The Real Rush Limbaugh -- "What's Freedom Got To Do With It?"

“I say what I mean. I don't speak in code. That's why

I am a star and ace communicator.”

– Rush Limbaugh

Just in case you don't know. Rush Limbaugh is a conservative radio talk show host. His website describes him as "America's Truth Detector; the Doctor of Democracy; the Most Dangerous Man in America; the All-Knowing, All-Sensing, All-Everything Maha Rushie; defender of motherhood, protector of fatherhood and an all-around good guy."

Just what does Limbaugh promote in his self-proclaimed title of “star and ace communicator”?

In an unprecedented theatrical moment in presidential history, Limbaugh was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom – the nation’s highest civilian honor – during President Donald Trump's State of the Union speech on February 4, 2020. 

The award was initiated by in 1963 by President John. F. Kennedy to honor those “who have made exceptional contributions to the security of national interests of America, to world peace, or to cultural or other significant public or private endeavors." Past recipients include the likes of Mother Teresa, Billy Graham, Rosa Parks, and Martin Luther King, Jr.

In this case, Trump awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to a model of white nationalism known for his repeatedly attacks of black and brown people. Limbaugh, like Trump, championed the so-called birtherism conspiracy theory that incorrectly challenged former President Barack Obama's nationality and flagrantly denigrated the black president and everything for which he stood.

Limbaugh has called Obama a “halfrican American” and has said that Obama was not black but Arab because Kenya is an Arab region, even though Arabs are less than one percent of Kenya.

Since mainstream America has become more accepting of African-Americans, Limbaugh decided to play against its new racial fears – Arabs and Muslims. Despite the fact Obama graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law school, Limbaugh has called him an “affirmative action candidate” (2008) viciously stating that Obama “probably didn’t get out of Harvard without affirmative action.”

In 2010, Limbaugh claimed:

“I think this is the first time in his life that there’s not a professor around to turn his C into an A, or to write the law review article for him he can’t write. He is totally exposed. There is nobody to make it better. I think he’s been covered for, all his life.”

On February 11, 2010, Limbaugh said …

“He’s (Obama) not following the civil rights speech codes set forth by the Reverend Jackson and Al Sharpton and whoever else is in charge of them. But nobody – Obama is uppity, but not as a black. He is an elitist. He does think he’s smarter and better than everybody else. That’s what he was taught. He’s a Harvard man.”

Of course, Limbaught knew that "uppity," when applied to black people, has racist connotations. It was a term racist southerners used for black people who didn't know their place.

Limbaugh even has repeatedly played a song on his radio show “Barack the Magic Negro” using an antiquated Jim Crow era term for black a man who many Americans supported for president. The song is an attempted satire of liberal white guilt and the jealousy of established black leadership set to “Puff the Magic Dragon.”

“Barack the Magic Negro lives in D.C.
The L.A. Times, they called him that
'Cause he's not authentic like me.
Yeah, the guy from the L.A. paper
Said he makes guilty whites feel good
They'll vote for him, and not for me
'Cause he's not from the ’hood.”

Ironic and hypocritical? Yes, both apply to Rush Limbaugh.

Consider that because of his parents' desire to see him attend college, Limbaugh enrolled in Southeast Missouri State University but left the school after two semesters and one summer. According to his mother, "he flunked everything,” and "he just didn't seem interested in anything except radio."

“Uppity”? Limbaugh has been married four times, and his marriage in 2010 featured a wedding reception after the ceremony during which Elton John entertained the wedding guests for a reported $1 million fee. Limbaugh evidently calls Obama “uppity” when his own background is upper class. His paternal grandfather, Rush Hudson Limbaugh, served as a U.S. ambassador to India under President Dwight D. Eisenhower; an uncle served as a federal judge during Ronald Reagan's presidency; and his conservative father, Rush Hudson Limbaugh II, worked as an attorney.

Limbaugh's racist attacks extend to others besides President Obama.

Rush Limbaugh acknowledged making these statements in a 1990 Newsday article:

“Have you ever noticed how all composite pictures of wanted criminals resemble Jesse Jackson?”

(To an African American female caller): “Take that bone out of your nose and call me back.”

This was from the transcript of his radio program on January 19, 2007 …

“Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it.”

Media Matters for America documented this statement (with an audio clip) as one made by Limbaugh in the course of his radio program on August 21, 2007 …

“Right. So you go into Darfur and you go into South Africa, you get rid of the white government there. You put sanctions on them. You stand behind Nelson Mandela – who was bankrolled by communists for a time, had the support of certain communist leaders. You go to Ethiopia. You do the same thing.”

