Posted on 03/03/2012 2:15:11 PM PST by TSgt
For over 20 years, I have illustrated the absurd with absurdity, three hours a day, five days a week. In this instance, I chose the wrong words in my analogy of the situation. I did not mean a personal attack on Ms. Fluke.
I think it is absolutely absurd that during these very serious political times, we are discussing personal sexual recreational activities before members of Congress. I personally do not agree that American citizens should pay for these social activities. What happened to personal responsibility and accountability? Where do we draw the line? If this is accepted as the norm, what will follow? Will we be debating if taxpayers should pay for new sneakers for all students that are interested in running to keep fit?In my monologue, I posited that it is not our business whatsoever to know what is going on in anyone's bedroom nor do I think it is a topic that should reach a Presidential level.
My choice of words was not the best, and in the attempt to be humorous, I created a national stir. I sincerely apologize to Ms. Fluke for the insulting word choices.
While it's true that some on the left have called him an "entertainer" in the past, it's difficult to find any of them taking that position today. Google "limbaugh entertainer" and you get 100 hits of Santorum saying he is an entertainer taking an absurd point of view. Nobody on the left.
Sickoflibs and I don't agree about Limbaugh's joke that Fluke should sell sex tapes to pay for birth control. He thinks it was funny, I think it was creepy, not funny. I also believe that it makes the Left's job of talking women into voting for Obama easier. I hope I am wrong about that.
Now you are contradicting on your own argument. Are you claiming you don't consider him a leader ? When your main ridiculous argument is that ‘the left’ is calling Rush an entertainer instead?
You are totally lost in your confusion.
Two very simple points:
Rush isn't my leader (I tend not to have any).
Rush is a political conservative commentator who also tries to be entertaining.
Those two ideas are not mutually exclusive.
If that is difficult for you, so be it.
If true then you started an argument about nothing with no point.
Between football and golf and his weddings and his parties and a few weaved in commercials he manages to slip in a lecture or two about how Republicans should NEVER CAVE UNDER PRESSURE, even if it means them losing the next election. That is pure entertainment in my book.
True. Which is why I made the following comment (as posted to sickolibs in an earlier post):
Rush is neither "my leader" nor is he "just an entertainer". The left will inconsistently apply either line of propaganda when it suits their need.
If true then you started an argument about nothing with no point.
So then you agree that Rush is primarily a conservative commentator who also tries to entertain...and he is NOT simply "just an entertainer"???
Well right now it suits their needs to make Rush out to be much more than an entertainer, which is what he is.
The Sharptons, Maddows, Matthews all spent the week calling Rush the Republican spiritual leader to set the stage for demanding that every elected Republican explain their position on Rush's statements.
And on the Sunday shows Republicans were all asked to explain their positions on Rush. You can bet that by Monday Obama spokesman will claim that Republicans spent another week defending their leader Rush regarding birth control instead of talking about jobs.
I will be damned if I am going to help them.
Between football and golf and his weddings and his parties and a few weaved in commercials he manages to slip in a lecture or two about how Republicans should NEVER CAVE UNDER PRESSURE, even if it means them losing the next election. That is pure entertainment in my book.
Helping the left demand that Republicans waste all their time defending, or opposing everything that Rush says while he is entertaining is not in my book.
They will undoubtedly use the Fluke affair in some way as long as they think it's working. I think they will try to make the case that Rush is the very image of the GOP's "disrepect toward women" or some such lie. I expect Obama himself to make more oblique statements, but he has been known to get carried away with his ideology.
When I first heard of the apology I was disappointed. Then I read his statement and was relieved. The Left was using not the substance, but the semantics to rope-in sympathy for their position. He did nothing more than retract a couple of poorly chosen and over-the-top words. He used the apology/statement as a platform to expose the argument to many who don’t listen to his show; they might discover that they agree with him. Unfortunately, tv media outlets (whether out of bias or the need for brevity) may in most cases only report that he apologized and not read the whole statement.
Rush said something like, “she is asking to be paid to have sex...then, what does that make her?” and he should have left it there, to our imagination - done. Absurdity demonstated. If anything, he needed to apologize to himself for going that extra bit further and giving the opposition the ammo with which to blow this whole thing up.
thats the problem, i just can see rush limbaughs words as demeaning to *women*...
if I, as an alcoholic, go before a CONgressional panel, mics and cameras and bright lights, and attempt to persuade them to force local bars, distilleries, and brewing companies, including every citizen who believe drinking to be against their 1A freedom of religion and freedom from government... to *invest* into my party fund, at the point of a government rifle, then Ive painted a target on my back...
tomorrow, some talkin head makes a reference to me that I, an admitted alcoholic, am a 'drunk'...should the population of self respecting alcoholics be enraged ??? or just those who desire a subsidy to continue their destructive behavior ???
chances are slim to none that rush was settin up for a monday show doubling down and change his terminolgy to *whore*...it wouldnt demean wimmin any more, and he would be king of the smackdown...but as i said, slim to none...
That was the message today.
But they like Wazzman Schultz today keep saying that Republicans are the ones starting this social issue war making believe that Obama-care has been in effect for 30 years now.
chances are slim to none that rush was settin up for a monday show doubling down and change his terminolgy to *whore*...it wouldnt demean wimmin any more, and he would be king of the smackdown...but as i said, slim to none...
But Rush went way beyond what she said by making the "joke" that she should sell sex tapes to pay for her birth control. I think that is clearly worse than just using the S-word. That is the kind of creepy "humor" we expect from Letterman and Maher. And it could help Obama to 4 more years. I hope not.
