Limbaugh's loss is his gain

Rush Limbaugh won.
And with every word I type, or she types, or you read...his margin of victory increases.

The only person surer than I was that the right-wing, radio talk-show host had no shot at becoming an owner of the St. Louis Rams football team was Limbaugh himself.

And if I knew it, and Rush knew it, rest assured the NFL knew it too.

Commissioner Roger Goodell didn't just tip his hand, he clenched it in a fist when he addressed the Limbaugh issue earlier this week at the NFL owners meetings in Boston.
"I have said many times before that we are all held to a higher standard here," the commissioner said. "I think divisive comments are not what the NFL is all about. I would not want to see those kind of comments from people who are in a responsible position within the NFL. No. Absolutely not."

But my, what commotion all this has created, eh? In addition to blunt reaction from the usually cautious Goodell, he had the players in all kinds of tizzy, the union readying the torches, the owners diving for cover, and sparks flying off the keyboards in newsrooms everywhere.

For people like Limbaugh, it's all about the attention. By simply being Rush Limbaugh, he knows he can inject himself into any conversation or situation no matter how patently ridiculous or unbecoming, because he is a proud, polarizing figure with a mountain for a pulpit.

I have never figured out whether Limbaugh believes everything he says, though I am quite certain he doesn't.
I give him full credit for being an evil-genius who knows exactly what to say for three hours a day to keep his base feeling disenfranchised, disillusioned, scared, angry, and most importantly, listening, so he can clean up on all that advertising moolah and buy his way into any conversation.

Limbaugh knows that with that loot in his fat, little hands, he is in a position to toy with the likes of the Republican Party, the NAACP, any number of women's rights groups, or the National Football League...

Limbaugh knows that enough of us still believe that right (no, not that right) has to win out over wrong at least most of the time in this world. It just has to.
He knows that if he can threaten that comfortable premise, he has succeeded in making his world a little bigger, ours a little smaller, and his wallet a little fatter.

Limbaugh is the chubby, snotty-nosed 6-year-old at the birthday party with all the toys and treats. He doesn't need another toy or slice of cake, he needs to be stared at and listened to. In the world of that spoiled 6-year-old, attention is currency, and, buddy, negative attention beats no attention at all.

In the coming days, Limbaugh will invariably dine on this latest 'slight.'
He'll make sure that the listeners, who chase his sludge like it were some kind of gospel, understand that he was the victim of a left-wing conspiracy that will soon will be knocking at their doors.

And when he's sufficiently satisfied that he has made his loss theirs, he'll slink away to his mansion, light a cigar, and laugh out loud.

He will have won again.

You're welcome, Rush.