I like seeing marijuana-reform activist Mason Tvert in the news, because he understands how to be entertaining and informative, while the norm with political activists is to be heavy on the informative part and too light with the entertainment.

That’s one reason you see Tvert on TV.

But Wednesday, who’s subbing for David Sirota on AM760, Colorado’s Prgressive Talk? Tvert.

Tvert demonstrated that he’s not just about pot. He kicked ass on numerous topics.

I’m not saying he should replace Sirota, who’s doing a great job with the morning show. But Tvert makes a good sub.

I asked Tvert via email if he’d been on the radio before:

I filled in for Sirota last Friday, and I did two shows last summer as a sub for Mario Solis-Marich (AM760 afternoon drive).  Otherwise, my experience with radio has been on the other side of the interview, so to speak.  

Does he enjoy it?

Yes, it’s great.   Nice to be able to air my views on issues other than those involving marijuana and drug policy.  I also enjoy the opportunity to engage in dialogue with the listeners and the guests.  The first time I hosted a show (for Mario last summer), I managed to get Ted Haggard on the phone and get him to say he would accept the LGBT community at his new church (his church opening was in the news that day and it was just a day before Pride Fest in Denver).  I wrote a small piece about it and included a clip.

Judging from his beer promotions on his show, Sirota seems to prefer beer over pot. Is this a problem for you?

Sirota has been a very vocal supporter of reforming marijuana laws and has dedicated a great deal of coverage to the issue via his show and his writing.  It’s great to have him out there sparking discussion amongst the progressive community and letting them know this is an important issue, as well as one on which they should be comfortable speaking out. 

Any plans to continue with talk radio or other media work?

Would love to continue guest hosting shows and I try to find time to write, particularly on Huffington.  With the campaign going it is tough.  

“We had Scott Tipton from our district stand in our studio while he was campaigning, and…he said he would go to Washington DC and, night and day, night and day, that he would fight to cut the government in half,” said co-host Cari Hermacinski Oct. 18 on her syndicated Cari and Rob Show.  “He would cut it down by 50 percent. And what has he done, every time it’s come down to cast a difficult vote? He goes with [House Speaker] John Boehner. He goes with the leadership.”

Tipton isn’t standing in Hermacinki’s studio any longer.

“I sent him an email,” Hermacinski’s co-host Rob Douglas told listeners on the same day. “I said, come on the show. We’re going to hold open any time slot you want. I don’t care who’s on air; we’ll bump them, put you on so you can explain to the people of Colorado and this nation why we sent you to Washington, why you are spending more than Nancy Pelosi.”

But, they told their radio audience, no word from Tipton.

“We have not heard back from Congressman Tipton or any member of his staff, his chief of staff, his press secretary, his scheduler, and Scott Tipton himself,” Douglas told his listeners. “I have his personal email address. I’ve emailed them all, not a peep back.”

“We warned our audience that there would be chameleons and charlatans amongst those the Liberty Movement sent to Washington in 2010. Unfortunately, Scott Tipton proved our point,” Douglas wrote response an email. “The bottom line is that we believe Congressman Tipton violated his pledge to voters in the 3rd Congressional District of Colorado that he would go to Washington and work to place the country on a more sustainable fiscal path and therefore is not worthy of support from true fiscal conservatives.”

On the air Oct. 18, Douglas pointed out repeatedly that Treasury Department figures show that there have been no spending cuts at the federal level since Republicans took control of the U.S. House. He said Tipton and House Republicans had chances, through votes on government-funding bills and the debt ceiling limit, to change this.

“There have been votes where Tipton did not stand with the true fiscal conservatives in Congress and instead aligned himself with Speaker Boehner and establishment Republicans who played a major role in creating our nation’s fiscal crisis during the Bush administration,” Douglas wrote to me.

As a result, Douglas promised his audience Oct. 18 that he will not be voting for Tipton.

“At the end of the day,” he said, “we all control one vote. The show is about the whole country. But we can only vote where we can vote. Scott Tipton will never get my vote again.”

Asked how the audience of his show, which airs on 10 stations in Colorado and Utah, including KFKA in Greeley and KRDO in Colorado Springs, reacted to this stand against Tipton, Douglas wrote me, “Indications are that many in our audience agree with our view.”

But Douglas wrote that he has no plans to back a candidate that might challenge Tipton next year.

During his last few appearances on the Cari and Rob Show, which originates in Steamboat Springs, Tipton faced the kind of hard questioning you rarely hear when conservatives interview conservatives or, for that matter, when liberals interview liberals.

