As I listen to all the discussion about Limbaugh, Levin, the Fairness Doctrine, etc. and hear that Rush is very important, we need talk radio, it’s great to have a conservative alternative to the “drive by media”, etc., I have just one question: Why? I mean conservative talk radio has been around for two decades and has enjoyed a great commercial success, but just what exactly do we have to show for it politically? I wonder if the talk radio personalities could, if just for a few minutes, overcome their legendary modesty and tell us how many voters they think they may have persuaded to vote Republican (after all, when they tirelessly popularize conservative ideas for many years, those ideas are supposed to become more popular, right?).
I’m afraid the accidental presidency of George W. Bush (he would never have become president if either Elian Gonzalez had drowned or his mother had not) has served to disguise the truly sorry state of the Republican Party over the last two decades, when Republican candidates lost the popular vote in four presidential elections and narrowly won it in one. The Republican share of the two-party presidential vote averaged only 48% between 1990 and 2010 (but, of course, we are supposed to believe this is still a center-right nation). This is already the second worst period in GOP history (only the Depression was worse), and there’s still no light at the end of the tunnel.
By contrast, in the preceding two decades Republican presidential candidates won four landslides and narrowly lost one election. The average Republican share of the two-party presidential vote between 1970 and 1990 was an amazing 56%. This clearly shows that the liberal media per se is not a serious impediment to Republican and conservative victories (in fact one can argue that the liberal triopoly of ABC, NBC and CBS did McGovern, Mondale et al. a disservice by providing them with an echo chamber, never questioning their basic premises, never telling them “this is a really stupid idea” etc., while at the same time keeping Republicans on their toes and forcing them to learn to present and defend their ideas effectively, starting at the level of the most basic assumptions: e.g. both Nixon and Reagan could quickly explain why Communism was bad, while last year Republicans never even bothered to explain why nuclear Iran would be very bad).
Of course, the depressing turnaround in Republican fortunes around 1990 had multiple and complex reasons: the world changed, the country changed, both political parties changed, etc. Just as after the New Deal and Great Society the Dems were out of ideas by the 1970s, the Republicans were originally elected to tackle Soviet expansionism, strengthen the economy, cut confiscatory taxes, lighten regulatory burdens, reduce crime etc. By the early 1990s they succeeded in all those tasks – and then could offer no compelling rationale for remaining in power. A great fault lies with the lack of new conservative vision. Conservatives failed to appreciate the full importance of Khomeini’s revolution and to anticipate the threat of Islamofascism. They failed to appreciate the full importance of such middle class economic issues as health care and education. They remained in denial about the incorrectness of the “starve the beast” theory (unfortunately, if you want to cut spending, there’s really no alternative to Napoleon’s approach: “When you set out to take Vienna, take Vienna”). Etc., etc. etc. Instead the Republicans just cranked up social conservatism – unfortunately, at the time when the country was becoming more socially liberal. The emerging “conservative media” did not help much. While not actually offering any new compelling vision, talk radio hosts filled the vacuum and appointed themselves custodians of conservative orthodoxy and enforcers of ideological purity. While they don’t seem to have any measurable (positive) effect on general elections, they certainly wield a lot of influence in the nomination process. And I’m afraid that influence was not necessarily helpful for producing candidates with new conservative ideas.
23 responses so far
1 NT291 // Mar 8, 2009 at 10:10 pm
I think the GOP victories in 1994 are correctly attributed to the influence of Limbaugh. This poster has incredibly forgotten about the presence of Ross Perot in the 1992 and 1996 elections in making our poor record since 1990 the kernel of his argument.
2 Chekote // Mar 8, 2009 at 10:17 pm
How ignorant can one be? Newt was able to win control of Congress thanks to Rush and talk radio. Where does Frum find these posters? Is this the new intellectualism?
3 nolan084 // Mar 9, 2009 at 12:02 am
Talk radio is no more responsible for the GOP’s losses than they are for the GOP’s victories. You guys are fighting the wrong battle. Voters vote for candidates and ideas. Not guys/gals on the radio. We need the John McCain and George Bush supporters in our Party, but they shouldn’t be carrying the Party’s flag. We haven’t had an effective leader since Newt was roaming Capitol Hill.
4 mlindroo // Mar 9, 2009 at 2:40 am
Amazingly, none of the comments really address the irrefutable points raised by Andrew Pavelyev. Namely, the GOP has been far less successful since the Cold War ended. Maybe the performance in the 1992 elections indeed was an exception rather than the norm at that point (due to Ross Perot), but there have been few highlights since then. There has been exactly *one* real success: the 1994 midterms … the 2002 and 2004 elections now seem like mere aberrations due to 9/11. But the trend since at least 1996 has been clear: the Dems keep doing better in nationwide elections while the GOP has been losing ground.
