Judge Trey Loftin

A Texas state judge is promoting his recent decisions favoring a gas driller in its dispute with a local landowner as part of his election campaign, a move some legal scholars say may violate state judicial ethics rules.

With aspects of the case still pending in his courtroom, Judge Trey Loftin sent fliers to voters saying he forced the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to back down.

Loftin, who is campaigning to keep his state judgeship in a county west of Dallas, also sent out materials with the image of talk show host Rush Limbaugh, who credited the judge’s ruling in favor of driller Range Resources Corp. (RRC) (RRC), based in Fort Worth, Texas, for getting the EPA to reverse course.

The clear implication of his campaign fliers, of course, is that a vote for Judge Loftin is a vote for the very same kind of industry-friendly, Limbaugh-approved decisions he’s handed down in the past. Rather than, say, future decisions that side with big business only when the law favors big business and with local landowners when the law is on their side.

Worse, by making a case that is still pending in his courtroom a centerpiece of his campaign, Loftin might as well advertise that voters (and industry donors) can influence the outcome of that very case simply by supporting his campaign. This kind of campaign would be inappropriate even if Loftin were simply suggesting that he would rule against a frivolous lawsuit claiming that every Texan has a fundamental right to an unlimited supply of purple plastic plates, but it is all the more troubling when he implies that a wealthy and powerful industry group could keep a friendly judge on the bench by throwing their support behind him.

Today, Limbaugh turned his attention to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Limabugh said that Clinton “has reached a pinnacle and all she is is a secretary,” adding that the left has “the strangest definition of success.”

Limbaugh then said he was being prodded to talk about Clinton’s need to wear “Spanx,” but suggested she had a greater need for “Spankles.” Spanx are undergarments designed to reduce the visibility of body fat. Listen:

You can listen to Limbaugh’s attacks on Sandra Fluke here.

Republican radio host Rush Limbaugh, however, was delighted to see this Republican judge reaching out to aide the Republican Party. As Limbaugh said on his show yesterday:

Now, yesterday afternoon a federal judge by the name of Jerry Smith at the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in Houston had had enough, and he demanded that the Justice Department give him a three-page memo on whether or not this administration understands the concept of judicial review. Now, I saw this and I started cheering. I started laughing. Because it’s about time people started fighting back on this. The American people love the concept of a team. You have to have the right people on the team, but we are a team here. There is a team that’s opposing this president, and attempting to make him a one-termer this November at the ballot box. It’s great to have this response.

It is, of course, not at all surprising to see a leading Republican so gleeful at this Republican judge’s Republican Republicanism. The only loser in this incident is any perception whatsoever that the Fifth Circuit can be relied upon to see aside its partisan preferences and fairly apply the law. As Orin Kerr, a former constitutional advisor to Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), explains, “the court’s order was highly inappropriate, and Rush’s comments are an excellent example of why. Whatever the judges were thinking, their order was inevitably going to be interpreted as the product of three conservative judges trying to enter the political fray and take on a Democratic President.”

Calling Aronsohn a “sexist creep,” Alyssa Rosenberg noted the comment “tells you everything about how cosseted Hollywood’s disgusting sexists are.” Aronsohn issued a flippant apology on Twitter: “Yes, yes – it was a stupid joke. I’m sorry.”

While Aronsohn elicited widespread anger as a result of his snide insults, he did find one defender: Rush Limbaugh. The hate radio host, who constantly bemoans the “chickification” of various aspects of American life, used that term his defense of Aronsohn, urging women to leave them alone today:

All he’s talking about here is the chickification of his business. He writes sitcoms – he’s a comedy writer. He says the women have taken over. It’s all vagina all the time. We get it! Ok women, let us alone.

Watch it:

Limbaugh is trying to repair his corporate brand with advertisers, hordes of whom have left his show due to his willingness to engage in sexist attacks. Limbaugh is of course a suitable defender of Aronsohn, given his distinguished track record and his willingness to call female advocates “sluts.”

Limbaugh also alleged that media coverage of the case was a conspiracy between Obama, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson to ensure Obama’s relection. Listen:

Limbaugh argued that the case received scant media attention for the first several weeks because the media needed to focus on attacking him and the Republican “war on women.” Actually, media attention increased when the police finally released 911 tapes that revealed Zimmerman had pursued Trayvon Martin.

Get the essential facts of the case here.

A poster protesting the addition of Rush Limbaugh to the Hall of Famous Missourians (Source: AP)

Groups are keeping up the pressure on Tilley to change his mind. Two weeks ago, one group brought 600 rolls of toilet paper to the legislator’s office with signs calling on him to “Flush Rush!” And yesterday, another group marched outside the state Capital before leaving 35,000 petition signatures against the bust’s placement.

