M broadcasting from his studio in I don't know, some fucking place with one liver tight behind his back to make it fair for all of the narcotics in his system. Robert Evans, you don't know, you don't like me, You don't you don't like my my pseudo Russian intro stuffing. Not on board, not not a fan of that introduction. Um, this is behind the bastards. This is behind the Bastards. A podcast that will never be as big as The Russia Limbaugh Show because Sophie won't let me use cultic mind control techniques on our audience. Um, that is inaccurate. Feel free. Okay, well we're back. The man you just heard is Paul F. Tompkins, our guest for this exploration of the life and times of Rush Limbaugh. Everyone, Hey, Paul, how are you feeling? How are you? How are you doing? An hour and a half into talking about l Rush Bow Feeling great? Feeling great, feeling. I feel energized that he is dead. Yeah, I I too feel happy that he's dead. It's fun. It hasn't worn off yet, it has it never will. It will always be good that he's dead. There's a few people who are like that where it's like every now and then, I'm just like, think back to the fact that Ryan hard Hydrick is dead, and it's like good, good for him, you know, good for him. So, once upon a time, Paul, the United States used to have a thing called the fairness Doctrine. Now, in short, the fairness doctrine required anyone with a broadcast license to present controversial issues in a balanced way, providing roughly equivalent time to present both sides of an issue. And then this was obviously a flawed rule. Some issues, for example, like climate change don't have two sides, right, there may be different sides, but like what the right responses, but there's not two sides to the reality of climate change. Um, and while the but while the you know, the fairness starts. So the Fahren's doctrine not a not a perfect not a silver bullet, uh sort of of of thing of a jig. But while it was in place, right wing media in the form that we have today did not and could not exist now since the dawn of the fake news era which we're in now, a lot of folks have talked about the time of guys like Walter Cronkite, right, When when you had newsmen who basically every American trusted, who could shift massive national issues just based on their considered opinion. Right Cronkite calls Vietnam a quagmire, Suddenly national opinion on its switches. Um. And a big part of why these guys were trusted is they were required to lend equal weight to both sides. They couldn't just be partisan shills. Now, this generally meant that they would give kind of the conservative opinion and the liberal opinion as opposed to the far left of the far right. But it did mean that you you you didn't have something as unbalanced as Fox News right right. It's like the voter guide you get, yeah, exactly. It gives you the measured and says some people say this, say this yeah. And as flawed as the fairness doctrine was, it was part of why most Americans lived in a semi unified media ecosystem back in up prior to nineteen eighties seven. Now, obviously this did not last. In nineteen eight seven, the FCC, as the result of a court case, the FCC rejected the fairness doctrine. Conservatives cheered this on because fair media was seen by arch conservatives guys like Roger Stone as a big reason why Americans had broadly supported the impeachment of Richard Nixon at the end of the Watergate investigation. Watergate is one of these situations where when the investigation starts, the vast majority of conservatives are against it. Right, don't think Nixon did anything wrong. The evidence comes out in opinion shifts, and it becomes very popular to get Nixon out of office. Um, this is the last time that happens. Right, This is the last time that like people's minds get changed by the facts on a political issue in America. Um. And it's the last time this happens. Because the right goes after the fairness doctor, and after about a decade or so of fighting, they're able to get it killed. Um. And the end of the fairness doctrine was the necessary precursor to the creation of a holy, separate, walled garden of right wing content, which was seen by dudes like Roger Ales as a necessary step to protecting right wing voters from ever learning about other opinions, which would, they believed protect the next criminal, white right wing president from impeachment. Now, after Limbaugh's death, the new York Times let Ben Shapiro, noted novelist, write a column about his professional idol. Benny Shapps called the fairness doctrine quote, a standard that in practice allowed for the domination of broadcast media by liberals, with sporadic commentary by conservatives. Us of an imitation, It's it's so rush. Limball was aware from the beginning that his whole career hinged on the fairness doctrines. Death with his and like he starts being national voice in nineteen eighty nine, two years after the end of the fairness doctrine. That's not a coincidence. Now, with his unparalleled national platform and his status as a chief thought leader of the American right, Limbaugh went about turning the fairness doctrine into his main boogeyman. I found a Vanity Fair article from two thousand nine that lays this out quite well. Quote. The single most important issue in Russia's radio career is now among the hot button issues and conservative politics. The fairness doctrine a formalized, fair and balanced rule for covering the controversial issues on the nation's airwaves, which the Reagan FCC killed in nineteen seven. The most liberal wing of the Democratic Party, which puts substantial blame on talk radio for a generation of conservative dominance in Washington, wants to revive the doctrine, which would pretty handily destroy conservative talk. According to the official Seapack polling of its members, restoring the Fairest Fairness Doctrine is the third most significant Democratic Congress policy initiative opposed by the right wing raking, only behind expanding government in public healthcare. So yeah, there is with Russia's orchestration, a rapidness to the cause. Opposing the Fairness Doctrine is up there with opposing abortion. And he's you know, he's it's really him that's responsible for making this such a popular issue. It starts off as a thing that kind of high up extreme right wingers, guys who had been Nixon's right hand men push because they want to protect the next guy like Nixon. And it gets popular though because of Rush Limbaugh, because he sells it to the American conservative mainstream. It's funny, like the sorry but the idea that like with the Nixon era after Watergate, Nixon, when Nixon resigns, that is maybe the last time that there were real consequences for any for the for the highest office. Where after that, you know, Clintons impeachment, Trump's impeachment, whatever, it doesn't mean anything. It's it really is just like an asterisk in history, you know, essentially of saying like, just so you know, people, some people thought this was bad, and uh they and they said so officially, but there's no real consequence for any of this. So really what they're doing is saying, we cannot Nixon should not have had a consequence. We got to make sure that there's never a consequence ever again. And unfortunately that meant for everybody for like for I don't know what if because if it didn't happen, if it didn't happen after Bush, which there was not even an impeachment for Bush, like for the Iraq war that that we all know now was bogus. If there was never gonna be a consequence for that, then it worked and there there and and from now on, Like when is it ever going to happen again? When if it didn't happen, then when is it ever going to happen again? Yeah? I don't think it can because this propaganda eca system turns out people who would fight to the death rather than have somebody who on paper, is supposed to agree with them face consequences for blatantly criminal activity, right, and then and then it also it conditions whether whether you believe, whether you believe in whether you're you're on Russia's side or not, whether you're on that side of things or not. It conditions everybody to feel like it's okay that there's no consequences, because what are you gonna do? Yeah, it's just the way things are. You can draw a fucking line between kind of the things that Rush starts because it has an impact on on liberals and the left too. You've got this. It's it's Beau and and it's it's because obviously with the fairness doctrine, nobody ever heard anything from the far left right the far left, and in fact was criminally prosecuted a lot of times for their opinions in this period. Um. But the positive thing about the fairness doctrine is that it was a large part of why there was a broadly agreed upon understanding of the basic a basic reality in the United States, right that we don't have anymore. And when you lose that, I kind of think when you lose that, the only like things inevitably escalate to deadly violence. Yeah. Um, and that's bad, right, not that again, under the fairness doctrine, Americans were led into Vietnam, were let into Grenado, were led into Panama. We're letting to all these horrible, horrible things. Obviously we like it. It did not. It did not mean that Americans had an accurate understanding of the world. But when they had an inaccurate understanding of the world, it was still broadly similar. Right, And that is better than where we are now. I guess I think it is at least less toxic that. I guess you could argue the United States had more power, the government had more power to pursue violent activity overseas and stuff. I don't know, I don't know. It's it's a complicated issue. But whatever, whatever you can say about Russ Limball, he was not a dumb man. Uh. He was a huge bigot though, and that and that came any New York Times right up. Makes it clear that, among other things, he was quick to realize that rampant misogyny was an incredible marketing tactic. This was, as we discussed in our last episode, always cloaked in a thick haze of irony. Quote this is Rush. We know that women in groups, same office, same dormitory, same barracks eventually have synchronized minstrel cycles. We also know that there's this thing called PMS, and we know what turns a woman into a Hellian. We know that PMS has been used as a defense against a charge of murder. Here's my proposal. We have fifty two battalions. We can prepare the nations that will have on any given week of the year, a combat ready battalion of Amazons to go into battle. Imagine that your manual, Antonio Noriega, you were in the Papal Nuncial in Panama City. You feel safe. All of a sudden you hear this blood curdling scream outside. I am outraged, and there is Sergeant Major mole Yard leading a battalion of Amazons with PMS over the hill. That would be enough to scare the pants off of anybody, everybody. I mean, it's like, it's just not even that funny, That's what it's not. That's one of the things that sucks about Rush Limbaugh is that he for somebody who did a lot of bits and you know, I was supposedly doing satire. He just wasn't that funny. He wasn't. It's just that he was saying the bigoted, terrible things that a lot of bad people wanted to say, and the fact that it was so horrible, and the fact that it scratched their I made them laugh and made them think he was a genius because somebody was finally telling them it was okay to be as shitty as they kind of wanted to be from the beginning, because you put the tiniest effort into constructing these bits. Yeah, and