Jeff Goldstein on That Brief Steele-Limbaugh Flap
March 3, 2009
But some people’s reckoning this is over, because Michael Steele has apologized for the way he dismissed Rush Limbaugh. But there is a philosophical question here that has to do with the need to be candid about what we are doing. About what we believe, if anything.
At what point do we stop treating politics as if it were a game of Diplomacy, and decide that we need to tell the truth?
Ace defended the original Steele slam by referring to the Chair as a “politician.” I’m not sure I see it that way. And Rush Limbaugh is not, for crying out loud, a “bomb thrower.” I believe he’s converted a lot more people to free-market principles than has . . . um, the average blogger.
Having seen Limbaugh’s speech in its entirety, I’m going to go with Mike Hendrick on this one, and with Jeff:
Steele is wrong. And Ace is wrong for defending him. Until we understand how important it is to hold linguistic ground, we are destined to have the ideology that protects us erode. It’s time to get existential, people: win the immediate battles, even if you don’t think you can win the war.
Here’s what I wrote in a different context, but the message remains the same: each time we cede ground, we trade a bit o[f] of principle for what we THINK is a bit of pragmatism.
But the real pragmatism is a steadfast refusal to cede principle, because by doing so we cede the logical high ground. And it is there that pragmatism and idealism collide — because there is only one way language can be said to work correctly.
It really is that simple.
Michael Steele and Rush Limbaugh are not living anonymously somewhere in their respective parents’ basement or whatever, alternately whining about not getting any, and bragging that they are really “knee-deep” in vagina. These guys may have different roles within the conservative movement, but they are both analysts/strategists—public figures operating under their real names. Steele must have the discernment to see when the principles of freedom have been articulated clearly, and explain what his quarrels with Rush might be in specific terms without the Clintonian brush-off of referring to Limbaugh as an “entertainer.”
Again: a lot of people have gained an appreciation for free-market principles and small government by listening to Rush. Though I don’t agree with everything he says, I respect him immensely and his speech on Saturday night brought down the fucking house. It was funny and passionate, and it was a shot in the arm that we need as we figure out how to make our way home from where we are now.
Steele was right to apologize for the clumsy way he attempted to put Limbaugh on notice that he intends to head up the conservative movement for the next 2-4 years. Because if Steele wants to complement Limbaugh’s work or supplant him as a “leader” he must continue to earn it. Overall, he has been doing quite well on that score.
So I agree with Coulter on the points she makes on this vid at Hot Air, much as I like Beck’s thinking.
Furthermore to the degree that people perceive Limbaugh as a “leader” right now, I suspect he would be happiest if he could take that mantle off. He is a commentator and an educator. I don’t think he wants any role that is different than that—even if he was willing to play cheerleader a few nights ago.
UPDATE: More on Rush’s speech from Jeffrey Jena at Big Hollywood.
UPDATE II: John Hawkins demonstrates the intelligent way to debate Rush’s ideas.
Posted in Americana, Around the 'Sphere, Attila, Girl Reporter, CPAC, GOP, Organizing, Radio, new media, politics
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March 3rd, 2009 at 6:32 am
Well. said. Mr. Steele quickly saw the error he made in trying to marginalize Rush and corrected it. Good for him. Rush is not our leader, but he is key to informing and educating the masses. Who else reaches 20 million people each day?
March 3rd, 2009 at 7:54 am
Mr. Steele quickly saw the error
Yes, I’m sure he came to that realization when the RNC’s email server crashed and burned.
March 3rd, 2009 at 10:33 am
Fantastic round up of reactions.
Did all the lefties just start substituting the B in BDS with R? The media won’t even interview a Republican now without asking them to weigh in on whatever Rush said lately.
I am surprised that Rush Limbaugh weighs so heavily on the minds of Americans instead of the mortgage crisis, the systemic collapse of the global economy, the wars, and the latest spending bill. After all, I know when I’m writing my checks and looking at my bank balance or my W-2’s, I’m thinking about Rush said today. (eye roll)
March 3rd, 2009 at 2:26 pm
My concern with Steele’s put-down of Limbaugh is that it makes me question his personality, his judgment and his qualifications for the job of chairman of the Republican National Committee, which Rush correctly pointed out is not the same as being the leader of the Republican Party and is definitely not the same as being the leader of the conservative movement.
