Rahm needs to stop using the words "Rush Limbaugh" and "intellectual" in the same sentence. I get what he's saying, but it sends the message that Rush actually thinks things out. Other than that, he needs to keep oxycotin boy in the spotlight.

You really have to admire the reicht-wing. They now embrace "leaders" who are completely sexist (Limbaugh), out of touch with the needs of their constituents (Jindal, Sanford, etc.), out of ideas (pick one) and idiots (Wurtzelbacher). And they cannot figure out why they are ignored by anyone with half a brain. Oh well, as went the Whig Party...

They are both impotent.

I do think it is brilliant strategy to go on national television and force republicans to deal with who they believe speaks for them, meaning either their elected officials or some fat guy on the radio. What a great power play.

I still can't believe Gingrey apologizing like that, and to a drug-addled coward like Rush. Talk about toadie-ism. Why the hell didn't he tell Blobfish to go fuck himself? Doesn't anybody in the Republican Party have any balls at all?

I disagree. Limbaugh is not issuing orders, at least not to the GOP, he's still merely carrying their water.

The Republicans don't have a viable public face in office. They thought they had one in Palin and that didn't really work out. So they trotted out Jindal and he bombed big time last week.

Limbaugh is just the most public person they've got that anyone listens to, so for the time being he's the public face and voice of the party. The only orders he can issue are to the unthinking legions of brain dead dittoheads.

I almost feel sorry for the people who sincerely believe Rush Limbaugh is in any way a knowledgeable or credible leader. Their minds are poisoned with thoughts of fear, bigotry and hatred; and they personify the emotional and intellectual alienation and dysfunction of Robert Hanssen and Ted Kazinsky. They are America's ultimate lunatic fringe misanthropes being conned in plain sight by an insecure, overcompensating, self-hating egomaniac with the depraved personal ambition and all-consuming greed of Bernie Madoff, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove rolled into one on a daily regimen of Xanax and anabolic steroids washed down with Macallan's 60-year-old Scotch Whiskey and a big fat Cuba Libre cigar.

what the hell could Limbaugh DO to a Republican who essentially told him he was full of it?

Yes, he could certainly blast the person to kingdom come on the airwaves, but really, how much effect would that have overall? Are Republic supporters so reduced in numbers that Limbaugh's audience is all the Republicans there are? There are at least 300M Americans, and his weekly audience is only about 13 or so million people. They may be concentrated in regions and are able to affect a few elections, but I just don't see why the Republicans think he has so much influence or is that much of a threat to them politically.

This is just pitiful.

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Slightly off-topic but since RL makes me think of porn, maybe somewhat relevant:

Porn in the USA: Conservatives Are Biggest Consumers

8 of Top 10 Porn-Consuming States Voted Republican in 2008 Presidential Election

Is a big(fat)fish in a small "ideological" pond that takes people like Joe the Plumber and Caribou Barbie seriously.
He's been repeating the same half baked nonsense for years.
In any serious debate he'd be eaten alive.

while Rahm is lean and mean. Who would you rather have represent your party?

The Limbaughs, Malkins, etc are the real enemy. Anyone wishing for a President to fail is wishing for a country to fail. In my book since they are not a country or an army that would make them a terrorist.

... but I do have to disagree with him on one of his statements.

The Vulgar Pigboy is NOT an intellectual force. He's a stupid, willfully ignorant jerk who projects his own self-loathing out into the universe.

an interesting noun over at Steve Benen's site (The Washington Monthly) I had not seen it before. It is the word "limbicile". I believe you all can guess its' meaning.

What I am happy to see is the Obama administration keeps harping on the theme, the Republicans do not want to co-operate in rebuilding our nation. Please, keep repeating it over and over. Sooner or later lights will go on in the "collective brain".

For drivel like Limbaugh's verbal diarrhea to penetrate the culture, the first thing that had to happen was that all balance had to be eviscerated from the public airwaves. This began when Reagan eliminated the Fairness Doctrine.

From a relatively diverse national discussion, we devolved into a gelatinous, homogenized glop. Since most station owners are conservative, now that they were not forced to present a balanced point of view, they could be free to simply go into straight up propaganda, which is all Rush is. People believe him because he's a fat Goebbels. And if you "launch the propaganda" enough, and repeat it like a droning mantra to the exclusion of everything else, eventually you begin successfully warping minds.

Add to this the corporate media conglomeration that has gone unchecked thanks to BOTH Republican and Democratic Congresscritters acting like nothing but corporate whores? And "Voila!"

You have the sucking swap of broadcasting swill we're drowning in now.

At this point, there are 2,570 hours of NeoCon talk radio blithering on the airwaves every weekday, versus only 254 hours of Liberal talk nationwide.

On 92% of the nation's talk stations, no Liberal content is aired at all.

They don't have a better argument.

Fact is, in most places no other perspective is ever even heard.

Being the only game in town doesn't make you correct. It just means you're the only game in town.

Proof the argument isn't better, is frankly in the results. Proof in the pudding is that when Conservatives had control of not only the airwaves, but all three branches of government and most of corporate America? They managed to decimate the national economy, get us into an illegal war based on lies, and drown an entire American city.

Now people listen to Rush, but see the world outside and the reality of their pocketbooks, and with that cognitive dissonance, have begun to figure out that George Carlin was right.

"Some people are just fucking stupid. Some people are full of shit. And some people are fucking nuts."

Rush Limbaugh and all the Conservative lemmings who follow him, are all three! Fucking stupid, full of shit, and fucking nuts!

And they're gonna kill this country. If we let them.

The late GREAT Bill Hicks on Rush. Short but sweet

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6F7Q7BkAbCk

I it find telling that Bob Schieffer is so thoroughly clueless about the state of the GOP and what is called conservatism in this decade and the power that Limbaugh exerts on that party. he clearly is out of touch or in denial.

The U.S. has a real problem. This is a blowhard propagandist with a syndicated national radio show with an audience of millions.
Rush being the intellectual head of one of the largest political parties is dancing with the devil. He needs to be brought down.

Emanuel played this very smartly! By pointing out that rush Limpdick is the leader of the Republican Party he is forcing their hand. They have to either agree or disagree and no matter what they do they paint themselves into a corner. What are they going to do? Deny it? Well that will sure as hell get on the wrong side of Rash won't it? If they agree then it will make them look ridiculous to everybody except their shrinking base. What will they do???????

"He is the voice and the intellectual force and energy behind the Republican party."

oh come on now! barney the dinosaur is an intellectual force in the same vein too i guess, but only to toddlers. oh....wait.

Some people don't like Rahm because he's a tough bastard, but with all the Democratic wimps in Congress (Reid, Pelosi, Leahy, etc.), who failed to hold Bush, Rove, Miers or anyone else accountable for crimes and misdeeds, I'm sure happy to have one tough bastard fighting for us.

Rahm was the Chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2006, and helped the Democrats take back the House of Representatives. I believe that he's also been involved in pushing through President Obama's legislative victories on the Stimulus bill, expanded Children's Health insurance, and the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.

And all the while, he's a tough, articulate spokesman for the Democrats, as shown in the clip above.

No, I'm not Rahm's paid spokesman, I'm just grateful to have him on our side. I only wish we had a few more tough bastards to rival the many on the Republican side.