KFI: Turn On, Tune In, Turn Right : Radio: The talk-radio station’s executives say its climb up the charts is due to compelling programming. Others point to the conservative slate of hosts.

In its climb up the ratings charts over the past four years, talk-radio station KFI-AM (640) has taken on a much more conservative tone, following the lead of its top-rated personality, Rush Limbaugh. The extent to which this shift accounts for the station’s rise to No. 4 in the market is the subject of a debate as spirited as any heard on its airwaves.

KFI officials say that politics has little to do with their programming rationale.

“In programming the station, I don’t think of ideology,” program director David Hall said. “I look for other factors entirely: compelling, stimulating, thought-provoking.”

“The reason that KFI is a growing station is because there are stances being taken on issues,” echoed General Manager Howard Neal. “Regardless of whether people agree with the stance or not, they appreciate the fact that we are out there taking a stand. What drives talk radio are issues and intelligent hosts, not particular ideologies or political stances.”

But critics point to KFI’s roster of hosts--such as weekday regulars Limbaugh, Daryl F. Gates, John Kobylt, Ken Chiampou and Bill Handel, and weekend personalities Hugh Hewitt, Barbara Whitesides, Joe Crummey and Jane Norris--and see a lineup dominated by views that begin at the middle of the political spectrum and head due east.

“If they’re neutral, then who is their flaming left-wing liberal who they have on for balance?” asked Sherrie Mazingo, associate professor of broadcasting at USC. “They cannot suggest they are engaging in balanced programming. When KFI doesn’t present a program or personality to offset Limbaugh, then the station is saying, ‘Hey, this is the point of view we subscribe to and this is someone who, in effect, is a mouthpiece for us that is broadcasting basically the views of station ownership.’ ”

Some KFI hosts object to being categorized as conservative. “It’s not a matter of ideology; we try to give a common-sense look at problems,” said Chiampou, who teams with Kobylt weekdays from 4 to 7 p.m. Kobylt contends that their ideology is “all over the place.”

But KFI’s one avowed liberal host, Bill Press, who is chairman of the California Democratic Party, says the station leans to the right so much that “if I weren’t there, it would tilt so far it would topple over.” He’s heard only on Saturdays from 2 to 6 p.m.

Yet Press, Mazingo and others who bemoan KFI’s lack of balance believe the station is less interested in pushing a particular point of view than in responding to what produces ratings. And its more conservative stance has filled a void for many people who felt their views were not getting expression, given the perceived liberal bias of the mass media, Mazingo said.

“I think it’s a very wise move,” she said. “As always in regard to programming, we’re talking about the bottom line. The bottom line here is that it has been demonstrated that there is an audience out there--a substantial audience--for the expression of this kind of point of view. It’s simply a matter of appealing to the audience and giving them what they want. That sells ads and ads brings revenue and profits to the station.”

Limbaugh, whose program (heard weekdays from 9 a.m. to noon on KFI) is syndicated to 600 stations around the country, said that merely being conservative does not ensure success. “There are a lot of conservatives on the air everywhere and they’re not doing as well,” he said. “So there’s more to it than that, though there clearly is an ideological factor in the success of (my) program. But so what if KFI is (becoming more conservative)--what’s wrong with that?”

KFI officials maintain that being provocative, not simply ideological, is what has been the key to their success in differentiating the station from and overtaking its primary and once dominant competitor, KABC-AM (790).

Nevertheless, in taking a turn to the right, KFI has mirrored what talk-radio stations across the country are doing.

“A liberal point of view now on talk radio is the alternative point of view,” said Tom Leykis, a liberal host who was fired by KFI last September and replaced by Gates on weekday afternoons.

“There’s no doubt that talk radio nationwide has been taken over by the right wing,” Press said. “I listen to talk radio wherever I travel and it has become a sort of vehicle of conservative propaganda.” But KFI has never pressured him to change his views, he noted, and he believes the station’s basic motivation is to live up to its promotional tag of providing “more stimulating talk radio.”

Not everyone believes the situation is so benign.

Mark Schubb, West Coast director of the liberal media watchdog group Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, believes that, in addition to influencing the topics for discussion, the KFI hosts’ political orientation helps determine which callers get on the air.

“I have called into a lot of talk shows there and the screeners very aggressively pick and choose who gets on the air,” Schubb said. “If you have a really provocative viewpoint that doesn’t fit with the host’s, you won’t get on.”

KFI executives dispute that notion and contend that sparking such lively confrontations is their goal.

“I think the bottom line is to bring more listeners to the station, and whatever that takes, they’ll do,” afternoon host Gates explained. “They’re not there to set a political agenda, they’re there to sell the shows.”