At this point, Rush, you’ve got a choice, America has spoken out against what you believe so you can love it or leave it.
Hal Cohen -- World News Trust
Feb. 16, 2009 -- You may find it hard to believe, but Rush Limbaugh hates America. He’ll never admit this, of course, but it’s true. In fact, all Washington Republicans hate America. Okay, that may be extreme, but I intend to prove it using their own Rubrics. I’m sure you’ve seen this video.
A member of the mainstream media, CNBC, called him out on the statement. Rush’s initial reaction was to tell the reporter that he’d been reading too much liberal propaganda. The reporter, to his credit, would have none of it, replying that he hadn’t read anything he’d just listened to what Rush said. This forced Rush into a feeble backtrack that he didn’t actually hope Obama fails, just his policies. At best the difference is purely semantic.
At this point, I would like to ask media watchdogs like Media Matters, and Crooks and Liars to locate and post instances of Rush, at the beginning of Bush 43’s presidency railing about how Democrats want him to fail and how outrageous it was for them to do so. Then maybe this intrepid CNBC reporter can play these clips and ask El Rushbo why its okay for Republicans to hope for Democratic failure but its outrageous for Democrats to behave the same way. A good follow up question would be to make him cite any Democrat actually saying publicly that they were rooting for failure.
Republicans routinely bring up the hate-America meme when confronting criticism. The responses to the September 11th attacks are a perfect example of this. Democrats who pointed out the fact, and by the way it is a fact, that Al-Qaeda used our presence in Saudi Arabia as a recruiting tool, were said to be blaming America for the attacks. However, when Evangelical Christians said that God allowed the attacks because America tolerates homosexuals and abortions, they weren’t blaming America.
Returning to Rush, he claims to be acting out of patriotic motives. His backtrack mentions, and I may be paraphrasing here, that as a conservative, he hopes Obama fails because he “believes” the President’s liberal policies are wrong for America. There are many things wrong with his statement, but since I claim Rush hates America, I’m going to start with one thing. El Rushbo, with this statement, said that it is more important to him that his conservative beliefs be validated, than for the country to get back on its feet.
I don’t know about you, but I would happily admit that I was wrong about something if it meant more people got back to work. I would buy a 30 second Superbowl spot saying Liberalism Sucks if Conservatism were proved to create more jobs. I’m not an observant Jew, but prove to me that Kosher laws are good for the American economy and I will never eat lobster again.
Washington Republicans, and ditto heads can’t do this. They “believe” they are right. That’s precisely the problem. They believe it. Belief is not based in reality. Therefore, facts contradicting belief are simply ignored. Perhaps the perfect example of how disastrous this thinking can be was exemplified by Vice President Cheney’s appearance on Meet the Press on the weekend before the Iraq invasion.
Cheney said that he believed that we’d be greeted as liberators. When Tim Russert asked, “What if you’re not?” The response was a dismissive: “We will be.” That was the end of the exchange. No need for Plan B -- we believe we’re right. Faith has been defined as “belief in things not seen” and that’s all well and good. I happen to be a big fan of faith, having never seen God, but believing nonetheless. However, by the rules of logic, the inverse, if faith is true, then non-belief in observable things is untrue.
This is the root of their antipathy. They believe something to be true. They don’t think it so, they don’t know it, the believe it. Facts say that what they believe is flat out wrong. This cannot be so. Rule number 1, people cannot be wrong about what they believe. Rule number 2, when people are wrong see rule number 1. In the Republican universe, when reality inevitably trumps ideology, ignore reality.
Paul Krugman, a Nobel Prize winning economist, recently made an appearance on Morning Joe. Pat Buchanan made him defend the New Deal over the policies of President Hoover! Not to be outdone, however, the host, Joe Scarborough, talked about the economic gains made by the bipartisanship during the Clinton Administration. When Clinton passed his economic package in 1993 -- a year before Joe’s “bipartisanship,” not a single Republican voted for it. In other words, three fewer Republicans than Obama just got.
It was this legislation that put us on the path to budget surplus. It was also the first piece of legislation since World War II to pass with only one party voting for it. The Bipartisanship that Scarborough hailed to Professor Krugman, was referred to as gridlock at the time; a point Krugman did not miss.
In summary, when Republicans lose, they demand Democrats give deference to their ideas in the interests of bipartisanship. When they win, they demand Democratic obeisance, and they say screw bipartisanship. In the last two election cycles, the American People have voted resoundingly against Rush Limbaugh’s preferred candidates and policies. He is holding up his middle finger to all these people. It is high time to acknowledge that what he wants for America and what America wants are two different things.
At this point, Rush, you’ve got a choice, America has spoken out against what you believe so you can love it or leave it.
Hal Cohen is editor and publisher of Mollynyc.com