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What a Difference: The Impact of Rush
Human Events ^ | July. 30, 2008 | Dick Morris

Posted on 07/30/2008 8:52:08 AM PDT by Reagan Man

I distinctly remember when my phone at my Washington hotel room rang at 1 AM during the spring of 1996. A distraught President Clinton was calling. “We’re getting killed on radio,” he blurted into the phone as soon as I picked it up.

“What do you mean?” I answered blearily trying to get a grip on what he was talking about.

“Hillary’s mothe r just drove here from Pennsylvania and all during the trip she heard them saying the most awful things about me on radio,” the president explained.

“On whose show?” I probed.

“Rush Limbaugh,” Clinton replied.

“He’s been on your case for years,” I answered.

“Yeah, but its getting serious,” he insisted.

The next morning, I got in touch with Terry McAuliffe at the Democratic National Committee to discuss setting up a war room to feed talking points to liberal talk show hosts to counter the pernicious influence of Rush!

Now that the wind blows at my back – no longer in my face – Rush sure comes in handy when its time to put the liberals in their place. There is, quite simply, nobody like him.

After all, before there was talk radio, there was Rush.

And before there was Fox News, there was Rush.

And before there was NewsMax, there was Rush.

And before their was Sean Hannity or Neil Boortz or Michael Medved or Dennis Prager or Mike Gallagher, there was Rush.

No other modern political commentator can lay claim to founding a branch of political discourse.

Honoring Rush for his contributions to America is not an empty exercise. At this moment, the liberal forces that hope to come to power with Barack Obama are set on a course to destroy the very institution that Rush founded – talk radio. Through a rigid application of the so-called fairness doctrine, they threaten to drive talk radio off the air and onto the Internet. Who knows if the listeners and the advertisers will follow?

Their goal is not to assure that liberals will be heard on the airwaves, but to guarantee that conservatives will not. The liberals know that left wing talk radio does not attract an audience and is a financial black hole. The collapse of Air America attests to that fact. NPR, black radio, Hispanic stations, and radio aimed at young people creams off the bulk of the would-be audience for liberal talk radio. So if stations can only air Rush or Sean or Neil if they also air the likes of Al Franken, they’ll probably cancel all talk radio and play music instead.

In our new book Fleeced, my wife Eileen McGann and I also raise the prospect that the left will seek to enforce sections of the FCC law which require “community participation” in the “ownership and management” of radio stations. As the National Review has pointed out, this can be a cover for infiltrating boards of directors and programming departments with liberals – an effort to hijack talk radio.

The liberals wouldn’t be trying to destroy talk radio if it weren’t working. And it was Rush who founded it and Rush who still leads the parade. Having attempted to discredit him, imprison him, silence him, or cow him, they have failed miserably. And, as a result, Rush still rules….and rocks!


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: anniversary; clinton; dickmorris; rmthread; rush; rushlimbaugh; talkradio; tribute
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To: MaineConservative

Friendly advice... Tone it down... Violates the policy, and you could easily get booted.


81 posted on 07/30/2008 12:08:30 PM PDT by NYC Republican (Infuriate the MSM- Vote for McCain)
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To: NYC Republican

Do you want the votes or not?


82 posted on 07/30/2008 12:17:50 PM PDT by donna (The Latino community holds the election in its hands. -Barack Hussein Obama)
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To: NYC Republican

I will..sorry if I offend anyone here!!


83 posted on 07/30/2008 12:22:21 PM PDT by MaineConservative (Charlie Summers -- an Iraqi Vet and businessman for Maine's CD-1)
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To: donna

Savage listeners votes??? Not I, if I have to kiss the rear of Mike Weiner to be elected - I would not do it. He is HATEFUL and I think he is JEALOUS too.


84 posted on 07/30/2008 12:25:16 PM PDT by MaineConservative (Charlie Summers -- an Iraqi Vet and businessman for Maine's CD-1)
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To: MaineConservative
That whelp is your son?

Unfortunate.

You both have similar, if poor, writing styles.

85 posted on 07/30/2008 12:27:40 PM PDT by humblegunner
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To: isrul
Then you can't have listened to him very much.

He is a very vocal Libertarian. Very vocal.

