The story in the CBC podcast written by and hosted by Justin Ling began with a Canadian priest Charles Coughlin — a populist crusader who wound up espousing conspiracy and hate 100 years before Rush Limbaugh got his medal of freedom from President Donald J. Trump. What Coughlin did was crucial. He proved how potent radio could be.

Right-wing radio flexed its muscle with a boycott of Polish Ham. And the Kennedy government almost wiped right-wing talk off the map.  Right-wing radio began with loud, brash, infuriating zealots. According to Ling, these “broadcasters would fan the flames of a new populist ideology; they give a voice to a swath of Americans who felt like they never had one. They energize and then they radicalize the conservative movement.”]  That movement was home to ordinary conservatives and conspiracy pedlars and everything in between. Father Coughlin started off in Canada but graduated to Detroit. He was of the ‘go big or go home’ mindset. That influenced many that came after him. It has been the mark of right-wing radio ever since.

n the 1920s, talk radio was launched from what now seems a very unlikely source a firebrand Canadian Catholic priest. He claimed he got a “welcome present from the Ku Klux Klan” when he arrived in Detroit. Although the Klan reserved its most venal vitriol for black Americans it had other groups in its sights as well. As Ling said, “they had more than enough hate in their hearts to attack immigrants, especially Catholics who were flocking to Detroit to work in new auto plants.” When he arrived in Detroit, he was greeted with a burning cross courtesy of the KKK. That did not scare him off. Coughlin made arrangements to deliver talks on the radio, a relatively new media at the time. He knew he needed to raise money for his church which had massive debt for its huge church and was not raising enough from donations to sustain it. The situation was dire and at the same time the local KKK group was uttering bellicose statements about the church. He had a deep rich voice with near musical cadence that was very powerful on the radio.

It was particularly effective at transmitting anger and hatred. in fact, it was amazingly effective at that.