Whoever said New Yorkers don’t have good taste?
Glenn Beck may be one of the hottest talk show hosts in the country, but he apparently left New York’s WOR cold.
WOR (710 AM), one of the city’s two biggest talk radio stations, said this morning it is dropping Beck’s syndicated show as of Jan. 17 and replacing him with a familiar New York name: Mike Gallagher.
“The reason is ratings,” said WOR program director Scott Lakefield. “Somewhat to our surprise, the show wasn’t getting what we wanted.”
Beck, whose style is sometimes off-center and who hosted a well-publicized national rally in D.C. last year, has been seen as one of the rising conservative radio and TV talk stars.
The trade magazine Talkers ranked him No. 3 on its “Heavy Hundred” list last year, trailing only Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.
Gallagher was a long-time host on WABC (770 AM) before he moved to national syndication several years ago. WOR general manager Jerry Crowley praised Gallagher as a New Yorker who will comment more on local issues than Beck.
Limbaugh on the “Heavy Hundred” list? (I will not respond to a set up line..)
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.