Tag: Rush Limbaugh

Why There Will Never Be Another Rush Limbaugh (Thank God)

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Before Fox News there was Rush Limbaugh. Before Breitbart, InfoWars and QAnon, there was Rush, purposefully polluting American minds for profit. Today’s billion-dollar, name-calling conservative media traces its origins to the rise of Limbaugh’s three-hour radio show. But now, with the host’s passing this year, the nationally syndicated program represents a propaganda void that’s unlikely to be filled. 

That’s not to say there will be fewer, less dangerous conservative voices in the media, spreading deliberate lies and dividing Americans. There won’t be a shortage there, particularly on cable TV, online, and with burgeoning podcasts. But it does mean that in the increasingly fractured media landscape that the uniquely powerful and national position that Limbaugh occupied on the AM dial will not be replaced. 

Premiere Networks, which syndicates the show, is currently airing Limbaugh reruns instead of hiring a new host for the noon-to-three time slot. That’s not ideal for radio station programmers across the country, since talk radio is supposed to revolve around current events. (Today on Rush Limbaugh: Why Obamacare will destroy America!) But are the existing options any better, in terms of finding new talkers who can command the attention of millions of right-wing followers each afternoon? Continue reading.

My grimly ironic conversation with Trump, the fourth horseman of our media apocalypse

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The Four Horsemen of our media apocalypse — Rush Limbaugh, Roger Ailes, Rupert Murdoch, and Donald Trump — have ridden roughshod over us this past half-century leaving their hoofprints on our politics, our culture, and our lives. Two of them are gone now, but their legacies, including the News Corporation, the Fox News empire, and a gang of broadcast barbarians will ensure that a lasting plague of misinformation, propaganda masquerading as journalism, and plain old fake news will be our inheritance.

The original Four Horsemen were biblical characters seen as punishments from God. By the time they became common literary and then film currency, they generally went by the names of Pestilence, War, Famine, and Death. Matching each with Limbaugh, Ailes, Murdoch, and Trump should prove a grisly but all-too-relevant parlor game. The originals were supposed to signal end times and sometimes, when I think about their modern American descendants, I wonder if we’re heading in just that direction.

Reflecting on the lives of those modern embodiments of (self-) punishment makes me wonder how we ever let them happen. Isn’t there any protection against evil of their sort in a democracy, even when you know about it early? Maybe when evil plays so cleverly into fears and resentments or is just so damn entertaining, not enough people can resist it. Hey, I even worked for one of the horsemen. It was my favorite job… until it wasn’t. Continue reading.

Poisoning the public mind: The dark legacy Rush Limbaugh leaves behind

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Unitarian Universalists like me try to rememberevery day, and put into practice every day, a set of seven principles. I’m telling you this, because the first principle has been on my mind since hearing news of the death of Rush Limbaugh, the right-wing broadcaster. Perhaps no one in the United States, not even Rupert Murdoch, the owner of Fox News, is more responsible for poisoning of the public mind, for the revival of fascist collectivism, the tolerance of cruelty and violence, the appetite for meanness, and the near-impossibility of solving social problems everyone faces in this country.

The first principle of Unitarian Universalism is “the inherent worth and dignity of every person.” This isn’t dogma. It’s a commitment toward a more fully realized morality. Not a private morality, mind you, though that too is important. For Unitarian Universalists like me, morality arises from the bonds of human relations, so we really are indebted to each other even if it’s simply seeing, recognizing and honoring our shared humanity. These seven principles, as I see it, are a modern revamp of the ancient pre-Christian creed of doing unto others as I would have done unto me.

You can see why I’m troubled. I would not want anyone to say, after I’m gone, that the country is better off. I would not want anyone to say, after I’m gone, that my legacy can’t follow me into the ground fast enough. There is a pronounced tension between my desire to treat everyone equally and speak truthfully about evil men. So I find myself returning to the principles of UUism, not because they will resolve the tension (I don’t think it can be), but because thinking about them, setting them side-by-side in this place, in this time for this purpose might be of some use to someone somewhere. Continue reading.

Trump spews election lies while eulogizing Rush Limbaugh on Fox News: ‘He was furious about it’

Former President Donald Trump made his first media appearance on Wednesday to eulogize conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh.

“He was special,” Trump said, recalling that he had given Limbaugh the Presidential Medal of Freedom. “Rush is irreplaceable. He had an audience that was massive.”

“He was a fantastic man, a fantastic talent and people, whether they loved him or not, they respected him,” he added. Continue reading.

Rambling Trump flops hard after Limbaugh asks how he will protect people with pre-existing conditions

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President Donald Trump rambled off-topic after Rush Limbaugh asked him about health care protections for those with pre-existing conditions.

The president and his Republican allies are keen to undo the Affordable Care Act, which could place health care out of reach for Americans with pre-existing conditions, and the conservative Limbaugh asked Trump to explain his plan.

“This is [from] a woman in Massachusetts named Kathy,” Limbaugh said, reading the listener’s question. “‘I’m glad that you and the lady are recovering from COVID, so happy you’re our president thank you for all you do to defend us. Questions about health care and pre-existing conditions are very important to me and a lot of Americans. I believe you said pre-existing conditions will be covered in your health care plan, but please could you explain this a little more because there are a lot of people saying you’re not going to cover pre-existing conditions and I wish you need to get your message out since this that the Democrats are trying to malign you on this.” Continue reading.

