Asheville News

Matt Mittan suspension was radio publicity stunt

Jason Sandford March 25, 2010

Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

Don’t believe the rumors, the tweets or the newspaper story, about local WWNC talk radio show host Matt Mittan getting suspended for inflamatory comments on his show. It was all just a big publicity stunt.
The Asheville Citizen-Times reports on its front page today:

ASHEVILLE — A local radio show host was suspended after questioning the sanity of the popular syndicated radio and television political personality Glenn Beck.
Matt Mittan, host of the show “Take A Stand” on WWNC 570-AM, was taken off the air Thursday after a Wednesday show in which he made “inflammatory remarks about another host,” said program director Brian Hall.
“He’s been suspended for 24 hours … he’s had his hand slapped,” Hall said.
Transcripts or podcasts of the comment were not available on the station’s Web site, but a podcast that began shortly after Mittan’s initial remarks was.

The rumors started running rampant on Twitter Thursday afternoon. I was attending the YWCA’s TWIN awards on Thursday night, heard the story, and asked Hall, who was also in attendance.
Hall chuckled and said it was just a little publicity stunt. He said that Mittan had indeed riled some listeners on Wednesday. Mittan was simply sick on Thursday, Hall said, and the station decided to play it up by spreading the word that Mittan had been suspended when, in fact, he had not.
The station will come clean today, Hall told me.

Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

Hey Google, Asheville’s great!

Sticking to his story: Program director says Mittan was suspended; tune in at 3 p.m. to hear Mittan explain it all

6 Comments

ReplyingToMojo March 26, 2010

Hasn’t the author of this blog explained why he spells it Ashvegas instead of Ashevegas?

Reply
BeCareful March 26, 2010

Did Hall sucker you, Ash, to remind you to check things people tell you before you report them on Ashvegas, now that you again work for the Citizen-Times? Did you check with your fellow AC-T reporter Joel Burgess to see what his sources told him?

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Mo March 26, 2010

Matt is a nice guy, but his radio show sucks. He has the same 4 (idiot) callers every day. As with most psuedo political pundits, he already has a firm grasp on the next problem, but not a clue as to a solution. It’s just more fodder for stupid people to believe that the government (and everyone else for that matter) is out to get them. Promoting the society of the paranoid serves no one. The only thing that sucks worse than Matt’s show is the new counterpart on 880 (Local Edge Radio). The hosts are nice people (again doing shitty radio), which is what Clear Channel is best at. Admittedly, he’s a strange character, but Virato Live was good radio and they took him off the air.

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Mojo March 26, 2010

Just a little nugget for you as a lifelong native ashEville-ian….Asheville is spelled with an E and Ashevegas is also!

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kp March 26, 2010

Great pre-April Fool’s prank!

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Dusty March 26, 2010

loving the Ustream feed from Asheville Twestival! Thanks to Brett for managing the
tech!

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