Rush Was Right

I wrote this long ago and I’m leaving it mostly as-is:

Rush Limbaugh is right sometimes, and my low opinion of him does not discount the truth when he speaks it.

I quit following football ages ago, but I would pick up the highlights here and there at the gym. One morning back in 2003 I remember hearing about Rush’s comments regarding Donovan McNabb, and instinctively I felt he was spot-on.

With locker room SportsCenter segments alone, I was able to pick up on a narrative that fits right into Rush’s assertion:

I think what we’ve had here is a little social concern in the NFL. The media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well. They’re interested in black coaches and black quarterbacks doing well . . . McNabb got a lot of the credit for the performance of the team that he really didn’t deserve.

What interests me most is not the issue in the arena of football, but rather the automatic refusal to consider the possibility that Rush was right.

And he was most certainly on the mark for questioning how much race factored into Obama’s rise to the presidency.

In Toxic Talk, Bill Press takes issue with Rush’s belief . . .

If Barack Obama were Caucasian, they would have taken this guy out on the basis of pure ignorance long ago.

That may be taking it too far, but there’s an underlying truth to what he said.

The Bush years coupled with Clinton’s brought a legacy of baggage into the equation that made Obama look a lot better than what he actually was.

Anyone with an inkling of objectivity knows that.

By letting his revulsion of Rush trump reason, Press conveniently ignores the fact that Obama was undeserving of being seen as some kind of messiah.

They’re all unworthy

It’s impossible for me to root for someone inauthentic — whether they serve my interests or not.

When I was in elementary school, we went on a field trip to a local campaign office. While I was there they talked a bit about elections and parties.

Back when people could talk and stuff — without going batshit crazy over it.

I didn’t think for one second that anyone was trying to steer me in any direction — they were just explaining how it all works.

So if I sign up for this party, I’d believe in this, and for the other, I believe in that. I went away thinking . . .

Um, that’s not gonna work for me.

I don’t care for religion for the same reason — as I don’t like having my beliefs being prescribed to me.

Press had no such notion.

He’s so locked into the idea that Rush has a problem with blacks — that he can’t past his preconceived beliefs.

And he doesn’t want to

It is not that being black helped just any candidate, but rather that it served this candidate –given that Obama is biracial and has a unique upbringing.

Looking the part has a great deal to do with becoming president, and Obama looks presidential by our superficial standards.

Geraldine Ferraro and Rush are in opposite camps, and yet she said essentially the same thing as he did:

If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman (of any color), he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept.

Every word of her statement is true, but that didn’t matter to those who bombarded her with “vicious e-mail messages accusing her of racism.”

Utterly ridiculous

In a follow-up interview, Ferraro said she was “not trying to diminish Obama’s candidacy, and acknowledged up front that she would not have been the vice presidential nominee in 1984 if she had been a man.”

All she was trying to say was that Obama lacked experience and that the media was overplaying his qualifications — and I couldn’t agree more.

Because it’s the truth — and that’s what’s I do.

Easily the most obvious example of how overly-hyped President Obama is can be found in Hardball’s Chris Matthews.

He has been a disciple of Obama’s since the beginning, and Matthews did not even bother to hide it on Tuesday, February 12, 2008, the day of the D.C., Maryland, and Virginia primaries:

I have to tell you, you know, it’s part of reporting this case, this election, the feeling most people get when they hear a Barack Obama speech. My, I felt this thrill going up my leg. . . .
No, seriously, it’s a dramatic event. He speaks about America in a way that has nothing to do with politics, it has to do with the feeling we have about our country, and that is an objective assessment.