[Off Topic] Rush Limbaugh challenging notion of new politics

Mega-dittos, Rush

I am thankful for his voice…ditto-head since 1992…I for one will go to the barricades if there is ever a serious attempt to shut him down/up!  There are those on the left who fear anyone they cannot intimidate into silence.

I can see it now.  Should Mr. Limbaugh go to his great reward, every conservative in the country will take the day off to go buy flowers, travel to the gates of his studio and place them there, with a note stating that he was the peoples crown prince…..

If it is true that Mr. Limbaugh is indeed a conservative and not just another media blowhard, and if it is true he is “the only voice” speaking up for conservative policies and ideas, God help us all.

I don’t mean to infer that I hang on his every word, but occasionally, he does speak the truth….and some people can’t seem to understand that.

I’m taken by the dermal deficit on the part of the new POTUS; If he’s shaken up by Mr. Limbaugh, how will he fare when a rogue leader poses a real threat?

#3,

If that happens, the US economy will suffer for a day.

#3 (Dee)  IF conservatives do take off work (most will continue to work to honor Rush), we know they are working in the first place…the opposite of a more recent event on January 20th in Washington, DC where approximately 1,200,000 gathered and only 57 had to take off work to be there!!!    Magnolia-State dittos to el-Rushbo!!

RE: “God help us all.”

Dan Crawford—I completely agree.

We’re in huge trouble.  Especially given who the Republicans elected as their Fearless Leader yesterday. 

We’re doomed.

Cal Thomas is a strong conservative voice.  His Nov.6 commentary was powerful.

Conversely, Google seems to be applying subtle opposition to conservative orthodox Christian groups and organizations.  Looking up Faith radio, Sherwood Baptist Church, Albany, GA, (producer of Facing the Giants and Fireproof) and Familynet, a tv broadcast company, on Google today, each of their sites was marked with ‘warning, this site could harm your computer.’  Yahoo had no such warning.  This, coupled with Google’s financial support of ‘gay’ ‘marriage’ I am boycotting them. 

Have long ago given up on cable TV.

Floridian….I just checked Google, and it wasn’t there….but the Drudgereport BIG HEADLINE was “Google goes mad and tags rest of internet harmful.”

The Obama administration and Democrat politicians in general will try to close down or at least muffle the conservative talk radio hosts such as Limbaugh, Hannity, Savage, Levin and even moderate Prager. They will do this through political pressure and appointments to the FCC and trying to reinstitute the “Fairness” (ha) doctrine. There will be more pressure to do this as it becomes more and more apparent that the proposed massive “bailout” and “stimulus” fraud programs will not work as intended. God help us all!!!

I stopped listening to Rush years ago since half his program was about him. The half of his brain that is tied behind his back is the front half. Then there was Bill O’Reilly and he got just plain shrill.  I liked Glen Beck but he was too much of an alarmist. George Will can craft a sentence but it usually is on the unimportant subject of baseball. Ann Coulter is smart but too hyper and angry, Camille Paglia is entertaining but too far left. Charles Krauthammer is scary smart and Britt Hume retired. There you have it.  I have no heroes in the media. the media is in the entertainment business and should fess up about it.  At least professional wrestling was honest enough to call itself WWE. (World Wrestling Entertainment)

Maybe Greg Griffith and/or a group of Christians in computers and media… could start a Christian-based cable company and a good computer search engine…and Chris Johnson and others who know good books could establish Christian library network.

13—I agree with you about Limbaugh. Conservatives would do well to listen to someone else.  He reminds me of the Rev. Jerry Falwell in the height of his influence, often right, sometimes insightful, but with a delivery and political slant that often hurt the conservative cause.

I just began my third year of Morning Prayer using the daily office readings.  Having read through the entire cycle I ha

AAAARGGGGHGGG!

.....I have concluded that there is no news, only olds.
we keep doing the same stupid stuff over and over again.

DcnDale:  You should try tuning to different radio stations and listen to the ones I mentioned above. None are perfect, but they make very valid, truthful points in their own way. Even Limbaugh does that occasionally.

#19 athan-asi-us,
“Limbaugh, Hannity, Savage, Levin and even moderate Prager.”
I haven’t heard Prager but I’ve already made my case against Limbaugh.  Hannity needed Alan Colmes to keep him honest and will be less credible without him. Savage is entertaining but rants with such vehemence it diminishes his effectiveness. (Mark) Levin is articulate and convincing. I don’t want to sound cynical but these folks are in Show Business.  After they become “famous” they put their dog and pony show on the road, sell books and make loads of money. I think about the switch Ariana Huffington made from hard core conservative to liberal. How in the world could a James Carville live with a Mary Matalin? It is because I think there is a disconnect between what they believe and who they are and that is Show Business.  I just don’t depend on an entertainer to be my spokesperson.

I too have been praying for our new president.  I heard him say in a recent interview that he and his family will be looking for a new place to worship.  I pray that he will be led to a place where he and his beautiful family will come to know the saving grace of our Lord.

#11 Floridian.  Had you taken an opportunity to visit some w-political sites today..a window manufacturer I grabbed out of the air at random, you would have learned that Google had not reserved its toxic site warning to conservatives. Funny the first thing that comes to mind when one encounters such a thing.  Mine was: “Somebody ‘s hacked Google”

The Associated Press reports today (Jan 31) that Rush Limbaugh is paid $38,000,000 per year, or $3,166,666.67 per month. HIs contract runs until 2016.

If you read Rush consistently you will see that he is much more qualified to be the ABC that Mr. Williams.

13: My favorite is Hugh Hewitt, witty with lots of class. And his blog is pretty good.

I sometimes get a kick out of Rush—the whole stick, smartest man on the radio, institute for conservative studies.  But frankly, I have a hard time thinking of it as really “news.”  Too much entertainment, not enough analysis.  And too many folks I live and work with listen to him all the time, and it just makes them angry and paranoid.  I do like Hugh (I called in and got on when Williams said something really dumb about a year and half ago—don’t remember which dumb thing it was, something about America along the lines of stuff Wright gets into as well). 
I am grateful for Ken Myers at Mars Hill, and for Kendall and you all! 
Oh, as far as Rush’s salary goes, its based on income he produces.  Amazing. 
Anyway, while I do generally appreciate what Rush does, and while I don’t buy the idea of leading from the middle (isn’t it Rush who says a moderate is a liberal on slow?), he does, imho, tend to give a certain shrillness to the gop that doesn’t help it win elections.  People who listen to him often can get lazy about how they speak about “worthy opponents”, giving conservatives a bad name.

As I read this, I can’t help thinking of how Rush Limbaugh was saying that he hoped Obama fails.  What a mean-spirited thing to say…  I was no fan of Bush but I can hardly say that I wanted him to fail.

he hoped Obama fails

You can’t take that out of context.  Obama supports goals that Rush disagrees with.  Rush wants his to fail at accomplishing those goals.  I can’t say I disagree with him.

I want Obama to fail at getting DOMA repealed.  I want Obama to fail at getting FOCA passed.  I could go on.

Rush Limbaugh can be helpful at times because he articulates conservative principles and exposes things we would not otherwise be aware of - but then he negates that by ridiculing people, this is distracting and offends many listeners regardless of their politics, frankly I am offended when he uses Barbara Strisand’s initials as an epithet.
Most of the conservatives I know do not ridicule other people or seek to offend them and we need a better representative than Rush Limbaugh.  It seems to me that conservatives would be better represented by someone like Governor Huckabee who seems to combine charitable Christian behavior with conservative principles.

I wish Rush would run for something, maybe join Franken in the Senate.  I suppose that his drug arrest would might be a problem though.

Holding a poltical office is the last thing Rush wants.

Don Dale # 20,
You wondered: “How in the world could a James Carville live with a Mary Matalin?”
Have you seen any of Mary Matalin’s interviews? She displays little interest in explaining Republican interests even though she is always introduced as a Republican. Maybe she is more enthusiastic about pleasing her husband than she is about representing Republicans.

Limbaugh is in entertainment.  He says so himself.  He’s in the business of getting radio listeners, and he’s been doing that well for twenty years.

It was Obama who made Limbaugh the center of attention this week, by telling Republicans they shouldn’t listen to him.  Making Limbaugh the center of attention is usually a mistake for liberals.

Limbaugh is making some of the same suggestions about policy which House Republicans made when the President came to meet them.  He dismissed them summarily, saying, “I won.”  Counter-proposals were offered in the House which Democrats voted down handily.  At this point, Limbaugh is clearly not leading the Republican Party, but he is effectively giving counter-proposals and opinions a public hearing which they wouldn’t otherwise have.

Rush is not news.  Rush is commentary.  If you want news you need to go elsewhere (question:  where???).  As commentary, it has a slant:  his slant.  If you don’t agree or can’t stand it, don’t listen.  His commentary also “connects the dots” of various developments in an insightful way that straight news won’t give and that most commentaters can’t give you.  I don’t agree with everything he says but I appreciate his 20 years of experience of peering into the microscope of politics and describing what he sees and what he thinks is going on and what he thinks will happen.  Case in point:  the so called democratic/Obama stimulus plan.  Think you would have learned a tenth of what you know now if your only outlet for information was (p)MS-NBC.  Megga-dittos for lots more years I hope.
In terms of what he is paid:  good for him, that is the worth the market place has accorded him.

Capt. Deacon—I agree.

I don’t always agree with Rush—disagree a lot, on occasion.  But boy—I enjoy listening when I can, and I love his analysis—especially when he’s the only one out there. 

A pity that he is.  But thank God he is.

Betty #29, I agree wholeheartedly.

If Gov. Huckabee is the ‘12 nominee, the GOP’s goose is cooked.  Just my opinion, #29, #36.  And here we have a view of Republican problems.  Obama has been able to temporarily unite Republicans in opposition to this spendthrift bill, but it’s only temporary unity.

You may think it is temporary unity. We’ll see. It would seem to me that the Dems just handed the GOP a chance to revive by shutting them out. Sounds like the Senate is primed for much the same thing even while McConnell, Grassley (ranking member of the relevant gateway committee), McCain, and Kyl are saying all ofthe right things. Keep this up and Obama might lose at least one of his majorities in ‘10. It’s a little early to predict GOP destruction, Dem triumphancy. or anything else. The Cabinet isn’t set yet, let alone sub-cabinet positions.

All the praise of Limbaugh in this forum reveals the utter hypocrisy and homophobia resident at this sight. I am an Anglican traditionalist but I wouldn’t blame any Episcopalian revisionist for walking away from this site with strong sense of vindication.

First, Rush Limbaugh is a racist masquerading as a conservative. He claims to desire that everyone be judged on the content of their character, but for him that means the ham and eggs justice of an immediate amnesia with regard to America’s slave-owning and Jim Crow legislating past. That would be bad enough, but whenever a controversy emerges that involves a person of color enjoying a modicum of success, social credibility, or political power, it all resolves to illegitimate preferential treatment and craven white-guilt collaboration with an otherwise obvious enemy. That was as much the narrative with Donovan McNabb as it was with Barack Obama. Of course, he is willing to reverse that narrative when a person of color demonstrates proper obeisance to his ideological vision of the “way things really ought to be.”

Second, the comment that he is more qualified to be ABC than +++Rowan would first seem to turn on some demonstration of coherent Christian conversion. One may not agree with the present ABC’s sympathies on any number of theological issues (I don’t), but he is resolute in exploring those issues as a devout Christian theologian. Limbaugh, on the other hand doesn’t even attend a particular church. If he is baptized, he betrays that identity in refusing to assemble with those of like precious faith.

Third, for all the hell that has been raised here regarding +Gene Robinson’s betrayal of his marriage vows and his alcoholism, you folks have gone awfully easy in overlooking Limbaugh’s three divorces, his present extramarital meanderings, and his dealings in illegal drugs. I have all the sympathy in the world for people who inadvertently become addicted to prescription medications, but there is an enormous double standard at work when onlookers can rain down fire on a recovering alcoholic and not even mention a the problem of a person who actually, factually broke the law on manifold occasions to obtain his pills.

Speaking for myself, I think that all the professed moral outrage over conditions in the Episcopal Church reduces in most of your cases to a baser anger at simply being out of power. After making a profession of swallowing camels for the last 50 years, it has long seemed odd to me that it suddenly this camel sticks in the throat. The answer seems to have been that this particular camel simply has a skin color, a gender, a sexual orientation, or a political allegiance that is not to your taste. It boils down to the observation that you’re OK with infidelity to Christ, just not THEIR infidelity.

#39 #40 abbotcolumcille,
“I am an Anglican traditionalist”
Really?

Yes, really! I just think that the Word of God smashes right-wing idols right alongside left-wing idols.

#42 abbotcolumcille,
So…are you saying that a Bishop in TEC and a radio personality should be held to the same standards?
“Speaking for myself, I think that all the professed moral outrage over conditions in the Episcopal Church reduces in most of your cases to a baser anger at simply being out of power.”  So….as a “traditionalist”, would you see yourself as being out of power?

Dcn Dale,

No, JoePewSitter said so in post #24 and apparently he thinks that Limbaugh wins out. I, of course, disagree on both points. A bishop is guardian of the faith and is supposed to be the last line of defense with regard to the Apostolic Faith.

Second, depends on what you mean by being out of power. I’m in the ACNA and have never been part of ECUSA/TEC so I guess you could say that the numbers and vitality of faith in the Global South speak well of us, but there’s plenty of sin in our camp too. The items I point to above are a big part of the problem. Nothing wrong with us that more Global Southern influence won’t cure.

Abbotcolumcille

Right On!  How anyone could listen to Rush Limbaugh’s

rants is incomprehensible,

#44 abbotcolumcille,
I think quite a few of the above posters (including myself) do have problems with Rush but the “baser anger” you refer to is a misread. I think many in TEC are angry not because they are out of power but because their church has been hijacked. They have a right to be angry and use this forum to express it. It does remind me very much of the dysfunctional family where often only one or two members of a family will see the elephant in the living room.  It is frustrating to watch the majority ignore the elephant.

abbotcolumcille, Limbaugh certainly has personal issues.  But closet racist?  No.  I listen and I don’t hear that. I wouldn’t listen if I did.  Much of the rest of your comment imputes hypocrisy to the whole board because one person (in jest, I thought) suggested Limbaugh would be a good +ABC.  No one else agreed with him, and of course Limbaugh is not bishop material at all.

