When Republicans tried to tie Michael Moore to the Democratic party, Democrats cut him loose. Moore is not an essential cog in the party apparatus; for a working stiff in the Congressional sausage factory he’s a noisy pain in the ass. Mostly prominent Democrats seemed more than happy, eager, to kick him in the shins.
Meanwhile the grand Omabunist conspiracy involving Rush Limbaugh amounts to, what? Mentioning his name a couple of times? The first sentence of this paragraph doesn’t even have a proper verb. What was Obama trying to do? Casually mentioning how influential a guy is does not usually destroy a person or silence him or whatever the dumbest f*cking people on Earth, aka Ann Althouse’s commenters, think that Obama is trying to do (warning: link may cause brain damage). Here is the underpants gnomes version of Obama’s evil plot.
Step 1: Publicly suggest that Republicans agree with Rush Limbaugh.
Step 2: ??
Step 3: Clear Channel replaces Rush’s show with Randi Rhodes and CounterSpin.
Maybe Tom Robbins could put together a semi-plausible Step 2. I don’t have that kind of mojo.
Granted that Step 1 is so horrible that it is exactly like the ‘some say’ tic that George W called up practically every time that he wanted to make a point, except that instead of conjuring up a fanciful ‘some’ Gibbs said who said it. Everything that happened next, literally everything, happened within the Republican caucus.
I will recap. First a few brave and/or stupid souls tried to carve out some distance. Instead of brushing it off Rush went apeshit, and instead of moving on each heretic took a turn on his knees begging for mercy and to get the howler monkeys out of his switchboard. Other Republicans (to their credit) recognized that the whole sorry spectacle reflects badly on the party, but then blew it by stirring up a big campaign to complain about it in the media.
At the RNC, where better days would have smart minds planning out the next election, senior officials are still throwing chairs and pooping in one other’s lunch bags.
Republicans could have kept their yap shut and let the country think that a drug-addled ignoramus pulls their strings. Instead they opened their mouth and proved it.
jeffreyw
I’m still waiting for one of the retard republicans in congress to introduce a resolution calling for a national holiday on the fat one’s birthday.
Tiparillo
it seems similar to the all Fairness Doctrine blather and the recent swell in "liberals don’t believe inthe frist amendment" crap I keep reading in Wingnut comment threads…..just more paranoid victimhood, I guess
Jim in Chicago
Write your own apology to Rush Limbaugh!:
I’m Sorry Rush
It’s fun: a sort of Republican Mad Libs.
;D Jim
joe from Lowell
The fact that these idiots think the White House and Democratic Party are enjoying this because of the damage it does to Rush, rather than to the Republicans, just goes to show that the charge is true.
Kashford
I don’t think Democrats, by and large, "cut Michael Moore loose" or "kicked him in the shins". Democrats didn’t need to, because the right-wing attempt to make Moore the grand poo-bah of the Dem Party was on its face laughable. (Same with Cindy Sheehan).
Democrats defended Moore (where defense was warrented), but they didn’t engage in the "Michael! Michael!" idoltry that we saw at CPAC ("Rush! Rush!").
Other than that niggling point, your analysis is spot-on.
chrome agnomen
step 2: scales fall from rights’ eyes. ‘what have we been thinking? country first!’ they quickly get behind effort to bail out country, support commission to investigate war crimes of bush administration, …
can’t go on, laughing at myself while trying to type.
Kashford
Oh, I think they’re enjoying this because of the damage it does to the Republicans.
Only Rush would possess the ego to think this is really about him.
chrome agnomen
@ jeffrey
now that we have a person of color in the white house, no need for that inconvenient mid-jan holiday, is there>
jl
Two points:
1) how did the Obama team practice the paranormal mind control that made the current GOP empty suits, incompetents, liars, stups, and COWARDS in charge of the party go and grovel on their knees to Limbaugh? I guess that is somewhere in the "??" part of the plan.
2) the media scumballs who are peddling this nonsense have revealed themselves to be the lowest kind of hypocritical partisan hacks. They slobbered all over themselves praising Rove and other GOP operatives for what they supposed where similar political theatre over the past 20 years. These people are not journalists, and not honest analysts, they are hypocritical, corrupt, partisan hacks and scum, trying to distract the country in a time of crisis with propaganda and intellectual garbage.
