Callers Tell Station To Keep Liddy Watergate Figure Denies ‘Fueling Lunatic Fringe’
Talk show host G. Gordon Liddy, who bragged about using a drawing of President Clinton for target practice, remains popular on a Spokane radio station, a program manager says.
The convicted Watergate felon is at the center of an emerging public debate - led by Clinton - about whether some talk radio shows fan hate and violence.
“I don’t believe I’m fueling the lunatic fringe,” Liddy said this past week.
His show is broadcast Monday through Friday, from 8 to 9 a.m. and from 12:30 to 3 p.m. on KGA, a 50,000-watt AM station in Spokane.
“Rush Limbaugh is No. 1 and I would say G. Gordon Liddy is No. 2,” Dean Allen, program director for KGA, said Friday.
“Our listener line has been very busy this week and people, about 10-to-1, don’t want us to discontinue the Liddy show,” Allen said. About 75 calls have been received.
Listeners who call the line (at 448-7874) don’t have to give their name, and their remarks may be broadcast, Allen said.
Liddy, 65, is a former FBI agent and Nixon White House aide who now makes his living as a talk show host and lecturer.
He is scheduled to speak in Spokane at the Opera House on May 13. KGA is sponsoring the appearance. Tickets cost $15, and there are about 700 seats remaining, sponsors say.
Liddy has drawn criticism for his advice to people who are confronted by hostile agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms. “I advise shooting them in the head,” he said.
After the Oklahoma City bombing, Liddy modified his statement. He said the action should only be in self-defense and he wasn’t advocating unprovoked shooting of federal agents.
“If they smash in unannounced, screaming at you and assault you with lethal force, you have two choices,” Liddy said. “You die under their bullets or you can shoot back and try to defend your wife and family.”
Liddy told his listeners: “If they’re wearing flak jackets, don’t shoot them there; shoot them in the head.”
He then modified his advice, saying: “Shoot twice to the body, center of gravity. If that does not work, shoot to the groin area.”
In Oklahoma on Thursday, Liddy’s comments drew unanimous scorn from that state’s Senate.
The Oklahoma Senate voted 39-0 to ask broadcasters and sponsors of Liddy’s show to stop funding the show.
In Tennessee, meanwhile, a shortwave radio station has decided to stop broadcasting “The Intelligence Report” by Michigan militia leader Mark Koernke.
“We’ve got to get the gasoline off the fires,” station manager George McClintock said.
MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: LIDDY IN SPOKANE G. Gordon Liddy is scheduled to speak in Spokane at the Opera House on May 13. KGA is sponsoring the appearance. Tickets cost $15, and there are about 700 seats remaining.