Are you ready for a fast, funny, daily rundown of the day’s top stories?
“Franklin in the Morning” takes you on an unpredictable ride through breaking news and issues other broadcasters and commentators won’t touch.
Wild, independent and novel, “Franklin in the Morning” is WND’s new weekday morning feature, available at WND.com. You can watch or listen to it any time of day.
“Most shows wait for other media to approve of the day’s stories,” Raff explains. “That means the news is late, filtered and sanitized. This is a very different, very WND approach: first and fearless.”
Raff comes to WND from WCGO Chicago’s daily “Franklin Raff Show.” Some may also remember him as G. Gordon Liddy’s longtime producer and sidekick at Radio America. He started out in radio as a boy, spinning vinyl in rural Quebec while calling in “comedy bits” to Washington, D.C.’s “The Greaseman Show.”
Later, he helped propel Yale’s WYBC 94.3 FM from No. 12 to No. 1 in the Arbitron 12+ metro rankings and the highest ratings in the commercial station’s 50-year history.
Radio great Rusty Humphries was one of the first to hire him.
“I was interning with Jack Diamond at WRQX (ABC Radio) in Washington, and TMC Comedy Network was doing these wild parody songs for the show,” Raff explains. “I asked, ‘Can I write for you?’ Rusty said, ‘Sure!'”
Raff’s radio career accelerated at Clear Channel, where he was a “radio rep,” or salesman, rock jock, talk co-host and, later, talk host in smaller markets. With Clear Channel Franklin earned the industry designation Radio Marketing Master.
“We built businesses, lived and breathed advertising, and made our clients rich,” he said. “Blizzard predicted at 6 a.m.? We were on the air before 7 with our clients’ Snow Day Sale. It was energetic, accountable marketing – a lot like what we’re doing at WND.”
Asked how he managed to succeed on the programming side of the industry, Raff said: “I always felt sort of thrilled and honored by the intelligence and passion of our audience, not only in talk, but in music, in country, in urban formats. I want to serve, entertain and be a friend.”
His childlike enthusiasm shows. Raff still wears a tie every day “unless I’m working on a car or a boat or something.”
“My dad told me to always wear a tie, so I guess I’ve been doing that since I was very young.”
His father, nuclear physicist Sam Raff, read the left-leaning Washington Post and the right-leaning Washington Times every day.
“It’s how people become conservative,” he explained. “Even when I was away in college in this beautiful left-wing machine and reading and delivering the New York Times every morning, which was one of the things I did to make money, I remembered that there really were two sides to things, and that thoughtful Americans like my dad paid attention to different perspectives.”
In 2003, Raff was tapped to produce WND founder and CEO Joseph Farah’s Radio America talk show.
“I’ve known Franklin for a long time,” said Farah. “He is an incredibly gifted and talented performer – a student of the art of radio. I’m so glad we’re getting a chance to provide this forum to showcase his communication gifts.”
Raff added: “I am allied with WND not just because we share a constitutional consciousness, but because we have the same core philosophy about sharing big ideas in an open-minded way. We love God, we love America and we love people. It’s always delightful to see folks realize how charitable, worldly and inclusive we so-called ‘right-wingers’ really are!”
Tune in right now to “Franklin in the Morning.”