Rush Limbaugh

“Rush and GOP Elite: Getting Too Cozy?” (Dec. 29), on Rush Limbaugh, points out that his TV show has suffered a drop in ratings. Is it any wonder, now that it comes on in the Los Angeles area at 1:10 in the morning? Even I won’t stay up that late for any TV show.

I suspect that if Channel 9 scheduled Rush during normal waking hours there would be a big increase in the viewing audience. He is being replaced by some pretty bad TV fare on our local prime-time schedules. Do you suppose he’s being deliberately blacked out in Southern California?

EUGENE PORTNER

Long Beach

Love him or hate him, I have to believe that The Times has a hidden agenda with the piece on Limbaugh. That would be to attack and discredit him. One has to look to the quote in the ninth paragraph from the end of the column, “Limbaugh on any given day will have significantly more influence than any of the networks. The audience is huge and they are paying attention,” to understand the magnitude of the perceived threat of Limbaugh. That should have been the most significant line of the story.

Reports cite fewer people reading newspapers. The newspaper’s influence is fading. More open debate has found facts that were reported to be not quite accurate. The prime example would be the constant media attention to “slashing” the budget when the truth is finally starting to come out that slashes are in reality only an increase in spending at twice the rate of inflation rather than at three times the rate of inflation.

Perhaps your reporters, instead of attacking the messenger, should concentrate more on factual accuracy.

BARRY LEVY

Redondo Beach