Update [2008-4-25 9:55:58 by Steven D]: Richard Blair at All Spin Zone says Rush may have committed a felony for calling for riots, and should be prosecuted.
SECOND Update [2008-4-25 10:37:40 by Steven D]: COLORADO REVISED STATUTE 18-9-102(3) reads:
Inciting riot. Any person who incites, urges, instructs, or signals a group of five or more persons to engage in a riot and injury to a person or damage to property results therefrom commits a class 5 felony.
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You read that right. Rush Limbaugh is calling for “riots” at the Democratic convention in Denver. What a disgusting human being. Calling, hoping, dreaming for violence merely for his entertainment and the entertainment of his “ditto head” followers.
Talk show host Rush Limbaugh is sparking controversy again after he made comments calling for riots in Denver during the Democratic National Convention this summer.
He said the riots would ensure a Democrat is not elected as president, and his listeners have a responsibility to make sure it happens.
“Riots in Denver, the Democrat Convention would see to it that we don’t elect Democrats,” Limbaugh said during Wednesday’s radio broadcast. He then went on to say that’s the best thing that could happen to the country. […]
Several callers called in to the radio show to denounce Limbaugh’s comments, when he later stated, “I am not inspiring or inciting riots, I am dreaming of riots in Denver.”
I guess Chicken Hawk Supreme Limbaugh wants to re-live his youth from 1968 when the “rioting” at the Chicago Convention (caused mostly by the Chicago Police) likely cost Hubert Humphrey the election. An election where the the victory of a Republican, Richard Nixon, guaranteed that an unpopular war would continue for another 7 more years, with an ever increasing death toll among both Americans and Vietnamese.
Of course, no one should be surprised that Limbaugh would take this tack. He’s long been the pilonidal cyst on the American body politic. Almost single handedly he created the conservative racist, politically incorrect talk show format, where defamation of one’s “enemies” is standard operating procedure. He went after Hillary and Bill Clinton mercilessly in the 90’s pushing conspiracy theories that one or both of them had Vince Foster murdered. And more recently he’s shown he’s an equal opportunity smear merchant by playing racist ditties like “Barack, the Magic Negro” during his radio program.
Nor has he been reluctant to use eliminationist language on his show towards liberals and Democrats, and anyone else he deems worthy of his scorn, from feminazis to AIDS patients. But this is a new low, calling for specific incidents of violence at a major political party’s convention. The man who cheered on the mass arrests of peaceful demonstrators (and innocent bystanders) at the 2004 Republican Convention, who gloried in the news that we were torturing the bad guys at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib (even as he cynically refused to call it torture), now wants to see riots. Now encourages riots.
And how many of his flock of wingnut sheep will take the opportunity to become agents provocateur in Denver? How many will attempt to ignite the very violence for which Limbaugh is an advocate? We already know that his listeners have participated Operation Chaos, where he commanded them to vote in Democratic primaries for Hillary Clinton so that the nomination battle between Obama and Clinton would continue, and thus weaken the Democratic Party’s chances in the Fall. This is merely the next step in his attempt to influence the elections.
With all the problems facing this country, most if not all of them the result of the Republican party’s domination of all three branches of our government, but especially the executive branch, this is what prominent Conservatives promote. Chaos, violence, hate, bigotry and eternal war. Our soldiers and Iraqis are dying every day, food shortages are occurring around the globe (even in the United States), energy and food prices are on the rise, unemployment is up as are foreclosures, and our financial system teeters on the brink of a calamitous fall, and this is what Rush Limbaugh spends his time pontificating about.
He’s the right wing media’s version of Emperor Nero, divorced from reality, fiddling while less fortunate Americans than himself, fat and happy with the millions of dollars generated by his caustic brew of hatred, spite and ill will, slowly burn. Ten percent of Ohioans are on food stamps and he merrily calls for riots at the Democratic convention. What kind of man does such a thing?
For there is a word that describes this type of person and I don’t mean sociopath, for that gives Rush an out, makes his foul deeds the result of a diminished moral capacity. No, the word is one any right wing conservative ought to recognize since they use it themselves so often. That word is traitor. Rush Limbaugh is an evil toad and a traitor to democracy, to our Constitution and to our Nation. He doesn’t participate in the violence he glorifies, but he is its primary advocate on the right, and for Bush’s wars as well. So convinced of the righteousness of “his cause” he willingly appeals to the worst sides of our nature, hoping to inspire others to do the deeds he lacks the spine to do himself.
In that way he is not much different than Osama bin Laden. Both have their devoted, fanatical followers, both are extremists, and both believe that violence in pursuit of their cherished ideals is a “right deed” as the Stoics would say. Both promote wars that kill thousands.
The biggest difference? Rush doesn’t have to live in hiding. He can live the “good life” of the top .0001 % of the wealthiest Americans, even going on “sex tours” to poverty stricken countries with bags of Viagra to assist his enjoyment of all the delectable young girls available to perverts like himself. He can illegally obtain and abuse prescription narcotics, yet avoid any prosecution for his crimes. Yes, it’s a wonderful life if you are Rush Limbaugh, knowing he is completely free from the consequences of his actions, no matter how heinous they may be.
Too bad for the rest of us we are not so lucky.
