About Howie:

Until December 6th, 2006, Howie was a liberal-centrist radio talk show host in Providence, Rhode Island.  In the Fall of 2006, corporate/political forces decided that the free speech provisions of the US Constitution didn't really mean all that much, and they decided to silence all but the most ultra-conservative voices on talk radio in Rhode Island.  Both Howie, who had been on the air for fifteen months, and his close friend and mentor, ex-RI State Attorney General Arlene Violet, who had hosted the talk show following Howie's for seventeen years, were summarily fired.  Arlene received a 30-day advance "gag-order" notice required by her contract, but Howie's advance notice consisted of "Nice show today, Howie!  Now leave immediately and don't come back." 

Worse even than that was the fact that Arlene was told to leave the next day, which was a day earlier than she had been told, and she was escorted out of the building!!  As Harry Chapin stated in his song 'W.O.L.D', "That's how this business goes!".
Before that, Howie was an air traffic controller for 33 1/2 years, most of it spent at T.F. Green Airport (PVD) in Providence, Rhode Island.  During that time, he was a co-founder of NATCA, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, which is the federal union that represents the nation’s air traffic control workforce, as well as several other federal professions.  He served the first regional vice president of the NATCA New England Region, and also served as local president at PVD for fourteen years and alternate regional vice-president for 11 years.  He retired from federal service in 2005.

After retirement, he was asked to be a radio talk show host in the local Providence, RI market. As stated above, he served in that capacity for fifteen months, after which the station he worked for decided to shift to the ultra extreme right, and save salary money in the process. Howie and his mentor, Arlene Violet were shown the door, leaving only cost-free syndicated ultra-extreme right national programs and a single right-wing local host.

Howie was born in New York City, and from the age of almost seven, has lived in Spain, Holland, Venezuela, and Puerto Rico, when he graduated college and originally was an air-taxi pilot before becoming an air traffic controller in the FAA. He also spent four years in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam conflict.

Howie is married with two grown daughters. He is a Harley Davidson rider (see photos on www.howiebarte.com) and loves Sushi and Sashimi. He self-describes as a liberal-centrist with libertarian tendencies, particularly when it comes to our legislators making laws that supposedly protect us from ourselves. He is willing to pay his fair share of taxes, but believes that corruption and inefficiency in government should be financed solely by the jerks that pass these laws and skim off the top (or even the bottom).



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