Starting in 1992, 19 states have voted for the Democratic presidential candidate in every single election. This translates to a solid “floor” of at least 252 electoral votes. In contrast, the Bushes, Dole and McCain only managed to consistently win 13 states having just 96 electoral votes in 1992-2004. All of them (except Texas, which might be a future battleground thanks to the explosive growth of the Hispanic minority there) are small rural states. Little wonder, then, that three out of those five elections were Dem landslides and the fourth (Bush vs. Gore) only was settled by the Supreme Court although the Democratic candidate won the popular vote. Some “center-right” nation indeed!
The bottom line is that the GOP needs to do better on many fronts now. The party does not attract urban voters, minorities, women, the young or educated voters. Is there any reason to assume the message of Rush Limbaugh, Hugh Hewitt or Mark Levin really resonates with these key groups? Their underlying conservative ideology might not necessarily be a problem, mind you, but the message needs to change since the American electorate no longer is concerned about the same things as 30 years ago.
MARCU$
5 nolan084 // Mar 9, 2009 at 4:49 am
mlindroo,
It’s up to candidates to win and lose elections. Not talk radio.
6 Realist // Mar 9, 2009 at 9:47 am
chekote said: “Newt was able to win control of Congress thanks to Rush and talk radio.” Really? Then why isn’t Rush chairman of the RNC? Oh wait. He already is.
7 jsanderssr // Mar 9, 2009 at 10:01 am
GW Bush won the presidency (twice) in great part because the dems offered up idiots for the post. If talk radio is the key, whey didn’t air america and similar excreta win it for the dems?
8 kharwick // Mar 9, 2009 at 11:55 am
Inane, as it is not talk radios job to win or lose elections for the Party, and they are just a medium to articulate the events of the day and how they impact us all as conservatives.
The mess the RNC now finds itself in is due soley to those that be within it, and not from anywhere else. There is no way talk radio or anything else other than the insiders in the Party can do to right this ship, though now that the grey voters who have to decide every morning which side of their head to part their hair are seeing the results of Democrats run amuck ther also may be some assistance coming from the opposition.
9 sinz54 // Mar 9, 2009 at 12:31 pm
The value of right-wing talk-radio is to motivate the GOP’s base to turn out to vote in elections. The GOP can always count on Limbaugh’s 23 million dittoheads. And as long as the GOP and the Dems had split the Independent vote in past elections, heavy turnout of the GOP’s base could win the Red States plus Ohio, which amounts to an Electoral College majority. That’s how Bush won in 2004, for example. The dittoheads delivered the Red States, and the evangelicals delivered Ohio, and that was an Electoral College majority. But in 2008, this strategy failed, for two reasons: 1. Independents broke for the Dems. Without a sizable portion of the Independent vote, the GOP cannot win swing states like Ohio, even if their base turns out massively. 2. New voters–Hispanics and the young–broke overwhelmingly for the Dems. From Limbaugh’s demographics, we see that Limbaugh’s audience is mostly older, mostly male, mostly concentrated in the Red States, and nearly 100% white. But that cohort represents a shrinking portion of the electorate. That’s what Republicans have trouble accepting: White married Protestants, the bread and butter of the GOP, are now down to only 51% of the electorate–and that percentage shrinks every year. If the GOP can’t win over other groups, it can’t win future elections, no matter what Limbaugh says or what the base does.
10 sinz54 // Mar 9, 2009 at 12:44 pm
chekote: “Newt was able to win control of Congress thanks to Rush and talk radio.” No. What happened was that Bill Clinton had campaigned in 1992 as a centrist. But in his first year in office, he moved decisively to the left–incompetently, by delegating health care to Hillary (who botched it), by proposing to raise taxes, and by proposing to lift the ban on gays in the military (over the objections of the Joint Chiefs). Clinton’s first year in office was total left-wing amateurishness. Between that and the fact that he got elected with only 43% of the popular vote in the first place, the electorate had soured enough on Clinton to want the Congress to be a check and balance to his Administration. And you’re not giving enough credit to Newt. Newt’s “Contract With America” positioned the Republicans as technocratic reformers. The GOP had a positive message of reform, which contrasted with Clinton’s left-wing amateurishness. Yes, talk radio can help get the GOP’s message out. But they need to put together a good message first. In 1994, Newt’s message was unquestionably superior. Right now, the GOP is still searching for a message. Talk radio can’t help much there, other than to rile up the base to hate Obama’s guts.
