Special secret ghost operative, helpfully named Ghost, writes in from the Mandarin’s Proving Grounds Road Tour:

Dread Lord,

I was driving through Dallas the other day, and this ad kept replaying on XM radio about a new channel that is supposedly “colorblind” and brings together both parties in order to fix problems in government, under a tag called “No Labels”

http://www.siriusxm.com/potus

This could either actually work, I think, or is just a lousy PR stunt by people no one actually cares about. More likely the second, as seen through the eyes of a jaded Millennial.

Your humble minion–
— Ghost

Gotta agree with your analysis, Ghost. This is a bad PR move to trick listeners, which of course is doomed to fail if and when people actually, you know, listen.

First, as you know, the whole “No Labels” gimmick is a ruse by liberals who want to appear reasonable by pretending not to be Progressives. You can listen to this interesting and pragmatic blend of liberals, conservatives, and indepedents for about five minutes before you realize only one of the three is actually welcome there.

Second, you can mix up the conservatives and liberals as much as you want on a station; that does not make it balanced. It takes little effort to realize what the slant is—who does their morning drive and who does their afternoon drive? Those are the peak hours for audiences, and therefore you can determine everything about a station based on who it puts in those slots. The morning drive is hosted by uber-liberal MSNBC personality Michael Smerconish, and the afternoon slot is held by Julie Mason, who is a major Obama supporter in the White House Press Pool (and is considerably anti-conservative).

Third, you also know that conservative radio stations enjoy killer ratings, and liberal stations tend to fizzle and melt after a short while. POTUS is clearly an attempt to claim political neutrality in an effort to sustain a slightly longer lifespan than Air America and its clones. But reality will set in once the audience realizes it is smarter than the station.

The saddest part is that POTUS probably has no clue what a partisan bubble it is. It may honestly think it is balanced and neutral; however, it is clear that any pretense of neutrality will soon evaporate after a few minutes, if it has not done so already.

What are your thoughts? By the way, nice job Millennials: you are waking up to political reality at a much earlier age than the Gen Xers did. Already half of you are done with the Democratic Party, per latest polls.

The Czar of Muscovy

Божію Поспѣшествующею Милостію Мы, Дима Грозный Императоръ и Самодержецъ Всероссiйскiй, цѣсарь Московскiй. The Czar was born in the steppes of Russia in 1267, and was cheated out of total control of all Russia upon the death of Boris Mikhailovich, who replaced Alexander Yaroslav Nevsky in 1263. However, in 1283, our Czar was passed over due to a clerical error and the rule of all Russia went to his second cousin Daniil (Даниил Александрович), whom Czar still resents. As a half-hearted apology, the Czar was awarded control over Muscovy, inconveniently located 5,000 miles away just outside Chicago. He now spends his time seething about this and writing about other stuff that bothers him.