Got my brown leather dress shoes back in the mail the other day.

Inside, the company &045; they had refinished the soles so now I feel like Nancy Kerrigan skating away from Tonya Harding, and put enough polish on the tops to scorch an ant &045; had packaged two shoe trees, a pair of soft cotton sleeves to store my shoes in and a shoe horn as gifts.

The last of which I’m planning on donating to the ESPN &uot;Help Rush remove his Bruno Maglis from his grill&uot; campaign.

The round mound of sound, whose syndicated political radio show is in more than 650 markets, was brought in by ESPN this season for its &uot;Sunday NFL Countdown&uot; to poach ratings from Fox and CBS’ pregame lead-ups.

And through this past Sunday he was doing his job. The Associated Press quoted an ESPN spokesman as saying Limbaugh’s presence had upped &uot;Countdown&uot; ratings by 10 percent.

However, Limbaugh, an outspoken conservative that routinely lambastes the liberal media for having conspiracies hoisted upon he and Republicans, did not just toe the line with racial comments against Philadelphia Eagle quarterback Donovan McNabb, he sliced it in half.

&uot;Sorry to say this, I don’t think (McNabb’s) been good from the get-go. I think what we’ve had here is a little social concern in the NFL,&uot; Limbaugh said Sunday of McNabb, who had underachieved through two games of this season compared to his previous four years. &uot;The media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well. There is a little hope invested in McNabb, and he got a lot of credit for the performance of this team that he didn’t deserve. The defense carried this team.&uot;

McNabb, who has made three consecutive luaus at the Pro Bowl and led the Eagles to back-to-back NFC championship games &045; likely unaware of the shock jock’s comments &045; promptly went out and completed 18 of 29 passes for 172 yards in a 23-13 win at Buffalo.

His 78.5 quarterback rating nearly equaled the combined ratings of Philadelphia’s first two losses of the season.

Limbaugh’s inflammatory comments cost him his job at ESPN Wednesday evening, after those from the camp he wontedly attacks &045; Democrat presidential hopefuls Rev. Al Sharpton, Howard Dean and Wesley Clark &045; had the ammunition to call for his fat mouth on a platter.

Limbaugh can get away with attacking the left weekly because his megadittoheads, consisting mostly of salesmen passing lull time on the road between 99-cent heart attacks, are hearing him on a platform, which let’s face it is a dinosaur.

Unless your name is Howard Stern, I don’t care how many markets Limbaugh is in, what he says usually isn’t a blip on the mainstream’s radar screen.

The statements he made about the former No. 1 draft pick are ignorant and are kindle for a massive Limbaugh bonfire, which now has him painted as a racist and given light to a possible recent drug addiction to the painkiller OxyContin.

It’s a filthy, nauseating standard Limbaugh tried to depict about the media.

However, not as filthy as my shoes were.

Chuck Corder

is a sports writer for The Natchez Democrat. You can reach him at (601) 445-3633 or by e-mail at

chuck.corder@natchezdemocrat.

com.