Limbaugh says Fox News 'caved' in Sherrod coverage
CNN Political Ticker
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Rush Limbaugh said Thursday on his radio show that Fox News and at least one of its anchors "caved" in its coverage of Shirley Sherrod, the former USDA employee who was fired in haste on Monday after an edited clip of her was posted on a conservative website.
"I have to go after it … because even Fox caved on this," Limbaugh said. "Even Shep Smith. Even poor old Shep Smith went down there and said that everybody's wrong on this, that [BigGovernment.com founder Andrew] Breitbart is wrong and so forth. There's only a handful of us that have the guts to put this story straight. If we don't hammer back nobody will."
Limbaugh dismissed the story, saying he was bored by it.
Washington's 20 saboteurs
John Avlon
The Daily Beast
Programming Note: John Avlon will appear on tonight's AC360°
They think you're stupid.
[cnn-photo-caption image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/images/03/25/art.getty.rush.limbaugh.jpg caption="Rush Limbaugh ranks on Avlon's list of Washington saboteurs."]
Ninety-three percent of Americans believe that Washington is too partisan, according to a Wall Street Journal/NBC poll taken one month ago.
That's not a subtle message. Ninety percent of Americans rarely agree on anything—60 percent is a landslide mandate in elections. But the professional partisans and pundits in Washington have been falling over themselves arguing that bipartisanship is a fool's game as of late. They insist that Americans must get more sophisticated when it comes to the ways of Washington and embrace the town's bitter and predictable partisanship as both wise and inevitable.
Limbaugh too risky for NFL
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Roland S. Martin
CNN Contributor
Rush Limbaugh stood a better chance of suiting up in an NFL game before he would ever step foot in an owners suite as a limited partner in any ownership group.
We can sit here and say that the decision by the partnership trying to pursue the St. Louis Rams decided to put Rush out to pasture because of his hateful words against African Americans and so many others over the years he has been on the radio, but the reality is that the National Football League is the biggest and baddest of all sports leagues, and they were not going to allow anyone – including the guy who just signed a $400 million contract – to mess with their money.
There is nothing that the NFL doesn’t sell to sponsors. Whether stadium naming rights, billboards, suites, and official sponsors of any and everything, corporate America is as much a part of the NFL as the players. And we all know that corporate America likes things squeaky clean, and if anyone gets in the way of the brand, they are removed from the scene. Quickly.
Don't blame Limbaugh for our faults
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LZ Granderson
CNN
Things ain't what they used to be.
That sentiment harkens back to a simpler day in which innocence was not met with sarcasm, a man's word was his bond and yadda yadda yadda. What a bunch of crap.
I would like to know which time period in this country's history that phrase is referring to - during the witch hunts? Trail of Tears? Television's "Happy Days" would lead you to believe life in the '50s and '60s was all about high school dances and hot fudge sundaes, but many of us know that was hardly the case.
No, if we take an honest look at this country's 233 years, what we will find are moments of brilliance and triumphs, moral bankruptcy and hypocrisy and a great deal of denial and revision by everyone. It is because of our tendency to rewrite unpleasant aspects of our history that we struggle to make the kind of significant social progress we need to truly realize the American Dream.
Sources: Limbaugh dropped from group seeking to purchase Rams
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Don Banks
Sports Illustrated
If conservative radio commentator Rush Limbaugh ever had much of a chance to be a minority owner in a successful bid to buy the NFL's St. Louis Rams, it is now over, two league sources have confirmed to SI.com.
In a statement released Wednesday evening by St. Louis Blues chairman Dave Checketts - who is heading the group that hopes to buy the Rams - he announced Limbaugh's official exit from the bid. It is believed that Limbaugh's controversial participation would have doomed the group's effort in the eyes of NFL owners. League sources told SI.com that Limbaugh's candidacy in any Rams bid had "zero chance" of being approved by the league's owners. In his statement, Checketts said Limbaugh's participation had become "a complication and a distraction" to the group's efforts.
According to league sources, Limbaugh comes with too much troubling baggage in terms of his outspoken views that often intersect the divisive issues of politics and race in America. In a time when the NFL is hoping to have complete uniformity among its team owners in anticipation of the tough collective bargaining negotiations to come with the players union, there was little interest within the league to associate with an owner who is paid to give his highly charged opinions on the radio for hours each week.
