Now It’s Newt Gingrich Versus Rush Limbaugh Versus Newt Gingrich
Let’s face it the Rush Limbaugh Versus (you fill in the blank) story isn’t just a story with “legs” — but a story with as many legs as a centipede.
First it was Rush against President Barack Obama. Then Obama’s associates against Rush. Then RNC Chair Michael Steele against Rush and Rush against Steele.
The latest is that the conservative icon with the big radio ratings (who is a turn off to many other Americans who don’t see those who disagree with them on policies as ill-intentioned, dumb or a step down from evil) is now at war with Newt Gingrich, the former House Speaker who clearly views himself as the potential brains behind a 21st century conservative revival (and already reportedly dropping hints he wants to run for President in 2012).
First Gingrich threw down the gauntlet by saying this on “Meet The Press” about Limbaugh’s (in)famous comment that he wants President Barack Obama to fail (a comment Limbaugh later qualified but didn’t at first):
“You’ve got to want the president to succeed,” said the former House Speaker. “You’re irrational if you don’t want the president to succeed. Because if he doesn’t succeed the country doesn’t succeed… I don’t think anyone should want the president of the United States to fail. I want some of his policies to be stopped. But I don’t want the president of the United States to fail. I want him to learn new policies.”
As the Huffington Post notes in the link above, Gingrich and Limbaugh have not exactly be been best buds — particularly recently.
So, today, Limbaugh fired back on his increasingly-listened-to radio show in his inimitable style — a razor-sharp style that in the past had slashes aimed largely but not exclusively at Democrats and which is increasingly being applied to Republicans who hold his name in vain. The Politico gives us this quote from the leader of the GOP’s WHHF (“We Hope He Fails”) faction:
“I’m frankly getting tired of talking about Newt. I mean, it’s a pointless exercise,” Limbaugh said of Gingrich’s dismissal of him on “Meet the Press.” “I’m surprised by nothing when I’m dealing with people in the media who think they’re in politics. … They are fly-by-night operators, and most of them stand for nothing until they see a poll about what the American people want, and then they go out and try to say one way or another what the American people want while trying to falsely hold onto an ideology at the same time — and you can’t count on them. You can’t depend on them. They will sell you out; they will throw you overboard to save themselves, faster than anything. And they’ll use you on their way up as often as they can at the same time.”
“I mean, next week Newt could come out and profess his total admiration and love for me if it would serve his purposes,” he continued. “They’re running TV ads against me. Newt Gingrich wishes they were running TV ads against him.”
In the end, this isn’t just a petty exchange between two individuals who don’t exactly suffer from self esteem problems.
As conservative David Frum notes, the Limbaugh issue is a battle for the soul of the political party and for the way conservatism is to be defined as it heads into this new century. In his piece in Newsweek that should be read in full, Frum ends it this way:
Rush is to the Republicanism of the 2000s what Jesse Jackson was to the Democratic party in the 1980s. He plays an important role in our coalition, and of course he and his supporters have to be treated with respect. But he cannot be allowed to be the public face of the enterprise—and we have to find ways of assuring the public that he is just one Republican voice among many, and very far from the most important….
….In the days since I stumbled into this controversy, I’ve received a great deal of e-mail. (Most of it on days when Levin or Hannity or Hugh Hewitt or Limbaugh himself has had something especially disobliging to say about me.) Most of these e-mails say some version of the same thing: if you don’t agree with Rush, quit calling yourself a conservative and get out of the Republican Party. There’s the perfect culmination of the outlook Rush Limbaugh has taught his fans and followers: we want to transform the party of Lincoln, Eisenhower and Reagan into a party of unanimous dittoheads—and we don’t care how much the party has to shrink to do it. That’s not the language of politics. It’s the language of a cult.
I’m a pretty conservative guy. On most issues, I doubt Limbaugh and I even disagree very much. But the issues on which we do disagree are maybe the most important to the future of the conservative movement and the Republican Party: Should conservatives be trying to provoke or persuade? To narrow our coalition or enlarge it? To enflame or govern? And finally (and above all): to profit—or to serve?
Clearly Gingrich doesn’t plan to be a ditto head. In the end, will Frum, Steele, and Gingrich be provided one way tickets out of Political Party Town courtesy of the GOP’s seemingly dominant WHHF faction? For the past week, some analysts were wondering whether there was someone courageous and/or big enough to take on Limbaugh. Is Newt the one? Probably not (although he thinks he is). And is a Newt apology in the cards?
