Pat Oliphant for March 08, 2012
Transcript:
Rush Limbaugh: Want me to pay for their contraceptives, do they? Prostitutes is what they are!! Bah! Elitist sluts! Cat: Who's the fat jerk with the big cigar? Dog: Really! How can you call him that? Why, he's the most revered, finest, most upstanding, widely renowned and respected right-wing media foulmouth in the business! Cat: Goodness! Should I apologize? Dog: I wouldn't go that far, but you must try to remember... that sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Punk: Don't call him fat again.
It seems to me Limbaugh knew exactly what he was doing. He’s a master of language and realizes the nuances in what he broadcasts — unless he was under the influence, of course. Regardless of what you think of his viewpoints, he’s a professional willing to take risks. He might have miscalculated slightly, but he’ll come back. And if not, well, he’s already a multi-multi-millionaire.
In FOLLOWING THE EQUATOR, Mark Twain relates a conversation with P.T.Barnum. Barnum wanted to buy Jumbo the elephant, a favorite at the London zoo. When that didn’t work at first, he made public inquiry into purchase of the Nelson Monument. Much uproar! Then he actually did buy Shakespeare’s birthplace, but in the face of virulent protests “generously” gave it back.
He did get Jumbo, which is what he really wanted after all. But even better, the series of incidents did serve to “furnish me a couple of columns of gratis advertising in every English and American paper for a couple of months, and give my show the biggest boom a show ever had in this world.”
Twain further commented that in planning to make a public apology Barnum thought “… such a letter, written with well-simulated asinine innocence and gush would have gotten his ignorance and stupidity an amount of newspaper abuse worth six fortunes to him, and not purchasable for twice the money.”
People such as Limbaugh are always three steps ahead of the public. Sadly, most pundits in the media are aware of the game and willingly gorge off the resultant publicity, as do remoras from sharks.