Those Who Are Ignorant of History...

 ... are doomed to think Charlie Sykes is an affable gasbag who, for some reason, shows up on MSNBC nearly as often as their corporate peacock logo.

But he isn't.

Charlie Sykes is a 30-year Conservative hate radio veteran and Wisconsin political kingmaker.  He, as much as anyone else, built the GOP into the monster factory that it is today.  The monster factory that swept Donald Trump to power, and ran Sykes out of his Wisconsin radio gig...and straight onto MSNBC.  

In virtually every interview I have every read or heard with Sykes, and on virtually every episode of his podcast, Sykes forcefully and repeatedly compresses the timeline for when his Republican party lost its mind to "these past few year" or  "over the past several year" or "in the past five or six year".   Because the decades-long run up to Trump during which Conservative hate radio stars like Sykes were deeply complicit in grooming the deranged party base is not something Sykes wants to talk about.

And acknowledging that the Left -- the awful, dirty, huppie, commie Left -- was actually right about the Right all along is definitely not something Sykes wants to talk about.

However the past cannot stay buried forever, and with the recent raft of books that explicitly name and shame Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich as the direct forbears of Trump, Sykes has now decided that maybe, just maybe, the past actually did happen...just not exactly in the way we the awful, dirty, huppie, commie Liberals remember it.   

Sure, Charlie Sykes was there, but, see, he wasn't really a part of it.  Well, maybe a little bit, but it's certainly not a matter worth dwelling on, and certainly not a fit subject for his seemingly hourly interludes on MSNBC.  No, he was more of a "volunteer coffee boy” 30-year Conservative hate radio veteran.  Existing at the periphery of the Right, but never really aware of what was going on.

Like Zelig: somehow present at every significant moment in modern Conservative history, but just passin' through, and not really aware of what he was seeing.  

Here is the blurb from Tuesday's Bulwark podcast:  

Republicans cling to the idea they are members of the party of Reagan, but Reaganism ended in the 90s when angry right-wing populists like Rush, Pat Buchanan, and Newt Gingrich seized control of the conservative movement.  . Nicole Hemmer joins Charlie Sykes today.

And we're off

Sykes [welcoming Nicole Hemmer]: ...who specializes in media, Conservatism and the Far Right.  And she has a new book, "Partisans: The Conservative Revolutionaries Who Remade American Politics in the 1990s".  

Golly that sure sounds a lot like Dana Milbank's new book, which Milbank was on this same podcast promoting a week ago.  And they both sound a lot like what Liberals have been warning about and getting absolutely slagged for since the 1990s

There follows the usual greetings and pleasantries.  

Sykes:  So I'm reading the title of this book.  "Conservative Revolutionaries". But that's an oxymoron isn't it?  I mean, Conservatives are supposed to be the opposite of revolutionaries.

Hemmer:  Yes.  It's supposed to be an oxymoron.  But there was actually a movement in the 1970s and 1980s for Conservatives to take on a more radical approach to politics.

What?!?

As you read along with the transcript (all typos and omissions are mine) keep in mind that Charlie Sykes already fucking well knows all of this since he was in the vanguard of that movement from the 1980s until five minutes ago.  

Hemmer:  ...and by the 1990s, that kind of radicalism -- the idea that you need to, uh, remake the government, overthrow the, uh, current order in the United States -- that became a pretty key part of right wing politics in the US.

The 1990s?  The devil you say!

Sykes:  And you've also traced the role of Conservative media, which, or course, is one of my interests as well, having been part of it and the theme of this podcast...

No, Charlie.  Collecting bottle caps or skeet shooting or playing chess by mail are "interests".  Feeding the racist, paranoid base of the GOP the slop they wanted to hear is how you made your entire living -- fed your family, bought your estate, became a Wisconsin political power broker --  for 30 years.  

But please do go on.

