posted on July 2, 2004 08:57:46 PM new
Man of the Month: Ed Schultz
Who would have guessed the Democrats would find their own Rush in a thick-necked, trash-talking former conservative from Fargo?
by Robert Kurson | Feb 01 '04
It's 1988, and an angry fan at a North Dakota state football game has just flung a whiskey bottle into the radio-broadcast booth. Most ordinary announcers would ignore the incident. But the man behind the mike this day is not ordinary. Understand what he does next and you will understand why he's not the kind of guy likely to turn up on NPR.
Ed Schultz—massive chest heaving, veins in his nineteen-inch neck throbbing—yells something like this into the mike for all of Fargo to hear: "Who the #*!@ did that? Who has the guts to point him out? Because I'm coming after him." Then Schultz leaves the booth and goes looking for the guy in the stands.
He never found the culprit. Management asked him to take some time off. Asked later if he hadn't made a terrible career move, the former Division II quarterback and passing champion replied, "I made the honest move." North Dakotans nodded. His popularity continued to rise, to the point where he was given his own radio talk show in 1992. His program immediately jumped to number one in its markets and stayed there—even as he began to shift his views from conservative to progressive over the next decade.
Now it's late 2003, and Schultz is weeks from going national with a new show on the Jones Radio Networks, starting with about a dozen markets in January. Democrats, who have been raising funds for the effort, believe The Ed Schultz Show could be the answer to Rush Limbaugh, but conservatives predict Schultz's doom. Why should he succeed when Mario Cuomo, Jim Hightower, and others failed before him?
"I'll tell you why," Schultz says during a commercial break in his Fargo studio, where he'll continue to do his local show as well. "You need to do what you were trained to do. Mario Cuomo wasn't a radio guy. To my knowledge, no liberal who's tried this was a dedicated radio person. I am. It's my blood." In fact, his ratings in his local markets have soundly thumped Limbaugh's for years, though their programs don't go head-to-head.
Cue the Led Zeppelin intro; ten seconds to air. As Schultz, who turns fifty in January, slides his headphones over his red hair, he flashes a quick smile. He takes a caller's question about right-wing pressure to cancel CBS's Reagans miniseries, then urges listeners to "connect the dots" between that decision and the Bush administration's refusal to allow media coverage of flag-draped coffins returning from the Middle East. He pounds his fist and says, "There is no endgame here, folks! The president gives a speech and talks about democracy and, I mean, it's apple pie, everybody loves it. But give us the details about how it's going to end. The bottom line is they don't know. They [ pound ] do [ pound ] not [ pound ] know!"
He takes more calls, none screened, none seven-second delayed—unthinkable in talk radio. He cajoles, belly laughs, teases, interrupts, even allows that he might be wrong. His voice is baritone and fast and moves through expressive ranges like a steel roller coaster. In a minute, he can ridicule Minnesota hunters, speak substantively on education policy, call the governor an "empty suit," and talk NFL football. He allows not a moment of dead air. In meter, inflection, pace, and fun—the qualities that keep talk radio from sucking—he is like no radio Democrat you've heard.
Not long ago, the Virginia-born Schultz was Rush Limbaugh—a raging radio conservative who worshiped the bottom line. Then things began happening in his life. In the late 1990s, he did remotes from dying small towns and found himself worried for rural America. He broadcast from wheat fields and became appalled at the plight of farmers. He watched Medicare stumble as his mother died of Alzheimer's. "I basically got out in the world," he says. Perhaps the best-known Republican in staunchly conservative North Dakota, Ed Schultz suddenly found himself a Democrat.
"But not a wacko liberal," Schultz says during another break. "I own shotguns; I've shot more pheasants than most people have ever seen. I'm pro-life. I'm strong on military and foreign affairs. But I'm also pro-American-worker, pro-union, a women's advocate, a believer in education."
He's also still a little pissed. He should have made an NFL roster. Instead, he toiled in the Canadian league, where the field was a little wider, the ball a slightly different shape—the undoing of a gridiron artist. And two years ago, he finished second for the Minnesota Vikings play-by-play gig. "I'm still angry about it," he says.
Back to the air. Callers pile on: CBS was right to cancel The Reagans . He zings back: "I watched Saving Jessica Lynch last night on NBC. I couldn't help but wonder, Is this movie absolutely, 100 percent, totally accurate? If not, what will I think about Iraq and the war?"
A caller demands that Schultz apologize for referring to three politicians as Moe, Larry, and Curly. "I know what you're about," Schultz says. "You've called this program before, and you do not do it with good intentions to contribute. You always call to be cantankerous— cantankerous !"
No one is poison-arrow-proof. "Food for thought," he said recently. "When Rush Limbaugh was attacking Wesley Clark, he was on druuuugs . I'm drug free."
Another hour and it's over. Schultz steps outside into the crisp Fargo air, then into his "Big Eddie Cruiser," a mammoth RV he uses to broadcast live from wherever news is breaking. "I'm taking it to the Iowa caucuses," he says. "I'll take it anywhere. We can own stories using this thing."
Schultz takes a seat behind the wheel. It's #*!@, he says, that a liberal talker can't make it on the national airwaves. People listen to talk radio not to hear politics but to be entertained. It's about entertainment.
But what happens if the national talk landscape feels different than Fargo? What if the field is a little wider, the ball slightly different? What happens to Schultz's touch then?
"I've got a better grip on this industry," he says, hopping out of the cruiser and locking its door. "I'm better positioned to do this than I've been positioned to do anything in my life."
If you had been watching Ed Schultz's dance card over the last decade, you would have noticed quite a shift. Once adoringly in the arms of Republicans, the talk-show host now waltzes with the Democrats, making him the most notable team switcher since Anne Heche. Here, some of his sharpest moves.
Move 1: Homelessness
Turn to the right: "Yeah, it's cold out, but you'd think these people could figure out how to get out of it. How about getting a job?" —1993
Now turn to the left: "A lot of these homeless folks are Vietnam veterans. . . . We've turned our back on these people after they gave to the country. What's wrong with this picture?" —2001
Move 2: Farm Subsidies
Slide to the right: "The American farmer's hat is bent from being stuck in the mailbox waiting for the government check." —1994
Now slide to the left: "This country can't survive without the American farmer. . . . We aren't just subsidizing the farmer, we are making it possible for every American to purchase food." —2000
Move 3: Universal Health Care
Dip to the right: "Why should I have to take care of somebody down the street because I am successful and they have failed?" —1995
Now dip to the left: "The health-care industry and the lack of coverage for millions of Americans has to be on the table. We need a universal package." —2001
