General Motors Shoots Foot With Rush Limbaugh Green Ad

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by Michael dEstries July 30, 2007
Categories: Transport.

snipshot_e4hw8hbkkxw.jpgFile this one under unbelievable. Just when you think General Motors has more than two brain cells rubbing together on working to improve America’s impression of fuel efficiency in auto-making, someone had the clever idea to hire right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh to tout their green initiatives. This is the same guy that revels in owning a Maybach because it has shitty mileage, believes global warming is bogus, and calls environmentalists “wackos”.

It gets better. Not only does Limbaugh praise GM’s commitment to the environment, but he also heaps praise on his Escalade and Suburban SUVs. Now hey, obviously this is a guy that truly enjoys those vehicles — but we just find it incredibly odd that GM would choose to have someone represent them that could not truly care less about the direction they’re trying to head in. Save the planet? Make America more efficient and sustainable? The guy has been battling environmentalism since the early 90s — he couldn’t give a rat’s ass.

Truly disappointing. Even the Spice Girls would have been a better choice. You can listen to the ad here.

via Autogbloggreen

About Michael dEstries

Michael has been blogging since 2005 on issues such as sustainability, renewable energy, philanthropy, and healthy living. He regularly contributes to a slew of publications, as well as consulting with companies looking to make an impact using the web and social media. He lives in Ithaca, NY with his family on an apple farm.

View all posts by Michael dEstries →
  • ALAN HOFFMAN

    AS A GM STOCKHOLDER, I AM APPALLED AT THE DECISION TO HAVE THAT DISTASTEFUL, LIMBAUGH REPRESENTING OUR COMPANY. HE IS THE LAUGHING STOCK OF ALL BUT HIS RIGHT WING [ EXTREME ] DITTOHEADS. WITH ALL DUE HASTE, DISOWN HIM !!! HIS VOICE WILL BRING NOTHING BUT RESENTMENT TO GM.

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  • D

    I think you meant “couldn’t care less” and “couldn’t give a rat’s ass”

    • 2006prius

      It seems like both GM and RL will do anything for money…even go against their beliefs. Like Ralph… who apparently believes anything he reads.

  • Ralph

    But global warming is bogus, as is most of the environmental bs that we get from lefties like those that populate this website.

    More power to GM.

    While you wennies are all polluting the environment with the Prius — the car that has to have the raw materials for its batteries toted across the globe twice — some of us will be riding in style in a Caddy.

    Of course, Ms. Global Warming, Ms. Madonna, will be riding in her Maybach, just like Rush.

    At least he’s not a hypocrite.

  • http://www.ecorazzi.com michael

    Thanks, D. Corrected.

  • http://www.eventsetter.com Event Calendar

    This doesn’t surprise me, as GM doesn’t appear to be a very well managed company.

    • robay

      This is perfect and hilarious!

  • http://www.blackbagproductions.com Stephane

    Hey Ralph: Get some facts from scientists not from the left or right check out learn what global dimming is…instead of dooming the planet on the basis of your ”feelings”.

    ps: you are right for the prius ;) still it is because of the companies ”old fashioned” ways not the product that is bad you have to differenciate different issues to judge them correctly…

  • unlikelee

    wait…so its still o.k. to pollute you say mr. ralph? just because global warming has been overstated….I agree completely with you, you are a great man. leave the world a mess, rather than just trying to be a good person for you, your family, and your children..Or is it just all about you Ralph? Like it is for mr limbaugh. I agree that global warming is not quite the crisis it has been said/made out to be…but at the same time, if its something that does help clean up the world, get people to act on pollution (which is still bad for this planet by the way) and to help make the world a better place..I am all for it, so yes, using rush limbaugh I would think is wrong for all the wrong reasons.

  • jdehaan

    What a bunch of uneducated IDIOTS!

  • http://www.oneyeargoal.com OneYearGoal.com – $100,000 online in one year

    Wow, that is incredibly stupid. I mean, I support American car makers and all that, but that’s like hiring Osama Bin Laden to MC a Bar Mitzvah – probably not the most attractive of choices.

    One Man. One Year. $100,000 online. Limbaugh free and VERY Green ;)
    http://www.oneyeargoal.com

  • Nacelle

    Pure genius! Limbaugh has be putting down the Prius for a long time. Now he’s advertising for GM on cars that do the same thing. Their cars must be good for him to make this kind of change. And his followers will soak it up.

  • Dave

    Isn’t he in prison for being a junkie like all the other black people he says are junkies and druggies? Oh yeah, he’s a rich fascist white guy. Sorry, I forgot that we live in a democracy there for a minute.
    So, why do you folks want to argue about whether global warming exists when the point is that GM hired a criminal who got off because he’s a rich white guy to bullshit you about their lousy cars?
    Think about it this way — they are hiring someone they think will make them look good…
    Go ahead, buy one, and whine about it later.

