Byron York says that for all the hype surrounding the liberal radio network Air America, they seem doomed to fail based purely on their distribution strategy.

All the broadcast outlets are AM stations, and in the past all have been rated near the bottom in their respective markets. According to published ratings from Arbitron, the company that measures radio audiences, WLIB was ranked 25th (out of 38 stations measured) in the New York market in the last quarter. KBLA, which broadcast Spanish-language programming before switching to Air America, was ranked 38th (out of 51 stations measured) in Los Angeles. WNTD, which also broadcast in Spanish, was rated 36th (out of 43 stations measured) in Chicago. KPOJ was rated 25th (out of 28 stations measured) in Portland. And KCAA did not have ratings high enough to be measured.

York goes on to say that since most of the stations are displacing minority and foreign language speaking programming, the regular listening audience is likely to tune out. The question remains whether or not Air America can even attract enough of a new audience to make up for it. York doesn't think so.

It seems likely that both stations, along with WLIB, have lost at least some of the listeners who enjoyed the old programming, and it is not clear if that loss has been compensated by the addition of new listeners who want to hear Air America. [...]

In any event, given the stations' performance in the past, plus the effect of the recent changes, it is unlikely that the entire nationwide listenership of Air America exceeds the number of people watching the local TV news on any given evening in a single large — or perhaps even medium-sized — television market. And that casts a new light on Franken's stated ambition to use his radio program to defeat President Bush in November.

"This show is about taking back our country," Franken said on the first day of his program, The O'Franken Factor. "It's about relentlessly hammering away at the Bush administration until they crack and crumble this November, because, don't get me wrong, friends, they are going down."

Given the size of the Air America audience — one radio expert called it "microscopic" — it seems reasonable to say that if the president indeed goes down, it won't be because of the new liberal talk radio network.

Their entire strategy seems to be to feed off of the anti-Bush crowd. A Bush victory in November would still leave plenty of Bush hatred floating around, but if they are doing this poorly now, will it be enough to pay the electric bill come January? Whether Bush wins or loses in November, what are they going to do after the election?