How is it THIS is the slur that broke Limbaugh's back?

[yurbud]

I'm not complaining. I look forward to the day when he makes his living signing autographs at conservative conventions and klan rallies, but it seems like he's said things a lot uglier than this over the years. Other right prominent right wing talkers have said worse, and hell even Republican POLITICIANS have said worse and often survived.

Is it just that the mood of the country has finally changed and too many people have no stomach for this ignorance and bullying anymore?

[Lint Head]

1. Yep. It's the 'stage' on which the incident happened. A "perfect wave" of bigotry preceded by

GOP Congress critters dissing women publicly with video and photos. Rush's bull is usually only heard by his ditto heads and they don't care. Now his hatefulness is on display every day and that is a Public Relations nightmare. Love it!

[TreasonousBastard]

17. I think you got it...

the incredible nonsense of the pill discussion in the primary led to a general disgust and aggravation and Limbaugh's comment was the perfect fuse.

[IndyJones]

45. This is how I see it, too. The perfect storm. Women are insulted by how the GOP wants to make

decisions about their health and exclude them from the discussion. The Catholic Church can't seem to quote a bible verse supporting their position - it's dogma. Women are not buying it and the situation is pissing them off like never before. Then with the transvaginal thing...OMG...so many hateful things just crossing the line. I read a great quote, "get out of my vagina". I think that most women feel disrespected and marginalized and the GOP is going to feel the same way in November if they don't get off this garbage fast.

[me b zola]

2. I believe it is because of social media

I asked myself this already, and social media is the only thing i can think of. When he made the "kill liberals" remarks I think it was before the rise of social media.

[Arugula Latte]

6. That was my thought, too.

We've reached critical mass. These bullying assholes just aren't used to us having a way to instantly fight back. They had the airwaves for 20 years and were free to spew their hate without consequence. Email communication just wasn't effective in fighting back -- Facebook is. The Komen blowup is a good example.

[yurbud]

11. PBS did a bio on Rush years ago and showed his biggest flop was...

a TV show with a studio audience that didn't necessarily agree with him.

He had to stack it with dittoheads but it didn't seem quite as hip with a bunch of old rednecks who looked like they were still pissed about the end of Jim Crow and had just told some kid to get off their lawn.

[ieoeja]

19. I remember watching that once. The audience looked so fake.

It looked like the audience was reading a teleprompter that kept repeating the same word over and over. And every time the audience read out "ditto", they looked/sounded like they did not know what the word was, thus forcing them to sound it out phonetically even though it was just that one word over and over again.

That was my first and last exposure to Limbaugh. I had friends who were huge fans of the show. Watching that show left me with the horrible realization that these friends must be incredible dumbasses.

[yurbud]

22. I used to listen to him when I had a messenger job because

I thought it was funny and there wasn't much else on. I didn't agree with him, but figured he was just sincerely wrong until he said something that he had to know wasn't true.

He was talking about health insurance companies dropping people once they got some serious illness and said, ''Why would they drop a paying customer? It makes no sense!''

A paying customer who costs you money instead of makes you money does make sense.

That kind of moved him into the category of cynical liar and propagandist for me.

Also, after 9/11, I realized that all the angry, violent rhetoric of the far right wasn't an exaggeration for comic effect--they really would like to kill or imprison anyone to the left of Ann Coulter.

Now I can't listen to those guys for any length of time even as guests on more middle of the road shows because every time I do, I feel like a cow listening to one of those "beef, it's what's for dinner'' commercials.

[RainDog]

8. agree - advertisers, etc. can see, via social media

Last edited Mon Mar 5, 2012, 03:37 PM - Edit history (1)

that the few right wing blowhards are not representative of people's views.

millions of Americans are disgusted and have had enough - and this particular issue began with Komen, followed by the pedophile-sheltering bishops' complaints, followed by an ALL-MALE committee to discuss the issue...

the majority of people in this nation support private choice for birth control and don't think women should be discriminated against in health care coverage because of a few religious zealots.

this gets to people where they live - and, in Fluke, people saw their own sisters and daughters being attacked in the most personal and disgusting way by an obnoxious pig.

[me b zola]

47. I think you hit it on the head:

"... in Fluke, people saw their own sisters and daughters being attacked in the most personal and disgusting way by an obnoxious pig. "

[Kber]

12. I think you're right.

[tsuki]

3. Did you really think that Rush would

get away with bullying Reapubligan politicians until they bent over, apologized and kissed his nasty backside. If I have learned anything, Reapubligans play a long game.