We should send them copies of ‘Atlas Shrugged’ and encourage them all to go ‘John Galt’
bh
honestly i really wish people would stop equating Moore with Limbaugh in any form. Sure Moore may be over the top at times but that is about the nicest thing you can say about limbaugh.
woody
There is one "left/progressive" radio luminary who desires above all else to be the "Rush Limbaugh" of the Left: that insufferably stupid, obtuse, ignorant, pandering fuckwit Ed Schulz.
Why is it such wanna-be demagogues are always obese, blustering toads?
chrome agnomen
@ woody
from eating all the toad stools?
Keith
Leave Larry Craig out of this.
KRK
Step 1was Obama saying to Republican members of Congress "you can’t just listen to Limbaugh…." As in, don’t listen only to Limbaugh, try listening directly to your constituents as well. I think we’re seeing that most people would’ve been fine with Obama saying "don’t listen to Limbaugh at all," but he didn’t even get close to that.
El Tiburon
More great news for McCain.
cleek
if you survived that, you gotta check out the comments on this article, too.
joe from Lowell
You know what’s interesting? I’ve never heard of him.
How many Republicans – hell, how many Americans – have never heard of Rush Limbaugh?
NonyNony
@Kashford:
It depends on what you mean by "Democrats". I can’t think of any Democratic politician that leaps to the defense of Michael Moore – and I can think of a few who like to beat up on him as an easy shorthand to distance themselves from "liberals". I think in the post above, Tim is speaking specifically of Democratic and Republican politicians, not self-identified Democrats or Republicans.
But yes – there is no one on the Democratic/liberal side of the aisle that reaches the levels of idolotry that Rush does on the Republican/conservative side. Mostly I think that’s because the Democratic Party has wanted to be "Republican lite" for so long that it reflexively rejects anyone who wraps themselves up in Liberalism the way that Rush has wrapped himself up in Conservatism. It kind of speaks to the makeup of the parties too – the Democrats are a true coalition of left, center-left and center-right politicians – they don’t all identify as "liberal" and a number would actually call themselves "conservative". The Republicans are all center-right or right or whacky-over-the-top-far-right. And they ALL call themselves "conservative". So rejecting a guy who has managed to convince a good portion of your political base that he’s the living incarnation of their political philosophy probably looks like a bad idea to most of them these days.
wolfetone
"Maybe Tom Robbins could put together a semi-plausible Step 2. I don’t have that kind of mojo."
Now that’s one of the funniest and most self-effacing lines I’ve read in a while. Kudos, Tim, for bringing up Robbins at a time when we all can use a good dose of his scathingly accurate wit.
Alan
I posted a couple times on that Althouse thread. The avalanche of stupid has pretty much driven me away from that site. What’s frustrating is seeing a whole new generation of dupes repeating the same arguments I used to make 10 to 20 years ago when I was a huge Limbaugh fan. I recognize the damage the outrage machine Rush created has done. I realize the "substantive" arguments Rush makes lacks any valuable substance. It’s all just RW factoids that people repeat by rote. So yeah, it is brain numbing.
oh really
I’d rewrite that slightly:
To exclude Ann from a group of which she is so obviously a member is just plain unfair.
PS I’m pretty sure Glenn Beck is the absolute dumbest person in the history of the world. He’s certainly the biggest clown.
Punchy
WTF? I’m going to believe this is snark.
Comrade Stuck
The dems committed the unpardonable sin – they said something true. In wingnut world, true stuff is best lied about or not mentioned and it throws off their mojo when people don’t comply.
And further, that Obama repeating Rush’s own hopey jabber that he hoped Obama fails was taking him out of context and wasting time that should be spent on cleaning up their economic mess. Only logical.
I mean, what idiot doesn’t know that in the wingnut lexicon saying they hope someone fails is exactly like saying "I think his policies will fail". It takes some deep thought to understand, but no deeper than Rush’s jelly rolls.
jenniebee
A den of vipers will eat their own? Who knew?
Wisdom
The Republican leadership, like the nation, thought their instutition could benefit from social experimentation at the worst of times.
Fortunately for Republicans, they will be able to head off disaster and fix the RNC in short order. Unfortunately for America, that will not be the case.
