I saw Rush Limbaugh on Morning Joe this morning, when the show played part of Jamie Gangel’s interview.  Besides disavowing his obvious leadership role in the Republican Party, Limbaugh tried to explain yet again his deathwish for the Obama administration, his “I hope he fails” remark.  To him, he was simply displaying his patriotism.  Huh?

Ms. Gangel basically let him get away with this sleight-of-hand, and just for the record, Rush first made his infamous remark on the brink of Obama’s inauguration, then reinforced it in an interview with Sean Hannity, then “explained”  it on his show by way of attacking the stimulus package in February:

Let me give them some more fodder: I want the stimulus package to fail.  ‘Cause if this thing for the first time ever does what it never has done before, we’re in even worse trouble.  If it becomes established that the federal government and the federal government alone can manage the economy and take over the private sector, then forget it, folks. I’m looking for property in New Zealand, and I’m going to put my money in Singapore.  I do not want this to succeed, and nobody who has any respect for the founding of this country and for the capitalist system, who is honest and who has looked at it, would want it to succeed either.    (2/13/09)

Later on his broadcast that day he said in response to a caller:

I want this to fail because this is the most expansive expenditure in the Democrat Party and liberalism’s power that there has ever been.  I hope it blows up in their face.  I hope this thing does exactly what those of us who have studied these kinds of things do.  I hope it prolongs the failure. I hope it prolongs the recession. Because people are going to have to figure out here that this is not how economies recover.  Government is not the central planner. Government is not control of this. Government can’t do it. This is a disaster.  And, you know, I could sit here and say, “Yeah, I’m going to cross my fingers and hope and pray this is the first time this works,” but if this works, the America that you and I know is over, Trevor, for your kids.  It’s over for a generation.  It just is.

Did you get that?  “I hope it prolongs the failure. I hope it prolongs the recession. Because people are going to have to figure out here that this is not how economies recover.”

So, no matter how he nuances it now,  Limbaugh’s hyper-patriotism can’t be taken seriously when he so obviously puts his own ideology—and his hatred for the Democratic Party—before the health of the country.

And by the way, something which few journalists ever point out:  If the Democrats’ plans are doomed to fail, as Limbaugh has said time and time again (“this is not how economies recover“), then isn’t it superfluous to “hope” they fail? 

The truth is, Limbaugh got caught in a moment of pomposity, in a moment of stupidity, and rather than admit it and regroup, he plowed on into even further ignominy.