To the extent that a leader articulates principles and inspires people to adopt and advance them, then Rush Limbaugh is indeed the leader of conservatism right now and he proved it with his CPAC speech, which I heard in its entirety in one of the overflow rooms thanks to having the sense to stay put in my chair after the Conservatism 2.0 session ended.
As a brand new conservative who has only ever heard snippets of Limbaugh from the MSM, along with its demonization of him, I was absolutely flabbergasted at how warm, compassionate, inclusive, courageous and insightful his speech was. I’m glad my remarks from the first session of Conservatism 2.0 are on PJTV video so I can prove this isn’t a “me too” statement regarding Rush’s comments about conservatism and the individual: what I said there is that the essence of conservatism is about creating the conditions for individuals to succeed AND the reason that conservatism isn’t selling as well now as it used to is that the victim entitlement demagogues, especially lesbians — my people — and African-Americans (Wright, Sharpton, Jackson, ACORN leaders et al.), have successfully stolen the dreams and ambitions of their constituents by persuading them that they have no power as individuals to succeed due to various all-powerful demons (who are usually white, not that there’s anything racist about that).
Obama personifies this pernicious, soul-killing ideology, and the reason people were open to him as a savior, and to the idea that big government is their salvation, is this loss of belief in themselves, their inability to imagine that they could succeed as individuals instead of giving up their individuality to become true believers in a conformist and totalitarian mass movement dependent on a big government nanny state to take care of them.
In his CPAC speech on Saturday (2/28), Rush pointed out how conservatism loves individuals and wants everyone to succeed. But the reason I jumped out of my chair on Thursday at Conservatism 2.0, and that I am going to keep banging this drum, is that longterm fiscal conservatives — I know I’m repeating myself — are acting like there’s something wrong with their ideas and that modifying them will be the key to current and future success.
NO! NO! NO! NO! A THOUSAND TIMES, NO!
The necessary condition for condition for fiscal conservatism to succeed is that the majority of the population MUST believe they can succeed as individuals in realizing their goals. START THERE, conservatives, and victory is in your grasp.
Remember, the number of people that conservatives need to reach with this message is not overwhelming.
In the 2008 election, 58,343,671 people — 46 percent of votes cast — believed in themselves as individuals, rejected Obama’s flim-flammery and voted for McCain/Palin; 66,882,230 people — 53 percent of votes cast — voted for Obama, some as true believers who wanted a savior; and some as idealists-cum-suckers-who-will-spend-the-rest-of-their-lives-with-trust-issues-when-they-wake-up, who believed in his magical powers to make mutually exclusive things exist simultaneously in the same space.
A seven percent margin of victory, when it is comprised centrists who did not pay attention to the candidates until the last two weeks before Election Day (if ever), of the hopeless, the suckers/idealists — and, it has to be said, the ACORN coalition of the existentially-challenged, serial voters who cast ballots in multiple states, and illegal aliens eager to support an “open borders” candidate — is not an overwhelming number of people to reach in order to turn the tide.
We can do this, people!
During CPAC I felt a special calling to reach and free my people — the lesbians who have been rendered helpless and hopeless by women who have exploited and deluded them. Surely this has to compare with birds returning to Noah during the flood with branches in their beaks — a harbinger that the time adrift will soon be over. If CPAC did this for me, I think it was a success.
Now, to return to the doubts Steele’s remarks about Rush inspired in me.
First, Steele’s response to Hughley, who was a thoughtful interlocutor, to me sprang from a wounded ego. If so, that’s a personality problem that suggests he does not belong in the job of RNC chairman. If he is so easily shamed and can be gotten to respond so inappropriately so easily, he is now the bitch of Obama, who the master of manipulation.
Second, when you’re down, you don’t get up by forming a circular firing squad, especially when your judgment is so poor that you take a shot at your movement’s most popular talk show host immediately after he has inspired and energized your base.
Third, making rookie mistakes like this after serving in elective office, non-entity that he was as Maryland’s lieutenant governor, suggests Steele does not have the qualifications to be a successful chairman of the Republican National Committee.