KG
In a sane world, the GOP nominee in 2012 would be the first person to tell Rush to shut the fuck up. Then again, in a sane world, Al Gore and George W Bush are not the nominees in 2000 and we never learn what a hanging chad is.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
I have now seen Roger & Me, Bowling for Columbine, Fahrenheit 9/11 and Sicko and I still can’t figure out how Michael Moore hates America. I’ve been told that Moore is dishonest because 1) Moore could have interviewed Roger Smith anytime Moore wanted, 2) Moore used animation in Bowling for Columbine which he placed after an interview with one of the South Park guys, 3) he was mean to Charlton Heston, 4) Moore showed shots from a "peaceful" Iraq in F9/11, and 5) took advantage of Cuban propaganda to obtain healthcare for American 9/11 first responders.
Am I missing anything?
Oh, wait, of course I am, 6) Michael Moore is fat, really fat.
Martin
A new strategy memo went out last week. Try to keep up, please.
jibeaux
Wow. That Althouse thread got to Godwin before 9 in the morning.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
Michael Moore is fat and hates America. But mostly he’s fat.
jibeaux
Why, cleek, why. I thought we were friends.
jl
A third thought: Republicans DO agree with Limbaugh, at the very least, only they speak in code. Sometimes the code is easy to break. I have seen few comments on John Boehner’s assertion that the Democrats have been offering the public a ‘free lunch’ for the last 80 years.
You do that math.
So, that takes us back to 1929. What free lunches was Boehner talking about? Social Security? Unemployment insurance? Federal Deposit Insurance? Workers rights to organize at all? Any meaningful regulation of financial markets at all? Rampant crony capitalism and corruption that ruled during the twenties? Grotesque inequality in income and wealth that rivaled the Gilded Age?
Boehner doesn’t have to grovel to Limbaugh. The face value of his comments put him past Limbaugh’s usual schtick in extremism.
I’ve noticed Boehner’s body language and facial expressions recently -he has been swanking around like a cheap twenty’s hood. I suggest we give him a suitable nickname. How about ‘Johnny the Boner’?
I agree with commenters above that step one of the supposed plan did not really happen. The administration merely suggested that the GOP shouldn’t listen just to Limbaugh.
The truth is that the GOP brass is just as extreme or more extreme than Limbaugh. They are already deep in Limbaugh territory without listening to him at all. So, the administration could have made a much stronger statement, and that would have merely been stating a truth, not part of a supposed cheap plot.
The Grand Panjandrum
She wasn’t drunk blogging per chance?
@cleek: I read that earlier today and got a laugh out of it. Who could known that a bunch of winguts would spend eight years with their hand in the sand as war crimes and all manner of malfeasance were perpetrated by a Republican and not one peep about impeachment. Less than eight weeks into the administration of a very popularly elected Democratic president and they are running around with their hair on fire.
What is it Atrios always writes? Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh the stupid, it burns! Yeah, it’s like that.
jibeaux
I will never forgive you, cleek. This is completely going to suck up the afternoon.
Matt D
Ah Althouse commenters.
I remember stopping in there a couple weeks ago and checking out a thread where the various participants were discussing whether, were abortion legal when Obama was born, his mother would have been more likely to abort him–because liberals love abortion–or keep him–because liberals love making statements about race. I’m not even really paraphrasing the arguments–that was really the discussion.
Althouse herself is somewhat interesting but maaaaan her regular commenters tend to be vile.
Tony J
It is blackly funny that a throwaway line by Obama in a closed-door session with GOP Congresscritters getting leaked has led to a situation where the leadership of the Republican Party are having their faces rubbed in the the fact that Rush Limburgh basically owns their asses.
He’s the real leader of their Base, but it seems like it took a few weeks and half a dozen bitch-slaps from their formerly friendly mouthpiece for them to get the message. And it’s quite precious that the MSM are trying so hard to spare the GOP any blushes by making their failure a problem for the Democrats.
But what has really struck me reading comments all over the place about this blow-up is that I haven’t seen a single pro-Republican voice anywhere even try to make the case that Republicans should be, y’know, a little bit worried that openly wrapping themselves in the ‘Party of Rush’ banner and ditching the whole concept of electoral democracy in favour of a fat loudmouth who 70% of the country can’t stomach might – not – be the best strategy for people who don’t want to spend the next few decades out of office and laughed at by their neighbours. Not one.
I’m almost at the point where I’m willing to go the whole hog and say that the Republican Base would prefer to see their Party out of power and helpless to defend them from Liberal Tyranny just so they have an excuse to live out their apocalyptic fantasies. These people are so ‘off the hook’ that they appear to want to relive the 1860s, only they’ll win this time, because now they have better guns than their ancestors.