In April, under tough questioning from both Douglas and Hermacinski, Tipton acknowledged that he had lost trust in House Speaker John Boehner. And he promised to return to the radio show to explain why Boehner had agreed to a budget compromise shaving just $352 million from the federal budget instead of a promised $100 billion.

Douglas complemented on the April show Tipton for answering questions on his radio show, saying on the air after Tipton hung up:

“I gotta hand this to Scott Tipton. He has come on this program every time we asked him to come on.”

As far as I know, Tipton never returned to the show to explain why Boehner didn’t cut $100 billion. But questioned by a Washington DC reporter, Tipton’x office later issued a clarification regarding his commenis on the radio, stating that he was, in fact, confident in Boehner’s leadership, even though he didn’t actually say he trusted Boehner.

Tipton returned to the Cari and Rob Show in May, and again was subject to intense questioning. Douglas grilled Tipton about whether his daughter, a government-relations officer for Broadnet, used the Congressman’s name as she tried to drum up congressional business for firms that use technology licensed by Broadnet, which is owned by Tipton’s nephew.

At the time, Douglas told the Colorado Independent that Tipton’s answers were “Clintonian.”

Tipton apparently hasn’t appeared on the Cari and Rob show since then, marking the end of a relationship with the hosts that, as Tipton entered office, promised to be close and illuminating.

“He said he was happy to be the canary in the coal mine for the Cari and Rob Show,” Douglas said on air Oct. 18. “He would be a representative in Congress who would explain what the Republicans were doing.”

Douglas continued: “Why is Congressman Scott Tipton, why is Speaker of the House John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Paul Ryan, why are the Republicans lying to the American people, lying to the Republican Party, lying to the men and women who break their backs every day in this country to send their hard-earned money to Washington to have it wasted publicly, have it wasted secretly…to have it wasted, while these fat cats enrich their families, enrich their wallets, and do not do what they took a pledge to do?”

For a long time I’ve wondered, what if a Denver talk show paired a true leftist with a true righty.

We’ve got KHOW’s Caplis and Silverman Show, but as you know if you listen, Caplis is a thoroughbred Republican and Silverman is a right-leaning centrist, and leaning more to the right each day as he ponders joining the GOP.

What about a left-right duo?

KOA dipped its toe in this direction today, pairing AM760’s talented David Sirota with less talented KOA host Heck’ve-a-job Brownie. The odd duo subbed for Mike Rosen.

The started the program by telling us that they both like each other, even though they are diametrically opposed on most issues.

They also said they didn’t carry water for any political party.

I thought this might be a backhanded slap at Mike Rosen, who carries so much water for the GOP that you worry water will start pouring out of your car radio.

But I don’t think there was actually any intention of slapping Rosen on the part of either of them. They both seem to like him, though Sirota and Rosen have predictably sparred in the past.

In any case, I wondered if KOA was thinking of replacing Rosen with this pair.

Greg Foster, KOA program director, told me that Rosen is on vacation, and Rosen-Brownie were simply subbing for him, and it’s just a one-day deal.

It’s the first time they’ve co-hosted, he said, but each has been a guest on each other’s show. (Brownie started the broadcast by calling Sirota his “guest”, but Sirota reminded him that they were co-hosting.)

Was Foster worried there would be a nasty blow up, on air?

“If I thought there was going to be a blowup, as you say, we wouldn’t have put them on the air together,” Foster replied, adding, “The intention is to have two people together who are entertaining on the radio and known in the market.”

If KOA changes its mind and decides to pair a liberal with a conservative, they shouldn’t get rid of Rosen, who adds value to the discussion of politics in Denver.

I’d suggest leaving Sirota where he is and adding a lefty to Brown’s evening KOA program. Brownie’s show needs some extra life, and a lefty cohosting with Brown could do the trick.

Talk radio serves an ever more useful role in being a venue where public officials comment on their votes and other activities, often for the first time.

I’m late in spotlighting it, but such was the case Sept. 22 on KFKA radio, when Rep. Cory Gardner explained, apparently for the first time, what he thought of  legislation passed by the U.S. Senate providing $7 billion in disaster-relief aid to ensure FEMA had enough money for victims of Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee.

In response to a question on KFKA’ s morning radio show, AM Colorado, Gardner said the Senate’s bill was not fiscally responsible. 

AM Colorado: You guys are also looking at the disaster aide bill. It didn’t pass yesterday. Is there something in the works that you are going to be looking at the next couple of days on that?

