Bush, & Gop turn to talk shows for help

By Andrea Hopkins1 hour, 30 minutes ago
American radio talk-show hosts have become frontline warriors in a drive by President George W. Bush and his Republicans to pull off a surprise and maintain control of Congress in November 7 elections.
In the face of opinion polls favoring Democrats and bad news from Iraq, Bush turned to the powerful hosts of talk radio two weeks before Americans elect 435 representatives to the U.S. House and a third of the 100-member Senate.
On Tuesday the White House invited more than three dozen hosts from both sides of the political spectrum so they could interview top administration officials.
Radio personalities and programs play a political role in many countries. In America, they have become largely a powerful ally for conservatives, even as the rise of Internet blogs has broadened the spectrum of voter voices being heard.
"The liberal media wants to suppress the vote, they want to convince you that this race is over, they want you to go away and they want us to lose. I'm here to tell you that you have the power (to prove them wrong)," conservative talk radio host Sean Hannity told a Republican rally in Cincinnati last week in a jab at what conservatives call a liberal mainstream media.
Hannity, who does a show for ABC Radio that reaches 13 million people a week as well as a television show for Fox News, said his shows give politicians the opportunity for "real interviews, not soundbites" -- the sort of unfiltered access to voters that mainstream media don't offer.
"Look, on my radio program today I had the vice president, the secretary of defense, the secretary of state, Karl Rove, Tony Snow and Dan Bartlett. That's all in one radio show," Hannity told Reuters in an interview.
American University communications professor Jane Hall said that access appeals to politicians frustrated by a traditional news cycle they have little control over.
"It's a way to go around the filter, go directly to people who might be more inclined to agree. It's a friendlier audience," Hall said.
UPHILL BATTLE
The five largest U.S. talk radio shows by audience are all conservative programs with audiences of between 4 million and 14 million people a week, according to trade magazine Talkers. Rush Limbaugh, who declined to be interviewed, has the largest audience, while Hannity is a close second.
Earlier this month, the liberal news and talk radio network Air America filed for bankruptcy after slightly more than two years on the air.
Analysts said the rise of other populist media -- most notably the Internet -- along with growing schisms among conservatives over immigration, the Iraq war, budget deficits and social policy will make it tougher this year for talk radio to help Republicans chalk up an election win.
"Talk radio is still predominantly a conservative phenomenon, but it's getting smaller in scope and if it's going to be effective for conservative Republican candidates, it's going to have to be more intense than it used to be," said Michael Frank, vice president of government relations at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative Washington think-tank.
"The conservative base itself is not exactly united and cheering on behalf of one party this time ... and that may blunt some of the effectiveness of talk radio as a kind of organizing tool for Republican candidates."
Still, radio hosts are hoping the political activism of their audience will result in another strong Election Day turnout for Republicans. A study by Talkers magazine found 74 percent of talk radio listeners voted in 2004 -- well above the average U.S. election year turnout.
"If all of us go out to the polls and get every person we know to go out the poll ... the great thing that will happen on election day is we will confuse and confound the pundits and confuse and confound the liberal media," Hannity told the Republican rally in Cincinnati.
His audience was enthusiastic.
"I'm old, I'm tired, I've got diabetes, and I'm freezing to death, and yet I'm glad I came here -- it makes me want to work harder," said Zip Jaycox, 79, a self-described "strong Bush supporter and strong Republican" volunteer who goes door-to-door with her husband to rally party voters.
"We're going to get out and work like the very dickens."