I learned earlier of the passing of Rush Limbaugh. There may be those who might believe that I would be glad about this, but I’m not. First of all, how am I supposed to tell Nathan that he gets all his talking points from Rush Limbaugh anymore? But in all seriousness, I do believe that Rush Limbaugh was a smart and entertaining guy. I definitely didn’t always agree with him, but sometimes I did. It’s funny to me that the times I did agree with him were largely the times that he was breaking down his points logically and reasonably. Then there was the other side of Mr. Limbaugh.
The reason I ultimately checked out of listening to Rush Limbaugh is because while I never voted for Bill Clinton, never really liked Bill Clinton as a candidate, didn’t agree with many of Bill Clinton’s policies, and I questioned Bill Clinton’s moral character many times; I did not believe that Bill Clinton was Satan incarnate and was to blame for everything that went wrong in government. The problem with listening to Limbaugh is that it felt like he was a broken record, and I got tired of it. It’s the same reason I stopped listening to Rachel Maddow later, but we’re not talking about her until she dies of cancer at age 70.
I moved on to listen to Mark Davis, because he thought in many ways like Rush Limbaugh, but it wasn’t the constant Clinton hate fest. Then it was and I realized that the problem was probably that the ratings game was showing that radio listeners loved Clinton bashing. I can’t know this for sure, but it was enough that I stopped listening to Mark Davis too.
Then the lies that the LameStream media was basically silencing right wing media. You remember when that happened? Of course you don’t, because the right wing media was silenced and couldn’t tell you about it for the last thirty fucking years. Constantly. Non fucking stop. I wasn’t listening to Rush Limbaugh by this point, so I can’t say that he was to blame for the theory that they were being silenced while he had the number one talk show in America. I just know that his number one show and the rise of Fox News just didn’t jive with the LameStream media silencing them. Maybe they just thought “silenced” meant “disagreed with.”
My issue at this time of Rush’s passing is that I liked the guy, but I feel like he may have helped usher in an era of partisan division that has made us hate our friends for no other reason than they believe a different lie. And I do mostly blame the media for this. The problem is that Rush was a prominent part of the media, so I can’t discount his participation.
If I have anything to say, it’s that Rush Limbaugh made millions off of his years in radio. This means that if he was disingenuous with his coverage of events then he lied to make his fortune. If he was saying what he truly believed, then I feel he was sometimes misguided, but won’t criticize his success. Only he knows.
We should mourn the passing of Rush Limbaugh, if not for any other reason than there are people who will miss him. But as someone who is still alive, let me say this. We have to stop the fighting over nothing. The truth is that neither side is evil while the other side is our saviours. If anything, the constant poor handling of our government should be creating a different division between the voters and the deadbeats we keep voting in. I wish that there were more reporters who would focus on who are obstructing progress and conservation than reporting our side good their side bad all the time. We’re so afraid of Satan’s party or Hitler’s party taking control that we’re not seeing that there is essentially one party. It’s a group of assholes who are being paid by lobbyists and don’t care about the common folk. So this is a tough “tribute” to write because I have issues with the person’s public persona, but I’m sure that I would have liked the person. If I’m around when Al Gore passes, I’ll have a similarly tough time writing about him. He seems like a nice guy, but politically I think he’s terrible. So the issue is this. I liked Rush Limbaugh. I’m sad he’s no longer with us. I realize that in a lot of ways he was a satirist who liked to say things he wasn’t completely serious about for entertainment. In that way, we’re similar. I feel too strongly about the partisan division to not point out that he contributed in some way though. So with that said – Rest In Peace, Rush Limbaugh. I hope you had a good life.