it's it's it's the same thing with all of these You've got this kind of strain of comedians who thinks that it's important that they be allowed to say the N word. Not a single one of them has ever told a good joke involving the N word. Right, it's not funny. You're just going for shock value, right, that's all you're trying to do. And that can be There's not that. No good humor comes from shock value. But again, I haven't heard a single good joke from a white comedian involving the in word. Um, not that it would be appropriate then, but I haven't heard one. You know, like so from the beginning, the villains of the Rush limbaugh expanded universe were, as The New York Times explained, quote black activists, gay activists, abortion rights activists, homeless activists, animal rights activists, militant vegetarians, environmentalists, artists with erotic tendencies, and above all, the now Game gang that's the National Organization of women. His hatred Russia said that his hatred for these people caused him an uncontrollable urge to tweak. Quote. The simple fact of the matter Limbaugh is apt to inform dolphins, savers and tree lovers is that we are human beings, and we are the most powerful, smartest species, and we can damn well do whatever we want. And you can draw a line from this kind of the way he's phrasing things. Here's like it's stupid to care about the environment and animals because we're more powerful than them. Um to the like the ship that Identity Europa and Patriot Front, these like explicitly fascist organizations exist. Now we'll put up these signs, like these posters of the United States that say not stolen conquered right where it's like, fuck the indigenous people, we beat them and so we deserve all this right. That's just an extension of what Russia is saying, you know, and he the fact that he made that mainstream is why they have a chance of making that mainstream, you know. And the idea that it's so that they that they that he phrased it as this uh matter of personal choice, um, rather than like just common sense practical thinking, you know, like do you really want to do you really want to put your trash in two separate trash cands? You know, And it's like, well, it's not so much that it's a hassle. It's that we're gonna make earth unlivable for ourselves, not that we're like, you know, fuck you the dodo you should have you should have had claws or something. It's that we're fucking ourselves. Like that's why why has that been? Why is that so hard to understand? It's so hard to comply with and so hard to uh uh keep as part of the narrative when because the logical extension is, what do you care You'll be dead by the time by the time this ship, by the time this ship affects people in in a meaningful way to to you, a meaningful way, you'll be dead, So what do you care? And and these are people that are all allegedly all about the family, and it's like, well, I mean, do you plan on having grandchildren, great grandchildren, great great grandchildren? Like do you care about what? I don't know? I don't, I don't. I'm not being funny now and I'm just being just being whiny. But what you're getting at, Paul, and what the core of this is is that Rush doesn't believe in positive things. And I don't mean positive in a good sense. I mean he doesn't believe in things that should be done. He believes in tweaking people. That is what he turns American Conservatism into. He turns it from were conservatives. These are the things we believe about how the government and how society should be run. And too conservatism is owning the Libs. That's where we are now. And that's what this is is is my politics are a sort of rhetorical violence against the people I disagree with. Because improving the world, changing making positive alterations to the world is difficult and complicated and involves a lot of debate and trial and error. That's hard. All I want to do is own the Libs. That's what Rush Limbaugh created, brought into the world and turned into the entire that that's the only thing that's left in conservatism. Right, You've got these odd You've got a couple of dudes left on the right who actually believe in something like Mitt Romney and Arnold Schwartz an egger right. Not that what they believe in is great or that I I believe in it too, but they both have a clearly have a principles that aren't just owning the Libs. But they're on the fringe now because owning the Libs, as all the right has. Um, it's just it's not it's not it's not standing for something. It's it's I. It's like, not what I my politics are. I don't want somebody telling me what to do. I believe in a vague idea of a John Wayne movie. And you know, things were better in this bygone era before these people started to suggest that maybe we can improve things and that's where it ends. Yeah, and it's it's it's very frustrating, Paul, because that the core of that idea that like I want to be left alone. That's more or less my politics. That's what led me to anarchism is like, don't fucking tell me what to do, and I don't want to tell you what to do. And that is what as a kid I was taught conservatism was. But it's not what conservatism has ever been. And I think a big part of why why the Republican establishment embraces Rush is that by the early nineties, in particular, by the mid nineties, definitely, it has become clear that nothing that the right does works for the actual people that that vote them into office. Down economics does not function. You know it doesn't. It's well documented objectively, does not work the way they say it does. They're fighting against environmental regulations damages the world and makes it uninhabitable. Fighting against corporate regulations gets a lot of their voters killed by dangerous working conditions and stuff. All of the wars they get us into our disasters and expensive, and do not achieve the foreign policy or even the basic national security goals they sat Conservatism as Americans do it at least does not work. And when you know that, you can't go back to the drawing table. You can't admit failure, you can't acknowledge the mistake. What you can do was own the Libs, you know, and that's why that's all it is now, is owning the libs. Um, it's good. It's a good, healthy, healthy society, Paul. It's only going to get better too, so we gotta get better. So Russia's justification for the outrageous caricature of a right winger that he played on his show had always been that these liberals and leftists advocating for black lives and women's liberation and basic environmental safeguards were absurd, And, as Rush put it, I demonstrate absurdity by being absurd. That's his own words. Now this turned out to be an objectively good business because none of his listeners seemed to find Rush himself absurd. The character he played became the man he was, and the once a political wanna be DJ turned into a mouthpiece for the very worst of our society's impulses. One thing that made the Russia Lmbough Show groundbreaking was that, for the first time in an explicitly political talk show, the focus was not on guests or actual reporting or anything but the personality Limbaugh had created. Rush was his own guest, and this was a deliberate choice he made and a very intelligent one to make the show more profitable. If the focus of your show is on the news and on what guests have to say, you can kind of slot any person with a decent voice in to replace the host. Right that limits how much money you're going to make, and it limits kind of the length of your career. Rush himself explained in an interview, I wanted to be the reason people listened. That's how you pad your pocket. That's how you establish yourself, and that's very smart. He did, in fact establish himself in Rush's radio success finally got the TV people listening. They decided to try him out as on screen talent. He teamed up with Roger Ailes, the man who would later invent Fox News, and together they produced one of the most outrageous and vile news programs ever made. It would sadly also turn out to be one of the most influential. And now, Paul, it is time you and I to take a journey into this particular piece of our right history. So this episode from two of the Russia Limbos show opens with a title card which features an image of a microphone with the name Rush and blazoned on it, and the words warning, the views expressed on this program are not necessarily the views of the staff, advertisers, or your local station, but they ought to be. Yeah, it's good ship, man, it's good ship. So the episode itself has a weirdly quiet intro, no music, just rushed, with the pointers standing and what looks like an office with wall to wall bookshelves and TVs interspersed within the books on the bookshelves. He introduces himself and he starts talking about a recent conversation he had with President George H. W. Bush on his radio program. So there continues to be more controversy surrounding my performance with the president yesterday when he came by my radio program. The press is telling you things that aren't true. But we have the tapes and we have the truth me and we'll show you and tell you both tonight. So that's telling. That's that's that's extremely important what he does here. You have to remember Fox news was not a thing yet at this time, fake news was not a buzzword. Limbaugh is groundbreaking in that he was not only critiquing mainstream news as being fake and lying, but he's also telling his listeners I am the truth. This paragraph from a write up by Rolling Stone gets to the core of why I find what he's doing here so terrifying. Quote. He wasn't selling political ideas and he never has. He was selling political attitude, the swaggering certitude, the mocking dismissiveness, the freedom to offend, the right to assert your privilege without guilt or embarrassment. And partly because he was modeling that liberation with such wicked glee, Limbaugh was making himself indispensable. Within six weeks of tuning in regularly, he would tell new listeners they'd be on the cutting edge of social evolution. Best of all, he promised, I will do all you're reading and I will tell you what to think of it. I will do all you're reading and I will tell you what to think of it. Yeah. Wow, it's so and it's so bald. Yeah, it's right out there. It's like he's not there's no, it's not like um uh sort of obfuscating language. He is to say very clearly what the deal is, this is and this is the this is the logical extent of this. I'm so smart, you know, I gotta tie half my brain behind my back just to make it fair. You know, I'm this big genius. I'm so smart. You don't need to read or think. I'll do it for you, and then you two will be smart. And this is a huge thing. He spins a lot of effort in reinforcing his intelligence. Um. After this section of the show, he goes on to introduce the other topics of that episode, which include feminazi glorious Steina, interview of the movie The Hand that Rocks the Cradle. Then we cut into Yeah. Then we cut to the actual intro, which is terrible nineteen nineties talk show music played over a series of mocked up news articles with titles like E I B linked to higher i Q. Limbaugh gets patent, Limbos says no to presidential bid, Limbaugh checks brain on donor's card. Limbaugh to carry a torch at the Mental Olympics. Again, he puts a lot of effort into and it's absurd, right, but it clearly works. It worked on my parents, you know, all of the people who raised me. To some extent, they're convinced he's fun. Yeah, he's fun. But he also says