Happy Abu Ghraib from Rush Limbaugh
Uncategorized - - Posted on April, 27 at 6:39 pm by Tim
Belle Waring had this postscript up on a post about another maltreated prisoner at Guantanamo Bay and it is worth noting:
I know I’ve related this before on my own blog, but my grandfather was an OSS spy in WWII. In one of the letters he sent home to my grandmother he describes how he met up with US ground troops who had just taken a French village controlled by a particularly awful German captain. He relates how his first impluse was to beat the shit out of the guy, knowing what he did about what the man had done. But he just gave him a cigarette instead. I don’t remember exactly what he said in the letter, but it was basically that the German was surprised at his mild reception, and my grandfather told him that was what happened when you were taken prisoner by Americans, and that we were better than them, better by a long shot. Anyone who thinks Osama bin Laden is more of a threat to the US than the Axis is welcome to come to East Hampton to get hit on the head with a lead pipe by my grandpa. He’s still pretty spry. Also, just stop.
The only people who seem to want to piss upon such images of the American soldier, the American military, are the throngs on the right who continue to downplay and lie about the abuse of prisoners in Afghanistan, Gitmo, Iraq, wherever.
And none piss from a greater height than Rush Limbaugh. Here he is (via Light of Reason) trying making jokes abou the whole thing, running a call-in segment to elicit ideas for gifts to send people who dare to remember the anniversary of the Abu Ghraib revelations:
CALLER: Just to keep you with the season, I want to wish you a Happy Abu Ghraib. And I apologize that I didn’t get my Abu Ghraib present in the mail. I was wondering what I could get you for Abu Ghraib this year and how are you going to decorate your Abu Ghraib tree sir?
RUSH: You want to know what to get me for Abu Ghraib? You know what? That is a good question. I don’t really want anything for Abu Ghraib. The Democrats, that is who we need to get presents for. One thing, have you thought about handcuffs? Those have multiple uses for Democrats. A whip. You know, to go along with the handcuffs. Dawn says a good present would be to give a Democrat a digital camera so that he or she can document their own atrocities. All you have to take it to a Madonna concert. You got the whips, and the handcuffs and chains right there on stage and people are paying for this.
CALLER: They may have military intelligence, Rush. Who knows?
RUSH: That is a great question. What kind of gift to give Democrats here on the anniversary of Abu Ghraib. I’m glad you called, Christopher.
We’ll think of more as they, as they come up. You know, you might give them a little pyramid game, something that is in the shape of a pyramid. Wire tap kit. Could borrow that. Ted, actually could borrow one from Raymond Reggie, a wire tap kit. What else? Autographed picture of Mary Mapes. Boy, if you could score, come up with an autograph of Mary Mapes, she’s the mother of the Abu Ghraib scandal. Jumper cables. A pair of jumper cables—superb idea, Mr. Maimone. And these are things we all have lying around the house, folks. Just get rid of it. It is junk. Give them a German shepherd. Oh, yeah, a German shepherd dog, little German shepherd puppy. You can train yourself.
…
It is Abu Ghraib Day. Senator Kennedy issued a statement, Democrats celebrating the one year anniversary of the Abu Ghraib scandal. I don’t know how I forgot this. Obviously, at the top of the gift list has to be women’s underwear. Remember, women’s underwear was put on the heads of Islamic prisoners to humiliate them. Democrats found this totally objectionable, can’t believe it. Another thing, remember all of the pictures of Abu Ghraib prisoners with bags on their heads, with eye holes cut out. Give them some of those. Those are cheap. Go to the grocery store, get groceries, then give them the empty bags with the eye holes cut out favorite liberal Democrat, that as well as handcuffs. The bag for the head has a series of uses for liberal Democrats as well. Then, of course, there is a leash. A leash can be found at any pet store and it goes along with the German Shepherd that you are going to give away to a democrat here as they celebrate the one year anniversary of Abu Ghraib Day. Kevin in Eugene, Oregon. Hello and welcome to the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: How you doing Rush?
RUSH: Pretty good, Kevin.
CALLER: Love to talk to you.
