6 NEWS Controversy of the week
Rush Limbaugh: How he changed conservatism
“Conventional etiquette dictates that we do not speak ill of
the dead,” said Erin Gloria Ryan in TheDailyBeast .com,
but that never stopped Rush Limbaugh, who died of lung
cancer last week at 70. After Kurt Cobain’s suicide in
1994, the conservative talk-radio pioneer called the young
singer “a worthless shred of human debris.” At the peak
of the AIDS epidemic, Limbaugh would mirthfully
recite the names of dead gay men while playing
“I’ll Never Love This Way Again.” He was no less
cruel to the living. Women were “sluts” if they
wanted publicly funded contraception, and cas-
trating “feminazis” if they wanted careers, while
the 12-year-old Chelsea Clinton was ugly—the
“White House dog.” He once instructed a black
caller to “take that bone out of your nose,” and
consistently described African- Americans as lazy, crime-prone
ingrates demanding “redistribution” of his listeners’ money.
Limbaugh’s impact cannot be overstated, said Alex Shephard in
NewRepublic.com, and that’s not a compliment. The resentful,
nativist, truth- disdaining, “lib- owning” culture of today’s Right
was born and raised in Limbaugh’s studio. He “made America
worse’’—and Donald Trump “inevitable.’’
Liberals will never forgive Limbaugh, even in death, for break-
ing their “monopoly” on the national media, said Ben Shapiro
in The New York Times. Before 1988, the conservative ecosys-
tem amounted to a few niche magazines; a columnist or two;
and the polysyllabic erudition of William F. Buckley Jr.’s Firing
Line. Limbaugh changed all that. He proved that even the driest
tenets of conservative theory could be relayed in “understand-
able language.” His 20 million listeners found his funny, caustic,
“fighting spirit” not just entertaining but inspiring. Limbaugh
showed that conservatism “could be fun,” said Dan McLaughlin
in NationalReview.com. But as years passed and the nation’s
polarization deepened, Rush grew angrier, and “there was
more darkness and less light.”“Limbaugh wasn’t funny,” said Justin Peters in Slate.com.
His wit was that of “the prep school bully making fun of
the foreign-exchange student’s lunch.” He made himself
wealthy by persuading his mostly white audience they
were victims facing oppression and extinction from
hordes of minorities, feminists, and liberal elites. “In
Obama’s America,” he once told his listeners, “the
white kids now get beat up with the black kids cheer-
ing.” Like his fan and imitator Trump, Limbaugh
was “curiously devoid of any skill at argument,”
said Jonathan Chait in NYMag.com. Opposing
points of view were dismissed not with logic and evidence but by
brute “assertion, mockery, and resentment.” His was the voice of
the conservative id, paranoid and belligerent, and it came to domi-
nate not only right-wing media but the Republican Party itself.
“The line from Limbaugh to Trump is about an inch long.”Limbaugh’s talent for radio was real, said Charles Sykes in The
Washington Post, and early on, he led the conservative movement.
By the end, Limbaugh was “very much a follower, scrambling to
keep up” with his listeners as Trump led them ever deeper into the
fever swamps of extremism and conspiracy theories. For conserva-
tives, Limbaugh was a “monkey’s paw,” bringing wish fulfillment
at a terrible cost, said Ross Douthat in The New York Times. He
was a true pioneer who created a right-wing media infrastructure of
enormous reach and energy. But over time, he replaced the “gentle-
manly” conservative optimism of Buckley and Reagan with an insu-
lar, truth- denying cult of grievance that “helped make conservatism
less popular.” His ultimate legacy is of “ashes and defeat.”Only in America
QThe Republican Party of
Oconto County, Wis., has
rejected a resolution con-
demning political violence.
The resolution condemns“all
political violence of the past
year” while calling for “free,
open, and civil discourse.” But
a majority of party members
voted no, reportedly objecting
to being “told ‘what is right
and wrong.’”
QThe Disney+ streaming
channel is preceding replays
of The Muppet Show with an
“Offensive Content” warn-
ing. “This program includes
negative depictions and/or
mistreatment of people or
cultures,” reads the warning—
a reference to puppets some-
times wearing Asian, Middle
Eastern, or Native American
costumes. The warning ex-
presses hope that airing these
“harmful” images will “spark
conversation to create a more
inclusive future together.”The bespectacled,with a new study from India suggesting that
people who wear glasses may be up to three times less likely to
contract coronavirus. Researchers theorize that glasses prevent
their wearers from rubbing their eyes with contaminated hands.
Grace,after Dolly Parton formally asked Tennessee lawmakers to
shelve plans to erect a statue of her on the grounds of the state cap-
itol. “Given all that is going on in the world, I don’t think putting
me on a pedestal is appropriate at this time,” tweeted the country
legend, 75. She suggested the state wait until “after I’m gone.”
West Virginia,which is among the world and national leaders in
Covid-19 vaccination rates, having administered 100 percent of the
436,000 doses it has received. “Not bad for a bunch of hillbillies,”
said Maj. Gen. James Hoyer, head of the state’s vaccine task force.Mike Lindell, the MyPillow CEO, who declared himself “so
happy” that Dominion Voting Systems sued him for $1.3 billion.
Lindell says the suit will enable him to prove his claim that Domin-
ion’s voting machines were rigged against Donald Trump.
The breakfast of champions,with news that customs inspec-
tors in Ohio intercepted a package containing 44 pounds of corn-
flakes frosted with cocaine instead of sugar. A narcotics detection
dog named Bico sniffed out the creative smuggling effort.
Line jumping,after two women showed up at a Florida Covid
vaccination site “dressed as grannies,” with bonnets and spectacles,
so they could receive their second injections. When suspicious staff
asked for ID, it turned out one woman was 34, the other 44.Good week for:
Bad week for:
Newsco
mEl Rushbo: The conservative idIn other news
Manchin may sink
Biden’s OMB pick
Neera Tanden’s nomination
to lead the Office of Manage-
ment and Budget was in
major jeopardy his week after
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.)
said he would oppose her
candidacy because of insulting
comments she’d made in the
past about GOP lawmakers
on social media. Two Senate
committees postponed votes
on Tanden’s nomination.
Democrats accused Manchin
and Republicans of applying a
sexist double standard to Tan-
den, who would become the
first woman of color to head
the OMB. Manchin had voted
to confirm former President
Trump’s nominee for ambas-
sador to Germany, Richard
Grenell, who also had a history
of Twitter trolling. Manchin
said Tanden’s tweets would
create a “toxic” relationship
between OMB and Congress.