The pair battle for listeners and advertisers in a competitive market. | Courtesy photo, AP Photo Savage, Hannity dial up radio feud

On the airwaves and behind-the-scenes, two major conservative radio hosts are waging a war for the afternoon drive — and the moral high-ground.

A simmering feud between radio stars Michael Savage and Sean Hannity has burst to the surface now that the two men are going head to head in prime drivetime — battling for listeners and advertisers in an already competitive market.


The two pundits aren’t just questioning each others bonafides. It’s not simply a professional rivalry — it’s clearly personal.

“My competitor doesn’t have the capacity to go beyond the Democrat-Republican talking points,” Savage told POLITICO. “That’s all he’s ever done. That’s all he can do. He has no education. I’m just going to lay it on the line, I’m not going to mince words.”

“You could say, well, I’m a snob,” Savage said. “Well, ok, I’m proud of my doctorate, two master’s degrees, I’m proud of my 28 books, including many in health. And so, yeah, I’m proud of my academic achievements. I believe it’s embarrassing for people to act as experts, even in politics, if they don’t have a rigorous training in anything.”

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Hannity attended New York University and Adelphi University, but left both before graduating so he could pursue a broadcasting career, according to a biography.

Hannity doesn’t name-check Savage on air, though he has alluded to him. When asked about the feud, Hannity blamed his competitor.

“Here’s the bottom line,” Hannity told POLITICO. “I love everybody in this business. This guy is obsessed with me, I’m not obsessed with him. And, you know, I understand the Dickeys are bitter because I left,” referring to the heads of Cumulus.

Savage, 71, kicked off 2014 with his show “The Savage Nation” moving into the prime 3-6 p.m. afternoon drive timeslot on Cumulus radio stations. Savage scored the spot when Hannity split with Cumulus last year and re-upped his contract with Premiere Networks, a subsidiary of Clear Channel Communications.

John Dickey, the executive vice president and co-COO of Cumulus, told POLITICO in a statement that Savage “is off to the great start we expected in this important timeslot and we’re very pleased about how listeners and advertisers are responding.”

For his part, Savage is relishing his new time — and the rivalry with Hannity. Savage says the root of the personal conflict is Hannity, who has told unflattering tall tales about him. Savage would not detail what Hannity has said, saying he “would rather not repeat the lies.”

“Having said that, now he says things about me, I’ve heard, that are bordering on slander,” Savage said. “He’s making allegations about sexual activities, etc., that if he keeps it up, I’m going to sue him. Because he’s making it up out of whole cloth.”

( Also on POLITICO: Krauthammer: Obama got 'whiny')

Hannity has alluded to Savage, although not by name, on several occasions on his own 3-6 p.m. EST show. On April 25, 2013, Hannity was discussing how disgraced politician Anthony Weiner had recently admitted there might be additional personal photographs of himself out there and noted, “I don’t know what it is, too, about people with the last name Weiner. If you Google ‘talk show host Weiner Fiji Ginsberg,’ boy is it a shocker. Must be the last name. Just Google it.”

Savage was born Michael Weiner and later changed his last name.

On Wednesday, Hannity again brought up the reference to the beat poet Allen Ginsberg, saying, “Here’s a mystery that we will one day unfold to you. Who is the phony conservative radio host, who is this guy, who once went — really old man, bitter, angry, pathetic — that once went skinny-dipping, claims to be, he’s a phony conservative — according to reports, we’re only beginning our research, we’re going to get to the bottom of it, and then we’re going to have real, real fun.”

This conservative host, Hannity said, once went “skinny-dipping” in Fiji “with a liberal poet, Ginsberg.”

Hannity is no stranger to controversy himself. He found himself in hot water in 2009, for example, when Comedy Central’s The Daily Show host Jon Stewart reported Hannity had manipulated video footage to show large crowds at a health care protest. Hannity apologized to his Fox News viewers for the error.

And Savage has often found himself embroiled in conflict, both off the air and on. He had a short career as a TV host on MSNBC in 2003, but he was fired for telling a caller on air, “Oh, so you’re one of those sodomites. You should only get AIDS and die, you pig.” He later apologized, but his incendiary comments have long been a hallmark of his career. In 2009, for example, he was named to a list of individuals banned from entering the United Kingdom as he was “considered to be engaging in unacceptable behaviour by seeking to provoke others to serious criminal acts and fostering hatred which might lead to inter-community violence.”

And Savage has brought his battle with Hannity onto the airwaves, calling his fellow radio host one of the “most shallow men” in media and a “fake conservative” on a show in May 2013.

One thing you won’t hear Savage fight about on air, however, is President Barack Obama’s signature health care law: His show is an “Obamacare free zone,” he notes.

“Boring, boring, boring, gone,” Savage said. “I can’t listen to it. If I can’t listen to it when I’m scanning the dial, I don’t know how anyone else can hear any more about it. It’s socialized medicine light, we know the website failed — and? What else is there to know? Tell me why I need to talk about it.”

Hannity — however — talks at length about Obamacare. His style is to deliver monologues with a conservative take on the day’s political news, and he also peppers his show with talk from a variety of guests and callers.

The San Francisco-based Savage said his show is more about the “very into the existential situation we all find ourselves in every day.” Savage has also had a number of other careers throughout his life, including as an author, anthropologist and academic. He’s aiming to make this afternoon drive time — likely his “last act” in his 20 year radio career, he said — a good ride for his listeners.

“To me, everything is political anyway. If I talk about food, ultimately it becomes politics. Because what is more political than health? Nothing,” Savage said.