Sunday chatter.

• Author: Cotterell, Bill
• Position: Letters - Letter to the editor

Paul Waldman's otherwise perceptive article on the Sunday talk shows leaning to the right ("John Fund Again?" March) missed an important point that really explains it all.

Does Waldman think these news programs exist to inform the public and explore issues? Like the rest of television, they exist to show us advertisements; therefore, they depend on ratings. If Katrina vanden Heuvel or Paul Krugman brought in viewers, they'd replace George Will and Bill Kristol in a minute. If booking Dennis Kucinieh and Bernie Sanders boosted ratings, we'd rarely see Mitch McConnell or Lindsey Graham.

Look who's sponsoring these shows: GE, Archer Daniels Midland, pharmaceutical companies, IBM, insurance companies, airlines and investment houses. Who are the customers of these advertisers on Sunday morning? I'm betting they're mainly white male business executives and retirees. That such a demographic niche would rather watch conservatives than liberals should not surprise anyone.

Bill Cotterell

Tallahassee, Fla.

It's just too convenient that the period before 1997 cannot be analyzed and compared. I remember getting tired of seeing Bob Novak on "Crossfire" or George Will on ABC Sunday mornings, being outnumbered three to one. I can vividly remember Ann Lewis and Lanny Davis seeming to appear on TV about 200 days a year. Are you honestly saying that you cannot find those little newspaper items in The Washington Post that listed who was going to be on the weekend talk shows?

It's childish to put forward an argument like this, as if TV history began in 1997, as if there never was a period of decades when the talk shows were lopsidedly leftist...