  • http://www.floridatech.us dave

    The earth has been colder than this, and warmer than this, what really matters is pollution – dead zones at the bottom of the sea, huge areas of the ocean covered in plastic that has drifted to the bottom and swirled together to cover areas larger than several states… I personally question the effects of global warming. If frozen water makes up the polar caps, and frozen (solid) water takes up more space than liquid water, then if the polar caps melt the total volume of the planets water will be less since a volume of liquid water is LESS than that same volume of water in solid form (frozen). Put a bottle of water in the freezer and it expands and bursts. Ok, so the ice in the mountains rushes to the sea, etc, but what about warming causing more evaporation and more humidity in the air? That reduces the volume of water in the sea – and again – lowers the levels of the oceans. We can argue this forever – but IF the water rises, what happens to all the LAND FILLS used to reclaim lowland wetlands so people could live on them? Entire CITIES are build on garbage. If that stuff gets flooded – it all floats out into the sea – not to mention all the nuclear and toxic stuff elsewhere which will get flooded. I suppose government is not worried about that though since the solution to the problem (they allowed to happen) will be to tax us further anyway. Bye bye miss American Pie. I used to listen to Rush in the good old days when he supported Ross Perot before he first ran for president, when Ross wanted to do the voting on issues over the internet using a “New England Town Hall” style of pure democracy. Someone must have said something to him point blanc because he did an immediate 180 on that issue, and since that moment I knew he was simply bought and paid for.

  • http://www.floridatech.us dave

    I meant that Rush was bought and paid for, not Perot. (Perot’s whole late personal history later turned out to be a bit whacky sounding anyway – but I’m not entirely certain it wasn’t helped along in that direction by political powers bent on putting such a potentially big political spoiler to bed once and for all).

  • http://www.facebook.com alex shabaz

    global warming is just liberal propaganda and they probably pay scientists to come up with fake results. pollute away!!!!

  • http://antwren.blogspot.com Dave

    Wow. OK GM show us you’re green. Agree to reasonable increases in CAFE standards.

  • zev goldman

    Limbaugh’s comments are correct, at least about man caused global warming.
    What you don’t seem to realize is that Limbaugh is one of the nation’s best comedians.
    If you think he truly drives a certain vehicle because it gets poor gas mileage, you are one of the people he is laughing at.
    The man preaches something that is basic to America’s character. Don’t be a candy ass and rely on the government to do for you what you should do for yourself.

  • http://www.interwoventhreads.com/blog Andy Woolard

    I think the Limbaugh’s environmental dings are only part of the problem I have with him endorsing anything other than a microphone.

  • Yancey

    Hey Stephane, I get my facts from scientists and plenty of them know the whole global warming scare is just bogus. Ever see the BBC’s ‘Great global warming swindle’? And those are some of the scientist that had there name attached to a lot of the global warming propaganda…without their permission…before they threatened lawsuits. You dont have to support left or right polices to not like being lied to.

  • balthisar

    What an idle complaint. Don’t you know how many people on the left listen to the Rush Limbaugh show? It makes perfect commercial sense to ad-target these guys. It would be irresponsible of GM to stay out of this market segment.

    While Mr. Limbaugh does call “environmentalist wackos” “wackos,” it’s not true that he calls *all* environmentalists wackos — just the wackos.

    This article and several of the comments are actually on the wacko side of things because rather than making an intellectual approach to GM’s ads, such vitriol is being spouted only because people have an *emotional* opposition to this pairing.

    Time to grow up.

  • Bob

    I support most of what Rush says. I don’t believe in the Al Gore version of global warming. I think it’s just a natural cycle and is not caused by man. I also think that most of the people who speak on behalf of the enviroment are wackos. That being said, there’s nothing wrong with trying to polute less, use resources more efficiently, and safe money too. When they make a usable plug-in electric car I’ll be the first one to buy it… not because it will save the planet but because it’s just a good idea. You can be a conservative and a responsible citizen of this planet too. People just love to jump all over Rush because he’s the liberal boogey man.

  • http://www.ecorazzi.com michael

    Is this the type of talk you support? Interesting. This is word-for-word from his radio show yesterday,

    “It’s cool in Northeast again here today. It’s all over the place. Temperatures are wacky and they’re cooler than they should be. I took credit for this yesterday by highlighting the huge carbon footprint that I am making, on purpose, to help put pollutants into the air because we know that when nature does that, we cool the climate. So I have a pretty large estate and I’m running all the things that I have in it. I’m running the pool cooler 24 hours a day. The thermostat is 68 degrees in every room in every house. The lights are on a lot. I even air-condition my garages, folks! Ab-so-lutely. I’m not about to take a shower, get dressed walk out for dinner at night and get into a sweaty, hot garage, sweaty.”

  • http://www.jerryrigband.com JB

    With that mindset we might expect to see Bill Clinton advocate for sexual abstinence, Ted Nugent endorse his favorite tofu and Dennis Hastert dance in TV commercials for LA weight loss.

  • http://blog.kevitivity.com Kevitivity

    Rush rocks!

  • http://www.housedoctorspei.com/ William White

    I am very concerned about GM and all the other auto makers. It seems they are so clueless about what people expect in a vehicle. I drive a 2000 F-150 half ton and I am appalled by the quality. At 120000 km the thing has had a complete new front end, some parts twice already. Building junk like this is what’s making Toyota # 1 and as for hiring Rush, well you made Bush President so wearing stupidity on your forehead seems to be the “New American Way”. It’s all very sad.

  • milander

    My wife and I are both involved in language and translation work, as a result we do 99% of our work over the net. We moved out of the UK 10 years ago for the simple and explicit purpose of providing a place for ourselves and our children where we will not suffer when the World starts to go to crap. It won’t be in my generation, possibly not in our childrens but we both firmly believe it is happening. We are not survivalists, we are not isolationists but we are preparing. At the moment we have bought high land and are building on it, we have recently installed solar and wind generators as well as an organic sewage disposal and water regeneration. Our house and our 2 sons houses are log built and fully equiped. We also have a storm shelter on higher ground too.

    This probably sounds nuts to a lot of you and maybe it is. Fact is though that it does no harm to prepare for the worst. This year alone we have had 26 continuous days of over 33C and a winter 3 years ago was -15C for 41 days continuously. While this is kinda normal for Hungary it is not normal to have 500+ die this summer alone due to the heat, people here are supposed to be used to it, ergo it is not normal.

    The World is changing and I’d suggest that anyone with the means to do so start looking at where they can go and what they can do otherwise they are going to be stuck in a global katrina soon.

    We are now out of that loop and thank God we are.

  • Mike

    Global warming may very well exist, but most likely has little to do with the carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide being emitted by vehicles. Solar activity goes through cycles of increased and decreased levels.
    “Global Warming” is another attempt at control of gullible people, just like “The War on Terror”. Where was the environmental crusader Al Gore when his political party was in power? It is all about control to the people in power; it’s just a different way of frightening people into toeing the line. More efficient use of energy and alternate sources are important because the current ones are finite. When it runs out we’re in deep trouble. Cars are not more fuel efficient than they were 20 years ago. My wife had a Chevy Sprint that got 38 mpg in town and close to 50 mpg on the highway. Hybrids are going to bring their own problems when their batteries need replacement at about 5 years. Where is all that hazardous waste going? Claiming a “carbon offset” is hypocritical. If you’re going to be a crusader, don’t do something that needs “offsetting” like flying to talks on global warming in private jets, using more energy in a month than most people do in a year or more, etc. I have an suv, but I don’t claim to be anything other than an average person and I use less fuel in a year than a jet uses in one trip. A long, boring comment, for sure, but I get sick of the hypocrisy.

  • Steve

    The thing is (and I’ll chime in), Rush’s comments are right on the money, at least as far as man-made “global warming”. I don’t think I’ve seen even a simple classroom lab experiment proving that CO2 is even a “greenhouse gas” to begin with, let alone that mankind is destroying the planet with it. It’s the biggest “junk science” story in history!

    That said, GM’s choice of a spokesman is sort of irrelevant. They chose Rush because of his sheer audience base, and his “America First” reputation… in the end, the product has to back up the hype, and sorry – GM cars are almost all inferior to their Japanese, Korean or European counterparts.

    I said it. It was painful to say, but I said it.

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  • http://nutritionresearchcenter.org Vic Shayne, PhD

    Is this really so surprising? Can we forget that GM pulled the plug on their last electric vehicle and threw the fleet into a landfill? GM is all about the cash, so Limbaugh is right up their alley. GM has no commitment to the environment; they have a commitment to making money. They destroyed mass transit and the trolley system in this nation and created urban sprawl and freeways. They are a main reason for pollution. I would NEVER buy one of their vehicles. It’s unAmerican!

  • http://nutritionresearchcenter.org Vic Shayne, PhD

    And another thing. It amazes me when people say that they don’t “believe” in global warming. Of course, they are not the scientific researchers who have proven global warming, they just believe this or that. What kind of way is this to base one’s decision-making? Worse is when you take Rush Limbaugh’s word and follow his example. Lesson for the day: read the research yourself and know instead of believe.

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