Well as funny as I thought it was when those MSNBC libs played the tapes and reacted on camera, I have a simple rule regarding this. Rush SAID HE WAS wrong. So it makes no sense now to argue that he was right.
Ever see those judge civil court TV shows where the person is being sued for a crime they were already convicted of and they claim they were not really guilty and they make up an excuse like ‘My lawyer told me to plead guilty’ ??? Well the judge says if you pleaded guilty there I have to assume you were guilt here, It's very straight-forward.
“But worse than that, he went on to say that she should sell sex tapes to pay for birth control, and in so doing, dragged himself at least temporarily down to the level of Letterman and Maher.”
Wrong. Once again, lying about a virtuous woman is not on the same moral plane as making appropriate remarks about a depraved woman.
“If you approve of Limbaugh’s “sex tape” comments, and disapprove of Letterman and Maher, that is hypocrisy.”
Wrong.
“Hypocrisy is the state of pretending to have virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles, etc., that one does not actually have. Hypocrisy involves the deception of others and is thus a kind of lie.
Hypocrisy is not simply failing to practice those virtues that one preaches. Samuel Johnson made this point when he wrote about the misuse of the charge of “hypocrisy” in Rambler No. 14:
‘Nothing is more unjust, however common, than to charge with hypocrisy him that expresses zeal for those virtues which he neglects to practice; since he may be sincerely convinced of the advantages of conquering his passions, without having yet obtained the victory, as a man may be confident of the advantages of a voyage, or a journey, without having courage or industry to undertake it, and may honestly recommend to others, those attempts which he neglects himself.’
Thus, an alcoholic’s advocating temperance, for example, would not be considered an act of hypocrisy as long as the alcoholic made no pretense of constant sobriety.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypocrisy
The vast majority of people who make false accusations of hypocrisy based on an erroneous definition of the concept are leftists.
“At a minimum, ignoring a very important part of my post, you tried to smear me.”
There is no very important part of your post which I ignored. I tried first to explain why it’s not hypocrisy to agree that a slut is a slut while holding that a virtuous woman is a virtuous woman, then I expressed my judgment that, based on what you say and how you say it, you are not a conservative, but an agent provocateur.
It now occurs to me, though, that it could be that you simply haven’t gotten as far as this concept in your struggle to free yourself from the toxic nostrums of the popular culture or the college campus.
It is long past time for decent people to wake up and realize that when dealing with scumbags, civility is nothing but a self-imposed handicap. If it’s true, say it. If it’s a lie, call it a lie. No hypocrisy is involved.
Once again, lying about a virtuous woman is not on the same moral plane as making appropriate remarks about a depraved woman.
Right. Fluke should make sex tapes. Your version of "appropriate?" I guess you are right. It's not hypocrisy, it's swinishness. Palin would not approve of such vulgar public jokes about misguided left wing students. She knows what it feel like to be the object of cruel remarks that pretend to be "jokes," so it would be hypocritical for her to claim they were "appropriate."
But although you may be a very fine person in other respects, your approval of those particular jokes is selectively boorish (not hypocritical, because you believe they are "appropriate"). Somehow you have the ability to recognize that some left-wing comments about Palin are inappropriate, but do not possess that ability when applied to political enemies.
Fluke is my enemy too. I doubt if I could stand to be around her. But I don't know her really. For all I know, she doesn't need birth control because she doesn't like men.
The vast majority of people who make false accusations of hypocrisy based on an erroneous definition of the concept are leftists.
Any evidence to back up that claim? And even if that were true, your "logic" is like saying that since you have a pet, it must be a dog. That would be a guess, not "judgment."
I tried first to explain why it’s not hypocrisy to agree that a slut is a slut while holding that a virtuous woman is a virtuous woman, then I expressed my judgment that, based on what you say and how you say it, you are not a conservative, but an agent provocateur.
And based on what you say with your rickity "arguments," you sound like you use such charges against conservatives who disagree with you.
It is long past time for decent people to wake up and realize that when dealing with scumbags, civility is nothing but a self-imposed handicap.
Extreme, timid civility can be a handicap, but beware lest we become what we say we hate.
If it’s true, say it. If it’s a lie, call it a lie. No hypocrisy is involved.
OK, you lied about me. Maybe you can't help it.
You seem to have missed the title of this thread, Rush says he was wrong to say those things. That's black and white.
Don't pick fights where you can't win. And that is exactly what Rush did. If it were a member of congress getting beat up over a stand (like shutting down the government) Rush would tell him to not give in even if it meant him losing his job. But when Rush lost a few sponsors the listener fantasy world left him and reality set in and he caved.
If he says he was wrong then who are we to claim he was right?
“If he says he was wrong then who are we to claim he was right?”
Oh, how about “people who strongly suspect that his apology was extorted under duress?”
Or, how about “people whose moral compasses are as well developed as his?”
“People who are not getting their arms twisted by business interests?”
“Free Americans who have the privilege of holding and expressing their own opinions?”
Well developed ??? His apology indicates that his ‘moral compass’ has went off in the wrong direction. Further defending him is like claiming the guy who pleaded guilty really didnt mean it.
Speaking of ‘moral compass’ and ‘extorted under duress’ Rush is the same guy who lectures his audience on how Republicans members of congress should hold on during a shutdown standoff EVEN IF IT MEANS LOSING THEIR NEXT election and seat. He sounds pretty brave behind that mike saying what others should give up in a battle. But he loses a few of HIS sponsors to his program and he's almost imediately making a public apology. He does NOT practice what he preaches.
Rush lives in a glass house and shouldn't throw those types of stones and he admitted it when he apologized.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.