Previously, the Pun-twit Class would have ignored him and let him rank, but when George Will weighed in on the issue against Limbaugh, you gotta figure the fix is in.

[Liberal_in_LA]

4. I remember his 'welfare queen' comments, clearly aimed at African americans

[yurbud]

14. that's mild for his racist stuff: remember the "get the bone out of your nose" crack?

to a black caller?

[Liberal_in_LA]

23. yikes!

[Motown_Johnny]

5. She is just a collage student

and is pretty much defenseless in the face of this attack.

Attacking other public figures is less offensive because they can fight back. This poor girl did nothing wrong and has no way to fight back.

I think that is why this is different.

[Fawke Em]

9. I was going to post the same thing.

Sandra Fluke reminds many citizens of their own daughters, sisters or even themselves.

A fat, old, grumpy asshole with a megaphone the size of a great pyramid picking on a young, attractive, articulate post-grad student makes even the most cold-hearted Dad-of-a-30-year-old-daughter cringe.

[yurbud]

15. it seems like there have been other times when righties have attacked specific, regular folks

[RainDog]

30. women comprise more than half of the population

the current attack is in conjunction with one of THE biggest issues for women: access to health care, including birth control, that is under attack in various state legislatures across the nation and is under attack by a religious group.

personally, I found it laughable to see catholic bishops say one word about their religious conscience when American bishops helped to shield pedophiles from prosecution for decades.

maybe women don't think those guys really care about their well being...

People JUST saw the power that social media could have to support Planned Parenthood after a right wing organization continued the right wing campaign to deny affordable health care to women.

It's time to clean house and sweep out the trash in our political lives.

[Motown_Johnny]

48. agreed, but it isn't just about women

Ms. Fluke is easy to identify with for all of us. We all know and care for someone relatively close to her age who she reminds us of. If we don't know someone that age now, then we have in the past.

She is every woman, every sister, every girlfriend, every daughter, every niece, every aunt, every mother. She is also every woman we have know professionally be it a coworker, a teacher, a nurse or anyone we may have interacted with in our entire lives.

I'm a guy and I am outraged by Rush's attack on her. He would just as quickly do it to someone that I know and care for. I can't be alone in this. I think most of us feel that way and that is why this outrage is different.

[KansDem]

7. Could this be Rush's "Have you no sense of decency" moment?

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/welch-mccarthy.html

Also--

The most famous incident in the hearings was an exchange between McCarthy and the army's chief legal representative, Joseph Nye Welch. On June 9, the 30th day of the hearings, Welch challenged Roy Cohn to provide U.S. Attorney General Herbert Brownell, Jr. with McCarthy's list of 130 Communists or subversives in defense plants "before the sun goes down". McCarthy stepped in and said that if Welch was so concerned about persons aiding the Communist Party, he should check on a man in his Boston law office named Fred Fisher, who had once belonged to the National Lawyers Guild, which Brownell had called "the legal mouthpiece of the Communist Party".[82] In an impassioned defense of Fisher that some have suggested he had prepared in advance and had hoped not to have to make,[83] Welch responded, "Until this moment, Senator, I think I never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness ..." When McCarthy resumed his attack, Welch interrupted him: "Let us not assassinate this lad further, Senator. You've done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?" When McCarthy once again persisted, Welch cut him off and demanded the chairman "call the next witness". At that point, the gallery erupted in applause and a recess was called.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_McCarthy#Public_opinion

Public opinion
McCarthy's Support in Gallup Polls
Date Favorable No Opinion Unfavorable Net Favorable
1951 August 15 63 22 ?7
1953 April 19 59 22 ?3
1953 June 35 35 30 +5
1953 August 34 24 42 ?8
1954 January 50 21 29 +21
1954 March 46 18 36 +10
1954 April 38 16 46 ?8
1954 May 35 16 49 ?14
1954 June 34 21 45 ?11
1954 August 36 13 51 ?15
1954 November 35 19 46 ?11

[yurbud]

16. so he BARELY had the support of half the country ONCE

That hardly sounds like Americans bought into the Red Menace en masse.

It reminds me of another giant contrast between the shit the beltway was feeding us and what people actually thought:

The hype about impeaching Bill Clinton for his free willy and the silence about impeaching Baby Bush for actual crimes that violated the Geneva Convention and a couple of other international treaties that we pushed for in the first place.



background on graphic

[meow2u3]

41. The principal contributing factor to McCarthy's and Limpballs' rants

Long-term substance abuse. In McCarthy's case, it was alcoholism; in OxyMoron's, prescription drug abuse.

