July 2006

Radio Free Liberty - A new voice for liberty in Springfield

By Glenn Nielsen

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A new voice for liberty can now be heard in Springfield Missouri and around the world over the internet. Radio Free Liberty (RFL) produced its first radio show April 29, 2006. Another seven shows were produced in the following two weeks.

The first show is an introduction to libertarianism and goes over the Worlds Smallest Political Quiz from the Advocates for Self Government.

Later shows delv into both national and local issues such as the War on Drugs, Illegal Immigration, and a dog breed specific ordinance in Springfield, Missouri.

The show is hosted by Cato Craft and Cat Ballou. I asked them a series of questions about the show. Below are the questions and their answers:

Who are the real people behind Cato Craft and Cat Ballou?

Radio Free Liberty was created and is hosted by Bruce and Cathy Clemens. We are both college teachers in Springfield, Missouri. While it was not really necessary for us to adopt pseudonyms for the show, we have chosen to, in keeping with a long and honored tradition in American political dissent. Ben Franklin wrote pseudonymously before the American Revolution as did Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay in writing The Federalist Papers (Publius). Unlike our founding fathers, we may not need to use pseudonyms for our literal survival in a hostile political climate, but it gives us a feeling of solidarity with them as we push the Libertarian message forward in a society with less and less liberty.

What motivated you to start the show?

There was a discussion at a get-together of our local Libertarians recently about the great expense of getting our message out using traditional media. Radio spots are very expensive and are limited by station reception and the fact that they are perishable: if you tune in after the ad runs, you've missed it forever. After thinking about that for a while it occurred to Cat and me that Podcasting solves all three problems. It's incredibly inexpensive to get "on the air," you have a worldwide audience, and once you "publish" your podcast, people can download and listen to it anytime. It never goes away! Besides, people who are podcast savvy, such as today's college age voters are, in our opinion, the precise demographic that the Libertarian Party needs to tap into to move our platform forward.

What is the show format?

Right now it's pretty loose, as we are feeling our way through our first several episodes. I wouldn't be surprised if you tune in a year from now and the "look and feel" of the episodes are different (hopefully cleaner and more polished!) I loved Harry Browne's show, and Radio Free Liberty's format is greatly influenced by the calm, deliberate and authoritative presence he had on the air. We would be honored to think we were carrying on that legacy in some small humble way. We see this show primarily as a vehicle to get the word out about Libertarian candidates running in our region, but I want to present the Libertarian view on general issues as well to appeal to a worldwide audience.

Will you have guests? Callers?

We plan to have in-studio guests, call-in guests, and we currently take calls on our toll free number and will work the calls into subsequent podcasts. We also plan to call politicians and pundits and engage them in dialog if they are willing to take our calls. If they don't we'll let you know that, too.

Currently the show is only available delayed via podcast. Are there any plans to go live?

Yes. RFL is new and all possibilities are on the table. We're excited about the potential of podcasting for reaching a large and motivated audience. The successes of the live Libertarian show Free Talk Live and Harry Browne's program really inspire Cat and me to look at live broadcasts as a goal. But we will have to grow to a new level to do that- hosting a streaming audio webcast is much more expensive than simply hosting podcast files. Not to mention it would tie us down to a structured schedule.

Can you let me know what plans you have for the show in the future?

We would like to spend the next few months working any bugs out of our system, improve our infrastructure, and grow the audience as much as possible. Next fall we plan to push Radio Free Liberty heavily at the many college campuses in the Springfield Missouri area because we would very much like RFL to be perceived by those students as a responsive voice of Southwest Missouri Libertarian politics. We definitely want to support our local candidates and build a powerful platform to disseminate their messages.

From there the sky is the limit. Podcasting is in its infancy and Cat and I think we are into something that will be huge in a few years. I believe in ten years most people will be getting most of their news and entertainment over broadband connections. Traditional radio will take a back seat to the web.

We hope live broadcasts, influential guests and trenchant reporting of Libertarian issues are in RFL's future.

Is Radio Free Liberty a commercial venture? Will there be advertising in the future?

Cat and I don't see RFL as a commercial venture. We would certainly like it to be self sustaining and generate enough funds to grow. To that end we would definitely consider sponsorship. We can do audio spots in the podcasts, but I don't want to load up the website with lots of banner ads.

If RFL generates income beyond its maintenance and growth needs, we'll use it as a pool to provide grants to help fund local Libertarian's campaigns.

How can someone tune in to your show?

You can listen directly from our website, or if you have iTunes on your computer (or any other "podcatcher" software) you can subscribe and automatically get every new episode downloaded to your computer or iPod when it is produced.

If you can download and install iTunes (it's free), you'll find Radio Free Liberty in the podcasts directory under "Politics". With a click of your mouse you can subscribe. Then every time you open iTunes, it'll download our latest episode for you to listen to at your leisure. Then call or email us to be part of Radio Free Liberty!

Radio Free Liberty can be contacted at:

  Website:   http://radiofreeliberty.com/
  E-Mail:    radiofreeliberty@mchsi.com
  Toll Free: 1-888-857-3853