Stupid doesn’t cover it. These people are genuinely pitching a tent at the idea of a civil-war.
AhabTExpropriator
@J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford: I have been a fan since I saw Roger and Me in High School, a couple of years after it came out. He is a smart, funny, engaging, and, yes, irritating individual. Sometimes it hurts my teeth to see him go after someone hammer and tongs, but, JFC, we need spit-in-the-eye muckrakers. So, leaving aside my personal discomfiture at his pursuit of his prey, I really enjoy Moore, and I was really distressed by the attacks on him.
anonevent
Step 2: And magic occurs here.
AhabTExpropriator
Indeed, they have been so absent that the Villagers have had to work extra hard to carry the water on the "Obama is uncivil" meme.
Joey Maloney
Can we start a fund to donate copies of The Guns Of The South to them? Audiobooks, natch, with the last hour missing. Then they can all go wank themselves senseless while the grownups are working, and then Harry Turtledove will win the Nobel Peace Prize.
NickM
Cornholio?
Svensker
I’m having a cranky day and am not in the mood to laugh at these fuckers. I hate them. I loathe them. I despise them. I would like to put them all in a huge very uncomfortable boat in the middle of the ocean with the sun beating down on them and no food or water, then boiling oil gets dripped on them slowly and then random explosions and then they are forced to the lowest level of the ship where they watch the water leaking in until they all drown in horrible pain and fear.
Ah. Feel better now. Anybody got a smoke?
Zifnab
@Svensker: You want to send them all to southern Louisiana?
Ricky Bobby
I still laugh out loud every time I see Rush’s name mentioned. It’s just insane that a major political party would let themselves degenerate to this point. Even in my wildest imaginings of the coming Republican Wilderness did I envision this kind of asshattery.
Watching the Repubs crawl through Rushbo the Hutt’s slug trail to pledge their fealty and kiss the bloated ring is STILL just un-fucking-believable.
/popcorn
dslak
Apropos the title of this post, I’m reminded of a line from a song by the same title:
SpotWeld
The GOP pretty much depends on Rush to supply a common lexicon for people who espouse right-wing views. (Defeatocrats, porkulus, Algore, etc…)
Has there been any term of art from Michale Moore that has entered into the common left-wing forum? It’s possible, but none spring to mind.
It’s sort of a twisted Sapir–Whorf hypothesis, because Rush controls the language he can control how people think. It seems that a lot of the GOP has to apologize to Rush because he can deny them legitimate use of the language and therefore access to the politcal base.
gwangung
QFT. Again and again and again.
And, sorry, but I have just as much contempt for the numbskulls who are saying it’s OBAMA’s fault.
Keith
Giving it some thought, the only person I see being able to stand up to Rush is unfortunately a bit too old to make a serious 2012 run – Ron Paul. Paul is the only person with his own base that is as passionate as Rush’s (Palin’s base is Rush’s base, IMO) that doesn’t overlap enough to turn on him the second they have to choose between Rush and Ron. His operation turned out a ton of money, but on the other hand, his core constituency is probably nowhere near as large as Rush’s, but I’d love for someone to prove me wrong.
NickM
Watching his performance at CPAC, I was thinking that the guy is back on the hbilly horse. Aren’t they worried about tying their futures to someone so unstable?
And I was also thinking, if this was a movie:
Act I: Really smart operative dares Republicans to say Rush is their kind of guy, to a T.
Act II: Republicans all pledge their everlasting troth and execute the few heretics.
Act III: Someone drops the pictures from the boys’ weekends in the D.R.
Act IV: . . . . (sweet anticipation) . . . .
Act V: Multiple Heads Asplode.
I know life doesn’t really work that way, but it would be nice to think so.
jibeaux
@Svensker:
I’m sorry. "Milk-teat" makes me giggle every time, well, at least the one time I read it it did. Surely the internets hold something that would cheer you up…maybe "David after dentist" on youtube, that’s one I saw recently…
I also find schadenfraude helpful. These guys are such lightweights. Come cryin’ to me in ninety-four-and-a-half months and I’ll feel your pain, little wingnut.
David
It’s just like the Sarah Palin wardrobe flap — the Republicans kept the controversy going much longer than it needed to.
Svensker
@jibeaux:
Yeah, some days I can laugh. Today I’m just pissed off and feelin’ mean.
