A rather credulous piece in today's NYT accepts the argument -- a standard c.w. argument, I confess -- that a Democratic president is going to mean good times for right-wing talk radio.
Under a headline proclaiming a "new dawn" for right-wing talk, Brian Stelter writes:
After eight years of playing defense for President Bush, the conservatives who dominate talk radio are back on offense.
Hours after Mr. Obama's election, the country's most popular radio host, Rush Limbaugh, was talking about the "rebirth of principled opposition."
Sean Hannity, the second highest-rated host, quickly cast his afternoon show as the home of "conservatism in exile."
It is a lively time to be behind the microphone...
There is, as I say, an old rule of thumb that when one side takes power, the organs of the other side benefit because their constituencies become mad and worried and angry, and these states result in higher engagement, driving up circulation or listenership or what have you. As Katrina cleverly puts it, "What's bad for the nation is good for The Nation." And indeed, The Nation's circ ballooned during the Bush years.
But what about the metric of influence? We've just gone through eight years in which the vice president and other administration officials went on Rush Limbaugh's show from time to time to reach the troops. Nobody from the new administration is going to be doing that, ever.
The right-wing shows will have very little relevance during the Obama age. Toward the end, the Times pieces gets around to allowing this as a possible future:
The presidential election provoked talk about the relevance of talk radio, especially given John McCain's ascendance to the top of the Republican ticket despite adamant opposition from conservative hosts. At the same time, left-wing blogs are acting as a powerful counterweight to the right-wing radio opposition that flourished during the 1990s.
In an opinion piece for USA Today this month, the radio host Michael Medved said he cherished the notion "that the last time a young Democrat took over the White House with gauzy visions of change, it produced a 'Golden Age' for right-wing talk," referring to the presidency of Bill Clinton and the ascent of Rush Limbaugh, among others. But he expressed concern that talk shows have cultivated a "niche audience rather than the Republican mainstream."
Exactly. In 1993, the phenomenon of right-wing talk radio was fairly new. New things have an energy and draw attention. Now, these people are just repeating themselves in a very tiresome way.
Maybe I'm wrong here; maybe someday the collective weight of all these blatherers will help foment a major rebellion against Obama. But now, they and their constituencies are isolated. Even conservative economists are signing on to a stimulus package worth a few hundred billion dollars. And Congress will presumably pass it. Where does that leave these people?
Their numbers may go up, but they'll just be talking to true believers who will be more and more disconnected from the general culture. I predicted at a public forum in Washington in early in 2008 that talk radio wouldn't matter very much in the election, and it looks like I was right. They couldn't stop McCain, they couldn't stop Obama, they loved Embarracuda, who ended up damaging the GOP ticket badly, and the mainstream didn't pick up their "stories" about how Obama and Bill Ayers were plotting to destroy America together and all that. They. Don't. Matter.
Drudge doesn't matter much either anymore, but that's another post.