Gardner: I think that will continue to be a focus of activity on the House floor. The Senate passed a stand-alone bill that would provide $7 billion in off-budget money for disaster aide- meaning that’s money that would…just additional $7 billion in spending. The House yesterday attempted to really change that narrative by providing responsible and needed emergency aid but doing so in a fiscally responsible manner as well. To meet the needs of the people who are suffering. I think that is the differences of opinion in the House and the Senate right now.

After reading on BigMedia.org that KVOR talk-show host Jimmy Lakey compared Michelle Obama to Chewbacca, a Colorado resident filed a complaint with Federal Communications Commission, claiming that Lakey’s behavior was “racially motivated and politically biased.”

In a letter last week, the FCC responded to the complaint, stating:

The FCC is barred by the First Amendment of the United States Constitution from trying to prevent the broadcast of any point of view, no matter how unpopular or distasteful that point of view may be to most people. Consumers often complain that certain broadcasts are “un-American,” too violent, or ridicule or demean certain groups because of their race, gender, religion or nationality. Such views that do not rise to the level of  a “clear and present danger of substantive evil” are protected by the First Amendment. Expressions that are obscene, however, are not protected. Similarly, expressions that are indecent or profane may be restricted to prevent their broadcast to children. FCC rules prohibit indecent or profane broadcasts between the hours of 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. The Communications Act prevents the FCC from censoring broadcast material, in most cases, and from taking any action that would interfere with freedom of speech.

Obscenity is defined as any material that depicts or describes, in patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable law; and lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.

Well, it’s clear that Lakey’s comments about Michelle Obama lack serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.

But I know that’s irrelevant and besides the point, which is that the FCC was right to deny this complaint. I wouldn’t want Lakey or anyone shut up for comparing a political figure to Chewbacca or a character in Planet of the Apes. Or for advocating the death of all Iranians.

But I don’t think I’m wasting my time, and the person who filed the FCC complaint against Lakey wasn’t wasting his time either, trying to make more people aware of these comments. This includes Lakey’s bosses at Cumulus Media, Inc, the radio conglomerate that owns KVOR, 470 AM, in Colorado Springs, and broadcasts the Jimmy Lakey Show Sundays from 9 a.m. to noon.

They should know about what he’s saying, in case they want to fire him or scold him somehow.

And of course we can complain to KVOR directly or stop listening to Lakey, which could set an example that might spread to the point where he can scream and laugh to himself on the radio.

Trouble is, it’s more likely that spotlighting Lakey has the opposite effect, bringing him more listeners. But ignoring hate speech doesn’t feel like the right thing to do.

Part of the reason Denver Post columnist Vincent Carroll is effective at getting under the skin of liberals is that he’s so good at mixing his opinion with interviews and other types of original reporting.

In my lowly way as a progressive blogger, I try to write like Carroll, with his edge and clear reporting, though he’s better at it (though his opinion is usually wrong, even if his facts are right).

So I read his column.

On Saturday morning, Carroll is very effectively ripping apart the county clerks, and at the end, he’s quoting from his personal interview with Secretary of State Scott Gessler.

For weeks, I’d been trying to ask Gessler–or anyone in his press office–a simple question about whether he thinks there’s fraud in Denver elections, and his office will not comment.

But he’s yapping it up with Carroll.

So I emailed Carroll:

I’m wondering, do you think Gessler or his media people should talk to me, even if I’m progressive, as they do you.

…what seems to bother Gessler’s spokesman the most about me is the fact that I crosspost on ColoradoPols, obviously a left-leaning blog.

I mean, it would be one thing if I were a progressive hatchet man, but I really don’t think I’m harder on the conservatives I interview than you are on the liberals who talk to you.

Carroll replied:

You are right that you are not a left-leaning hatchet man, but that doesn’t mean Gessler is under any obligation to talk to you.  Some people won’t take my calls, too.  Such is life in journalism.

Right.

But you’d think a public official would at least listen to the question, and if it’s a basic one, like whether there’s election fraud in Denver, and if the answer would serve the public interest, he’d respond, whether the questioner were progressive or conservative.

KHOW’s Peter Boyles apparently spent most of the evening in Civic Center Park last night to cover the dramatic chapter in the OccupyDenver/Wall-Street-Greed protest that was at first ignored by media large and small and then deluged with coverage.

But Boyles’ work stood out, as he took the protesters seriously from the get go, spent a lot of time with them and got to know them, and gave them a voice.

Print media, tweets, TV, blogs, all of the other media formats, didn’t really do justice to the personalities and motivations of the protesters. Boyles reminded me that a radio broadcast, with an intelligent host, can play a role in situations like this that other media formats, with their time constraints and ADD, just can’t.

Boyles is obviously a bizarre guy, whose broadcasts are often mindlessly destructive, but he’s doing a great job on this story.