RUSH: Thank you.
CALLER: I just want you to know that we are going to have our Abu Ghraib barbecue party tonight and we are going to be playing nude Twister.
RUSH: (Laughing.) How many people you got coming?
CALLER: Well, I figure we only need 8 or 10 to make it a rip roaring time. I thought that would be kind of fitting.
RUSH: Yeah. Nude Twister? Big Abu Ghraib barbecue. (Laughter.) Okay. And that’s from Oregon. Progress here.
…You know, the Democrats today celebrating the one year anniversary of Abu Ghraib. Now you have to be very careful about how far they take this. I mean, it is one thing to start giving them gifts. We forgot, a water board would be a great gift. For some libs, if you could find a naked Iraqi inflatable insurgent doll that would be a thrill.
Do you reckon Belle’s granfather thinks Rush is funny?
Posted in Uncategorized |
April 27th, 2005 at 9:22 pm
I can assure you that no one deplores the abuse of prisoners more than the rightwing, regardless of what you might believe from reading or listening to Rush. Rush represents only his own views, not those of other members of the right.
Foremost of those who deplore any abuse is President Bush. It doesn’t make any sense for him to do otherwise.
(Yes, another stupid comment from wronwright, but a sincere one).
April 27th, 2005 at 11:08 pm
Rush is the most popular and influential rightwing figure (outside the party proper) in the country, speaking to millions each day, a guest of Republican administrations, including Bush II who had him along to inauguration celebrations at the White House, able to get interviews with key figures such as the VP and the Prez during the last campaign - do you think they go on his show because “represents only his own views”? In fact, Bush was last on Limbaugh exactly when Rush was making his earlier jokes about Abu Ghraib (frat party comments) and Bush called him a “good friend.” What bigger endorsement of Rush’s centrality to American conservatism do you want?
So, I’m glad to note you abhor his comments here, but really, you are just wrong about his position. You couldn’t get a more representative figure of middle-American conservatives.
April 28th, 2005 at 1:24 am
Wron, much of what Bush does doesn’t make sense to me, but he does it anyway.
The fact remains that Gonzales prepared a legal opinion finding that torture was intra vires for the President. When questioned about this at his A-G hearing, he responded that he had been acting politically not judicially or as a justice officer, and would not have given that opinion as Attorney General.
This leads to the unescapable conclusion that the pro-torture opinion was commissioned by his superiors.
April 28th, 2005 at 2:34 am
Tim, much of what Rush says I dislike as much as you do. I’m not even sure he believes a lot of what he says. More than being influential, he is simply loud.
As far as whether Rush is a representative figure of middle-American conservatives, absolutely not. Actually, conservatives are not as monolithic as you might think. We don’t even agree with each other on many topics. It’s just that to members of the left of center, we seem to be of one cloth.
Actually, and I will deny this if you ever mentioned it to anyone, I came close to voting for John Kerry. I happened to agree with him on many issues (health care, the trade deficit, outsourcing of jobs to low wage countries). But in the end, I couldn’t trust him to deal with the issue of Islamic terrorism in an effective and realistic manner.
April 28th, 2005 at 2:45 am
Sean, I don’t believe that’s exactly correct. It’s my understanding that the issue he was given was whether harsh interrogation techniques can be used to extract potentially important information from suspected terrorists. His opinion covered the spectrum of various techniques and explained what is acceptable depending of the circumstances.
It is quite common for attorneys to be asked to offer legal opinions for future reference. This, however, should not be seen as endorsing those techniques.
As far as what the President’s choices and actions have been, they do make sense to me, whether it’s the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, the reduction of personal income tax rates, the lowering of trade barriers, or the reforming of Social Security. I don’t necessarily agree with him on some of it (such as SS) but most of it I do.
April 28th, 2005 at 3:14 am
As far as whether Rush is a representative figure of middle-American conservatives, absolutely not. Actually, conservatives are not as monolithic as you might think. We don’t even agree with each other on many topics. It’s just that to members of the left of center, we seem to be of one cloth.
