“An educated city like Austin deserves a news/talk radio station that at least attempts to provide professional news and honest commentary,” said Dean Navarro. “KLBJ-AM ain’t that station.”

Navarro and his political action committee – Save Our Ears – is leading a petition campaign either to recall the entire radio station or send it into space. “They might need a Rush Limbaugh-driven, crazed right-wing radio station on Mars,” said Navarro. “We don’t need it in Austin.” Navarro acknowledged that gathering the petition signatures among Austin’s mostly youthful hipster citizenry presented some challenges. “Anybody over 50 was an easy sell,” he said of a demographic still familiar with the AM station’s wandering into the hard-right wilderness in the early Eighties. “Below that age, the most common reaction was ‘KLBJ-Who?'”

Navarro said that while the primary target of the petition campaign is undoubtedly Lim­baugh and his midday, three-hour hysterical rants – “We think he and Clear Channel are probably looking at bankruptcy soon anyway” – SOE has also had enough of the local Limbaugh wannabes like “Todd and Don” and “Mark and Charlie,” whose commitment to conservative politics audibly gives the impression of “whatever the market will bear.”

“I’m sure that should that particular demographic – primarily suburban commuters stewing in their cars coming into or out of Downtown Austin – suddenly become enlightened and start listening to political reason again, these hosts would abruptly become fountains of moderate wisdom,” said Navarro. “It’s not about the politics, per se. It’s about whatever they can sell to the credulous this year.”

Navarro added that if the petition drive does not succeed in the actual recall of the station – and it’s not clear exactly how that would work – at least SOE wants to reclaim the letters “LBJ” for Democratic Travis County. “One of our greatest modern presidents, who expanded opportunity and civil rights for millions of Americans, should not have his name permanently linked to these cynical, tinhorn opportunists. Let them rename the station KGOP – that would at least make it plain who they’re really working for.”

This article appears in Our Next (P)resident.

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Contributing writer and former news editor Michael King has reported on city and state politics for the Chronicle since 2000. He was educated at Indiana University and Yale, and from 1977 to 1985 taught at UT-Austin. He has been the editor of the Houston Press and The Texas Observer, and has reported and written widely on education, politics, and cultural subjects.