I just had occasion to listen to the Aug 28th 2008 edition of Extension 720. I started listening to Milt Rosenberg as a child while my parents listened to the show. Rosenberg is thoughtful, professorial, and respectful of his guests. Upon the occasion of National Review contributor, Stanley Kurtz, being on town (doing research on Obama and the Annenberg Challenge), Extension 720 booked him for the following day. They contacted the Obama campaign national headquarters just down the street and requested a representative to provide a contrasting point of view. However the Obama campaign had no interest in participation as evidenced by the fact that instead of discussing sending a person, they hung up on the show's producer and sent out an e-mail asking people to call in and complain.

Its bad enough that the campaign's responce to its critics was to slander him an attempt to silence him, rather than to send someone to confront Kurtz in a debate where Rosenberg would have insured a useful and productive exchange. But they also used their own non-participation as a primary cause for attack. They chose to send no representative, so the responsibility for the absence of a Obama defender is their own, not WGN's.

It is worth noting that on September 16th, when David Freddoso was the guest author, Extension 720 found a willing defender of Obama, Dan Johnson-Weinberger, an activist and former student of Obama's rather than get burned again by the campiagn tactic of not sending a represenative and then complaining that they were not represented.

While it is true that the Kurtz interview happened during the Democratic convention, the notion that the Obama campian was unavailable to do media during their convention is absurd. You do major events to get people talking, so of course people are available to capitalize on the media. The campaign chose not to do Extension 720. The late notice (first thing that day, 13 hours advance) is more of an issue, but not at all uncommon in the media, where responding to news is so common. The booking itself was late, so advanced notice was impossible.

Here is a link to a Kansas City media blogger.