Limbaugh's school of hard knocks for other guys

Palm Beach Post ^ | Sunday, May 9, 2004 | Frank Cerabino

[new cruelty]

Rush Limbaugh is a slow learner.

That might explain why he looked at the sadistic photos from the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and likened them to some college fraternity high jinks.

Boolah, mullah! Boolah, mullah!

Most reasonable people expressed disgust by the sight of the bound, nude, hooded men in American custody being forced to degrade themselves sexually.

And Limbaugh surely would have, too, if it had been under the previous administration.

But Limbaugh's a referee without a whistle these days. So here's how he excused the inexcusable:

"This is no different than what happens at the Skull and Bones initiation, and we're going to ruin people's lives over it, and we're going to hamper our military effort, and then we are going to really hammer them because they had a good time," he said on his radio show.

Limbaugh added: "I'm talking about people having a good time. These people, you ever heard of emotional release? You heard of need to blow some steam off?"

I knew he was an apologist. But I just figured that in light of his newfound expertise in the realm of investigatory zeal run amok -- something he claims to have learned the hard way in Palm Beach County -- he might have temporarily burst through the wall of his professional limitations.

But, like I said, Limbaugh is apparently a slow learner.

And yet, there's hope.

There used to be a time when he thought that the problem with drugs was that we weren't locking up the people who got caught. This was during the days when he thought the American Civil Liberties Union was a flaky impediment to justice and criminal defense lawyers were an evil bunch of liberal simps who were out to subvert the truth by freeing the guilty on procedural maneuvers.

He has been educated through experience in that regard.

Caught in cross hairs of justice

Ever since the Palm Beach County State Attorney's Office declined to respectfully turn a blind eye to Limbaugh's years of prescription drug abuse, he has become a champion of the drug addict caught in the cross hairs of justice. He talks of the pain of addiction, the need for treatment and the unfairness of prosecutors pursuing people with a personal problem.

If you go to Limbaugh's Web site these days, it's full of tales of horrific miscarriages of justice and calls to end investigatory techniques that we, as Americans, shouldn't stand for.

There are warnings about the "threat to the rule of law." Harassment we can't condone. And a horrible "fishing expedition" for information that should chill us to the core.

No, none of that is about the sadistic abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison.

It's all about Palm Beach County State Attorney Barry Krischer's having the nerve to document Limbaugh's drug abuse through the use of his medical records.

Oh, the horror!

From Limbaugh's bellowing, you'd think Krischer was breaking chemical lights and pouring the scorching phosphoric liquid over the naked talk-show host's... oh, never mind.

Besides, that's just "people having a good time."

All those naked Iraqis must be guilty of something, right? There can't be any innocent civilians rounded up by overzealous authorities. That never happens.

And as for the guilty -- well, the rights of people behind bars is just a left-wing abstraction.

For now. The slow learner better hope this isn't the next awakening in his education.

[Destro]

I am not a Greek Cypriot. Never have been and have no known connection to Cyprus. Boy, do you suck at this.

[Torie]

Cheers arasina. Raise a toast for me to Steyn, one of most gifted essayists on this planet. He is almost as good orally. The man is just overloaded with talent. It is unfair. He should have spread it around.

[Torie]

I thought you were from Cyprus, or your parents were. My bad.

[gargoyle]

...Reloaded...

[F16Fighter]

"I couldn't believe that he compared it to a Yale frat stunt. I don't think that hooding a man and attaching wires to his extremities or forcing them to strip and be piled into a pyramid qualifies."

G.O -- they seemed to be poses designed just for pictures. Were the wires connected to anything? And the piling of Iraqis into a pyramid qualifies as THE definitive frat stunt. Only at a frat party, the pyramid people would have been forced to drink 2 six-packs before piling up ;-)

"And it is outrageous that this is such a huge story - it's being handled by our military, so it should be a story for a few days, tops. But that does not mean, to me, that Rush's comments didn't cross the line."

