Yesterday, Georgia Republican congressman Phil Gingrey took a shot at Rush Limbaugh. Today, Gingrey called Rush on the air to apologize, which in turn led MSNBC’s Tamron Hall to wonder whether Gingrey was engaging in some Rush ring-kissing. Hall posed her question [during MSNBC's 4 PM hour] to “Hill” editor A. B. Stoddard, who left no doubt that’s exactly what Gingrey was up to.  The pair proceeded to share some yucks at the representative’s expense.

Gingrey’s original criticism came in reaction to Rush’s observation that the fact that Pres. Obama was going after him, shows that he is:

obviously more frightened of me than he is Mitch McConnell. He’s more frightened of me, than he is of, say, John Boehner, which doesn’t say much about our party.

That in turn led Gingrey to observe to Politico:

I think that our leadership, Mitch McConnell and John Boehner, are taking the right approach. I mean, it’s easy if you’re Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh or even sometimes Newt Gingrich to stand back and throw bricks. You don’t have to try to do what’s best for your people and your party. You know you’re just on these talk shows and you’re living well and plus you stir up a bit of controversy and gin the base and that sort of that thing. But when it comes to true leadership, not that these people couldn’t be or wouldn’t be good leaders, they’re not in that position of John Boehner or Mitch McConnell.

By today, Gingrey, noting “the high volume of phone calls and correspondence received by my office since the Politico article ran,” posted a mea culpa on his website, and called Rush to apologize directly. All of which led to this exchange between Hall and Stoddard.

TAMRON HALL: So I don’t want you to get into that fight [over the stimulus package] but I want you to get into the middle of something else involving Rush Limbaugh. Congressman Phil Gingrey took a shot at Rush Limbaugh and appeared on his show. Let’s play the moment.

Cut to an excerpt of Gingrey’s call to Rush today.

PHIL GINGREY: I clearly put my foot in my mouth with some of those comments [nervous laugh] and I just wanted to tell you Rush and all our conservative giants who help us so much to maintain our base and grow it and get back this majority, that I regret those stupid comments.

RUSH LIMBAUGH: Look, I appreciate that.

HALL: A.B., with all due respect to the congressman, was that a kiss-the-ring moment?

A.B. STODDARD: Oh, I think he was asking for an apology [Ed.: forgiveness?] and he’s regretting his statements; he’s taking them back. Remember, because of the way the districts have been re-drawn, a lot of Republicans who have not lost in ‘08 and ‘06 and remain in the Congress are typically in very Republican districts [Ed.: Gingrey received close to 70% of the vote in November in his conservative GA district]. And Rush Limbaugh can put them out of work. Rush Limbaugh has crashed, by opposing the immigration reform last year, and the year before, the phone system of Congress. He’s a very powerful person with much leverage. And the people listening are sometimes constituents, they usually are constituents of Republican members. And when they say something, anything, about Rush Limbaugh, anything that’s negative, they’re going to have to take it back.

HALL: He did. Alright, A.B., thank you very much. He took it back fast!

As you’ll see from the video, the two shared a bit of mirth and hilarity at the congressman’s expense . . .