things that I like to hear. But he's fun. He's just fun. He's fun. I think also You cannot underestimate the um the effect of the pointer. If you have, if you have, if you're on television and you have a you're you're walking on over television with a pointer and pointing at something, it looks very official. Totally absolutely, That's why I have a point. Well I have a gun, but it works the same way. Um. So, Robert, what all your weapons in front of you? Well, I'm always I'm always surrounded by weapons. What what's going to happen during this scusion? You don't have anything on you right now? Mae? Right here? Yeah, strapped, Paul fucking here's my knife there. That's lovely nice, A nice little hunchback there. That makes it. Yeah, alright, now we're all armed. We can properly get back to the show. I didn't realize this was this was a knife on the table show. I apologie. This is this is I mean, there are like three knives on the table right, this is a significant number of that's a beauty on the table. I apologize. So the show proper starts after this point, after these fake news articles kind of go through and Russia's first subject on this episode is the then new TV series Murphy Brown Murphy Brown was obviously the titular character of the show. She was a recovering alcoholic investigative journalist and a primetime news anchor and a single mother. Murphy Brown was a very feminist and progress progressive series for its day. Limbaugh opens his episode by expressing anger at the show's success, and then, in what I would consider a fairly abusive manner, he tells his audience why they shouldn't watch it. Clip. Oh, people on my radio show didn't You probably watched it too, but you didn't have to. You know why you didn't have to because I told you you didn't have to. I have the script. I told you everything that was going to happen on this show. I told you it wasn't funny. I told you it was defensive. I told you this show was was was was a little heavy handed. I said that they're they're focusing on the wrong thing in this show, and they really did. I have You've heard a lot of people say a lot of things about this show, but I'll tell you the most important thing is that they got very defensive about what a family is. They trot out all these various examples of what a family is and that's not what the Vice president or any of the family values people. That's profoundly abusive. I think this is this You shouldn't have watched this show because I told you not to, and I told you not to because it's not good for you to imbibe this um And I think it's important to break down exactly what he's doing here. First off, he is trying to physically separate his audience from mainstream American society. Murphy Brown was a hugely popular show in this day. He is literally telling them, you don't need to watch this thing other people are watching because I am telling you not to. And he justifies this by saying that Murphy Brown is an assault on family values, which he goes on to call functional values, because families, the ones portrayed on Murphy Brown were, in Limbaugh's eyes, non functional. This is significant because Murphy Brown was a single mother. She was one of the first single mother's portrayed on American TV as not just existing but as being a successful person and a competent parent. Was furiously not into it. I can't let you can We can't let people watch this because it will give them the wrong idea, not just about single mothers. I also think it's worth noting that on the show itself, the idea of her being a single mother was a uh a plot point that it was a story arc that they discussed a lot on the show. It was not a it was not a blive decision by the character. It was um. They really talked about what it because because it was a show that did that did a lot of satire, talked about issues the The discussion of whether or not she was going to have the baby and what it meant to be a single work mother UM was discussed at great length on the show. Yeah, and that that's why he wants, That's why it is important to him to keep his audience away from it. Now. That was not the only kind of groundbreaking thing about Murphy Brown. The show was incredibly significant in its portrayal of gay people. In several episodes, most notably in nineteen two and nine four, homosexuals were shown as not just normal, functional members of society, but as existing in significant numbers throughout American society. There's an episode where like one of the characters buys a bar and it becomes through kind of like comedic hijings or whatever becomes a gay bar, and he's like slowly realizes what it is. But the point the episode was making is that gay people are all around us. They're part of our community. They are a significant, meaningful part of our society. This was rare in mainstream television for the time, and it made Rush Limbaugh furious. We have another clip here of of that just adults teaching kids doesn't matter what the conversation a composition is of the family, and nobody has has been critical that when Quayle said that they glorified single mothers, what he was trying to point out, my friends, was and I think this show proved it last night. This is another thing. This show has got an agenda. And they say all day long they don't have an agenda, but last night's show proved it. It's okay that they have an agenda. Just say so, like this show. We we are perfectly upfront and honest about what I am and what I believe on this show, and we'll let that float out in the marketplace and let you accept it as it is. There's no attempt here to fool you, there's no attempt here to deny what I am. But that's what they're all about. Now this is also really significant. Um So what Russia is doing here is he's framing his objection to Murphy Brown as reasonable and not based in hate. He's saying, I'm not against single mothers, or'm not against gay people or whatever. I am against the fact that this show conceals its political agenda. And I can see why people like most of my family would have found this reasonable. But what's happening here is very sinister, because Murphy Brown was not trying to be left wing. It was trying to make a point that single parents and that gay people are regular human beings who contribute to society. It was trying to point out that single parents are valid and functional people. These should not be political points, and recognizing the humanity of huge chunks of the population should not count as an agenda, but it was critical for Rush Limbaugh to turn it into one, because if you can take the basic humanity of marginalized people and make it a political talking point, then you make it into something people can oppose on principle and thus frame their bigotry is not hate but simply a political stance that they have every right to. Rush was not the first person to talk about the gay agenda, or to oppose single motherhood. Not even close. But before him, the most prominent voices attacking these these groups of people were on the religious right, which had first had risen as an organized political force in the late seventies. They were obviously influential, but they were also obviously religious extremists, and a lot of non religious conservatives and libertarian types did not want to identify with fundamentalists. Rush who had a documented history of mocking religious conservatives, provided the more libertarian right with a secular justification for bigotry against gay people and single mothers and women in general. And that's one of his great innovations. Unfortunately, he pioneered this idea that if you are saying this is okay, this thing is okay, what you are doing is saying that's that's somehow that's an attack on me and what I'm so the idea of dan Quile saying it glorifies single mothers, um no one that that show. No one was ever saying we should do this instead right, we should be doing we should be doing this instead of what you think is right. This is what we should be doing, rather than just saying can't isn't this okay? Like these these people exist. Isn't that all right? These people exist, It's all right, and they shouldn't be hated or punished or or ostracized for being this. He's not even talking about a slippery slope. He's he's just saying that if you are saying this is okay, that means you are saying the way we live is not okay. And that's just not there at all. It's just not there at all. But if he's if he's able to make it be that way to his listeners, then he can number one, make sure they will always oppose these things that he just finds gross. And number two, it further separates them from mainstream society. This is the beginning of the splintering of the mainstream American right from the United States, from most of the people in this country. And it is the beginning of making sure that there there was no You cannot reconcile the right with with the modern world, with the rest of civilization, because you doing a different thing than them is an attack on them, Like we're being attacked because you're different, and so we get to fight you. That's Russia's great innovation. And also that the way you think is the real America and not the people think that's haunting. But you know what isn't haunting, Robert, the products and services that support this podcast, hopefully, hopefully unless it's Raytheon, which is very haunted products. But that's a story for another day. And we're back. So Paul, I would love to go with this through this entire episode with In fact, I would love to do a reoccurring series where we just go through, point by point every episode of Rush limbas TV show and talk about it. I think it would be amazing. It isn't wild, Yeah, yeah, what's the what's the opposite of Proustian? Yeah? Um, I it would be very I think fun and also intellectually valuable. But we just we have so much ground to cover, we that that this has to be the end of that episode of the show. Yeah. We can't do a rewatch of the We can't do a rewatch podcast with the Rush Limbo Show. Yeah, at least not not today. Um. I think we've gotten the point across and characterize what he's doing on the show and why it was significant. Now, the Rush Limbaugh TV Show was what you'd call a modest success. The thirty minutes syndicated series ran from n which is not a long run, but isn't a super short run either. You know it was. It was not a huge hit, but it was successful. That said, it's actual impact on history was much raider then its four seasons might suggest. As I said earlier, Roger Ales was the executive producer of Limbough's TV debut. Limbaugh and Ales had met in nineteen ninety, and Rush would later say that their meeting was quote like finding a soul mate. And I'm gonna quote here from a write up that I found on courts the persona Ales helped Limbaugh create on that show, something between a commentator, political strategist, news anchor, and entertainer is exactly the kind of act you can see today on Fox News. It is not hard to draw a straight line from Limbaugh's TV show to talking heads like Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity. Like today's Fox News personalities. Limbaugh fancied himself as a man of the people who railed against the latest liberal politicians and voters. But as he did that, he was flying his private jet around the country to wine and dine with powerful figures. The myth he created of himself with the help of Ales is the same myth that we see pushed again and again on Fox News by its biggest names. In retrospect. Ales may have been using Limbaugh's