Ever since Rush Limbaugh passed away on February 17, 2021, I have not listened to anything on AM radio. Despite that, if I were to buy a new car, I would not want a radio in it that doesn't include the AM band.
AM radio is a vital source for news, weather reports and emergencies.
But some automakers are dropping the AM band on new EV and some fossil fuel vehicles. This is prompting a, surprisingly, bipartisan response in congress.
From NOLA.com:
WASHINGTON – Reception was scratchy until the AM knob was tuned precisely, but for truckers all over the country in the 1970s and 1980s, WWL’s Charlie Douglas kept them company throughout the night from New Orleans.
The soundtrack for workers on oil rigs off Louisiana’s shore came out of KLEB in Golden Meadow.
Terrestrial radio communication based on "amplitude modulation" was the first national media and came into wide use at the same time as the light bulb. As technology improved, AM evolved to become the primary player of rock and roll, country music and the blues in the 1950s and 1960s.
The latest evolution towards internet streaming and satellite technology poses a fatal risk to AM, and broadcasters are looking for a congressional solution.
Some makers of electric vehicles have stopped including AM radio. A bunch of other manufacturers plan to remove in-dash AM access, even in fossil fuel cars.
WWL and other radio stations around the nation are asking listeners to “take two minutes” to inform Congress of their support for AM radio. Broadcasters this month are on Capitol Hill lobbying for the “AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act of 2023,” or S.1169, which would require installation of AM broadcast radio in cars without cost to the consumer.
Even in a fractured Congress, the bill by Sen. Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, has found common ground among usual ideological foes from Texas Sen. Ted Cruz to Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.
To read more, go here.
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