It's a complex issue -- I respect your opinion.

[Hoplite]

It's just rare that I find you on a thread not devoted to psephology - I mean, look at that word, can you blame me for keeping my distance?

Si vales, valeo, as always.

[Destro]

Funny story - I was in school and in front of me were these two guys yacking away - and I turn to my pal a half-British-half Persian bloke and said "Look - F*cking A-rabs" ... then the names were called out - turns out they were Greek Cypriots. My bad.

[ConservativeGadfly]

What strikes me as odd about this whole thing....from the photo release to this flank attack on Rush....is the timing.

Think about it. Last week, things were going just swimmingly last week -- Kerry was on the defensive about his medals and anti-Vietnam activities and then suddenly, KA-BLAM! A story comes along that not only blows that off the front pages, but also nicely supports the anti-military sentiment that boils just barely beneath the surface of most leftists.

What the left was on the defensive for JUST LAST WEEK in their vicious attacks on Pat Tillman and their wavering defense of John Kerry.....is now buttressed by a story that embraces the whole idea that "everyone in the military is a brute and inherently evil" theory.

What they are so darned good at doing is changing the subject. They are just masterful at it. And by the time we figure that out, we are usually already backtracking and on defense.

Sigh.

Same thing with Rush, actually. It strikes me, though, that Rush is not usually taken in by this tactic. Not much gets him off his game.

Now, as for you, Torie, I understand your need for more intellectual fare. But you clearly don't see the inherent beauty of what Rush really does. He has taken issues that pointy headed policy wonks for YEARS have droned on about with absolutely no message acceptance among the masses, and he has successfully articulated them in dinner table language. And he has done it with humor and bare bones simplicity -- do you not see the sheer genius in that? Oh, and in the process, he single-handedly saved talk radio and created an entire industry.

Rush has converted as many folks to conservatism as Billy Graham has to Christianity. He IS a national treasure.

If he weren't so effective, the Left wouldn't be trying to do everything in their power to take him down. Let's not help them do it, ok?

[Diddle E. Squat]

Actually I think freeper 'GreatOne' IS right on with his statement. But what you wrote gets at the root of the problem:

especially with the 20 year olds we have today who grew up on a diet of web porn and violent movies and TV shows.

This incident is likely a huge battle in the culture wars, whether we recognize it right now or not. It is the fruits of libertine moral relativism and the 60's boomer's default 'push the limits/the rules don't apply to us' approach to life. What we have are portions of a generation that grew up floating in a moral vacuum, many increasing separated from any moral/ethical standards. "Don't ask, don't tell", "Who are you to judge", "What's wrong for you is not wrong for me", "Its just about sex", "There's nothing wrong with porn", Howard Stern and a shock culture that by default must keep pushing extremes just to reach simple satisfaction, all contribute to the densisitization.

When people grow up in a culture that encourages rationalizing whatever they want, and ignoring any rules/standards that are inconvenient, it is a much smaller step to crossing the line into real abuse. If S&M is ok among consenting adults, accepted among ones peers, elevated to just another form of entertainment, and interspersed routinely into one's awareness, how much easier does it become to inflicting it on the unwilling? For those for which gay porn has been normalized, the shock of Abu G. is primarily only the lack of consent. For a prison guard from a culture that tells him they'll look the other way and allow him to do 'whatever it takes' to keep order, why would he not carry that ignoring of rules/laws over into prisoner interrogations, especially when adding in the emotion of the situation of dealing with some persons who are actively seeking to destroy your society? How can we expect persons immersed in the segment of American culture that mocks and tears down the norms that encourage self-control to then suddenly exercise the high-degree of self-control required in this situation?

