Once upon a time there was a little, cranky hard-right infomercial radio program on WDEV, hosted by Laurie Morrow, and called True North Radio. Then, in 2006, Morrow “left” (?) the program and was replaced by proto-tea-partier Paul Beaudry when the program received a mini-makeover, becoming a bit more lively. It was shortly thereafter, in 2007, that fellow proto-tea-partier Rob Roper became the head of the Vermont Republican Party.
Roper became a frequent voice on Beaudry’s North, which was a veritable full monty of hard-right dog-whistles, from routine climate change denialism and relentless pro-Vermont Yankee segments, to an on-again, off-again crusade against the insidious Hinesburg Representative Bill Lippert and his agenda of un-American homosexual indoctrination (which he promoted by simply being gay, apparently).
The little’s show’s profile grew and grew. Then, in 2009-2010, the Tea Party phenom hit the nation! Statehouse protests! Baudry with a bullhorn calling out Bernie Sanders at public appearances! By 2010, it was all building to a head, as “moderate” (ha) Jim Douglas was retiring, and the heir apparent was social conservative Brian Dubie who hired a hard-right, slash-and-burn southern GOP operative to run his campaign. Beaudry himself jumped into the fray, coming from nowhere over the past few years to win the Republican primary for US Representative, practically chomping at the bit to take on librul Peter Welch!!! Meanwhile, Roper steps in to fill the vacated hosting spot.
And then came November…
Dubie lost to anti-Vermont Yankee poster boy Peter Shumlin. Beaudry was stomped by Welch. And oh yeah, Lippert is still there, too.
Come December – the very next month – True North Radio announces it’s funding hasn’t come through, and the program will be packing it in.
It’s hard not to look at the timeline (in particular the evaporation of funds the month after the Election) without wondering if the whole point of the program after the Morrow-exit wasn’t simply about building a head of steam to take it all in Election 2010. Mission un-accomplished indeed.
None of which is to say that there aren’t necessarily meaningful implications to True North’s demise and planned resurrection as an online-only site (no, seriously – I really think there are). I’ll get to those in tomorrow’s piece, though.
True North went bankrupt.
but they’ll learn from it.
OT
btw, what’s this I hear about Patrick Berry becoming the FWD commish..
I never would have guessed that people wanted to listen to a dumber, more annoying version of Rush Limbaugh.
This show did more for Democrats in this state than it did for Republicans.
It was positively delightful to listen to Beaudry struggle with the English language. He could mangle sentences in ways that would make George W. blush. He didn’t sound knowledgeable or informed. He sounded ignorant.
Additionally, the hosts of this show (especially Beaudry but Roeper as well) put the most prominent Vermont Republicans (who typically like to hide under the “moderate” label) in a very difficult situation. True North didn’t do “moderate”. They did tinfoil-hat-wearing-extreme. And since the show’s hosts were so close to the leadership of the VTGOP, True North served to blow the cover of the “moderate” Vermont Republicans. It exposed them for what they are: hard right wing conservatives.