The only reason Limbaugh was successful was because he was a politically incorrect ass. The more he upset people, the better it was for him. If he was PC, his show doesn't last. People stop talking about it, stop being mad about it. The show goes away.
What he did was theater. It worked too well.
I agree with the "theater" part - but to say his show was only successful due to shock value is silly. It was successful because he was a great broadcaster who delivered an entertaining, highly polished show to his audience.
Think of what talk radio was like before Rush came along. It was a mixture of milquetoast hosts who spent a lot of time interviewing guests, professional advice shows, and curmudgeons such as Larry King.
Between talk shows in certain dayparts, many of these AM stations would play really bad dentist's office music from the 60's & 70's.
Premiere says it will announce replacement programming no sooner than 90 days from now. The only person I can see holding court with Limbaugh's large audience is Donald Trump, but would someone like him really commit to doing 3 hours of radio daily for five days a week? Doubtful, especially if we're talking two or three years from now.
Ironically, Mike Pence is another possibility. Let's not forget he formerly was a talk radio host on WIBC in Indianapolis. Listening to Pence for three hours a day would be fatiguing, in my opinion.
I, for one, would like to see Ben Shapiro get the time slot. However, he is probably under contract with Westwood One (Premiere's arch competitor) and cannot simply change horses on a dime.
The most likely outcome? Premiere moves the wallbanger (Sean Hannity) to middays in order to clear his program in more markets and on better stations. They then backfill Hannity's existing time slot with someone else.
Morgan Wallen is a piece of garbage.