Sherborn Millionaire Bob Murchison Sent Hundreds Of Misleading, Harassing Emails To WEEI Advertisers In Order To Remove Kirk Minihane From Top Rated Morning Show

 

Editor’s Note: We published a version of this blog 3 years ago on Turtleboy Sports. We have updated it slightly and are republishing on TB Daily News in anticipation of another blog today about Bob Murchison.

 

This is Northeastern journalism professor Dan Kennedy.

He is a member of “Beat The Press,” a show on WGBH that basically purports itself to be a watchdog of the media. They comment on stories that involve the Globe, the Herald, and local media personalities, and claim to be unbiased. This is Emily Rooney, the quarterback of the program.

Former WEEI morning host Kirk Minihane exposed Globe columnist Kevin Cullen for lying several times about being at the Boston Marathon bombing and personally knowing first responders who rescued people, as well as the Richard family. Beat the Press had to discuss it. This column in particular by Minihane just exposed the complete lack of credibility from the Globe and Cullen.

Dan Kennedy and Emily Rooney covered for Cullen, proving that even the unbiased media watchdogs cannot be trusted. Here’s what Dan Kennedy wrote:

“I’m a longtime admirer of Cullen’s work. Though I don’t know him personally, we’ve exchanged a few friendly greetings over the years. We should all be willing to wait and see if the investigation finds that the April 14 column represents a momentary lapse — or is an example of something more pervasive.”

Wait and see? Kirk showed tape of him claiming to be at the bombing, when in fact he was not at the bombing. End of story. He was already making up excuses for him about a “momentary lapse,” as if repeatedly making up insanely dramatic stories is something that happens on the job.

In this clip Dan Kennedy suggests that Cullen might not have meant to lie:

“Kevin Cullen may not have deliberately done that, but it was troubling.”

Obviously they’re in the bag for the Globe.

Globe editor Shirley Leung also teamed up with Sherborn millionaire Bob Murchison to harass WEEI advertisers relentlessly. The ongoing harassment contributed to a mental health crisis for Minihane in which he had to be hospitalized for repeated thoughts of suicide. Instead of standing by him Entercom got rid of Minihane on the morning show, despite the fact that it was the highest rated morning show in Boston. Doing so cost the Jimmy Fund over $1 million in donations that the program solicited annually.

A private citizen of no significance was able to get the top rated sports show host kicked off the radio. However, in a since deleted tweet Dan Kennedy claimed that the idea that Bob Muchison is “some sort of malign force is offensive.”

 

Of course Murchison was a malign force behind this. Shirley Leung admitted she was working with him. Murchison got a sit down meeting with Kirk Minihane, Gerry Callahan, and WEEI executives, in which he demanded they stop talking about controversial topics he didn’t approve of on the show. No one else got a meeting like that – just Bob Murchison.

So glad I never had him as a professor when I was in that program. Embarrassing. https://t.co/5VguLFakLg

— Lucy Burdge (@LucilleBurdge) November 21, 2018

Since Dan Kennedy doesn’t seem to think that Bob Murchison is some sort of malign force we’re going to show you how wrong he is. Back in June we published this blog exposing some of the tactics Murchison was using to relentlessly harass WEEI advertisers. However, we didn’t actually show screenshots of any of the emails because, 1) we still wanted Kirk Minihane on the airwaves and didn’t want to jeopardize his employment there, and 2) program Joe Zarbano called me personally and asked me not to because they would be tied to him. He was worried that more WEEI advertisers would jump ship if they realized that private emails were being shared with Turtleboy, for the purposes of exposing Bob Murchison. But now that Minihane doesn’t work there and Zarbano spinelessly did nothing to protect free speech on his station, I think it’s about time to release the emails.

Here’s one Bob Murchison sent to Arbella Insurance’s John Donahue, lecturing him “again” (his own word) telling him that he “expects” them to stop interviewing on WEEI, and links a “homophobic” segment in which Callahan says that he doesn’t think 7 year olds should undergo gender reassignment.

It worked because Arbella’s Gayle O’Connell then emailed Entercom to make sure that their ads were only playing during Red Sox broadcasts, not during the Kirk and Callahan show when they’d actually be heard by more people.

Here’s Bob on April 10th emailing MA Energy Marketers Association, and even CC’ing what appears to be competitors. He essentially copies and pastes from a template:

Here he is emailing from Windriver Environmental’s John O’Connell on April 9 at 7:18 AM, pretending to give a shit about the Jimmy Fund, an organization that Kirk and Callahan have raised millions of dollars for.

Here he is doing the same on April 25 to Chace Building Supply’s Richard Chace.

Again, it worked, as gutless Angela Wilcox emailed Entercom shortly thereafter, asking them to remove their ads from the Kirk and Callahan show, while admitting that she has no clue what Kirk and Callahan even is, because she’s never listened to it.