"The league would be on pins and needles for three hours a day, five days a week," one league source said. "The NFL isn't interested in having its own Mark Cuban situation, where [the Dallas Mavericks owner] is fined for something he said, but then pays the fine, moves on and doesn't care what he says the next time either. The league wants the focus to always be on the game, not the opinions of any particular owner."
Sharpton's letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell
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Reverend Al Sharpton
President, National Action Network
Dear Mr. Goodell:
I was disturbed to learn that there is a potential bid by Rush Limbaugh to buy the St. Louis Rams and I would like to request a meeting with you to discuss the myriad of reasons as to why he should not be given an opportunity to do so. Rush Limbaugh been divisive and anti-NFL on several occasions with comments about NFL Players including Michael Vick and Donovan McNabb and his recent statement that the NFL was beginning to look like a fight between the Crips and the Bloods without the weapons, was disturbing.
I commend the executive director of the NFL Players Association DeMaurice Smith for publicly asking that the League seek to unify not divide in a letter to the executive committee.
Mr. Smith courageously implored that the league reject divisiveness, and we, at National Action Network,
and countless people across the country, strongly echo his sentiments.
I look forward to hearing from you to set up a meeting in the near future.
In Progress,
Reverend Al Sharpton
President, National Action Network
St. Louis Rams fans sound off
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Jeff Roman
Rams Gab
News has come out over the past few days about a bids to buy the Rams by a group headed by Rush Limbaugh and a group headed by St. Louis Blues owner Dave Checketts. But, St. Louis Post-Dispatch has learned that the two are joining forces to submit a bit on the Rams.
First, the good news. If a group lead by Dave Checketts, owner of the Blues, purchases the 60% stake in the Rams, the Rams will not be able to leave St. Louis. Because of the NFL’s ownership rules, Checketts can own two sports teams, but they both have to be in the same city. Considering that Checketts is a new owner of the Blues, he wouldn’t be in a hurry to sell the Blues to move the Rams. Additionally, Rush Limbaugh is from Cape Girardeau, MO, so he will have a vested interest in keeping the Rams in St. Louis.
The de facto problem with de facto leadership
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Ken Olshansky
Senior Producer, CNN'S D.L. Hughley Breaks the News
It was a noisy week here at D.L. Hughley Breaks the News.
Last weekend, in a conversation with Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele, D.L. called Rush Limbaugh the ‘de facto leader of the Republican party’. “No he’s not,” Mr. Steele asserted. “I’m the de facto leader of the Republican party.”
Then Saturday, Rush Limbaugh—the “incendiary” entertainer himself—gave an energetic address (OK, that’s an understatement) to the Conservative Political Action Committee, in defense of his statement that he wants President Obama to fail.
And on Sunday morning on “Meet the Press”, the president’s chief of staff Rahm Emanuel called Rush Limbaugh the “voice and the intellectual force and energy behind the Republican Party."
These three incidents came together to create a firestorm of cable news chatter. But the problem with firestorms is that they throw off a lot more heat than light. In all the talk, we missed a chance to talk about what we really need: a loyal opposition.
Look, I’m as excited about our new president as the next guy, but presidents are like toddlers (OK, some presidents more than others…). They need firm boundaries or they’ll end up hurting somebody. A loyal opposition provides those boundaries: keeping the president and the ruling party accountable; questioning the motivation behind policy decisions; and most importantly, forcing the president and his party to defend their actions to the voters.
Voters can be supportive of the president and his party, but they shouldn’t be blindly loyal. We need a loyal opposition to keep our system functioning.
But… when the opposition gets all hot and sweaty, and jumps around like the Vegas-period Elvis … we don’t really need that so much.
Rush Limbaugh debate is idiotic
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Ed Rollins
CNN Contributor
The cold winds of March have obviously affected the intelligence and thought processes of people who need to get their thinking straight.
The idiotic debate raging in Washington this week around Michael Steele, the newly elected chairman of the nearly defunct Republican Party, and Rush Limbaugh, a conservative icon for the past 35 years, is beyond foolish.
The battle to be the "de facto leader" of this party is akin to the question of who wants to steer the Titanic after it hit the iceberg. Who represents the party or its values is not relevant when only 26 percent of voters have a positive impression of the party at all and only 7 percent very positive, according to the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News survey.
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