I’m very pleased to hear it. Perhaps you and other rightish commenters might allow the possibility that the same is true of your opponents, before you indulge in blanket generalisations about the “Left” and assume that we are all disciples of Michael Moore and Noam Chomsky.
As for Limbaugh not being representative of conservatives…maybe. The problem is, he clearly thinks he is. Perhaps you need to talk to him, not us.
As for your voting choice, you’re entitled to it, and Kerry did run a lousy campaign. But I’m not sure that the guy best equipped to deal with radical Islam is the same guy most recently seen holding hands with a Saudi dictator and begging him to increase oil production. Judging by Bush’s current approval rating, there’s quite a lot of “buyer’s remorse” going on over there.
April 28th, 2005 at 3:23 am
Rush is one sick, corrupted bastard.
If I were a Seppo, I’d be pretty damned concerned about the potential for his views to be seen as representative of the U.S.
In fact, I’d openly ‘deplore’ his drug fueled ravings regardless of whether or not my personal beliefs and actions were in line with his.
April 28th, 2005 at 4:39 am
Wronwright, you’re being disingenuous. Gonzales was asked to prepare an opinion, which is indeed a common request of attorneys, but what he returned and what was then acted upon is the issue, rather than the way you’re spinning it. That torture “may be justified” and that international law restricting the use of torture “may be unconstitutional if applied to interrogation” unleashed the Abu Ghraib abuses, despite its content not detailing specific techniques. Those are well known to anyone having had access to a newspaper over the last thirty years. As for the President’s choices in this matter, including extraordinary rendition, I hope to suppose you don’t agree with what has taken place as a result of the Gonzales memorandum.
April 28th, 2005 at 5:20 am
It was more than the Gonzales memorandum. It was a precise graded 72 level interrogation plan prepared first for Afghanistan, then spread to Gitmo and thence to Iraq.
Supported by the high command in Iraq, pushed as I remember by Sanchez. And the interrogations at Abu Ghraib were softening up activities sanctioned and required by army interrogators.
A President acting in good faith, showing how America deals with atrocities, would be picking up the senior people. But then - it worked for My Lai. Why wouldn’t it work again?
April 28th, 2005 at 12:48 pm
Personally I think Rush has a tendency of saying things that make him seem like a horse’s ass, er, arse. But if I was to try making an accurate judgment on the man, I would need to listen to him and discern what he’s trying to say. Some of it is crap, some is right on. My problem is, I don’t tend to listen to him.
So yes, I do have somewhat of an opinion on Rush. He’s a bit of an ass who makes good points here and there. What I’m trying to do is make heads or tails of what Tim and the commenters to this blog are. For the most part, you make good points. And at other times, well, not so much.
One last thing. The Abu Graib abuses were not caused by the Gonzales memo. Even if it were to state unequivocally that all detainees must never be mishandled or abused in any way, shape, or form (somewhat what we have now to our detriment), I would think the abuses would have happened. There are sick people in this world, and sometimes there are in the US military. The question is not always whether we can prevent such things from happening, but how do we react when they do. I think the US military has reacted as well as can be expected.
April 28th, 2005 at 12:58 pm
“A President acting in good faith, showing how America deals with atrocities, would be picking up the senior people. But then - it worked for My Lai. Why wouldn’t it work again?”
Look, I fully realize that I’m a visitor to this blog. So I have to be careful what I say. But let me say this.
One problem that the left of center has in 2005 is that this is not 1968. The older generation is not comprised of fathers who served in the service during World War II and mothers who helped build the nuclear family after their husbands returned home from the war.
Many members of the right were fellow travellers with you, or more accurately we walked the path that many of you are walking now. We went through our times of liberalism (and ok, libertinism) and maybe a few even were Marxists/socialists. We walked the walk, we talked the talk. So much of what the left says is very familiar.
We are not in Vietnam, the times are not simply “a changing” as Bob Dylan would sing, they have changed.
April 28th, 2005 at 3:02 pm
I understood David to be saying the lower ranks carried the can for My Lai and it looks like they’ll carry the can for Abu Graib. Whatever happened to the Presidential boast “the buck stops here”?