TV act is that test run for Fox News to see if the brand of conservative opinion that was working on the radio could be translated to and expanded on TV. In nineteen ninety six, the same year the Limbaugh Show ended, Ales co founded Fox News at the behest of the media mogul Rupert Murdoch. Much of what ensued, the liberal bashing, fearmongering alternative reality in which Fox's personalities lived was reminiscent of aless weird little Limbaugh talk show experiment. So this is really a test case for what becomes Fox News, you know, And the year Limbaugh Show in six is the year Fox News launches. What's strange to me is well, I guess because the show was over, I guess the show, you know, the viewership went down. I wonder why he didn't just stick Limbaugh on Fox News in those in those early days, he wanted to actually, um yeah, so uh like like Ales actually tried to get Rush to join the network I think in two thousand six. Um, but each kind of preferred radio. I don't think he actually liked being on TV very much, not not not to the extent that he enjoyed, you know, doing his radio show. UM So I think that was mainly the reason. But also by the time Fox News really got going, Ales had a half dozen Rush limbas you know, which we'll talk about a bit later. So throughout the mid and into the late nineteen nineties, the Rush Limbaugh Show was a bona fide cultural phenomenon. Rush created the first fully monetized right wing cult of personality within like the American media. At least as you heard in the clips we played, Rush discouraged his listeners from thinking for themselves. He was the genius, and if you just agreed with him and thought the way he thought, then you were, by definition also smart. As a result, from the very early point, he gave his fans the nickname ditto heads. The New York Times explains the etymology of this term as it evolved on his show. Ditto a time saving greeting used by callers to avoid tedious repetition of the obvious. For example, you're wonderful Rush, and I agree with everything you've said. Dittohead then means a Limbaugh fan, So you're like, literally, he's saying, my fans are people who say and believe all of the exact same things that I do. Um, and they're absolutely going to praise me. And so in order to save some time, let's get let's just condense all the fawning praise that you will, no doubt give me into one word, so we know that what you're saying is, Rush, I love you. You are everything to me, um, and I need you to know that before we get into whatever fucking issue we're going to get into. Yeah, you're the only thing that matters to me, or at least your beliefs are, because I am so empty as a person as a result of how capitalism has hollowed me out and hollowed my my class out, that that I have nothing but the hatred of liberals that you embody until that first guy came along that had to implement mega dittos. Yes, yeah, and then there's mega dittos. And I can't even get too much into some of the terms used on the Russia Limbo Show because it makes me want to punch things. Until my hands are broken. And I already said that happened last year because of one of his fans. Anyway, the core of the Rush Limbaugh show was not, as he would always claim, advancing conservative ideology, but was instead attacking liberals and the left, who he referred to as kami libs or pink kami libs. And I don't know. I again at this fucking gun class I was at last weekend. The instructor was like, the far left wants to take your guns away, and obviously I couldn't be like, actually, the far left is pretty heavily strapped. It's liberals think are but like, that's part of part that this idea that Joe Biden is somehow a leftist right, that he's a communist, that you hear an auch and you hear all over the right. Now, that was Limbo saying anyone who is not a conservative as a far left, so it doesn't matter that actually the Democratic Party is a profoundly conservative political party. In today's Democrats are basically the same Republicans were when I was growing up in the nineties. Um. There's also never any follow up on these these the fearmongering claims whenever there's an election, like what happened to the Obama sleeper cells, like he never are are they still in play? Is he still waiting to give them the word? Like they never go back and say, oh, it turns out that didn't happen. It's this, I mean, that's kind of the thing about Republican talking points. Like the other thing they kept panic like r like terrified during the Obama years, He's gonna take your guns. He's gonna take your guns. He's gonna take your guns. Barack Obama did not one single thing to restrict gun ownership in the United States, um, whereas actually Trump actually did ban certain fire the bump stock. Like Trump put through more restrictions on gun rights than not that I'm saying bump stocks are dumb, but Trump objectively restricted gun ownership more than Obama. But you never know it to listen to the right wing media, it's it's preposterous you that by now people would know, no, no one's going to take your guns. No one's going to take your there's too many of them. It's it's not that you know, we'll talk anyway. Absolutely, yeah, it's yeah. As I said earlier, the core of Russia. Limbaugh's actual ideology was owning the Libs um his his conservatism was built entirely around attacking the other, and over his years on air, Rush built up an audience of millions, and eventually tens of millions, who began to see political victory as being not about achievements that improve life, but about tearing down and harming the enemy. This is why you get to a point where now mainstream Republicans are selling mugs with like that are like the tears of my enemies are in the Yeah, you know, I'm gonna quote from the Rolling Stone here quote Any Republican Canada is better than any Democratic candidate, Limbaugh told his audience early on, which might sound kind of innocuous on the surface, except that for Limbaugh, the superiority of our side and the inferiority of them was increasingly over the years a dead least serious matter. It became tribal warfare, which you know, kind of where we are now. On January three, Time magazine featured Rush Limball on its cover. We see him wearing a suit and smoking a cigar. Smoke curls up out of his mouth. Behind the bold words is Rush Limbaugh good for America. Now, it was obvious to anyone who was paying attention that he was not. But for the most part, the liberal media that Russia attacked and demonized embraced him as kind of like the loyal opposition, as an erudit foil to debate with, to argue against, but nonetheless someone who deserved respect and honor due to his success. Like you can see this in the episode of Family Guy that Rush was on right where it's like he has these fun bickering arguments with the token liberal on the show, but in the end they really both like each other, you know, um, as opposed to what Rush actually represented, which is the politics of violent elimination of the opponent. Um. And it's that. That's what's most amazing to me is no matter what he said about the mainstream media, about the liberal media, whatever, they fedded him, They they praised him, They made him like he was never treated as a pariah. Barbara Walters said in an interview, people just can't get enough of him. The Los Angeles Yeah, The Los Angeles Times described him as a self styled commander in chief, fighting his private culture war against the many liberal do gooder notions that interfere with his right to eat and wear and spend whatever he damned well wants, and say whatever he damn well pleases. C Span highlighted him in a fawning interview that helped turn him into a household name. Within a year of that interview, he was carried by five hundred and thirty stations and listened to by an estimated twenty five million Americans. He started writing books with titles like The Way Things Ought to Be, each of which dutifully went on to become a New York Times bestseller. For a man who built his career attacking the liberal media, Rush never received anything but encouragement and financial support from his so called enemies. The fundamental hypocrisy seas that undergirded his career were seldom called out. Russia. Limbaugh had not even registered to vote until he was thirty five years old, two years before his show became a national, nationwide success. The repeated double standards in his work and his life never hurt his pull with his audience. For example, Russia Limbaugh repeatedly attacked Bill Clinton as a draft dodger, which he was, but so was Rush. Limbaugh took the route that most wealthy young Americans during Vietnam took and found a doctor who would diagnose him with a bullshit injuries so that he couldn't be called up for service. When he was eventually called on this by some journalists who were doing their jobs, he responded, I had student deferments in college, and upon taking a physical was discovered to have a physical by the virtue of what the military says, I didn't even know it existed, a physical deferment. And then the lottery system came along when they chose your lot by birth date, and mine was high I and I did not want to go, just as Governor Clinton didn't, which on its own is a reasonable statement, except you spent years attacking Clinton for being a draft dodger. You draft funny and hypocritical. To me, my my favorite draft dodge uh explanation of all time is still Dick Cheney. I had other priorities. Yeah, that's that's just that's incredible, And it's true. Both Cheney and George W. Bush did, like rush, like Clinton, everything they could to not actually go and fight in Vietnam. One of the things that will always be the most infuriating thing in one of the most infuriating things to happen in American politics. To me is the way in which um John Kerry, who is a whatever else you can say about him, fought courageously, went to win despite the considerable privilege he was born into, did an incredibly dangerous job, was wounded multiple times, and risked his life repeatedly for the lives of his men. Right, Vietnam was a terrible war we never should have been in. It was fundamentally immoral on a national scale, but on a human level, John Kerry did the right thing, which is not use his privilege to get out of fight eating in a war that other people of his class got us into. And he was portrayed during that campaign as like a liar and a craven coward. What George Bush, who did everything he could to not fight in Vietnam, was seen as this brave warrior hero. It's it's still very frustrating. I don't even like John Kerry, but my god, the man did the thing all of you say is what you're supposed to do as a man. It's it's infuriating, it's infuriating. The ditto Heads continued to listen to their idol Slam Clinton for being a draft dodger, even while they celebrated a man who, by his own admission, had done the exact same thing. Rush would eventually rack up three to four and I should have stayed here. I'm not. It's not bad to be a draft dodger. The Vietnam War was again, horribly immoral. It's perfectly it's what. What is immoral is dodging the draft and then going on to incourage to do nothing but encourage more wars that involve American serviceman. Right, that's immoral. It is not a moral to dodge the draft and say, hey, this was a bad war. We shouldn't get involved in stupid, pointless wars that just kill people for the profits of a tiny number. Like that's bad. I'm not going to do it, and I'm not going to support it. That's fine. Yeah, it's doubly a moral when you're well past the age where it would affect you where it's you're now, there's another there's a later generation of people that will be affected by this very uh, you know, hypocritical line of attack. Yeah, it's the moral inconsistency that's infuriating John Kerry. I actually and John Kerry did not support the Vietnam War and became after he got out a very very outspoken voice against it. Um. But it's the if if Limbaugh had served in Vietnam and then gone on to be a war hawk, then at least he would be ideologically consistent. You know, at least I could say Rush Limbaugh believes in something. It's like John McCain. At least he fucking believed in something. You know, it was terrible and fundamentally toxic as well, But it was not He's not like Limbaugh. You know, he is a person who has beliefs. Um. I don't know. It's that It's not like that line from the Big Lebowski right, like, say what you will about the tenants of national socialism, Dude. At least it's an ethos, you know. Uh So, Rush Limbaugh was not a man who I think believed in much much Other than the fame and wealth of Rush Limbaugh. He would eventually rack up three divorces and four wives. He never had any children. Despite this, tens of millions of conservatives listened to him, opening on family values and traditional morality on a daily basis. Rush called it functional values, and one key aspect of his functional value system was rejecting illegal drugs. At one point on his TV show at the height of the drug war, Rush told his audience, if people are violating the law by doing drugs, they ought to be accused, and they ought to be convicted, and they ought to be sent up the river. He repeatedly called addics junkies. Yeah, to go to prison if you dog. He repeatedly called addics junkies, and some justed that drug dealers deserved death for their crimes. Well. He enthusiastically supported the drug war and the use of the car Serile state to lock up mostly black men for selling drugs. Rush Limbaugh was actively trafficking huge amounts of opiate pain killers. Rush used his housekeeper as a hook up, handing her cigar boxes filled with cash in exchange for thousands of pills of oxy content, hydrocodon and the like. In two thousand three, she went public and knocked on him to the police. When the story broke, he was charged for his crimes and Florida Sheriff's deputies opened an investigation into a drug trafficking ring. We don't know exactly what Rushes if he was just a customer, or if he had some other role in it, but he was buying huge amounts of pain killers. I'm talking about a guy who was spending probably hundreds of thousands of dollars on his addiction. And did it come from did he have some injury that got him hooked on it or yeah, he got it prescribed to him initially for an injury and he got addicted like most people do that. This is this is not just with prescription painks. Most people who have a problematic addiction to a drug get addicted because of something negative that happens in their life, right, trauma or an injury, or or an emotional depression whatever. That's most people who have a problematic addiction. Um Limbaugh said, anyone who does that should go to prison. Then he did that, you know, and he oh, yeah, he gets caught. Uh, And when he gets caught, it is a big story. In two thousand three, his housekeeper went public, wore a wire recorded him doing a drug dealer deal, knocked on him to the police, and when the story broke, he was charged for his crimes and Florida Sheriff's deputies open an investigation into that drug traffic trafficking ring um. His third wife left him, He checked himself into rehab while his multimillion dollar team of lawyers went to work defending him in court. The legal battle would go on for three years, during which time he began doctor shopping to maintain his addiction. He was charged again with fraud for concealing information to obtain prescriptions from four different doctors who prescribed him roughly two thousand pain pills during one six month period. The case would eventually wrap up in two thousand six, when Limbaugh agreed to a plea deal that allowed him to avoid prosecution if he sought treatment and avoided other criminal activity. It's very frustrated. Huh, Yeah, I actually didn't. I didn't really, I wasn't really cognizant of all the the legal side of this. I just remember the hypocrisy of him being, you know, uh, just gobbling up shaming and while he's gobbling down these pills. But I had no idea. I guess I didn't. I didn't. Uh, I didn't bother exploring that side of right, and like he doesn't even it's not even a slap on the wrist. It's like a little light tap on the wrist. It's not even a slap on the wrists. So fucking upsetting. And again, the immorality here is that he always advocated criminal consequences from people who did exactly what he did, and then he didn't go on to suffer them. And that's what's It's that, like, there's nothing morally wrong with being addicted to pain killers. If it were legal, I would absolutely be a pain killer addict. Seems rad Um, it's it's the But I'm also consistent about the fact that I don't think doing or possession any substant Yeah, with the exception of, like, you know, some explosives. Um, there's a line to be drawn, and I don't think people should have certain but Harold, speaking of Heroin, you know who supports our podcast, Sophie, I don't know the fine people at the cinaaloa cartel, so very specifically, like, yes, this is a cartel supported podcast, And I just want to say, let's go to ads before I get us in some trouble. Ah, we're back good times. So, while Rush was using his wealth power to avoid the legal consequences that he enthusiastically supported existing for the crimes he committed, he continued to act as the voice of America's conservative conscience. Mostly this meant being super racist. At one point on his TV show, he played video clips of black men and boys standing in front of the TV and and like, while he was playing these clips of black men and boys, he would stand in front of the TV and make guerrilla noises and grunts, the apparent joke being that black people were like monkeys, Like that's kind of I don't know what else he could be saying, um, pretty sat very satire, Like I think he got that from a New Yorker cartoon. It would be like if Jonathan Swift actually murdered Irish children and then was like, this is a satire, Get it. The joke is that their food rush repeatedly blamed corruption and violence in African like the African nation national governments, as the fault of black people being rid of white colonial leaders, as we see in this quote from two thousand seven quote. Right, so you go into Darfur and you go into South Africa, you get rid of the white government there, you put sanctions on them. You stand behind Nelson Mandela, who was bankrolled by communists for a time, had the support of certain communist leaders. You go to Ethiopia, you do the same thing. Right. He's saying that because the black people got rid of their colonial oppressors, that's why Africa's in bad shape. Not the decades of trauma those governments pushed. Not the fact that when those governments gave up colonial control, they put people like Idi Amine, who had been a British military sergeant in charge of the government and turned out that he was a fucking monster. Not because those governments, like colonial governments, continue to suck wealth out of these countries and support kleptocratic dictatorships that allowed them to suck more wealth out, that made the country dysfunctional, and that led to consistent, like decades and decades of violence. Not that they supported ethnic groups one over the other, like they didn't Rwanda, which led to their one to genocide. None of that. It's because they got rid of the white people, even the white people to actually leave. You know, it's super fucked up. I didn't know that he'd actually gone to the lengths of trying to smear Nelson Mandela. Yeah, communists, Uh, it's good stuff. I mean Nelson Mandela also was at one point some guy somebody who supported like terrorism and stuff, which also is totally justified. If your government is the apartheid government of South Africa, terrorism is not necessarily the wrong thing to do. I would say, it's not off the table. It's not off the table. Sometimes terrorists are right. Yeah. That is like you could argue that the founding fathers of this nation, who despite their own bigotry and slave like the government they're rebelling against, also allowed slavery. They were right to do terrorism to get rid of having a king, because kings are bad, you know, like terrorism is justified sometimes. Um So Rush was repeatedly critical of professional sports for the presence of black athletes, as we see in this two thousand seven quote. Look, let me put it to you. To you this way, the NFL all too often looks like a game between the bloods and the crips without any weapons there. I said it. Wow. The inherent criminality of black people was a belief that Rush held deeply, and he expressed it constantly. In nine he said, the a c P should have riot rehearsals. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies. You're saying this after the la riots, you know, this is like, this is what the n A. This is not people reacting to horrible violence the only way that they can, right. This is not a riot being the language of the unheard, this is what the CP wants because to criticize athletes, I bet he couldn't even do a jog. Yeah, it's it's pretty great. The the yeah, the ticking point of like they just these you know, these people, they just love to riot. Yeah, they just loved not these people are being oppressed and murdered, and finally violence was the only thing they could think to do because they were given no other options, and they've reached the end of their human tether. Like the people I idolized who founded this nation, slavery is over. What more do you want? I mean? And when I say that, I don't mean to say like that. Obviously anyone rioting in Los Angeles and was a thousand times more justified than George Washington. And that said, I still think getting rid of a king, all other things being equal, getting rid of a king is a violent reason to do violence. Kings are bad. Yeah. So Rush repeatedly argued that white people shouldn't be blamed for slavery, saying it's preposterous that Caucasians are blamed for slavery when they've done more to end it than any other race. Any race of people should not have guilty. If any race of people should not have guilt about slavery, it's Caucasians, bitch. It's amazing how many Caucasians fought to keep the thought and died to keep slavery going. Rush is this just like at this point when you say things like that, right, he is what do you think the percentages of uh for in Russia's mind? I actually believe this or what is the most out to what is the most outrageous thing that I could say? I think he comes to believe it because these beliefs, well, I think what it is. It starts he's not a political person. He doesn't care about politics. He starts with a joke because he starts doing this persona because it gets him listeners. But he's also a narcissist, and these beliefs aren't political stances to him. There are aspects of his personality, and his narcissism dictates that he comes to believe it because believing it and defending these things is the same as defending himself. And again, he's a fucking narcissist. I think that's how it works. I like the Trump thing where he starts out telling a