I have to admit, my own lukewarm support of Steele went cold at CPAC when an AOL reporter, who interviewed me, asked for my reaction to Steele’s statements about gay marriage on the Mike Gallagher show — it was the first I’d heard about them:
GALLAGHER: Is this a time when Republicans ought to consider some sort of alternative to redefining marriage and maybe in the road, down the road to civil unions. Do you favor civil unions?
STEELE: No, no no. What would we do that for? What are you, crazy? No. Why would we backslide on a core, founding value of this country? I mean this isn’t something that you just kind of like, “Oh well, today I feel, you know, loosey-goosey on marriage.” […]
GALLAGHER: So no room even for a conversation about civil unions in your mind?
STEELE: What’s the difference?
(quoted at thinkprogress.org)
My reply to the AOL reporter was that Steele may be more committed to Black Liberation Theology than anyone realizes. This thought occurred to me because black ministers in Maryland are very active in opposing equal rights and marriage for gays. I wonder how much influence they have had on Steele, and how much he is beholden to them? I am thankful that former Gov. Parris Glendening got a state-wide civil rights law protecting the rights of homosexuals to jobs and housing passed, in memory of his gay brother who died of AIDS.
It is this toxic betrayal of the “rainbow coalition” promise by black ministers that was the second thing to turn me against Obama during the primaries. (The first was his support of open borders. I lived for many years in a community overwhelmed by illegal aliens and while they are divided by an almost infinite number of hatreds, the two things they agree on is that women are property and gays should be killed. So I do not feel the least hateful about insisting our borders should be secure and illegal aliens returned to their homelands forthwith. To say nothing of the fact that tolerating breaking our laws by anyone makes a sap out of everyone who plays by the rules — nothing is more corrupting to the social contract.)
Conservatives can come to blows on many hot-button issues — gay marriage; don’t ask, don’t tell; illegal immigration; and abortion — but what won my heart at CPAC was the willingness of the speakers and everyone I met to emphasize our common ground that conservatism is about creating the conditions for individuals to succeed. Now we have to be the ones that inspire people to believe in themselves again. We took it for granted they still do, but a critical number had lost faith in themselves without our realizing it and the victim identity predators got them.
Our message is the one that will free them and show them the way to fulfill their full potential. To get them to believe in themselves again so they can connect with what conservatism has to offer, how about adapting this message from Napoleon Hill (author of “Think and Grow Rich”)?: What you can conceive, and believe, you can achieve. If that phrase seems corny to you, get over it. Do that because it will turn the tide for conservatism with a speed that will confound and astonish Obama and his fellow purveyors of confusion, helplessness, hopelessness and doom. That is because it has magic and power in it, because it connects with everyone’s deepest longing and unleashes their power, and because the best way to fight darkness is to turn on the light.
P.S.
Since we lesbians and gays do not have a national civil rights law to protect our rights to jobs and housing, quite a lot of us have to be entrepreneurs and make our own jobs. Conservatives, do you know what that means? It means that lesbians and gays are YOUR natural constituency, not liberalism’s. Think about that and let it sink in. Gays and lesbians ALONE would have swung the election to McCain/Palin. Plus, we’re fighting to be allowed to marry and to serve our country. Seriously, if THAT’S what we’re fighting for, how evil can we be?
March 4th, 2009 at 9:58 am
Joy,
You left the kindest reply to my screed above on my site saying that Steele should be given another chance, so I hope it is proper etiquette to cross-post my reply.
You are the soul of charity and the embodiment of wisdom! (I really do talk that way.) I think your take will be the prevailing one.
And perhaps the analogy to Obama is apt, since Obama has managed to keep his narcissism mostly in check, Steele may be able to do the same.
By the way, the way to recognize someone with narcissism is to rate their ability to create shame out of thin air, or out of proportion to the provocation, as in Steele’s case. You know a narcissist feels shamed — either by someone else’s superiority or by a perceived insult — when he or she suddenly starts putting others down. I find knowing this makes their tantrums almost funny. This trait and the Democrat’s obvious skill at exploiting it are my enduring concern about Steele.