Howard Kurtz had to twist like a pretzel for this, and it's truly ironic to see Politico's Roger Simon step up and set Howie straight.

KURTZ: Now, Rush Limbaugh also loves to stir controversy by design. And this week, he talked about the president and made a bit of news. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

RUSH LIMBAUGH, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: That's exactly the same thing you could say about Obama. He wouldn't have been voted president if he weren't black.

Somebody asked me over the weekend why does somebody earn a lot of money, have a lot of money? I said because he's black. If Obama weren't black, he'd be a tour guide in Honolulu or he'd be teaching Saul Alinsky constitutional law or lecturing on it in Chicago.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

KURTZ: Of course here we are talking about Rush.

But did you find those comments to be more than just the usual Limbaugh rhetoric?

SIMON: You mean did I find them to be racist and repugnant? Yes, I found them to be racist and repugnant.

KURTZ: Why racist? Can't a case be made just on part of this that if Obama was a white freshman senator, he wouldn't have beaten Hillary for the nomination?

SIMON: I think anyone who beat Hillary for the nomination had something going for him besides race. And let's be fair. His race was not going for him. We only said that after he won.

He had to win in states where there was almost no black population. If he had lost in Iowa, the first Democratic contest, he would have been through. There are no black people in Iowa. He convinced white people that he really was an agent of change.

KURTZ: That's a good point.

First Howie tells us how Rush was just stirring controversy, that he didn't really mean it, but was just stirring it up for the sake of having a discussion. And when that doesn't work he tries really, really hard to convince the audience that there's some grain of legitimate thinking behind Limbaugh's amazing racist nastiness.

This goes beyond any attempt at "objectivity", and really, there's no real reason for any serious reporter to even try and be "objective" about Rush Limbaugh anyway. Objectivity should not apply when the subject is clearly wrong. What happened to pointing out the Emperor's nakedness?

Let's get serious for a minute, Howie. Any argument that starts with "If Obama were a white freshman senator..." is a racist argument. Period. It marginalizes any skill Obama has in favor of his race, status and position.

With each day that passes, CNN is sinking lower into the abyss. The idea of Howard Kurtz hosting a show called "Reliable Sources" is, well...laughable.