And also, this string is clearly labeled “Off Topic.”  The bloggers here are generally conservative, but they’re careful to separate the political from the religious.  Those who don’t like conservative politics can easily avoid the “Off Topic” posts.  To come over here and rant about alleged “utter hypocrisy and homophobia” is just silly.

Dcn Dale,

>>I think many in TEC are angry not because they are out of power but because their church has been hijacked.<<

You’ve made my point for me. The Church (or the TEC as a portion of that Church) is not their possession to be hijacked. The Church is given as a gift of God’s Spirit and not ours to wrest from the grasp of our enemies-theological or political. The refusal to reckon with this basic ecclesiological truth is what just kills the integrity of a conservative Anglican witness.

This reminds me of the Israelites who wished to call down imprecations on their Babylonian captors while God’s answer was that Israel went into exile for her own sins. Yes, Habakkuk, the Babylonians are bad, but let’s not pretend that all was well and faithful in Zion before Nebuchadnezzar arrived at the borders of Israel. God is free to chasten his children by whatever means lay at his disposal and matters are only worse where God’s children harden their hearts to discipline and hide behind a facade of self-congratulation.

I think that facade is on active display in this thread. When did the Gospel ever reduce to alloyed idolatry of American exceptionalism, Ayn Rand-style Libertarianism, social conservativism, and Chicago school free market economics? And how does my raising that basic theological question call into question my status as a Traditional Anglican?

Katherine,

Far be it from me to dictate how contributors should conduct themselves, but even the off-topic threads are public and they are not as hermetically sealed-off from theological/ecclesiological issues as you want to maintain.

On Limbaugh’s racism, we can disagree, but I remain unrepentant in the charge and think that I can back it up with overwhelming support. In any case, the holding of conservative political opinion here isn’t exempt from critique by the standards of the Kingdom of God and I am simply concerned that an important voice for traditional Anglicanism doesn’t get swallowed up in a plausibility structure that suborns patently unchristian notions of justice, equity, and power. 

If that’s silly, I’m pleased to play the fool.

RE: “First, Rush Limbaugh is a racist masquerading as a conservative.”

No, he’s not.  And of course, there’s a legitimate sports question about Donovan McNabb that Rush enjoyed exploring.  I enjoyed listening too—and learn something when Rush discusses sports.  The fact that you believe that McNabb was not treated any differently because of his race is fine—but someone else thinking differently doesn’t make them a racist.  There are the same questions about bunches of other sports heroes as well, which I could name but won’t.

Nope—Rush treats “people of color” in the same way as he treats people of “non-color.”  He judges their ideas and their performance—the sign of a non-racist, not a racist.

RE: “The answer seems to have been that this particular camel simply has a skin color, a gender, a sexual orientation, or a political allegiance that is not to your taste.”

Nope—the answer lies behind the highest legislative body in the church formally, officially, nationally, legally, and publicly approving of heresy—a far cry in my book and in most books from some egghead bishop’s heresies and publicity-seeking.

RE: “Third, for all the hell that has been raised here regarding +Gene Robinson’s betrayal of his marriage vows and his alcoholism, you folks have gone awfully easy in overlooking Limbaugh’s three divorces, his present extramarital meanderings, and his dealings in illegal drugs.”

Rush is not purporting to be an Episcopal bishop, nor issuing blessings for fornication and illegal drugs.  As soon as he starts doing those things, I’ll begin denouncing him and TEC right off.  But wait . . . by that standard he’d be perfect as a TEC bishop, other than the unfortunate issue of his conservative ideals.

Which is . . .of course . . . why you don’t like him. 

See—you’re like Rush too.  You judge people based on their ideas.  And you don’t like Rush’s ideas.

All the folderol about “racism” and fornication and then the red herrings about “you folks are really bigots yourselves” is only so much rhetorical filler to cover for your dislike of his ideas.  So why not come out and discuss that rather than hide behind faux spiritual issues, abbotcolumcille?

Or did you just want to fling about herrings?

RE: “I am simply concerned that an important voice for traditional Anglicanism doesn’t get swallowed up in a plausibility structure that suborns patently unchristian notions of justice, equity, and power.”

See—would have been nice if you had gotten to your real point first, and skipped over all the self-righteous filler.

But it’s a little late for your wishes.

All five of the bloggers here are political conservatives and believe that your notions of “justice, equity, and power” are unChristian as well, along with of course being unConstitutional, too—although probably the Australian/British/forgotten guy doesn’t care so much about that latter bit. 

And we’ll continue posting these off-topics just as we’ve always done, only now in the post-Obama term as well.

So the “important voice for traditional Anglicanism” was “swallowed up” the very instant it was founded, abbotcolumcille.

Perhaps other traditional but politically liberal Anglicans will go found a nice blog together with their off-topics on political matters and you’ll be happy.  ; > )

#48
“The Church (or the TEC as a portion of that Church) is not their possession to be hijacked. The Church is given as a gift of God’s Spirit and not ours to wrest from the grasp of our enemies-theological or political.”
Nice try, but even though I used the phrase “their church” instead of “God’s Church” you are still wrong.
Based on your statement you would also be critical of Martin Luther for writing “the Babylonian Captivity of the Church” and St. Paul for his corrective feedback to the Corinthians.

God is free to chasten his children by whatever means lay at his disposal and matters are only worse where God’s children harden their hearts to discipline and hide behind a facade of self-congratulation.

Is the good abbot talking about TEC here?

I’m no admirer of Mr. Limbaugh’s, but I don’t think any political party or leaning has a monopoly on goodness and neither Democrats nor Republicans can be labeled as definitively “unChristian.”

abbotcolumcille:

When did the Gospel ever reduce to alloyed idolatry of American exceptionalism, Ayn Rand-style Libertarianism, social conservativism, and Chicago school free market economics?

Who said it did?  Not I.  Nor is the Gospel reduced to unalloyed agreement with liberal Democratic politics, either.

You can try to prove Limbaugh’s a racist, but you won’t succeed.  A racist thinks people from other races are less competent and less worthy than his own group.  I’ve never, ever heard such a thing on Limbaugh’s show, nor will I.  To make a case for “racism,” you’d have to twist the definition of the term to mean “criticizing the opinions of someone who happens to be from a different racial group.”  Rush criticized people with whom he disagrees and he’s not fussy about what they look like.

Sarah,

>>Nope—Rush treats “people of color” in the same way as he treats people of “non-color.” He judges their ideas and their performance—the sign of a non-racist, not a racist.<<

This is just ideological complicity with the ham and eggs justice that I wrote of above. I don’t care to change the editorial policies of your site, but my charge of hypocrisy stands.

Here’s the smoking gun with regards to Limbaugh’s racism, etc….

“I mean, let’s face it, we didn’t have slavery in this country for over 100 years because it was a bad thing. Quite the opposite: slavery built the South. I’m not saying we should bring it back; I’m just saying it had its merits. For one thing, the streets were safer after dark.”

“You know who deserves a posthumous Medal of Honor? James Earl Ray [the confessed assassin of Martin Luther King]. We miss you, James. Godspeed.”

“Have you ever noticed how all composite pictures of wanted criminals resemble Jesse Jackson?”

“Right. So you go into Darfur and you go into South Africa, you get rid of the white government there. You put sanctions on them. You stand behind Nelson Mandela - who was bankrolled by communists for a time, had the support of certain communist leaders. You go to Ethiopia. You do the same thing.”

“Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it.”

“The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies.”

(Of African-Americans) “They’re 12 percent of the population. Who the hell cares?”

(To an African American female caller).“Take that bone out of your nose and call me back”

Regarding President Obama, Limbaugh has called him a ‘halfrican American’ has said that Obama was not black but Arab because Kenya is an Arab region, even though Arabs are less than one percent of Kenya. Since mainstream America has become more accepting of African-Americans, Limbaugh has decided to play against its new racial fears, Arabs and Muslims. Despite the fact Obama graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law school, Limbaugh has called him an ‘affirmative action candidate.’ Limbaugh even has repeatedly played a song on his radio show ‘Barack the Magic Negro’ using an antiquated Jim Crow era term for black a man.

(Regarding Arab Muslims) “As I said yesterday, truce is an old Arabic word. Goes way, way back in Islamic-Arabic culture, and it means, “We will get you later.”

(Regarding Latinos) “OPEC announced a cancellation of its 10 percent cutback in production so—and there’s some little strife going on in Venezuela with that wacko, Cesar Chavez, down there. Hugo. Hugo, Cesar—whatever. A Chavez is a Chavez. We’ve always had problems with them. So the bottom line is that I don’t think supplies are going to be interrupted.”

(Regarding LA’s Latino Mayor Villaraigosa) “[Bill Clinton] came over to the table three times. (doing Clinton impression) “Hey, Limbaugh, you’re looking really good.” I shook his hand, he left, comes back, the mayor of Los Angeles, I thought it was a Secret Service agent, maybe a shoeshine guy. Turns out he gives me his card, I said, “Oh, my gosh, it’s the mayor of Los Angeles.”

(Regarding women) “We’re not sexists, we’re chauvinists — we’re male chauvinist pigs, and we’re happy to be because we think that’s what men were destined to be. We think that’s what women want.”

And I’m not terribly impressed by your appeal to the U.S. Constitution. See Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 3. We’ve a long way to go rectifying the systemic imbalances created there.

It is a misuse of Dr. King’s “I have a dream” speech to think that he was calling for an instant cultural amnesia with regard to slavery and Jim Crow.

“You know who deserves a posthumous Medal of Honor? James Earl Ray [the confessed assassin of Martin Luther King]. We miss you, James. Godspeed.”

Gag. Did Limbaugh really say that?

No, oscewicee, I don’t think Limbaugh really said that.  At least a few of this guy’s list I recognize as complete fabrications, and many others are distorted misquotes, out of context, or taking satire as serious commentary.

If what Limbaugh thinks were really represented by that list, I would never listen.  This is a guy who doesn’t listen and has cribbed somebody’s alleged “quote” list from someplace on the internet.

I think I found his quote list crib.
http://newsone.blackplanet.com/obama/top-10-racist-limbaugh-quotes/

It includes video clips, but they are not clips of Limbaugh saying the things in the list. I don’t personally have much use for Limbaugh, but I would hope that those quotes *are* fabrications.

Either source those quotes or have the Christian decency to withdraw your false witness, #55.  Or is public libel now an acceptable leftist strategy?

He certainly did not say those things. If he did say any of them, you would need the complete context.  You are quick to think the worst of him, and I imagine you’re not a regular listener.  I’ve listened to him for almost 20 years.  I’ve never heard him say anything I would consider racist.  And why don’t you tell his right-hand guy, “Bo Snerdly” that he’s a racist.  Bo might find that amusing.  So would Dr. Walter Williams who frequently fills in for Rush.  Not to mention Thomas Sowell who is a hero of Rush’s.

I don’t know where you get “quick to think” - I asked if he really said them. No, I’m not a listener of his at all.

Despite the fact that sometimes when I listen to Limbaugh I do think he goes to far, this country owes him a debt of gratitude that it will never pay, much as it owes Ronald Regan.

Do you think for one minute that our government would be less bloated, intrusive, and socialist if Limbaugh had never existed?  There was a time when he was the ONLY voice calling Washington to task for their excesses and appropriations of our Constitutionally-guarenteed liberties.  Who else is going to do that?  Tom Brokaw? George Stephanapoulos?  Katie Couric?  What a bunch of morons.

The facts are, life is hard.  The fact are, Capitalism is the best economic system ever devised because it gives each individual rights AND responsibilities.  Rights without responsibilities give you a welfare state, responsibilities without rights give you the good old USSR (which I’m sure more than a few people running things nowadays wish they could go back in time and live in).  I’m so sick of people whining and complaining about how the U.S. government is “mean” or “uncaring” or “divisive” or that Limbaugh is the same.

BOO HOO!!!  Why don’t you just grow a pair and go get a job.

Truth is, Limbaugh says the things that we think, he just does it louder and on the radio.  The things we don’t offer in polite conversation.  The things we don’t want to consider because it might point to our own “heart of darkness”.  The parts of us we’re trying expunge, not because they are not valuable or important, but because they might hurt someone’s FEELINGS, or we might end up being called bigot, or homophobe, or mean-spirited (and of this sounding familiar to my orthodox friends?).  Crap.

I say God Bless Rush Limbaugh, and God Bless the United States of America, a system built wisely enough 225 years ago to envision a time when we would all be threatened by an over-arching nanny state that wants to make us no more than piles of human jello, mindlessly sacrificing our lives and labor so a couple of limousine liberals can fly their private jets all over the country giving out crap to people who are perfectly capable of earning it on their own.  God Save me from wimps and people who thrive on creating dependence and weakness in their fellow man, all in the guise of being “holier than thou.”

Bah.  Limbaugh, at the very least, is unafraid to look a corrupt system in the eye and call it what it is.  He at least has the courage to get off his butt every morning, fire up the Golden EIB microphone, and explain in great detail what is happening to us, things that the sold-out left over hippie media is afraid to tell us.

How many stories did you see about Daschle’s tax evasion this weekend?  They sent out the press releases at like 7pm Friday evening, and the complicit hippies in the media covered it up.  If it wasn’t for Rush, we’d have no idea the man about to turn our health care system into a pale reflection of the NHS was a crook.  And make no mistake, Tom Daschle is the worst kind of crook, the one who masquerades as an honorable politician.

Is Rush a model for our children?  No.  Is he qualified to be a Bishop in TEC?  Depends on who you compare him to, but probably not.  Is he perfect?  Far from it.  But having listened to him rant and rave since 1988 I can tell you that America would be in FAR WORSE SHAPE than it is right now if he had never existed.

As far as the current economic crisis, we all know it was the direct results of some liberal Senators trying to make a mortgage a right, instead of a privilige.  John McCain, doddering old fool that he is, in 2005 begged the Senate to scale back Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and Kennedy and Barney Frank (now I think HE’s qualified to be a Bishop in TEC, based on current standards) shouted him down. 