I'm really anticipating the take that Bill Bennett and others like him will have on this incident, and how they place it in the greater context. I don't want to fixate on any one particular detail, but rather on how the 'no rules' and shock culture inevitably leads to such incidents that force us to admit that limits are needed, and are there for a reason. Sooner or later the culture wars(and our even political divide) will be decided, one way or another. If history is our guide, Abu G. may be one of those incidents that forces a societal introspection and correction. What we need to fight for now is that the interpretation and analysis is correct, and not some trumped up short-term emotionalized political goal, that masks and provides the delay of an easy out to pretend that everything will be better without addressing the real problem.

[WorkingClassFilth]

BOILER PLATE.

So, is this fellow capable of independent thought or does he normally bellow from his ass?

[Diddle E. Squat]

As a rule, I don't shadow posters I've disagreed with in one thread to the next, looking for openings to challenge them.

Well that's nice, but your analysis appears once again to be way off, if you are implying that is what I have done. Here's another hint, that should now make it pretty obvious: You are not the poster I am familiar with.

[Destro]

Rush is not a national treasure - no radio jock is - even if they are doing politics it is all a gimmick. Radio personalities are just one rung up the ladder from circus clowns in the show biz hierarchy. This is show biz - nothing more - a genre that started in the 70s built around the format of pissing people off enough to get them to listen - either pissed at the radio DJ or pissed off along with the radio DJ.

Read the Federalist Papers - those are a national treasure - leave the false hero worship at home.

[Destro]

I'm really anticipating the take that Bill Bennett and others like him will have on this incident

Is Bill Bennett laying out any odds? What is the point spread?

[Torie]

Well, I do wade elsewhere actually, often into economics, and then to even areas where I don't think I have an intellectual advantage, just to test the waters. But I understand your distaste for the dismal science, and the non-science of psephology, that awful word, that seems to suggest some criminal act on some orafice (sp).

[Diddle E. Squat]

Is that simply humor, or an attempt to take one weakness and then use it to try and discredit anything he will say? The latter is the same tactic that the Dems are trying to use against Rush. In fact that tactic is the subject of this thread.

[John Lenin]

I still have a problem with calling humiliation where you are not physcially hurt, torture. If there was some real torture I want to hear about it and see it but so far what I have seen does not come up to the torture category and that's how it is being portrayed by the media.

[A Jovial Cad]

*Here's another hint, that should now make it pretty obvious: You are not the poster I am familiar with.*

What in the world? Another "hint" that "should now make it pretty obvious" that you do not consider me the "poster I am familiar with"? You sound like a soccer-mom at an intervention session, not a poster to a political forum on the Internet.
Enough with the serpentine language and clever mysteries surrounding your "hints" to me: do you have a question, problem, proposition, or dispute with my arguments--in this or any other thread--or not? If you do, fine--I'll see that bid and raise you. Deal.
If not, move on, and annoy someone else with your smarmy secret-agent routines.
Most of us here prefer plain language, plainly stated, BTW. That's your free "hint" for the day.

[danamco]

Were you there to see, by yourself, that what the pictures are "staging" or what the medias are accusing of took place?

My pictures from the Equator "baptisms," a full day event on board, are gross in the eyes of people who have no clue about this seagoing tradition. They will make comments on how can such "abusive" behaviors take place. They cannot picture that everybody on board would meet together on the after deck for a nice and camaraderie party with "breaking bread" together and over a nice dinner receive their "real" Equator birth certificate.
That certificate had to be presented on another ship they might join and cross the Equator. If they could not present the certificate they would be dragged through the same gross ceremony once again! People are really shocked when the see my photos (in black&white)

[Diddle E. Squat]

I agree that humiliation is not torture, though I am against stripping a man naked in front of women. There are plenty of other techniques that can be used.

But reread this thread if you think all that happened was humiliation. Physical abuse such as rape, forcing prisoners to masturbate and ejaculate into each others mouths, and beating men to near death is torture. And all are alleged in the military investigations.

[lewislynn]

The man has no depth. He bores the hell out of me.

No surprise there, how could anyone who voted for Gray Davis also be a Rush fan.