Rush: On Top Because of Courage

by Phyllis Schlafly, Eagle Forum: Rush Limbaugh's 20-year domination of talk radio is a remarkable testament to the durability of conservative ideas as well as to Rush's skill and courage in explaining controversial conservative principles in an entertaining style. Rush has been the top-rated radio talk show since rankings started 17 years ago, and nobody else is even close. Listeners realize his extraordinary talent for timing and relevance anytime he uses a substitute host.

One of the secrets of Rush's success is that he is not intimidated into appeasing the organized pressure groups that frighten so many others into platitudinous mush. He takes them all on: the radical feminists, the wacky environmentalists, the open-borders crowd, and even George W. Bush's deviation from conservatism. From the get-go, even in the feminists' glory days of the 1980s when they were fawned over by the national media, Rush was not scared off. He is one of a handful of men in public life willing to stand up to the feminists. When feminists make outrageous demands, Rush calls them feminazis. When feminists insist that he apologize for a remark contrary to their agenda, he makes a joke about it but does not apologize. . . .

Rush is the most important and influential conservative since Ronald Reagan. It's astounding that after 20 years on the air, he continues to draw an audience of 20 million people per week. Without a script, Rush can hold an audience for three hours a day, five days a week. He entertains, informs and teaches with plenty of solid, fact-based arguments that, for many Americans, is the only conservative message they ever hear. . . .

Liberals can do well reading a speech from a teleprompter (look closely at Barack Obama's televised coverage and note the teleprompter placed inconspicuously in the corner of the screen). But very few liberals are sufficiently well informed and internally confident to talk for three hours on a live microphone without goofing, and even take random questions from callers. Many others are afraid to criticize the media darling, Barack Obama, but Rush says, "I'm not going to bow to political correctness. I'm going to do it with humor. I'm going to focus on the issues. I'm going to react to what he says. Simple."

But it isn't simple. Before Rush, there wasn't interesting talk radio. There were only sour liberals who pontificated to a shrinking audience. Rush turned AM radio into a lively genre where liberals are completely outclassed because they are boring, just regurgitating tired notions that are a proven failure and can't be intelligently defended. Al Sharpton says that Rush is "the most dangerous guy we have to deal with on the right." Indeed, he is.

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