This is how I feel.
Tsulagi
Of course not just limited there. As you might imagine it’s been a cornucopia of tard over at RedState with the
CountryGOPRush Firsters reporting for duty.To buck up morale during the fight, Commander E.E. shared with the ball-buying RSSF troopers the results of his very first face time with Rush at this CPAC. Still swooning…
Must have been an overload of starbursts. Pretty much confirmed in his next sentence…
I hope one of the troopers had a cigarette to give to their commander.
NonyNony
@Tony J:
David Frum made roughly this point – and got shouted at by the usual gang of idiots.
I can’t find them right now, but I think David Brooks and Ross Douthat had similar sorts of pieces about the danger of becoming the Party of Limbaugh. And the purity police basically called them RINOs and told them to get the hell out of the GOP and become Democrats.
Which is an interesting conundrum. The folks who are most likely to see just how destructive this path is are the very ones who are going to get shouted down by the noise machine. The noise machine has worked itself loose from the party and the party is now afraid of the monster it’s created. The politicians are apologizing to the noise machine instead of telling it to shut up and do the job it was built for.
sgwhiteinfla
TimF
I think you mistake how this really all started. First Rush came out about grabbing his ankles or something or other and hoping the President fails. Then in a closed, I repeat, closed door meeting President Obama mentioned off the cuff that Republicans couldn’t listen to Rush Limbaugh and hope to have productive bipartisanship. The weakass kindergarteners in the Republican party then went to the media, anonymously of course, and repeated what President Obama said. After that talking heads started asking Republicans if they agreed with Rush most notably Chris Matthews on Hardball. This stuff has been going on for over a month before Robert Gibbs ever commented on it from his podium. And even then he was responding to a question from the media. And the first time Gibbs didn’t even say anything about Rush running the party. He talked about how regular Americans wouldn’t want President Obama to fail. But what really set the story on fire was Gingrey and Sanford saying Rush was wrong and then going back and grovelling and asking for his forgiveness. Hell if the White House was planning this all alone they must have some kind of mind control over the Republicans AND Rush Limbaugh. Oh and I just love this video that Jed Lewison made about who was really promoting Rush hard during CPAC. I can promise you that it wasn’t the White House.
http://www.dailykostv.com/w/000954/
David
The Republican Party® (a subsidiary of Rush Limbaugh Entertainment, Inc.)
Xel
Democrats were by default complicit in wanting troops to die and wanting the Iraq/Afghanistan gambles to not pay off simply because they rationally criticized extremely botched wartime rationales and executions. The onus were on us, somehow.
Criticizing Limbaugh? ENTARTETE POLITIK; DEMOFASCISTS; OPPRESSION; LEFT-WING HATRED; CONSPIRACIES; PARTISANSHIP; NO MANDATE FOR DESTROYING REAGAN’S HERITAGE!!!!!
Democrats may wear thin gloves, but they are merely slapping, they are not going under the belt or for the temples and they do not have brass knuckles at the ready.
Conservatives and sceptics should be welcomed (and won over, if possible). Republicans are not allowed to complain for a long time and should be disregarded. Seriously, what we are seeing now, unmasked, is basically the thing that has steered the most powerful government on earth for years, and they aren’t even looking at their score-card. The mind boggles.
dslak
@NonyNony:
It couldn’t have happened to a nicer group of people.
Svensker
@Zifnab:
lulz
Tony J
Which is funny in a Darwinist way. While I’ve been schooled quite roughly over the last decade to recognise as fact the truism that Republicans are basically incapable of crawling out of the ‘Shock and Bore’ mentality, I’m still surprised at how competantly the Obama Administration is handling the Defenestration of GOP credibility. The MSM aren’t just playing catch-up, they’re stuck in the bathroom at 3am trying to dodge their best pal’s vomit while everyone else heads off with the cool guy for a better scene.
Heh. Let’s really push the boat out and put them on a diet of The Amtrak Wars. There’s no better example of what the Republican Party has turned into than the dumb-ass Trackers who are happy to die at 40 in the service of their leaders. Patrick Tilley was a freaking prophet, I tells ya.
The Populist
Ed’s got an ego the size of his girth but I believe he means well. He’s a moderate voice but can be spot on and DID support Obama and still does.
