Posted on 08/03/2007 2:50:58 PM PDT by Cat loving Texan
By E. J. Dionne Jr. Friday, August 3, 2007; A15
Perhaps you missed it, but Wednesday was the 19th anniversary of Rush Limbaugh's radio show. Limbaugh was celebrating his ripe old age, in media years, in the same week that liberal blog fans were trekking to Chicago for the YearlyKos convention. Therein lies one of the most important stories in American politics.
Make no mistake: From the beginning, Limbaugh was a revolutionary figure. He befuddled Democrats and the journalistic establishment because he was an up-to-date throwback. The large audience he won on the right marked the return in the United States of openly partisan mass media, a 19th-century phenomenon that had all but disappeared in the late 20th century.
Limbaugh is not primarily about information, though he freely uses even those bits that come his way courtesy of dreaded "liberal" media sources. His goal is mobilization, and he has been extremely good at it. He spawned conservative imitators in media markets all over the nation and aroused a faithful band of Dittoheads who despise all things liberal and Democratic.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Right, because, prior to that, there was no leftward tilt to mass media...
The large audience he won on the right marked the return in the United States of openly partisan mass media, a 19th-century phenomenon that had all but disappeared in the late 20th century.
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BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. These SOBs will never admit their partisanship. Two words — Dan Rather. Two more - WASHINGTON POST.
KOS seems to be a good example of good or bad publicity not mattering, if only you can get your name out there.
It will implode in time just like every other liberal whack-job effort.
The column doesn’t even make sense. C’mon, EJ, you can do better.
How do “hits” work ? does 500k hits mean 500k different computers ?
I guess most people mispronounce it as Daily “Cause”
when it’s really “Kose” (short for MarKOS). Well, then,
I feel pretty comfortable calling it Daily BLows...
When the Soviet Union was still around, Communist sympathizers had to keep their sentiments quiet. Now, the Reds think that enough time has passed that they can come out of the closet.
*** These SOBs will never admit their partisanship. Two words — Dan Rather. Two more - WASHINGTON POST.***
Or an even sorrier sack of **** named Walter Cronkite way back in 1968.
“Limbaugh even blamed the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, on a president who had been out of office for eight months. I’m still waiting for his apology.”
I don’t remember Rush or anyone really blaming Clinton for 9/11, UNTIL after so many Democrats / liberals / radicals began blaming Bush for “not connecting the dots” about the plans for 9/11. Much of the planning for 9/11, we learned later, happened while Clinton was president. And the string of terrorist attacks in the ‘90s, including the 1st World Trade Center bombing, were not taken by Clinton as a wake up call about the threats we faced.
The only “apology” that anyone owes to Clinton about 9/11 is that the person most at fault for 9/11 is bin Laden, and not any president or anyone else in government.
Kos is short for Kossacks as in DailyKossacks.
Anyone who believes that the MSM was not partisan should be treated to videos of the talking heads during the first Reagan presidential election. They were visibly shaken, upset, and sad. You could just tell that they were announcing the worst news of their lives.
And no, the news was never partisan </sarc>. We all “know” about the Watergate break in, but even few Freepers are aware of WHY the Nixon administration was willing to take the risk of breaking into Dem offices.
The original break-in was scheduled in order to locate proof that the Dems were running a prostitution ring out of their offices. You would have thought that that would be a juicy tidbit for evening news, but it was swept under the rug.
With apologies to the Kossacks for the comparison, of course...
Total B.S. -- unless you want to just say, yeah a few personalities may have tried to jump on the wagon.
There were thousands of conservative personalities who finally had an opportunity as the suppression of free speech ended.
The fact is, the most oft-heard caller comments in the early days of modern talk radio were "I didn't know others believed as I do! You're saying what I've been saying for years, I didn't know others knew that!"
IOW there were tens of millions ready to say Ditto! to those statements and who shared traditional beliefs and faith in America! The America.
The employee of the newspaper was happy when the majority was the silenced majority and news and issues weren't so "complicated."
Modern talk radio (and the Internet) marked the return in the United States of openly partisan mass media, a 19th-century phenomenon that had all but disappeared in the late 20th century.
He's got that right. We have a free press again!
E.J. just doesn’t get it.
That’s the problem with Liberals. The only people in their world that are entitled to scrutiny are conservatives. Liberals give their ideological brethren a pass because they believe wanting to do the right thing is equivalent to doing the right thing. In their world emotion trumps action, intentions trump results.
And as far as the Mr. Dionne’s whining for a bygone era where partisanship was less prominent, what he is telling his readers is that he pines for the world he grew up in. He pines for the time when his fellow liberals ruled the world and conservatives knew their place...silent and acquiescing.
Sorry, E.J., but Rush does't owe you anything. If anyone owes this country an apology it is Bill Clinton and his foreign policy team. It was they and not Rush Limbaugh who relegated international terrorism to the back burner.
He's right about this, actually.
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