Don't like what Rush Limbaugh says? Just ignore him

Don't like what Limbaugh says? Just ignore him

  http://www.suntimes.com/news/cepeda/1832357,CST-EDT-esther19.article

BY ESTHER J. CEPEDA

We like to think we live in a free country. Sure there are taxes to pay, seat belts to click, but for the most part, you're pretty much free to do whatever tickles your fancy.

Unless you're Rush Limbaugh, that is.

If you hadn't heard, the fiery radio star was one of several investors in a group that is considering buying the St. Louis Rams football team. After a tempest in a teapot that included bystanders citing top 10 lists of Limbaugh's most racist comments, and the outrage of the Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson tag team, the investor group dumped him to make a potential offer work.

Limbaugh has become a toxic asset, a way bigger liability than his good old American greenbacks are worth, a victim of his popularity among the crowd that embraces his hard right -- some say racist and sexist -- ideology.

Now that Limbaugh's detractors have proved him financially rich but too morally impoverished to buy a piece of a struggling NFC West team, they're gleeful that he'll have no part of the mostly family-friendly National Football League. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell is surely relieved he dodged the "What did Limbaugh say now?!" bullet and won't have to start dreading his PR staff's calls to his cell phone.

But really, doesn't it all seem like a bit much? It is incredible to me how people despise Rush Limbaugh. You can probably find places where he's burned in effigy on Friday nights just for laughs.

You have to wonder: Why do otherwise rational people expend so much of their precious energy on hating a hater? Limbaugh has free-speech rights just like the rest of us. And if he uses those rights to talk smack about people, then there's only one good way to deal with his vitriol: just ignore it. Really, stop giving him so much power.

This goes for the Lou Dobbs' and the Glenn Becks and the Ann Coulters of the world. And if you're a conservative, it goes for your liberal archenemies such as Michael Moore, Keith Olbermann and Markos "Daily Kos" Moulitsas Zuniga, too -- if you don't like what they're all frothed up about, turn the channel or surf away. It's easy.

In the end, the NFL players who felt troubled about a potential Limbaugh ownership stake made their own fuss and were heard. The football league and the investor group tallied the threats and opportunities and said goodbye to Rush.

Though apparently effective, the take-away lesson from this is not that the best strategy to complain about a media personality's content is to enlist career civil rights activists to derail a financial sports transaction.

It is not -- Rush Limbaugh lives on in all his glory. This has scored him tons of publicity and he has been freshly armed with new fodder for his endless complaints about the liberal activists' hold on the mainstream media.

Now he's some sort of football investor angel martyr to his breathless fans. And exactly how does that help the people who think Limbaugh's views are hurting them or their way of life?

And yet the St. Louis Rams are still looking for a buyer with a loaded checkbook.

That's just plain silly. If Limbaugh wanted to put his cash into a football team, it should not have been derailed by those offended by the legal, First Amendment-protected methods Limbaugh uses to earn his living.

Money is money. It's all green, it's all dirty, and it all pays the bills.

Instead of stopping Limbaugh from spending his money as he pleases, his detractors should focus on finding a way to keep it from getting into his pockets to begin with.

 

Comments

[Mexitli]

Estas Loca.

[Paul]

The NFL decides who becomes an owner not the other way around.

All this blowhard (Rush Hudson Limbaugh A.KA. Jeff Christie) has to offer is his money and his opinions, which in my opinion are on the fringes of racism (one mans opinion). There are many more groups biding for the Rams, not just his group. Lets face it there are more men with money that will gladly fill the slot and the Rams will win or lose depending on how well the team works together and not on whether or not Rush is an owner.

As for Vick, well he is a player (he has talent not like you, Rush or I, unless you are a NFL player?) and he served his time and the NFL decided we live in the land of second chances, so why not (I personally don’t like it but, oh well). Life has never been fair (NEWS FLASH!)

Now as to the “Free Speech” argument, I guess many of you like myself heard Rush on Thursday “Almost in tears”, priceless. But the last two days he now is in his normal ranting and will continue until someone surpasses him, “Free Speech” continues, so quit your whining.

http://www.chasingevil.org/2009/10/rush-limbaugh-in-his-own-words.html

[ED]

Equating Rush Limbaugh on the right to Michael Moore on the left is not only simple-minded and plain stupid but it is also irresponsible. But what else can we expect from Esther

[Paul]

It seems to me that all the negative vibes this blowhard (Rush Hudson Limbaugh A.KA. Jeff Christie) has been spewing over these many years has come back to blow back on his face (A classic “Blow Back”). He always tries to give off the airs that he can have anything he wants but as we all witness those with more money and more influence tossed him aside like sack of potatoes and the ultimate insult was that it was done in public (money don’t buy you everything butterball).

Now of course he blames everyone else (Michael J. Fox, Perez Hilton, Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Sonia Sotomayor, Hillary Clinton, Olympia Snowe, ESPN, NFL, the media, basically people of color, the handicapped, women and gays) when of course all you have to do is listen to his show and plainly hear his daily prejudices filled sermons. So NFL, I salute you decision, job well done. And to the whaling cry baby perched on his self made pedestal, quit your whining it was your own fault. He is reaping what he has sowed, KARMA, "palin and simple" like his followers. Don’t we all feel better?