Posted on 03/05/2012 11:51:28 AM PST by raccoonradio
The tally of advertisers who have pulled their spots from PREMIERE NETWORKS host RUSH LIMBAUGH's show over his comments about law student/activist SANDRA FLUKE last week (NET NEWS 3/2) now stands at nine, although it is presently unclear whether LIMBAUGH's weekend apology (NET NEWS 3/3) will result in any returning advertisers or whether the advertising suspensions are permanent or temporary.
The list of advertisers pulling spots from LIMBAUGH's show includes CALIFORNIA regional mattress chain SLEEP TRAIN and national advertisers QUICKEN LOANS, CITRIX (GOTOMYPC), SLEEP NUMBER, PROFLOWERS.COM, CARBONITE (which initially said it would hold off pulling its ads until its CEO spoke to LIMBAUGH), AOL, and LEGAL ZOOM. QUICKEN LOANS' sister CLEVELAND CAVALIERS have pulled spots from LIMBAUGH's show on CLEAR CHANNEL Talk WTAM-A/CLEVELAND, which happens to be the team's flagship station, according to WTAM, citing TALKING POINTS MEMO. Most recently, MICHAEL ROZBRUCH of TAX RESOLUTION SERVICES tweeted: "We have decided to join other advertisers and suspend our sponsorship of The RUSH LIMBAUGH Show."
Limbaugh Opens Show With Apology And Barbs At Obama, Left
At the outset of his show TODAY, LIMBAUGH joked about canceling his own company's "TWO IF BY TEA" commercials but being unable to get past a busy signal. "Give me 30 minutes here," he said, "and then you can do what you want."
Taking a shot at the left for what he described as saying and doing anything to make its point, LIMBAUGH said, "In fighting this issue last week, I became like them ... I descended to their level ... I became like them, and I feel very badly about that." He added, "I do not think that she is either of those two words ... the apology over the weekend was sincere ... I became like the people we oppose."
He then went on to criticize President OBAMA's "socialist agenda" and "extra-constitutionally" making moral judgments over what private insurance plans cover, and recounted his version of the timeline of the issue and Rep. DARRELL ISSA (R-CA)'s rejection of FLUKE's bid to testify before Congress. "All of this," LIMBAUGH said, "is political," adding that the examples of women denied coverage of contraception by GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY's health plan that FLUKE sought to testify about were anecdotal and "unprovable" hearsay, and that FLUKE, knowing that GEORGETOWN is a Jesuit Catholic school, went there to change the policy. He repeated his apology's assertion that the segments from last week were intended as satire and prompted by reports of FLUKE claiming that she could not afford birth control. "I acted too much like the leftists that despise me," he said. "It's wrong, and that's why I apologized. Don't be mad at them or mad at her, everybody was being true to their nature except me."
On the departed advertisers, he said he is "sorry to see them go," but noted that they had done well through their access to the LIMBAUGH audience. "It's a business decision and it's theirs to make. They've decided that they don't want you, and so be it." He said that he "knew the political inclinations" of the advertisers and that they didn't care, nor did he, as long as they were making money. He said that he rejects "millions" of dollars a year from potential advertisers, including, he claimed, GENERAL MOTORS. He said the show will "replace those who leave... who no longer want your business" and advised listeners to "make your own decision" on doing business with those advertisers. And he repeated the apology as well as his assertion that the left does not apologize for its own comments (including BILL MAHER's calling SARAH PALIN names) and that the right should not descend to the left's level.
Fluke Isn't Impressed With Apology
FLUKE, appearing on ABC-TV's "THE VIEW," said that the apology didn't change anything for her. "I don't think that a statement like this issued, saying that his choice of words was not the best, changes anything," she said, "and especially when that statement is issued when he's under significant pressure from his sponsors who have begun to pull their support."
One Activist Wants Clear Channel To Do More
Meanwhile, the same activist who issued a press release rejecting CLEAR CHANNEL's offers after Talk KFI-A/LOS ANGELES hosts JOHN AND KEN as not enough did the same regarding LIMBAUGH, issuing another pair of press releases reiterating her intention to complain to the FCC. JASMYNE CANNICK's JOHN AND KEN release contradicted the comments of other activists who had met with KFI officials, including PROJECT ISLAMIC HOPE leader NAJEE ALI, who told the LOS ANGELES TIMES, "Mission accomplished. We got everything we asked for."
She is an adult,advocting a whorish lifestyle.
This is just PC speak now, where you can't use the word 'bum' or 'drunk' because they are considered 'judgmental' words.
Conservatives have to learn that if we give up the word battle, we will lose the battle for ideas.
You win the subtlety contest.
Just cancelled my Carbonite subscription and sent them an email applauding them for making a stupid business decision.
Carbonite was nothing until they started advertising on Rush! Maybe Mozy will fill their time now?
! Ditto
So IOW, use these vile words like the left? Freedom Of Speech is not free without responsibility, Rush acted very gracious and did the right thing by upholding his standard and apologizing. His word choice was wrong because Ms. Fluke did not deserve this distasteful language and he is not this kind of human being to insult someone as such. He has character unlike like many on the left.
I'm proud of him today for upholding a higher standard.
The word 'slut' is not a 'dirty word', it is an accurate word, describing one's behavior.
The fact that you would use the initial 'Ms' shows me that you have already bought into the false PC language.
The Left invented 'Ms' because they didn't want anyone to know if a woman was married or not, as being 'judgmental'.