86 posted on 07/30/2008 12:29:40 PM PDT by AnAmericanMother (Ministrix of ye Chase, TTGS Ladies' Auxiliary (recess appointment))
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To: dynachrome; whatisthetruth
"I will say Rush is a bit better since the 2006 elections. (water carrier, anyone?)"


87 posted on 07/30/2008 12:29:57 PM PDT by MrCFdovnh
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To: MaineConservative

All you have to do is save your insults for Obama - the man who will actually have power over you.


88 posted on 07/30/2008 12:30:24 PM PDT by donna (The Latino community holds the election in its hands. -Barack Hussein Obama)
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To: donna

“Do you want the votes or not?”

What does that mean? Is that some kind of threat? Will Savage’s listeners vote for Obama if Savage tells them to? I don’t think you’re helping Savage very much.


89 posted on 07/30/2008 12:43:21 PM PDT by ozzymandus
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To: MrCFdovnh

Ahhh... Yet another Weiner-ite... Welcome to a thread that’s NOT insulated with Savage-bots.


90 posted on 07/30/2008 12:45:51 PM PDT by NYC Republican (Infuriate the MSM- Vote for McCain)
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To: humblegunner

If you have no use for radio, why are you commenting on a Rush thread? Instead of insulting people’s kids, shouldn’t you and the rest of the trailer trash be down by the river shooting beer cans off each other’s heads?


91 posted on 07/30/2008 12:46:05 PM PDT by ozzymandus
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To: ChinaGotTheGoodsOnClinton

If that happens, (God Forbid), I’m buying stock in satellite radio, and the new Clear Channel Internet Radio neither of which are controlled by the Federal Government.

Conservative Talk Show commentators revived AM radio and they’ll be the founding fathers of alternate communication.

The Rats are dangerous. If they do gain control of the White House and the Congress, get ready to fight for your freedoms, because they’ll do whatever it takes to stay in power. They are a dictators, and the MSM are their storm troopers. Any one who can’t see that is blind, igorant, or both. I’m afraid that there are a lot out there like that. Hopefully they are in the minority come November. Pray for America.


92 posted on 07/30/2008 12:59:26 PM PDT by Yankereb
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To: isrul

The individuals named are not the point of the story ... you may like Prager but the others all attract hugh audiences to the Rush-founded medium of talk radio. Among them, they get their conservative views broadcast to a vast cross-section of the population. Rush doesn’t attract all conservatives, no single talker does, but among them there’s an audience that didn’t exist before Rush.


93 posted on 07/30/2008 1:02:29 PM PDT by EDINVA
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To: NYC Republican; humblegunner; fishtank
Great... one of the most influential conservatives in the country, and you want him silenced... Fess up, you’re really a liberal, aren’t you?

Hey NYC, they can't help it. You can't fix stupid...

94 posted on 07/30/2008 2:27:18 PM PDT by BlueMondaySkipper (Involuntarily subsidizing the parasite class since 1981)
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To: BlueMondaySkipper

Exactly! Savage is a disgrace, and some of these sheeple follow him like lemmings


95 posted on 07/30/2008 2:43:31 PM PDT by NYC Republican (Infuriate the MSM- Vote for McCain)
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To: MrCFdovnh

....too skinny........


96 posted on 07/30/2008 2:47:21 PM PDT by fishtank (FIRST defeat Imam Mahdi Obama. - THEN resist McCain. -- A good plan.)
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To: BlueMondaySkipper; NYC Republican
You can't fix stupid...

Pot-Kettle-Black?

97 posted on 07/30/2008 3:34:12 PM PDT by whatisthetruth
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To: MrCFdovnh

LMAO!


98 posted on 07/30/2008 3:35:48 PM PDT by whatisthetruth
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To: BlueMondaySkipper
You can't fix stupid...

So anyone who says anything negative about Limbaugh is stupid?

Really?

That's amazing. It must be nice to live in a safe, well-defined little world like that.

99 posted on 07/30/2008 4:16:42 PM PDT by humblegunner
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To: ozzymandus; Eaker; Allegra; Squantos; Xenalyte; TheMom; pax_et_bonum; eastforker; thackney; ...
shouldn’t you and the rest of the trailer trash be down by the river shooting beer cans off each other’s heads?

Has this guy got me pegged or what!!??? ;-)

100 posted on 07/30/2008 5:14:30 PM PDT by humblegunner
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