Ok, rant over.  But don’t give me any crap about how bad Limbaugh is for this country.  America would be much poorer than it is now without his constant reminders of who we are and where we came from.

Amen.
KTF!...mrb

They sent out the press releases at like 7pm Friday evening, and the complicit hippies in the media covered it up. 

Mike, the New York Times was blogging about this as early as Friday.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/daschle-nomination-snagged-by-back-tax-problem/?scp=8&sq=daschle&st=cse

I check the news through Yahoo and they were showing AP stories about it as early as Saturday if not before.

Oscewicee, my comments were directed to abbotcollumcille who came up with these preposterous quotes.

Either source those quotes or have the Christian decency to withdraw your false witness, #55.  Or is public libel now an acceptable leftist strategy?

Chris:  Public libel is an acceptable strategy… for some folks.  Remember the 2000 election when the loony left spread all those rumors about Jeb Bush calling the Florida Highway Patrol to block the doors to the polls?  “They” all claimed it happened but could not produce any specifics nor could they produce any photographs or witnesses. Yet “they” keep insisting it actually happened.

Dittos mrb!  Rush is a very bombastic personality and oftentimes his comments are loaded with irony and sarcasm.  I suppose if he were on the Left we would call him “nuanced.”  But he’s a radio personality.  You can’t merely read his words in black and white and clip phrases out of context.  How were they delivered and what was he talking about?  His statements are intended to be heard as much as read.

Snopes says the “bone out of your nose” comment is true:

http://www.snopes.com/politics/quotes/limbaugh.asp

That was the only one I could find mentioned on Snopes.

As I have understood this last go around, you folks are saying that Limbaugh didn’t say these things, unless he did. In which case he was taken out of context, unless he wasn’t. In which case, he didn’t mean what he said.

Ockham’s Razor would argue differently. The simplest explanation is that Limbaugh really is a barely concealed racist and makes a mint reflecting and feeding the barely suppressed anger of folks who feel marginalized and who are looking for an enemy.

I’m saying that it is basic hypocrisy for putative Christians to lionize this kind of behavior (or at least to make apologies for it), whilst condemning with so earnest and urgent outrage every leftist sin you can imagine. You celebrate the sins of people you like while condemning the sins of people you dislike. In this, you’re no different than the folks at 815. Stamping out pinkos in the name of Jesus is simply your version of the Millennial Development Goals.

Here’s the source material. No false witnesses here.

“I mean, let’s face it, we didn’t have slavery in this country for over 100 years because it was a bad thing. Quite the opposite: slavery built the South. I’m not saying we should bring it back; I’m just saying it had its merits. For one thing, the streets were safer after dark.” – Quoted in Jack Huberman, 101 People Who are Really Screwing America (New York: Nation, 2006), 232.

“You know who deserves a posthumous Medal of Honor? James Earl Ray [the confessed assassin of Martin Luther King]. We miss you, James. Godspeed.” – Quoted in Jack Huberman, 101 People Who are Really Screwing America (New York: Nation, 2006), 232.

“Have you ever noticed how all composite pictures of wanted criminals resemble Jesse Jackson?” – Attributed in Rodger Streitmatter, Mightier Than the Sword: How the News Media Have Shaped American History (Boulder, Co.: Westview, 1997), 222

“Right. So you go into Darfur and you go into South Africa, you get rid of the white government there. You put sanctions on them. You stand behind Nelson Mandela - who was bankrolled by communists for a time, had the support of certain communist leaders. You go to Ethiopia. You do the same thing.” – Quoted (with context) in A.J. Walzer, “Limbaugh claims Dems’ interest in Darfur is securing black ‘voting bloc’” Media Matters, 23 August 2007. Online: http://mediamatters.org/items/200708230008.

“Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it.” – The Rush Limbaugh Show, 19 January, 2007

“I mean, why didn’t these morons leave New Orleans before the hurricane? I’ll tell you why: because they wanted to rape and loot! That’s just the way some people are! And if they’re black—if the rapists and looters are black—it’s not George Bush’s fault! We’ve had these problems ever since the Emancipation Proclamation. Once the whites leave town, all you’ve got is overwhelming lawlessness. That’s not racism, Mr. Snerdley; it’s a proven, demonstrable fact. Have you even seen a ghetto in Greenwich, Connecticut? I rest my case.” – The Rush Limbaugh Show, 12 September 2005

“The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies.” – The Rush Limbaugh Show, late 1992 (attributed by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2549)

(Of African-Americans) “They’re 12 percent of the population. Who the hell cares?” – Quoted in Derrick Z. Jackson “Limbaugh Brings Baggage with his ESPN Blabber” The Boston Globe (16 July 2003).

(To an African American female caller).“Take that bone out of your nose and call me back” – Old quote attributed by multiple sources to his pre-syndication days at KFBK Sacramento. A 1990 Newsday article (8 October 1990) quotes Limbaugh as saying that he “felt guilty” for the comment, so it’s unlikely that this is a false attribution.

(Regarding Arab Muslims) “As I said yesterday, truce is an old Arabic word. Goes way, way back in Islamic-Arabic culture, and it means, “We will get you later.” – The Rush Limbaugh Show, 16 April 2004.

(Regarding Latinos) “OPEC announced a cancellation of its 10 percent cutback in production so—and there’s some little strife going on in Venezuela with that wacko, Cesar Chavez, down there. Hugo. Hugo, Cesar—whatever. A Chavez is a Chavez. We’ve always had problems with them. So the bottom line is that I don’t think supplies are going to be interrupted.”  - The Rush Limbaugh Show, 26 March 2004

(Regarding LA’s Latino Mayor Villaraigosa) “[Bill Clinton] came over to the table three times. (doing Clinton impression) “Hey, Limbaugh, you’re looking really good.” I shook his hand, he left, comes back, the mayor of Los Angeles, I thought it was a Secret Service agent, maybe a shoeshine guy. Turns out he gives me his card, I said, “Oh, my gosh, it’s the mayor of Los Angeles.” – This is a widely reported controversy, but my source was Veronique de Turenne, “Villaraigosa gives Limbaugh the brush-off on “shoeshine guy” insult” The Los Angeles Times, 7 May, 2008.

(Regarding women) “We’re not sexists, we’re chauvinists — we’re male chauvinist pigs, and we’re happy to be because we think that’s what men were destined to be. We think that’s what women want.” – The Rush Limbaugh Show, 15 April 2004.

Regarding President Obama, and Limbaugh’s use of ‘halfrican American,’ ‘affirmative action candidate,’ and ‘Barack the Magic Negro’: If you’re a regular listener, you’ve certainly heard this in the past six months. I am only an occasional listener and heard every single one of these.

The main reason that Rush Limbaugh does not represent conservatives is because most conservatives do not ridicule people. Rush uses ridicule as a way of making a point, but this antagonizes people who might otherwise be willing to listen to his conservative ideas. It then puts conservatives at a disadvantage because others may expect to face ridicule when discussing things with conservatives.
He doesn’t seem to be racist in that he ridicules black and white alike, for instance he ridicules both Jesse Jackson and Barbara Striesand and a great number of other people of various races and it may seem funny at the time but the people subjected to these personal attacks (many of them leaders) by are probably so angry that they will refuse to ever listen to anything any conservative has to say.

RE: “Barney Frank (now I think HE’s qualified to be a Bishop in TEC, based on current standards)”

You see, it’s precisely this kind of homophobic B.S. that harms us all. That wasn’t funny. It was a cheap shot across the bow of a public servant who hasn’t applied to be in your club and who isn’t looking for your approval. God knows that you’ve given him no reason to think that your church is a healthy or healing place.

The fact that you felt so constrained to write down such an ugly comment reveals the root of bitterness in your heart. As I said, I think that this is just baldfaced hypocrisy.

Wow, Abbot, you’re trying really, really hard here.  No, I don’t believe most of your “sources.”  You see, I am a listener, so I know what kinds of things he says.  And by the way, the “magic negro” comment was not his; it’s from a black columnist with the LA Times who Rush was quoting.  Very similar to the recent kerfuffle regarding Rush wanting Obama to fail.  You need to hear the entire context of the comment. Just the kind of misquotes you and your “sources” love to jump on.  Do you really believe Walter Williams would fill in for him if he was a racist, or that Bo would be working so closely with him?  Perhaps they know more about him than you do?

Betty See,

I agree for the most part with your comments. The one place of contention would be to note that while Limbaugh does ridicule whites and persons of color, the locus of his ridicule is very different. Whereas with whites, his ridicule is ideological and devoid of racial reference, his ridicule of everyone else is focused on racial and/or sexual stereotyping. Thus, Barack Obama is a “magic NEGRO” and Barney Frank is a “GAY congressman” and Hillary Clinton is a “FEMI-nazi.” His humor is directed immediately toward that which is most different from his vision of a better world—a place where women are not powerful, where gay people are non-existent, and where people of color know their place.

The link to the Darfur comment is there. The context doesn’t make it more palatable, to me.

Alli B,

Your argument is akin to the contention what whites are entitled to use the N-word simply because the term is used by hip-hop artists.

As I argued with Betty, the term may have been used by David Ehrenstein in that LA Times article you reference (his point was to reference a literary archetype laden with racist overtones - Cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_Negro), but Rush decided to satirize the term by playing the Shanklin song over and over. Limbaugh picked up on the stereotype and drove it to Disneyland.

Your argument is akin to the contention what whites are entitled to use the N-word simply because the term is used by hip-hop artists.

No, it isn’t.  Two different things entirely.  And yes, you did attempt to attribute the quote to Rush, which is nothing less than dishonest.

#71 Abbotcolumcille,
Here are some references to your “sources”. Jack Huberman.
Well to the Left Of Attila The Hun :Jack Huberman’s Blog Jack Huberman is the author of The Bush-Hater’s Handbook Books by Jack Huberman. The Quotable Atheist. How To Save Our Secular America!
“Media Matters for America is a Web-based, not-for-profit, 501(c)(3) progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.”
Your sources reveal two things about you. You only want to present your version of the truth and you are not “an Anglican traditionalist” just because you refer to yourself as one.

1. How come no shoutouts for Laura (Ingraham)? Unquestionably Conservative, smarter and wittier than any of the rest, (not to mention cuter) and a Christian to boot (which I have no reason to believe Rush is).

2. Anyone who is interested in hearing these hosts but cannot get them via terrestrial radio may find them here: http://radiotime.com/channel/c_57917/Conservative.aspx

3. I like Rush and it is important for conservatives not to throw him under the bus, as people like David Frum are now recommending, but he’s deadly wrong about some things. Conservatives need to be willing to re-evaluate theor policies, strategy and tactics and it’s not enough to talk about returning to the principles of Ronald Reagan. Ronald Reagan did not talk about returning to the principles of Barry Goldwater or Robert Taft; he fashioned approaches to the problems of his own times. Conservatives have to do the same now.  In particular, reflexive insistence on tax cuts are no longer a winning tactic when, after Obama’s changes, only about half of adults will be paying any income taxes, and over half of workers will be paying more in payroll taxes than income taxes.
In addition, the Republicans will be in huge trouble if they are or come across as an overwhelmingly Southern party with satellites in places like Utah and Idaho—a point which I should note has also been made by such people as Newt Gingrich, Mitch McConnell, Trent Lott, and Haley Barbour.

My concern with Rush Limbaugh is that he seems to be representing conservatives and I hold him to a higher standard because of that.  He of course is not the only one who uses ridicule to communicate with the audience, Mainstream Media seems to thrive on ridicule and their treatment of Sarah Palin was shameful. I am glad that Rush has pointed out their bias and wish that they would return to objective reporting.
As for MSNBC with Keith Oberman and Rachel Maddow, I believe that nothing can redeem their hostile, ignorant, ridicule of President Bush and others who do not march to their liberal parade.

abbotcolumcille,

I see that you’re still not arguing your real point—which is that you believe that conservative policies are unchristian.  Instead you’re continuing on with the rather silly name calling and “quotes that prove Rush is a racist.”

But these three things right here provide evidence that you don’t listen to Rush - -you merely read the leftist tripe that you enjoy so much: “Thus, Barack Obama is a “magic NEGRO” and Barney Frank is a “GAY congressman” and Hillary Clinton is a “FEMI-nazi.”

Rush’s calling Obama the “magic Negro” is mocking—yes, mocking—precisely the attitude that leftists like you hold so near and dear, that is “you must support and vote for Obama’s policies because . . . well . . . you know . . . he’s black.”

It’s no more “racists” of Rush to point out this attitude and mock it to scorn than it is for us to mock the Simple Country Bishop’s rhetoric and attitudes.

You just don’t happen to like it because it makes fun of a very real and very transparently obvious attitude of folks like you.

Second—yeh, Hillary is precisely the representation of Rush’s definition of a feminazi—that is, an idealistic feminist who will use power to act as a fascist to institute her demands regarding feminism.

Again—you don’t like that word because you don’t like the idea behind that word - - which is simply that some feminists are at heart little mini-me fascists.

Third, Barney Frank is a gay congressman.  Good for Rush to point out that fact.  Not certain how it’s an insult.  It’s just a fact that we all need to know.  That and the actions that he was caught for oh so long ago.

My suspicion is that you don’t think Rush is a racist.  You just hate his ideas with a passion and have decided that you’re going to call him names rather than combat his ideas.

That’s actually understandable—better to attack him than his ideas.

But it speaks worlds of both your integrity and your rhetorical abilities.

Thank God the ACNA got you and not poor old TECUSA.

Interesting take on the word “context” this weekend.  Leonard Pitts (Miami Herald) claimed he had not taken Rush out of context because “I cut and pasted what he said directly from his website!”  Oh really?  I sent Mr. Pitts an email saying that I hoped he really didn’t believe that cutting and pasting was a guarantee of context.  Either he was showing a high level of journalistic ignorance or he was being deceptive…..a poor practice for anyone and especially someone who wants to be taken seriously as a journalist.

Here’s exactly what Pitts said:

They claimed I misquoted him (the quote was cut and pasted directly from Limbaugh’s own Web site). They claimed Limbaugh was referring not to Obama’s presidency, but to his supposed desire to institute a socialist government (except that Limbaugh was, by his own admission, responding to a question about his hopes for Obama’s presidency).

