Media personality Michael Smerconish took to Twitter early Wednesday morning to share his thoughts about what and who was driving the deep partisanship in Washington D.C.: The professional wrestling approach to news, fathered by Rush Limbaugh and followed by many others.
Smerconish teased his revelation on Twitter with a link to his website that contained an extended nine minute clip from Smerconish’s recent documentary, The Things I Wish I Knew Before I Started Talking. In a post to his website, which has since been deleted, Smerconish urges readers to purchase the entire full length documentary, but “this nine minute clip is the most important to show how the media is driving the partisanship in Washington”. The clip can still be found on Facebook.
“When I first started out in radio 30 years ago, (hosts’) personality mattered, not ideology,” Smerconish said in the clip. “They weren’t on air because of a political perspective but because they could tell stories.”
Smerconish said the rise of hosts like Limbaugh and others of his same ilk changed the business model, shifting focus away from local hosts to nationally syndicated ones.
“When I was getting started, AM radio was in trouble, FM was taking over,” Smerconish said. “AM radio needed a savior and they found it in Rush Limbaugh… Conservatives rightfully felt shutout of the mainstream media and he is a gifted showman who filled that void and created this clubhouse for conservatives.”
While Smerconish believes that Limbaugh provided a needed voice for conservatives, he and similar radio and TV hosts that followed changed the political climate in Washington.
“When Fox News came along in 1996 and later MSNBC, they took a page from that playbook,” he said. “Now the business model was toned down to entertainment masked as news. It’s like professional wrestling, good for ratings, good for revenue bad for the country. You have good guy vs bad guys, constant conflict and a predetermined outcome.”
Smerconish concludes that the pro wrestling approach to news is the major driving force between the political divisions within the United States.
“The media has moved to extremes,” he said. “The rise of polarization in Washington directly correlates with the changes in broadcasting I am describing. Pre-Limbaugh, 60 percent of the House and Senate were comprised of moderates. By 2010, every Senate Republican was more conservative than every Senate Democrat and every Senate Democrat was more liberal than every Senate Republican. In the 1970’s, members of Congress would vote with his or her party about 60 percent of the time. Now the typical member of Congress votes with their party more than 90 percent of the time.”
The clip ends with Smerconish claiming that while there were many factors that caused this change, media was the driving force behind it.
“Look, I’m not trying to blame this all on the media,” he said. “Social media is an issue. The beer muscles that come from anonymity online has fueled incivility and polarization, but mostly this is what happens when Washington takes its ques from those with microphones and not the vast majority of the people. When politicians follow the modern era pro-wrestling approach to news, the nation suffers. For that to change, people need to change the channel.”
