Rush Limbaugh may leave radio network over advertising fallout

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52. Already has happened in my area.

Last year both the Rush and Coast to Coast AM shows (Premiere Networks properties) moved from the Cumulus right wing talk station AM 560 to the Clear Channel talker AM 910. 560 later began broadcasting the Huckabee show where Rush used to be.

In fact most of the Limbaugh affiliates nationwide are Clear Channel due to CC owning Rush's distributor Premiere Radio Networks, which is also Randi Rhodes's syndication company. Clear Channel's streaming radio app iHeartRadio owns the exclusive mobile streaming rights to all Clear Channel AND Cumulus stations!

However, in some of the biggest markets the local Cumulus news/talk station carries Rush, specifically New York City/WABC (the flagship Rush station since 1988), Detroit/WJR, Chicago/WLS, and Washington, DC/WMAL. And some smaller areas too: Lansing/WJIM, Mobile/WVNN, Chattanooga/WGOW, Little Rock/KARN, Fayetteville/KFAY, Albuquerque/KKOB, Boise/KBOI, Colorado Springs/KVOR, York, PA/WSBA and Reno/KKOH.

Rumor is that WOR, WABC's rival heritage AM station in NYC recently bought by Clear Channel, will swap Huckabee with WABC in exchange for Rush.

If Rush does withdraw from Cumulus, I wonder where he'll find new stations in the smaller markets I listed as those stations I listed are most likely the ONLY informational station in town. Or if the show does move stations chances are the newer stations won't be the 50 kW blowtorches like KKOB, KKOH, WLS, and WJR. In the case of Chicago, I doubt that WGN (the heritage "live and local" talk station) will even want to take in Rush if WLS replaces Rush with Huck, nor will the local Salem Communications talk station WIND. Same situation exists in Detroit where the only other talk station than WJR is a Salem station WDTK with its own network programming.

Seems that Rush's tipping point was his creepy obsession with Sandra Fluke. Hopefully, the backlash to Rush will prevent another right wing wannabe Andrea Tantaros (currently a panelist of Fox News' The Five) from winning a major radio deal...Tantaros made similar misogynistic remarks this time about one of Obama's kids.