He Who Lives By The Loudmouth ... (CBS News makes it official: We Favor The Destruction of Limbaugh)

CBS News ^ | October 2, 2003 | Dick Meyer

[Timesink]

He Who Lives By The Loudmouth ...
WASHINGTON, Oct. 2, 2003


Rush Limbaugh says he’s a victim of the thought police. In his latest Against the Grain commentary, CBSNews.com's Dick Meyer says, in a nutshell, 'spare me.'

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(Photo: CBS) Am I delighted to see Rush Limbaugh attacked, ridiculed and forced out of his ESPN gig? Absolutely. Justice is being served. (Photo: CBS)

Live by the loudmouth, die by the loudmouth.

Poor Rush. Not.

Do I think Rush Limbaugh’s cracks about Donovan McNabb are seriously racist? Not really.

Do I think they were offensive? Mildly, not profoundly.

Do I like it when the thought police, the language cops and the political correctness enforcers pounce on an utterance and declare it illegal? No, I hate it.

Am I delighted to see Rush Limbaugh attacked, ridiculed and forced out of his ESPN gig? Absolutely. Justice is being served.

Limbaugh routinely insults those he disagrees with. He gives them nasty nicknames; he mocks them, besmirches them and makes fun of them far more adeptly than his current attackers. This is how he makes his millions. It is ludicrous for him, and for his defenders, to claim he is being treated unfairly. Others are simply doing unto him what he does unto others. That’s justice in my book.

Limbaugh’s public shtick for years and years has had a constant hum of low-grade racism and race baiting. When he talks about black people on his radio show, he often uses "ax" instead of "ask," apparently to be funny. When the topic is Carol Moseley Braun, his producers play the theme song from "The Jeffersons." This is how he entertains his audience. This is how he makes his millions.

Given Limbaugh’s track record, why did the McNabb remark cause such a frenzy when so many other cracks hadn’t? I really don’t know. Maybe because it was on TV. Maybe because it was about football and his audience, for a change, was actually knowledgeable about what he was talking about – and knew that what he was saying was stupid and wrong. I don’t know, but as I said, I am delighted.

It doesn’t matter if I think Limbaugh’s remark was racist or offensive. Many other people did. And just as Limbaugh has a right to speak his piece, so do they. And they did. And Limbaugh left the ESPN gig. What is unfair about that?

Limbaugh is an entrepreneur who peddles the spoken word in the open market. The market has firmly rejected his latest public offering. Markets do that, and Limbaugh worships the market. So what’s unfair here?

Well, Limbaugh and his defenders say he is being deprived of the right of free speech. I quote from his Web site:

"You know, this is such a mountain made out of a molehill. So much needs to be said here. I guess at the top of the list would be that we supposedly have freedom of speech in this country, but if you don't say what people who consider themselves the Arbiters of What Can Be Said agree with, then they want to come after you with everything they've got and try to humiliate you and take a stab at your reputation and otherwise get your mind right."

That, of course, is exactly what Limbaugh does for a living – he humiliates those who he thinks don’t have their minds right and he takes stabs at their reputations. He calls opponents of the Iraq war unpatriotic, for one very mild example. This doesn’t deprive anyone of his or her free speech rights. Nor is Limbaugh being denied his rights now.

Poor Rush, say his defenders, is being held to a politically correct double standard. It may be that he is being held to a political standard, but it isn’t double. The last sports and race flap was instigated by Dusty Baker, the manager of the Chicago Cubs, who is black.

This summer Baker said he thought black and Hispanic players probably tolerated playing in extreme heat better than did white players. The Arbiters of What Can Be said machinery started to crank up, columns were written, talk radio hashed it out. But it turned out that not very many people were offended. Was it because Dusty is black or because what he said really isn’t very disturbing? It doesn’t much matter; many people were offended by what Limbaugh said and they get to be, and if there are consequences for Rush, so be it.

Personally, I think as a culture we’ve become over-sensitive to insignificant offenses and insensitive to significant offenses – poverty, lack of public services for the impoverished, for instance. I think jumping on people for using the wrong buzzword or a politically incorrect locution does nothing to breed tolerance and public cheer. But as someone who also peddles words in the public market, I am acutely aware that if I write something that offends, no matter what my intentions, the offended have every right to feel offended and call for my head. They are not tampering with my freedom of keyboard.

My only concern about the Limbaugh Affair is that he’ll make money on it.

(An earlier version of this story mistakenly said Limbauch was fired from ESPN. I apologize for the error.)

Dick Meyer, the Editorial Director of CBSNews.com, is based in Washington. For many years, he was a political and investigative producer for The CBS News Evening News With Dan Rather.

