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Latest top host figures

The new figures are in and TALKERS magazine’s Fall 2005 estimates of the weekly cume ratings and rankings of the nation’s most listened-to radio talk show hosts, based on Spring 2005 local market Arbitron reports and other factors, indicate that the industry has remained relatively stable since the prior bi-annual report released earlier this year.

With one million the cut off and the emphasis on news-talk radio (which includes “specialty” hosts heard mostly on news-talk stations and FM youth-talkers who address social and political issues), some 33 individual personalities qualified for inclusion on this survey.

Still at the top is Rush Limbaugh followed by Sean Hannity, who again moved toward narrowing the gap between the two. Michael Savage remains a powerful force and Dr. Laura Schlessinger shows amazing resilience considering many news-talk stations’ realignment toward more politics and less relationships programming during the past year. Limbaugh and Hannity –– the nation’s leading political talkers –– showed some overall erosion since the prior survey, but a study of news-talk radio trends over the past 15 years indicates that this is common in the ratings periods immediately following an election year. More recent indicators over the summer show that both hosts, as well as political talk in general, are moving back up to their prior positions.

Hosts on the upward path include Neal Boortz, Mike Gallagher, Bill O’Reilly, Doug Stephan, Jerry Doyle, Bill Bennett, Ed Schultz, Tony Snow, Michael Medved and Dave Ramsey.

Making their first appearance on the survey are Al Franken, Alan Colmes and Stephanie Miller.