The truth about Air America's sudden absence on the airwaves in Los Angeles and Chicago.

Drudge reported that they bounced a check and therefore Arthur Liu, owner of WNTD and KBLA, yanked them. This was of course reiterated throughout the right-wing echo chamber (Rush Limbaugh and his clones throughout the country). Once again though, these guys are lying to their listeners or are at least behaving like lazy reporters and not gathering the facts before opening their mouths.

Air America chairman Evan Cohen called station owner Liu's claims outright lies and says he's in breach of contract. Their court petition is available on the Smoking Gun.

Blah3 points out that Liu's political contributions signal where his loyalties lie in this matter. Confirm this yourself at the Political Money Line:

4/26/1999 LIU, ARTHUR $1,000 National Assn of Broadcast NEW YORK,NY 10013 MULTICULTURAL RADIO
10/12/1999 LIU, YVONNE $1,000 Bush, George W NEW YORK,NY 10128 MULTICULTURAL RADIO
10/13/1999 LIU, YVONNE $1,000 Giuliani, Rudolph W NEW YORK,NY 10128 MULTICULTURAL ORG
5/16/2000 LIU, ARTHUR $1,000 National Assn of Broadcast NEW YORK,NY 10013 WPAT-AM
6/30/2000 LIU, ARTHUR $1,000 Lazio, Rick A WKDM/WNWK
6/30/2000 LIU, YVONNE S Y $1,000 Lazio, Rick A
9/14/2000 LIU, YVONNE S $1,500 Republican National Cmte NEW YORK,NY 10128
4/6/2001 LIU, YVONNE S $500 National Republican Congre NEW YORK,NY 10128
5/7/2003 LIU, ARTHUR MR $1,000 National Assn of Broadcast NEW YORK,NY 10013 WPAT-AM/MULTICULTURAL

Meanwhile, the station is expanding to more and more markets, and now has affiliations with 16 stations which is up from the six when it launched two weeks ago.