Talk show host Laura Schlessinger won’t stay away from radio very long, only a weekend, in fact.
Sirius XM Radio said it has a multiyear deal with Schlessinger to bring her “Dr. Laura” advice program to satellite radio in January. Specific terms were not revealed.
Schlessinger had said in August that she was quitting her syndicated radio program, a week after she apologized for using the N-word on the air 11 times while talking to a black woman, and activists demanded her ouster.
She ends her traditional radio program on Friday, Dec. 31. The following Monday, her “Dr. Laura” show will begin live at 2 p.m. on Sirius XM. It will air for three hours a day on Monday through Friday.
“The first and most important thing that appealed to me was the freedom to speak my mind without advertisers and affiliates being attacked by activist groups that just love to censor anything they don’t agree with,” she said. “That just about made my heart and head explode.”
The liberal watchdog Media Matters for America was a persistent critic. Its leadership didn’t accept her apology and sought to encourage advertisers to drop her show. She was reading the Media Matters website when she decided, “that’s it, I’m done with this,” Schlessinger said.
In the radio incident that prompted her to quit, Schlessinger said to the woman involved, who was married to a white man, that “if you’re that hypersensitive about color and don’t have a sense of humor, don’t marry out of your race.”
Schlessinger said she’ll have some new segments on her show, including interviews with people about situations “that are relevant to the morals, values, principles and ethics that I nag about everyday.”
She said she’s sure she’ll say things that will offend someone.
“When I talk about married couples staying together for the sake of the children, somebody’s offended,” she said. “When I talk about mothers staying home with their babies, feminists are offended. when I talk about how wives should have more sex with their husbands, women are offended.”
Schlessinger will be the biggest radio star to jump from traditional to satellite radio since Howard Stern, who had also tired of controversies over things he said and found the opportunity for a big payday.
She’s likely to sacrifice some viewers. It’s estimated her show is currently heard by about 8 million people a day. Sirius XM has 20 million subscribers, but it’s not certain how many of them will be interested in Schlessinger. The service does not release figures estimating listeners for their shows.
Her show will also be available online and through apps on many smart phones, Sirius said; shows will be repeated on radio over the weekend.
(Source: AP)
Laura Schlessinger is prone to reinventing herself. She lived a loosey goosey lifestyle until she “discovered” Limbaugh and his success through conservatism. Like Hannity, she is opportune that way. Unlike Palin or Bush she is intellectually curious and capable of thought. She grew up unlovely and unloved and it shows through her attitude to callers, especially the caller who inspired the N word rant. She’s a bully, only out of love. Sound familiar? She is not the monster who bankrupted this country, committed war crimes, and squandered our moral capital; she is just one of the many who monstrously supported him. She was irreligious, then she was orthodox, then she wasn’t. She is sixty something and going to Siirius XM where she can say whatever the Hades she likes. Difficult to understand what she can express with a loose mouth that she couldn’t convey with a smug and smarmy one.