Rush Limbaugh is sometimes correctly recognized as the real leader of the Republican Party. No one better represents the principles and morals of the GOP.
He's become more independent since they lost the White House and voters cut Karl Rove loose from central control of national talk radio PSYOPS, but Limbaugh is still the default leader of the Republicans' best messaging tool.
Today (11/17/2014) Limbaugh's reiterating his support for shutting down the government again. He disagreed with Fox's Karl Rove and Britt Hume, who recently said it would be a bad idea for Republicans.
Last time Democrats seemed to be caught by surprise. They should not assume it won't happen again.
Limbaugh is the same loudmouth who drummed up similar support for defaulting on the debt in 2011 by suggesting for months that it would be no big deal and would merely force Obama and the Democrats to give them what they want. With that and egging on loons like Cruz, he should get a lot of credit for the compromise sequestration. But he doesn't.
Maybe it's the good cop bad cop routine, but his purpose or aim (his or something he's paid for) is to pump up the dittohead teabagger (the Republican base) support for the Ted Cruz faction and encourage him/them to try to shut government down again.
Rove and Hume are lesser messengers, more sane, representing what Limbaugh may sometimes refer to as the GOP establishment. Who will 'win' this? At the very least Limbaugh and whoever is pushing him are applying the same suicidal march-to-the-edge-of-the-cliff negotiating pressure. He knows he has not been blamed/credited for his big part the last time and has no problem doing it again. Limbaugh notes that Ted Cruz got a lot of the blame/credit for the government shutdown and got reelected! And Republicans just won big! So, what's so bad about going suicidal.
Impeachment moves will follow similar patterns, with years of unchallenged free-for-all attacks on Obama by the talk radio gods to build on.
Will we do this all over again and end up on the edge with more compromise by Democrats trying to deal with the insane faction of the Republican Party?
If we do it will because the Democratic Party and liberal/progressive organizations continue to give Republican radio and its gods a free speech free ride. Democrats need to do something different. Liberals/progressives need to go on the offensive, and Republican radio is a great place to start.
By the way, he's also been attacking net neutrality in support of Cruz, saying the US government and Obama want more control over the internet. Will that old radio technology beat the internet again?