Da Techguy's (no longer backup) Blog

You know people are complaining about Rush Limbaugh taking the “leadership” of the Republican party David Frum for one:

Rush knows what he is doing. The worse conservatives do, the more important Rush becomes as leader of the ardent remnant. The better conservatives succeed, the more we become a broad national governing coalition, the more Rush will be sidelined.

Yeah the one thing Rush really wants is for conservatives to do bad. What planet is Frum on?

Apparently it is the planet of style not substance; to wit:

On the one side, the president of the United States: soft-spoken and conciliatory, never angry, always invoking the recession and its victims. This president invokes the language of “responsibility,” and in his own life seems to epitomize that ideal: He is physically honed and disciplined, his worst vice an occasional cigarette. He is at the same time an apparently devoted husband and father. Unsurprisingly, women voters trust and admire him.

Listen to this description, nothing concerning what he has actually done, all smoke and mirrors.

Now listen to how he describes Rush:

And for the leader of the Republicans? A man who is aggressive and bombastic, cutting and sarcastic, who dismisses the concerned citizens in network news focus groups as “losers.” With his private plane and his cigars, his history of drug dependency and his personal bulk, not to mention his tangled marital history, Rush is a walking stereotype of self-indulgence

Hey he’s loud , successful, smokes, has faults, and is fat! I guess that means he must be wrong about things.

What nonsense. Leaders lead. Rush is leading because nobody else is willing, who will lead, Romney? HA! Huckabee? Steele? HA!

When someone steps up, and articulates the conservative position with confidence and without fear then Rush will be able to recede into the background. The alternative is cowering and that will not do.

Or at least he can melt down when asked about conservatives.

On the same night he was offering the keynote address to the Conservative Political Action Conference, Rush Limbaugh drew criticism from an unlikely source: Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele.

In a little-noticed interview Saturday night, Steele dismissed Limbaugh as an “entertainer” whose show is “incendiary” and “ugly.”

You know I left the democratic party when I perceived that believing Catholics are apparently racist bigoted homophobes who oppress women.

If Mr. Steele thinks that as a conservative who agrees with Rush is not welcome either I’m sure I can find somewhere else to go. And if the RNC site blog is any indication if I do I wouldn’t be lonely at all.

Ask and before your post is done you receive:

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.”

Not really sounding much like a party leader, but its still early and there is time to recover. Watch for the left to pounce with glee. That is the point when we will find out if Steele is a leader or no.

Update: Why was this a big deal? This is from Rush’s statement on the matter:

My parents taught me when I was growing up that you always stood behind people who defended you, you never abandoned people who stood up for you and who defended you against assault. Michael Steele was a candidate for the Senate in Maryland. Michael Steele was on this program, he got airtime on this program to attempt to refute the lies being told about him by Michael J. Fox in those famous ads way back when that were also run against Jim Talent in Missouri. I personally took time to defend Michael Steele and to rip the substance of those ads, had him on the show. I went after Chuck Schumer when Chuck Schumer’s former employee stole Michael Steele’s private credit record information and released it. When I went to Washington a couple years ago for a personal appearance from my station there, WMAL, WMAL arranged for a number of dignitaries to meet me backstage. One of them was Michael Steele, who thanked me very much for coming to his defense. Something’s happened. Now I’m just an entertainer and now I am ugly and my program is incendiary.

Any Sicilian knows you stick by those who stick by you.

Update 2: Hot air is divided. Or at least Allahpundit is.