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Mark Reed Levin (born September 21, 1957) is an American radio host, lawyer, author, and political commentator who served in the Reagan administration. He is the host of The Mark Levin Show, a nationally-syndicated talk show that airs throughout the United States, and the President of Landmark Legal Foundation. He is the author of multiple bestselling books and a contributor to various other media outlets.

[edit] Biography

Mark R. Levin grew up in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and holds a B.A. from Temple University, where he was graduated Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude. Levin also earned a judicial doctorate from the Temple University Beasley School of Law.

Beginning in 1981, Levin served as advisor to several members of President Ronald Reagan's Cabinet, eventually becoming Associate Director of Presidential Personnel and ultimately Chief of Staff to Attorney General Edwin Meese; Levin also served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education at the U.S. Department of Education, and Deputy Solicitor of the U.S. Department of the Interior.

He has practiced law in the private sector, and is president of Landmark Legal Foundation, a conservative public interest law firm founded in 1976 and based in Leesburg, Virginia.

Levin has participated in the Freedom Concerts, an annual benefit concert to aid the families of fallen soldiers, and he uses his radio program to promote the concerts.^[1][2] Levin is also involved with Troopathon, a charity which sends care packages to soldiers serving overseas.^[3]

In 2001, the American Conservative Union awarded Levin its Ronald Reagan Award.^[4][5]

[edit] Radio broadcasting

Levin began his broadcast career as a guest on conservative talk radio programs. For many years he was a frequent contributor of legal opinions to The Rush Limbaugh Show, where Limbaugh referred to him on-air as "F. Lee Levin," a tongue-in-cheek reference to the famous defense attorney F. Lee Bailey. He was also a contributor to The Sean Hannity Show and eventually got a radio slot of his own, on WABC, following Sean Hannity's program. Hannity has nicknamed Mark Levin "The Great One." Levin and Hannity remain frequent contributors to each other's programs, often calling in and facetiously referring to each other as "Doctor Hannity" and "Doctor Levin."

[edit] The Mark Levin Show

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Levin began his radio hosting career in 2002 as a Sunday afternoon host on WABC. His radio show, a mix of political and social commentary from a conservative point of view, covers legal issues in some detail, including decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court. Levin follows the traditional talk radio model of taking listener calls throughout the show. In the fall of 2003, his show filled the 6-8 p.m. (ET) time slot. As of February 2, 2009, his show was expanded to three hours, namely, 6-9 p.m.^[6]

As of 2006, his show is syndicated by Citadel Media (formerly known as ABC Radio Networks) on over 150 stations as well as on the XM America Right and SIRIUS Patriot channels. Levin's show has been rated number one in its time slot in New York, Chicago, Detroit, Dallas - Fort Worth and Washington, D.C.^[6] According to Talkers Magazine, The Mark Levin Show is tied for the fourth most-listened to talk show with The Laura Ingraham Show on commercial radio in the United States, with more than 5.5 million listeners weekly.^[7]

Levin occasionally has guests on his show, including Republican politicians, conservative pundits and commentators, and a variety of entertainers such as Jackie Mason, Jon Voight, and Clint Walker.

Levin's show has garnered criticism from moderate conservatives. New York Times columnist David Brooks labeled Levin as one of a number of "people I consider loons and harmful for America".^[8][9] Former George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum has emerged as a leading critic of Levin^[10][11] and repeatedly criticized Levin's approach as an example of right-wing broadcasters who have adopted an angry tone and posed a negative influence on both conservative politics and civil discourse.^[12][13] Mark McKinnon, former advisor to George W. Bush and John McCain, has condemned Levin's "jaw-dropping hate language about the President" and accused him of "reveling in the President's failures".^[14]

For his part, Levin dismisses Frum, Brooks and others as "phony conservatives"^[15] and "ineffective lightweights who shoot spitballs at conservatives^[16]. Levin believes that Frum, Brooks, et al. are used by liberal pundits and organizations^[17] who try to portray them as the real face of conservatism^[18] in order to make Levin and others look like extremists.^[19]

[edit] Writer

[edit] Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto

Cover of Liberty and Tyranny

Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto (ISBN 1-41656-285-0) was released on March 24, 2009, and became a #1 New York Times best seller for eleven of twelve weeks,[1] as well as #1 on Nielsen's BookScan.^[20], and comes in at #2 of Amazon.com's list of bestselling books of 2009 ^[21]. The book includes discussion of a variety of issues that, according to Levin, need to be addressed in the United States. Liberty and Tyranny has sold over one million copies according to Threshold Editions, the book's publisher.^[22]

Former Federal Prosecutor Andrew C. McCarthy wrote of Liberty and Tyranny in The New Criterion, "We are in the high tide of America’s Leftist ascendancy: the Obama evisceration of individual freedom and installation of authoritarian collectivism—at warp speed, driven by an ambition that would have made Woodrow Wilson and FDR blush. Against this tidal wave, Levin offers not so much a defense as a plan of attack, a clarion call to roll back the seas of Change."^[23] On the other hand, Steve Almond of Salon wrote that "the tantalizing beauty of a Mark Levin's text resides precisely in this ability to attribute any crisis of State to its nefarious indulgences. The current economic meltdown, for instance, should not be blamed on the psychotic greed of Wall Street, but on the State's deranged need to throw money at the poor and undeserving."^[24]

[edit] Rescuing Sprite: A Dog Lover's Story of Joy and Anguish

In 2007, Levin released a book about his dogs, Pepsi and Sprite. Specifically, the book was about Sprite, a Spaniel mix that his wife and son persuaded him to adopt from the local shelter in 2004. The book was titled Rescuing Sprite: A Dog Lover's Story of Joy and Anguish (ISBN 1-41655-913-2). Rescuing Sprite chronicles Sprite’s health deterioration in 2006 and how Levin and his family dealt with their loss.

[edit] Men In Black: How The Supreme Court is Destroying America

Levin authored the bestselling book, Men In Black: How The Supreme Court Is Destroying America (ISBN 0-89526-050-6) in 2005, in which Levin advanced his thesis that judges (from all parts of the political spectrum) have "legislated from the bench." In her review of Men in Black,^[25] Slate senior editor and legal correspondent Dahlia Lithwick wrote that "no serious scholar of the court or the Constitution, on the ideological left or right, is going to waste their time engaging Levin's arguments once they've read this book." In contrast, a review in the Defense Council Journal, a publication that "provides topical and scholarly writings on the law, including its development and reform,"^[26] described Men in Black as “…a forceful indictment of what Levin identifies as an increasingly 'activist' court for amending our national Constitution in the guise of construing it.” ^[27]

[edit] Other works

As of October 2009, Levin was listed as a Contributing Editor on the National Review Online^[28] website. The archives contain multiple articles contributed by Mr. Levin, beginning in 2000.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Mark Levin Show, The Official Mark Levin Website
• marklevinshow Twitter feed
• The Official Mark Levin Show Audio Rewind
• Landmark Legal Foundation
• Mark Levin is on the air from NationalReview.com