If it was quoted from his website, it was not misquoted. That isn’t a claim about context. The next part is.

RE: “I don’t care to change the editorial policies of your site, but my charge of hypocrisy stands.”

I couldn’t care less about your “charge of hypocricy.”

RE: “Here’s the smoking gun with regards to Limbaugh’s racism, etc….”

LOL.

Nice boilerplate crib sheet, Abbotcolumcille, but no cigar.  Half those “quotes” are Limbaugh being tongue in cheek and funny—and yeh, I’ve heard them and he’s mocking and being sarcastic about the liberals.  And half are dead on accurate takes on ideas—you know, the ideas you hate so so much.

Sorry you don’t like Limbaugh’s ideas.  Liberals usually don’t.

Dcn Dale,

RE: >>Your sources reveal two things about you.<<

Soooo let me get this straight. Because out of my fourteen quotes (a fraction of what’s available and widely sourced), there are two sources with whom you disagree on ideological grounds, I am NOT an Anglican Traditionalist?

This seems to be fairly strange logic. In fact it is precisely a logical fallacy (actually a combination association fallacy and ad hominem fallacy). First, I didn’t quote Huberman’s opinions on atheism and didn’t quote either book you referenced. Second, while Media Matters is a progressive non-profit, the attributed quote is sourced elsewhere. Limbaugh still said the words attributed to him. Third, I’ll repeat my above statement in different words, since when did Anglican traditionalism reduce to American political conservativism and how is my identity (which I suppose is up to my bishop to decide) relevant to the facts in dispute?

The Barmen Declaration of 1934 was drafted to debunk just this sort of abuse of Luther’s two cities doctrine. For all your above referenced zeal for Luther, one would think that you would appreciate this.

I quoted Gandhi in a seminary paper once upon a time, does that make me a Jain or a Hindu as well?

Hey Dcn Dale,

RE: ”  .  . . you are not “an Anglican traditionalist” just because you refer to yourself as one.”

He said he was a member of the ACNA and not previously a member of TEC.  So I assume that he’s a person who has entered one of the parts of the ACNA: AMiA, REC, CANA, etc, having been something else prior to 2000 [or if he was REC, perhaps his whole life.]

I think we should take him at his word.  He’s a traditional Anglican who is politically liberal.

This is fine.  There are plenty of those out there.

The fact that he’s chosen to attack Rush on basically silly premises and “evidence” of “bigotry” and “homophobia” [sic] rather than be honest about his loathing of and disagreement with politically conservative ideas is another matter.

But I do think you should give him the benefit of the doubt about being a part of the ACNA.  I doubt many people would lie about that!  ; > )

It is fun…in a sad sort of way…to watch “orthodox” Anglicans try to rationalize their support for the party of death. 50 million dead babies later and some still think that the sins of the Republican Party justify throwing in with baby killers.

Sarah,

Ergo, Limbaugh didn’t say these things, unless he did. In which case he was taken out of context, unless he wasn’t. In which case, he didn’t mean what he said ... unless he ...er… . You’re a liberal using liberal cribs! 

Nice self-referential world you’ve concocted there-perfectly immunized from critique and a monument to perfect continuity with the City of God. I’ll leave it to your conscience to accuse or excuse you, but I suspect that sober minds can see the lines of continuity that I have drawn here.

Matt,

So now I’m a baby killer or complicit with them??? What if I voted Republican? Would I then be complicit with the party of torture, that did nothing for eight years regarding the question of abortion, that engaged in an unjustified war in Iraq, and that conspired in the execution of numberless prisoners (including minors and the mentally handicapped)?

but I suspect that sober minds can see the lines of continuity that I have drawn here.

Lines of continuity?  Like quoting things he most surely did not say along with things he did say which were out of context?  That’s a liberal’s view of continuity, to be sure.

“So now I’m a baby killer or complicit with them???”

What on earth are you talking about? I did not call you a baby killer. I am relatively sure that you have not killed any babies. You simply have thrown in your lot with those who do so for a living and those who want to make sure that it will always be legal and easy to do so.

“What if I voted Republican? Would I then be complicit with the party of torture”

Oh, don’t get me wrong…I am no fan of the GOP. I am probably going third party next cycle…But of the two parties, the Dims are clearly the most reprobate…no sin of the GOP stacks up next to 50 million baby carcasses. 

“That did nothing for eight years regarding the question of abortion”

For an orthodox priest, that is some very fine revisionism

“that engaged in an unjustified war in Iraq, and that conspired in the execution of numberless prisoners (including minors and the mentally handicapped)?”

I’m sorry that you seem not to possess the moral capacity to distinguish between killing combatants in war, accidentally killing civilians in war, executing convicted criminals, and purposefully slaughtering babies.

I am sorry, very sorry for you.

#82, Yes, Mr. Pitts did say misquote, but nowhere did he correct his earlier stance of excorciating Limbaugh for hoping Obama policies would fail (and by extension, the President too would fail)  if they were going to be socialistic.  By cutting and pasting, Mr Pitts can be the paragon of quotational purity but miss the context of one’s remarks by the proverbial country mile.  I predict Mr. Pitts will never address the correction needed.

#84 abbotcolumcille,
“The Barmen Declaration of 1934 was drafted to debunk just this sort of abuse of Luther’s two cities doctrine. For all your above referenced zeal for Luther, one would think that you would appreciate this.”
Luther’s two kingdoms doctrine deals with God’s rule over the entire world, secular and spiritual. It has nothing to do with his criticism of Roman Catholicism in the “Babylonian Captivity of the Church.

You know I strongly believe that folks can be orthodox but politically liberal, even socialist.  I had a good discussion with Chicago Mom about that right here on this board.

However I confess that I’ve never run into, personally or online, an orthodox person who would use the word “homophobia” seriously. I view the use of this word as a sign that the user is (at a minimum) so seriously deluded by the Spirit of the Age that his or her opinions about any moral issues must be dismissed. His or her judgement is so marinated in nodern liberalism as to consider innocent and normal expressions of orthodox belief as morally wrong.

There is a branch of the church that has considered itself orthodox merely because of a devotion to certain forms of service, certain devotional exercises, certain ceremonial practices, while knowingly allowing large numbers of homosexuals to minister within it.  The same branch that questions whether ++Bob Duncan’s solutions are correct because other bishops took different approaches to different problems 1500 years ago. I can’t help but wonder if that’s not where abbotc is coming from.

Toral

Wow!  Can of worms officially opened, let’s see where to begin…

Oh, Abbot, I’m sorry you think my tongue in cheek comment about Barney Frank being qualified to be a Bishop in TEC offensive or useless, but truth be told, there is ample evidence of Mr. Frank’s moral and social degredation outside of his sexual preferences to qualify him, in my opinion.  The fact that he was gay (and we had to find out by interns he molested going public) was simply a bit of icing.  I don’t care for the man’s politics and he is a danger to the United States and your own personal freedom.  He remains in Congress because the good folks from Massachussetts have thrown in their lot with the Federal Government (in addition to their own exorbitant tax rates at the state level) and can no longer separate themselves from the Federal Trough.

Ergo, they need the highest seniority members they can get their hands on representing them, so they can continue to get their overly-fair share of the Federal Pie.  Just their Universal Health Care package alone is going to overrun it’s budget by $450M plus in 2009, money they can only hope to get as an Obama Prize by Kennedy, Frank, and the rest of their delegation working Obama over.

And if anyone wants to mix politics and religion further, and try to decide which party is more “moral” or “Godlike” I’m afraid we’re in for a long night.  Matt does have a valid point, however, in that Republicans including George W. Bush have tried to overturn that Roe v Wade abomination that has allowed the unfettered killing of 40 or 50 million infants since the early 70’s, whereas the Democratic party has staunchly defended a woman’s right to kill her own baby.

Want to talk about torture?  Yeah, I’m actually against that.  In addition, I remain convinced, no matter what the outcome, that the Iraq War was a mistake, too expensive for the benefit we received.  I really thought it cost a lot of money too, that is, until I saw the so-called Stimulus Package, which actually costs more than all 5 years of the Iraq Conflict PLUS Afghanistan.  But yeah, if I had been President, I would have continued to bottle up Iraq and kept the price down.  But, not my call.

To be clear, my earlier rant defending Limbaugh had only one purpose, to delineate as forcefully as possible my belief that for our country to survive both Conservative and Liberal Views, both socially and economically, must be given credence.  If one or the other becomes too dominate, it will be 1860 all over again (now THERE was an illegal war, certainly the states had the right to join the Union, and clearly they had the right by popular vote to UNJOIN, but of course Lincoln didn’t see it that way).

If we leave this country to the liberals, motivation will cease, the spirit that created this nation will cease, free enterprise (barely free now, truthfully) will become extinct, and all the great achievements of man will crumble into ruin.  Plus, as we who have studied the rise and fall of the Soviet Union know, the math simply doesn’t work. 

Governments cannot create expansion nor wealth, government is a leach on both.  Government jobs cannot create enough value to sustain themselves, let alone create more jobs because they must be paid for with tax dollars.  The average Joe on the street (sadly) does not get this.  Limbaugh does, and he preaches it to the hilltops, lest we forget.

If I may borrow a brilliant example from the Magnificent Dr. Walter Williams, expecting government spending to stimulate a free market economy is equivalent to taking a bucket of water from the shallow end of a swimming pool, dumping into the deep end of the swimming pool, and then expecting the OVERALL water level to rise.

Anyway, Abby, glad you stopped by!  I always welcome challenged by intellectual guardians of one point of view or the other, so to better prepare me for that ultimate argument I must fight every day.

I speak of course, of that argument between me, and me.

KTF!...mrb

#94 Mike B.,
Thanks for putting your “can” out there too!
Blessings

government is a leach on both.

I must say, as a civil servant from a long line of government employees (mostly school teachers and soldiers) it is always nice to be appreciated.

Of course, neither party has ever on a platform of increasing the budget of my administration.  I guess we aren’t flashy enough.

Honestly, I want to understand where, exactly, has President Bush proved to be a champion of the unborn except in the most craven and politically expedient sense? Rolling back Clinton’s Mexico City policy in the 2001 was a good thing (and its reversal by President Obama, regrettable), but this seems more symbolic than real. Not sending federal money to people who are officially on record as providing abortions is a policy I support, but I fail to see how this simple executive order leads immediately to a real reduction in the number of abortions worldwide. Stats would suggest that the rate has been basically stable since a fairly measurable decline during the Clinton presidency. It certainly doesn’t make up for eight years of negligence regarding economic and social conditions that incentivize abortion and discourage motherhood and adoption.

One may point to the appointment of Alito and Roberts, but President Bush required a meltdown on the part of the pro-life lobby to take Harriet Myers off the table. Even with these two reputable and competent judges on the bench, it remains unclear that there has been a significant shift in the court so as to reverse Roe v. Wade. Both are on record as respecting the stare decisis validating Roe and we won’t know the outcome with certitude for some time to come.

Finally, where is the consistency in our standards for an ethic of life? It seems to me that all human life is possessed of an equal dignity (because all human life images God). I’m glad that there seem to be no ringing endorsements of torture here, but the estimated 100,000 deaths in Iraq include a ridiculous number of noncombatants (and combatants who are merely acting to defend their homes). Its not so easy as simply weighing numbers on a scale. Where human dignity is imperiled anywhere it is imperiled everywhere and microscopic (and largely symbolic and certainly uncostly in a political sense) gains in favor of the rights of the unborn do not neutralize complicity with the culture of death elsewhere.

So the “party of death” moniker seems unfair and hypocritical to me, Matt.

Dale,
“The Barmen Declaration” is integrally related to Luther’s “Babylonian Captivity” and his “Address to the German Nobility.” In both of the latter writings, Luther promulgated a doctrine of the two cities that valorized state intervention in ecclesial affairs. “The Barmen Declaration” largely corrected this misreading of Augustine and reasserted the Church’s prophetic distance from the idealization (and thus, the idolatry) of any manifestation of the political order. This is applicable where faithful Christian orthodoxy (and the question of my sexual orientation as well, if I read Toral’s reference to “large numbers of homosexuals to minister within it” rightly) reduces to American political conservativism.

On the parenthetical note, wouldn’t my wife and children be surprised?

Honestly, I want to understand where, exactly, has President Bush proved to be a champion of the unborn except in the most craven and politically expedient sense?

What do you think could have been done better, given the handicaps posed by Roe v Wade?

I’m glad that there seem to be no ringing endorsements of torture here, but the estimated 100,000 deaths in Iraq include a ridiculous number of noncombatants ).

Most noncombatants were killed by various insurgent factions.  Since when did Bush become culable for the deaths of those killed by terrorists?

(and combatants who are merely acting to defend their homes

Yeah, weep for the poor Aqueda in Iraq and Sadrists merely fighting to defend freedom and democracy against the Imperialists. Still, the amount of blood on the hands of the Democrats,(World War I, World War II, Korea, Viet Nam) using your apparent standards, still makes the Republicans look downright dovish.

RE: “If I may borrow a brilliant example from the Magnificent Dr. Walter Williams, expecting government spending to stimulate a free market economy is equivalent to taking a bucket of water from the shallow end of a swimming pool, dumping into the deep end of the swimming pool, and then expecting the OVERALL water level to rise.”

This is one of those places where political conservativism fails to appropriate the critique of the Gospel (there, Sarah, I said it). Williams IS a great thinker and a wise theorist, but this quote suffers for its ontological moorings. It assumes that this world is a closed system wherein all the gifts have been given. Jesus is risen from the dead, however, and the Holy Spirit has set us free from this old “law of sin and death” thinking. What happens when God gets in the game and an impoverished person makes use of some tax funded grant to get training, land a job, and work her way toward a beautifully productive life? No, it doesn’t happen all the time (sometimes it reinforces dependency where the person treats the gift with contempt or the grant program is incompetent), but human beings are genuinely capable of redemption and self-transendence and the church is not always competent or potent of itself in our present system to facilitate this possibility.

At its heart, the social safety net in the United States is not bare Socialism. Indeed, it was premised on intentions that were derived from the Gospel metanarrative. Corruption is, indeed, inherent to the system, but corruption is inherent to unregulated market economies as well. You say, don’t penalize productivity; I say don’t create and valorize a system wherein productivity incentivizes and even requires that a harvest to the very edges of the field to the neglect of the poor (Cf. Lev. 19:9–10., Lev. 23:22, Deut. 14:28-29). God judges that the poor are actually entitled to this on the grounds of justice, not charity.

