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The free market, rather loudly, told Rush Limbaugh it wasn't interested in what he sells. Undoubtedly there are NFL owners who share Limbaugh's brand of conservatism. A few, I'm told, are so far to the right politically they think Limbaugh is liberal. But the voices that spoke up in the private club Limbaugh wanted to join shouted him down.
It was noticeable enough that several players, very eloquently in some cases, said they wouldn't want to play for a team he owned. But then there was an owner, the Colts' Jim Irsay, who went on the record as saying he wouldn't vote to accept an ownership group that includes Limbaugh. And most important, the NFL commissioner himself, Roger Goodell, said very firmly that Limbaugh's public utterances as they relate to race, to African Americans specifically, are "divisive" and "polarizing."
It was obvious at that point that Limbaugh wouldn't be part of an NFL ownership group. And it's fair. Limbaugh,
every day and
very publicly, judges people, turns thumbs up or thumbs down on someone's candidacy or worthiness. Now
he's been judged: Thumbs down, not interested. Millions of people believe what Limbaugh believes about politics and race. But millions of others believe something else and, more to the point, reject what Limbaugh espouses.
And the push-back was more than Limbaugh was going to overcome, so it's over."