It all began with William F. Buckley, Jr. It is worth noting that 2025 marks the centenary of Buckley’s birth.
In 1955, the young Mr. Buckley founded National Review magazine. Famously, he is noted for saying this: “A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it.”
What could not be seen in 1955 was that Buckley was opening the floodgates on what would come to be known as conservative media. Just a short recall will note that a mere dozen years later, in 1967, The American Spectator was created by R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr., then a young student at the University of Indiana. (And the Spectator, full disclosure, is where I also hang my journalistic hat.)
On into the future came the birth of talk radio and the massive success that came…
