It all started when Obama made Palin do the Couric interview -- he deliberately sabotaged the GOP instead of looking for bipartisan solutions.

Were you unaware all this time that Scherer is a Republican hack?

This story is MSM catnip.

Obama's offhand comment about the gop listening to rush was small- now they're feeding the story, are maybe worried it's getting out of control and are now blaming Obama for their own actions. Meanwhile you know Steele has probably had a sit down with more than a few concerned gopers.

Pass the popcorn!

I love seeing the dems play offense on this one- keep it up!

Please enjoy the comments section in Scherer's article and feel free to join in. That was about the dumbest post Scherer has ever put up and he has put up some dumb sh*t.

The corporate media is not responsible for the stories about the corporate media that the corporate media tells, cuz yanno, it's out there, so they have to talk about it. Rilly.

We are beginning to see the rats who have been hiding in the bilge come top side to defend a sinking boat, after they drilled holes in the bottom to let out the water! -Kevo

Hack GOP journalists defensively blaming the White House? Clear sign that Obama's devious strategy is working. Whatta card!

Dear Rush, we are so sorry. Please don't throw us in the cornfield.

XXOO,
Your faithful minions

Obama pointed to a bridge. Repubs chose to jump off of it. So, it must be Obama's fault.

MissMudd - Please go to this DCCC site to file a more complete apology to Limbaugh. It's a hoot.

Michael Scherer is the world's biggest concern troll.

during the campaign he continually carried water for McCain. This kind of nonsense from him is nothing new.

Man, I think Rahm Emanuel did everybody a big favor. Politics hasn't been this funny since Lewinsky.

Time's Michael Scherer is one of Rush Limbaugh's biggest fans.

He wishes that he could become a multi-millionaire by sitting on his big fat ass and reading fake, phony, trumped-up, scripted, focus-group-tested, corporate-sponsored, pseudo-ideological, so-called "conservative" talking points on the radio all day -- just like his hero, Rush.

But Scherer's job, while not as lucrative as Rush's job, is still important: Scherer's job is legitimize Rush Limbaugh's blatant lies and vicious hate speech for a more mainstream audience.

So of course, Scherer is going to say that it's "wrong" for Democrats to criticize Rush Limbaugh's blatant lies and vicious hate speech, or to criticize Republican politicians for their cowardly, fawning subservience to Rush Limbaugh's blatant lies and vicious hate speech.

Because that's what Time magazine pays him to do.

Limbaugh (who's loving the attention and promotion)

I'm not so sure he's loving it. His bull-in-a-chinashop schtick doesn't allow him to back down, but I very much doubt he wants to be portrayed as a fool. To keep his audience, he needs this aura of the man of common sense who speaks his mind. But most of his followers would like to not see the Republican party implode under his weight.

OMG dan, it's getting bigger than, than Rush himself!

Rush on Mt. Rushmore!

I'm not big on jumping all over people for blog posts -- a lot of text goes up every day and not all of it is necessarily going to be well thought out. However, that being said, Scherer's post seems to me to be one of the most inane things I've ever read. It's so completely wrong-headed in terms of logic, substance, and perspective, that I wonder what he could've possibly been thinking.

INMO, the whole Limbaugh flap shines a bright light on the sort of lunacy that passes for policy discussion over on the Right, and I think all Republicans should welcome the attention.

(ok, that last part was a lie.)

1 very large ego equals - "You can't make this up"! wow, & pass the popcorn.

Suze

after all is said and done. Obama is president to all Americans, (and believes in freedom of speech). even those who wish failure for our country. The neo conservative right who demonstrate lack of love of thy neighbor every nano second should realize (parpaphrase) what you give out you will get back 10,000 fold. So when the Reublicans wish for failure the republicans will get it back 10,000 fold.

You are too kind to Scherer. He's a shallow jackass.

Limbaugh is a dick.

