedom to do the show my own way, with little or no interference. I've been blessed to have the total support and confidence of station management for virtually all of that time, and you can't ask for better than that.

WHAS is one of America's most legendary radio stations. It has a rich history of community service, and it's been one of this country's most successful news/talk stations. It doesn't get any better than working for WHAS--a station that has been part of the fabric of Louisville. What a great honor to work for one of America's great radio stations with some unbelievably talented personalities.

We had a great run! Doing that program was my life's dream. Nobody loves his job more than I loved mine, and while I'm deeply disappointed that it's over, it's time to turn the page.

The only thing constant in life is change. In the end, you either adjust or destruct. Adversity gives us a great opportunity to learn and grow, and this morning, I'd like to hear your life change stories. What happens when you're unexpectedly laid off or your business goes bust?

Again, thank you so much for your calls and e-mails in support of our show. It was something special, and I appreciate you more than you will ever know.

LET'S GET DAVEY IN THE HALL

Baseball announces it's newest members of the Hall Of Fame this week. Ok, I'm a Red's fan, but Davey Concepcion deserves to be with other Big Red Machine team members in Cooperstown. Check his stats against other Hall members and decide for yourself.

Concepcion and friends have started a web-site www.concepcionforcooperstown.org to help make it happen.

Jerry Crasnic of ESPN writes
Tim Gay, once an aide to former West Virginia Senator Jay Rockefeller, now works as a communications consultant in Washington, D.C. He has written a biography
of Tris Speaker, and helped plan a forum in Pittsburgh last summer with author David Maraniss on the legacy of Roberto Clemente. That caught the attention
of Concepcion, who gave his blessing for Gay to begin a Hall campaign.

Concepcion made nine All-Star teams and won five Gold Gloves, but was overshadowed by Johnny Bench, Joe Morgan, Pete Rose and even the understated Tony
Perez on the Big Red Machine teams of the 1970s. Since he had a minimal grasp of English, it was easy for the writers to shortchange him.

Gay's Web site shows how Concepcion's statistics compare favorably with those of Ozzie Smith, Phil Rizzuto, Pee Wee Reese and other Hall of Fame shortstops.
He's making the case for a player whose profile never quite matched his achievements.

"Davey is kind of a modest, retiring guy, and his command of English back then wasn't great," Gay said. "In that era, unfortunately, Latinos tended to be
overlooked and underappreciated. There were games when Davey would drive in the winning run or make a couple of spectacular defensive plays, and the reporters
and cameras in the clubhouse would hang around Rose or Bench or Morgan's locker getting quotes."

Concepcion received 31 votes, or 6.8 percent, in his first year on the ballot. He peaked with 80 votes, or slightly less than 17 percent, in 1998. He's
revered in his native Venezuela, where a statue was built in his honor outside the ballpark in Maracay, and Venezuelan business interests have helped sponsor
his Hall of Fame lobbying effort. But since Concepcion decided to return home years ago, he's been out of sight and out of mind for voters.

Not this year. Concepcion shook hands and signed autographs at the Redsfest celebration in Cincinnati in early December, and Reds broadcaster Marty Brennaman
wrote an editorial in the Cincinnati Enquirer supporting his Hall candidacy. "Davey was the engine that made the machine go and go," wrote Brennaman.

IS THE CD DYING?

John Nova Lomax writes an interesting article in the Houston Press about the future of CDs and music. It's not time for a funeral yet. There are too many discs in circulation, but no doubt, the way we use and acquire music is changing.

Last month, EMI Music Chairman and Chief Executive Alain Levy walked up to a podium at the London Business School and told an assemblage of bright-eyed
young titans of tomorrow something that, in all likelihood, they already knew full well.
"The CD as it is right now is dead," he said. As usual, the big brass at the very pinnacle of the industry seemed the last to know. Levy's remark came towards
the end of a year in which the 89-store national retail chain Tower Records went bankrupt and announced that all of its stores will soon shutter. Online
giant iTunes cracked the top ten music retail outlets for the first time ever, and the only places CDs actually sold well were stores like Target, Best
Buy and Wal-Mart.
And yet it remains too early to say that the CD is dead, as in buried in a casket underground. It's certainly terminally ill, condemned, a dead medium walking.
Indeed, sales of CDs still dwarf digital sales, to the tune of $6.45 billion to $945 million worldwide. But CD sales are sliding, a little faster and steeper
every year. People tend to buy less music as they grow older, and the CD audience is pretty much exclusively aged 30 and up. Very few teenagers buy CDs,
and what's more, just about every music retailer will tell you that those who do will end up burning that CD for a few friends.


Read the full article at

http://www.houstonpress.com/Issues/2007-01-04/news/feature_full.html