The Populist
Actually its:
The Republican Party® (a subsidiary of EIB Networks LLC, a division of Rush Limbaugh Entertainment, Inc, a Divine Corporation on loan from God).
binzinerator
@Tony J:
The GOP is now a regional party of the Southern redneck bigot, a.k.a. the New Confederacy. And at their core what they really really really resent is that anybody else who isn’t white, male, hetero and fundamentalist gets to have the same rights, the same jobs and same opportunities as they do.
It’s really no different from the first time around. All that "state’s rights" bullshit was to put a fig leaf on their naked bigotry.
Some of the mentality of the Old South never really went away, and the people who clung to that kind of thinking just recently wrested control of a major party with which to represent their kind of thinking.
So in short, yes. They are.
AhabTExpropriator
@Svensker: I here ya, and I m right there with you.
Only I would say that this is how I’m feeling!
The Populist
Yep, when somebody starts spouting Rush points, I ask them point blank: Where did you hear that, Rush Limbaugh?
They get all mad, stutter and tell me to shut up and no they can think for themselves. Seems to me they get this stuff from Rush and lie to make it seem they came up with it on their own. Funniest yet is that back in the day nobody would even miss a chance to call themselves a proud dittohead.
I find those that still call themselves dittoheads tend to be the dumbest of the dumb.
AhabTExpropriator
er, that’s "hear," and "I’m."
Rassa-frassa-stupid-edit!
The Populist
Maybe this time we let them leave and see how well they manage themselves. No one southerner can agree on anything.
They would have to surrender all nukes and weapons that the US taxpayer paid for before they can go off on their own. They must pay for their own defense, their own weapon systems and we seal the borders.
AhabTExpropriator
@The Populist: Can’t we just sell them to Mexico or something?
obese blustering toad
@woody:
Croak in a fire, Woody.
The Populist
One problem…even in the south they are a minority to some extent. Again, one man’s bigot is another man’s enabler. They like to think of themselves as true individuals so I could see them falling in love with the idea of having their confederate flag flying in place of ol’ glory but in the end, they will suffer without us.
Most of the world know the deal with southerners. They are the reason we are fighting in unnecessary wars and they get subsidized by all the big states.
They are fucked if they leave.
David Hunt
I’m afraid that I have to disagree with that on technical grounds. There are people on the Earth that do not have the intelligence necessary to learn how to (barely) operate a computer and then post comments on internet sites. There is a certain minimum amount of intelligence that is required for that which a percentage of the population falls below.
For a well defined example of that minimum of intelligence necessary to comment on an internet site you can check either the aforementioned Ann Althouse and her commenters, or youtube (the comments of virtually any random video).
jibeaux
@The Populist:
We agree that unsweetened tea is an Abomination Unto the Lord.
The Populist
Not a bad idea but one side of me thinks one day soon WE will be bailing out or buying out Mexico!
The Populist
For real knee slappers go to the OCregister website and pull up any article you know the GOP slam.
Let’s say a school is short of funds. Bingo – the comments under the column are full of retards decrying how much money we spend (did you know, according to most of these buffoons, we spend more money on education than ANYBODY in the world?) and all we get are illiterates.
It becomes a parade of assholes and some pretty racist points that bring down the section. They blame the teacher unions, they blame illegals, they blame everybody but the fact that the USA is one of the WORST in the industrialized world to fund it’s schools properly. When you point this out, they pounce.
Dennis-SGMM
OT: Two weeks after Michael Steele’s Tech Summit, the RNC’s chief technologist, Cyrus Krohn, has resigned.
Considering that the Republicans don’t have a deep bench when it comes to technology, this will hurt. No word on whether or not Krohn had criticized Rush Limbaugh.
Dennis-SGMM
The only way to prevent this is to smoke more weed.
Joe Lisboa
the RNC’s chief technologist, Cyrus Krohn
For a "technologist" that’s a pretty freakin’ sweet name. I hope he has laser eyes and a host of minions. Carry on …
gbear
@NonyNony:
Given that those same people are the ones who helped create that machine, I’m not going to waste much time feeling sorry for them.
Cris
@J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford: Interesting to see that Moore can finally admit that he was "booed off the stage" at the Oscars.
However, I think Moore is too generous in that editorial. One, he claims the "only difference" between him and Rush is that the majority of Americans agree with him (Moore). Give yourself some credit, Mike: in spite of your tendency to overstate (and occasionally misrepresent) the facts, at least you state facts. Limbaugh just makes shit up.
