Clear Channel Marches Backward

Perhaps the Sirius (SIRI - commentary - Cramer's Take)-to-Comcast (CMCSA - commentary - Cramer's Take) analogy isn't fair. It's not fair because when I look at Clear Channel (CCU - commentary - Cramer's Take) and I look at Sirius, I would rather buy Sirius at $7 than Clear Channel at $32.

Clear Channel's giving you everything you want today: a dividend, more paper, lots of unlocked value -- everything but earnings. After its one-day pop, I wouldn't want to be near this stock because the core business seems to be going backward.

Once again, we will hear all sorts of great things today from Clear Channel. Of course, they will be the opposite of the great things we used to hear; notably, that as terrific as the synergy between its business units was, it is even better not to have synergy, to split into two units, Outdoor and Entertainment. As fantastic as the union between promote and play was, it is even better not to promote and play.

Thanks! Terrific! Great!

In the end, we like stocks for growth. Sirius, even if it brags about losses, has the kind of pure growth that I like.

Clear Channel, it has that oxymoron, negative growth.

Bottom line: Sell Clear Channel, buy Sirius -- if those are your only choices.

Random musings: Silver Lake, the leader of the consortium of private equity firms trying to acquire SunGuard (SDS - commentary - Cramer's Take), is having problems getting financing for the deal. Now we learn from BusinessWeek they might do Sun Microsystems (SUNW - commentary - Cramer's Take)? Huh? Sell Sun.

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At the time of publication, Cramer was long Comcast.

James J. Cramer is a director and co-founder of TheStreet.com. He contributes daily market commentary for TheStreet.com's sites and serves as an adviser to the company's CEO. Outside contributing columnists for TheStreet.com and RealMoney.com, including Cramer, may, from time to time, write about stocks in which they have a position. In such cases, appropriate disclosure is made. To see his personal portfolio and find out what trades Cramer will make before he makes them, sign up for Action Alerts PLUS. While he cannot provide personalized investment advice or recommendations, he invites you to send comments on his column to [e-mail]. Listen to Cramer's RealMoney Radio show on your computer; just click here. Watch Cramer on "Mad Money" at 6 p.m. ET weeknights on CNBC. Click here to order Cramer's latest book, "Real Money: Sane Investing in an Insane World," click here to get his second book, "You Got Screwed!" and click here to order Cramer's autobiography, "Confessions of a Street Addict."