Lowell Ponte, NewsMax.com
Tuesday, Nov. 14, 2006

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This article, "Talk About Power" appeared as part of NewsMax Magazine's November, 2006 cover story on "The 25 Most Influential Talk Radio Hosts in America." To order this edition, and take advantage of our FREE offer, Go Here now.

The raging controversy that erupted earlier this year over the Dubai Ports World deal was sparked by neither a politician nor a businessman, but a talk-radio host — Michael Savage, host of the Savage Nation program.

It all started in February when Savage came across an obscure story disclosing that a deal had been approved allowing Dubai Ports World, a company owned by the government of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, to take over operations at six major American ports.

Savage railed on his radio show that the United States was turning over security at our ports to potential Muslim terrorists — and all hell broke loose.

Soon, the Dubai Ports story had been hijacked by the Democrats. Sen. Chuck Schumer — whom Savage had regularly slammed as "an ambulance chaser from Brooklyn" — even came on Savage's radio show twice. Sounding like an old pal, Schumer joined Savage to denounce the Dubai deal.

It also came to light that a close aide of President Bush had first heard about the deal when he tuned in to Savage's show. But the president himself didn't find out that his administration had approved the deal until three days after Savage and Schumer jointly condemned it.

Bush and his Republican allies were forced to defend the deal, while, ironically, Democrats took arch-conservative Savage's side, sensing that they had a national security issue the Republicans were waffling on.

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After Congress began moving to renege on the deal, Dubai Ports World agreed to transfer the operation of its U.S. ports to an American firm — ending the political crisis.

Although Savage's agenda is not likely to make it to the networks' nightly news, it was clear to his many listeners — more than 8 million weekly, according to his radio network — that Savage had won the day. Clearly, Savage has influence. NewsMax has ranked him the No. 4 most influential radio host in America.

There is little doubt that the nation's major talk-radio hosts have influence well beyond their listening audiences, and have already impacted the political and cultural fabric of the country.

NewsMax scoped out the talk-radio landscape — now encompassing more than 1,200 stations across America with a regular audience of 100 million weekly (about a third of the nation) — to find out just how influential these talk-radio hosts are.

America's airwaves are home to approximately 4,500 local, regional, and national radio talk hosts, and from that list we distilled 25 whom we believe are the most influential.

We compiled our rankings based on several factors, including radio audience size and, importantly, the host's global media reach outside of radio. This "media reach" includes TV shows and appearances, syndicated columns, books, and Internet outlets. We also looked on how much impact these hosts have had on the political, social, and cultural landscape of the nation.

While our 25 most influential radio hosts cross the political spectrum, it's no secret that the nation's talk-radio microphones have a distinctly rightward tilt, and the names that made our list reflect that.

"The reason talk radio tilts right," legendary host Barry Farber told NewsMax, "is that the American people have a direct voice here. You and I will never appear on the CBS Evening News, page one of The New York Times, or other ‘mainstream media' controlled by unelected liberal elites. But you can pick up a telephone right now and have your say on a talk-radio show, a medium that, like a town hall meeting, reflects America's conservative values."

Talk radio's germination begins with the early greats — radio hosts like Barry Grey, Bob Grant, Barry Farber, George Putnam, Ray Briem, and others who boomed their opinions in major markets like New York City and Los Angeles. In the late 1980s, talk titan Rush Limbaugh took talk radio to the next level — making modern talk radio a national community where out-of-power conservatives found solidarity.

After Republicans won the Congress and White House in 2000, out-of-power Democrats tried to duplicate conservative success by creating their own partisan network, Air America Radio, bankrolling liberal hosts such as Al Franken and Ed Schultz in the hope of creating a charismatic Limbaugh of the left.

Even as network television appears to show its age — evidenced by sagging ratings — talk radio remains as forever young as the throbbing strains of "My City Was Gone," the Pretenders tune you hear every time "El Rushbo" signs on the air of his Excellence in Broadcasting network.

Perhaps that explains radio's magnetic ability to attract stars from other media. A few of the notable cross-media additions this year: