How did conservatives reach todays level of influence?
Our primary purpose in writing this book has been to tell the story — in its entirety for the first time — of how the conservative movement came to power by utilizing new and alternative media. Our secondary purpose is to use what we’ve learned to predict, as much as possible, the future of the ongoing conservative-versus-liberal power struggle. First then, let’s review the historical lessons we’ve presented in the past pages. Our story began in 1955, in an era of liberal hegemony over America (Chapter 4). Liberal gatekeepers at the most influential newspapers and magazines, as well as the three television networks, decided what was news and what wasn’t. A tone of faux objectivity disguised what was in reality elitist control of the nation’s political discourse. Put together all the influential media, we concluded, and you get a score of something like liberals 95, conservatives 5. Or 97/3. That’s the sort of monopoly enjoyed by Pravda in its Soviet heyday. At the same time the United