I say that our role is not to damn the darkness, but to illuminate it by the Gospel.

RE: “Yeah, weep for the poor Aqueda in Iraq and Sadrists merely fighting to defend freedom and democracy against the Imperialists.”

Well, yes, I do weep for them. Does the Iraqi insurgent bear the image of God any less than you or I? Is he less guilty of sin before God or less deserving of being condemned alongside all “sin in the flesh” than you or I? Outside the upper eschelons of organizational leadership, is the average grunt in the Sadr faction doing any less than you would have done had the Soviets invaded your town in the 1980’s (Wolverines!!!)? Your feigned pity suggests assumptions of clear moral rectitude vs. clear moral guilt and I’m not sure you are entitled to those assumptions.

And don’t get me wrong, I’m an equal opportunity critic as regards party and am no defender of Truman’s Hiroshima or Kennedy-LBJ’s Vietnam.

#97 abbotcolumcille,
You’ve posted some strong arguments. I’d say you’re one of the best liberal thinkers to come on S.F. but you don’t need a Jack Huberman or his ilk to support your position.  By the way, Since you were referencing Limbaugh from 2004 (A person I have not defended) Do you think you could have been on the Radio three hours a day for even four years with no script and not said some stupid things? I appreciate your intellect but don’t share your politics.

the average grunt in the Sadr faction doing any less than you would have done had the Soviets invaded your town in the 1980’s

I think a better comparison would be the US “invasion” of France in June 1944, or even Germany a little bit latter, but your milage may vary.  After all, some people do think that Ba’athist style autocracies are just grand, or that the Iranian Revolution is a perfect model for the future of Iraq.  I guess it is all a matter of perspective.

So since I give about 50% of my income to taxes, I don’t need to tithe because I’m really virtuous by paying my taxes under threat of arrest and imprisonment (unless Obama wants to appoint me to a cabinet position)?  I mean at least 20% of that has to go towards “charitable” social services.  Awesome.  I’ll phone my rector tomorrow.

The problem with that theory is manifold.  First, governments don’t create wealth.  They either need to take it via taxes, borrow it, or print it.  In each case, you remove private wealth that can be used for charity in taxes, increase the price of borrowing by crowding out private equity by borrowing, or dilute the value of money when you print more of it.

Second, it’s not voluntary.  There’s no virtue in an involuntary act. 

Third, you may feel better lobbying the government to take someone else’s money to give it to someone else you think is more deserving, but do the recipient’s feel that way?  Every year during the legislative season, we get protest after protest from various welfare “rights” groups.  It certainly doesn’t appear they view it as charity.  It looks like they see the government as a big pot of dough they they have a claim to.  Things go both ways.  St. John Chrysostom said something to the effect of “The rich need the poor to learn charity and the poor need the rich to learn gratitude.”  The government taking about 40% of GDP and doling it out makes people want their cut and envious of those who appear to be getting more.

I’m not arguing against a “safety net” per se, but at a certain point, no matter what good intentions you have, if you put alot more money into a system and don’t get hardly any measureable macro results, that’s as immoral by taking someone else’s money for no good reason.  The point has to be to do what’s effective, not just tossing hay-bails of money at a problem.

AndrewA,

RE: “After all, some people do think that Ba’athist style autocracies are just grand, or that the Iranian Revolution is a perfect model for the future of Iraq.  I guess it is all a matter of perspective.”

This just goes to show you how murky, romanticized, and ideologically-blinded your understanding of the political situation in Iraq really is. You mentioned the Sadrists explicitly and, given that Al’Qaida in Iraq didn’t exist until after the invasion, let’s begin there. Sayyid Muqtada al-Sadr is a Shi’a , not a Sunni and certainly not a Ba’athist. Would it assist matters to know that he was personally forced to watch as several family members (including father and two brothers) were tortured and murdered under Sadaam Hussein’s Ba’athist regime. Most of his army grunts have witnessed similar oppression and violence in their own experience. Thus, this isn’t the Vichy government we’re dealing with.

Secondly, Sadaam’s Iraq was a violent and malignant regime, but the equation with Nazi Germany reinforces my observation that you are operating under illusions of moral rectitude that don’t apply. You’re just pimping the notion that our violence (unjustified on even the most generous reading of Just War theory) has “made the world safe for democracy” and condemning the ingratitude of people who lay cut and bleeding in the wake of the glorious “bull in a china shop” excursion. I say that’s lunatic and fundamentally anti-christian (as in Antichrist).

Bill,

You need to read #99 again. You’re simply repeating William’s ontological error using different words. I don’t grant the premise and therefore disagree with the conclusion. Government’s are not reified impersonal actors, but collective organizations of people. People do create wealth through their creative capacities and collaborative behaviors.

No its not voluntary and the goal is not virtuous charity. As I said above, the legislation of Torah prohibiting farmers from reaping to the edges of their fields was premised, not on charity or voluntary generosity, but justice due to the poor. You’re operating with a conception that your ontological status and the wealth that comes from it is yours. The Gospel teaches us that all our wealth, and indeed our very selves, is a gift of God. It’s God’s money and he has ordained that the poor have an inalienable claim on a portion of it. The moment you make this about charity and your condescending benevolence, you have failed to understand the Gospel.

Sayyid Muqtada al-Sadr is a Shi’a , not a Sunni and certainly not a Ba’athist.

Tell me something I don’t already know, but since this is starting to veer off topic even for the off topic I just assumed everyone had a working knowledge of the main groups involved and didn’t need a detailed description of each. 

I say that’s lunatic and fundamentally anti-christian

No, what is lunatic and fundamentally anti-christian are the various agendas driving those that feel that they need to take advantage of the removal of a brutal dictator by brutalizing their neighbors or shooting Americans rather than working together to build a functional society.

Abbot, your later comments, after going way over the edge through #88, are more worthy of you and your political group.  Rational argument is always better than just calling people “racists” and “homophobes.”  We have a number of people who vote left-wing and are believing Christians who post here.  We have a much larger number who vote right-wing and are believing Christians.

You object to the conflation of conservative politics and the faith.  So do I.  I also object to the conflation of liberal politics and the faith.  You won’t convert anybody to your political point of view by being insulting.  I’m glad you’ve realized that.

Anyway, since there is little point in rehashing Iraq untill 30 years from now or so, going back to abotion, what could Bush have done better?

oscewicee, interesting link to Snopes.  The sum of it is that Limbaugh “may have said” those two things in the 1970s, long before he went on national radio.  So as a young man he said, maybe, a couple of offensive things which he’s sorry for.

I can tell you that I listen fairly regularly and I do not hear racism, that is, the idea that dark-skinned people are less intelligent or less valuable than “whites.”  I would turn him off forever if that were his program.  But here’s what Rush does:  he uses satire and he uses ridicule to make fun of ideas he thinks are nonsense.  Often his satire is very sharp-edged.  He uses it equally on people of all racial and ethnic backgrounds, if he thinks they’re being—ridiculous.  Leftist critics cherry-pick his satires of black people to claim he’s racist; they omit his satires of everybody else.  His criticisms are aimed at what people say and what policies they propose, not at who they are in essence.

What about spending some of that “political capital” that he was in such a swagger over after winning the election in 2004 to provoke a genuine national conversation on the right to life? Granted that the issue is of far greater moral weight (especially by Matt Kennedy’s lights) than social security or winning the “war on terrah,” why doesn’t President Bush get pilloried for refusing to spend that capital on those most responsible for his re-election.

Katherine,

I wasn’t engaged in name calling or hysteria. The comment about Congressman Frank was homophobic (or, using a moniker more to your liking, “spiteful in a way that was directed toward his being gay”) and I think the charge of racism regarding Limbaugh stands.

Oh, I agree abbotcolumcille, that President Bush could have done more…no doubt about it and I’ve noticed that your argument seems to be…“see the GOP does bad things too…” You’ll have no argument from me on that point. But pointing out GOP deficiencies does not justify throwing in your lot with those who actively support baby killers and who put forward legislation like FOCA to expand the legal power to kill babies in the context of 50 million baby carcasses.

Per Matt above: the GOP is no paragon of virtue and its present composition is down right suspect to true conservatives and strict constitutionalists.  But as in many areas of life, choices often present themselves as the lesser of two evils.  Dittos for Mr. Rush: looking back over +20 years, might he have said some things differently?  Sure, but I’m not sure he would, given the chance; part of his entertainment value (both to him and others) is tweaking the noses of the liberals.  Now when I watched the paradies of Sarah Palin on Saturday Night live, I could laugh.  Why is it that liberals can’t laugh?  Hey Mike Bertaut…...do you you know why liberals can’t laugh?????

Abbot, that’s rather condescending of you to say that I’m “misunderstanding the Gospel.”  That’s awfully judgemental of you.  So your argument is that if the government claims it’s about economic justice they can take whatever they want?

As I CLEARLY stated, I’m not about entirely obliterating the safety net for those who are incapable of caring for themselves or have fallen into unfortunate circumstances, but we’re talking about Caesar here, not Christ.  I don’t disagree that it’s unjust to not help the indigent in some fashion, but it’s equally unjust to spend funds in a wasteful or inefficient manner, even if the “intent” is charitable.  That’s unjust to every single taxpayer who trust our elected officials to be stewards of that particular resource and not engage in political payola to groups like ACORN that engage in massive voter fraud under the guise of helping the “community.”

Given the fact I render unto Caesar 50% of my net income with income taxes (state and federal), sales taxes, property tax, social security, medicare tax, other miscellaneous taxes, I’d much rather lower that to about 25% and give the other 25% to my church and Catholic Charities.  The problem with your premise is that you rely too much on the government as an instrument for economic “justice” and not the church who can do it far better, and Christ is thereby glorified, not the state.

Besides, didn’t the Torah come from God and not from man?

As an example of how people completely misunderstand Limbaugh and then twist his statements into something he didn’t intend, take a look at the context of his controversial “Barack: The Magic Negro” parody song, which some here present as evidence of racial hatred.  The idea came from this opinion piece by David Ehrenstein in the Los Angeles Times, titled, oddly enough, “Obama, the Magic Negro”.  Here Ehrenstein argues that Obama is “inauthentically” black, merely a token figure (“the Magic Negro”) who whites are creating to “assuage” their guilt over slavery.  This opinion was widely discussed during the election campaign, in Time for example.  Limbaugh took these ideas and created the song.  The clever part was making Al Sharpton the singer.  Sharpton bewailing the “injustice” of an inauthentic black man getting the success he deserved is just funny.  Of course you can ignore all this context and simply believe that Limbaugh hates black people and was making fun of Obama, which is easy enough to do if you don’t like him to begin with…

By the way, I should point out that racism comes in more than one size and shape. Therein lies the basic mistake in Katherine and others who claim to “hear no racism” simply because Limbaugh doesn’t invoke the “in your face racism” of KKK/Nazi boilerplate.

The problem, as I indicated above, is that all his satire and humor viz women, homosexuals, and people of color turns on the differences in gender, sexual orientation, and race/culture. Women in power are derided, not because a given idea is bad, but because they are women who have stepped out of Limbaugh’s ideal hierarchy. African-american liberals can’t simply be persons with whom he holds disagreements rooted in Kensyean vs. Chicago school economics, they are stereotypical “welfare queens” or “criminals” bent on stealing money that doesn’t belong to them so that they can buy plasma televisions for crack addicts. Note how the humor turns on the dehumanized stereotype. Now there is a tiny grain of truth to the stereotype and one could cite anecdotal evidences where they hold true, but that’s the problem with stereotypes rooted in race and culture. They work precisely as prejudicial categorizations that provide the illusion of personal knowledge but in actual fact they excuse us from ever being implicated in actual personal knowledge.

Example: The guy with Latino features standing outside the Home Depot (or standing beside Bill Clinton) is assumed to be an illegal immigrant seeking work (or a low wage “shoe shine boy,” as Limbaugh put it). You entertain that you have captured the person by imposing that narrative on him and then come the feelings of resentment that nothing has been done to “secure our borders” (Code for “keep those criminal Mexicans who don’t speak our language at a safe distance from us”). What you don’t know is that Miguel is a third generation American Citizen whose grandfather came to this country from Cuba. He’s at the Home Depot to pick up some filters for the hot tub on the deck of his $700K home in the suburbs and he’s waiting for his wife and kids to return from Starbucks.

Now, none of us can avoid this kind of thought process entirely. Indeed, cognitive science suggests that our brains are hard-wired for just this kind of grouping. The problem comes in where we never question or second guess our prejudices and merely assume their facticity.

The problem comes in when the stereotypes in question are only negative. The man with Latino features is “illegal,” the black man in the Mercedes is a “gangster drug dealer, the woman at the mall with seven young children is a “welfare queen with illegitimate children,” etc.

The problem comes in when we fail to see how that prejudicial story imposition conceals assumptions about who has the power to compose the social categories we operate under. Many love Limbaugh because he says and celebrates what they are already thinking and that either validates their sense of rectitude or functions as a salve when they feel alienated from the prevailing culture. In this, however, his listeners have already fallen victim to thinking that thier impersonal prejudice is just “common sense.” It’s hardly “common” where it exempts us from actual “communion.”

Of course, most of this is obliterated in an instant the second we actually enter into the world of another human and come to know them personally. This is the whole point in St. Paul’s declaration that Christ has “broken down the middle wall” separating, in his case Jew and Gentile, making “one new man in Christ.”

Nevin,

Buddy, you’ve got to read the thread. See #75.

