Even Rush Limbaugh is distancing himself from the Fox/Donald Trump conspiracy theory of blaming the Russia investigation for the school shooting at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida last week.
As I’ve previously noted, it’s far-fetched, even for a conspiracy theorist, to believe that a screw up in the Miami field office over a warning about shooter Nikolas Cruz, had any connection to the Russia investigation. Or, to put it another way, that in a bureau of more than 30,000 staffers, everybody is working on the Russia investigation and putting everything else on the back burner.
But Fox News pushed that gaslighting at least twice on Saturday. Then Saturday night, Trump echoed the talking point in a tweet.
Then, in his lapdog interview on Sunday, Fox host Chris Wallace opened the door for Limbaugh to validate the conspiracy theory.
But first, Wallace all but asked Limbaugh to attack the FBI by asking him to “explain” the failure in the Miami field office. Even though Limbaugh is a guy who has never spent a minute in public service, much less in law enforcement. (transcript excerpts via FoxNews.com, with my emphases)
WALLACE: Let me ask you—let me ask you about one aspect of this,
though, because we have now learned of two cases where the FBI failed to follow up on credible information about the shooter and we’ve now learned that just last month, that someone close to Nikolas Cruz, the shooter, called the FBI tip line and according to the FBI said this. He talked about Cruz’s gun ownership, desire to kill people, erratic behavior and disturbing social media posts as well as the potential of him conducting a school shooting. But that information was never forwarded to the Miami field office. How do you explain that?
Limbaugh’s response was coy:
LIMBAUGH: Well, I could be snarky and I could say maybe the FBI should stop trying to find every case of sexual harassment in the White House and maybe they ought to give up on this ridiculous pursuit the Russians colluded with Trump in the election. But clearly—this is my point—a lot of people knew, a lot of people had every bit of knowledge they knew to act on this guy, to surveilled this guy.
You know, we’re told, well, we can’t do anything until the crime has been committed. That’s what has to change and is going to take some really smart people to figure how to do that without violating civil liberties and the Fourth Amendment and so forth. But it’s clear that the way we deal with this now—this, Chris, this is totally political.
Then Limbaugh took a swipe at the Parkland students who had opened the show with a discussion of their plans for a March 24 demonstration in Washington, called “March for our Lives,” to push for tougher gun regulations.
LIMBAUGH: The students think they are taking politics out of this. The minute they bash the NRA, it’s politics. And the point for many of this is—this is an event that advances a political agenda for the American left and the Democrat Party -
But, apparently, knocking the kids was not on the menu. Knocking the FBI was. Wallace interrupted Limbaugh to go back to that topic.
WALLACE: Let me pick up in something you said, because you just said at the beginning, I could be snarky and I could say, well, maybe the FBI should stop wasting so much time. And you have suggested this in a kind of provocative way on your radio show, that the FBI is spending too much time on the Trump investigation. But in fact, the president tweeted just that last night. …
LIMBAUGH: I said it Friday. I said it Friday.
WALLACE: I know—well, maybe he listened to you.
[…] Do you really see a connection between the FBI investigating the Russia investigation of potential Trump connection and the fact that they miss the signals here?
LIMBAUGH: No, that’s why I said I could be snarky. But I am trying to make the point. The FBI is engaged in a bunch of stuff that’s the waste -- time-wasting and isn’t going to take us anywhere and it’s all—Chris, everything has become politicized, political in this country and that’s why we can’t solve anything.
Memo to Fox and Trump: When even Rush Limbaugh doesn’t want to be part of a right-wing talking point, it’s time to reconsider.
Watch Limbaugh run away from the conspiracy theory below, from the February 18, 2018 Fox News Sunday.
Get the feeling that you have a similar ‘old codger’ problem to me when it comes to co-ordinating hand and eye, wd – your habit of posting of a blank space immediately before one of your thoughtful comments makes me laugh out loud in recognition of a kindred soul :)
And Rush NEVER apologizes or backtracks unless he knows he might be culpable.
I wonder if Mueller is looking at tRump’s enablers, too.
Will the rats jump the ship?
You know damn well tRump won’t take a bullet for any of them, is this the beginning of the end?
For the sake of the country, we can only hope…
.