Category Archives: Hearne_Christopher

Now it’s time to lay down the numbers most important to radio execs and advertisers…

The Top 10 highest rated stations in June for Men and Women, ages 25 to 54. In prime time –  6 a.m. to 7 p.m. – Monday through Friday. That’s where 85 to 90 percent of a station’s revenues are earned and its heaviest duty air personalities slug it out for the survival.

Let’s start with men…

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No more shaking in his shoes every three months for newly axed Star columnist Steve Penn…

While the rest of the newspaper’s staff stands braced for the next round of what have become almost inevitable quarterly cutbacks and/or layoffs, Penn got his walking papers over the weekend.

"For using material that wasn’t his and representing it as his own work," the paper explained to readers this morning.

A staggering loss? Not really.

Penn, along with fellow news columnist Mike Hendricks took a major hit two years ago and were converted to part timers in one quarterly cutback. Penn took it like a man, quietly suffering the hit while Hendricks brayed and whined on his Facebook page and inviting "friends" to help him find a better-paying job elsewhere.

But that was then; and now?

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I’m about to do the unthinkable…

I’m going to tell you exactly why and how Steve Penn was fired by the Star. In my humble opinion, of course. But trust me, I spent 16 years toiling in the belly of the beast and I know how things work at 18th and Grand.

Steve Penn wasn’t merely fired because he slipped up and got caught. He was fired because he wasn’t very good – which is being generous – and the paper stumbled on to an unimpeachable reason to rid itself of him.

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The odds of storm siren Katie Horner leaving KCTV for the joys of motherhood? Slim to none…

Oh, that’s what the station said in its wondrous press release about Horner leaving all right. That Horner “feels she needs some additional time with her young daughters."

She may feel that way to some extent, but come on. Clearly, Horner likes cashing paychecks as well – who doesn’t?

If Horner had nothing to hide, nothing to fear, why isn’t she returning phone calls?

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I didn’t think so…

So I’ll skitter past the above headline’s premise. And then let you in on a couple things about the state of newspapering in the capital of Kansas that you’ll never in a million years hear from the moist, sincere lips of jimmycsays. You know, Fitzpatrick.

Mostly because he’s not dating anybody there (like I am). At least I don’t think he is.

I’ll begin by telling you that by KC standards there’s not a whole lot to do in Topeka or T Town as some of the hipper natives refer to it. I mean, they’ve got Olive Garden, Famous Fave’s, IHOP and most of the main food groups as defined by America’s top chain restaurants. There’s a buncha other stuff, too. Family stuff, church stuff, Fred Phelps stuff and that nutty new governor Sam Brownback.

I won’t bore you with the details…

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Word that Mark Funkhouser is hightailing it out of KC for a D.C. think tank sparked a bevy of Google searches by locals…

Funk is going to work for a new company called the Governing Institute. Which just happens to be owned by a company associated with Government Technology magazine that was sold two years ago to a media company whose top management include Scientologists, New York Times media writer Tim Arango reported in 2009.

The implication being something sinister might be in the offing. However Arango provided no evidence of Scientologist malfeasance in his story and there have been no followups subsequent to the initial handwringing.

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This just in…

Stricken singer Marilyn Maye – hospitalized last month the day before she was to perform a series of sold out shows at Jardine’s for Father’s Day week – is back up and at ’em. The legendary KC jazz diva was hospitalized with a rare case of kidney stones, a painful condition more rare in women and older folks.

Maye’s mishap sparked a logistical nightmare for the jazz club…

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And now, the rest of the story…

On the heels of my stunning red-light cam bust for turning right onto 39th off Southwest Trafficway, I contacted Kansas City Public Works spokesman Dennis Gagnon to get the skinny on some of the pricklier aspects of the controversial program.

In the case of my particular bust – which came as a bit of a surprise to me since rather than running the light, I merely turned right without coming to a full stop- "That is one of the few intersections that have multiple directions covered," Gagnon says. "It has three directions covered – we don’t have it covered from the west."

Too bad I wasn’t leaving Missie B’s and turning right onto the Trafficway from 39th.

"My guess us you didn’t stop," Gagnon says. "Did you roll around the corner?"

As a matter of fact…

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At long last, Marcie Paegelow‘s harrowing daily nightmare is over….

For what seemed a lifetime, Paegelow witnessed crash after grisly crash from her front row seat at A&A Royal Auto Trim on the southeast corner of 39th and Southwest Trafficway. Because prior to the installation of red light cameras two years back it was one of the most dangerous intersections in Kansas City.

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Outside of KC Confidential, Bryan Callen may be one of the most famous guys you never heard of…

Caught up to him during his recent gig at Stanford’s, but held off since Craig wrote about him everyday for like a week.

But now it can be told…

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I never should have read Crime and Punishment….

Then again, I was in high school and had little choice. The Dostoevsky classic wrestles with lead character Raskolnikov‘s belief that some people are above the law and have the right to commit crimes.

What god-fearing American motorist hasn’t come to terms with that concept as they race along 10 mph over the speed limit? There’s a word for it – scofflaw – a person who flouts the law, rules & accepted practices.