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16 Responses to “Now It’s Newt Gingrich Versus Rush Limbaugh Versus Newt Gingrich”
Again, the biggest loser out of this mess is the Republican Party. This isn't one of those helpful ideological battles between various elements of the conservative coalition. This is a struggle of egos. People questioned Obama for pushing the Limbaugh issue. But it has clearly sucked the wind out of the Republican opposition in Congress.
Elrod, don't kid yourself about taking the wind out of the Republican opposition in Congress. But obviously anyone who trusts a David Frum or David Brooks simply ain't part of the Reagan wing of the Republican Party, but a RINO who thinks that splitting the difference with the political mobsters from Chicago will somehow forge a “new” Republican Party. The Republicans were always a proclaiming a party of principle, and even when these principles were almost completely ignored under GWB, McConnell and Hastert, a core of Repubs under Limbaugh and his allies tried to keep the original principles going by ranting against Bush's [and the Repub majority in Congress's] flagrant overspending and earmarking. Give the guy credit for that much. I actually listen to him when I can.
As for Gingrich, Matt Bair's piece in the NYT magazine a couple of weeks ago must have relit this busted flush's gambling urge. The most telling anecdote in the Bair piece was by a Gingrich colleague who said that Newt has ten ideas an hour and e-mails them frantically around his universe, but sadly only about one a week has any legs to stand on. Newt is constitutionally and temperamentally a Democrat, eager to change even when it may be risky and stupid.
Elrod, don't kid yourself about taking the wind out of the Republican opposition in Congress. Read this NYT piece today to get a sense that Obama is running into more than Republican opposition.
But obviously anyone who trusts a David Frum or David Brooks simply ain't part of the Reagan wing of the Republican Party, but a RINO who thinks that splitting the difference with the political mobsters from Chicago will somehow forge a “new” Republican Party. Like Olympia & Susan in Maine or the ineffable traveling salesman from PA suffering from ingrown hairplugs. The Republicans were always proclaiming a party of principle, and even when these principles were almost completely ignored under GWB, McConnell and Hastert, a faithful remnant of Repubs under Limbaugh and his allies tried to sustain the original Reagan principles by ranting against Bush's [and the Repub majority in Congress's] flagrant overspending and earmarking. Give the guy credit for that much. I actually listen to him when I can. And he is being set up by Rahm-bo & the Chicago Mob as a straw-man to divert the media from the yawning fissures in overall support for Obama [Concocted polls are being generated tirelessly to do the same].
As for Gingrich, Matt Bair's piece in the NYT magazine a couple of weeks ago must have relit this busted flush's gambling urge. The most telling anecdote in the Bair piece was by a Gingrich colleague who said that Newt has ten ideas an hour and e-mails them frantically around his universe, but sadly only about one a week has any legs to stand on. Newt is constitutionally and temperamentally a Democrat, eager to change even when it may be risky and stupid.
People questioned Obama for pushing the Limbaugh issue. But it has clearly sucked the wind out of the Republican opposition in Congress.
The only relevant question is how anyone can believe that Obama really meant it when he said that it was time to move past the pollitical gamemanship. Of course his goal was to 'suck the wind out of the GOP opposition.” As some conservative bloggers pointed out yesterday, that's a play right out of the Saul Alinksky book to marginalize the opposition (a play which has been coapted on both sides of the aisle, but Obama plays the game even more masterfully because he has people believing that he's somehow above the fray. He gets the upside of these tactics without any blowback of responsibility for them.)
I think the failure of republican-ism in this century can be measured in large part by how much it's more rightward members are in denial about their own responsibility for the very challenges faced by the person they most want to tear down… even to the extent of running interference for destructive hack like RL. I believe I have a quote that is appropriate for describing that sort of dynamic:
Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need to do so,
almost everyone gets busy on the proof. ~ John Kenneth Galbraith
As some conservative bloggers pointed out yesterday, that's a play right out of the Saul Alinksky
http://www.sodahead.com/blog/18714/obamas-radic…
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=19735
http://townhall.com/columnists/BurtPrelutsky/20…
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE….
LOL Let's bring back the Obamama as a radical socialist, maybe even a Marxist or Trotskyist.
How long before Michele O <strike>Jiang Qing </strike> is part of the Gang of Four?
Joe says: “…famous comment that he wants President Barack Obama to fail (a comment Limbaugh later qualified but didn’t at first)”
So we won't forget his original comments, which he confirmed again, and again, and again…
” I'll say it again. Not only do I want Obama to fail, I want this package to fail. I want this to blow up in their face.
