[advantager]

I believe Rush did become famous on television, but after the mid-90s it was really all about his radio program. So it might be to your point, fundamentally it isn't the internet, or TV, maybe it was radio.

I do believe that the Rush style radio talk show lays the foundation for Tucker Carlson and all of the conservative pundit TV programming. Which is the basis for the problems we see with Facebook / Fake News etc.

[derac]

One can trace that lineage in conservative thought back to the John Birch Society.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Birch_Society

[pyuser583]

Why stop there? Why not Fr. Coughlin or William Jennings Bryan?