Imus, D

==<div><div>These pieces, instead, are a political defense of Covid-19 misinformation and bro jock racism. Robust public health measures to control the pandemic are seen by the right as left-wing government overreach, and therefore someone who criticizes them, however inaccurately, is on their team.</div><div>
</div><div>The Rogan affair is a spectacle by right-wing media to paint an advocate for a right-wing political cause as a victim. Meanwhile, right-wing tabloid vitriol has celebrated the punishment of speech by regular working people.</div></div><div>=</div>=10. Don Imus: What can be said about the guy who was fired for calling a group of women on a college basketball team “nappy-headed hos?” Fox calls him the anchor of the morning block on its financial network.

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Don Imus’s firing by CBS Radio and MSNBC last spring represented sufficient punishment for his derogatory aside about the Rutgers women’s basketball team, the chief executive of Citadel Broadcasting said yesterday. The executive’s comments are important because Citadel is believed to be on the brink of returning Mr. Imus to broadcast radio.

AP Photo/Richard Drew

Don Imus

Related

CBS and Imus Settle Differences Over His Firing (August 15, 2007)

Off the Air: The Light Goes Out for Don Imus (April 13, 2007)

Times Topics: Don Imus

“He did something wrong,” Farid Suleman, Citadel’s chief executive, said in a telephone interview. “He didn’t break the law. He’s more than paid the price for what he did. I think he should be evaluated by what he does going forward.”

Citadel, a publicly held company, owns ABC Radio Networks, which includes WABC in New York City.

Mr. Suleman would not comment on widespread reports in recent weeks that his company was working toward an agreement with Mr. Imus. But three people who collectively have had conversations with both sides of the negotiations characterized them as having reached an understanding for Mr. Imus to take over the 6 to 10 a.m. slot on WABC, its flagship AM station in New York. Still, no contracts have been signed, which means that whatever agreement exists between the sides could unravel.

If the negotiations proceed on course, though, Mr. Imus would return to radio in the New York City region on or around Dec. 1, said the three people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the negotiations are continuing. Mr. Imus would replace the morning talk team of Curtis Sliwa and Ron Kuby.

It was not possible yesterday to determine the salary Mr. Imus was seeking, or the duration of the agreement he would sign with Citadel.

Separately, Mr. Imus is seeking a television channel that would simulcast his program, as MSNBC did. Among the preliminary conversations he has had was at least one with Roger Ailes, chairman and chief executive of the Fox News Channel and the forthcoming Fox Business Network, as well as chairman of Fox Television Stations.

In recent weeks Mr. Imus had a lunch at Fox headquarters in Midtown Manhattan with Mr. Ailes and Bo Dietl, a private investigator who was a regular guest on his radio show. Among the points discussed was whether there might be a place for Mr. Imus’s program on a Fox cable network, including the business channel or FX, said one person who was briefed on the lunch by a participant.

Reached yesterday, Mr. Dietl did not deny that the lunch occurred. Asked if he could share any particulars, though, he said only that he was looking forward to Mr. Imus’s return to radio and, eventually, television, and that he was hopeful there would be a role for him.

A Fox spokeswoman, Dana Klinghoffer, did not respond to phone and e-mail messages yesterday seeking comment on the lunch, or on whether any Fox outlet had interest in an Imus simulcast.

Citadel would also offer Mr. Imus’s new show in syndication. Theoretically, at least, he could be heard soon thereafter on some of the company’s 243 FM and AM stations across the country, as well as on some of the hundreds of other stations that carry at least some Citadel programming.

At WABC, Mr. Imus would join a lineup of talk-show hosts that could hardly be characterized as shy or retiring, including Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.

Martin Garbus, the lawyer who represented Mr. Imus in his settlement with CBS Radio in August, said he had no comment.

Should Citadel and Mr. Imus reach a formal agreement, it would represent a reunion of sorts for Mr. Suleman and Mr. Imus. Mr. Suleman was the chief executive of Infinity Radio, which owned WFAN, the flagship for the Imus program, before Infinity merged with CBS Radio.

Mr. Imus is also expected to reunite, on the air, with Charles McCord, the newsman who has served as his sidekick for three decades. Still to be resolved is whether Mr. Imus’s program would include Bernard McGuirk, his longtime producer and another on-air foil.

It was Mr. McGuirk who touched off the exchange about the Rutgers women’s basketball team that wound up claiming Mr. Imus’s career at CBS and on MSNBC.