Posted by
Mark Anders on Monday, October 08, 2007 3:56:48 PM
It was the summer of 1992. I was just getting ready to start my first year at Southwestern Seminary in Fort Worth when I first heard the mention of Rush Limbaugh. Someone I was working with at campus security recommended that I listen to Rush’s daily radio show sometime. That got my curiosity up, and I had to see what all the hype was about. I remember the first time I tuned in to the show. I was driving around the campus in my security vehicle and had plenty of time on my hands. I had no sooner started listening when I heard Rush refer to something the Rev. Jesse Jackson had said. I think he satirically referred to the good reverend as “The Reverennnnnd Jack (brief pause)….sonnnnn.” You have to hear it yourself to appreciate it. That was the first time I had ever heard anybody publicly challenge something Jesse Jackson had said. I remember just being thankful that somebody had the courage to do that. It didn’t take me long to realize that Rush stood for a whole set of beliefs that I had held for years. It wasn’t only that I found myself agreeing with him on issues like “big government” and “foreign policy.” I also found that I was learning a lot about a lot of other important issues and about how many of those issues related to the others. I have always said that Rush helped me put my beliefs in a framework. I knew, for example, what I believed and how I felt about different things, but I didn’t know where those beliefs fit in the political spectrum. I didn’t know the difference between “left wing” and “right wing” or conservative and liberal. To tell you the truth, I didn’t even know what the real difference was between a Democrat and a Republican. But Rush explained the issues in a way that made them understandable to me, a common citizen. I will always be indebted to him for that. Do I always agree with him? No, even though I do agree with much of what he says. But I do think that, regardless of one’s political persuasion, anybody who dares to listen to him can, at the very least, benefit from the education. But be careful if you decide to take me up on that. You might actually find yourself agreeing with him more than you thought. After all, anybody with over 20 million listeners per week must be saying something right.