lie, but then he repeats the lie enough times that it becomes true to him because he is saying, yes, that's exactly the case. So another repeated rush limbab bit was attacking the daughters of Democratic presidents for being In nine, he called Jimmy Arn's daughter Amy the most unattractive presidential daughter in the history of the country. In the early nineteen nineties, he declared Chelsea Clinton to be the White House dog, which is like just very vile. Um. I don't even think it's like the Trump boys and Ivanka made themselves political figures, perfectly fine to insult and attack them. You're never gonna hear me saying anything bad about like Tiffany or Barren, because there their children. You know, like, you don't fucking talk about them if they don't make themselves into a major part of things. You know, Now, Chelsea Clinton has done, hasn't put herself in the public eye, and it's perfectly fair to criticize her for the things she does in the public eye. But at that time, when he was saying that she was literally, but she was a child. Yeah, and what you're what he said about her is a kind You can't be a good person and say that about a child to an audience. Yeah. In two thousand twelve, when your town law student Sandra Fluke went before Congress to argue that contraceptive should be covered by the Affordable Care Act, Limboch called her a slut and a prostitute. It's it's hard. You can't overstate how vile he was. When um the Marty from Back to the Future, um uh. Michael J. Fox, Michael J. Fox made some political statements that Limbab disagreed with. Limbob mimicked having Parkinson's disease to mock him on his Show's a bad person to say that to to and imply that Michael J. Fox was playing it up for the cameras when he went testified before Congress. I remember this. I remember this so well because Michael J. Fox deliberately did not take his medication and said that and said, I want you to see this is what happens and Russia. Limbab accused him of like playing it up like it's not that bad, and he's he's jiggling all around like I that's like burned into my brain forever. It's horrific. I mean, it's like and and to say that it would be it's like, I think what he did was perfectly reasonable. I'm not going to take my medicine because you need to know what it is like for people who don't have access to the medicine. I'm rich. I have access to all the medicine I need. Here's what it's like if you don't. I want to make this less abstract to you. Yeah. I I had a friend. One of the big things in terms of like me changing my political attitude that started with like me changing my attitudes on drugs. This conservative that like marijuana should be I llegal, that it was a moral I had a friend who was much older than I met on World of Warcraft, who had multiple sclerosis, and we were video chatting and she showed me how badly her hands shook before she started smoking. Right, she like showed me herself shaking, and then she took a hit, which was difficult for her, and I watched in real time how it affected her. And I never again supported keeping that ship illegal because you can't when you see it, right, you can't it's medicine, not that most people use it use it medicinally, which doesn't isn't wrong, like it's out wrong to use it recreationally, But just the idea that what she was doing was a crime made it clear to me how ammorl our drug laws were um in a way that maybe if I had like it would have taken longer otherwise I think, um so Yeah. Anyway, Limbaugh did occasionally face consequences for his bald faced bigotry. In two thousand three, ESPN hired him as an on air commentator. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and he was fired after like seven weeks because he said Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb didn't deserve any of the praise he received. So he said Donovan, Yeah, he said Donovan McNabb didn't deserve the praise that he received because, quote, I think the media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well. They're interested in black coaches and black quarterbacks doing well. I think that there's a little hope invested in McNabb, and he got a lot of credit for the performance of his team that he really didn't deserve. People just like this guy because he's black, not because he's a good quarterback. The media has invested in black men being good quarterbacks. You know, I like you went into your Shapiro voice for that quote. It's what the funk man. You couldn't do what he's doing? How dare you like? So this combat drew enough widespread condemnation that Limbaugh was forced to resign from ESPN. But obviously this had little to no impact on his bottom line. Maybe it annoyed him personally, but it didn't hurt him financially. By the early aughts, Rush was worth hundreds of millions of dollars. He had a private jet, He had a palatial mansion in Florida. He smoked cigars that cost more than some people's cars. This is disgusting, but I think any fair accounting of Limbaugh's career has to acknowledge how impressive it was too. The early two thousands saw the explosion of Fox News. This is the period where it became the most watched news network in the country. A slew of Limbaugh imitators rose up, men like Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck, and Tucker Carlson, to name a few. While these folks were all hugely successful and influential, none of them ever eclipsed Rush. This is because, in addition to wielding influence, Rush held extrue actual, demonstrable political power. And I'm gonna quote the Rolling Stone again here. His sky hire ratings and the rabid fandom of his dittoheads, who just happened to fit the profile of people who voted frequently in Republican primaries, made it inevitable that the GOP would come courting. After he he boosted Pat Buchanan's pitchfork populist make America First Again challenge to George Bush, the President became so hell bent on gaining Limbaugh's favor for the general election that he not only invited the host to the White House, but toted his bags personally into the Lincoln Bedroom. Limbaugh had only praised for Bush from that day forward, at least until he lost to Bill Clinton in November. That set a pattern. Limbaugh might instinctively gravitate to the radicals, but he was ultimately a team player, the national precincts captain of the Republican Party, as Mother Jones described him two years later, Limbaugh basically co captain the Republican Revolution with House Leader Newt Gingridge, when their efforts produced a landslide that brought seventy three anti government Zealots to Congress. The host was made an honorary House freshman and fed it at a GEOP orientation in December, where the new members wore Rush was right, buttons and listened to his marching orders. This is not the time to get moderate, he said, This is not the time to start trying to be liked. Ronald Reagan himself declared Limbaugh the number one voice for conservatism in our country, and Rush was always very clear. And Rush was always very clear about where he wanted to see the party head. Smaller government, stronger, more powerful corporations. He said all he said outright. I consider myself a defender of corporate America. Yeah, it would not be wrong to view Rush Limbaugh as something of a cult leader. One of the strongest pieces of evidence supporting this conclusion is, in my mind, Limbaugh's embrace of the irrational politics. For Rush Limbaugh was never about concrete results or observable reality. It was a fight between good his side and evil anyone who disagreed with him. And since those were the stakes, it didn't matter if he lied or spread conspiracy theories because the essence of what he was saying, that the Democrats were monsters, was true. Nowhere is this clearer than in his hatred of the Clintons. It started when George H. W. Bush lost to Bill, robbing Rush of a president who would directly, you know, take him into the White House right. From an early stage, Rush realized that lying about the crimes committed by Bill and Hillary was a more productive route than criticizing them on policy, and so in nineteen four he announced Vince Foster was murdered in an apartment owned by Hillary Clinton and the body was taken to Fort Marcy Park, rolling Stone rights conspiracy theories once the province of fringe right wingers started to become the mainstream Republican fair they are today during Clinton's two terms, and Limbaugh was the great popular riser of the genre. Long before Fox House began amplifying the fringe eyear theories about American politics, Limbaugh was busy mainstreaming wing nut world, the conspiracy cranks, the on Bircher's, the Christian Zionists, the science deniers, the info warriors, their wildest fantasies, fears, and paranoias, all came out to play in the national prime time on the Rush Limbaugh Show, repackaged by the host into a palatable fair for the Republican masses. And this isn't this is significant because Russia's demonizing of the Clinton's who There's plenty of very value valid things to critique them on, but at the end of the day, pretty normal neoliberal politicians. It's even spread on the left, this idea that Hillary Clinton is somehow more of a war monger than other liberals, right, is somehow like exceptionally bad. When she's not. She's very much in line with everyone else in in the party, and everyone else who was had has held those positions and is not as bad as some of them. Right, She's more hated by certain people. Even on the left. You'll find people who are who are more directly aggressive towards her than they are to fucking Kissinger. Um. And it's not that she's not bad. She is. So is Bill. They're greedy, Bills a rapist. They they have supported, you know, Initiati, the Iraq War, a number of violent actions overseas that were disasters, but there they did that as part of uh uh as as like within a large group of people. Right, there's nothing about them that is exceptionally bad for the the the the crew that they run with, but this absolute demonizing of them that has a real impact by the on the election. That's a big part of what we get Trump is something that Rush Limbough pioneers. The Clintons are not like my parents hated Trump, hated Trump when he was running and voted for him because their hatred of Hillary Clinton was it's beyond rational. It's it's it's it's and again a lot of super valid criticisms of Hillary Clinton. I don't think she should have ever been president. Also hard to say she would have been worse than Trump. Um, And if you are saying like she would have, for example, been more killed more people overseas than Trump, you're not actually paying attention to the death toll as a result of American air strikes and missile strikes and drone strikes as it changed from the Obama administration where Clinton was Secretary of State to the Trump administration. Because there was a massive escalation and death under that. In addition to repealing of the rule about any sort of reporting about civilian casualties from US air strikes, Trump was worse on this sort of stuff, but you'd never know it anyway. I don't want to get into a rant on this, but like that, you can't. It's almost impossible to analyze the Clintons, their impact, their crimes, and their and their um and their their behaviors, their policies with any sort of rationality because this they've been turned into goblins. Right. It's it's very frustrating, um and it makes it it makes it so that if you try to say, like, well, actually, this thing you're criticizing them on isn't a