But here’s a downside to playing Raskolnikov…

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Forget trivial Tweets by second string radio flunkies, we’re talking survival of the fittest…

The death dance between three decade-old alt weekly the Pitch and three year-old, ad rag Ink is as serious as it gets. The battle lines are drawn, no slap fights here. These two publications are fighting for their lives

In no small part because both are mired in the money-losing world of newsprint – which Tony likes to remind us is a dinosaur industry.  And neither may actually be in the black – not if a hardcore breakdown of costs, expenses and revenues were laid bare. The Pitch has been a money-loser and up for sale at a fire sale price for years, its founding publisher revealed earlier this year on KC Confidential.

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With the Royals in the tank, the Chiefs in limbo, there aren’t a lot of sexy sports topics to kick around…

So why not drum up a sports radio war? Despite the Royals poor play 610 Sports has had a few upticks. And there’s always the listeners who love to hate WHB superstar Kevin Kietzman.

So you know, let there be war!

But apart from making Cowtowners’ water cooler lives a bit more interesting, is there really a sports radio war being waged in Kansas City?

Yes and no – emphasis on the latter.

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Cancel the Jerry Mazer memorial statue fund raising drive…

For now, anyway. The Plaza panhandler is alive and well and holed up in California as had been rumored. However, most staffers at Barnes & Noble on the Plaza and fellow panhandlers outside thought Mazer had succumbed to cancer and gone to Cheeseburger Paradise, no record of his death could be found.

Was the down payment-on-a-cheeseburger seeking vagabond be alive somewhere, reduced to roadkill or lying in an unmarked grave?

Nobody knew for sure….

That is not until Scooters Coffeehouse manager Kait Reynolds launched her own private investigation.

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Two thumbs up, to recently axed Kansas City Star movie critic Robert W. Butler…

It takes a darn good sport to put up with me at times. Like that’s a secret. And from the looks of Butler’s just-posted review of the new Transformers, that’s exactly what he is – a good sport.

"If you somehow find yourself in a theater showing this third episode in the ‘Transformers’ saga, there’s a bit of good news," Butler writes on his new blog. "It’s not nearly as bad as installment 2. I base that judgment on my ability to keep my eyes open this time around."

Here, here!

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So what does 610 Sports host Nick Wright really think about Jason Whitock?

That’s a question worth asking in the wake of last week’s two part visitation by Whitlock to Wright’s afternoon drive local radio show. During which Whitlock feigned friendship while calling Wright out for being a poser.

First the polite answer.

"I think Jason Whitlock is very talented and very good at what he does, at promoting the brand of Jason Whitlock in his writing,"  Wright says.

Now the unexpurgated version.

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About spanking new Kansas City Star publisher Mi-Ai Parrish…

With the newspaper likely facing another round of staff layoffs and/or cutbacks following the close of its second quarter at month’s end, the question is, will Parrish’s first major order of business be the axing of however many staffers? As has been the practice for years under now-former head dude Mark Zieman.

Or will parent McClatchy grant its newly-arrived publisher a stay of execution for the sake of getting off on the right foot?

"Oh boy, I hope there aren’t more ropes lying around to hang the bodies from the ceiling," winces retired Star editor Jim Fitzpatrick, who covers the newspaper on jimmycsays.

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It’s hungry at the top …

As in, money hungry. In the playful, halcyon early days of hit ABC sitcom Modern Family, there were  group hugs all around. No mas, The National Enquirer reports. The cast is caught up in an "old-fashioned war over money."

"Cast members go for the throat as they battle for big raises," the headline reads.

According to the Enquirer, Modern Family’s castmembers are in the process of renegotiating their salaries "with the series on a hot streak."

"Each cast member wants a bigger piece of the pie than the others, especially in light of the show’s ratings success and the big bucks syndication deal that was cut last year," a show insider tells the Enquirer. "Their agents are climbing over each other’s backs trying to get the best deal."

On top of Modern Family’s financial food chain?

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Ruthless bitch slap or meaningless love tap?

You make the call. With Anthony Weiner‘s package in the rear view mirror, the Royals in the toilet and the Chiefs in limbo it almost had to be a slow sports news week. So much so that the local sports blogosphere jumped for joy over back-to-back call ins by all-but-forgotten former Star sport Jason Whitlock to 610 Sports afternoon host Nick Wright’s show.

Did Whitlock really take Wright "to the woodshed" or "bitch slap" him as one blogger breathlessly panted?

"No way," says KCC movie guy Jack Poessiger who listened to both broadcasts. "He tried, but he never was able to. It was just an on-air stroking of the mind. There was no bitch slapping on either side."

On a scale of one to ten – 10 being a major league bitch slapping, what would Poessiger rate it?

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A funny thing happened to 610 Sports afternoon host Nick Wright on the way to the dentist yesterday…

He awoke to a column by former KCC media sport Greg Hall claiming that Wright was so damaged from an on-air encounter with former Star sports scribe Jason Whitlock on Monday that he was taking yesterday and today off from his radio show.

That somehow Wright had been either wrist-slapped off the air by management at Entercom or so shamed he couldn’t bear to face listeners.

Which I can now report was ridiculously bogus. Really.

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