Actually, the Democrats didn't really have to do anything to tar and feather the GOP with Rush Limbaugh. The King of Right-Wing Talk Radio did a pretty good job of doing that himself with his speech at the Conservative Poltical Action Conference in Washington.

Indeed, Limbaugh sounded a lot like a contender for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination in his hour-long speech.

I can already see the "RUSH 2012" buttons now...

Well, that is the stupidest thing I've read today.

The reason the White House is going after Limbaugh is because Limbaugh is telling the Republicans not to cooperate with Obama.

When Hollywood has to apologize for offending Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, he might have gotten one thing right in his article.

"No, Obama said he was going to solve problems instead." - Michael Scherer

Yes, and Rush Limbaugh is one of them.

Scherer's rant being incoherent and factually dubious, it's up to the reader to surmise or divine what he's upset about. Far as I can tell, Scherer's problem is that he doesn't feel that Limbaugh is really an extremist, and hence his iconic status shouldn't be as damaging to the GOP as the Dems think it is.

But Scherer needs to take that up with the overwhelming majority of non-dittoheads who find Rush creepy and deranged, not with the Dems who are exploiting this widely-felt revulsion.

Important to note the Scherer is TIME's White House correspondent. Nice to know they sent a serious journalist to cover that post in these troubling times.

Scherer's piece just stinks of the usual MSM mosh-pit that occurs when anything that reflects badly on the GOP appears on the front page. Someone has to be the first to offer a spin that deflects attention away from the actual story towards an attack on Democrats.

So when Obama says, in a meeting with GOP Congresscritters, that they shouldn't think that parroting Limburgh's bile helps get the country back on its feet, then the quote is leaked, and a parade of Republican officials first dismiss the idea that Limburgh is an influence on GOP policy, then fall over themselves in their haste to apologise for offending him with their 'mis-quoted' words, the only story worth pushing is how this is a problem for Obama, who is obviously failing miserably to live up to his promise to 'elevate the tone' by forcing those poor Republicans to make fools of themselves.

Shame on him. Doesn't he know that America is a centre-right country?

Yes, it's true--it's Obama's fault.

After all, every problem is the result of the evil geniuses of the Democratic party. Look at the poor Republicans, all the problems during the Bush administration were the fault of the Clinton administration or the coming Obama administration.

So the question is, "Why is there even a Republican party when even they admit they are such hopelessly impotent saps?"

Reap. Sew. Fuck. You.

For years we were treated to the spectacle of the manufactured outrage by Republicans for Democrats to "disavow" or "denounce" whoever the boogeyman d'jour was: Cindy Sheehan, Michael Moore, Jeremiah Wright, Ward Churchill, Sean Penn, whoever said something provocative (or stupid) enough to make the squawkers squawk. And Democrats usually obeyed and vigorously . That these people aren't part of the Democratic operation hardly mattered. They were coming from a left to hard-left perspective and as a result had some connection to the Democrats, who were accountable for these statements for some reason.

Here's a fat hateful fuck who the GOP literally gravitates toward in message, belief and action and somehow this is all so unfair. Their tears taste like sweet nectar.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

You want to oppose everything? Fine. It's your right. But you are also accountable for it. Learn to live with disappointment, GOP.

By talking about Rush as the GOP de facto leader, Democrats do a couple of smart things. They place the GOP's implacable partisanship in a known context (talk radio's Us vs Them demonology) and they remind moderate Republicans what the ultimate price will be when they capitulate to Limbaugh. If there was really a GOP establishment apart from Rush, we'd be hearing from them. That there isn't tells us everything we need to know about the GOP's base strategy. It's completely base all the time and without the smarts to moderate itself. Obama becomes the easy winner in any contest with a fatuous blowhard.

What is all the fuss about??? It isn't as if this was written by David Broeder. Wait, that is coming next week!

No, Obama said he was going to solve problems instead.

