Chris Wallace on Limbaugh: He is a 'Sweet', 'Vulnerable' Man

Remember when Chris Wallace interviewed former Vice President Dick Cheney? You know, the interview that Andrew Sullivan likened to "a teenage girl interviewing the Jonas Brothers"? Well, our good buddy Chris Wallace has done it again, this time in an interview with Rush Limbaugh.

Just watch how Wallace characterizes Rush Limbaugh in this online video from Fox:



Wow, Limbaugh is "nice", "sweet" and "vulnerable". Don't hold back there Chris. As for the actual interview, Wallace lobs softball after softball at Limbaugh like he did for Cheney. Here are a few of my favorite excerpts:

WALLACE: If you had to bet now, does Barack Obama win re- election in 2012?

LIMBAUGH: If I had to bet now, he will not.

WALLACE: Have you got a name of somebody who’s going to beat him…

LIMBAUGH: No.

WALLACE: … can beat him?

LIMBAUGH: No. I have no clue about that.

WALLACE: If he does win, how is Rush Limbaugh going to handle seven more years of Barack Obama?

LIMBAUGH: You know, I’m glad you asked me that, because one of the questions I always get is, Rush, isn’t Obama — aren’t these Democrats in power good for your business? The way I go about my business, I’m out to get the highest ratings I get every day.
I’m going to attract the largest audience I can regardless the news. It’s my — it’s my talent that draws the crowd. The news is incidental to it. No. I’m worried, seriously worried, about the future of the country.
I would never put my personal success in front of what I think is something that’s disastrous for the country.

[...]


WALLACE: I think you’re a great broadcaster. How can you possibly be worth that kind of money?

LIMBAUGH: Very simply. Value is determined by what somebody will pay you to do what you do. I’m probably worth more. I’m not complaining. Do not — do not misunderstood.
But you know, this whole question — see, because I’m a capitalist. You’re worth whatever you can get. You’re worth whatever your value is, and that’s determined by what somebody’s willing to pay you for it.
And the only reason I get that money is because the people who invest in me get results beyond their expectations.

[...]

WALLACE: In the Time Magazine article about Glenn Beck recently…

LIMBAUGH: Oh, yeah.

WALLACE: … they write just as you found your place as the triumphant champion of the age of Reagan, that Beck is tapping into the fear and anger on the right today.
Is that why you think he’s struck such a chord, because he taps into the fear and the anger of the conservatives today?

LIMBAUGH: There is a lot of fear. There’s a — there’s a tremendous amount of fear in the country over what is happening in Washington to individual liberty and freedom. He may well have tapped into that.
The anger — I think that’s — that’s sometimes overplayed, because it’s become a cliche for the left to say angry white men as a way of denigrating conservative energy and ideology. But there’s no question there’s a lot of anger. And if — and if he’s tapped into that, I wouldn’t be surprised.

WALLACE: When you look at Glenn Beck and you see this explosion, what do you feel?

LIMBAUGH: Well, I’m kind of — I’m kind of proud.

WALLACE: No envy, no competition?

LIMBAUGH: No, no, no, no, no. I mean, my radio audience is astronomically high. I’m — look it, in 1988 there was nobody doing what I’m doing. Nobody. You had — CNN was the only cable network, and you had the three networks and the newspapers.
And now look. Now look what’s out — all of this conservative media, conservative talk radio, television, Fox News, the conservative blogosphere. I mean, I — in one way, I could — I could — if I wanted to have my ego to be as big as Obama’s is, I could say, Look what I created.
So any success out there on my side, conservative media — damn, if it’s going to help us get this country back, bring more in.

You can watch the whole interview here and remember, this is the "news" programming that Fox claims is "Fair and Balanced".

Michael Steele's Revisionist History

I am sure that many of you have heard about the fighting that has been going on between the RNC Chair Michael Steele and the conservative radio personality Rush Limbaugh. In case you are late to this story here is an intentionally brief summary:

- Rush Limbaugh made the comment that he hopes President Obama will fail.
- Limbaugh is criticized for saying this but stands by his comments saying that if Obama succeeding means going against the principles that he believes, then of course he hopes Obama fails and he would think that many Republicans want Obama to fail as well.
- RNC Chairman Michael Steele goes on CNN, says that he is the head of the Republican Party and that Limbaugh is an entertainer. He also says that Limbaugh can be "incendiary" and "ugly". Here is the video of this exchange:




After this exchange, Limbaugh retaliated saying that Steele is not the head of the Republican Party. Steele then apologized to Limbaugh by saying:

“My intent was not to go after Rush – I have enormous respect for Rush Limbaugh...I was maybe a little bit inarticulate. …There was no attempt on my part to diminish his voice or his leadership.”

Now, there is some revisionist history taking place as Michael Steele is claiming that he never attacked Limbaugh in the first place. He claims that he said that there were other "people out there" who may think that Limbaugh is incendiary and ugly, but that he never meant that to be his viewpoint. Watch:




In case you want to hear the exact language from Steele's CNN appearance that directly contradicts his most recent claims that he "never attacked" Limbaugh, just go watch it again for yourself. I also enjoy how Steele and others within the Republican Party are now saying that it is the Democrats and the left who are distracting America by bringing attention to all of this. Steele mentions in his final clip that the left are implementing some kind of plan that they have wanted to enact for a while...to distract Americans from the real issues by bringing up this controversy. Sure, that's it.

It's not only Steele either. Check out this exchange between MSNBC's David Schuster and former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleisher. Fleisher comes out on the offensive with his talking point about Obama acting "childish" and Schuster tries to show Fleisher just how hypocritical this claim is. It takes effort to not go insane when these items get flipped on the head on such a consistent basis and as part of a strategy to falsely revise history: