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They're So Bad at This: Matt Gaetz Calls Out New Republic Over Right Wing Podcast Story

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In the last decade, the listenership of podcasts has increased significantly. In 2023, at least 42% of people ages 12 and over have listened to at least one podcast in the past month, according to Pew Research. In 2020, several of the Top 200 Apple podcasts were right-leaning, including shows belonging to Ben Shapiro, Glenn Beck, and Stephen Crowder.

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Conservative media has flourished, always, in places outside the mainstream -- AM talk radio, for example. So it's natural that podcasting would appeal to conservative content creators and listeners, two demographics sorely (and intentionally) underrepresented in traditional mainstream media.

So The New Republic (TNR) is realizing that podcasting is popular on the right because it circumvents the mainstream media.

Duh.

That's the point.

They write:

In recent years, however, politicians have turned to another, newer format: the podcast. After washing out of the presidential race in 2020, Pete Buttigieg launched The Deciding Decade, which focused on issues like gun violence and the minimum wage. (He abandoned it when he got a real job as secretary of transportation.) Podcasting is especially popular among sitting politicians on the right: Ted Cruz and Matt Gaetz have reasonably popular podcasts, as does their fellow Republican member of Congress, Dan Crenshaw. Mike Johnson, the newly installed speaker of the House, did as well—until unceremoniously abandoning it after being elevated—though his was far, far less trendy. The rise of political podcasting is a reflection of the ongoing blurring of right-wing media and politics: Sitting congressmen not only take cues from bloviators like Tucker Carlson and Ben Shapiro, they playact as them between votes. The idea is that podcasting rewards authenticity, providing politicians with a direct line to constituents, avoiding pesky filters like the press in the process. In practice, however, these podcasts are dreary and disposable bite-size campaign books.

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'The ongoing blurring of right-wing media and politics', as if the mainstream media hasn't been an arm of the Democrat party for decades

Yes, they do.

As we are fond of saying, that, somehow, is (D)ifferent.

American's trust in the media, as of October of last year, was at an all-time low, with just 32 percent of people polled having a 'great deal' or 'fair amount' of trust in the media.

Anyone who reads Twitchy knows why that is.

It's not, and there are several left-wing podcasts, as well as countless others covering everything from true crime to cooking.

It does feel that way, doesn't it?

Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz, one of the podcaster politicians mentioned in the article, highlighted TNR's complaints about him:

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So he's not bombastic like the late Rush Limbaugh, but instead 'discusses [things] like a congressman'?

The horror. The horror.

Seriously, that's their complaint? Make it make sense.

The Streisand Effect is real, people.

And that somehow makes him bad at podcasting?

Sure, TNR.

Exactly. Remember their meltdown when Musk took over Twitter? They were so mad they lost one platform of the many they dominated. They want control and get mad when they lose even an ounce of it.

And if Gaetz was like Limbaugh, TNR would complain he's 'apoplectic' and 'outraged' and also say he's bad at podcasting.

Heads they win, tails you lose.

Probably wouldn't hurt.

The right flourishes on alternative forms of media because people want that content, and they can't get it from CNN, MSNBC, or ABC. Those outlets are shamelessly left wing.

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Listenership tells us whether or not a podcast, or a podcaster, is good and the market will decide which shows live or die. We don't need TNR to try to shame the right for 'blurring' politics and media. The Left did that long ago.

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