Remember how Bill Maher got FIRED for his words?

[boolean]

Funny how the only well known celebrity/pundit to ever get fired for saying something on air was Bill Maher. Why isn't whoever the fuck employs rush limpballs scared about advertising dollars? Where are all the sponsors shaking in their boots and pulling out of their contracts? It's amazing to me that such a reprehensible comment goes unpunished whenever it comes from a puke.

A liberal says something that MIGHT be offensive, and he loses his job. The pricks go after his head and chop it off. They say shit like "he has the freedom of speech to say that, and we have the freedom to boycott and the advertisers have the freedom to pull out". But a conservative that says something that is COMPLETELY 100% offensive to millions of people gets off. No threats of boycott. No corporate masters making statements and issuing damage control memos. No sponsors pulling out. Just business as usual.

It makes me sick.

[stopbush]

1. Wasn't PI on ABC when he got fired?

Seems that ABC is the biggest rethug suck-up network these days.

[mtowngman]

2. That's the "liberal media"

actually it probably has more to do with timing. There was a hell of a lot more truth to Bill's comments- but they were made in the midst of the post 9/11 furor.

[MrSlayer]

3. He didn't get fired. His show ran for 8 more months after the comments.

They didn't renew him but he wasn't straight up fired for saying what he said. He plays this up as if he said it and he was fired the next day but that isn't what happened.

[boolean]

6. And the difference is?

Not renewing his contract = He got canned.

[MrSlayer]

9. Yes they cancelled but it's not as if he was fired immediately.

That's how he portrays it. I'm a fan of Bill's but he is disingenuous about the ABC thing.

[RaleighNCDUer]

13. Maybe not so disengenuous. The network had a contract with

him, and his ratings were good, so there's no way they could just drop him for anything short of outright treason - but in the halls of the studio the corporate masters might have said "That's it, you're fucking out of here, when the season ends, you're gone." That would still be construed as being fired.

Of course, I was not a fly on the wall there, but that's how it always struck me.

Pretty much the same as happened with Phil Donahue. The only liberal talk show, with decent if not stellar ratings, and it goes down the tubes. He was not renewed, but it sure looks like being fired.

[CrispyQ]

16. I heard Maher once explain it:

When I called the show "Not Ready for Prime Time" the network didn't realize that I really meant not ready for prime time!

[Strawman]

4. Well Limpballs did get fired from ESPN

For his ridiculous, racist comments about Donavan McNabb. His current employers aren't targeting a mainstream audience. Their target audience eats this crap up but eventually even they will not want to identify with this overgrown anal cyst. Some new shitbag will take his place.

[MrSlayer]

5. self delete.

Brain cramp.

[Strawman]

7. yeah

The OP asked why doesn't Limpballs ever get fired. Well, when he was on a mainstream media channel, ESPN/ABC, he did.

[MrSlayer]

Yep, you're right.

Thus my self delete. Got ahead of myself.

[BOSSHOG]

11. I believe he quit before he got fired

Tom Jackson threatened to quit. Limbaugh, the coward, who chose not to defend his actions slinked off to his targeted audience. He failed to realize that ESPN doesn't have the same audience he has on the radion, close minded, ignorant bigots.

[Homer Wells]

8. Back in the 60's

The television show, "The Smothers Brothers Hour" was canceled after Pete Seeger sang the song "Waist Deep in the Big Muddy",referring to LBJ and the Viet Nam debacle.

That is the only other time I can recall something like that happening. Pissed a lot of us off at the time.

[A HERETIC I AM]

12. Don't forget the Jackie Mason incident on the Ed Sullivan show

Where Mason got angry because they (or Ed himself) were trying to get him to either hurry up or change the subject and he essentially shot Ed Sullivan the bird on live, National TV. He didnt appear again on NBC for years and years.

[RaleighNCDUer]

14. That was probably less the network and more Ed.

Nobody fucked with Ed Sullivan - he could make and break careers.

[Jawja]

10. Self Delete

Point already made.

[Robbien]

15. The rightwingnuts immediately attacked the sponsors of Bill Maher

The rightwingnut 101st keyboard brigade went into action almost before the words left Bill Maher's mouth. Thousands of calls, emails and faxes hit the offices of each and every sponsor and each and every news desk.

O'Reilly says foul things and the leftwing just complains to one another.

Of course the left gets hit with consequences while the rightwingnuts skates free. The squeaky wheel gets the grease.

[bling bling]

17. You said it.

The difference is the Republicans fancy themselves a clique or club or something. All for one and one for all. This enables them to launch wicked powerful phone/e-mail/letter campaigns against whoever pisses them off.

Of course, the downside to the lockstep mentality of politics is that their blind loyalty allows their leaders to use them as tools. And I guess they don't care. Feels better to be a part of a team for them, even if it's a bad team.

You don't usually see the Democrats launching seething cordinated attacks on the people we find offensive. We're by and large more of a group of individuals who see ourselves as a group of individuals rather than a cohesive mass version of the 3 muskateers.

And sometimes we do get organized and make calls / send letters and all that. But it usually takes something pretty big. The Republicans, on the other hand, will go for the jugular over a molehill every single time. You really can't be a member of that team without having to adopt a very ugly, nasty perspective of people who aren't on your "team" or who think differently than you.