She got a copy and pasted email from Bob Murchison and made a business decision for a company she represents based on that email alone. That’s the kind of power this psychopath bully has.

Here’s Bob Murchison on April 25 at 10:47 AM emailing a dozen people from American Family Care, once again copying and pasting complaints about the speech on their show. Among his complaints were that they thought the Philadelphia Starbucks incident was a stunt, and that they questioned Adam Jones’ obvious lie that someone in the stands at Fenway Park repeatedly called him the n word.

Once again, it worked, as the higher ups at AFC urgent care started freaking out about it:

One company his harassment did not work well with was Kaplansky Insurance. This is what Bob sent them:

And this is what they sent him back.

God bless Kaplansky Insurance.

Here he is harassing Alicia Criniti at FW Webb, who he admits to harassing last fall as well, and he was dissatisfied with her initial reaction.

“I think most of the on-air people have responded with a great deal more sensitivity on these types of issues.”

This is scary language. It shows that Bob Murchison listens to every show and takes notes on what they are talking about. Those who have conformed get his nod of approval. Those who don’t get their advertisers harassed as he relentlessly tries to shut their voices down. And why wouldn’t he? It worked because Entercom and Joe Zarbano are gutless. Millions of people listen to talk radio, and the idea that one man can sit there and dictate what is discussed on these shows is Orwellian.

Here he is on April 9 harassing a Mr. Torrisi at Jackson Lumber, once again lecturing them about how to run a small business.

Evidently he did not get a response so he emailed them again two weeks later on April 24.

Local companies like Kaplansky understand what Kirk and Callahan is, and how popular their show is, which is great for marketing. But Wendy’s is a national corporation, and they’ve probably never heard of the show before. Bob Murchison was most effective with his campaigns against bigger national companies like Wendy’s. Here he is emailing them:

Here’s Wendy’s Ray Arruda emailing Michelle Horowitz from their advertising agency about it.

And here’s Melanie Edwards from that advertising agency pearl clutching and canceling all ads on WEEI.

“This went right to the top at Wendy’s.” Bob Murchison is the reason WEEI lost the Wendy’s account. He has the ability to do this by himself. He did not organize a mob to swamp them with hundreds of emails and calls. He did this alone.

During Super Bowl week Kirk Minihane went on Barstool Radio and did a show with Dave Portnoy and Kevin Clancy, where he now works.

In it Portnoy was his usual unfiltered self, but Minihane was actually pretty tame. Nevertheless Bob used this audio, sent it to NCL, and insinuated that Minihane was some sort of pedophile based on things Portnoy had said previously:

As you can see, it’s Portnoy who mentioned the size of Brady’s kid’s dong, something he got in trouble for 8 years ago. Minihane just commented on his commentary.

Nevertheless it worked, as Allison Smith at NCL asked Luke Condolora to look into finding out “how other advertisers are dealing.”

In other words, if other companies are pulling out because of Murchison then they probably should too. Because they are gutless.

Here he is contacting Jordan’s Furniture

Thayer Associates

And the Piano Mill

He even mentioned a clearly sarcastic comment Minihane made about wearing his Klan robe to Jake and Joe’s for an event, because he was mocking stupid people who called him a racist.

WEEI lost a $180K advertising contract with ARS because of Murchison.

Here’s Greg McGlone, media director for the Radio Agency, canceling all advertising after Murchison contacted him.

And finally here’s an email from Katz Media’s Heather Scott to Entercom, after being contacted by Horizon, telling them to cancel all advertising with WEEI after Murchison contacted them.

It cost WEEI $13,000 for that quarter alone.

But despite all of this Dan Kennedy insists that Bob Murchison is not some sort of “malign force.”

You saw it in those emails. Wendy’s, Horizon, and many, many others cancelled because of Bob Muchison’s relentless campaign of censorship. All it took was one man with millions of dollars and too much free time, and the most popular host in Boston was censored. Free speech is a myth.

Adam Reilly from Beat The Press invited me to come on the show sometime, specifically to discuss our censorship on Twitter and Facebook, along with the blogs published about Murchison.

But now he’s ignoring us because his show exists to carry water for the Boston Globe. Turtleboy and Kirk Minihane are the only media personalities in this town that don’t back down and always tell the truth. Nonetheless, we should all be troubled that one man with a gmail account can effectively control what millions of people listen to on the airwaves.

I NEVER said I didnt know anything about Murchison – on BPR last Friday Jim Braude said he didn’t know who he was – why would he? I follow media issues – I’ve known of him for months if not a year. https://t.co/ptqG2Abbgq

— Emily Rooney (@EmilyRooneyBTP) November 20, 2018

 

 

 

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