#30 The Origins of Conservative Talk Radio w/ Brian Rosenwald
The Road to Now
Benjamin Sawyer
4.8 • 628 Ratings
🗓️ 21 November 2016
⏱️ 61 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The 2016 election is over and many Americans are trying to understand how Donald Trump was able to defeat the political establishment and reveal major flaws in the ways experts assess public opinion. To help us understand this election, Bob and Ben speak with Dr. Brian Rosenwald about his research on the history of conservative talk radio. Brian traces the rise of Rush Limbaugh and other conservative radio hosts in the 1980s, and the ways they have both reflected and shaped their listeners' views. He also explains why there is truth to claims of liberal bias in the mainstream media, but not for the reasons most critics assume.
Our conversation with Brian also provided an excellent opportunity for Bob and Ben to discuss the 2016 election and our take on the best ways to move forward.
Dr. Brian Rosenwald is a fellow at the Robert A. Fox Leadership Program at the University of Pennsylvania. He is currently converting his doctoral dissertation, "Mount Rushmore: The Rise of Talk Radio and its Impact on Politics and Public Policy," into a book for Harvard University Press. Brian also conducts research for the Slate podcast Whistlestop.
For more on this and many other episodes of The Road to Now, check out our website: www.theroadtonow.com
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Coming up on the road to now. |
| 0:03.1 | Right. I mean, as President Obama said, he said, you know, a couple weeks ago, if so, if I watch Fox News, I wouldn't vote for me either. |
| 0:11.8 | Liberal media bias exists. And I'll say that again for your audience, because I know some jurors just hit the floor. |
| 0:18.6 | Yes, I'm a scholar. Yes, I'm saying, liberal media bias exists. Talk radio as a political force is entirely an accident of history. |
| 0:27.4 | I'm Bob Crawford. And I'm Ben Sawyer, and this is the road to now. Well, you guys wanted an |
| 0:32.1 | election recap episode, and this is, I think this is as good as any. We had the privilege of speaking with |
| 0:40.1 | Brian Rosenwald. Ben, tell us a little bit about Brian. Yeah, Brian is a fellow at the Robert |
| 0:45.6 | A. Fox Leadership Program at the University of Pennsylvania, where he also is an instructor of |
| 0:49.8 | history. And his research looked at the rise of conservative talk radio. Its origins and the ways that it |
| 0:55.7 | both reflects and shapes a popular opinion, you know, for its listeners, and the origins of |
| 1:01.4 | folks like Rush Limbaugh. I told an amazing story about how Rush started off in a way as almost |
| 1:06.9 | as a comic. It's just this great stories. And aside from all this, what was really great was we were able to use this to actually speak in a fairly balanced way about the election, I think. You know, what can we learn from it? I don't know about most of you guys who were listening, but the week since the election have been one where I've seen a lot of polarization, a lot of people unfriending each other on social media, |
| 1:27.7 | a lot of people unwilling to listen to each other, think about what we could learn from this election. |
| 1:32.1 | I get that it's a fairly recent thing. |
| 1:34.3 | I get there's a lot of people who are scared. |
| 1:35.8 | There's reasons for that. |
| 1:37.4 | But I think overall, this conversation was something that we were able to give our take on it in a way that sticks |
| 1:45.2 | with our goal of trying to follow, you know, the historic lines and what's at work and not get |
| 1:51.6 | too partisan with things. Yeah, and there are definitely historical lines that come from the beginning |
| 1:59.5 | of right-wing talk radio and Rush Limbaal to the election of Donald Trump, |
| 2:04.2 | he spoke to their audience. He was able to tap into the energy. Since 2008, the energy in the Republican Party |
| 2:13.8 | has been, has come from these right- talk radio shows and, and they're listeners. |
... |
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