In light of comments noted pill popper and radio host Rush Limbaugh made about a Congressional witness’ testimony (he called her a “slut”), Rush Limbaugh has suffered at the hands of popular opinion designating him a categorical creep. Soon after this happened, a bunch of The Rush Limbaugh Show’s sponsors weighed in by pulling their advertising from his show after he apologized, helping shift that categorical designation into a technical one. Is there anything he can take away from all of this? What, if anything, does Rush have left?
But of course: Twitter.
Rush Limbaugh didn’t have but 10,000 followers on December 5th, but his growth—for anybody, let alone a blowhard in the midst of a Republican presidential primary season—was solid, averaging about 230 followers a day through the last month.
And then, on February 29th, the Sandra Fluke comments—and controversy—were yielded by Rush. And instead of pulling away from him, Twitter users flocked…
…To him:
On March 1st and March 2nd, Rush picked up somewhere in the ballpark of 5,400 followers. For context, @RushLimbaugh had about 29,471 followers before the 29th, and started this week out with 38,911.
He’s tacking on about 617 followers a day on average, but that average is of course skewed by the last few days of abnormal gains.
Now, let’s compare this to the Twitter account of Sandra Fluke, the target of his comments:
Fluke’s growth looks anemic compared to Rush Limbaugh’s, no? But:
@RushLimbaugh’s was born unto Twitter on July 26, 2011 (or 224 days ago), and @SandraFluke was born unto Twitter on February 17, 2012 (or 18 days ago).
In other words:
Rush has been gaining followers on a full-timeline average of 173.7 followers a day.
Sandra Fluke, who has 24,319 followers, has been gaining on a full-timeline average 1,351 followers a day.
The Takeaway:
1. Everyone loves to watch a good Twitter trainwreck, but you get more followers with honey (or by being literally slutshamed by a pompous, pill poppin’ blowhard).
2. At this rate, Fluke might do well to try to pick up some of Rush’s sponsorships.
3. The only thing worse than not having a verified account is actually having a verified Twitter account with far fewer followers than an unverified account of you that’s never actually been used.
4. People clearly like Rush Limbaugh most when he has absolutely nothing to say.
fkamer@observer.com | @weareyourfek
