Rush Limbaugh, part of the right wing’s talk radio dominance
Many people are aware of the generalization that there are many more right wing or conservative radio outlets than there are progressives or liberals on the radio. But what’s truly alarming is just how politically unbalanced the radio airwaves are.
For example, 10 out of the top 20 most popular radio shows by weekly listeners are conservative programs (listed below by popularity rank):
1. Rush Limbaugh
2. Sean Hannity
7. Mark Levin
8. Glenn Beck
9. Coast to Coast AM (George Noory, George Knapp)
10. Mike Gallagher
12. Hugh Hewitt
14. The Savage Nation (Michael Savage)
15. The Dana Show (Dana Loesch)
19. The Joe Pags Show (Joe Pagliarulo)
In contrast, only one of the top 20 radio programs, the Thom Hartmann Show, is a liberal political program. Others, such as NPR’s Fresh Air and All Things Considered, are more general interest, personal interest or news programs. Specialty programs such as Marketplace (financial) and Delilah (music) also round out the list, making the dominance of conservative talk shows even more striking.
There are also scores of (mostly AM and some FM) radio stations across America that feature syndicated programming from these top conservative talkers. Additionally, there is a second tier of conservatives who dominate the radio airwaves, including Larry Elder, Dennis Prager, John Batchelor, Chris Plante, Jay Sekulow, and Mark Larson. Indeed, some of the top radio station owners, such as iHeartMedia (formerly Clear Channel Communications) and Salem Media Group, feature such conservative programming. Salem brands many of its news/talk stations as “The Answer,” and its stations air a full plate of syndicated conservative programming. There are also many religious radio stations in the U.S., and a good number of these have a conservative political bent.
The progressive or liberal side has little to compete with this conservative juggernaut. In addition to Thom Hartmann, there are a few liberal talk show hosts on broadcast and/or satellite radio, such as Stephanie Miller, Bill Press, and Mike Malloy. Sirius/XM satellite radio has the Progress channel, which airs programming by Michelangelo Signorile and others. However, Sirius/XM also airs the the conservative Patriot channel, and in any event, it is a subscription service not freely available like AM or FM radio. Democrats, progressives and liberals also have online media outlets, such as the Daily Kos website, as well as individuals like Sam Seder with online shows, blogs, or popular social media accounts, but they have no advantage against popular Republican and conservative online media outlets such as Red State, the Daily Caller, and NewsMax. Ditto for podcasts, where the liberal side is subject to plenty of competition from Laura Ingraham, William Bennett, Tammy Bruce and others.
There can be little doubt that when one side has an overwhelming media presence, its messages and narratives will get through to the public more effectively, even out of proportion to their actual support. Most Americans are busy every day, with work, school, or other responsibilities. They don’t have much time to study every issue in depth. At most, they might turn on “the news” (often meaning broadcast or cable TV news channels) while tired after a hard day’s work, or they might listen to news and talk radio while driving to work in the morning. These viewers and listeners are susceptible to messages and narratives that are dynamically presented and repeated. Republicans have mastered the science of political messaging on radio talk shows and other media, and have built giant networks over which to spread their messages. Democrats are desperately far behind, and risk losing elections that they should not lose as a result. The Democrats should make it a top priority to build more media networks, including radio and television outlets, over which they can distribute their highly popular messages.
Photo by DonkeyHotey, used under Creative Commons license. https://is.gd/gwG6UJ
Won’t it be simpler and more effective, in the short run, to re-introduce something like the Fairness Doctrine? Building a larger network will take years, if not decades, and we need an immediate rebalancing now.
Thanks, you’re right that there are big obstacles to building a larger network, and it hasn’t been done in all this time. In the meantime, once President Biden hopefully gets his FCC nominee Gigi Sohn approved, resulting in a 3-2 Democratic FCC, they could reinstate the Fairness Doctrine. However, its reach is limited, as it only applied to broadcast radio and TV, since those stations are directly licensed by the FCC. Other technologies, such as cable TV, thus were not included.