» Hugh Hewitt Scores Sarah Palin Interview: The GOP Vice Presidential candidate appeared last night on Salem Radio Network's Hugh Hewitt Show. Commenting on her meteoric rise from Wasilla, Alaska to the national political stage Palin made no bones about her small town roots telling Hewitt, "It's time that normal 'Joe Six-Pack' American is finally represented in the position of the vice presidency. I think that that's kind of taken some people off guard and they're out of sorts, and they're ticked off about it. But it's motivation for John McCain and I to work that much harder to make sure that our ticket is victorious, and we put government back on the side of the people of 'Joe Six-Pack' like me." SRN VP/News and Talk Programming Tom Tradup called Hewitt's landing of the first network radio interview with the Alaska Governor, just 48 hours before her scheduled debate with Democratic VP nominee Senator Joe Biden, "a broadcast coup."

» Radio Feels Pinch From McCain Campaign Suspension: While radio saw a drop in the number of ads run by Republican John McCain when he temporarily suspended his campaign during last week's economic showdown in DC, the Arizona Senator's messages airing on both broadcast and cable TV actually increased during the week of 9/22-28. Media Monitors weekly watch on the candidates' media spending habits show that the McCain camp aired 2,506 radio ads -- down 1,652 from the prior week -- while Democrat Barack Obama ran a whopping 16,075 radio spots, an increase of more than 4100 ads over the previous week, during the same period. The latest survey also notes that Obama's radio ad blizzard last week made his campaign not only the number one political advertiser for the week of 9/22, but also the number eight overall national radio advertiser for the week. Read the full report HERE.

» Mandis 'Da Man At WOWO/Ft. Wayne: The Federated Media News/Talker has named Dan Mandis as Operations Manager for WOWO and at Sports clustermate WKJG. Most recently Director of AM/FM Programming and Operations for Citadel/Colorado Springs, Mandis' name is familiar to many in the industry from his longtime production stint on the nationally syndicated Dr. Laura Program. Mandis started his radio career at KFI/Los Angeles where he served as a producer and general staffer for the SoCal News/Talker. In his new job Mandis will report directly to Federated Media/Ft. Wayne GM Mark DePrez.

» Headphones Suddenly A "Must Have" Accessory: If you notice a sudden jump in the number of folks around the office sporting headphones over the next few weeks, blame it on the month of October and ESPN Radio's 11th consecutive season of coverage of Major League Baseball's post-season action. ESPN Radio will kick off this year's coverage at 3pm (ET) today with Game 1 between the Philadelphia Phillies and Milwaukee Brewers. That will be followed by Game 1 of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Chicago Cubs series at 6:30pm, and Game 1 between the Los Angeles Angels and Boston Red Sox at 10pm. ESPN Radio will offer play-by-play coverage of every MLB Division Series, League Championship Series and World Series game. You can check out their post-season game schedule HERE.

» Talk Media News Notes: Longtime San Francisco Bay Area broadcaster Ed Krampf, is named SVP/Market Manager at CBS Radio/Tampa where he'll oversee the company's six-station cluster including Sports/Talker WQYK-AM. He'll assume the role currently held by Charlie Ochs who previously announced his planned exit on October 3 ... Greg Garber is the new Local Sales Manager at Clear Channel News/Talk KFI/Los Angeles and sister liberal talker KTLK-AM ... Arbitron has reissued the Phase Two Arbitrend report for Detroit after discovery of an internal calculation error. The reissue dropped CBS Radio all-newser WWJ from a 6.4 (12+) share (June-July-August) to a 5.1 ... News/Talk WCOJ/West Chester, PA turns out the lights pending a flip to Catholic religious programming ... Tampa Bay News/Talker WWBA is now simulcasting on both it's current home at 1040 AM and on recently LMA'd crosstown WMGG 820 AM. WWBA is expected to take up permanent residence at 820 AM on October 10.