reasonable thing to or at least the way you're criticizing them isn't reasonable, Suddenly you're defending them, and it's like, no, that's not what I'm It's very I hate it. I hate everything. Sorry, it gets that that's sort of specific personality demonization gets in the way of actually accomplishing, uh, you know, discussions of of policy and where and where we are as a country and how we do things. Because absolutely they were completely typical of the people that occupy the White House on any given year, you know what I mean. And and and like you know, Hillary, uh, even if she had killed as many people overseas as Trump did, probably fewer people domestically in terms of policy. Um, if you're talking about that, if you're gonna talk again into the pandemic and stuff like that, if she had been elected, um and and you know anyway, Yeah, I totally agree that it's like it's a very weird um uh thing that uh, that's that that absolutely sprung out of the Rush Limbaugh uh personal personal demonization that that that then gets into you know, like this fucking Alex Jones ship where there's a fly. Yeah, exactly, it's this, it's this turning people from like, Okay, let's analyze what this person has actually done, how it's worked, when it's been successful, when it's been unsuccessful, when it's been moral, when it's been a moral And to know, she's just a criminal, she's just a warmonger, and we don't have to analyze what she actually did or anything. We don't have to. We we just have to condemn her. We should. And it's not that she doesn't deserve condemnation for a lot of things, but like for one thing, I don't know, I don't I don't want to get onto a defending because I don't like Hillary Clinton, but she's also has it like it's very frustrating. Yeah, it's very it's all just very frustrating. Um and and he's and he creates this culture and it it spreads. Now it's not just the Clintons now now it's it's everyone. Right, you don't have to analyze people that you disagree with. You come up with a three word thing about them, and you spread these like like Bill Clinton has committed crimes. He's a fucking rapist. You don't have to make up that he and his wife are having people murdered. Like, yeah, like he's a rapist. That's bad. But of course a lot of people calling him a rapist or rapists themselves, and they have to make it up that. Now, no, he's a murderer. You know. It's it's fucking bullshit. It's very frustrating. So Rush also led the charge on demonizing and denying global warming and climate change. In his book See I Told You So, he declared that quite a few scientists are now backtracking on their once dire predictions of melting ice caps and worldwide flooding. Cut to Texas being submerged in the layer of snow that destroys civil society or the entire West Coast burning down last year. Anyway, he lampooned Al Gore uh and scientists who warned about climate change as quote a few hardline do sayers who are sticking to their thermostats. Yeah, yep. His conclusion was, you know, and now it's it never affected him and he never affected him. Now he's dead. Yeah, as far as he knows, he was right about this. He was right about this. Limball was unquestionably the single most influential American conservative from about nineteen eighty nine to at least two thousand eight. Now, his star did start to fade by the end of George W. Bush's term, and there are a couple of reasons for this. For one, he'd been out at as an opiate addict, gone to rehab three times, and through it all had repeatedly defended an administration that led the United States into two disastrous and expensive failed wars. By the time Barack Obama was elected, many of the more libertarian minded right wing we're starting to reject the neo conservative ideology that Russia had spent eight years hyping up. Now the fact that Barack Obama was the man who finally broke. A years of GLP power wound up being the salvation of Limbaugh's influence. Yes, he'd encouraged the nation to burn through its treasure and influence, losing two wars, but now a black man was president, the floodgates of right wing racism open wide. In the first four years of Obama's term, the number of hate groups in the United States rose by seven hundred and fifty five percent. This surge in public anti black racist I know, it's pretty shocking when you actually look at the number. Yeah, the idea, there's there's a black resident. We're gonna need more hate groups. Guys. This here's the hate groups, the extant hate groups that we're not going to get it done. We need more hate groups. There is a black president who in his actual policies is not wildly different from George H. W. Bush. But like, yeah, um, the fact that Barackoba. Yeah, So, this surge in anti in public anti black racism was heralded, in cited, and led by Rush Limbaugh, the USA's most prominent bigot. There already a lot of different clips that I could select and make this point, Paul, but none is more appropriate than this song. That aired on Russia's program while Obama was still on the campaign trail. Now, the context of this is that Limbo was talking about the fact that um Al Sharpton Barack Obama. Now Sharpton had like a public series of arguments, right, I think Sharpton was backing Hillary at first. Um So this is this song that you're about to hear. The singer is supposed to be Al Sharpton singing about Barack Obama. And I'm just gonna let Sophie play the clip now imaging indecing times because he's not send him County what God him and not mecause he's not from see real black man, snoop call have talk and talk and walk the walk not coming and one imagic All right, I think that's enough of that. Yes, pretty bad. I mean I just I guess I just wish that non comedy people would stay in their lane. You know what that that like the meter was terrible. It's bad. It's not it's not funny unless you're bigot, you know, unless you're a bigot. So Limbaugh had other Obama singers saying at one point, if he weren't black, he'd be a tour guide in Hawaii. In two thousand eight, he compared Obama to a cartoon monkey he repeatedly called Michelle mouchell and while because she's a cow, you know, and by the and all the while, he claimed that racism had nothing to do with his hatred of Obama. Doesn't matter to me what his races. He's liberal is what matters to me. Yeah, Okay, Barack the magic Negro guy. Yeah, I just I just brought it up time, that's all. Yeah, I just I can't talk about it enough, but I'm not. It's just convenient that he's black. It's not a problem that I have with them, but it's convenient for me from my satire. God, I hate this guy. Is he even doing satire at this point? Like? Has he has he pretended? Has he dropped that pretense? Yeah? I mean I can play you songs that like there's a bunch of Nazis that will go through and like rewrite Disney songs to be about hating the Jews and stuff, or about race traders and whatnot, because it's the kind of thing that's easy to spread. Right. You You make a racist song and people laugh and at first it's a joke, and then it becomes less of a joke. It's the whole story, right, That's exactly what Limbaugh is doing. You know, it's not even all that much less racist. Um, he just doesn't say the N word. Um. When Canada Obama became president, Obama, Rush said, I hope he fails, explaining that rooting for liberalism to fail is rooting for America to succeed. Limba declared that stopping Obama was quote what I was born to do. One of his tactics to this end seemed to be stoking fears that because Obama was anti white, he was trying to gin up a race war. In two thousand nine, Rush declared, in Obama's America, the white kids now get beat up with the black kids cheering. Clearly he would have preferred it when you know, I don't know when white kids were burning down black kids schools in his hometown. Those were the days. Those were the days, my friend, he thought they'd never had. Yeah, it's great. Limba was not the only person who stoked white resentment in anti black Big a Tree in this period. He was not close to the only person, but he was the man who had created the blueprint and the cultural space that all of those other right wing media figures acted in. Ben Shapiro was very open about the fact that Limball was his hero and idol. Alex Jones altered the way he spoke and altered the acoustic setup of his Info Wars studio in order to more closely resemble Rush Limbaugh. In two thousand ten, Limbaugh was picked to address SPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference. He was the main event that year and gave what he called his first Address to the Nation. Limbaugh was so central to the Republican Party at this point that RNC Chairman Michael Steele was asked on CNN if Limball was the effective party leader. When Steele claimed that Rush was just an entertainer, This piste off Rush Limbaugh, who attacked Michael Steele on air and caused such an outpouring of right wing rage against the RNC chairman that Michael Steele was forced to make a public apology to Rush limb Ball kind of proving that he was effectively the leader of the Republican Party. Yeah. No, it puts me in mind of Howard Stern Uh coming into the Philadelphia market and Uh forcing John Dobella, the host of the Morning Zoo to apologize for being on the radio. Jesus, I didn't know that it happened. It was It was ridiculous. So, as leader of the Republican Party, Limbaugh spent the Obama years repeatedly hammering home the idea that there could not be peaceful coexistence between the right and left in the United States. Quote from Rush, we live in two universes. One universe is a lie. One universe is an entire lie. Everything run dominated, controlled by the left here and around the world is a lie. Every other universe where is where we are, and that's where reality reigns supreme and we deal with it America, the real America, and there can be no coexistence this now. Now we're in the age of you know, because Biden said the you know, it's looking for unity. Anytime somebody's looking for unity, and uh, there is a there's a criticism of a famous monster like Rush Limbaugh. The response from the right is always, where's the famous unity? Where what I thought you wanted unity? And it's like, well, do you care about unity? You don't give a shit about it. You're already living in a world that says if you don't, if you don't come to believe the things that I believe. You are against America, and you are. You're the real racist, You're the real misogynist, you are the real hater of of all things that are decent. So it's I don't know how we I don't know how we unfunck ourselves from this, from this situation. Yeah, it I don't know that we can. UM, But the way to do it is not too not to yield to these people, right, it's it's it's not to just let them get what they want, because what they want is the annihilation of the other and and honestly the annihilation of themselves, because it's a fucking death cult at this point, like they can't be allowed to win. And like the people and and that's not to say that, um, every aspect of what has what traditional conservative ideology is wrong. They have some points. That's why it brings people in the idea that like you should always be worry about giving the government control of things, You fucking should, you know, like there's a space, there is a space for conservatism in society. That is not what rush Limbaugh turned it into. Which is not to say that it was because fucking Reagan was president before Limbaugh came onto the scene, and he was terrible and very