Limbaugh’s parody wasn’t merely a reset of Ehrenstein’s “magic negro” analysis. Ehrenstein has a genuine honest to God point in questioning racial assumptions born of white guilt. Limbaugh’s parody (and the use of Shanklin’s song over and over) actually intensified the racism inherent to the question by reducing a “magic negro” to an “ordinary negro.” In the effort to deconstruct the caricature that President Obama is “more than human.” Limbaugh painted a picture that makes him “less than human.” Therein lies the problem and I suspect that Ehrenstein would agree.

abbot, your comments and what reading I’ve done, such as the link to the “I hope he fails” interview, suggest to me that Limbaugh is primarily an entertainer, primarily a sort of right-wing stand-up comic of the political arena. Seen as an entertainer rather than as a serious political commentator, Limbaugh’s remarks fall into line with others I can think of, even his use of stereotypes. Which doesn’t explain why he is taken so very seriously. But his stereotypes aren’t that different from ones I’ve heard from other comics. I don’t find them funny either. But the “I hope he fails” comment, judging from the interview, is best seen in the light of someone being deliberately, quite intentionally, provocative and hoping to stir up a hornet’s nest. It is, after all, how he makes his money.

My last three cents on this thread:

I believe there is room for legitimate philosophical agreement as to what economic policies produce the best results, within the realm of orthodox Christianity.  Indeed, Christianity has coexisted with all sorts of economic systems.  I don’t think it particularly useful for a church to become a shill for any specific economic philosophy, or a Christian to accuse those with differing opinions on economics of misunderstanding the gospel. 

I believe that the removal of Hussein was just.  Whether or not it was wise is something that remains can only be truly judged decaded from now, although given the political bent of the “world history” departments of most universities (and I should know, being a world history grade student) I doubt Bush’s policies will ever get a positive reaction from the academic community.  At any rate, it is something that can’t be undone and glorifying or excusing the sectarian violence, thuggary and jihadism committed by the various factions is not useful to the future of Iraq.  Fortunately the results from the early results latest elections, as well as the fairly peaceful manner in which they have been carried out, seem to demonstrate that the Iraqis are starting to sick of the violence that is being promoted by abbotcolumcille’s freedom fighters.

I don’t know much about Rush and I haven’t so much as listened to his radio show in over a decade.

oscewicee, All that you say is true of Schori also. How quaint!

There were 113 comments when I first took a look at this thread, I grant I didn’t read every word of every comment. 

The truth is “Barack the Magic Negro” isn’t about Barack Obama at all, it is poking fun at racial hucksters like Al Sharpton who see Obama as a threat to “health” of the racial grievance industry.  Limbaugh doesn’t think of Obama as a “Magic Negro”, he has contempt for the people (all on the left) promoting such a bizarre concept.  The song certainly wasn’t an effort to “deconstruct” Obama (good grief, who even thinks like that?)  Limbaugh doesn’t think at all in terms of race when judging or evaluating people.  It’s all about ideas with him.

I only needed to hear a few seconds to completely tune Limbaugh out…He’s like smelling Limburger - you either like him or think he stinks.

Cal Thomas and Hugh Hewitt are far more appealing to me.

A new fresh young voice for conservatives is needed…bet there are some Godly regenerate minds out there who are educated, articulate and persuasive….go to Summitt ministries and to Veritas to listen and read about the coming generation. 

Hope they get a chance to redeem the disaster and disgrace of the Boomer Christians before Armageddon…but with Obama already kissing up to Iran and Syria, I doubt it.
God uses the Assyrians/Babylonians/Egyptians as His giant paddle when His people are errant and rebellious.

Not so, ctowles, because she, alas, is dead serious and has taken for herself the power to do as she wishes.

I believe that the removal of Hussein was just.  Whether or not it was wise is something that remains can only be truly judged decaded from now, although given the political bent of the “world history” departments of most universities (and I should know, being a world history grade student)

Unfortuantly I keep demonstrating why I’m not a typist.  That should be grad student, not grade student, even if I sometimes type like one.  Of course, I also mean to say that Iraq can only truly be judged decades from now.

Thumbing through this thread, one thought comes to mind:  We have become denizens of the mad realm of Political Correctness.  If Christ had been “politically correct”, He probably never would have been crucified.  And then where would WE be?

It’s interesting how invoking the name of Rush invites so much leftist opposition bombast.

Let’s start at the beginning.  The Limbaugh (Law) Firm in Cape Girardeau, MO, has been around a hundred years, and Rush is not the first Rush:
http://www.lawyers.com/Missouri/Cape-Girardeau/The-Limbaugh-Firm-1026569-f.html

If you enter the lobby of the firm’s main office, you will see a copy of Missouri’s 1821 Constitution, signed by a Limbaugh.

Rush started his talk radio bit on a local station there, and then hit the big time in Sacramento.  He is first, very quick and sharp, then a polished entertainer, and as a result of being entertaining, has built an international mass radio audience that dwarfs anything the liberals, leftists, progressives, or whatever they call themselves today, have ever amassed, even with the endless propagandizing of the left-tilted “national media”.  That’s what “liberals” (who are really the bigots due to their absolute intolerance for any views but their own) hate about Rush: more people listen to him and agree with him, and his ratings prove it, year after year.  Rush’s proven ability to “pull numbers” (broadcasting slang for “get ratings”) is something that the stations carrying his show can, and do, take to the bank, “liberal” bleating to the contrary notwithstanding.

Although the “liberals” would really like to use a renewed “fairness doctrine” via the FCC to throttle Rush, the legalities of censorship today are a lot different (more permissive) than in the era of the previous “doctrine” which the liberal Democrats who staff the FCC used to threaten the licenses of stations not deemed sufficiently PC, and revoked one (the “Red Lion” case).

Rush has demonstrated free speech as a reality, unlike the leftist majority of the always-slanted “national media”.  The left hates the publicly-visible contrast that reveals the slanting.

RE: “Ergo, Limbaugh didn’t say these things, unless he did. In which case he was taken out of context, unless he wasn’t.”

Oh I never said that—but you certainly wish that I had.  ; > )

You just didn’t like what I said—which was that half of those quotes were mocking irony, and half were excellent, right on points made about attitudes of your ilk—attitudes that you demonstrate quite nicely on this thread.

RE: “I’ll leave it to your conscience to accuse or excuse you   . . . “

Probably for the best since so far, you’ve merely hidden behind your boilerplate about Limbaugh the “racist” and SF commenters the “homophobes.”  So far—no rational argument from you has hit this thread.

RE: “.  . . , but I suspect that sober minds can see the lines of continuity that I have drawn here.”

Lol.

Right—because all the folks on this thread who disagree with you are clearly not of “sober mind” because . . . you know . . . like . . . they don’t agree with you.  ; > )

RE: “This is one of those places where political conservativism fails to appropriate the critique of the Gospel (there, Sarah, I said it).”

Oh you’d already said it far above in the thread—but you just covered it up with your rather silly statements about Limbaugh’s racism and homophobia, because you preferred to focus on that rather than the fact that you hate and disagree with conservative ideas.

But then—we already knew that.

RE: “Women in power are derided, not because a given idea is bad, but because they are women who have stepped out of Limbaugh’s ideal hierarchy.”

Nonsense.  Limbaugh’s just fine with “women in power”—who have conservative ideas; Margaret Thatcher would be exhibit A.  And he’s just fine with “men in power”—who have conservative ideas.

You just don’t like his ability to point out the ridiculous and point out the fascist in both “women in power” and “men in power” who are liberals.

RE: “Many love Limbaugh because he says and celebrates what they are already thinking and that either validates their sense of rectitude or functions as a salve when they feel alienated from the prevailing culture.”

I enjoy Limbaugh because he’s able to communicate conservative ideals in an articulate way—and mock liberal ideals intelligently.

And that’s why you hate him.

RE: “Limbaugh painted a picture that makes him “less than human.””

Nope.

Limbaugh painted a picture of liberals that made them look ridiculous. And that made conservatives laugh.  Because it was so so so true.

Good for him.

Hopefully he’ll keep it up.

And the more press he gets—the angrier you will get, precisely because he communicates conservative ideas strikingly well.  And you don’t agree with conservative ideas.

In all of the above commenting, you’ve managed to say very little of substance other than reflexive name-calling.

Here’s the thing you said that reveals your foundational worldview—something actually of substance—something serious that we can actually disagree on.

RE: “You’re operating with a conception that your ontological status and the wealth that comes from it is yours. . . . It’s God’s money and he has ordained that the poor have an inalienable claim on a portion of it.”

And you’re operationg with a conception that others ontological status and the wealth that comes from it is the State’s.  It’s God’s money and he has ordained that the State has an inalienable claim on determing where a portion of that money goes to.

And in a nutshell—that’s where you and I disagree.

Would have been nice for you to start out your rants with that comment rather than the ultimately useless other boilerplate herrings with which you filled this thread.

Sarah, gal, you are most articulate and brilliant to boot. Your #126 was a great example of well reasoned responses. You said:

I enjoy Limbaugh because he’s able to communicate conservative ideals in an articulate way—and mock liberal ideals intelligently.

To which I say “amen.” If people follow the current liberal thrust to its logical end, the consequence will be socialism beyond anything this country has seen and will be its total downfall. Seems so few are willing to stand up and be counted as you are. It does take courage! Few are well enough informed and many simply don’t care. It seems “our” government programs are creating an entitlement mentality. In his warnings, Rush is so right on!

2 Thessalonians 3:10-15 “...we commanded you this: If anyone will not work, neither shall he eat. For we hear that ther are some who walk among you in a disorderly manner, not working at all but are busybodies. Now those who are such, we command and exhort through our Lord Jesus Christ that they work in quieness and eat their own bread. But as for you, brethren, do not grow weary in doing good. And if anyone does not obey our word in this epistle, note that person and do not keep company with him. that he may be ashamed. Yet do not count him as an enemy but admonish him as a brother.”

Our January Imprimis just came and the lead article was an adaptation of a speech of last December by Rush Limbaugh delivered in D.C. at the 9th annual Hillsdale College Churchill Dinner. Do Conservatives Need to Get Beyond Reagan? Hope you will post it. The other article is adaptation of a speech by Burton W. Folsom, Jr entitled, Do We Need a New New Deal? “If histroy is a guide we have every reason to believe that if President Obama institutes a New New Deal, then universal health care, federal bailouts and jobs stimulus programs will be COSTLY, POLITICIZED and WILL FAIL.” (my caps)

For reasons of economic and societal health and stability (whether one enjoys listening to Rush’s show or not) we had better stop shooting the messenger and heed the message. Likewise for giving heed to the message of other brilliant conservatives. We might be able to help save this country from such a fate.

I think I’m still on topic, but if I got too far off, delete it or whatever you choose.

There’s no point in commenting after Sarah, since she covers it all.

But, Abbot, what’s offensive about calling Barney Frank a “gay” Congressman?  Frank is proud of it.  It’s true.  This fact is not the centerpiece of conservative criticism of Frank.  Corruption is, and poor judgment re:  Fannie Mae.

Sorry, can’t help myself.  One more thing on Iraq:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/feb/03/comment-iraq-elections

Sarah,

RE: “Probably for the best since so far, you’ve merely hidden behind your boilerplate about Limbaugh the “racist” and SF commenters the “homophobes.” So far—no rational argument from you has hit this thread.”

No rational argument at all??? Hmmm. I didn’t expect that we would agree entirely, but such dealing in absolutes is a sign of either irrationality or invincible intractability. More charitable minds than yours have already conceded the merits of at least a few points I have made.

RE: “you’re operationg with a conception that others ontological status and the wealth that comes from it is the State’s…”

I think you misread me here. Ideally, I would give the state as a secular entity no ontological purchase whatsoever, so I’m an Augustinian and not a statist. As I said above, however, we are living now and not in some ideal Medieval past or an imagined eschatological future. The church at present is disestablished and divided along confessional boundaries and so remains both incompetent and impotent as an instrument of comprehensive social justice. Given that this is the case, it is incumbent on Christians as individuals and as commmunities of faith to reckon their ontology and resources rightly and to work collaboratively with the system that is while remaining active in reforming it. What I object to is the continual conservative protestation that individuals are self-constituting and that their resources are ultimately their own. This is basic Cartesian modernity, but it is not Christian at all. I don’t think the state is omnicompetent, but I reject the notion that it is some impersonal thing that functions in independence of the collaboration of persons who are part of it. The notion that we must shrink government to the size that it can be “drowned in a bathtub” is ideological lunacy where the Church is unwilling and unable to assume its place in all the particulars. This ain’t a local food pantry writ large and anyone who imagines it to be so just hasn’t thought very deeply about the matter. You want limited government and so do I, but I think that the limits are better established at the military and emperical end than at further cost to the poor, the sick, & the middle class.

RE: “Limbaugh the ‘racist’ and SF commenters the ‘homophobes.’”

I remain unrepentant with regard to the former. Both the comments and my subsequent analysis of his discursive game stand on the merits. Contrary to your characterization of my opinions, however, I do not HATE him or conservative opinions generally. Indeed, I would think that my genuine praise for Walter Williams would have been an indicator of this. Secondly, I did not call any SF commentator a homophobe. I said that the remark itself was homophobic and I’m fairly certain that others would acknowledge the truth in that. Ask a few gay friends if you have any.

RE: “And that’s why you hate him.”

Contrary to your characterization of my opinions, I do not HATE Rush Limbaugh or conservative opinions generally. Indeed, I would think that my genuine praise for Walter Williams would have been an indicator of this. I do think that many of his comments are overtly racist (who knows what lies behind the schtick) and that his ideology as a whole depends for its life on a barely concealed, and therefore plausibly deniable, bigotry. I am disappointed that he gets so much play as a legit commentator and that moreso when his ideology is functionally equated with Christian orthodoxy. This has been on perfect display here when my critique of Limbaugh legitimated open speculation that I am not really Orthodox, not really and Anglican traditionalist, that I am heretical, or that I am a closeted homosexual.

With all due respect, I do not believe that some of the persons posting here would recognize racism if it bit them on the leg. If anyone here does not believe that Barak the Magic Negro is not racist per se then try “Matt the Magic Mick” or “Sarah the Stupid Cracker”. A little sensitivity goes a long way.

AndrewA,
I’ve been lurking on this site for a few days lately, and I owe you a big “Thank You!”.  I’m deployed out here in Iraq and it’s nice to have a friend at home sticking up for us as we seek to truly win this one.  Yes, the elections are a BIG WIN and suggest that we have turned the corner.  AL Sadr seems to be losing credibility and we are hopeful that more and more Shi’a will refuse to be puppets of the Persians (Iran).  Rush and Hugh Hewett are among the few in the media who seem to know what’s going on and how wise Bush was to pursue this campaign.  Folks in Iraq already appreciate the security we brought, except for Al Sardr’s folks and the Jihadists.  Someday America will appreciate what we’ve done here as well.  Blessings to you!