MISS Fluke is an advocate of a whorish lifestyle, and the breakdown of the family.
She willingly came on his radio station and thus, should have expected a reaction against her radical agenda.
You aren't going to beat the Left with 'nice' words.
You need to call them what they are and return to using words like drunk, bum, coward, whore, whoremonger-good old fashioned words that were clear and precise.
That is why the Left hates them and then demands that the Right be 'polite', as they rip us to threads.
His apology only added fuel to the fire and the Left only saw that as a first step in his 'reeducation'.
Did the Imus apology save him?
My on-line dictionary defines slut as a slovenly or promiscuous woman. Sounds pretty accurate to me.
And yet he can't articulate that to the people who would or could identify with him. If he can't convince "us" in the war of ideas, how can he engage the independents and moderates to be against Obama?
He should have triple-downed on his critique.
He still would have lost his advertisers. He still would have been battered by the MSM. And he still wouldn’t have his apology accepted. But he would at least have his pride and convictions.
Pathetic
If RUSH’s motives were so pure, he would have apologized after the first commercial break of making those comments.
The only reason he apologized is because he began bleeding sponsors. It was purely damage control.
It’s insulting to his audience to claim otherwise.
His initial point was correct - what do you call someone who wants to get paid to have sex?
I’m not sure what’s wring with making that point - other than the leftist hypocrisy.
Sticking to your convictions and standing up for the first amendment is what we are desperately missing from our elected officials...and now apparently from our conservative media.
AMEN!!
Did you catch his Meet the Press interview with Gregory? Literally breathtaking. He can handle the MSM.
It might have added "Fuel to the fire" but guess who I and many others will trust more? Guess who I and many others know has more character? Guess who has already beaten the left and their PC crap?
Rush most certainly did the right thing by apologizing and upholding HIS standard, not the left's.
The left has no standards because they take no responsibility!
“I have been paying for Aol since at least 95 despite my family telling me to drop it. So today I finally cancelled.”
Check your credit card statement like a hawk for the next few months to make sure you are not still being billed for canceled service.
Says who? Newt has absolutely NO problem articulating sound principles and policy. Mittens spends his millions repeating lies about Newt and then gets his a$$ handed to him every debate so far. Mitt cannot beat Obama because he is not a conservative. No moderate (and that's being kind to Willard) is going to beat Obama.
Santorum is a good guy, but he's not the conservative spokesman to beat Obama. He's been the fortunate recipient of being off to the side when Mitt was spending all that money to take Newt out (recall Newt was FAR out ahead of Mitt at the time). There is only one candidate who can beat Obama -- Newt Gingrich.
Go Newt!
I listened to Rush today and formed the complete opposite opinion, especially after mentioning that GE is wanting on his show badly. Also it appears that Clear Channel is ardently behind him.
In my opinion Rush made a bad error. Well he’s human. Ye gads we’re all human and we all FLUKE UP from time to time. The bigger person is the one who admits it,offer apologies, and moves on. Rush did just that in my opinion; I won’t attempt to change yours.
My on-line dictionary defines a slut as a slovenly or promiscuous woman. It might have been more polite to refer to Ms. Fluke as promiscuous, but slut was more provocative.
Frankly, I got tired of hearing Rush talk about it and turned him off. The mistake that Rush made was harping on it for three days. He was excited by the media attention he was getting. It was a mistake, but calling her a slut once would have been ok with me.
I am much more interested in the issue of which party is hurting women by the denial overage for women’s health issues, GOP or Democrat.
Just as a reminder:
ObamaCare’s promises to cut costs really mean cutting care, especially expensive cancer care, which often occurs at what will soon be the “end of life.” America’s leading position in cancer care will fall off a cliff, taking your life with it.
The “changes” to be forced on us starting in 2013 do not provide “hope.” For cancer patients, ObamaCare’s “change” is a drastic threat to your survival.
ObamaCare deals a body blow to our state of the art cancer treatment. Multiple “hits” in the healthcare bill include: (1) Medicare fee cuts to cancer specialists, resulting in payments that may be below the cost of staying in business; (2) cutbacks in coverage for the screening tests that pick up early cancers, such as prostate specific antigen (PSA), mammograms, Pap smears, and colonoscopies; (3) onerous and costly government mandates and regulations, interfering in physician-patient decisions for allowed treatments; (4) de-labeling (i.e., disapproving) some cancer drugs to save money, already started with Avastin for aggressive late stage breast cancer, and (5) denials of life-saving treatments, copying the UK’s National Health Service rationing board (Dr. Donald Berwick’s stated goal). The UK rationing board (N.I.C.E.) now denies many new cancer drugs for leukemia, multiple myeloma, stomach, lung, breast and prostate cancers.
Well wow. And guess what? Instead of making news about gasoline prices and the other issues Newt brought up, Rush made headlines for spending two days talking about a college co-ed and contraception. Was Newt talking about Rush in that media elite comment wasting their time in non-issues? And Newt ended up answering Gregory's question.
Other than South Carolina to date, Newt hasn't been able to debate himself into the minds of conservatives to vote for him to win. He likely will win his home state. But will he win the neighboring state of Tennessee? Or what happened in Washington state over the weekend? And why did he not qualify to meet the qualifications to be on the Virginia ballot?
Newt may not have a problem articulating sound principles and policy. What he has had trouble with is convincing people that he’s the person who needs to go up against Obama. There’s a gulf between talk and motivating people to their corner. Thus far, other than his home state and South Carolina, News has had a problem motivating people to his corner.
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