Rush Limbaugh life and biography

Rush Hudson Limbaugh III is an American radio talk show host, conservative political commentator, and an opinion leader in conservative politics and conservatism in the United States. He hosts The Rush Limbaugh Show which is aired throughout the U.S. on Premiere Radio Networks and is the highest-rated talk-radio program in the United States. Limbaugh signed an 8 year, $400 million contract extension with Clear Channel in 2008 that pays him $50 million a year.

Rush Limbaugh is the outspoken, ultra-conservative and ultra-popular host of The Rush Limbaugh Show, an A.M. radio show about American politics. Limbaugh got his start in radio while still in high school. He landed in Sacramento, California in the 1980s and perfected the politically-oriented sarcasm that earned him national syndication. Limbaugh gained particular fame as a staunch opponent of president Bill Clinton; by 1995, when Newt Gingrich led a Republican majority into the House of Representatives, Limbaugh was one of the most popular radio hosts in the U.S., with a fervent audience of "dittoheads," fans who proudly parroted his conservative views and called him "El Rushbo." His popularity continued into the 21st century, even as Limbaugh announced in 2001 that he was almost completely deaf; by the end of that year he'd had a cochlear implant that allowed him to remain on the air. Two years later (2003) Limbaugh admitted on the air that he was addicted to painkillers -- although only after the press reported he had been caught trying to illegally obtain prescription narcotics. Limbaugh spent five weeks in a drug rehabilitation center and returned to the airwaves in November 2003. After a three-year investigation by Florida authorities, Limbaugh agreed to a deal in 2006 that resulted in a $30,000 fine and 18 months of treatment. Rush Limbaugh remains the dean of modern radio shouters, has written the books The Way Things Ought To Be (1992) and See, I Told You So (1993), and manages to keep his name in the headlines no matter what's going on in Washinton, D.C.

Rush Limbaugh has been married four times: to the former Roxy McNeely (1977-80), to Michelle Sixta (1983-90), to Marta Fitzgerald (1994-2004), and to Kathryn Elizabeth Rogers (June 5, 2010). Rogers was an event planner when she met Rush at a 2004 charity golf tournament. She was born in 1976, the year before Rush's first marriage... Limbaugh's first three marriages ended in divorce. He has no children... Limbaugh's marriage to Marta Fitzgerald took place at the home of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who also officiated... Rush coined the term "femi-nazis," a derogatory term for liberal feminists... Early in his radio career, Rush Limbaugh broadcast under the name of Jeff Christie, according to The New York Times... His grandfather, Rush Hudson Limbaugh, Sr., was a prominent Missouri lawyer. He died in 1996 at the age of 104.

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