Who Cares About Rush Limbaugh

One of our local leftist loons, quoted here by Robert, does his part to spread the Party's talking points o' the month (while accusing everyone else of partisanship):

So when Republicans get in line behind a drug addict like Limbaugh and state that they want Obama to fail, what they are saying, folks, in effect, is that they want Obama's measures to rescue America to fail.

No. They are saying that they want Obama's plans to fail because Obama's plans are destructive for America.

That is the issue. That is why the stock market has been going down since it became likely that Obama would be elected, and why the market has continued to decline since Obama's inauguration. Obama/Pelosi's spending, taxing and regulating schemes destroy wealth and opportunity.

Rush Limbaugh is irrelevant, a phony issue cooked up by the permanent campaign to distract attention from the obvious fact that the Great One is wrecking our economy. What kind of President focuses his scarce time and political capital on conducting carefully planned and focus-grouped demagogic attack campaigns against media critics during an economic meltdown? How does that help the country? Obama is demonstrating ideologically driven incompetence on a colossal scale, not to mention a shocking level of personal arrogance and narcissism. That's the issue, he's the issue, not Rush Limbaugh. It's as if Nixon were still in office or we were living in some kind of marginal third-world country where the government was always conducting propaganda campaigns against enemy conspiracies.

And who cares about Carville. Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer as recently as 2006 were telling the media (and our enemies) with obvious glee that we were losing in Iraq. So was Obama. They were saying it for the purest, most cynical partisan motives. But that's all forgotten now that W's won that war. On to today's talking points...

Steele DOES Get It

This Politico article totally takes Rush Limbaugh's side in the Michael Steele/Limbaugh "battle".

(Michael) Steele’s job is really not that difficult. Being a party chairman is not what it used to be. Steele’s job is to raise money and go on TV every now and then and not screw things up too badly.

He has failed at this last task.

Unfortunately for him, Steele actually believes he should be the voice of the Republican Party, crafting its vision and shaping its strategy.

Enter Rush Limbaugh. Limbaugh has his own voice, his own vision and his own strategy. And the real trouble for Steele is that Limbaugh understands the core of the Republican Party — where it wants to go and what it wants to do — far better than Steele does.

Steele has somehow gotten it into his head that hard-core Republicans want to expand the party base to attract new voters, especially minorities.

Well, I don't know for sure if all "hard-core" Republicans want to attract minorities into the GOP, but I'd like to think that there's more than enough reasonable ones that do. Steele is being victimized for going on talk shows and not hitting back the hosts hard enough when confronted with anti-GOP rhetoric. In this sense, criticism of Steele is justified (e.g., I would have NEVER let anyone associate the GOP with Nazis as Steele allowed D.L. Hughley to just recently).

OK. But the Politico article primarily hammers Steele for having the crazy notion that the Republican party shouldn't be reaching out to minorities. That's just ridiculous. One thing is to sell out your principles while reaching out, yet another is to maintain those principles intact while encouraging folks to come to our side of the fence. I mean, it's not as if people are banging down doors to join the GOP these days.

In this humble correspondent's view, it is VITAL that the GOP reach out to minorities. If Michael Steele, a minority himself, knows that, why doubt him? If we keep our heads in the sand and pretend as if folks are just going to magically show up and be Republicans, especially in a day and age when the media continues to feed misconceptions of Republicans and conservatives, when minorities will soon become the aggregate majority in this country, then you can kiss conservatism in this country good-bye.

True conservatism doesn't have to sell out in order to appeal to a wide range of individuals. This has been proven time and time again. People just want to be a part of something that makes sense, and conservatism in its purest form most certainly does. If it's indeed true that hard-core Republicans desire not to reach out to people outside the traditional GOP profile (again I'm not convinced of this), then perhaps it's they who need to reevaluate their values, not folks like Michael Steele who despite differences in style and personality have bravely swam against the tide in support of their true beliefs.

(Cross-posted at Babalu)

Go Ahead, I Dare You

As mentioned in previous posts, I respect Rush Limbaugh and think he's a very intelligent man, but find him a bit too much to take in one sitting. Kind of how I feel when I eat too much of my wife's cheese flan. Therefore, this Republican and conservative won't be signing up to join the Rush fan club anytime soon.

Having said that (and you knew this was coming, right?), I feel Democrats and the Obama administration are making a HUGE mistake by engaging and mocking Rush.

Apparently, some level-headed Democrats feel the same way.

From NewsBusters via Malkin:

Susan Estrich is worried. Very worried. She believes that the current coordinated Democrat strategy of attacking Rush Limbaugh is completely counterproductive. And she's right:

He talks for hours every day. He gets paid to talk. Just talk. Doing it well is no small thing; witness the number of people who have tried to be him, or be the NOT-him, and failed. But he doesn't have to build a coalition. He doesn't need the votes of the other side to earn his check. He doesn't have to write the legislation, convince Olympia Snowe, raise money to keep the lights on, put his name on the ballot. All the things he doesn't have to do give him the freedom to be as effective as he is at what he does.

Trying to beat him at his own game when your own game is played by a different set of rules is a losing proposition. He knows that.

Estrich, whom I generally respect despite ideological differences, makes other good points in her piece. One thing she didn't mention that many Democrats and the White House are underestimating is one simple, basic but important thing (already alluded to):

Rush Limbaugh, like him or not, is an extremely smart and savvy man who has used his smarts and instincts to make himself the most popular radio host in the country. If you underestimate this, well....go right ahead. But consider this a fair warning.

Lampoon Limbaugh and his listeners at your own risk. Limbaugh has nothing to lose. I can picture Limbaugh right now doing his best Robert Conrad and daring the White House to keep it up. The opposite is most definitely true for the other side.

(Cross-posted at Babalu)

Lay Off Jindal!

I respect Rush Limbaugh and think he's a very smart man, but sometimes I have little use for his hot air. His on-air rant today about conservative criticism of Bobby Jindal's response speech last night was a classic example of me of agreeing with the message, but rolling my eyes a little at the histrionics.

Anyway, here's Rush sticking up for Gov. Jindal.

H/T: Melek