“Matt the Magic Mick”
I don’t know, I kinda like it…

God bless, Fr. Wes.

Malachi023, I think the parody song “Barack: the Magic Negro” is hilarious.  It’s clever satire.  It makes a very good point about the silly racial obsessions of the left.  On the other hand I’m a bit concerned that you think the word “negro” is an ethnic slur…

Oh, Malachi, Sarah/Oscewicee/Anybody the Stupid Cracker is one we’ve been hearing all our lives. This is supposed to be something new and shocking to us??

Did you vote for Barry just because he was black?  While you watched the inauguration, did you sit there the whole time and think, “Wow.  An African-American president.  Martin Luther King.”  Do you hear or read criticism of Barry and reflexively think “Stupid racist Klansman?”  If so, then lectures about “racism” coming from you ring more than a little hollow/

Hey Abbot,
Barack the Magic Negro first appeared in an editorial in the left wing LA Times.
Check in out and apologize.

Old Soldier,

#75 and #116. Check in out and apologize.

Christopher,

I’m not sure that I have given you sufficient warrant to judge that I even voted, much less that I voted for President Obama (Barry is a bit informal for my tastes as would be the use of “slick Willy” and “Bush”). And to your more specific question, I have already granted the partial validity at least of Ehrenstein’s “Magic Negro” critique of hyperventilating liberal beatification of the president whilst he was a candidate.

That being said, given that President Obama would have only counted as three-fifths of a person in 1787, I’ll confess to a measure of pride and gratitude at our having been able to transcend such heterodox ignorance.  That admission, however, doesn’t suggest that his race was a sole or even a sufficient reason to vote for his presidency. To the second part of your question, I only cry racism where I am able to defensibly identify it. It’s simply too important an issue to make the charge whimsically.

This may be off topic for this off topic thread but I have to comment that if we have to choose a media personality to represent conservatives I would choose Bill O’Reilly over Rush Limbaugh.

Malachi023, Post 131,
Although I don’t expect Sarah to magically change the country, I do think that “Sarah the Magic Cracker” sounds kind of cool.

#141 Betty See,
Betty that name will have to compete with “Her Royal Highness of Fisking” for Sarah. I know it’s not that imaginative but I said at the time that some would consider it faint praise. (I was trying to pull some unabashed male fawners out of the woodwork like Moot and AndrewA.)

I have to agree with you Don Dale #142, Her Royal Highness, Sarah, often does some magic Fisking and she should be recognized for that.

Re #139: The three-fifths of a person rule was actually designed to lessen the power of the South in Congress; by not being able to count slaves as full persons, the South had fewer Representatives than they would have had otherwise.

Miss sippi,

Hence the oft-used moniker: “Faustian compromise” or “Deal with the Devil.”

Chris Johnson,

RE: “Do you hear or read criticism of Barry and reflexively think “Stupid racist Klansman?”

Judging by this thread, I think that would be a “yes”!  ; > )

RE: “With all due respect, I do not believe that some of the persons posting here would recognize racism if it bit them on the leg.”

Yeh . . . especially when the definition of “racism” on this thread is a laughable “Rush is making fun of the liberals!  He is mocking our ideas!!!”

RE: ““Sarah the Stupid Cracker”

Go for it—I take most attempted insults from a liberal as a compliment. 

I’m basking in it now.  ; > ) 

And my self-esteem has risen exponentially.

RE: “Both the comments and my subsequent analysis of his discursive game stand on the merits.”

Right—they fall down in a limp puddle.  Your comments were utterly baseless and without merit.  Further, they were and are cowardly as they served merely to obscure your true ire with conservative ideals behind a facade of self-righteous and false smugness.

Nice.

Moving on to the source of your real ire . . . let me assert pretty much the opposite of what you assert when you finally got down to the brass tacks.

RE: “The church at present is disestablished and divided along confessional boundaries and so remains both incompetent and impotent as an instrument of comprehensive social justice.”

Of course, your notion of “social justice” is not mine.  So we don’t even start on the same playing field, playing the same game.  Beyond that, even were we to agree on what “social justice” is, the fact that the church is “disestablished” is a feature, not a bug, and the fact that it is “confessional” in no way mitigates its ability to provide help to your select communities, as in fact it did par excellence until the State decided to take over further income from its citizens and force further redistribution to segments it deemed worthy and full of potential votes.

RE: “Given that this is the case [sic], it is incumbent on Christians as individuals and as commmunities of faith to reckon their ontology and resources rightly and to work collaboratively with the system that is while remaining active in reforming it.”

I completely agree.  We should work within the Constitutional framework of this wonderful country, and where the State has abrogated to itself powers which do not belong to it we should work to reform that with all the strength we can.

RE: “What I object to is the continual conservative protestation that individuals are self-constituting and that their resources are ultimately their own.”

In regards to the relationship between government and the governed, the principle that “their resources are ultimately” the individuals is in fact a foundational principle of our country—it’s called “private property rights”  The fact that you wish to overturn this foundational principle of free and just societies is no big surprise.  Dictators the world over have likewise wished for this.

RE: “I don’t think the state is omnicompetent, but I reject the notion that it is some impersonal thing that functions in independence of the collaboration of persons who are part of it.”

I completely agree.  Conservatives who “collaborate” will work to lessen the state’s power and contain it within the principles of Constitutional limitation of powers upon which our nation was founded.  Liberals will of course fancy that the “collaboration of persons” will involve stealing more “resources” of individuals to give to their favored segments.

Again—no big surprise.

RE: “The notion that we must shrink government to the size that it can be “drowned in a bathtub” is ideological lunacy where the Church is unwilling and unable to assume its place in all the particulars.”

No it’s not.  Even were the Church “unwilling and unable”—which of course I do not grant—it is still in violation of the Constitution—our societal contract and the foundation of the best governmental system known to mankind—to expand the role of the State beyond the boundaries established by the Constitution.  Not to mention the fact that State-forced redistribution of wealth is immoral—and those who seek to aid such redistribution are engaging in envy, greed, and lust for power.

RE: “You want limited government and so do I, but I think that the limits are better established at the military and emperical end than at further cost to the poor, the sick, & the middle class.”

Of course you do.

At any rate, now that I’ve reiterated just how mutually opposing our foundational worldviews are—no surprise, again, as it was clear from the beginning that they were—there is still good news.

It looks as if you’ll have plenty of opportunity to engage in Marxist theory in the guise of denouncing “racism” [sic] and “homophobia” [sic] on many further threads.

As long as Rush is the main spokesperson for conservative principles, I’ll be posting off-topics on his thoughts when I find the time and interest.

The “dialogue” and “sharing” have been real.

Since I don’t think you’ll add anything new to this thread, you’re welcome to the last word here.  I need to slip away to some other threads.

Remember . . . the person who has The Last Word on the blog post—Wins.  ; > )

<blockquote>I think the parody song “Barack: the Magic Negro” is hilarious.  It’s clever satire.  It makes a very good point about the silly racial obsessions of the left.  On the other hand I’m a bit concerned that you think the word “negro” is an ethnic slur… <blockquote>

Nevin, I do believe that “Negro” is an ethnic slur just as I believe that “Mick” and “Cracker” and a hundred more epithets I could name are and I am very concerned that you don’t. The point I was trying to make is that what constitutes an ethnic slur many times depends on whose proverbial ox is being gored. Might I suggest that whether something is humorous or not is not the proper test of whether it is racist or not. I heard a lot of Irish jokes growing up which were both humorous and racist. Nevin, talk to someone who has been through the civil rights movement in the 60’s and ask them if Negro is an ethnic slur.

Oscewicee, I am truly sorry people called you stupid cracker. To be judged on anything other than merit is demeaning to you as a human being and hurts us all.

Malachi023, I don’t know how old you are.  The word “Negro” was, in my youth in the 1950s and early 60s, the correct and polite term for Americans of African descent.  An example is the United Negro College Fund.  This term had replaced the earlier “colored” which was by the 1950s out of vogue, but it had previously also been acceptable, as in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).  In the 1960s, the term “black,” which had previously been insulting, became the new description of choice when it was adopted by the black power movement. “Negro” remains polite, if outdated; “n****r” was of course never polite and still isn’t.

Thus the use of “Magic Negro” in the LA Times article and the parody is evocative of the generation both are talking about.  The parody makes fun, not of Obama, but of white liberals who have finally found a candidate they can support to assuage their white guilt.

Malachi023 #147,
I know I am betraying my age when I point this out, but I believe you are mistaken when you refer to the word Negro as an ethnic slur. Historically the word Negro was the only respectable way to refer to people of color or blacks (as they are called now). This was before any one even thought of referring to Negros as African Americans. 
The word Negro may begin with an N but it is not the “N” word.
You can find out more about the word at the following site
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negro

Katherine and Betty See,

Your appeal to historicity makes you either hopelessly anachronistic or quaintly disingenuous. Merely because something was acceptable at one time does not make it acceptable for all time. The next thing you will be telling me is that Marlowe’s “The Jew of Malta” is not antisemitic because it was acceptable at the time Marlowe wrote.

Malachi023, I’m not a liar, so that must make me an anachronism.  Are you telling me that “Negro” is now just as offensive as “n****r?”  I didn’t get that memo.  I do use “black” even though when I was growing up it was insulting.  So far as I ever heard “Negro” is outdated but inoffensive.

Of course Shakespeare was antisemitic, as were most of his time.  But “Jew” is still not a nasty word.

Read Betty See’s Wikipedia link.  It gives the use and derivation of the word.  It says it is now “often” considered an ethnic slur, but gives no examples.  This is absolutely news to me.  As we have no idea who wrote the Wikipedia article, or what “often” means and to whom and by whom this is an ethnic slur, I await enlightenment.

Limbaugh in nearly my age, and I would imagine the word in his lexicon still carries the neutral, non-pejorative tone it does in mine.  “Barack, the Magic Negro” scans much better to the tune of “Puff the Magic Dragon” than “Barack, the Magic Black” would—and the tune also tells you which generation this was aimed at.  Mine.

Barack the Magic Negro is intentionally racist, used by Rush as satire to point out the racism of the left. His point, for those of you who missed it, is that Barack is an “acceptable” black because he is not really black, like Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson.

He did not grow up in the hood, nor suffer racial discrimination in the US, because he did not live here until he was in his late teens.

His mother is white, is black father is Kenyan, so his experience as a “black” person in America is not the same as most other black people.

Rushes point is that because he is not from the hood, and is articulate and clean (Joe Biden’s racist comment),he is a black person who white liberals are comfortable with and will vote for.

The left wingers here will not see see that their treatment of blacks as people who eternally need help, and that this “help” prevents many blacks from achieving their potential, is racist.

Here are the words for those who are not familiar with the parody:
(sung by an Al Sharpton impersonator)

Barack the Magic Negro lives in D.C.
The L.A. Times they called him that
cause he’s not authentic like me.

Yeah the guy from the L.A. paper
said he made guilty whites feel good
they’ll vote for him and not for me
cause hes not from da hood.

See, real black men like snoop dogg
or me or Farrakhan
have talked the talk and walked the walk
not come in late and won.

Barack the Magic Negro lives in D.C.
The L.A. Times they called him that
cause he’s not authentic like me
cause hes black but not authentically.

Barack the Magic Negro lives in D.C.
The L.A. Times they called him that
cause he’s not authentic like me
cause hes black but not authentically.

Some say Barack’s articulate
and bright and new and clean
the media sure love this guy
a white interloper’s dream.

But when you vote for president
watch out and don’t be fooled
don’t vote the magic negro in
cause…

(background singing the first 3 lines, while the singer is saying)

Cause I wont have nothing after all these years of sacrifice and I wont get justice this is about justice this is about justice, buffet, I don’t have no buffet there wont be any church contributions there’ll be no cash in the collection plate, no cash money, no walkin’ around money…

Oh, thanks for posting the words, #153.  I can’t listen to the parodies on podcast overseas; they don’t put them on the podcasts for copyright license reasons.

The target was not Obama.  The targets were white liberals and Al Sharpton, whom Rush views as a hustler.

#150 Malachi023,
Malachi, how would one properly quote Abraham Lincoln or Dr. Martin Luther King if using the word “Negro” is considered racist? I would be offended if I were African American and some P.C. individual misquoted Dr. King in order not to offend contemporary ears.

Katherine, even older blacks don’t refer to themselves as “negroes” anymore and I never hear white people use the term either- even Merriam Webster carries the proviso that it is “sometimes offensive.” The only acceptable use I know is in the old organizational name, United Negro College Fund. The word has been pretty much out of use since the 1970s, and I think the reason it is found offensive is that it was the word that was corrupted into the infamous “n” word.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_Negro

Spike Lee originated the term in a lecture at Yale University in 2001.

I think it is rather ironic that some terms are pejorative when one uses that term to refer to another group but the same term is “endearing” when used among a like group of individuals. In one sense, it is a slur in the other is a mark of fellowship.

oscewicee, #156, I knew it wasn’t in current use anymore.  I switched, myself, so “black” once it became the preferred term.  I just didn’t know that “Negro” had become offensive. 

Given that Rush’s use of the term came from an opinion piece written by a black liberal in the LA Times, and, according to #157’s link, originally from Spike Lee, I think he gets a pass on this parody, agree with him or not on his targets.

There may be some people that find “negro” offensive, but that doesn’t make it an ethnic slur like the other word which no here even wants to spell out.  Obviously the LA Times didn’t find it offensive because they left it in the headline for that aforementioned article.  And Limbaugh doesn’t even use the word negro, he only put it in the song because of this specific reference.  Whether the iconic figure “Magic Negro” is a legitimate topic of scholarly interest in academia today or just the creation of left wing nut jobs (OK, they’re the same thing) I don’t know.