Sykes:  ...Y'know, every once in a while people will say "You guys focus too much on the media.  Shouldn't you be talking more about politics."  But I would argue that -- and I think you might agree -- that you cannot understand the current political moment or the derangement of the Right Wing politics without understanding the central role that Right Wing has played in the past four decades and continues to play now.

This is where I hadda go lay down and take a little nap, because holy shit kids, Charlie Sykes has done entered the Before Time.  That Undiscovered Country from whose bourne no suggestion of connectedness to the present moment has ever been contenanced by Never Trumpers.

Sykes:  That's basically... that's basically one of the arguments you have made in several books now, correct?

Hemmer:   That's absolutely right.  Even outside of right wing media, because we are a democracy, our media environment is a core party of our political environment.  The two can't be separated from one another.  Media and politics go hand-in-hand.  And I think sometimes people think of "media" as ephemeral or too cultural and not really about hard politics.

Don't know who those "people" are, but literally no one I know thinks this.  

Hemmer:   But you can't make sense of what policies get put in place or how voters make their choices without understanding the media environment they and politicians are sort of soaked in.

Sykes:  So...was there a moment at which the entertainment wing [chuckles] of the Republican party became dominant.  When the Republican party basically became a creature of its entertainment wing rather than the other way around, because I still remember when it used to be kind of a talking point on the Left that, well, Conservative media gets its talking points from the RNC.  And now [chuckles again] you've gotta roll your eyes and I think it's the other way around now.  What was the tipping point do you think?

Hemmer:   I actually think... it's a longer process.  The 1990s really were an important turning point.  And I point to one example from 1992 when George H. W. Bush...

There follows the story of Bush the Elder, so worried about the challenges from Pat Buchanan and Ross Perot in 1988 that he turned to Rush Limbaugh's television producer, Roger Ailes for help.

Hemmer:   And Rush Limbaugh was such a huge figure in the 1990s...

Ms. Hemmer repeats the bit about Bush the Elder inviting Limbaugh to stay in the Lincoln bedroom, and carrying his bags for him.  A story which was widely known ad reported on at the time, and has been repeated a million times since. 

Pause for a moment to consider just how deeply weird this interview is. Sykes knows all this.  For 30 years, Sykes was known as the "Rush Limbaugh of Wisconsin".  This is like unto Charles Ponzi having a podcast and interviewing a woman who wrote a book on investment fraud, and asking her in wide-eyed innocent wonder, "Tell me about these so-called 'Ponzi schemes' one hears so much about?"

Hemmer: You have advisors to Bush saying "You have to sound more like Rush Limbaugh".  And then you have a leader of Republicans in congress, Newt Gingrich, ...

Yeah, we know.  We know.  We fucking well know.  

Hemmer: ...who is really focused on words and rhetoric and media.   He throws open, in 1995, when he becomes Speaker of the House, the doors of the capitol to radio show hosts all across the country so they can amplify the message.  

Ms. Hemmer, I don't want to frighten you but there's one of those Limbaugh-imitating, wingnut message amplifiers sitting right... 

across... 

from... 

you.

Hemmer: And I think that's still Gingrich trying to manipulate different factions, but you can already sense that something is changing.  And by the end of the 1990s not only do you have magazines like the American Spectator that are setting the conspiracy framework around the Clinton administration but you have a whole new profusion of right-wing radio hosts.

Fun Fact:  Sykes began his career as a backup host for Mark Belling at WISN in Milwaukee in 1989. By 1992, he’d landed his own WISN show. Within a year, he moved on to WTMJ, where he hosted his right-wing radio show until December 19, 2016.

Hemmer: And that really is a moment -- throw in fox News -- when you suddenly have an entertainment complex large enough to start dictating to the Republican party.

Sykes: Another frequently told story...

Notice the passive voice here

Sykes: Another frequently told story, of course, is after Republicans shocked the world and took control of congress back in 1994, uh, one of the first things they did when they had their initial caucuses in early 1995, they brought Rush Limbaugh in speak to the freshman class, right?  So it was... it was this acknowledgement that, in many ways, they were already a creature of Conservatives talk radio.