But Tilley insists that Limbaugh must be honored for having been “successful”:

Tilley said Limbaugh, who is from Cape Girardeau, is an important — if controversial — figure in Missouri’s history.

“He’s transformed talk radio, he’s the most popular radio personality in the country and he’s from our home state of Missouri,” Tilley said. “Does he say controversial things? Yes. Does he say provocative things? Yes. Does he say things that I disagree with? Yes. But he certainly has been successful.”

The fact that Limbaugh attacked Fluke, disrespecting all women in the process, should prevent him from receiving the honor, said Jessica Peters, a Planned Parenthood volunteer in Missouri. “If we say that it’s OK for somebody to call somebody a ‘slut,’ then it’s OK for people to use name-calling,” Peters said.

That rival talker is former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, and the rival network is Cumulus Media. “The Mike Huckabee Show” launches on April 9, and Cumulus is eager to sign up radio stations to carry it. The opportunity for them is two-fold: if stations decide to drop Limbaugh, there’s an obvious opening for them to carry Huckabee’s show instead. But even if they don’t, most of the local station contracts with Limbaugh are exclusive: another station in the same market can’t carry him. In the past, that meant the station had snagged itself a prize. In the future, it might look more like they’re saddled with a cigar-smoking albatross.

Cumulus Media’s seized that opportunity, telling stations that don’t have Limbaugh now and that might choose not to reup their contracts to carry him in the future, that in Huckabee, they’ve got a better alternative. The company’s distributed a list of 31 advertisers who have asked that their spots not be affiliated with any Limbaugh-related programming. And they’re pitching Huckabee’s show by telling stations it’ll offer “more conversation, less confrontation.”

In a few weeks, we’ll start to see if that strategy works. And even if it does, Huckabee’s tone may be different from Limbaugh’s, but that doesn’t mean his positions—with a few exceptions like childhood obesity and arts education—will vary much from the man he has a chance to dethrone. But as radio stations reassess their budgets, they might want to reconsider whether Limbaugh’s once-vaunted brand will continue to be worth it to them at the end of the next contract they sign. More than 140 advertisers have already made that assessment and decided to move on.

While Romney refused to issue a strong condemnation of the language used by Limbaugh, he’s far more willing to do it against liberal pundit Bill Maher:

In an appearance on the Sean Hannity radio show, Romney said, “Frankly, what Bill Maher said, and I finally read the transcripts, I was offended, outraged that a person would say that on TV and would not have been called on the carpet before now and not apologized for it. To have the Obama campaign retain a million dollars from Bill Maher, it is simply outrageous. I don’t condone that kind of language and particularly in a public setting, a TV setting.… It’s just gone way beyond the pale.”

Maher used a crude epithet to describe Sarah Palin, an act which ThinkProgress criticized him for. Defending his language about Palin, Maher said, “ To compare that to Rush is ridiculous – he went after a civilian about very specific behavior… I used a rude word about a public figure who gives as good as she gets.”

Why is Romney willing to give Limbaugh a pass while claiming Bill Maher is “beyond the pale”? As Romney himself said, “Well, you know, I find it hard to disagree with Rush Limbaugh on topics.”

But without explanation, Premiere has supended these national advertisements for two weeks. Radio-Info.com calls the move “unusual.” The development suggests that Rush Limbaugh’s incessant sexist attacks on Sandra Fluke have caused severe damage to the show.

From the memo:

Attention Traffic Managers of Premiere News/Talk Affiliates:

We are suspending the requirement to run barter spots for two weeks, March 12th and March 19th, for our News/Talk affiliates only.

Please replace/re-traffic any Premiere barter spots immediately. Contractual requirements to run barter spots are being suspended for these two weeks only. Replace them with Lifelock and Lear Financial or a local spot of your choice.

Earlier today, ThinkProgress exclusively reported that 140 advertisers, including dozens of major national corporations, had requested their ads no longer air on Rush Limbaugh. Lifelock and Lear Financial are among the only companies standing by Limbaugh.

Over the last several days much of the advertising time during the Rush Limbaugh show on his flagship station, WABC, has been filled with free public service announcements.

The existence of the memo was first reported over the weekend by Radio-info.com, an industry newsletter. Radio-info did not publish the full list of companies. The memo was posted website of the Traffic Directors Guild of America, an association of professionals who distribute paid advertisements to radio stations. It was quickly deleted but ThinkProgress obtained a copy from a Google snapshot of the site taken on March 9.