April 28th, 2005 at 3:08 pm
“We are not in Vietnam, the times are not simply “a changing” as Bob Dylan would sing, they have changed.”
And that excuses the cover up of, the memos and plans that lead to, and the refusal to hold anyone in the chain of command responsibel for Abu Graib how?
And I wasn’t even a gleam in my father’s eye in 1968 — the baby Boomers are not the entirety of the Left, my friend.
April 28th, 2005 at 3:50 pm
No, but we were what you are. And we are what you might very well become.
April 28th, 2005 at 5:57 pm
Incredible. The man is a depraved, decadent, son of a bitch.
April 29th, 2005 at 1:36 am
Wron, when you skip out of Spleenvile with all its blood-lust and hate and banning of dissent and overt bigotry and meanness and dumbness and viciousness, and come over here where your opinions are accepted and responded to on their merits and the worst thing ever said to you is that your comment (not you) is stupid;
do you ever question what you have become?
The cynicism that comes with life’s traumas and disappointments is to be resisted.
April 29th, 2005 at 2:05 am
Well believe me, I gotten a bit beaten up over here too. But as I’ve said, I understand that I’m a visitor here and expressing a conservative viewpoint will often act as an exercise in masochism. The left is every bit as tough and tenacious as the right. And their patience for hearing a viewpoint different than their own is not endless.
I will state upfront that on most issues I won’t agree with most of the readers of this blog. And I understand you will not agree with me. But maybe just maybe I will learn something I didn’t know. It’s certainly not as if I know everything.
April 29th, 2005 at 6:37 am
No, but we were what you are. And we are what you might very well become.
To which Neo replied, “No, it can’t be. If the decision is already made, how can I make a choice…etc”
And then he gets into a big fight with multiple versions of Hugo Weaving.
April 29th, 2005 at 4:23 pm
“No, but we were what you are. And we are what you might very well become.”
Which is all very deep and philisophical, but it sorta misses the original question:
How does the fact that times have changed excuse the the cover up of, the memos and plans that lead to, and the refusal to hold anyone in the chain of command responsible for, Abu Graib?
April 29th, 2005 at 4:43 pm
As I’ve said, the issue for the left is not whether anyone has been held responsible for Abu Graib. It’s whether President Bush, Secretary Rumsfeld, and the top generals will accept responsibility in the manner and to the extent deemed acceptable to the leftwing?
In my opinion, they have done so by acknowledging the problem, supporting thorough investigations (read, plural) of the crimes in a transparent fashion, answering all questions posed by the media and Congress, and accepting the ultimate responsibility for it. They have apologized. Justice has been served and will continue to be served.
The only other recent situation I can recall that sounds familiar to this is when Bill Clinton was impeached for receiving BJ’s. I said then, he apologized. Damn it, let’s move on.
I say the same for this case. Let’s move on.
April 29th, 2005 at 10:14 pm
“In my opinion, they have done so by acknowledging the problem, supporting thorough investigations (read, plural) of the crimes in a transparent fashion, answering all questions posed by the media and Congress, and accepting the ultimate responsibility for it. They have apologized. Justice has been served and will continue to be served.”
No, justice has not been served. the man who wrote the memos responsible for the lossening of the ruels was promotoed. No senior staff memember has been punished significantly for these failures of command. In the words of one former military intelligence official:
That you would associate a BJ with torture is mind-boggling. they ar enot the same thing - -they ar enot even in the same unniverse. if “The Left” seems unsatisifed with this travresty it is becasue we still believe in those silly little concepts like human decncy and justice.
April 29th, 2005 at 10:26 pm
I’m not associating a BJ with torture. I’m saying that WE NEED TO MOVE ON. On all things.
I absolutely agree with everyone here that torture is wrong. It has to be eliminated. But we absolutely disagree with the facts, the causes, the assignment of blame and culpability … actually, we disagree with most everything here.
This is one of those issues that we must agree we disagree. And move on.
April 30th, 2005 at 1:30 am
yeah wronwright take your own advice - go away and annoy others with your weasel words.
April 30th, 2005 at 12:41 pm
Adrian, for once I might agree with you.