Rush Limbaugh: Model Republican?

Rush Limbaugh has just done what no Republican bigwig could accomplish, said Andrew Breitbart in The Washington Times. The talk-radio giant's rousing speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference over the weekend jump-started "the flagging conservative cause." (read the transcript, or watch the video) Limbaugh's "clear-headed, timely, and sometimes rambunctious call to ideological arms" made it obvious why "President Obama has singled him out for destruction."

It also made clear why Republican leaders aren't so comfortable with Limbaugh, either, said Thomas Schaller in Salon. Strip his speech of the "cheap applause lines about freedom" and the don't-think-like-a-minority optimism, and Limbaugh's message is: "Le mouvement conservative, c'est moi."

In this moment of Republican weakness, said Reihan Salam in Forbes, Limbaugh may just be able to remake the GOP in his own image. But his increasing intolerance of even the slightest dissent will only doom the party by driving out non-Dittoheads—"13 million listeners plus their spouses, plus the family dog" don't add up to an electoral majority.

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