Rush Limbaugh Blames Obama for Missouri State Fair’s Racist Rodeo Clown

Rush Limbaugh is blaming Obama for the racist mocking of the president by a rodeo clown at the Missouri State Fair.

Limbaugh claims that the racist incident occurred because Obama has diminished the presidency.

Transcript:

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LIMBAUGH: While we’re on the subject, have you heard about this thing that happened at the Missouri state fair? “Missouri State Fair officials and politicians on Sunday condemned the performance of a rodeo clown who donned a mask resembling President Barack Obama during Saturday’s bull riding competition.” Apparently the clown’s name, Perry Beam, rodeo clown, wore an Obama mask during the bull riding at the Missouri state fair, which is in Sedalia. “A tempest over the incident erupted after a website reported a Facebook account of it. The Facebook writer said he had taken a Taiwanese student –” (laughing) — it’s sad, funny, it’s a whole bunch of things. The way we’re grouping ourselves. So yeah, yeah, yeah, a Facebook writer had taken a Taiwanese student to the rodeo in Sedalia Saturday night and during the bull riding segment a rodeo clown appeared wearing an Obama mask.

That wasn’t all the. “The announcer wanted to know if anyone would like to see Obama run down by a bull.” This was what was posted on Facebook. And it is also reported on Facebook that the crowd went wild. So the announcer asked it again and again, louder every time, whipping the audience into a lather, “Anybody like to see Obama run down by a bull?” This caused the governor of Missouri and the lieutenant governor of Missouri and Senator Claire McCaskill to express outrage and shock and sadness and venom over how this could possibly happen.

Who would do this? Why was the crowd going nuts? This is absolutely embarrassing. This is intolerable. This is unacceptable. Who do these people think they are? Why would anybody put on an Obama mask as a clown, and why would the announcer ask if anybody wanted the Obama clown run over by a bunch of bulls, and why would the audience cheer this?

And it was just last week on this program where I — with some weight and seriousness — and it’s not an Oprah comment on the weight. I mean, it was heavy — talked about Obama going on a comedy show to tell us something very serious about foreign policy, and I said this is diminishing the office of the presidency, the way Obama’s handling this, just totally diminishing it. He is reducing the office to the lowest common denominator, and I would suggest to you that whatever the truth of this thing is in Missouri, the clown putting on the Obama mask, is representative of the fact that there is a declining overall respect for the office of the presidency.

When the president of the United States more often than not connects with the American people on late-night comedy shows, what else can happen, other than the diminishing of the office.

Limbaugh believes that because President Obama went on The Tonight Show, his opponents now have free reign to be as racist as they want. Limbaugh has been pushing the bogus argument that somehow Barack Obama harmed the office of the presidency by going on a late night talk show. He is trying to argue that Barack Obama delegitimized his presidency by having a chat with Jay Leno.

This is more blame the victim nonsense from the right. They can’t take responsibility for the seeds that their racist attacks against President Obama have sown, so spend their time dreaming up ways to blame the president. The thought process that started as a justification for their racism against Obama has grown to include all minorities. This type of thinking is also visible in the way that conservatives blame Trayvon Martin for his own death.

Rush Limbaugh has always used anything that Obama has said or done to argue that the president has diminished the office, but what he really means is that the presidency has been diminished because a black man is living in the White House.

His blaming of Obama isn’t about talk shows. It’s about defending the racist attitudes of Republicans towards Barack Obama by any means necessary. No matter how much Republicans protest, they can’t hide their racism by blaming the victim.

Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association