I read about this “controversy” yesterday, and it made me laugh and laugh. I’m still laughing – this is one of the best stories ever. You know how the villain in The Dark Knight Rises is named “Bane”? You know how the biggest (debatable) political story in America right now is Mitt Romney’s ties to Bain Capital (and when he actually left Bain, and whether he’ll disclose his Bain income, and when he’ll release his full tax returns, etc)? Well, join those two stories. Is The Dark Knight Rises some kind of “liberal conspiracy” against Mitt Romney with a perfectly timed release? Will voters automatically assume that Bane = Mitt Romney’s Bain? Well, Rush Limbaugh thinks so. Or he thought so yesterday, but now Rush is trying to take it back:

Holy backlash, Batman! One day after slamming “The Dark Knight Rises” for featuring a villain named Bane, which he said benefits the Obama campaign because of its similarity to Mitt Romney’s venture capital firm, Bain, Rush Limbaugh backtracked – slightly – from his earlier comments.

Comic book fans eagerly awaiting the final installment of director Chris Nolan’s Batman trilogy, which opens Friday, however, turned out to be worse whiners than his usual liberal critics.

“Yesterday on this program, I uttered some words about the Batman movie and the evil villain named Bane,” he said during his radio show Wednesday. “I made some comments about it, it doesn’t matter what. I have had more reaction to that than anything – including the Fluke thing,” he said, referencing the controversy stoked earlier this year after Limbaugh called Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke a “slut” and a “prostitute” after she testified before House Democrats on birth control health insurance coverage. “More people are concerned about whatever I might have said or didn’t say about a Batman villain than they are about their own jobs,” continued Limbaugh.

Batfans took exception to Limbaugh’s suggestion that the filmmakers deliberately chose the villain to terrorize Romney’s campaign just months before the election.

“Do you know the name of the villain in this movie? Bane,” Limbaugh said during his show. “The villain in the Dark Knight Rises is named Bane. B-A-N-E. What is the name of the venture capital firm that Romney ran, and around which there’s now this make-believe controversy? Bain. The movie has been in the works for a long time, the release date’s been known, summer 2012 for a long time. Do you think that it is accidental, that the name of the really vicious, fire-breathing, four-eyed whatever-it-is villain in this movie is named Bain.”

Dennis Kneale of Fox Business Channel echoed the point Wednesday in a segment flagged by the group Media Matters: “Is it mere coincidence that the name of the villain is Bane, spelled differently than Bain consulting and Bain capital?”

When reached by the Daily News, Bane co-creator Doug Moench said he was “tickled” by the whole controversy and that politics were the last thing on his mind when the character was introduced in 1993.

“None of us thought about Mitt Romney or Bain capital, trust me,” he said. “It was 20 years ago, for Pete’s sake.”

But Limbaugh vehmently claimed that he’s been misquoted. As conservative comic book fans have long noted, there’s a school of thought that Bruce Wayne – a billionaire with a passion for law and order issues – would naturally be a Republican.

“I even said yesterday, at the end of my whole Batman discussion, that Batman is more like Romney,” he said Wednesday. “Made the point that the rich, wealthy, made the point the rich wealthy hero in the Batman movie is more like Romney and that the Bane guy seems more like an Occupy Wall Street guy. And yet, here I am, supposedly articulating a conspiracy between the comic book creators and the Obama campaign that somehow they created this villain with the same name as Romney’s private equity company. No, all I said yesterday was that the Democrats are going to try to make that linkage.”

[From NYDN]

LMAO. LMAO for all of it – the Bain/Bane thing, Rush having to backtrack, AND for Rush claiming that Bruce Wayne would totally be a law-and-order, fiscally conservative Republican (although…hm…that one might not be completely wrong, actually…?). Obviously, Christopher Nolan has put strong political messages into his Batman trilogy – The Dark Knight was so obviously about the Iraq War, I consider it one of the finest war/insurgency films ever made – but I don’t think Nolan was prescient enough to know that Mitt Romney would get the nomination OR that Bain Capital would be the big political story this year. It’s just luck. Even Nolan didn’t know what to say about it – when asked about Limbaugh’s comments, Nolan said, “I’m not sure how to address something that bizarre, to be honest. I really don’t have an answer for it, it’s a very peculiar comment to make.”

Nolan also addressed the growing, impassioned fan-war over some not so gushy reviews of TDKR – the war SHUT DOWN Rotten Tomatoes it had gotten so bad. Nolan said, “I think the fans are very passionate about these characters the way a lot of people are very passionate. Batman’s been around for over 70 years and there’s a reason for that. He has a huge appeal, so I think you know people certainly respond to the character.” Meh.

Photos courtesy of WENN, fan-made agitprop.