Chafets' research extended from roughly when he met Limbaugh, in 2008, into 2010, shortly before the book was published (see below); travel and living expenses for a stint like this would have to be considerable. Sentinel publicist Christy d'Agostini emails in response to a question,
"To the best of my knowledge, our author paid for all research expenses out of his own pocket.He has no financial arrangement with Rush Limbaugh, just a reporter-subject relationship.This is not an authorized biography. Details about Chafets' advance are confidential, as they are for all authors."
Limbaugh's own website gives Army of One a boost: "I spent 16 hours interviewing with Zev Chafets," Limbaugh says online. "I'm told I should sit down and read the book cover to cover." (When I went to the site, this blurb ran beneath a conspicuous ad for Shadow Government, "the book Obama doesn't want you to read," illustrated with a photo of an unsmiling Obama wearing dark sunglasses.)
For a biography in basic facts, and chronology, the wikipedia entry on Rush Limbaugh is probably adequate. Limbaugh was born Jan. 12, 1951, in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, into a well-connected Republican family of high achievers in law and politics including two federal judges, one appointed by Reagan and one by George W. Bush. Stephen Nathaniel Limbaugh, Jr., the cousin later appointed to the federal bench by Bush, previously served a term as the Chief Judge of the Supreme Court of Missouri. Coincidentally, Stephen Limbaugh's term ended June 30, 2003, coincidentally about the time the feds were investigating Rush Limbaugh for drug abuse (see date on the email above).
From "Life on the Mississippi" to "The Honorary Freshman"
The first six chapters of Chafets' book--roughly the first half, through "Limbaugh in Limbo"--are better written than the rest. That might be because the author had more time to become steeped in local color and other material for the chapters on Limbaugh's early life and career, including the aforementioned access to family members. In chapter 2, "Life on the Mississippi"--title lifted from one of Mark Twain's travel books--Chafets gets off to a classy start by quoting Samuel Clemens' nineteenth-century description of the town of Cape Girardeau.
Chapter one, "I Hope He Fails"--quoting Limbaugh's hateful comment on new president Obama--gets the book off to a less auspicious start, also clarifying that Limbaugh was not among conservative commentators who met with the newly elected Obama for dinner at the home of George F. Will. Instead, the date of Will's dinner party, Rush was at the loser White House, "where President George W. Bush threw him an intimate fifty-eighth-birthday luncheon." As Chafets makes clear, Limbaugh immediately became the big face on the shrunken Republican brand, post-2008 election.
Like most writing about Limbaugh, An Army of One highlights polemics, and some character issues, without delving too deeply into Limbaugh's caginess as a media competitor--a careerist, in short. Writing about Limbaugh often emphasizes his truthiness; seldom his turfiness.
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