Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Speaking of the Nervous Breakdown   [Rich Lowry]

This Corner debate over Rush, prompted by Jerry, is another pretty good symptom of it. Rush is not the problem with the Republican party. He has been hugely influential when the Republicans have won — '94, '00, '02, '04 — and hugely influential when they have lost. He may not poll well, but that's because he's not a politician trying to pander to swing voters. He's defending a worldview. At NR, we see the evidence of his influence every time we encounter intern candidates who say they first were attracted to conservatism by hearing Rush. I don't listen to much radio or watch much TV during work hours, but when I'm in a car I listen to and enjoy Rush and Sean. As for better talk radio, well, if you've been doing this for 20 years and built a massive audience, it's a pretty good sign you do it well. As someone who does TV and radio in short bursts, I can't imagine pulling it off for 3 hours everyday. That said, I think Rush is wrong about some important aspects of our current predicament (for example, he underestimates the importance of new policy ideas for our movement), as I discussed at the time of his CPAC speech. But the debate over Rush himself is a distraction, and in large part — although not in this case — driven by people who want to divide conservatives and hope to define Limbaugh's worldview as out of bounds. For a more formal statement of all of this, refer back to NR's editorial on Rush a few months ago.

 

UPDATE

 

E-mail:

 

Hi Rich,

 

I don’t listen to Rush often, but I did today, just awhile ago, and he was on a riff about using lifestyle taxes to pay for health care (double the cost of movie tickets because theaters promote sedentary lifestyles!) that brilliantly cut to the heart of the argument against socialized medicine. And he was funny! What more could you want?

 

05/13 11:49 AMShare