Radio

There’s a great scene in Woody Allen’s Radio Days in which the young Allen character’s Uncle Abe catches his wife Ceil listening doubtless not for the first time — to a radio show improbably called Ventriloquist of the Air. As she cackles and hoots, the obviously exasperated Abe bellows, “He’s a ventriloquist on the radio!…

The burning question: What vision strikes terror into the hearts of political consultants? The apparent answer: An obvious byline. I refer, of course, to the recent declaratory ruling by the Federal Communications Commission requiring a readily readable sponsorship tag line-or “disclaimer”-on campaign television commercials. The ostensible goal of the FCC action is to clarify to…

Introduction Since the 1952 Eisenhower campaign introduced to the world the political commercial, few major campaigns have seemingly centered around one single spot — and a radio spot at that. But such was the case in the 1978 U.S. Senate race in Illinois. That contest saw two-term incumbent Republican Sen. Charles H. Percy defending his…