Categories: Featured News

With All of His Advertisers Gone, Rush Limbaugh Becomes A Right Wing Welfare Bum

Last updated on May 1st, 2014 at 10:35 pm

Rush Limbaugh’s advertisers have deserted him, and the only way his radio remains financially sustainable is by being bankrolled by right wing organizations. In short, Rush is now taking handouts.

After the news that 48 of Cumulus Media’s top 50 advertisers have requested that their ads no longer appear on Limbaugh’s show, the other shoe dropped. Media Matters reported that, “Rush Limbaugh’s syndicator, Premiere Radio Networks, is the single largest independent contractor to the Heritage Foundation according to their latest 990 filing with the IRS, receiving $2,236,555 from the think tank. With advertisers fleeing his show, and as a result radio companies suffering major losses, the fiscal sponsorship of the conservative movement is now fiscally critical…Without wingnut welfare, which has also included sponsorships from FreedomWorks, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity’s shows would not be financially viable.”

Conservatives argue that the free market should be left alone. They make entire careers out of “keeping the government out of the free market.” They oppose any government regulation or taxation because it interferes with the free market, but when the free market decided that Rush Limbaugh’s show was not financially sustainable they threw their ideology out the window, and started subsidizing Limbaugh’s program.

What Limbaugh is doing is even worse than welfare. Rush Limbaugh and his fellow right wing talk show hosts are engaging in payola. Groups like FreedomWorks and the Heritage Foundation spend millions of dollars a year paying the likes of Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, and Rush Limbaugh to talk up their efforts without disclosing to their audiences that they are being paid to do so. Right wing talk radio is a pay to play business, and thanks to the advertiser boycott, payola is the only thing keeping Rush Limbaugh’s show financially afloat.

The advertiser boycott has been so effective that Rush Limbaugh is living off of corporate welfare.

Rush Limbaugh, who once suggested that poor people shouldn’t be allowed to vote, can’t generate enough advertising revenue for his show to financially sustain itself. The glory days are over for Limbaugh. He is now dependant on the generosity of his fellow ideologues. The same right wingers who want to defund PBS are secretly slipping Rush Limbaugh cash under the table.

If Big Bird should be subjected to the whims of the free market, Rush Limbaugh should too.

Thanks to the advertiser boycott, Rush Limbaugh’s show is in worse shape than anybody thought.

Follow Me
Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements. Awards and  Professional Memberships Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association

Recent Posts

Trump And House GOP’s Promise To Not Cut Social Security Is Total Nonsense

Trump got House Republicans to not use reconciliation to cut Social Security. The problem is…

2 days ago

Trump And Mike Johnson Agree To Apparently Cut Americans’ Healthcare To Pay For Tax Cuts For The Rich

President-elect Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson have agreed to a deal that would fund the…

2 days ago

Dozens Of Republicans Humiliate Trump/Musk By Voting Down CR

Donald Trump demanded that the debt limit be raised as part of the government funding…

3 days ago

Trump And Vance Blame Biden For Elon Musk Caused Chaos

Donald Trump and JD Vance are blaming President Biden for the havoc caused by Elon…

4 days ago

House Republicans Are Falling Apart And Now Mike Johnson Could Be Toast

The first little bit of pressure involving passing a bill to keep the government open…

4 days ago

Elon Musk Melts Down As House Republicans Show Him That He Has No Power

X boss Elon Musk is throwing a tantrum on his social media platform as House…

4 days ago