I hope the stimulus bill fails. I hope it does exactly what we know it will do, blow everything to smithereens and not do one thing that has been promised. Apparently, experience is the greatest teacher, and when these poor people who think Barack Obama means a new house, a new car, a new job, when they find out that's not what Barack Obama means, maybe then they'll see. So I hope that happens.
I hope Obama fails. Now the bill has passed the House. I hope when they implement it, that it fails. If I hope it fails beforehand, I better hope it fails afterwards to be consistent, right?”
Rush Limbaugh February 13, 2009
Not much room for “qualifying” here
CS- It is impossible for Obama to move past the political environment in DC when the loyal opposition is hell-bent on the complete obstruction and destruction of his agenda.
He has reached out to the GOP, compromised and tried to find common ground- but Republicans would rather see the country go down in flames than see a Democratic president succeed after the dismal failure of one from their own party.
This is all about Rush inflating Rush and increasing his demand and earnings.
““I’m surprised by nothing when I’m dealing with people in the media who think they’re in politics. … They are fly-by-night operators, and most of them stand for nothing until they see a poll about what the American people want, and then they go out and try to say one way or another what the American people want while trying to falsely hold onto an ideology at the same time — and you can’t count on them. You can’t depend on them. They will sell you out; they will throw you overboard to save themselves, faster than anything. And they’ll use you on their way up as often as they can at the same time.”~ Your quote of Limbaugh
********
One of the things about malignant narcissism is that the narcissist himself will give you a full profile of his own persona and motivations in the language he uses to smear others.
“nuff said….: )
The GOP is doing itself no favors by allowing Rush to be the face of the party. Frum is entirely correct in pointing this out. Rush tolerates no deviation from his version of the “truth”, and is helping to create an image of Republicans that is both intolerant and moribund in ideology.
If you study the history of the presidency, flexibility and willingness to compromise has proven to be the key to success. Even the GOP's iconic figure , Ronald Reagan, understood that.
I'm amused at the relentless reliance on ideological cant and posturing the leftosphere among bloggers use to attack RL, whom few of them have ever listened to. Basically Rush is for supply-side economics, which pulled the country out of the double-digit inflation, interest rates and unemployment the hapless Carter clowns had inflicted on the country. He hopes priming the pump fails because he thinks it's bad economic doctrine [I personally think that a judicious mix of ss & pump-priming in some areas might work, but that's off topic.] The fact is that the Chicago mob of Axelrod, Emanuel, and others are trying to distract the country from Obama's somewhat scattershot attempts, which will ensure deficits far greater than GWB's, to correct the economy and which are running into Democratic as well as Republican opposition. Gingrich is over-the-hill dotty and Jindal is just fine—though getting blasted for style points again shows the emptiness of the MSM and their slavish loyalty to the DNC/Alinsky party line of the moment.
Hillary did her senior thesis on Alinsky and Obama got his start with ACORN, a classic Alinsky agitprop organization.
Kim, the opposition, by definition, always opposes. The occupant of the WH and the majority party in control of Congress has two choices in dealing with that- they can try to debate the policy and try to persuade them of the correctness of their position, or they can answer those who question the policies by saying “I won.”
When Bush and the GOP Congress did the latter, I don't think you complained that the Democrats were being oppositional by not going along.
And no, having a Super Bowl party doesn't count as 'willingness to compromise'. What, did he let them pick the brand of beer?
CS- I seem to remember that when the Democrats were oppositional, you thought they should compromise more with Bush.
When Reagan was in power, Tip O' Neill managed to work with him- as Clinton managed with Newt Gingrich before Newt engineered his impeachment.
Somehow, the party out of power needs to bring more to the table than obstruction.
Given Limbaugh's obvious girth, one would think he would stay away from expressions like “pointless exercise”
Kim, no, that was not my opinion about the Democrats. I understood that they would not compromise with Bush during the times when he framed it as 'my way or the highway.' I opposed them because I didn't think they were right in many of the things they opposed- but not because I didn't think they had the right to oppose.
And those examples of bipartisanship were in times when the WH and Congress were controlled by opposing parties. So, let me be the first to say that I agree with you there- we need to return to that situation ASAP- say, 2010.
I'm being flippant, but the point is that when one party controls the WH and Congress, the minority party has no power to do anything but obstruct.