Notice it's "they" not "we".  It's "Republicans shocked the world" not "we shocked the world."   It's "a creature of Conservatives talk radio" not "a creature of Conservatives talk radio hosts like Rush and me."

Hemmer: Absolutely.  They gave Rush Limbaugh a pin and a title, calling him "The Majority Maker" and they turned to him for advice.  For what they should do in this new congress.  And one of the things he says is, "You do NOT waiver.  If Newt Gingrich waivers on his promises -- if he doesn't stay a hard-line Conservative -- then I'm coming after him."  And that threat was well understood by Gingrich and other members of the Republican caucus going into the new Congress.  

Sykes:  Well I'm sorry to say I have a picture here of a much younger person with much darker hair -- me -- [chuckles] sitting with Newt Gingrich [chuckles] in 1995 where he was appearing on my Conservative radio talk show host and that was a long time ago.  And I do think that was, uh, one of the turning points.  [Hurriedly] But I do want to take a quick digression.

Of course you do.

And then Sykes o'erleaps a quarter century of Conservative history to land...

Sykes:  Let's run the tape forward to where we're at now.  

Translation: Let's just skip over my entire career.

There follows a long story about a nutjob at a school board meeting ranting the kind of bile ones picks up on Hate Radio every day in Murrica.

This, in turn, is followed by a back-and-forth about how *real* Reaganism collapsed as soon as Reagan left office.  How St. Ronnie was almost pure awesome, but after he ascended to Republican heaven, Bush the Elder was an easy target for Buchanan, Limbaugh etc.  

Now pay extra special attention to this.

Sykes:  So in your introduction to your book you write about watching Trump accepting the nomination in 2016 in Cleveland and you write "The party's transformation, sudden though it seemed, had been under way for a quarter century.  In the turn towards nativism and more overt racism and the criticisms of the Conservative elites, in the wariness about free trade, democracy, and the sharp-elbowed, fact-lite punditry.  And none of it had happened behind the scenes. None of it was hidden.  It was all out there in plain sight."  But as you point out, too many people were too attached to the idea of the Party of Reagan to notice how fundamentally Conservative politics had changed.

Wait for it...

Wait for it...

Sykes:  And I'm gonna put myself in that category that I did not fully understand that transformation.  How deep it ran.  I mean, look, we all saw Pat Buchanan, and we knew those people were out there, we never thought -- we, me -- didn't think that it would ever become dominant, but they saw something that a lot of Republicans did not see, right?  

And I am suddenly transported back to sitting in the kitchen at 2 A.M. with my dad because he wants to talk and there's  no one else to talk to at 2 A.M.  He's on his fifth or sixth vodka and tonic, wondering, in his rambling, circuitous way. what had gone wrong with his life.  This was a regular thing.  And the one cause of his troubles that he absolutely refused to consider was the drink that was in his hand.  

The drink that was always in his hand.  

Hemmer: That's right.  And I think that the nativism is a good place to look.  In 1994...

Sykes:  By the 1990s, that line between entertainment and politics had all but disappeared...

Sykes:  So who do you think now are the dominant Conservative media figures?  The ones who really make a difference.  Who is driving the trend right now?  When you look at the end-point of the evolution from the 1990s, who are the most powerful, influential, entertaining Conservative media voices.

The answer is Tucker Carlson. Period.  Alex Jones.  A bunch of podcasts like "Ruthless" which gets off on dancing on RBG's grave. Etc.

Hemmer: That idea of drinking Liberal tears is such a strong motivation.

Hemmer: [Paranoia and conspiracies] are embedded in the very raison d'être of Conservative media.  This idea that you need to trust us. You tune into us because we're right and we're Right.

Sykes:  Because the other guy's lying to you and hates you. 