  It’s sometimes difficult to know how to refer to black people.  Is it African-American or black?  A few of us were discussing a new hire recently and one of my black coworkers asked us to point out the individual.  Attempting to be PC one said, “It’s, uh, the African American lady over there”.  The black guy snorted and said, “Oh, you mean the black girl?”

oscewicee wrote:

Katherine, even older blacks don’t refer to themselves as “negroes” anymore and I never hear white people use the term either- even Merriam Webster carries the proviso that it is “sometimes offensive.” The only acceptable use I know is in the old organizational name, United Negro College Fund. The word has been pretty much out of use since the 1970s, and I think the reason it is found offensive is that it was the word that was corrupted into the infamous “n” word.

I do not think that Negro morphed into the “N word”. Although Negro is earlier, according to Merriam Webster on line, both are ultimately derived from the Latin word for “black”. As far as I know, Negro has never been deliberately offensive; it has simply become old-fashioned/outdated, and Black appears to be headed in the same direction. I am probably considered rather old-fashioned nowadays for preferring to refer to myself as Black rather than African-American. I was certainly a Negro when I was a little girl.

As far as I am concerned, the current custom of some Black people calling one another “n*****” is far more offensive than Negro ever was or will be.

kyonge, I didn’t mean that the word Negro was originally offensive, but that the “n” word was twisted out of it by those who wanted to be insulting. When I was a little girl, Negro was the preferred word and the folks who meant to be hateful used the ‘n’ word instead. We share something here, in a weird way - when you said “I was certainly a Negro when I was a little girl,” I thought, well, I was crippled when I was a little girl. I am not sure how much changing the words really matter - being disabled is just as bad as being crippled was - but when the word becomes synonymous with a thoughtless dismissal, or, worse, with a wish to wound, then people who care about people don’t use the word.

Thanks, kyounge.  I am glad to know we anachronisms are not rude.  Personally, I don’t care for “African-American.” Does that mean the descendants of people brought here as slaves, recent black African immigrants, children of foreigners like our new President, or even white immigrants from former colonial African nations?  It’s confusing and non-descriptive.

And as to the other word, I’ve heard that; in fact, it’s been years since I heard a white person use the offensive word.  It’s deliberately demeaning.  Some word that describes the negative behavior the person engages in should be used, rather than this word that calls the person himself inferior.

On nomenclature, I think that the golden standard is referring to persons or to groups of persons as they wish to be referred to. It’s more than a question over potential offense or whether I judge that a preferred descriptor is “descriptive”; it’s about the power to name and to thereby define a person in some sense. While one may not be able to avoid this entirely, appropriate humility (still a Christian virtue, I think) dictates that we accept people as they offer themselves to us. Thus in a practical sense, I am strongly obliged to use African-American where that is the preferred term regardless of how useful I think the term is. In anthropology this is called respect for emic categorizations and the resistance to the use of etic categorizations.

With regard to Sarah’s parting shot, I acknowledge that there is a wide difference between our views of the world and of the implications of the Gospel for social and political thought. I think that the accusations of “Marxism” are simply the result of her overheated emoting, but (perhaps unsurprisingly) I would reject the description. My thinking on this, again, has been shaped in large part by St. Augustine’s City of God and his various letters dating from the first half decade of the fifth century. I have also read with great appreciation the writings of Anglicans, Rowan Williams and John Milbank on Augustine and have been significantly challenged as well by Reinhold Niebuhr. While my thoughts are in some sense my own, you can take up the big problems with Augustine himself. He’s your true opponent, not Marx.

#164 abbotcolumcille,
“While my thoughts are in some sense my own, you can take up the big problems with Augustine himself. He’s your true opponent, not Marx.” I never thought of St. Augustine as an “opponent” but as I said on an earlier post, (#101) I don’t share your politics. Additionally, you never answered my question.

DcnDale,

RE: “Do you think you could have been on the Radio three hours a day for even four years with no script and not said some stupid things?”

I assume this is the question to which you referred. Sorry, I thought it was rhetorical. My answer is that, Limbaugh never admits to the mistakes, never acknowledges the offense given, and continues to say similar offensive things. To quote President Obama, “It’s not never making mistakes; it’s owning up to them and trying to make sure you never repeat them.”

This suggests to me that Rush either doesn’t understand or doesn’t care that the prevailing opinion in minority communities is that he is a racist. Though there are admittedly some real exceptions to this opinion among African Americans and others (as I have noted and conceded), I suggest that the majority report among these communities is a fairly helpful barometer as to whether he, in fact, is a racist. At very least, one would think that this prevailing estimation would lead him to greater caution when touching on the subject of race. As Malachi023 noted above, a little sensitivity goes a long way.

Malachi023, #150,
This is a perfect example of the way revisionism confounds our language and renders us helpless to understand each other
If we accept your revisionist definition of the word “Negro” it almost makes Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech seem unintelligible, yet we know that Martin Luther King was proud of being a Negro.
You can find his speech here

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkihaveadream.htm

By the way, he was also proud of being a Christian.

Malachi023, #150,
I may be as “hopelessly anachronistic” as you suggest, but please remember that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

Betty See,

RE: “revisionism confounds our language and renders us helpless to understand each other.”

Hopefully this doesn’t anticipate Malachi’s response, but I think that what you have written here reveals a basic misunderstanding of how language (more specifically, “lexical semantics”) functions. You rightly intuit that one of the great problems in communication is the definition of words, but this problem is not solved by arguing for a concrete fixity of definition and meaning. Words just don’t have a neat and tidy meaning that is forever “written in the stars.” Rather, they receive their meaning from usage, in dynamics of a speaker’s intention, the context in which the speaker places them, and in the inference of the receptor of the communication. All of these are laden with assumed cultural and interpersonal conventions that are never written down. They are intuited in the course of the communication. This is why there are several entries under the word “love” in Webster’s Dictionary and why the word “bad” can mean either “evil” or “sexually attractive” depending on whether you hear the word in a Christian sermon or in a song by the Jackson Five. It does no good to protest because languages inevitably evolve. This is why you probably can’t understand this sentence even though it’s composed in plain English:

“His hors were goode, but he was nat gay. Of fustian he wered a gypon al bismotered with his habergeon, for he was late ycome from his viage, and wente for to doon his pilgrymage.”

The point is that over the period between the 1950s and today, the word “Negro” has taken on an antiquated and (ofttimes) offensive cast in the ears of the present-day African-American community. The same was true of the word “colored” even though you sometimes hear that term used by older black men and women. Both terms were largely the coinage of whites of the Jim Crow era and carry with them connotations of injustice and abused power. You may not intend the offense, but neither did my great-grandmother intend offense toward me when she called me a “gay child” (meaning that I was “happy”) while I was in my early teens. I trust you understand why I took offense as a singularly heterosexual kid in the thick of puberty.

Frustrating though this may be for you, the Golden Rule would suggest that you respect these sensibilities and refer to people the way they offer themselves to you rather than as you prefer to name and define them. This can also be spiritually healthy because it requires you to stay in conversational contact, and thus in relationship with others who are outside of your cultural and generational context.

Nice self-righteous lecture there at #169.  Words do change meaning.  I mourn the loss of “gay” in its earlier sense.  Lovely word, now completely unusable.  We have had one black lady (#161) comment that she doesn’t think “Negro” is offensive as yet, so there’s an opposing opinion at least as valuable as yours.  Betty See was merely pointing out that “Negro” used to be the polite, acceptable term and that many historically important books and speeches use it.  Would you have us, as many liberal activists insist, stop reading Mark Twain’s “Huckleberry Finn,”  which is a strong condemnation of treating people as objects rather than as people, because it contains the now definitely offensive “n-word?”

Yes, I can read Chaucer, and no, I’m not stupid, and I don’t think Betty See is either.

Abbotcolumcille #169,
Speaking historically, (as an anachronism would) during the 1940’s 50’s and 60’s, the people who treated Blacks with kindness referred to them as Negros and would never use the “N word“.
Those who hated Blacks used the “N word” and referred to white people who were kind to them with the epithet “N word’ lover”.
I don’t think Richard Wright who wrote “Black Boy”, considered Black a proper way to refer to Negros and I admit that the language has changed but I have to wonder if African Americans really object to the word Negro as strongly as politically correct wordsmiths claim they do.
You may consider history unimportant and think that it is unnecessary to be able to communicate with people of other generations or verbal experience but I believe that revising words at whim is detrimental to communication and that we may, someday, find ourselves in another Tower of Babel where it is impossible to understand each other.

Katherine, Thank you for the kind words.

“Negro” of course, is simply Spanish for “black”.  Considering Spanish to be offensive is something I normally associate with rascists.

I’m not at all convinced that abbotcolumcille is qualified to speak on behalf of every single black/African/Negro/whatever person in the world, nor do I think him/her to be qualified to invent motivation in another person. 

I also find “African-American” to be a poor term.  For one thing, it is too vague.  It places in the same category people whose ancestors have been in Virginia since Jamestown, people that moved in from Hati, and people straight off the airplane from Kenya.  It also leaves out that that have a legitimate claim to be of African descent, whether they be Egyptians or Afrikaaners.  Furthermore, if we want to look at this from a liberal perspective, the way the word is constructed is exclusionary, in that it places emphasis on African before American.  If we really want to be inclusionary, we should speak of Americans with African ancestory.  Bonus points if you can be specific about the type of African ancestory, instead of assuming that, say, a Zula is somehow just like an Ethopian, which is about like saying that a Slav is just like a Celt. 

Personally I try to avoid ALL racial (as apposed to ethnic) terminology.  It is so much nonsense anyway.  Why should a person with darker skin be any more identified as a seperate kind of person than a redhead?

#166 abbotcolumcille,
“RE: Do you think you could have been on the Radio three hours a day for even four years with no script and not said some stupid things? I assume this is the question to which you referred. Sorry, I thought it was rhetorical. My answer is that…..”
And You still didn’t answer my question but took it as another opportunity to go after Limbaugh. This has not been a discussion at all but an opportunity for you to use the comments of others for your own purposes.

Rather, they receive their meaning from usage, in dynamics of a speaker’s intention, the context in which the speaker places them, and in the inference of the receptor of the communication.

You have certainly given an excellent display of the meaning of “patronizing,” Abbot. You would be surprised at how many of us can read Chaucer. Some of us even went to school beyond third grade. In you heavy and ponderous explanation that, hey, language evolves (who knew?) you have left out the evolution that does not come from a process of *natural* selection (if such terms can accurately be applied to culture, and they can’t): the process by which I, for instance, changed from being “crippled” to “disabled” - a process that doesn’t seem to have been successful in getting English to swallow its latest euphemism, “differently abled.” It is almost like we have a leftist academy out there deciding what words mean ... today. Hurry, or you won’t be able to keep up.

There is, clearly, a generational difference in how the word “Negro” is perceived. There may be a geographical one, as well. In fact, there are a lot of English usages that have, as you point out, different understandings among different subsets of our culture. Which is why it behooves us to talk to people and learn and why Merriam-Webster says “Negro” is “sometimes” offensive.

Frustrating though this may be for you, the Golden Rule would suggest that you respect these sensibilities

I hope you respected your poor grandmother’s sensibilities as what she said about you was a charming thing for her to say ... if you had the ears to hear. May we all have ears to hear.

Regarding charges of self-righteousness, patronizing, and/or distorting the current state of the question among African Americans, I have only offered what I have learned from long experience and occasional mistakes. As I challenged Sarah earlier in the thread, talk this over with your black friends and see what their preference is. That’s how I found out.

The alternative, of course, is to insist on a static usage of terms, to take personal offense at being confronted, to insult persons who are uncomfortable with your chosen discourse, and to withdraw into ever-constricting mutual admiration societies.

Good luck with making that jibe with the church’s missional mandate in the world.

A google search turns up many references to Rush Limbaugh’a racist remarks, among them “You know who deserves a posthumous Medal of Honor?”  Read here:

http://newsone.blackplanet.com/obama/top-10-racist-limbaugh-quotes/comment-page-1/

Is there any debate about whether or not he actually made these comments?

St. James, read the thread above.

abbotcolumcille, you began here by calling political conservatives “racists” and “homophobes,” and you’ve never budged.  I’ll check with my [black] niece by marriage when she arrives to visit me soon to see if I’m a racist, and then maybe I should ask my [Thai] sister-n-law, whom I dearly love.  Self-righteous is the word for you, all right.

Katherine,

NO! I began here (as I have said on at least two occasions) by calling RUSH LIMBAUGH a racist and have defended that delimited opinion consistently throughout the thread. I also observed that a SINGLE COMMENT, written by ONE contributor was homophobic.

Asking your niece might be a good start, but you might want to work on basic honesty and even-handedness in dialogue even before that. Honestly, it is really hard to take you seriously as a discussion partner when you seem so bent on the deliberate distortion of my words for your own purposes.

NO! I began here (as I have said on at least two occasions) by calling RUSH LIMBAUGH a racist and have defended that delimited opinion consistently throughout the thread. I also observed that a SINGLE COMMENT, written by ONE contributor was homophobic.

Yet you began with:

All the praise of Limbaugh in this forum reveals the utter hypocrisy and homophobia resident at this sight.

You, sir, are a liar - and a very condescending one at that.

abbotcolumcille, just a question about your political views. We may have a duty to the poor, but does that mean we have the right to steal other people’s property in order to help them? Do you see there’s a real problem here? Or at least a real issue here that needs more than your facile call for more government intervention?

abbotcolumcille,
I am sure that Katherine’s neice does not think that she is a racist because Katherine probably treats her with respect and as an equal.
If you treat Blacks in the superior way that you treat those who post on this site I am afraid that they might get the impression that you are a racist no matter what word you use to describe them.

If taxation is “stealing other people’s property”, then one might have expected Jesus to have spoken out against it. Tax rebellions were common in the Roman empire.
There is a legitimate debate to be had on what rate of tax is appropriate in any society. But the attitude that “taxation is theft” comes from Leo Tolstoy rather than the Bible.

And so, this is where our worship at the altar of political correctness has led us.  Lest we say the wrong thing, let us say nothing at all.  I guess we can revert to sign language.  How typical of the so-called “enlightened” (code word for left-wing liberal) among us, yea the same people who find conservatives like Limbaugh (with whom I often disagree) so objectionable.  Entertaining or not, at least Limbaugh doesn’t pull any punches, and I admire any conservative willing to take a stand, even if doing so exposes himself to ridicule by the self-appointed pseudo-intellectuals on the left.