toxic, not like to toxicity, and the Republican Party goes back very far. But also it's not for nothing that the Republicans used to be the party of Abraham Lincoln. You know, uh, there, it's it's not there. There is a way to have a conservatism that is influential in society that isn't a fucking death cult. And we have to at very least get back to that if we're going to continue to be a democracy that doesn't spiral inevitably into civil war. You know, I have I'm a pretty committed leftist, but I also do not seek a society that forces my beliefs on other people. But you can't. You can't give these people an inch because they'll take everything. That's how they are, you know, That's what part what Rush had a big impact in making them into. By two thousand fifteen, Rush Limball had succeeded in leading a right word push that finally prepared the Republican Party to nominate an obvious fascist, Donald Trump. Limbaugh embraced Trump early on right wing radio host and never Trump or Joe Walsh, who is another actually principled conservative, draws a direct line between Limbaugh and Trump. Quote. The average Trump supporter loves Trump because he fights man. He fights, not because of any policy or issue or political philosophy. That's why they love to Rush. Before him, it wasn't about conservatism. I still can't tell you after thirty years what the funk he believes in. But he knew how to prey on audiences, grievances and resentments, which is what conservative talk radio does. Rush was the son of a bitch. He'd lie about the dims and punch them and make fun of them. That gave him a quote like following from the beginning. Trump sort of inherited it, and I Joe Walsh again not a grade I agree agree with on much, but he's right on the money here. He's analyzing it properly. Absolutely. The thing I think the thing also about Trump is like, like Rush doesn't really have any deeply ill beliefs like that you could you couldn't say this guy, even convincing himself, really cares that much about anything beyond what's right in front of his fucking face that is about him. All he cares about is his own aggrandized right. It's it's narcissism. Trump and Limbaugh are very similar. Rush bent the knee to Trump, declaring him everything but the Second Coming. And we will not labor long on Rush during Trump's years, because once he had helped shepherd his massive audience into Trump's arms, his cultural influence faded. It was watered down by the sheer mass of right wing idolaw ideologues who flooded the Internet and increasingly urged their followers to embrace a rationality conspiracy and fascism. In February of Rush led the charge denying the reality of COVID nineteen. He called it the common cold and mocked even his old ally Matt Drudge for caring about the burgeoning plague. He urged his listeners against mask wearing, calling it a symbol of fear. Russia had long denied the dangers of smoking, particularly second hand smoke, but this was a new level for him. When Trump lost reelection to Biden, Limbaugh immediately called the election a sham and joined the chorus of voices claiming fraud. By this point, though, he was sick, and the playing field was so flooded with men who sounded like him, triggered the libs like him light like him, that his voice hardly rose above the din Rushi had succeeded in building a right wing so made in his own image that he no longer stood out in it. His last show was February second. He died less than two weeks later, killed by the lung cancer he denied had anything to do with smoking, because that was another thing Rush denight his entire career. Joe Walsh, a former Limbaugh lover, UH found like when he was much younger, he got into talk radio because of Limbaugh, eventually wound up and to be fair before Trump rejecting Limball in a lot of ways found the whole arc of Russia's career to be terribly sad. Quote. I didn't think that at the end of his life Brush would sell out to Trump the way he has. He had every opportunity this final year to come clean and be decent. I mean, he was still on this February lying about a stolen election. He'll keep up this act till he dies, and it's sad. When a writer from Rolling Stone asked if maybe the reason he kept backing Trump was that Limbaugh truly believed in what said, Walsh countered with a theory of his own quote. Maybe knowing him, it's one last, big, extended fuck you. Maybe it's Limbaugh saying I'm not going to bend to the Dims and anybody else, no matter what, never to the end, I'm never gonna do it. And at the end of this, I can't help but think that there's something terribly meaningful and the fact that Joe Walsh rejected Limbaugh in his later years and at his end, Walsh gained prominence as a voice of the Rising Tea Party. He is very conservative, but his constant principal resistance to President Trump proves that he is not a fascist. And it turns out what Limbaugh was really selling, what he was preparing the American right for all along, was fascism. If you want confirmation of this, you need look no further than how America's most prominent neo Nazis reacted to Limbaugh's death. Chris can't Well was one of the speakers and organizers of the deadly Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville. He is a straight up Nazi. He assaulted left wing counter protesters at the event, and when this brought legal consequence is on him. He filmed himself crying in fear, earning the nickname the Crying Nazi. Can't Well gained prominence among the all right as a podcaster with shows like Outlaw Conservative and Chris can't Well openly sees Rush Limbaugh as the man who invented his style of content, who made his career possible. He's in jail right now because he made a bunch of illegal threats and stuff. But he was interviewed for another fascist podcast by guy named Jared Howe on like right after Limbaugh's death, and in this clip about to play The Crying Nazi, Chris can't Well discusses his reaction to learning about Rush Limbaugh's death. And when I heard, you know, when I heard Katherine's voice like chop up, and I said, oh no, he knew you. Yeah, yeah, I knew. And Katherine Limball I had actually uh she wrote a letter to Rush. I guess. I kept thought hoping that you know, I get out of here in time that I can like call into the show or drop an email. And I started realized, like, all right, he's at philansan of weeks. Uh, if I'm gonna contact this guy just proa got to do it by mail. And I was actually gonna I forgot to do what I was gonna ask you to get me see if there was an address that I canna write to. And uh, it turns out to a little late vision. But you know when I when I heard her voice, I choked up and I said, oh no, my Shelly Ivy and he knew exactly what was going on to tell her and um and so yeah, I heard it when it happened, and I was like, you're gonna be fucking kids me, man. So that's I mean, you know, you he's legitimately affected by this. He's mourning Rush Limbaugh, this Nazi, and he's not the only Nazi. Morning Rush Limbaugh. The Daily Showa is one of the most prominent Nazi podcasts on the Internet. The words show up is the Hebrew term it mean I think it means calamity for the Holocaust. So there, it's literally this is the Daily Holocaust and it is maybe the most prominent Nazi podcast on the Internet now. TDS is its hosts call. It has been on the years for years at this point, since before Trump was in office, and the hosts of The Daily show a consider Limbaugh to be something of an idol. Now, these guys are hardcore Nazis, so they consider Russia moderate and they do demean him at times for that, but they also recognize that he paved the way for their financial success and cultural influence. And in this next audio clip you can hear several members of the Daily Showa can't emphasize that name enough. Learn live about Rush Limbaugh's death and the emotional impact it has on them is undeniable news cuked on that that's what happened today. What sen that's bad news for you, Buddy, Rush Limbaugh is dead. I mean, well, I guess I can't see what he's saying about tex I'm not gonna I'm not gonna dance on his grave. He said a lot of really dumb things. But I'm still something kind of sad about that. Like I'm very sad about that. I wouldn't be here. If not, I wouldn't be here, says host of the Daily Showa. Without Rush Limbaugh, I can't think of a more damning thing to say in a man's passing, but that he was truly honestly mourned by Nazis. Yeah, yeah, yeah, the end of the day. That's what you can say about Rush. And that is the end of our episodes on Rush Limbaugh. You're doing, Paul, I'm good. I mean, look, he said some dumb things. I'm absolutely going to dance. He sucked and I'm glad he's dead. He was a bad person. And I have to say on social media when when the story broke people were talking about it, there were a lot of people that wanted to say, you know, you can you you know, you can say whatever you want. But Rush was hugely successful, more successful and you will ever be had more influence. He was a millionaire. Guys take the w do you know what I mean? You can't. And this is the problem with these guys, with Trump, with people like this, is it's not enough for them to win. They need people to lick the boots. They need people to say you are the greatest. It is never enough for them. It is never enough for them to be hated, to be feared, to have all the marbles. They need you to say I love you too. They need it. And that is that is what the only solace I can take in a life like this is that in the end he didn't get the thing that he wanted, which was everybody saying You're the greatest and I love you and that. Yeah, it was piss and a bunch of Nazis crying. If you if you make if this is what you make of your life. This is how This is what's going to happen, is that you're gonna have people saying rest and piss. You're gonna have people saying this and it's and and sorry. You can have all the success you want. You're never gonna get that love. It's not gonna happen. And people are actively making plans to ship on your grave because you materially harmed their lives, Yes, and the lives of people that they loved. You have you have made life that much harder for generations of people of humans you have Rush Limbaugh had a material, significant negative impact on billions of people, many of whom are yet unborn. Yeah, rest and piss brush. I wish this to cancer had worked faster, you know. Yeah, anyway, Paul, you gotta got some plug. Double plug. At the end of this episode, Um, I'm gonna be appearing on The Daily Show, uh in a couple of weeks. TDS fan, By the way, I want to. I want to shout out and give face to Daniel Harper of the wonderful podcast I Don't Speak German, which is the deepest dives you're going to find on Nazi content creators. I guess you go Nazi thought leaders in the and I estate's very important work. Daniel Harper, I don't speak German. He provided those clips to me. Thank you, Daniel. UM, sorry back here, No, not at all. UM. You can follow me at p F Tompkins on Twitter and Instagram and um, I have a few podcasts that you can listen to. UM. You know, just all the usual stuff. You can find out about me on Paul off Thompkins dot com al F Tompkins dot com. Well that's gonna do it for us here at Behind the Bastards. UM, so go out into the world, tie one half of your brain behind your back and then die because that would actually kill you. That that would that would immediately lead to your death. Exposed brain. There's reason we have skulls people to take your brain inside of it. Yeah, anyway, I guess