Previously, ThinkProgress has reported that 50 companies requested their advertising be pulled from the Rush Limbaugh show following his sexist attacks on Sandra Fluke. The publication of the memo adds an additional 90 companies to the list of companies that have dropped Limbaugh:

21st Century Insurance • Hotels.com • Rite Aid • Ace Hardware • Honda • Robitussin • Acura • IBM • Sam Adams • Advance Auto Parts • Icy Hot • Sam’s Club • Advil (All products) • Intuit/Small Business • Schiff – Digestive Advantage • Alacer/Emergen-C • Schiff – Mega Red • Allegra (all products) • Johnson & Johnson (All Brands) • Schiff – Move Free • Kohl’s • Schiff – Sustenex • Ally Bank • La Quinta • Scotts Miracle-Gro (all products) • American Express • Lifetime • Autozone • Little Caesars • Sony • Lowe’s • State Farm • British Petroleum • Luxottica • Staples • Bullfrog Sunblock • Macy’s • Sterling/Kay Jared Jewelers • Caltrate • MasterCard • Subway • Centrum • McDonalds • Takeda Uloric • Chapstick • Midas • The Home Depot • Clorox (Pinesol/Homecare) • Napa Auto Parts • ThermaCare • Cortizone • National Realtor • Toyota • DeVry • NBC-TV • Discover Card • Office Depot • Twinings of London • Domino’s Pizza • Office Max • Tyson/Wright Brand Bacon • Exxon/Exxon Mobil • One Main Financial • Unisom • Farmers Insurance • United Healthcare • Ford • Orkin • U.S. Army • Outback • U. S. Postal Service • General Motors (All products -GM Certified Service • Chevy • Onstar • Cadillac • etc) • Preparation H • Visa • Gold Bond (all products • ProNutrients (all products) • Walgreens • Grainger • Progressive Insurance • Wal-Mart • Green Mountain Coffee • Prudential • Wells Fargo • Hallmark • Radio Shack • Wrigley • H&R Block • Rent-A-Center • Yahoo!

Check out all 140 companies (plus their statements, when available) on our Pinterest.

You can view a copy of the memo below:

Premiere Networks List Of Advertisers Asking Not To Advertise On Limbaugh And Other Right-Wing Hosts

Actually, Limbaugh launched hateful attacks against Fluke seventy times over three days. You can watch all of Limbaugh’s attacks on Fluke here. He doesn’t appear to be joking.

Maher insisted that he was not, in fact, defending Limbaugh but “defending living in a country where people don’t have to be afraid that they might go out of the bounds for one minute. Do we all want to be talking like White House spokesmen?” Watch it:

Maher also framed the criticisms of Limbaugh as an attack on “free speech.” But the issue is not whether Limbaugh was free to say what he did about Sandra Fluke. Hundreds of thousands of people are asking advertisers and others if they want to continue to pay for Limbaugh’s speech. At least 98 major advertisers have said no and canceled their ads.

Maher also dismissed Limbaugh’s comments by noting that “no one died.” The same talking point was echoed by Tucker Carlson who argued, oddly, that we should cut Limbaugh some slack because Don King was convicted of manslaughter in 1966 and still has a career. Carlson, like Maher, has his own history of mysoginistic comments. Last year he tweeted, “Palin’s popularity falling in Iowa, but maintains lead to become supreme commander of Milfistan.” He later apologized.

When it comes to advertisers avoiding controversial shows, it’s not just Rush From today’s TRI Newsletter: Premiere Networks is circulating a list of 98 advertisers who want to avoid “environments likely to stir negative sentiments.” The list includes carmakers (Ford, GM, Toyota), insurance companies (Allstate, Geico, Prudential, State Farm) and restaurants (McDonald’s, Subway). As you’ll see in the note below, those “environments” go beyond the Rush Limbaugh show

“To all Traffic Managers: The information below applies to your Premiere Radio Networks commercial inventory...They’ve specifically asked that you schedule their commercials in dayparts or programs free of content that you know are deemed to be offensive or controversial (for example, Mark Levin, Rush Limbaugh, Tom Leykis, Michael Savage, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity).’

This helps explain why, on Rush Limbaugh’s flagship station WABC, almost of the commercial breaks were filled with unpaid pubic service announcements. You can check out the list of the 50 advertisers who were known to have dropped Limbaugh before this report here.

But it’s not just Limbaugh that these advertisers want to disassociate with, but other big names in right-wing radio too. As the Daily Beast’s John Avalon notes, this is unprecedented in the 20-plus years that Limbaugh and his imitators have been on the air and could spell real trouble for an industry that’s already suffering demographically. Women ages 24–55 are the prize advertising demographic, but Limbaugh and other conservative hosts have steadily alienated these listeners over the years, so the sexist attacks on Sandra Fluke were “a perfect storm.”

The advertising flight is reminiscent of Glenn Beck’s Fox News program. After major companies refused to advertise on Beck’s show in light of racially insensitive comments, he was left with just fringe businesses like survival seed banks and gold sellers. Not long thereafter, he left Fox, reportedly under pressure.