On Rush Limbaugh

Yesterday morning, I listened to a short biography of Saint Augustine, and learned that he was a bishop for thirty years.  His was a productive life, with a rocky start.

 

That same afternoon I heard of Rush’s death.  I don’t mean to compare them morally, or in spiritual stature, but Rush also had a rocky start in his career, then about 30 years of successful performance at the apex of his field.

 

And it was 30 years ago, almost exactly, that I started listening to Rush.  He was my introduction to conservative politics, at the same time that RC Sproul was awakening me to the delights of Biblical conservative theology.  It set my course of early reading: Thatcher, Reagan, Churchill.  Ryle, MacArthur, Piper.

 

 

But what made Rush so significant?

 

Audience size

Clocking in at 25-ish million listeners every week, Rush could not be ignored.  How did he attract so many?  That’s the real story…

 

Liberal news bias

Rush filled a big gap in the media world.  As establishment media went from Walter Cronkite’s sound journalism to Dan Rather’s biased reporting, conservatives took note and sought other resources.  Sure, they had National Review, etc.   But daily news without the liberal bias was totally missing.  This bias was a new thing back when Rush started.  Conservative political opinion was suddenly and widely derided in all the news available.  Rush came on the scene and voiced without shame what half the country thought.  Instead of deferring to the beltway establishment, to which he was an outsider, he punched back and rejected their assumptions.  

Rush and Donald Trump were both loved by many for this.  The genius was that he tapped into conservative resentment at being mistreated, misrepresented, and biased against.  Listening to Rush was often a rush of feeling you were sticking it to the liberals who despised you.  This was confirmed to me yesterday, when the BBC came out with the news of Rush’s death, and quickly labeled his views “racist, misogynist, and homophobic.”  Wow.  Totally wrong.

Articulation of conservative principles

A sampling:

1. Less government intrusion and regulation.

2. Let Americans loose to make their own choices.

3. “Environmentalist wackos” aren’t following the science, but finding an excuse for the government to spend tons of money.

4. “Femi-nazis” are not happy people.  He played some feminist’s sound byte over and over: “We’re fierce!  We’re feminists!  And we’re in your face!”

5. Liberals pursue symbolism over substance.  Conservatives want to actually help the poor.  Liberals want to be seen as helping them by grandstanding and throwing money at them, which actually hurts.

 

 

Mixing News and Entertainment

After all the serious and stern Brokaws and NPRs of the world, here was a normal guy I could relate to, responding to the world with me, the way I would.  What a relief!

 

Rush tended his image carefully.  He avoided being seen as a policy wonk, insisting he was an entertainer.  He deftly mixed in important issues with a light hearted approach.  He wove together angry tirades against Clinton or Gore, with Reagan-style optimism that it is “morning in America.”  His serious listeners got mad when he spent his whole first Monday morning segments talking (bragging?) about the weekend golfing with some celebrities, or pow-wowing in the NFL owner’s box at the game.

 

The most brilliant aspect of his image was the braggadocio.  “With half my brain tied behind my back, just to make it fair” was a favorite tagline.  The genius of this was that his allies took it as good-natured ribbing.  But his enemies thought Rush was serious about himself, seething at his pride and arrogance, which confirmed conservatives in their view that liberals can’t take a joke.

 

 

The Down Side

So much for the significance factors.  Here’s a list for Rush-sympathizers to watch out for, as we look to a future America without Rush’s voice.

 

Rush was not a great moral example.

One of his earlier taglines: “I love the feminist movement.  Especially when I’m walking right behind it.”  Yikes.  He was married several times, swore on the show a lot, and didn’t make faith a major element of his show until the end.  I was thankful for his explicit testimony to faith in Jesus Christ that I saw about a month ago.  But the overall effect of his show was simply to validate the red-blooded American conservative male, with all his boys-will-be-boys moral failures.

 

 

Rush appealed to emotion more than we realize.

Anger was the most common.  A natural response, but not good to cultivate, long term.  I notice this when I listen to Ben Shapiro around my family.  They are struck by the negativity, the angry tone.  I think with Rush, too, this won out over the expressed optimism.  Conservatives have always sought to be happy warriors (Bill Buckley’s phrase), but do not often succeed.  The main gist of Rush’s show was to validate our anger at the way things are going in politics.

 

 

Rush was a master of ridicule

Tucker, Hannity, Shapiro and others follow this today, and it’s a bad legacy.  Deriding opponents is not a case against them.  Rejecting a liberal’s position should not result in feeling disgusted with them as a person.  We shouldn’t go there.  But Rush actively promoted that derision, and it’s a bad road to go down.  It isolates conservatives from everyone who isn’t on their team, stunting our potential to influence apolitical neighbors in our community.

 

 

Going forward

Rush was a Republican.  He galvanized Newt Gingrich’s Contract with America and the Tea Party, later.  But toward the end, he was just an extension of their talking points, and I stopped listening.

 

The Republican party today is a mess.  Years back, Peggy Noonan interviewed Rush for her book on Reagan.  I don’t think that could happen today.  Noonan is wrapped up in her establishment connections, as her book makes clear.  Her weekly articles drip with moral repulsion for all things Trump.  Meanwhile, Trump and the populist Republicans couldn’t care less about those connections.  There is deep division over this, and you know what they say about a house divided…

 

We need people who know the establishment system, but who aren’t corrupted by it.  Right now we have populists who don’t know the system, so can’t do much but yell into a bullhorn.  They seek out Gab and Parler as we speak.  These are Rush’s GOP fans, and they are going to be a thorn in the side of the party leadership for a while.  And then we have establishment types like Noonan who care more about their insider people than they do about deep political reform.

 

 

Where to go from here?

 

Emphasize the positive

Conservative commentators gravitate to negative criticism of liberals in power.  Less of this, and more focus on individual enterprise and work ethic would go a long way.  Rush was right about this.

 

 

Ask who can fix our problems

This brings us to the faith question.  Liberals tend to be secular, and thus put faith in worldly things, like government.  Biden thinks spending a lot of money will fix the ‘Rona problem.  But Christians know that only Jesus justifying and sanctifying us will fix our social problems.  There will be the occasional governmental solution that helps, but its role is way more limited than we think (“there oughta be a law”…).

 

Rush pointed us to Jesus at the end of his life, which shows us the way, too.

Public policy matters.  Liberal policies harm, while conservative policies help, or let other institutions help.

But the ultimate issues are spiritual.  As Rush Limbaugh now knows.