Mark Levin was relentless.
In a fashion that has been the hallmark of his career in-and-out of government and talk radio, Mark had been regularly zeroing in on Speaker John Boehner, recognizing Boehner for exactly what he is. A moderate Establishment Republican who was flying under the false flag of conservatism. Time after time, Mark had called for Boehner and others in the GOP Leadership to be removed. When House GOP Whip Steve Scalise was revealed to have gotten tangled up with former Klan leader David Duke, drawing prompt support from Boehner and others, Mark took to Facebook in 2014 to say:
GOP establishment a disastrous mess. Clean them out. Time for new leaders with conservative principles.
By July of 2015 he was posting this on his Facebook page:
It is time for Mitch McConnell and John Boehner to resign
July 27, 2015 at 6:23am“It is time for Mitch McConnell and John Boehner to resign for the good of the nation and the Republican Party. The nation and GOP are both suffering as a result of the unwillingness or inability of McConnell and Boehner to effectively defend either. Instead, these politicians are consumed with consolidating their own power on Capitol Hill and silencing opponents who dare to challenge their ironfisted rule. Sadly, they rarely act in the best interests of America's future. Indeed, time and again they have delivered victory after victory for Obama and his radical agenda -- from spending, borrowing, and Obamacare to illegal immigration, Iran and "trade" power. Never before has a Congress controlled by one party been so thoroughly impotent. This is due to the disastrous leadership of McConnell and Boehner. It is time for younger, wiser, and more courageous Republican leaders -- constitutional conservatives who understand the role of a statesman in perilous times -- who are willing to truly lead the nation and the Republican Party based on America's enlightened principles, advance the cause of liberty and republican government, and make the case everyday to the American people.”
Sean Hannity got it as well. Increasingly, the Speaker had balked at talking to Hannity and his conservative audience as the talk radio host increasingly realized what Boehner was - and was not - about. The Hill wrote up Sean’s resignation call this way: "Hannity: Replace Speaker Boehner."
The story began:
Fox News host Sean Hannity is calling on Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio) to step down as Speaker of the House.
Hannity, who has criticized Boehner in the past, said it's “time for new dynamic leadership” for Republicans and threw his support behind Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), the chairman of the House select committee investigating the Benghazi attacks.
“Trey Gowdy is my choice for speaker," Hannity told Breitbart News. “He has the ability to articulate and implement the changes needed to get the country on the right path.”
Hannity cited the federal budget, border security, energy independence and Gowdy's opposition to ObamaCare for backing the South Carolina Republican.
“John Boehner has snubbed and ignored conservatives for too long as evidenced by the recent ‘cromnibus’ budget deal he made with Obama, Reid and Hoyer,” Hannity added, referring to senior congressional Democrats. “It’s time he step aside for the good of country and the conservative movement.”
The $1.1 trillion “cromnibus” was an end-of-year spending bill opposed by many conservatives, which passed the House with Boehner’s support earlier this month.”
By all accounts, Congressman Gowdy is going to stick with his chairmanship of the Select Committee on Benghazi. But however the GOP Leadership is reconfigured, it is now abundantly clear that talk radio, not the elected GOP leadership, is the place conservatives are looking to for leadership on conservative principle. They aren’t looking to the GOP leadership in Washington, they are looking to talk radio.
Over at The Wall Street Journal, the editorial page sniffed that
“Mr. Boehner could have personally endured more talk-radio insults about surrender. But better, and more honorable, to depart if leaving might break the GOP fever ahead of a 2016 election that could set up Republicans for a governing majority in 2017.”
Got that? Calling for support of Ronald Reagan’s “bold colors” strategy is now a “talk radio insult.” Wow. This from the paper that once famously was crusading for the Reagan-Kemp “bold colors” of supply-side economics.
It would seem the obvious questions, questions that don’t register Inside the Beltway , are these:
Why is it exactly that conservatives trust Mark Levin and Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh more than they trusted the Speaker of the US House, John Boehner? Why is it that people with the literal title of “Representative” seem nowhere close to representing the people who elected them, but people who sit behind microphones as much as thousands of miles from this or that congressional district seem perfectly in tune with the constituents of said “Representative”?
The reasons are as obvious as they are simple. The talk radio hosts are not just conservative - they are consistent. And even more to the point, the talkers will boldly go, Reagan-style, where far too many Republican elected officials balk at going. Balking because said GOP officials are timid, the walking embodiment of Ronald Reagan’s disdainful term for them - the “fraternal order” Republicans.
Six years ago, at this Levin book signing in Tysons Corner, Virginia the response - a crowd that snaked out of the book store and seemingly endlessly around the shopping center itself - was an indicator of what was coming to those paying attention. Now the same phenomenon is showing itself in repeated high poll numbers for Donald Trump, Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina. It shows up in other poll numbers, as in the latest Fox News poll that has 60% of Republicans saying they feel betrayed by their own leadership. And it certainly showed up in a recent Quinnipiac poll in which a full 87% of prospective Iowa Republican Caucus voters said they preferred a presidential candidate with no government experience whatsoever.
Let's be candid. These talk radio hosts deserve credit for Boehner finally stepping down. A GOP Speaker who had such visible contempt for conservatives, a guy who didn’t even have the chops to show up on a Levin or Hannity show when he was under fire deserved to get the heave-ho. And as time moved on, talk radio became the place to go for those conservatives in the House (thank you North Carolina Congressman Mark Meadows and others) to vent their frustrations.
For those like Congressman Meadows who had to do - and still have to do - the heavy lifting for conservatism inside what is supposed to be the congressional wing of the conservative party, Hannity and Levin and others - don’t forget Laura Ingraham’s fearless cheerleading for Dave Brat’s successful overthrow of Establishmentarian Eric Cantor - became the go-to shows to communicate - really communicate - with the conservative world in and out of their own districts.
There is a long way to go in the 2016 election cycle. But without doubt it is safe to say that Levin and Hannity were serious leaders in making the resignation of John Boehner possible in the fall of 2015. Make no mistake: whomever emerges in the next several days as the new GOP Speaker of the House, that person will face the challenge of proving that they are not Boehner 2.0, a prisoner of the GOP Establishment.
Unless they have the chops to show up on talk radio and answer questions - hard questions where they won’t be able to shimmy and get away with the Washington dodge-and-duck routine, unless they - gasp! - lead, hey won’t be long for the Speaker’s chair either. And they shouldn’t be.