Two, he doesn’t go far enough to point out how eager the mainstream of the Democratic party has always been to cut him loose. President Bush phoned in to Limbaugh’s show. Did President Clinton ever show up at a Moore film opening?
Nancy Darling
@binzinerator
Having ancestors on both sides of the civil war, I feel entitled to comment. If the Confederacy had won the war they were fighting for"Old Massa", the Yankees would be building a wall on the Mason-Dixon Line to keep out their economic refugees. They still sign up to fight Old Massa’s wars in disproportionate numbers compared to the rest of the country. Only today Old Massa sits in corporate board rooms of oil companies, etc., instead of on the veranda of the big house. I have never figured out why they are so willing to fight in wars where there is nothing in it for them. Is it something in the Scots-Irish gene pool? Maybe I should read Bageant’s "Deer Hunting with Jesus" for some enlightenment.
Tonal Crow
@SpotWeld:
For years GOPers have been all about manufacturing (political) reality by redefining the language. They were amazingly successful, but it seems that they’ve finally overplayed their hand by coming earnestly to believe their own propaganda. Rove knew it was propaganda; Eric Cantor thinks it’s fact.
The Moar You Know
@The Populist: We’ll know we’re truly in deep shit when Mexico bails us out.
Tony J
Which is why you get the wannabes like Scherer pushing their way to the front of the mosh-pit and lifting their t-shirts to the shitty band no one likes anymore. They haven’t noticed, or don’t care, that the owners of the club just defaulted on their morgage, so all the electricity has gone off. And while the rest of the crowd are heading for the exits and talking about this new-wave retro act next door, they’re still hot for the drummer, ‘cos their sister blew him once, and he so totally gave them a slice of his girlfriend’s pizza. And she was loke, WTF, but he told her to cool it. Awesome!
Which is what boggles me the most. I’m a Brit with a fairly large alternate-history collection, but I never, ever thought that the South would actually think it could rise again, not in the in the Real World. I mean, so many wingnuts are alt-hist fans, didn’t they notice that the general consensus was that it was a bad idea the first time round? That they’re the Bad Guys?
One scenario I don’t see as too crazy is the GOP Base in the South and West going so anti-Obama they actually try this, and coming up against the majority that not only doesn’t agree, but shares their cultural bias for dealing with their own people’s problems in their own way.
No one likes an asshole who doesn’t know when to STFU. Especially when their own kids’ future is threatened by their assholism.
bvac
from an Ann Althouse commenter:
This is the kind of leadership the Republican party needs.
Mike in NC
I’d pay good money to watch Glenn Beck interview Doug Feith.
Could be. Jim Webb wrote a book about the Scots-Irish called "Born Fighting".
Svensker
@AhabTExpropriator:
Awrite, I haven’t heard that since Steve Allen days. You’re not my brother, are you, miraculously cured of dittoheadedness and posting on John’s blog? Are you?
Just Some Fuckhead
Not sure what’s up with all of the comparisons between Michael Moore and Rush Limbaugh. Is it because they are both fat white guys?
Michael Moore makes movies. Rush Limbaugh is a radio personality. Rush would correlate with the most prominent leftwing radio personality. Take yer pick.
Michael Moore would correlate to a successful rightwing filmmaker. Again, take yer pick.
Otherwise there is nothing similar about them at all. Michael Moore is a blue collar guy who has spent a lifetime agitating for the little guy, afflicting the comfortable, if you will. Rush is a child of privilege who has spent a lifetime toadying up to power and otherwise working for their powerful interests.
jl
GOP annals in leadership alert: Eric Cantor says he is with Rush.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/3/6/162336/7715/301/705515
Obamatron mind control and cheap PR tricks just got to poor Cantor! Oh, humanity, we are undone! Fie, for shame on the tricky Obama Borg!
Of course, Rush did nothing, poor man. Rush is a victim. This is all Obama’s evil tricks.
(Actually, not. Rush, earlier this week on his daily black comedy radio broadcast, not so subtly invited Cantor to genuflect, but I cannot find the link right now. Rush did not explicitly condemn or call out Cantor, but I guess at this point he does not have to. A mere gesture is sufficient to get our brave GOP statesmen to come groveling on their knees.)
It is all fell coup plotting by the communist Obamatrons!
