Justin's Political Corner
Like NFL player Asante Samuel, Rush Limbaugh is a bit flummoxed about why everyone is celebrating the coming out of NBA player Jason Collins. On his show earlier this week, Limbaugh complained that there is excitement for a person’s sexuality being “rammed down everybody’s throat all the time,” but no “tolerance” for people who oppose homosexuality:
LIMBAUGH: Folks, I grew up in a family where people’s sexual orientation, preferences, whatever, weren’t even discussed. Why can’t everybody just put your sexual preferences on Facebook and call it a day? What do we need to stop everything and have a national day of celebration, or mourning (depending on your point of view), or recognition or whatever about this? This tolerance, it only goes one way. So Person X of some national stature announces his sexual orientation as gay, and applause!
It’s a great day for America. We’re really taking giant leaps ahead. If anybody says, “You know, I’m not big on that,” it’s, “You bigot! You racist! You extremist. You homophobe.” There is no tolerance at all here. Not only do these people have to publicly announce it, but everybody else has to applaud and accept it.
Limbaugh went on to juxtapose Collins’s coming out with President Bill Clinton’s scandal with Monica Lewinsky, bizarrely suggesting they were comparable stories about a person’s private sex life — in other words, if Clinton’s sex life was supposed to be private, so too should Collins’s.
The gay community has faced real persecution in the century since people first started coming out, and bullying, family rejection, and legal inequality continue to be significant obstacles for them. Just because opposition to LGBT equality has become the minority opinion in this country does not mean that people who hold such positions are now oppressed.
H/T: Think Progress LGBT
Rush Limbaugh claimed that the government only arrested suspect Paul Kevin Curtis for allegedly sending ricin-tainted letters to government officials because he was a white southerner. But the letters were signed with Curtis’ initials and catch phrase.
Curtis, who is from Mississippi, was arrested last week for allegedly mailing letters containing the poison ricin to President Obama, Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), and Lee County, Mississippi Justice Court judge Sadie Holland. Though his case is still pending, Curtis was released from federal custody on bond after investigators failed to find evidence of ricin in Curtis’ possession.
Limbaugh interpreted his release as evidence that authorities merely arrested Curtis because they wanted the ricin suspect to be a white southerner. He told listeners, “You know the ricin letters that were sent? The drive-bys so desperately wanted the culprit to be a hayseed, hick southerner, so they went out and found this poor guy from Mississippi and they accused him of it,” and concluded, “They really wanted the ricin guy to be a white southern guy and not a dark-skinned something-or-other.”
According to the criminal complaint against Curtis, as ABC News reported, each ricin letter was signed “This is KC and I approve this message,” a phrase Curtis frequently used in internet postings and other letters.
Limbaugh’s theory is just another example in his long history of race-baiting.
From the 04.23.2013 edition of Premiere Radio Networks’ The Rush Limbaugh Show:
See Also: http://mediamattersforamerica.tumblr.com/
h/t: MMFA
-Rush Limbaugh, 04.22.2013 edition of Premiere Radio Network’s The Rush Limbaugh Show.
(via PolitiucsUSA: After Calling Newtown Parents Human Shields, Rush Limbaugh Has Got To Go)
Transcript via Rush Limbaugh:
LIMBAUGH: Now I got a guy who calls me, “Rush, are they registered lobbyists?”
“Where’s your heart, sir? What do you mean? They’re not lobbying! They’re trying to save other people’s children.” So that’s how it works. It was the president who asked for this mother of a six-year-old who died to do his speech. Senator Richard Blumenthal (Democrat-Connecticut) is using Sandy Hook to raise money in his e-mails. They’re trying to turn the Newtown parents into a dozen Sandy Sheehans in a way. It’s what the Democrats do, folks. They always try to hide their agendas behind women and children, and, most of all, victims. So the Newtown parents are human shields, in a sense.
The Newtown parents are out there to protect the Democrats from any criticism and to shut it down. Pure and simple.
Being controversial is Limbaugh’s gimmick. It is how he stays relevant, but referring to parents who lost their children in a horrific mass shooting as human shields goes too far. It is wrong when Limbaugh does his daily dredging through the pit of racism for ratings. It was wrong when he calledSandra Fluke a slut. Rush Limbaugh is, as a rule of thumb, usually wrong when he opens his mouth.
However, this is a new low even for him.
Since the Republican Party is too weak kneed and gutless to do anything about him, the rest of America has to take a stand. It would be nice to believe that if we ignore Limbaugh he will go away, but the left has been trying this strategy for decades, and the right wing talker’s influence has only grown within the Republican Party.
Couldn’t have said it any better.
Limbaugh freaks: Melissa Harris-Perry a ‘foreign’ Marxist who wants to steal children (via Raw Story )
The conservative pundit class is outraged over MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry’s recent ad spot about public education, and Rush Limbaugh, not wanting to be left behind, took his best swing at the university professor on Monday, describing her with the words “foreign,” “Marxist” and “communist…
Rush Limbaugh touts a 13-year-old who “proved” global warming is a hoax.
Who needs science anyway?
Media Matters) - When political novices fly too close to the Fox News flame, they risk getting burned. Just ask Dr. Ben Carson.
After profiting from a Fox News public relations blitz for much of the past two months, during which he logged at least twenty appearances on the network, the famous neurosurgeon, who has been toasted inside right-wing circles as a possible GOP savior, has suddenly been forced to defend his “trainwreck” interview where he likened marriage equality supporters to people advocating pedophilia and bestiality.
[…]
not only did Carson badly stumble with his shocking comments about marriage equality, but as we’ve seen from this predictable model, he’s also been turned into a professional victim by the right-wing media, whose practitioners like nothing better than ignoring substantive debates in order to complain about alleged biases in the press coverage. (All the while being careful not to actually repeat or explain what Carson’s scandalous remarks were, of course.)
Cue Rush Limbaugh:
-“We are in the midst of mob rule now. In this case led by the trolls at Media Matters and aided and abetted by the so-called mainstream media.”
-“Amidst all this talk of equality, Ben Carson is not allowed to voice his opinion.”
And from excitable Breitbart editor John Nolte:
Any one notice a pattern here? I’ll give you a hint, when is the only time the right-wing talking heads seem to care about racism or sexism?
I also love how these guys like to act like they are being victimized whenever there’s backlash against something hateful or bigoted they’ve said.
No one stopped him from voicing his opinion, he voiced it, and a lot of people thought it was a shitty opinion. That’s the way the grown up world works.
Rush Limbaugh asserted that same-sex marriage has never passed by popular vote, even though several states have passed gay marriage initiatives by popular vote and polls show a majority of Americans support it.
Discussing the upcoming Supreme Court cases on marriage equality on the March 25 edition of his syndicated radio show, Limbaugh said that “If left to a vote of the people, same-sex marriage loses every time it’s been on the ballot.” He added that “every time it’s been voted on by the people, it has gone down to defeat. That’s why the courts have to get involved”:
From the 03.25.2013 edition of Premiere Radio Networks’ The Rush Limbaugh Show:
In fact, same-sex marriage has passed by referendum in several states. In November, Maine, Maryland, and Washington became the first states in the country’s history to allow same-sex marriage by referendum. Citizens in Minnesota voted against a state constitutional amendment that would define marriage as only between a man and a woman.
Polls also show that a majority of Americans support same-sex marriage.
h/t: MMFA
