Politics | 05/06/2009 12:10 pm

Eric Cantor Retracts 'Listening Tour' After Rush Limbaugh Criticism (Video)

By The Staff at wowOwow.com

Eric Cantor spent his Sunday morning telling CNN that the Republican Party plans on launching a listening tour.

Said the House minority leader, "What we’re trying to do here today is kick off a series of town-hall forums so that we can get back to listening to the people."

Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh didn’t like that one bit and on Monday said the GOP shouldn’t take such a tactic: "We do not need a listening tour. We need a teaching tour. That is what the Republican Party, or, slash, the conservative movement needs to focus on. Listening tour ain’t it."

Well, Cantor must have gotten the message, because he told MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough this morning that the party’s rebranding does not amount to a listening tour: "You know, Joe, really, this — this is not a listening tour … What the National Council for a New America is, is an opportunity for us to go out across this country to talk about our conservative principles and to appeal to as many elements in our society as we can, and to really talk to them at a higher level."

Watch, via Think Progress:

51 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

The Repubicans have been listening to their base which is too small to get them elected.

John McCain lost the election because of the limbaugh base. Right wing libertarian extremists for the most part. This is not about fiscal conservatives - this is not about smaller government or high taxes. This is about ideaology and looking back at a liftestyle that can not be recaptured . A liftestyle that perhaps never was as good as we remember it. There can be an exciiting future ahead if we work togather. The Republican party just can’t seem to do that. To allow Rush Limbaugh to run the party is just plain stupid. Doesn’t any one of these people have cajones?

By starry Nite on 05/06/2009 5:06 pm

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What is really going on here? Is Limbaugh so powerful that he can turn the elected representatives of the people into shivering shaking plops of jelly? Why? By definition, elected representatives are chosen to act and speak on behalf of a larger group; if they don’t LISTEN to that larger group, then they’re no longer the group’s representatives, but instead are preachers, taliban, apostles of ideas they wish to impose on the group … Hey! What IS going on here!!! Didn’t Jimmy Stewart teach us anything?

By rocky rocky on 05/06/2009 6:21 pm

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I think Starry Nite just nailed it. We saw Obama come from the very far left… more so than any other in the Senate… to being more centrist. It seemed to happen around September, when Lehman rocked this country with its collapse.

The Republicans have no moderates, except for Olympia Snowe. They are hard right in a country that is not. This country will never travel that path again. It seems they want to adjust but don’t really know how. Even their young stars like Bobby Jindal are hard right. This is a big problem for the GOP. We need strong leaders in both parties, and some of those need to be those moderates who can reach across party lines.

By Maggie W on 05/06/2009 7:37 pm

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I agree, Maggie…….but, I really don’t think the Republican party can rise from the ashes any longer…..they continue to marginalize themselves daily……..only 20% of voters are now willing to identify themselves as Republicans.

By MK P on 05/06/2009 8:48 pm

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The far left is angry that Obama is centrist but I think people who really knew him- he always was. The far right sees him as far left.

Centrist are caught in the crossfire. I think the centrist and moderates are going to have to take a more supportive role. People expect Obama to move moutains against stiff opposition. The right have their tea bagging parties and the conservatives are almost like the silent majority.

By starry Nite on 05/06/2009 10:07 pm

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The centrists and moderates are going to have to step up. In the coming weeks, two big events will unfold. A new Supreme Court appointee and the first blueprint in health care will begin to unravel. This country had high hopes for health care in ’ 93, and we all know how that panned out. And that was back when the GOP actually had some back bone and did not allow someone like Rush to think for them. I just cannot understand that kind of timidity from a party that was once so strong and so powerful. What the heck happened ? Well, the past eight pathetic years certainly didn’t help. MK pointed out that their base is now only 20%. If someone had told me that would happen ten years ago, I would have thought that person had been smoking something funny.

By Maggie W on 05/06/2009 11:04 pm

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Yet another apologetic foolish Republican and they say Limbaugh is not the party leader!! I would like to know who is if it’s not him!!! Don’t they get it yet that they all look more and more like kids who been called before the high school principle and boy how embarassing do they look now? Why don’t they just let Limbaugh/Hannity/Beck/O Reilly and the latest now banned from the UK Savidge take over for them and do the listening tour they are all such great patriots I’m sure the country would be really impressed with that fine sample!!

By caj p on 05/06/2009 8:39 pm

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Well that was interesting. Cantor starts out saying that people feel like Washington is not listening, then says they are not going on a listening tour. In effect, he said that they were going out to not listen right to our faces. Is this their idea of reaching out, or is this the stale koolaid tour?

By Zera Lee on 05/07/2009 1:31 am

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Yet another attempt at baiting fake conflicts on the right >yawn< in order to divert attention from Obama’s habitual dishonesty, shocking disregard for the law, constitution, and/or ethics… and general, all-round incompetency. Team Obama, the DNC, and their MSM sycophants have been employing despicable Alinsky-esque divide-and-conquer and character assassination techniques for months now… manufacturing synthetic “fights” like Rush vs. Steele, plus ceaseless ridicule of Jindal, Palin, even shameful distortion of the legacy of Ronald Reagan. Clearly, the strategy is to eliminate GOP rallying points and philosophical framework for 2010/12 and create the image of a party in disarray.And it’s not difficult to see why the Democrats might prefer to banter playfully about made-up GOP “scandals” and irrelevancies like Meghan McCain’s latest drivel than debate Obama’s ongoing destruction of the country.When their pork-n-welfare spending orgy fails to create any real economic gains -but stokes vicious inflation and crashes the dollar instead- the Democrats face a bloodbath in 2010. And by 2012? LOL, the GOP could take 40 states running Gilbert Gottfried.http://reaganiterepublicanresistance.blogspot.com/

By James Yanke on 05/07/2009 8:16 am

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James Yanke, Wake up and smell the coffee. Only in your dreams will the country return to yesterday. It is a brand new day. Everything isn’t pork - some of us call it progress.

By starry Nite on 05/07/2009 4:11 pm