11 disenlightened // Mar 9, 2009 at 3:29 pm
How about, “What’s liberal Republican bloggers EVER done for us?”
Since the Republican party strayed from it’s principals and began acting more like Democrats, our fortunes have fallen. You and Frum seem to think we need to move even further left and get involved in policy and idea debates that the liberal media will twist and lie about. Barack Obama’s policies and ideas were not the deciding factor in getting him elected. A large percentage of Democrats who voted for him couldn’t tell you his policies and ideas, other than to say, like robots, “Republicans are for the rich. Democrats are for the common man”. The two deciding factors in Obama being elected were personality and race. You don’t fight personality and race with policies and ideas, because the people you are trying to impress don’t really listen – they vote on feelings and emotion.
12 A. Wilson // Mar 9, 2009 at 3:59 pm
What’s really unknowable is what the last 20 years would have been like for GOP prospects WITHOUT talk radio. They may have been much WORSE. —— The author attempts to address this using historical averages, but there have been too many other factors, some monumentally influential to the way people vote, that I think it’s really impossible to come to the conclusions the author attempts to. —- What we really need are CANDIDATES that can effectively and coherently put forth a conservative message, which is inherently more sensible and practical. THEY need to do more on this. —- Talk radio will be what it’s always been — about the only place one can get an alternative to the DVM. (Democrat-voting media) Stop to think how things might really be without that outlet, and without candidates that are unable or unwilling to make any effective noise whatsoever.
13 ChristianMiller // Mar 9, 2009 at 5:15 pm
sinz, you are misguided. You have stated several times here that the conservative vote will go R no matter what. We conservatives will let the leftists hang you from lampposts if you don’t stick with US. You and Frum are pissing us off, big time. It is one thing for us to agree that leftists are dangerous and unacceptable ( I’m not totally sure you agree with that BTW) but another to turn on your own and give aid and comfort to the enemy. You are naive and believe them more than you believe us. Therefore you have made your bed and you must sleep in it -and they will anally rape you. Trust me. We warned you. They hate you, they hate Frum and they are LYING and manipulating you that it is merely the “tone” of conservatives; or that it is abortion, or [gay] marriage. It is all pretext. They are driven by leftists and the rest are drones trying to be cool. If Colbert Stewart, Letterman, Oprah the View and so much more , say someone is uncool, they follow blindly. There are two kinds of Republicans for these people; mean-spirited, or stupid and out-of touch. In the former category are all the R’s who are obviously intelligent Nixon, Gingrich, Mark Levin, Limbaugh, and the rest are mocked as Stupid. Reagan, Bush II, Quayle. Ultimately leftism becomes totalitarian. You only need to read a bit of history.
14 ChristianMiller // Mar 9, 2009 at 5:25 pm
Andrew, you are ignorant of many things. Talk radio is not SUPPOSED to convince people of anything. If it was, no one would listen. Does that make sense to you, or not? You and Republicans like you, don’t have a say in talk radio. This is a free-market phenomenon. The fact that most talk radio hosts are conservative or libertarian is a SYMPTOM of the domination of the MSM. If you understand economics and marketing, talk radio is filling a vacuum. Nevertheless, the hosts are free to express their opinions and ideas, and are not a wing of the Republican party as you would prefer, and if they were a wing of the R party they would have roughly the attention that this website does. Near zero!
15 jsinger008 // Mar 9, 2009 at 5:27 pm
Andrew,
Great post. I wanted to point you to this interesting blog post that asked a similar question concerning Rush (i.e. how much of an impact does he really have?):
http://galleyslaves.blogspot.com/2009/03/how-influential-is-rush-limbaugh.html
16 sw // Mar 9, 2009 at 6:20 pm
Breathtaking originality. You are right to say that self-described conservatives ignored the menace of Khomeini and got too pushy with the social-con agenda.
Talk radio hosts in shades and shaved heads, standing like bouncers by the velvet rope that leads to higher office — not a pretty picture. However, Andrew, don’t forget that these folks flocked wholesale to Mitt Romney– but the voters had a different opinion. Talk radio trashed John McCain for years, in sometimes especially horrible ways, but they had to get in line behind the nomination. These entertainers (“There, I said it! Nyahh!”) can be great company on the commute, a real relief after a day spent in pc-land– they can educate, illuminate, triangulate, and stimulate the mind twelve different ways — but delusions of greatness, uh-uh. Let’s have a little humility and perspective. We’re Republicans. We’re supposed to be good at that.