Rush is a problem. As Obama explained, you can't just listen to Rush and expect to have a constructive and effective policy process, if in fact those are your intentions. Rush has been making every policy issue worse for years by misinforming his audience, demonizing the other side, and attempting to sabotage the credibility of the federal government. This is dangerous in a crisis, especially one in which the federal government is the only economic agent that can keep the economy afloat. I'm all for free speech. But, at a minimum, you should get your facts straight.

Now Limbaugh has challenged Obama to a debate. He may as well have said, "Elected Republicans, get out of the way. It's all about me now!!!" Oops, there goes the chandelier.

If Rush cared about the Republican party, as opposed to himself and his huge/extremely fragile ego, he'd have the sense to keep his mouth shut when Republican politicians criticize him. Or to act cool and above-it-all, with some remark like "well, he has to say that for political reasons, but we conservatives know he doesn't mean it." But NOOOOO, he has to react to every slight with loud roars of indignation, jowls quivering, bouncing up and down in his chair like a Flubber beach-ball, or perhaps Porky Pig trying to levitate, and working up his dittoheads into a spasm of moral outrage. Then they bombard their congress-eunuchs with death threats and insults, and the congress-eunuchs display their courage by groveling to the Great One for forgiveness.

And Rush had the unmitigated gall to accuse Obama of having a "messiah complex" and attacking his enthusiastic supporters for forming a cult of personality. What he lacks in self-knowledge he makes up for in sheer chutzpah.

Scherer's article, as dumb as it is, might be easier to take more seriously if TIME weren't such an embarrassingly pathetic publication these days. It's essentially People magazine with a few articles about current events. The rest is pure mindless pop fluff.

Michael Scherer won his spot at Time Magazine by promising to be a different, more substantive, less gimmicky journalist. He said he would not waste our time on "phony outrage," like fulminations on the meaning of "lipstick on a pig," or silly characters like "Joe The Plumber," a guy who was actually named Samuel and was not even a licensed plumber. No, Scherer said he was going to write about major problems instead. Now that he is actually at Time magazine, he still makes this case, almost every day. But what is Scherer writing about now? Rush Limbaugh.

Scherer's main problem is he thinks that if Obama/Gibbs/Rahm spend five minutes this week on twisting the knife into Limbaugh, they can't concentrate on anything else.

And while we're at it Bill Clinton and Obama are responsible for the current economic crisis y'kmow

You say "provocative", I say "dishonest and stupid".

> I don't see why the larger controversy is President Obama's fault.

That breeze you feel is Overton's Window opening up, to let fresh drafts of wingnuttery wash over the media.

No doubt "moderate centrists" will soon offer their version of a "reasonable compromise". Something along the lines of "Obama's claims of bipartisanship are exposed as false because of the GOP's infighting".

C'mon, Steve, credit where it's due. It wasn't the Democrats who made Rush the de facto leader of the Republican Party, as your "Reasonable people" comment suggests. It was the Republicans themselves. The Dems have just noticed--years behind the times--that it can be politically useful to tell that particular truth.

"I read the Politico article, and found that the initiative to make Limbaugh the face of the GOP has been driven by Paul Begala, James Carville, Stan Greenberg, and officials in the DCCC -- none of whom is an advisor to Obama."

I'm afraid that I have to call "Shenanigans!!" on you for that Steve.

Unless you failed to read the entire article, I don't how you could have missed the following line from it:

"By February, Carville and Begala were pounding on Limbaugh frequently in their appearances on CNN.

Neither Democrat would say so, but a third source said the two also began pushing the idea of targeting Limbaugh in their daily phone conversations with Emanuel."

This story tells us why Emanuel went out of his way to attach Rush on his Sunday's appearance on Face the Nation. Are you truly so naive to believe that he did so without consulting with and gotten approval from Obama himself before doing so?

Politico? The voice of journalistic pandering? No way, they made this assertion? My God, what next?

Each of the right wing radio talking heads get their lead from Rush and over the airwaves it goes coast to coast.

Big echo chamber

Are you truly so naive to believe that he did so without consulting with and gotten approval from Obama himself before doing so?

