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Rush Limbaugh is a racist. This isn't news, we all know he lives on the fringes of hate for anyone who isn't pasty-white like he is. But lately, he's been ramping up the hateful rhetoric to levels I've not seen even from him, and Monday's rant is no exception.

While I support the right for Limbaugh to say whatever he wants under the First Amendment, I wonder what the consequences will ultimately be. Republicans whine about President Obama starting class wars while Rush Limbaugh stirs the fires of discontent and race under the surface. It's a volatile game he's playing.

Via Media Matters:

Today on his radio show, Rush Limbaugh trotted out a new theory on the guiding prerogative of the Obamas. Limbaugh claimed part of what motivates President Obama and the Democratic Party is "the pursuit of money without having to work for it." He then said that the Obamas view their time in the White House as "an opportunity to live high on the hog without having it cost them a dime." Not content to leave it at that, Limbaugh elaborated, adding that the Obamas justify this by thinking "we deserve this, or we're owed this because of what's been done to us and our ancestors." Limbaugh concluded that if Democrats and the Obamas "don't know how to earn a lot of money working for it, they'll go someplace where they can legally steal it."

Here's a bit from the transcript (in the Media Matters post) that summarizes Limbaugh's strategy: Convince people that scary black guy wants to take something away from them and give it to their friends.

Now, people who've never had 2 or 3 million dollars think, "My gosh, what would I spend it on?" You'd be surprised once you have it. It's not that hard. And the concept of, "Well, gosh, don't you have enough?" That's a myth. That's something the liberals use to try to guilt other people out of pursuing achievement and so forth. But believe me, no matter what they have, it's never enough. And I think there's a lot of reasons why the Obamas, the Democrats are doing what they're doing. In addition to the ideology, in addition to whatever grievances they have about this country and its past and however they think it needs to be cut down to size, and however they think the people who have gotten rich need to be gotten even with. Also in the mix is their chance to get their share without having to work for it and set themselves up, and their friends up, for life in the process. I don't doubt that that's a factor here.

One of the reasons I loathe the Republican party is because their central reason for existence is money. Morals, compassion, kindness, art and beauty have no place in their ideology. It's all about the money, honey, and no one lives that out in public like Rush Limbaugh.

When life becomes nothing more than the pursuit of more and more and more material wealth and the Rush Limbaughs of the world tell the pursuers they're in danger of having to lose that wealth to a hated group of people, it's not hard to see where the de facto leader of the Republican Party is leading the pack.

I wonder when it rises to the level of shouting "Fire!" in a crowded room. Before or after violence erupts?