Thread by @Will_Bunch

1. On Rush Limbaugh's passing: Harry Truman supposedly said "it's a damn shame when anyone dies." Fair enough. But

Consider this timeline:

1985: Neil Postman's "Amusing Ourselves to Death" predicts a world where entertainment values wreck civil discourse

1987: Reagan's FCC...

2. ...kills the Fairness Doctrine and creates the possibility of conservative talk radio

1988: Sacramento radio guy Rush Limbaugh goes national with right-wing talk

Now, Limbaugh (as his later soulmate, Glenn Beck) was basically the nightmare predicted in "Amusing Ourselves...

3. ...to Death" -- a smooth entertainer with no real political ideas worth discussing, just a talent for funneling white rage into a 3-hour show. Yet in doing so, he changed U.S. politics forever and set the stage for Trump's American fascism

Before "Lock her up!" there was...

4. ...Rush and his attacks on "feminazis."

Before America became the world leader in denying climate change, Rush went to war with "tree-hugging" environmentalists

Before Trump made "the cruelty is the point" a national catchphrase, Limbaugh ridiculed Michael J. Fox and...

5. ...anyone else he disagreed with

As Republican politics devolved from the dog whistles of the Reagan era to the racist, xenophobic air horns of Trump, Rush was there for every step down

Even worse, his success launched 1,000 other black suns of right-wing hate, from local...

6. ...radio to the Fox News Channel. He was the first pocket of an air bubble that allowed the masses to breathe the all-day air of white supremacy, and to expand that bubble of unreality to insane conspiracy theories like QAnon

It will take decades, if it's even possible, to...

7. ...undo the damage to American's beliefs in fact-based news reporting, in the science around life-or-death issues like climate, COVID-19 and vaccines, in a politics that isn't a holy jihad, that was originally sparked by Rush Limbaugh. On the day of...

8. ...his death, I'm hard-pressed to think of someone in my lifetime with a more powerful negative impact on American society. His passing is a moment to reflect -- on all the work that lies ahead, for good people to reverse his legacy - 30 -