Chicago Sun-Times Editorial: Booting Limbaugh not a black and white issue

Chicago Sun-Times Editorial: Booting Limbaugh not a black and white issue
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
October 17, 2009
http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/1829641,CST-EDT-edit18a.article


After Rush Limbaugh got dropped last week from a group bidding for the St. Louis Rams, the conservative talk show host had a laundry list of folks to blame.

There was Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson. Or as Limbaugh calls them, "the two race hustlers."

There was the NFL players' union, and its executive director, who Limbaugh noted, contributed to Barack Obama's campaign.

And then, of course, there's the president himself and "Obama's America," whatever that is, exactly.

As we said, a lot of folks to blame.

Limbaugh's supporters came to his defense.

They questioned whether he had First Amendment rights like everyone else.

They argued that NFL teams field plenty of felons and other ne'er-do-wells.

They noted Keith Olbermann, the onetime sports journalist turned liberal commentator, still gets to work NFL games.

So why pick on Rush?

None of this, of course, had anything to do with Limbaugh's unceremonious booting.

It wasn't an issue of liberal or conservative. It wasn't an issue of black or white.

It was all about the green.

The owners of the 32 NFL teams are overwhelmingly a conservative group, if their donations to politicians are any indication, according to one recent study of their contributions.

They are businessmen who care deeply about the league's image, which translates directly into their teams' ability to make money.

And Limbaugh would have threatened that, every time he opened his mouth, as a minority team owner.

Of course, Limbaugh has a right to say whatever he wants. He has made him an excellent living doing just that. But it's not a right without consequences.

Limbaugh has profited greatly from the free market.

But this time around, he learned what many Americans know every day as they work hard to get ahead, only to have something knock them two steps back.

In any free market, there are winners and losers, fair or not.

In his St. Louis Rams bid, Limbaugh was a loser, for a change.

Welcome to the club, Rush.