{"id":13803,"date":"2012-12-04T17:21:28","date_gmt":"2012-12-04T17:21:28","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2012-12-04T17:21:28","modified_gmt":"2012-12-04T17:21:28","slug":"don_t_blame_costas_blame_the_microphone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2012\/12\/04\/don_t_blame_costas_blame_the_microphone\/","title":{"rendered":"Don\u2019t Blame Costas, Blame the Microphone"},"content":{"rendered":"

RUSH: A lot of people are still upset at Bob Costas for his halftime rant against guns on Sunday. Oh, have you heard the latest on this Belcher guy? Apparently on Friday night he was with a different woman. The New York Post has this story. Belcher, Jovan Belcher of the Kansas City Chiefs, was with another woman Friday night and getting drunk and he had suffered a concussion not too long ago, a game in November. He was getting drunk with this babe and apparently it was not a romantic relationship, but this other woman has come out and said, “Yeah, he was with me Friday night.” He was with her at dinner. He takes her home five miles from where he lives and then he stays in his Bentley outside her building until like four o\u2019clock or five o\u2019clock in the morning sleeping.<\/p>\n

So the story that he was upset with his girlfriend for staying out at the concert \u2019til one o\u2019clock apparently — well, he could still be, but he wasn\u2019t home at one o\u2019clock when she got home. He wouldn\u2019t know when she got home unless he was on the phone with her. He didn\u2019t get home until 5:30 in the morning, and then the argument ensued, and then the nine shots, and then the trip to Arrowhead Stadium where he committed suicide. And this other woman\u2019s not denying this. So, you know, as usual, on these things, you\u2019ve got to wait to find out all of the related information that is obviously not known soon after an event like this. <\/p>\n

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Also, a story in the Stack. A bunch of Chiefs players are not joining this anti-gun parade. A bunch of Chiefs players are saying guns are not the problem here. And in Costas\u2019 case, there\u2019s no way Costas should be fired. I mean, and I want to thank Byron York. <\/line>Byron York was on Greta last night with Karen Tumulty of TIME Magazine, and he tried to point out the hypocrisy. Sports people say they don\u2019t want any politics involved. He brought me up on ESPN and how that was just intolerable, and he correctly remembered that, after I resigned at ESPN, four or five days later, Chris Berman and that whole mealy-mouthed crowd went on the air and started apologizing. Berman said he was the quarterback and he forgot, and I had promised never to say anything about politics, which I never promised to do. <\/line><\/p>\n

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There was no such deal in my deal with ESPN to not bring up politics, but I never asked to be able to, either. It wasn\u2019t even on my mind. “We\u2019re so sorry. We didn\u2019t intend. We didn\u2019t realize,” blah, blah, blah, blah, everybody covering their own rear-end. And Byron York says (paraphrasing), “Look at that, ESPN just goes nuts to get rid of Limbaugh, but Costas over at NBC, perfectly fine.” Like I said yesterday<\/a>, the reason Costas can do it is because his bosses agree with what he said. It\u2019s no more complicated than that, the old NBC\/HBO cabal. They\u2019re interchangeable. They go back and forth, the people that work there, and he said what the bosses there agree with, so it wasn\u2019t any problem. <\/p>\n

But I don\u2019t blame Bob Costas. I blame the microphone. I blame the microphone. If that microphone hadn\u2019t been on, nobody would know what Costas said. If you stop and think about it, it\u2019s the microphone\u2019s fault. Costas, he\u2019s up there, he\u2019s in the broadcast booth at halftime. I\u2019ve been in that booth. I have had several visits to the NBC Sunday night telecast. And Bob comes in at halftime and he does the halftime show from the booth about ten feet to the left of where Al Michaels and Collinsworth are. In fact, where Costas… maybe I shouldn\u2019t say this. Ah, I\u2019ve already blown it. I\u2019ll never be invited back. <\/p>\n

Where Costas does the halftime show is where Kathryn and I usually watch when we\u2019re guests there. So we vacate with two or three, maybe four minutes left in the second quarter and Bob moves in to get ready for the halftime show. That\u2019s where he does it. But if nobody would have turned on his microphone, nobody would have known what he said. So whose fault is it, really? Is it Bob\u2019s or is it the microphone\u2019s? ‘Cause it\u2019s a tough call. It\u2019s a tough call, just like Snerdley, he totally understands where I\u2019m going with this. If Bob Costas\u2019 microphone hadn\u2019t been on there would not be a problem today, at least for Bob. You know, NBC might now want to think about getting rid of microphones. I mean, look at the damage. <\/line><\/p>\n

You know, NBC… Some people say that this kind of controversy is enjoyed by media companies, that any — any — controversy is good. I\u2019m not sure so sure. But this is not the first time a microphone has caused pain, suffering, damage. Look at all the previous occasions. I\u2019m sure you can think of some yourselves. The Reverend Jackson? Reverend Jackson was on a Fox News microphone that was accidentally left on. Reverend Jackson had no idea when talking about how he wanted to de-nut Obama.<\/p>\n

If the Fox News microphones had not been on, nobody would have heard the Reverend Jackson say that. So it wasn\u2019t Reverend Jackson\u2019s fault. What happened to Bob Costas was not his fault. The microphone was on. It is no more complicated than that. I think what this incident shows is that we might want to seriously think about permits for microphone usage. I mean, look at this. The microphone can cause serious pain.<\/p>\n