Tracing the roots of city boy Trump’s racist ‘suburban dream’ nonsense — all the way to Rush Limbaugh

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It’s no surprise that the current occupant of the White House is running for reelection on racism. Given his track record, it would be a surprise if he weren’t. Donald Trump’s racist rhetoric has always centered on fearmongering around crime, going back not just to the start of his presidential campaign in 2015, but back to the 1980s. Now he’s at it again, this time with a focus on the suburbs and, in anachronistic language that evokes June Cleaver or Carol Brady, ”suburban housewives.”

Based on his rambling, Trump seems to think the suburbs are still filled with white women in aprons making their kids PB&J on Wonder BreadTM with the crusts cut off, dutifully fixing after-work martinis for their husbands. Trump thinks he can scare those white-lady aprons right off with tales of Black and brown criminals descending upon their neighborhoods, and present himself as the white (orange?) savior who will keep their neighborhoods safe by keeping them white. This particular dog whistle is not one Trump invented, of course. Among others, Rush Limbaugh has been blowing it for years.

Let’s start with Trump’s current campaign. On June 30, President Shitgibbon tweeted that he was “studying the AFFH housing regulation that is having a devastating impact” on the suburbs. He also claimed that his opponent, former vice president Joe Biden, wants to make things “much worse”—correction: “MUCH WORSE.” Trump added that he “may END!” the AFFH. Continue reading.

Rush Limbaugh Revives Crude Sexist Smear Against Sen. Harris

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) is widely seen as a leading choice to be Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden’s running mate. As Biden moves closer to announcing his running mate, Rush Limbaugh revived a smear against Harris that implies that she advanced her career by dating a prominent politician.

Limbaugh has launched sexist attacks on Democratic politicians, family members, and aides for decades, frequently tying the attacks to personal relationships and marriages. This was particularly true of Hillary Clinton, for example.

The sexist narrative against Harris, pushed in graphic terms by a variety of fringe right-wing figures before spreading to Fox News, involved her past relationship back in the 1990s with Willie Brown, a former speaker of the California Assembly and mayor of San Francisco. During Harris’ own presidential campaign in 2019, Fox News personality Tomi Lahren tweeted a message at her going well beyond previous innuendos on the network and instead used language that could be traced right back to the fever swamps: “Kamala did you fight for ideals or did you sleep your way to the top with Willie Brown?” Continue reading.

Rush Limbaugh Is Talk Radio’s Coronavirus Super-Spreader

On February 24, as cases of COVID-19 were just emerging in the United States, radio host Rush Limbaugh declared, “The coronavirus is the common cold, folks.” The dangerously inaccurate comparison prompted a wave of criticism, yet Limbaugh doubled down. The next day, he told his audience that he refused to “join a panic” over the virus, claiming, “I have no interest in lying to you about anything.” In fact, that is exactly what Limbaugh did for the next five months.

Few media figures have done as much as Limbaugh to downplay and distort the facts surrounding a virus that as of publication has killed more than 140,000 Americans. The host has claimed that the virus has been “weaponized” to damage President Donald Trump politically, spread conspiracy theories about inflated death counts, attacked members of the coronavirus task force, referred to masks as a “symbol of fear,” and argued that “No matter how many people die from coronavirus, it’s not going to equate to the damage done to the U.S. economy” by lockdowns.

This misinformation had an impact. One study showed that individuals who listened to Limbaugh or watched Fox News were more likely to believe the threat of the virus was exaggerated. And for an audience that skews older and is therefore more susceptible to potential health consequences, Limbaugh’s rhetoric has been especially irresponsible. Continue reading.

Limbaugh baselessly claims Fauci is a ‘Clinton sympathizer’ who wants to ‘get rid’ of Trump

AlterNet logoRight wing talk show host Rush Limbaugh baselessly accused Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, of being a “Hillary Clinton sympathizer” who wants “to get rid of Donald Trump” during a Tuesday broadcast.

After claiming that the media tries to use its press briefings to undermine President Donald Trump, Limbaugh accused ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Jonathan Karl of bringing in a reporter from Phoenix TV, a privately owned company stationed in Hong Kong with connections to the Chinese government. Limbaugh claimed that Fauci “gave Karl a-thumbs up, like a ‘job well done’ kind of thing” after the press briefing.

“We’ve got all of these Hillary Clinton sympathizers still in the medical expert team here, and we know that one thing has not changed,” Limbaugh added. “And that is these people’s desire — above everything else — to get rid of Donald Trump.” Continue reading.

‘It’s Time To Listen To The Facts’: Progressive Group’s Ads Call Out Rush Limbaugh On Coronavirus

314 Action, which backs scientists for office, is airing the spots during Limbaugh’s broadcasts in 14 states.

A progressive group plans to run ads during Rush Limbaugh’s radio show in 14 states, aiming to counter the popular ultra-conservative talk-show host’s misinformation about the severity of the coronavirus and his criticisms of government scientists.

“Fox News and their friends ― and I mean that broadly, not in reference to the program ― has turned a global pandemic into a litmus test about loyalty to Donald Trump,” said Shaughnessy Naughton, a chemist and former Democratic congressional candidate who leads the group 314 Action, which is focused on backing candidates with a background in science. Limbaugh, she said, is “endangering the lives of his own listeners.”

Limbaugh, along with other Trump-aligned conservative media figures, has repeatedly aired skepticism of the deadliness and seriousness of the coronavirus pandemic, which has now claimed nearly 11,000 American lives and has sent the country into an all-but-certain recession as millions of Americans stay home in an effort to limit the strain on the country’s health care system.  Continue reading.