Posted on 03/02/2009 3:20:29 PM PST by Dan Nunn
Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele says he has reached out to Rush Limbaugh to tell him he meant no offense when he referred to the popular conservative radio host as an “entertainer” whose show can be “incendiary.”
“My intent was not to go after Rush – I have enormous respect for Rush Limbaugh,” Steele said in a telephone interview. “I was maybe a little bit inarticulate. … There was no attempt on my part to diminish his voice or his leadership.”
The dust-up comes at a time when top Democrats are trying to make Limbaugh the face of the Republican Party, in part by using ads funded by labor. Americans United for Change sent a fund-raising e-mail Monday that begins: “The Republican Party has turned into the Rush Limbaugh Party.”
Steele told CNN host D.L. Hughley in an interview aired Saturday night: “Rush Limbaugh is an entertainer. Rush Limbaugh — his whole thing is entertainment. He has this incendiary — yes, it's ugly.”
Steele, who won a hard-fought chairman's race on Jan. 30, told Politico he telephoned Limbaugh after his show on Monday afternoon and hoped that they would connect soon.
“I went back at that tape and I realized words that I said weren’t what I was thinking,” Steele said. "It was one of those things where I thinking I was saying one thing, and it came out differently. What I was trying to say was a lot of people … want to make Rush the scapegoat, the bogeyman, and he’s not."
“I’m not going to engage these guys and sit back and provide them the popcorn for a fight between me and Rush Limbaugh,” Steele added. “No such thing is going to happen. … I wasn’t trying to slam him or anything.”
On Monday’s show, Limbaugh reacted both to the comment and to the assertion on CBS’s “Face the Nation” by White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel that the radio host is “the voice and the intellectual force and energy behind the Republican Party.”
Limbaugh said: “I'm not in charge of the Republican Party, and I don't want to be. I would be embarrassed to say that I'm in charge of the Republican Party in the sad-sack state that it's in. If I were chairman of the Republican Party, given the state that it's in, I would quit. I might get out the hari-kari knife because I would have presided over a failure that is embarrassing to the Republicans and conservatives who have supported it and invested in it all these years.”
On the RushLimbaugh.com home page, the transcript is labeled: “A Few Words for Michael Steele.”
In the interview with Politico, Steele called Limbaugh “a very valuable conservative voice for our party.”
“He brings a very important message to the American people to wake up and pay attention to what the administration is doing," Steele said. "Number two, there are those out there who want to look at what he’s saying as incendiary and divisive and ugly. That’s what I was trying to say. It didn’t come out that way. … He does what he does best, which is provoke: He provokes thought, he provokes the left. And they’re clearly the ones who are most excited about him.”
Asked if he planned to apologize, Steele said: “I wasn’t trying to offend anybody. So, yeah, if he’s offended, I’d say: Look, I’m not in the business of hurting people’s feelings here. … My job is to try to bring us all together.”
Michael Steel screwed the pooch in his first month on the job. He’s toast.
I for one am thrilled that Rush is emerging as the face of the Republican party.
He’s been on absolute fire since the election. He’s turning heads, he’s ruffling feathers.
Someone has to stand up and take control of this pathetic party, and who better than Rush?
Let the Dems go ahead and pick this fight. They’ll lose.
good night and good bye Michael.
Man, woman, black, white, green, purple..it does not matter to me..Obama is a Socialist...I do not care about anything else.
Ditto.
Never did like it when our spokesperson thinks he’ll look better if he disses his allies in front of the enemy.
That is a second class person’s mentality. The second class status is usually defined by how you were treated in childhood, and whether you accepted the status others in the pecking order gave you.
It’s quite odd that in eight years Bush did nothing other than the TARP fiasco. It’s unusual he wouldn’t have done something like cut taxes, protect us from terrorism, and win two unpopular but necessary wars.
I’m not the delusional one here. I’m not going to say I’m anything special since it really doesn’t take much brain power to think logically beyond the immediately obvious. Some here apparently cannot. (No names. Wouldn’t want to insult anyone.)
bttt
Exactly. Steele fell for the bait and allowed the White House to focus on Limbaugh, so to push their agenda of shutting down talk radio.
Good letter. I just wrote on my donation request form that if he didn’t apologize to Rush that we wouldn’t send the RNC any more support, and mailed in prepaid envelop.
No explanation. You had good explanation. Thank you.
Steele is weak and is a threat to real conservatism. I hope he just ended his RINO-esque political career by bringing a knife to a gunfight with one of our best shooters.
Were you called a racist when you expressed your opposition to his socialist policies? I was. Many times. I guess I still have some naivete. I was shocked. It was the first time in my life anyone ever said that to my face and it was totally unwarranted. It was their attempt to shut us up. It didn’t work for me, but I’m convinced it worked on others.
Yes he did and for good reason! The RINO trash you speak of would have been leaps and bounds better than the communist trash currently occupying the office in question!
I would have done exactly the same given the circumstances!
What we need to fix is the primary process so as to prevent RINO trash from getting the nomination of our party so easily!
Oh, goody: he's popularizing the "Joe Biden Defense!"
I do not normally get so fired up...probably part of the Conservatives problems, we are busy with our own lives. But I felt good on Sat night after watching Rush. Then I just exploded on Sunday morning after reading about Steele.
I think that was my tipping point.
What will be or has been your tipping point?
We'll see.
I will, however, be the first to admit if I've been "had".
.
Steele will drive people away from the Republican party. Pragmatism? What is that supposed to mean? Moderates running? Like McCain?
Reagan wasn’t dealing with a RINO insurrection when he uttered that memorable phrase. This is zero-sum-game. Either the RINOs must be expelled from the party or the conservatives will have to leave and begin a new party. If that means we have to be in the wilderness for awhile, so be it. Eventually the worm will turn and we’ll have carte blanche to clean house.
I really do not listen to such crap. I work in a male dominated industry, so...I have learned the hits and slights do not really mean anything. You have the center and the right to rail against anyone calling you a racist or sexist...etc.
Please, for all Jen's do not let anyone else define you!
I actually agree with you, V.G., but I also think that this Steele/Rush issue just might start to fire up true Conservatives enough to start taking back our party. I’m not seeing a lot of split here. I’m seeing a huge coming together. We’ll always have our RINOS, but it sure does my heart good to see all the solidarity for Rush and for conservatism.
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