Today’s TEMS had to get scheduled earlier today for a conversation on politics.  Not just any conversation, mind you, but a conversation with a man who has over 20 million listeners and has enormous political influence.  Ironically, I wound up moving the show over Rush Limbaugh’s last broadcast hour in order to accommodate the appointment, about which I teased him when he first called.

His staff told me last week when we arranged this that Rush wanted to interview me for his June newsletter, but the call was much more of a conversation than an interview.  We moved across many topics, talking about the Obama administration, some of my blog posts from today, to my history in the blogosphere and where I saw myself in relation to the media.  I promised the staff that I wouldn’t give away too much about the interview, but actually it went longer than first planned; I presume Rush was enjoying the conversation as much as I was, and I enjoyed it immensely.

The interview focused mainly on my point of view, but I got a pretty good sense of Rush during the call as well.  He’s less optimistic than I am about the present situation, but nowhere near as pessimistic as others that he knows.  The one despair point that we both see is the lack of a credible opposition to the massive spending and intrusive governance we’re seeing from the Obama administration.  The Republicans dissipated their credibility on fiscal discipline and responsibility from 2001-6, and we both see little improvement so far among GOP leaders, at least until recently.  We need an effective and credible smaller-government, free-market party, and so far we’re not seeing a lot of life in the GOP along those lines.

The call lasted almost an hour, and I pity the person who has to transcribe it — but I can’t wait to read the article.  I think you’ll find it fascinating, so keep an eye out for it at Rush’s site next month.  It was a pleasure to have an hour of Rush’s time and as stimulating a conversation on politics as I’ve had recently.

Update: Opechanga in the comments wonders whether we can convince Rush to come on TEMS.  The invitation’s always open, but I know how difficult that can be when my show comes right after his.  One of these days … By the way, he did thank me for adjusting my show schedule today, and laughed when I apologized for stealing “literally dozens” of his listeners in the last hour of his show.