E-mail questions, comments, complaints and ideas to
Against the Grain

[Timesink]

Indisputably the most clear-cut admittance of liberal bias by a news organization I've seen in a long, long, long time. (And don't anyone even try to argue "it's just one guy's opinion." I've worked at these places, and there is no way, NO WAY, this would ever have been allowed to run if the overwhelming majority of CBS News did not agree with it 100%.)

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[Keith in Iowa]

SeeBS Nooze strikes again!!

[HitmanLV]

You know, our team really has to understand we are constantly getting set up and kocked down.

Rush should have not even returned ESPN's calls - they knew that given enough time, he would have said something provocative enough for the usual suspects to gang up on him. I mentioned this to a friend of mine a couple of weeks ago, before this latest flap began.

Our side often lacks street smarts. I'm still pulling for Rush, though.

[Timesink]

CBS News Establishes Its Liberal Hate Credentials For All To See

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[bvw]

Dick "Haid" Meyer. What a jerk.

[nopardons]

YIKES ! This is blatant and them some.

[OldFriend]

The writer is entitled to his own opinion and entitled to express that opinion.

I made identical comments about Rush's use of the word 'ax' and his parody of Carole Mosley Braun in a freepmail when Rush's comments about McNabb appeared here on FR.

I had a team of moving company packers in my home one day and had Rush on the radio. I was mortified when Rush went into one of his rants about certain black leaders. It was quite a revelation to hear his comments in the presence of the ridiculed.

Sometimes we need to think about how other people feel about the things we find funny.

[Welsh Rabbit]

I suppose it's natural that this producer for Dan Rather harbor such hate for Rush. Rush proved these tired old liberals can't compete in the marketplace of ideas when they don't have a monopoly on the media outlets. The ratings speak for themselves. Let this Clymer have his laugh. He's not enticing anyone to his side. It is exactly this sort of liberal bias that has made CBS irrelevent today. Whatever he may have done, Rush will be forgiven by a majority of listeners. Meyer will still be a bitter loser.

[Tredge]

I haven't been thinking about that but I like what you said there.

[jazzlite]

Well said!

[weegee]

Don't expect to hear the leftists talk of a "chill wind" in the silencing of Rush Limbaugh's voice. Michael Savage tried to warn of this when it was done to him earlier this year by a prank caller to his tv show. Plenty here on FR did not like Mike and booed him off the air (I'm sorry but I do not believe in politically correct diseases and there were 3 manners of death the Mr. Savage "wished" on the obscene caller; it all adds up to creative ways to say "drop dead"). Mike said that those criticizing him should be careful, that he would be one of many targets of such efforts.

Laura Schlesinger (sp?) was kept off the the tv by a forceful group of protestors. Michael Savage had been targeted a number of times. Rush opened his mouth but even this "journalist" admits that what he said was not so bad.

It's the politics of personal destruction yet again (a King Rat, Terry McAwful specialty). They are desperate folks. I would not discount a repeat of the 1968 Chicago riots at the 2004 GOP convention.

[weegee]

when I hear the left wringing their hands over elected congressmen calling Republicans "nazis" on the floor of the House, then I will care about what is and isn't politically correct on my radio.

[Cacophonous]

I agree with you; this whole ESPN mess is nothing. But Rush did put himself in this position by thinking - perhaps it's his ego - that because he has now gained a measure of "mainstreamivity" (yes, it's a word...) that his detractors would accept him and not gun for him.

[Fearless Flyers]

"Sometimes we need to think about how other people feel about the things we find funny."

"I had a team of moving company packers in my home one day and had Rush on the radio."

I find that funny, maybe sometimes you should think about how others feel about what you think is normal and watch your stereo typing.

As for me and mine it's about time others think about, why we find things funny.

When I start watching my words to protect others feelings I'll be in a perfect position to scrape their toe jam. It's not likely you'll ever find me or mine in that position.

[moneyrunner]

NAACP spokesman on O’Reilly yesterday ranting about Rush said … very clearly … “AX.” Now, if our black brethren say AX why would they consider Rush saying AX to be anything but the proper pronunciation? Perhaps your were projecting your own discomfort on to other people?

[snooker]

Constant Bull Shiat network never fails to deliver

[OldFriend]

I certainly am discomforted every time Rush uses 'AX'.

FWIW.....(probably nothing) I tutored 8 yr. old twin boys with learning disabilities. May I add they were white. Attended school with white children. Live in an all white community. One of the boys consistently said AX when he meant ask.

[OldFriend]

Frankly, I'm sorry to hear that it's okay to be crass because the left is crass. And we'll stop being crass when they stop being crass.

A little hypocracy here on FR?????????????

[OldFriend]

Rush's recent parody of Carol Mosley Braun is a case in point.

Rush had her voice represented by a stereotypical low barely erudite black woman.

Despite the fact that the woman is a despicable person, she is articulate and speaks without any accent of any kind.