[NightOwwl]

10. Those gosh-darn series of tubes

sure do spread information fast, especially now that they are hooked up to those new-fangled social media sites, or whatever it is the kids call them these days.

[mainer]

13. Because every woman who's ever taken birth control feels personally attacked

And because Fluke wasn't even there talking about herself; she was talking on behalf of all her female classmates. So Rush insulted all of them.

[kestrel91316]

18. He said it against the 52%. Bad move, given that we were already fired up

about the RW War on Women.

[GoCubsGo]

20. His back isn't broken yet.

Last I heard, he's still on the air.

[yurbud]

21. someone really needs to go to the Dominican Republic and do some snooping

it will probably just take buying a kid a sandwich to get the dirt that would finish him off.

[HopeHoops]

24. Well, pissing off just over half of the country isn't generally considered to be a good idea.

[Junkdrawer]

25. It's only women (and men who love women) who have sex....

That should cut it down a bit.... (tongue firmly in cheek).

[HopeHoops]

27. Well, that rules out the Republicans.

[Junkdrawer]

36. OK, this whole incident is a low hanging curveball over the plate...

But still, that's funny.

[Mosby]

26. mainstream conservatives have moved left on social issues

But the fundy/catholic/evangelical right has not gotten the memo yet. dumb ass rush seems to not understand that. He needs to get back to the "federal gov is bad" bullshit if he wants to get his base going.

[IndyJones]

46. Bingo! Rush's audience is a dying breed.

[edhopper]

28. He usually goes after more prominent targets

I think this is his "At long last have you no shame." McCarthy moment.

[hifiguy]

34. I agree.

Add to that the social media and the shitstorm began to rage immediately. This one is gonna haunt PigBoy for a long long time.

[brooklynite]

29. It WASN'T the slur...

...it was the SUBJECT of the slur. Susan Fluke was an intelligent, educated, heterosexual young woman who had the political skill and courage to stand up to the bully. Conservatives couldn't deflect the issue by lumping her into any of the traditional liberal cliche definitions and had to respond to the actual words used.

[RainDog]

31. imo, Fluke wasn't the subject. Misogyny was the subject

Misogyny has been the subject of this entire debate. iow, it's not just Rush's show. It's Komen, it's the tea party legislation, it's men who use religion as a cover for their desire to harm women.

[Matariki]

33. +1

[Cosmocat]

35. That is it, and it is a MAJOR, M A J O R loser in 2012

women have exponentially grown as a political force over the last half decade.

They are voting as a block, more and more, and more women vote than men.

Just completely self destructive for the Rs to take on women at this point.

[yurbud]

38. not as much desire to harm women but massage egos of little men

society and technology has changed so fast that a lot of guys feel bewildered and left behind.

This kind of issue gives them the false hope that cultural change will be rolled back when no Republican victory, no matter how sweeping, can do that.

[Matariki]

32. I disagree. The "subjects" of all his slurs were derserving of respect

I think that it had more to do with his timing - in the midst of so many assaults on women's rights, particularly the hard-to-believe assault on birth control - I think people have had it. He stepped in it and consequently has become a target for a lot of anger that already was boiling over.

I hope this breaks him. He's been a shit to way too many people.

[jonthebru]

37. Lets see where to start.

First, she is a citizen testifying in front of congress, intelligently taking on an issue that is very important to 51% of the population.
She never said anything that came close to justifying his language and slander regarding her.
She is not a public person, a celebrity so to speak. She is a private person like you and I (assuming you are not a celebrity or public person.)
Limbaugh called her out by name, slandered and misrepresented what she said in a very careless and poison manner.

I'm no lawyer but as I see it, she has a case against him for slander.

[yurbud]

39. I agree with the last sentence. All of the preceding could have been said about

a lot of targets of the right and Rush in particular.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

40. are we sure his back is broken and its not merely a pulled muscle?

[yurbud]

44. hard to tell. I'm just surprised it went this far.

[malaise]

42. This time people were already mobilized over

Planned Parenthood, Komen, those transvaginal bills in the ReTHUG controlled legislatures, etc. Scumbaugh was the last straw and they should have seen it coming.

[RainDog]

43. Republicans never compromise and never stop

Which is why they need to be voted out across this nation.

WHAT they refuse to compromise on is their belief that hatred toward specific groups should be respected by law.