Pig Virus. John Hayes. Tom Chiusano. Les Moonves.

The pantheon of dicks with which Stern has had to deal since I started listening in 1985.

BuffaloGeek mentions it at this post - CBS has sued Howard Stern for $500 million.

Now, what’s amusing about that figure is that it pretty much equals the deal Stern signed with Sirius. What’s also amusing is that CBS knew about Stern’s deal with Sirius since October 2004, and he played nice. He continued doing quality radio, day in and day out, for an increasingly hostile employer. When Stern announced the Sirius deal, big radio laughed - at the time, Sirius only had about 700,000 subscribers. Well, since that time, it’s grown to about 3 million subscribers, each of whom is paying $13/month. Do the math.

And Sat radio is head and shoulders superior - in terms of content - to what’s available on big terrestrial radio right now. They’re starting to get a bit scared.

Anyhow, it looks like the complaint alleges that Stern unjustly enriched himself by plugging Sirius (which he called “eh-eh-eh”) during the last days of the K-Rock show. When he hit a subscriber goal and was issued 34 million shares of stock, CBS says, that was proof of the enrichment.

The complaint also states that Stern improperly used CBS airtime to plug Sirius and his show there. It says that he acted in bad faith and didn’t produce the best show he could for CBS during the final months of his stay there. Which is total bullshit, because he continued to do a great show and pulled in stellar ratings throughout.

CBS made billions off of Stern. Now they have the audacity to bring this petty, vindictive lawsuit.

The best part about it is that it serves merely to draw attention to Stern and to Sirius. I wonder how many new subs they picked up over the last 24 hours?

UPDATE: FROM DRUDGE

“I’ve had a couple of business situations which I think are questionable [at CBS],” Stern warned.

CBS boss Les Moonves will be Exhibit A in Stern’s defense, the jock claims.

“I said, ‘Les, so how you gonna win a lawsuit?,” Stern recalls during a final meeting.

“‘You put me on David Letterman. You put me on 60 MINUTES. Why did you put me on these shows?’ Because the story of me going to SIRIUS brought in big ratings. So you can’t have it both ways.”

The lawsuit, which also names SIRIUS and Stern’s agent as defendants, claims Stern improperly used CBS radio’s air time to promote his new show with SIRIUS, which began last month. CBS also claims Stern discussed his plans with SIRIUS without disclosing them to CBS as required under his contract.

Stern charges: [Moonves] said to me at one point, he says to me, “You know, I have damages.” I said, “You do? What are they?” He goes, “Well, my radio division isn’t making money now.” I go, “Les, I’m allowed to leave.” He goes, “OK. OK. I don’t mean that,” he goes, “but you got bonus payments and stuff for selling radios.” I said, “You knew my deal. It was in the newspaper. It’s a matter of public record. And, by the way, p.s., I didn’t get any bonus payment. I got an accelerated payment.” He goes, “Oh, that’s different. Well, I guess, then if that’s the case I’m not gonna sue ya.” Doesn’t even matter. And then you leave the meeting. And then he goes, “I’m gonna sue ya.”……They had no damages. They sold a record amount of advertising. They made a fortune off of my last year there — so much so you barely heard the show, they ran so many commercials”

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