THE PLANK MARCH 4, 2009
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(AP)
Yesterday, I attended AEI's event commemorating one year since William F. Buckley's death. It featured a panel discussion between National Review's Ramesh Ponnuru, Charles Kesler of the Claremont Review of Books, and AEI's outgoing president, Chris DeMuth, about the future of conservatism. (The subject never gets old!) The institute's incoming president, 44-year-old Arthur C. Brooks, moderated the panel somewhat nervously--constantly pumping his legs and arms up and down in his seat like an anxious child.
The discussion was fascinating--lots of virtuoso Buckley quotes, meditations on the nature of the State and Man, exhortations to oppose Obama's budget because We Are Met At Armageddon, etc. But the most interesting thing about it was the shadow Rush Limbaugh cast on the room.
Not due to his presence, of course. (Bill Kristol was the only recognizable red-faced ideological archon in the audience.) But when it came time for questions, several audience members begged the panelists to address Limbaugh's role as the de-facto head of the Republican Party--the most eccentric of them referring to him as a "fat blabbermouth who sounds like an East European gangster."
No one took the bait. This wasn't just politesse--Ponnuru, who as a conservative reformer might be expected to say a few things about Rush's recent jeremiads against new ideas and outreach to moderates--delicately defended Rush the first time and simply clammed up during the subsequent questions. When a fellow from the New America Foundation asked the panelists about Rush's role within The Movement, Kesler looked at Ponnuru and asked, "You want to take it?" DeMuth then joked about skipping the query entirely, saying: "The answer is yes, we agree with you. What's the next question?"
Finally, Kesler let on that Rush is far better equipped to "instruct and entertain" than lead the movement, saying that "it's bad if Rush is the tip of the spear." But it was difficult to escape the feeling that even in a Washington think-tank, surrounded by conservative men of ideas, the three panelists were scared of the talk-show host's retribution.
--Barron YoungSmith
11 comments
Wow! Maybe he really is an East European gangster, and a fat blabbermouth, too.
- scrubbyoak
March 4, 2009 at 3:52pm
A joke about Rush Limbaugh's shadow reaching every *continent* would be too easy.
- adaglas
March 4, 2009 at 4:10pm
Scene: Special Projects Squad offices, West Baltimore. LT. OBAMA, SGT BIDEN, DETECTIVE EMANUEL, and DETECTIVE GIBBS sit around a bare table with some chairs. A complex of computers, monitors, networking boxes, cables etc reposes on a long desk by the wall. One of the screens lights up and shows a cell-phone number, and the text RNC LINE LIVE appears. After the dialing tones, there is the sound of aggrieved voices talking volubly at each other, the phrase “F**k you too, a**hole!” is heard. The text RNC LINE DEAD appears on the screen, followed by ID RECIPIENT: CANTOR, JOHN.
SGT BIDEN: Looks like it’s working – Limbaugh and his Eastern Europe boys are making a pitch for control of the Republican corners, and everyone else is running scared.
LT OBAMA: An historic moment, gentlemen. We may be watching their organization implode before our eyes.
DET GIBBS: That Steele play worked like a dream. But it was close – I couldn’t believe he was actually gonna f*****g apologize!
DET EMANUEL: Yep, Michael Steele is now officially Rush Limbaugh’s punk-ass bitch. He’s toast on the street. Burnt toast.
They all laugh. Obama smiles quietly.
DET GIBBS: I have to say it, Lt Obama sir, with the greatest respect, you are one evil son of a gun.
LT OBAMA: Patience, Detective – it’s just the ability to wait, and watch, and see the opening when it comes. The true evil genius is Detective Emmanuel here.
SGT BIDEN: You know, the old rule says, fatten ‘em up before you slaughter ‘em. In Rush’s case, however, there ain’t much space for extra padding.
They all laugh, Obama included this time.
DET EMANUEL: So how am I the evil genius?
LT OBAMA: Because, Detective, you have the nature of an evil genius but also because you have worked out that the best way you can secure your reputation is to volunteer to collect tonight’s dinner order. I’d say Thai, but I’ll go with the majority preference.
They all jeer good-naturedly, and immediately swamp him with suggestions and orders. DET EMANUEL groans, tries to scribble down the desired items, and heads for the door. Just before he goes out he swings around and stomps his foot hard on the bare floor – the noise is loud, snapping.
DET EMMANUEL: Ok he’s useful now, but some day, guys, that’s the sound of history catching up with one Rush Limbaugh.
He turns and heads out the door.
Close
- ironyroad
March 4, 2009 at 5:07pm
I am not much for commercial talk radio on any end of the ideological spectrum. I listen to NPR to understand issues, and read too much media online to stay abreast until I can pitch for some decent bylines again, but sometimes I wonder if even TNR is feeding its readership too much eye candy. I never listen to Limbaugh, even in my most moderate moods towards what I would consider to be occasional sympathy for the old-brand Eisenhower conservatism. For my part, gonzo-ideology isn't my thing--but the left just seems to have an overwhelming desire to bash the right wing in America, without turning a good hard eye on its own cultural messes. Rational conservative thought has degenerated. I get it people--but what does it say about progressives when progressives can't take a piss in the pot without being aghast and playing various renditions of Send In The Clowns?
I want to fix things, to make things better, as much as possible, for the disabled, who have been shafted in one form or another, since the Clinton Administration. I want a better and more level playing field in this country, and for the welfare state, such as it is, to stop punishing the poor by forcing them to stay poor because they lose safety nets otherwise trying to upgrade--and TNR is busily prattling away at an endearing buffoon, and this is the supposed vanguard of The Fourth Estate. I wish I had a smiley graphic for rolling eyes.
