Limbaugh Sacked by the NFL
19 October 2009 | By joe-kgmi in UncategorizedYes, I love the NFL and yes, I’m glad that Rush Limbaugh will not be a minority owner of the St. Louis Rams. But I do want to clarify my position, which I failed to completely explain when we discussed Limbaugh getting drop-kicked by the prospective ownership group on the show last Friday.
At issue are misquotes of Limbaugh on race and slavery that were spread by Rev. Jesse Jackson, Rev. Al Sharpton and others. A caller asked me how I would feel if someone spread lies about me, causing me to lose my job or not be hired in the first place. My response was, inadequately, that Rush Limbaugh is hardly hurting. While that’s true, my point was that it wasn’t the lies spread about Limbaugh that sunk his attempt at NFL ownership. It was the fact that he is an extremely controversial figure and the NFL shies away from that type of controversy. To assume that the head of the prospective ownership group fell for the misquotes lock, stock and barrel, and was simply duped by Jackson and others is nonsense.
Limbaugh is hardly Mr. Sensitive when it comes to racial issues (think “Barack the Magic Negro.” Nope, no racial insensitivity there). When Colin Powell endorsed Obama’s White House bid, Limbaugh said it was “all about race.” But his rantings are never about race!? Everyone is obsessed about race except Rush? Puleeze.
Poor Rich White Guy. Limbaugh would look a lot better if he didn’t blame his opponents everytime he suffers a set-back. Rather, he should be an adult and state that “not everybody embraces my views, but I have a right to them and I’m happy to take my lumps for expressing them.”
19 October 2009 | Tim Daniels Said:
Joe,
I agree with you that Rush is not “Mr. Sensitive when it comes to racial issues.” Yet, being “insensitive” does not make one a racist–which is what he was being accused of. Insensitivity may be (and in Rush’s case, is) nothing more than a refusal to accommodate faulty thinking BECAUSE of race or, when uncomfortable, to ignore racial factors when they influence opinion. “Barak, the Magic Negro,” is just such an example: penned not by Rush but by African-American columnist, David Ehrenstein, in the L.A. Times, it makes the point Rush was making–that race, not ideology, is/was a major factor behind the groundswell of white support for Barak’s candidacy. I agree with both Ehrenstein and Limbaugh: race is a poor reason for political support.
Whatever controversy is supposed to surround Limbaugh, it is not racial but political. Thus, it WAS lies that sunk his NFL ownership bid, insofar as the only “legitimate” basis offered for opposition was an accusation of racism (an accusation based not on “misquotes” but outright fabrications). Thankfully, most people in our country still recognize that opposing someone’s business ventures on the basis of political opinion is inappropriate. Sharpton and Jackson know this, too, so they resorted to lies.
Nevertheless, I am proud to live in a country where the individual can oppose or support a business venture on whatever basis he/she chooses, even a poor reason. That’s liberty; that’s free market capitalism. I don’t have to support a business, union, organization, insurer, or politician if I find them objectionable for any reason. Heck, I can even boycott the NFL!
19 October 2009 | Chuck Berlemann Said:
Joe
What bothers me about the dust up over Limbaugh’s attempt to be a partner in an ownership group is that the comments he is accused of making appear to be made up by an anonymous Wikipedia contributor. It is without a doubt true that Limbaugh says things that enrage persons from the left side of the political spectrum, however the charge of racist comments is unfounded. If there were any basis in truth for the racist comments he is accused of, we would have heard them as sound bite recordings replayed over and over. I can only come to the conclusion that he is being chastised for something he never said.
This reminds me of when your fellow Wisconsinite, Joe McCarthy made accusations that certain people were Communists and attributed those people with all sorts of treasonous acts. He of course was never able to prove the accusations because it was all BS. However if Edward R. Murrow, who grew up in Edison WA, hadn’t had the guts to stand up to him, no one knows how long he would have gotten by with what he was doing.
Another problem is that many people repeat sound bites without understanding context. I have frequently heard you say on air that you don’t actually listen to Limbaugh, so you don’t understand the context of “Barack the Magic Negro.” Rush was actually commenting on a column in the Los Angeles Times written by a Liberal Black columnist. He, the columnist, was making the point that white liberals would find Barrack palatable thus making him “Barack the Magic Negro.” So Rush wasn’t making fun of Barrack, he was making fun of people who would support him because he was an “acceptable” negro candidate.
23 October 2009 | Peter Said:
This reminds me, in a way, of the debate surrounding Glenn Beck’s reception of the Mt. Vernon city key. Really it’s all up to the entity with the team/key. It’s their decision right? I could really care less whether Glenn Beck gets a key to the city or Rush Limbaugh owns an NFL team. Mt. Vernon’s mayor likes controversial figures, great! The NFL doesn’t like controversial figures, great! Too many people are making this an opportunity to name call and bad mouth people they already clearly have a problem with. Limbaugh/Jackson, take your pick.
31 October 2009 | BarnCat Said:
I think in a way that even assuming that you can’t criticise Barack Obama w/o being called a Racist is racist thinking in the way that one thinks that ANY one race is being favored over another. Limbaugh is at least a Rushist.
On him being associated with athletics and sports in connection to his line of work and how he does it; wouldn’t Oxycodon be considered a performance-enhancing drug? Hence the lockout, I rest my case.
But seriously… It’s a common sense deal, Rush has said some pretty insensitive stupid things and will likely continue to do so and the NFL just isn’t into a connection to that at this time, he’s gone for it and been rejected from it just to have something to whine about and rake in ratings for. It’d be about like Don Imus trying to own a WNBA team, he can’t possibly expect to succeed at it, it’s a setup for an attention-getting fall.