Max Renn
@jl:
"Johnny Bones"
LanceThruster
Rahm Emmanuel, rather the just ignore the drug-addled gas-bag, instead praised him as "the voice and the intellectual force and energy behind the Republican Party."
In part, thanks to Emmanuel, Rush Limbaugh is a clear winner this week: His ratings have nearly doubled since his feud with the White House burst into the media limelight.
Heckuva job, Rahm. Instead of allowing Rush to marginalize himself in the mold of Ann Coulter, you helped resurrect his bloated zombie corpse.
It’s almost as if you were helping whoever Israel thinks is a better friend to them as far as Rethuglicans or Dems go.
Ivan Ivanovich Renko
Exactly.
And tied said stinking corpse right around the neck of every sorry son-of-a-bitch in the Republican party while he was about it.
Heckuva job? It was fucking genius.
joe from Lowell
You don’t get it, Lance.
The White House WANTS Rush Limbaugh to be as prominent as possible, because the public hates Rush Limbaugh. His approval ratings are at 28%.
Now, that’s enough to make a radio personality extremely popular and influential – as radio personalities go. But it’s also a political disaster to have someone like that as the leader, as the most prominent voice, of a political party in a two-party system.
This strategy has forces the Republican Party, already a distinct minority, to run away from the center, and embrace the most unpopular, unpleasant aspects of itself, thus weakening them considerably.
Yup, Rush Limbaugh, radio personality is a winner. Barack Obama, leader of a majority political party, is a winner, too. The Republican Party, on the other hand, are the big losers in all of this.
LanceThruster
I don’t think it is about any connection to the party, I think it is about rallying dittoheads. I think that the FAUX Noise-style dullards will circle the wagons around Rush. The party leadership itself can flounder again and again, but the ‘get a brain morans!" crowd will actually be energized by this move. Add a timely false-flag attack and the GOP will be back to "I told you so!" mode.
I hope I’m wrong but I’ve seen too many times where the Dems have shown themselves to be masters at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
I appreciate that you see it differently. Time will tell.
joe from Lowell
Lance,
When the Chairman of the RNC, and numerous sitting Congressmen and Senators, have to go groveling back to Rush for criticizing him, and when he’s all over the news as the keynote speaker at CPAC, and when every Republican who gets near a reporter is forced to answer, on television, "Do you agree with Rush Limbaugh," it ceases to be just about Rush Limbaugh, and becomes about the Republican Party.
The Get a Brain, Morans crowd just isn’t what it used to be. I can certainly understand your apprehension – look at 2002, look at 2004 – but things have changed. We don’t have to be scared of our shadows anymore. 2006 wasn’t a fluke. Barack Obama isn’t a fluke.
Bubblegum Tate
Well, to be fair, the Republicans jumped in and said, "Here, we’ll help you with the knot!"
joe from Lowell
Joe the Plumber got the "Get a Brain, Morans" crowed riled up. Sarah Palin got them riled up. ACORN and Reverend Wright and Bitter got them riled up. Let’s face it, these are the most easily riled-up people in the world. They turn over the kitchen table if they see an O in their Alpha-bits.
But they don’t control our politics any more.
conumbdrum
Lance, all you have to do is remember this: What is good for Rush Limbaugh and the "get a brain morans!" crowd is not necessarily good for the GOP.
More than anything, the Repubs need to make serious gains in popularity with Latinos, blacks, moderates and young voters… and the louder the dittoheads bray, the greater the odds that it will never happen. Rush’s boilerplate is like holy writ to the wingnut base, but as compelling as dysentery to at least half the nation.
The point should not be to avoid "energizing" the Limbaugh army… it’s to make their renewed vitality irrelevant.
DaveC
The point should be to identify Republicans with Limbaugh.
I’d love to see someone on TV refer to members of the Limbaugh Party.
Johnny Pez
I agree with those who think the comparison of Rush to Michael Moore is inappropriate. The fact is, there is no one on the left who is comparable to Rushbo. That’s been a big part of the problem.
RHL3 has been spewing his opinions over the public airwaves three hours a day, five days a week, for twenty frickin’ years, and his success has spawned an entire industry of right-wing talk-radio blowhards.
The closest comparison would be if, fifteen years from now, Daily Kos was still the leading liberal blog, and liberals still dominated online political discourse, and the liberal wing of the Democratic Party dominated national politics; in that case, then Markos Moulitsas would be a liberal version of Rush Limbaugh.