Let Rush Alone

I don’t really understand the fascination with and the national obsession that is Rush Limbaugh. Every media outlet was all over the story of the quest to be part of a group trying to buy the St. Louis Rams. Every newspaper, website, network news program, talk TV shows, radio talk shows, most water coolers and every lunch room in the country were obsessed over this story. Here is the boiled down version. A radio talk show host was going to be a minority partner investor in one of the worst football teams in the NFL. Rush was going to have no real authority with the team, he was not going to be involved in day to day management decisions and nothing he said or did was going to impact the players or the greater game itself. He was going to write a fairly large check and hope to someday get a return on his investment. That’s it, nothing more nothing less. This is not really a story and certainly not worthy of the 24 hour, day in and day out coverage it received.

Why was this nonsense such a big story? Rush Limbaugh is a huge star. He is someone people love to love and love to hate. He represents what is great about the American dream. If you work hard, if you are unique, if you have some talent you can be very successful. You don’t have to be a Harvard grad; you don’t have to be born into noble or wealthy conditions to make it to the top of your field. You just have to have that certain thing that attracts people to you. You also have to have the guts to stick with it. You have to have the fortitude to enjoy the highs and make it through the lows. He is one example of the success that can happen in this great country.

Make no mistake I am not even close to being a fan of Rush Limbaugh – in fact on my Twitter site I vowed never to use his name and refer to him with a reference to some self control problems he had a few years ago. I think most of his comments are shallow and only touch the surface of the issues; I don’t think he really digs down and does the hard work to find solutions to our many problems. He has been around so long that even the most casual listener can predict where he will fall on any given issue. This is why he said he hoped the President failed because he knew it would get the attention of the MSM and he would be back in the headlines. It will be interesting to watch to see how far he is willing to go now that Glenn Beck is sucking up so much of the right wing oxygen. It will be fun to watch if these two get into a wing nut cage match.

His being dumped by his fellow investors says more about the type of men they are than it does about the people who led the drum beats in opposition to Rush being part of the NFL. Jennifer Lopez, Marc Anthony & Gloria Estefan are all investors in the Miami Dolphins and nothing changed expect the men who really run the team have some fresh cash flow. Rush was going to be in the same situation and yet the entire nation convulsed over this issue. How was this important? Why did we care? What was really the point? If a man who has earned his money honestly and has worked hard for it wants to spend some of it on a sports team let him. It’s his bloody money and if this how he wants to spend it, so be it. I can think of far more harmful things someone like Rush Limbaugh can do with all that money.

I am calling on congress to set up a special committee to look at every investor of every professional sports franchise because the American people have the right to know that their sports teams are being funded by men and women who neither are without flaw nor have never made a controversial statement.