On March 10, 2010, Limbaugh hurled a racist comment towards embattled New York Governor David Paterson on his radio show. Discussing the resignation of Rep. Eric Massa and the possibility that Paterson would appoint his replacement or call a special election, Limbaugh invoked Massa’s last name in a reference to slavemasters, also known as “massas.”

On July 6, 2010, Limbaugh said …

“(Obama) wouldn’t have been voted president if he weren’t black. Somebody asked me over the weekend why does somebody earn a lot of money have a lot of money, because she’s black. It was Oprah. No, it can’t be. Yes, it is. There’s a lot of guilt out there, show we’re not racists, we’ll make this person wealthy and big and famous and so forth…. If Obama weren’t black he’d be a tour guide in Honolulu or he’d be teaching Saul Alinsky constitutional law or lecturing on it in Chicago.”

And, on July 14, 2010, Limbaugh eulogized Yankees owner, George Steinbrenner, on his show. For some reason he decided to make his eulogy race based, claiming that Steinbrenner was a “cracker” who created a lot of “African-American millionaires” and “fired a lot of white guys.”

Other tyrades by Limbaugh included these quotes:

“The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies.”

“We need segregated buses… This is Obama’s America.”

“They (blacks) are 12 percent of the population. Who the hell cares?”

“Let the unskilled jobs that take absolutely no knowledge whatsoever to do — let stupid and unskilled Mexicans do that work.”

“There are more American Indians alive today than there were when Columbus arrived or at any other time in history. Does this sound like a record of genocide?”

Limbaugh promotes language that deliberately dehumanizes his targets. He creates rhetorical frames – and sadly, the bigger the lie, the more effective – inciting listeners to view people they disagree with as sub-humans. His longtime favorite term for women, "femi-Nazi," doesn't even raise eyebrows anymore.

Of course, Limbaugh loves conspiracy theories.

Limbaugh blamed Obama's foreign policy, including the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, for allowing the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Limbaugh also claimed that the 2012 Benghazi attack occurred due to a secret arms trafficking operation to the Syrian opposition authorized by Obama and coordinated by Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, speculating that the 2016 Democratic National Committee email leak would reveal evidence of it.

During the West African Ebola virus epidemic, Limbaugh blamed Obama for allowing the spread of the disease to the United States in 2014, claiming that he should have stopped air travel to West Africa. He claimed that both the media and the government, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, deliberately downplayed its symptoms, expressing skepticism over the scientific consensus that the disease could be spread only through contact with bodily fluids and was not aerosol transmissible.

After the election he became supportive of deep-state conspiracy theories, claiming that the United States has entered a "Cold Civil War" in which the Democratic Party is attempting to illegitimately overturn the election results and that it is part of a trend of Democrats contesting elections beginning with the 2000 Florida election recount intended to eventually eliminate free elections in the United States.

Limbaugh claimed that the October 2018 United States mail bombing attempts were perpetuated as a false-flag operation to draw public attention away from Central American migrant caravans.

On his show, Limbaugh has said that the Christ church mosque shootings of March 2019 may have been a false-flag operation. Limbaugh described "an ongoing theory" that the shooter was actually "a leftist" trying to smear the right. Despite providing no source or evidence, Limbaugh continued: "… you can't immediately discount this. The left is this insane, they are this crazy."

Of Limbaugh's controversial statements and allegations they have investigated, Politifact has rated 84% as ranging from "Mostly False" to "Pants-On-Fire" (a signification for extremely false), with 5% of Limbaugh's contested statements rising to the level of "Mostly True" and 0% rated "True."

These debunked allegations by Limbaugh include suggestions that the existence of gorillas disproves the theory of evolution, that Ted Kennedy sent a letter to Soviet General Secretary Yuri Andropov seeking to undercut President Reagan, that a recent lack of hurricanes disproves climate change, and that President Obama wanted to mandate circumcision.

As Trump awarded Limbaugh for the Presidential Medal of Freedom, he lauded Limbaugh for “all that you have done for our nation (and) the millions of people a day that you speak to and that you inspire.” What has he “done” for the nation? Who has he “inspired”?

With his spiteful and sophomoric comments, Rush Limbaugh has sown lies and prejudice to forward his white nationalist agenda in America. Giving him the honor reserved for the best of American citizens – during of all possible times, the State of the Union Address – is indicative of a president who values and supports those who promote bigotry and division over integrity. Moreover, it is calculated and baseless propaganda during the process of impeachment in an effort to glorify Donald Trump.

There is no doubt Rush Limbaugh helped change the political landscape in the United States. However, in doing so, he has cared little for bipartisanship or even for civil discourse. The change Limbaugh has served best is the ever-increasing worship of political vaudeville that employs spite and emotion to incite an adoring radio audience. Oh … and did I mention this … Limbaugh is a beacon for those bigots who prefer a lily-white America? A person deserving of a medal for "freedom"? Never in my eyes.