On Fri, Mar 2, 2012 at 5:52 AM, Joe Hass <[email protected]> wrote:
> I have always operated under the assumption that Limbaugh is, at his core, > an entertainer. When political figures suddenly act as if he's a king maker > of some kind, they're doing nothing but helping him. > > His audience is dwindling, slowly but surely. I think he knows his end > game is closer. He can also read the tea leaves that shows his audience now > wants this rarer and rarer red meat. And he provides it to them (as Westley > notes). > > I'd also note that this critical mass of people are probably not making > the connection between this "slut" and the females in their lives, either > because they don't have those females in their lives for whatever reason, > or the women in their lives are just different. These are the people who > probably assume PBS/NPR takes up 5% of the federal budget. To quote Gene > Wilder, "You know...morons." > > And yet the MSM just loves enabling him, just like Charlie Sheen and any > other figure who really should be ignored or at least respected. So he says > this, and it gets a rise out of people, and once again we're talking about > Limbaugh, and for a day or two, he's won. > > I also think he watched the epic rise and fall of Beck and laughed at his > hubris for two reasons: he knows the moment you get people hooked on > conspiracy, you've got to keep going deeper and deeper into the well; and > he's smart enough not to step out of his little cocoon in Florida. > > I'd score this as a red meat throw, acknowledging the meat's getting > bloodier and rawer. And I would never connect him with Buchanan. As I > mentioned in a previous thread, Buchanan had the political chops from way > back when. Rush hasn't run for anything that didn't involve a dinner bell. > > I agree with the Limbaugh as entertainer scheme - but I guess my point (from far afield) is that even in that context this most recent scene seems to have badly misread his audience. The parallel to Buchanan is not that they play the same role, but that both recently (perhaps fooled by the dramatic changes in the extremes of the discourse at the most crazy ends of the internet bandwidth) seem to have misjudged the parameters of their distinct roles, and overstepped them. A similar parallel, in a different direction, might be comic like Michael Richards, who infamously lost track of the lines on the playing field he was performing on, and stepped way over the out of bounds marker, apparently still thinking he was operating with the field of play of an edgy stand-up. Buchanan seems to believe that he was still operating within his usual parameters as a curmudgeonly working class conservative Catholic, and Limbaugh seems to think he is still operating within the bounds of a conservative radio shock-jock. -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en