17 ChristianMiller // Mar 9, 2009 at 6:30 pm
There is so much wrong with this analysis i don’t know where to start. Bush is an accidental President because of one incident? This is preposterous. In Andrew’s brilliant forensics, in isolation of millions of other factors, he decides Elian Gonzolez won the election of Bush. What degree do you have again, genius? He wants to pretend the political landscape is static except when it is inconvenient for his point . Things have changed but he wants to magically return to the 70’s to 90’s. The media was more balanced then my friend, you aren’t aware of that? And citing voting percentages over time with different candidates and situations as well as third-party candidates in two of them,namely Ross Perot, 48% is pretty good Omitting the Democratic numbers may be an indication those numbers are worse. What are they Andrew? This is the kind of analysis people do when they are trying to promote an agenda, and it isn’t convincing to this talk-radio listener. We are smarter than you and you are unaware of this . You can’t even make a coherent argument or articulate an ideology, you cite ridiculous statistics, cherry-pick parameters and make odd statements (meant to be provocative like talk radio perhaps?) Face it, you are a cheerleader for a complete abstraction called the Republican party. This is no different than rooting for the NY Jets or the Washington Wizards. Go GOP! Go GOP! Whoever you are whatever you do, Go GOP! This attitude more than anything else turns off centrists. They sense your blind allegiance to a party not a principle.
18 Advocate123 // Mar 9, 2009 at 10:51 pm
Answer: Talk Radio has educated and articulated a Conservative message to the largest audience in America why they should vote for the Republican Party.
Without talk radio, most of the public would be in darkness as to what is happening with the Government.
A new Pew poll demonstrated that Rush Limbaugh had the most informed audience when compared to CBS News, ABC News, NBC News, MSNBC, etc.
The fact of the matter is that the ONLY articulate Republicans today are found on Talk Radio, and maybe if you would just listen to them, you would understand why nobody agrees with your nonsense.
19 sinz54 // Mar 10, 2009 at 8:03 am
Franco: Your threats are not going to change our basic point: We definitely want to “stick with you” in one national party; and together let’s take on the Dems, even in their home turf. But we don’t want you and Limbaugh’s dittoheads to dictate the GOP’s platform anymore. The kind of platform we’re envisioning is going to have items in it that the dittoheads won’t like. It’s going to have items in it that the GOP base in the Deep South won’t like. Get used to it!
20 ChristianMiller // Mar 10, 2009 at 8:25 am
Ha! Then they will lose again. I’m already used to it because McCain is the model and Obama is the result. And it hurt the “fiscal republicans” the most because the stock market tanked. Social conservatives aren’t generally very wealthy. Bush the ‘compassionate conservative” started all this in motion along with years of Clinton and Democrats of course. When you have a choice between let’s say Jindal and Obama, who do YOU vote for?
21 Captain America // Mar 10, 2009 at 8:04 pm
Mr. Pavelyev…With all due respect, don’t waste time and energy attacking “family” while the President shakes the very foundations of our capitalist system and way of life. Forget statistics, forget elections… why would you attack the only…ONLY media (besides FOX and a crumb or two on CNN) that gives conservative ideas a forum? Doesn’t everyone realize that this whole faux controversy was orchestrated by the White House in the first place? Sure, Limbaugh should have chosen his words more carefully, but any thinking person knows what he was trying to say. With Emmanuel and others endlessly quoting him out of context Obama and Pelosi have exactly what they need…cover in the face of a tanking economy (because of their ineptitude) and Republicans eating their own. Lets get smarter and focus on the 20 trillion dollar problem
22 talldude // Mar 11, 2009 at 2:23 am
test
23 talldude // Mar 11, 2009 at 2:26 am
“And citing voting percentages over time with different candidates and situations as well as third-party candidates in two of them,namely Ross Perot, 48% is pretty good Omitting the Democratic numbers may be an indication those numbers are worse. ”
I think you didn’t read the article very closely. It said the Republican share of the TWO-PARTY vote was 48%. That means that the third party results had already been factored out of the equation and that the Democratic share was 52%.
Face it, the Republicans are 1-3-1 over the last 5 elections. 2000 was for all intents and purposes a tie. Bush got lucky with the things in Palm Beach county, etc but it could have just as easily gone the other way. 2004 was a clear Republican win but still a relatively tight margin. The Dems won each of their 3 elections by 7 points or more.
Its about time for the Republican party to wake up and realize that the 80s are over. The WW2 generation was one of the most conservative in US history and they formed the backbone of the Nixon/Reagan success but they have been dying recently and large majorities of the people turning 18 are socially liberal.
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