But you're apparently stupid enough to believe that Republicans can't stop it by simply telling Rush to STFU.

This wouldn't be so big without the enthusiastic stupidity and clownishness of Republicans.

I think Scherer's mistaken for a few reasons here.

I will assume that the "I think" part is an oxymoron.

Meanwhile, POLITICO piles on with ...
Rush Job: Inside Dems' Limbaugh plan

MS is a fucking tool. But don't take my word for it, go visit the Swampland commentators, the posts are now at 170 a growing, and it contains some glowing reviews of Scherer's work. Benan you are too nice to this guy. He was a tool during the campaign and he continues to be a tool, Halperin wanna be.

This story tells us why Emanuel went out of his way to attach Rush on his Sunday's appearance on Face the Nation. Are you truly so naive to believe that he did so without consulting with and gotten approval from Obama himself before doing so?

Oh NOES! It's awesome that as your party is getting destroyed in public opinion and the Democrats for the first time in my lifetime are putting the screws to the GOP for tying their fortunes to a child-molesting drug addict all you can do is to "catch" Steve on the notion that Obama is OK with equating the Republicans political approach with that of their de facto leader.

I think you're right. Obama is actively in favor of this development. And the GOP is still tying its fortune to a hateful pig.

I'm surprised nobody blamed the recent snowstorm on Obama.

The only thing Obama said about Rush was that it's impossible to be bipartisan AND a Rush sycophant, Prove him wrong, bitch.

Gibbs: White House Diversionary Strategy "Counterproductive"

Well, we know how Bush resolved the "Saddam" problem. Would Scherer be happy if Obama resolved the "Rush" problem in the same manner? Invading Florida would be a lot cheaper than invading Iraq, and bombing Limbaugh into the Stone Age would be a lot less destructive than that "shock-n-awe" thingie we did in Baghdad six years ago. All we'd need is a single missile frigate, aiming its SSMs at Rush's sliding glass doors from about a half-mile off the coast. Maybe just a dinghy with a couple of RPGs (we can get those for next to nothing from the Somalis).

I'll even bet that we could convince the Iranians that Rush is the illegitimate grandson of the Shah, and the heir apparent to the Iranian throne---he's certainly pompous enough to fit the part!

arguing that the White House is not only wrong to criticize Rush Limbaugh, it's also largely responsible for the recent controversy surrounding the right-wing radio host.

Well, duh! I've been saying here for days that Obama's sparking this fight was a brilliant move. With the GOP continuing its humiliating implosion, that a member of the so-called "liberal media" claims that Obama was wrong to criticize the odious Limbaugh shows just how much Matt Drudge still rules their world. Feh.

[...] the initiative to make Limbaugh the face of the GOP has been driven by Paul Begala, James Carville, Stan Greenberg, and officials in the DCCC -- Steve Benen

And Tim Kaine. Who, very accurately, called Rush-to-Limbo "He Who Must Be Obeyed"... :)

Hilda Limbo. Limbo Bimbo.

Chicounsel cited: Neither Democrat would say so, but a third source said [Carville and Begala] also began pushing the idea of targeting Limbaugh in their daily phone conversations with Emanuel.

Yeah, numbskull, so the initiative to make Limbaugh the face of the GOP was indeed driven by Begala and Carville, just as Steve said, even if Emmanuel did pick up the ball and run with it.

Thanks for once again proving how stupid and dishonest you have to be to believe the Right's bullshit.

Jackass.

Shorter Chicounsel: Oh, shit, they're onto us! Misdirect, misdirect!

this entire controversy has been cooked up and force fed to the American people by Obama's advisers.

Yes, Rush hates to be the center of attention, but they're FORCING him to!

When the Limbaugh BS finally runs it's course, it will be time to make mAnn Coulter the face of the Repuglican party.

Let's keep the wingnuts alive and talking in the forefront. The more Limbaugh and Coulter open their mouths, hopefully the smaller the republican base will get

Michael Scherer, concerned GOP troll.