Rant raises profile of CNBC on-air personality Rick Santelli

Here's the rant in question...

Now an article about one possible route that this rant Mr. Santelli gave on the floor of the Chicago Board of Trade could lead from Phil Rosenthal:

CNBC's Rick Santelli's self-described rant on TV last week, bemoaning that "the government is promoting bad behavior" with President Barack Obama's mortgage bailout plan, clearly resonated with many Americans, made him a viral video star and drew a White House rebuke.

Only during the weekend, however, was it occurring to him how his newly raised profile—part Howard Beale, the fictional "mad as hell" anchorman, part Howard Jarvis, the anti-tax champion of fiscal responsibility—might be parlayed into other opportunities.

"I don't think in those terms, but maybe I should now," Santelli, 52, a full-timer on CNBC since 1999 whose current contract is set to run out around the end of the summer, said from his west suburban home. "I have three daughters. I have the whole college thing and whatnot."

Santelli, who doesn't have an agent, said he already has heard from several publishers, a prospect that interests him. And he previously has enjoyed doing talk radio. That said, he noted, "I'm pretty happy with what I do."
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"I've been associated with them 14 years, 10 years on the payroll, and you never see me much in commercials and whatnot," Santelli said. "Boy, has that changed in the last 36 hours."

A former trader and financial executive, Santelli said he appears on CNBC about 12 to 16 times a day and typically goes off on a tear a couple of times a week.

"I'm just a fired-up kind of guy, and it's all spontaneous," he said. "The ranting part, I'm just prone to do that. This one was just different. And, no, I certainly didn't expect it to turn out any different. It's just that with this one, we really, really tapped into a nerve."

With an allusion to communist Cuba and traders around him voicing their support, Santelli said from the Chicago Board of Trade floor early Thursday on CNBC: "This is America! How many of you people want to pay for your neighbors' mortgage that has an extra bathroom and can't pay their bills? ... President Obama, are you listening?"

Someone at the White House was. At his briefing Friday, Obama press secretary Robert Gibbs shot back—hard—likely out of concern for the traction the so-called Rick's Revolt could gain. "I feel assured that Mr. Santelli doesn't know what he's talking about," Gibbs said.

You know what else this can lead to. During his rant he talked about a Chicago Tea Party almost like the Boston Tea Party that spurred the American revolution. I found a couple of blogs about this. Check them out.

If not staying in the broadcast industry, I wonder if someone wants Santelli to run for office. There's alreay a button made just for that purpose. The button from a CNBC article.


Chicago Tea Party blogs
Rick Santelli’s Chicago Tea Party
The Chicago Tea Party

Also Marathon Pundit briefly writes about this coming Tea Party.