Hemmer: Exactly.  Exactly.  So you have to trust us.  And once you have that kind of loyalty and trust, it's very easy to manipulate.  It is very easy to turn conspiratorial, particularly when you frame your opposition as the Enemy.  Gosh, we see this, Charlie, in the 1990s in the conspiracies about the Clintons...  The conspiracy complex around the Clintons including thing like the Clinton Body Count, and these tapes like the Clinton Chronicles...that circulated all through congress, that was funded by Jerry Falwell.  Like that became the bread-and-butter of Conservative media in the 1990s.

Did I already happen to mention that Sykes began his career as a backup host for Mark Belling at WISN in Milwaukee in 1989?  And that by 1992, he’d landed his own WISN show?  And that within a year, he moved on to WTMJ, where he hosted his right-wing radio show until December 19, 2016?

I did?  

Oops.  

Sorry for repeating myself.

Sykes:  I remember back in the 1990s when all of this was shifting, the reaction from much of the legacy media, the mainstream media, was none of this criticism is valid.  We're being criticized for being biased.  That must mean we're doing our job.  And often did write or speak with disdain about, y'know, 40% of the population.  And I remember this being part of the Conservative media.  That it was as if they were giving us this massive gift by covering the news the way they did and not sitting down and going, "How can we counter this?  Still do our jobs.  Still be effective journalists without feeding the narrative that we are untrustworthy."

One hears a lot of this kind of peevish justification from goofs like Sykes.  That the media during the Bad Old Day was so liberal, so awful, so horribly biased that Conservatives had no choice but to yadda yadda. 

And yet one never hears actual, concrete, system-wide examples of this awful bias.  Is he talking about how Lyndon Johnson sailed to victory in his second term because the Liberal media refused to report on Vietnam and protests?

Or the horrible injustice that was done to Nixon by those nasty WaPo reporters?  

The fuss Liberals made over an innocent misunderstanding like Iran-Contra?  

Was it how Liberals rushed to blame Conservative media paranoia mongering for the Oklahoma federal building bombing just because the bombers were quoting chapter and verse from Conservative media paranoia mongering?     

Was it how Edward R. Murrow ended every broadcast with "Death to the West!"?

Did the breaking point come when Walter Cronkite changing his name to Walker Chronic and fired up a doob on the air?

Or are goofs like Sykes actually pissed at people like Norman Lear for putting the unvarnished face of the Right on teevee and laughing at it?

Sykes:  Also I think that Spiro Agnew is underappreciated in terms of his historical role as sort of the proto-populist, anti-media figure...  But he really was one of the figures who began to create that language, that voice, that pugelistin approach and the relentless attack on the media. A lot of what we trace back to Newt Gingrich can be traced back to Spiro Agnew, can't it?

And we're done.

And, as always, I am left with one question that no one in the know is ever going to answer.

Why does Charlie Sykes have a job at MSNBC?  Specifically, an opinion-having job.  Even more specifically, a political opinion-having job?

This 30-year Republican power-broker and veteran of Conserative radio just sat there and, with a straight face (and not for the first time), told the world that he never had the slightest fucking clue what was really going on right in front of him, in plain sight, in his own political party.  Confessing to abject, decades-long ignorance of the one and only subject for which he was hired for his special, insider insights. 

"Never knew what the fuck I was talking about" is a helluva resume top line.

And yet, somehow, he managed to almost immediately transition from the rubble of his radio career to becoming a fixture on "liberal" MSNBC and  the op-ed pages of American newspapers where every day he still pretends to be possessed of special insights into not only the minds of Republican base voters, but also the secret desires of "independents" and the hidden motives and agendas of dirty, commie Liberals like me.  

And so it goes.

Tomorrow:  How MSNBC saved Noah Rothman's bacon after the post-Trump media purge by giving him a perch on MSNBC from which to continue to slander Liberals.

I Am The Liberal Media.