- Jozanny
March 4, 2009 at 6:28pm
Jozanny, it's nothing but admirable that you want a better deal for the disabled. But the TNR post you're responding to here doesn't strike me as "prattling away"; it's part of the effort of left-of-center outlets like TNR to explain WHY we don't have "a better and more level playing field" and why the poor are still being punished. The writer is reporting on a "think tank" event in Washington. In a sane country, and even in the U.S. some years ago, an event like this might have featured conservatives and/or Republicans who, while leaning in one direction, were seriously interested in talking about federal policy in an open-minded way, with the idea that the role of policy intellectuals is to generate ideas that might actually lead to better policies and therefore better lives for actual people, especially the disadvantaged. They would have agreed with their more liberal counterparts that government has a role to play in such matters, and that therefore they did too.
But as the post reports, what we have now is a situation where even an event at a policy-oriented forum, an event honoring a leading conservative intellectual of an earlier generation, occurs in the shadow of a crude, anti-intellectual demagogue, a man with no interest in policy other than radical tax-cutting, a man contemptuous of the disabled in particular, and yet a man to whom the policy intellectuals in attendance are compelled to bow -- which means they simply aren't free to engage in that more enlightened and solution-oriented kind of discussion even if they wanted to. THIS is the situation that is un-leveling the playing field and damaging prospects for the disabled (as well as just about everyone else in America). TNR, of all places, also features lots of wonky talk about the particulars of policy, but ultimately the way you solve problems and make people's lives better is by operating effectively in the political environment -- and if the political environment (or one big part of it) is currently ruled by a hateful blowhard, then understanding this and, ultimately, trying to neutralize his influence IS serving the disabled and everyone else.
- JSmith125
March 4, 2009 at 7:06pm
I heard an interesting analysis of Rush Limbaugh as a person with extremly low self esteem going to radical lengths to over compensate for it by becoming a willdly self absorbed exibitionist. His apearance tells more about his self loathing than anything else, I think. My first thought upon seeing him crash onto the stage at the CPAC Convention looking mountainous & dressed head to foot in black was why a person with his money would not hire a personal trainer and a health food cook?
- frilz1
March 5, 2009 at 8:04am
On Obama even acknowledging Limbaugh, I'm reminded of a scene from "The Mothman Prophecies" where Richard Gere asks Alan Bates why this mysterious alien race doesn't just announce its presence and communicate with humans, and Bates replies that humans are more advanced than cockroachs and we don't try to explain ourselves to them.
(I, of course, don't need to write which one is the cockroach.)
- kevincollins
March 5, 2009 at 8:59am
Asolutely brilliant analysis JSmith125! You express better than I could exactly what I've been thinking since this whole Rush as head of GOP issue rose up.
There is no level playing field of discussion as long as Rush holds sway over the GOP. What I find so amusing about the situation is that by making Rush an issue, the Obama Administration handed the GOP the perfect opportunity to move to the center by rejecting just some of what he represents. All they had to do is say something like Rush goes overboard occassionally but his heart is in the right place or some other such patter. Then they could go on and attack the ludicousness of anyone saying Rush speaks for the GOP. BUT THEY COULD NOT EVEN BRING THEMSELVES TO DO THIS!
It is time for all of us to stop kidding ourselves and admit the truth. The GOP has pandered to the loons of the Right so much that the loons have taken over the Party's direction and agenda entirely. This was strongly evident the second Sarah Palin made her debut as VP and now this whole Rush issue brings it fully into the light. Anti-intellectualism and dogma are the hallmarks of the GOP now so right now there is no reasonable leader inside the GOP for the Democrats to spar with and to possibly compromise. Obama realized this truth and by bringing it out in the open he now has a freer hand to steer the country how he wants.
And as JSmith125 suggests there is nothing better right now that Democrats can do for the level of political discourse in this country than to pound hell out of GOP by continually tying them to Rush until they grow up and cast him and his anti-intellectual crowd of know-nothings back into the shadows of the GOP where they belong. We are all awaiting the second coming of WFB.
- woland
March 5, 2009 at 12:22pm
But the man is a god damn disc jockey, to use a term from yester year. I am not trying to throw too many arrows from my quiver at YoungSmith, but I think we're are a seriously screwed nation when an informed reader is one hauled along for the ride of what personality is driving the latest blogosphere chatter. My family doesn't read TNR, or any serious news magazines of any caliber, but I doubt their continuing education is in serious jeopardy when what they would read is a bunch of panelists passed the buck on the role of Howard Stern's alter-ego.
The analogy of desperate Roman circuses which distracted attention from the fall of empire from within seems apt.
I forget which contributor it was, maybe Wolfe, who said we need an opposition party, that this is a good thing? If so, we might want to re-examine our heralded two party system, since the strength of governing through consensus doesn't seem as viable as it used to be.
- Jozanny
March 5, 2009 at 3:16pm
How did a 3x married draft dodging drug addict become the leader of anything?:
- bigdukesix101
March 5, 2009 at 6:46pm
Good point, woland, about how the GOP should have responded -- and as you say, they couldn't bring themselves even to do that! Remarkable indeed. But as I pointed out on another thread, their real problem isn't Rush, it's Reagan, the sainted leader of yesteryear whom Rush was extolling in his CPAC remarks. They're all so palpably desperate for another Reagan, and some of them have figured out that Democrats HAVE their own Reagan already -- his name is Barack Obama -- and that he's currently in office, while their guy is long dead. Turns out, it's a horrible disadvantage for a political party to have a beloved leader -- it condemns them to a politics of nostalgia for a generation or more thereafter. Thankfully, Jimmy Carter never became that kind of figure for Dems (and if Obama does, it's going to be tough for them to get through the 2030s).
- JSmith125
March 7, 2009 at 3:14am