Talk radio is, basically, an entertainment medium, and it was proven Wednesday night on the stage of, appropriately enough, the Comedy Works in conservative Greenwood Village, where Denver’s top talk-show hosts squared off in hyped “battle.”

You’d expect to get plenty of meaninglessness from a two-hour event featuring 10 yappers skilled at yapping plus not one but two moderators.

I mean, what were they thinking? How could a panel of 10 normal people converse intelligently in such a setting much less 10 talk-radio hosts?

And sure enough, it was pretty stupid—and enjoyable, to an extent.

The ten talk show hosts were brought up on the comedy stage five at a time.

The first group was: Rick Barber (KOA), Peter Boyles (KHOW), Jon Caldara (KOA), Craig Silverman (KHOW), and Brownie (KOA).

KOA’s Steffan Tubbs and April Zesbaugh presented them with a “lightening” round of questions to which they had 15 seconds to respond.

The in-depth segment gave the yappers 30 seconds for their answers.

Asked what talk radio show he listens to, Caldara said, “What kind of loser listens to talk radio?” (Barber and later David Sirota admitted to listening to no talk radio, and Rosen said he enjoys his own podcasts the most, which may explain his re-use of old newspaper columns.)

To the question, should marijuana be legalized, Caldara said, “Of course. It makes Craig Silverman’s voice bearable.”

Silverman replied that he was “distracted” by the light bouncing off Caldara’s bald head.

Things got testy when Caldara joked that Boyles wanted to hurt illegal immigrants.

“You’ve been funny all night, but that’s offensive,” Boyles shot back.

Round two featured five more white men: Dan Caplis (KHOW), Thom Hartmann (Syndicated nationally and my own favorite talk-show host), Tom Martino (KHOW), Mike Rosen (KOA), and David Sirota (AM 760).

This group was more interesting because they actually disagreed more often than not, as Sirota and Hartman are on the political left.

Asked who they favored for president, Caplis said Cain or Romney, Hartmann sort of said Obama, Martino said Cain, Rosen said Romney, and Sirota said he did not “give a shit.”

Mike Rosen thought the smartest thing Obama did as President was “pick Joe Biden as his vice President, which makes Obama look smarter.”

To the question, is Obama a socialist, Sirota said, “He and half the Democratic Party are corporate socialists.”

Similarly, Sirota is ready to administer drug tests to welfare recipients as soon as bankers are tested for drugs.

At one point, Michael Brown kneeled at the crotch of Silverman, as if he were bowing to him, after Silverman said he planned to register as a Republican to ensure that the GOP picks moderate prez candidate.

“That’s how Brownie got a job from Bush,” said Caldara, who unfortunately gets my vote as the winner of the battle. The 15-second format suited his shallow worldview and potty mouth, as he acknowledged after the event.

The lightening rounds kept coming:

In 15 seconds, if Obama’s Jobs Bill isn’t the answer, what is?

Fifteen more seconds for, how would you solve I70’s problems?

What has the Tea Party accomplished, if anything?

Does global warming exist?

Has the war on terror made us safer?

Do you want to build a wall on the southern border?

Is America in danger of losing the title of the most powerful nation in the world?

Sometimes, the guys got an extra two minutes to discuss this stuff, not just the 15 seconds.

Yes, it was ridiculous, but hey, it wasn’t American Idol. It was much better. You could be entertained and learn something, which is right in line with modern politics.

But in the end, the second annual battle of the talk-show hosts proved my mantra that the best talk-radio shows have plenty of guests (and callers) on the air to take the focus off the yapping hosts.

With no guests and no callers, it gets boring, like this event did. I may like talk radio, but no way will I be attending next year’s battle.

If you’ve been following my blog, you know I’ve been trying to get Jimmy Lakey, who’s a Colorado Springs talk-radio host, to explain why he laughed like a mad man when a caller compared Michelle Obama to a character in the Planet of the Apes. (Listen here to the audio.)

On his show Sunday, September 25, Lakey offered up a response of sorts.

He was laughing about something, and he cut off his laughter abruptly and said:

“Oh, I’m sorry I’m laughing. Laughing makes many people nervous on this radio show.”

I’d been looking forward to hearing what Lakey had to say, but I never expected to agree with him, especially when he was mocking all the people who were legitimately upset by his behavior.

But he’s right. He laughs and I’m nervous.  That’s not my usual reaction to laughter, but in this case, it’s true.

Now I’m hoping he explains himself some more.

September 25, Jimmy Lakey show on KVOR-740 AM, owned by Cumulus Media, Inc.