Steele Apologizes To Limbaugh. Unfortunately.

After referring to what Limbaugh does as “incendiary” and “ugly”, RNC Chair Michael Steele backed way off by apologizing to the talkmeister.

“My intent was not to go after Rush – I have enormous respect for Rush Limbaugh,” Steele said in a telephone interview. “I was maybe a little bit inarticulate. … There was no attempt on my part to diminish his voice or his leadership.”

Steele reached out to Limbaugh Monday afternoon after Limbaugh lambasted Steele on the radio.

Now, Steele tells Politico that Limbaugh is “a valuable conservative voice for our party.”

“I went back at that tape and I realized words that I said weren’t what I was thinking,” Steele said. “It was one of those things where I thinking I was saying one thing, and it came out differently. What I was trying to say was a lot of people … want to make Rush the scapegoat, the bogeyman, and he’s not.

“I’m not going to engage these guys and sit back and provide them the popcorn for a fight between me and Rush Limbaugh,” Steele added. “No such thing is going to happen. … I wasn’t trying to slam him or anything.”

That’s too bad, because this was happening just as I was plugging in my popcorn popper.  But Steele folded, perhaps realizing that Limbaugh does call some of the shots for the GOP or, at the very least, has a large enough bullhorn to galvanize support, or lack thereof.

“He brings a very important message to the American people to wake up and pay attention to what the administration is doing,” Steele said. “Number two, there are those out there who want to look at what he’s saying as incendiary and divisive and ugly. That’s what I was trying to say. It didn’t come out that way. … He does what he does best, which is provoke: He provokes thought, he provokes the left. And they’re clearly the ones who are most excited about him.”

Asked if he planned to apologize, Steele said: “I wasn’t trying to offend anybody. So, yeah, if he’s offended, I’d say: Look, I’m not in the business of hurting people’s feelings here. … My job is to try to bring us all together.”

By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.