The Right’s Righteous Frauds

By Frank Bruni for The New York Times:

Say what you will about Bristol Palin, she’s a quick study. It didn’t take her long to master the ways of her elders on the censorious right and decide that personal circumstance and past error needn’t prevent someone from claiming righteous leadership. Uncle Rush must be proud.

Soon after President Obama stated support for same-sex marriage, Bristol publicly weighed in. Because, you know, the world was on tenterhooks.

In a blog post she focused on the reference that Obama made to his daughters — and to the same-sex parents of some of the girls’ friends.

“It would’ve been helpful for him to explain to Malia and Sasha that while her friends (sic) parents are no doubt lovely people, that’s not a reason to change thousands of years of thinking about marriage,” wrote Bristol, making her heady debut as the new Dr. Spock for a nascent millennium. She added that “in general kids do better growing up in a mother/father home. Ideally, fathers help shape their kids’ worldview.”

Fathers like...Levi Johnston? It’s with him that she conceived her child — out of wedlock, at the age of 17 — and by most accounts, his relationship with her and the Palin family isn’t any warmer than Juneau in January. A mother/father home is not what he and Bristol have succeeded in creating.

What’s more, she has made sure that their son, Tripp, will at some point be treated to a worldview-shaping image of Dad as something akin to a date rapist. That’s the description of him immortalized in her memoir, one of her many efforts to monetize her surname. It recounts the loss of her virginity as a result of getting drunk and blacking out in the company of Levi, who pounced. What a gift that narrative is to Tripp, now being hauled into a TV reality show, “Bristol Palin: Life’s a Tripp,” already in production. Little children are known to thrive in such environments.

I hesitated before picking on Bristol because she’s an easy target. It’s like shooting moose from a helicopter flying low over the tundra.

But she so perfectly distills the double standards and audacity of so many of our country’s self-appointed moralists and supposed traditionalists: hypocrites whose own histories, along with any sense of shame, tumble out the window as soon as there’s a microphone to be seized or check to be cashed. 

She proves that they’re not going away anytime soon — a new generation rises! — and that they haven’t been daunted by the ridicule justly heaped on Newt Gingrich during the Republican primaries, when he dared to cast himself as a religious conservative.

Certainly Rush thunders on. Last week he bellowed that Obama had decided to “lead a war” on traditional marriage. Seems to me Limbaugh started those hostilities long ago, if not with his first divorce then certainly with his second and third.

For entertainment at Wedding No. 4, to a woman 26 years younger than he is, he hired Elton John (who very questionably took the gig). Gays shouldn’t be allowed to tie the knot, but they sure can carry a tune.

More interesting than the tired, press-a-button condemnations from Bristol and Rush was Mitt Romney’s comportment. He didn’t hasten to turn same-sex marriage into a wedge issue, the way Rick Santorum urged him to, or use his commencement speech at Liberty University to fan the flames of hellfire.

He instead held back a bit, no doubt partly because his need at this particular juncture, as he recovers from the compromising and brutalizing primaries, is to pivot to the center, not cling to the right. I think Obama and his tacticians counted on as much.

And I think that the extent to which Romney continues to hold back will have enormous consequence for the Republican Party’s destiny.

Within its uppermost ranks are many champions of small government who squirm at the small-mindedness of the scowling theocrats in an increasingly uneasy coalition. These fiscal conservatives take advantage of the religious right’s political muscle but have reservations about its hectoring piety, and their own views on social issues are often moderate or somewhat liberal. Recall that Republican money played a pivotal role in the successful campaign for same-sex marriage in New York.

It came from donors who don’t want to see Romney take up an anti-gay mantle and who understand that a reputation for intolerance and bigotry imperils the future of the party, which they would like to orient away from stone throwers in glass houses. They’re Rush-fatigued. Palin-weary.

Bristol’s recent parenting advice to the Obamas extended into the realm of TV. She seemed to question whether they were watching “too many episodes of ‘Glee.’ ”

“Life’s a Tripp,” starring a single mom who once sold a family revelation to Us Weekly, will be more edifying, I’m certain. And it will showcase a woman who’s a shining testament to conventional, old-fashioned families.

America Deserves Better Than Rush Limbaugh

by David Badash for The New Civil Rights Movement:

I’ll be honest. I thought Rush Limbaugh might die. There wasn’t an emotion attached to it – I didn’t jump up and down, excited or upset. But the journalist in me realized there was a need for an obituary. So I wrote one. Then I put it away when we learned he was fine. In good taste, I couldn’t publish an attack on a sick man.

I’m glad Rush is in good health.

But I cannot accept his ludicrous and, of course, harmful judgment that the American healthcare system is perfectly fine.

So, two things. One, about healthcare. The second, about the man who continues to do damage to this country. Yes, a reminder about the hateful things Rush says about gays.

Here’s Rush on his healthcare experience:



Limbaugh claims that he received excellent treatment, the same as anyone else who would have called 911.

Anyone else with the name Rush Limbaugh. He bypassed two other hospitals to go to one selected to attend to the multi-millionaire.

Rush received great healthcare in part, because of who he is, because he could afford it, and because the state of Hawaii mandates certain levels of care, including that the healthcare professionals, like nurses, are unionized, and that employers offer healthcare to their employees.

But remember, the healthcare debate isn’t only about quality of care, but effectiveness and cost. Mr. Limbaugh’s personal experience doesn’t place him in a position to critique the quality of healthcare in this country. His financial status doesn’t place him a position to understand the impact of healthcare costs to the average person in this country.

Here’s what I wrote last Thursday when we learned Limbaugh was ill:

Extreme right-wing conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh was taken to the hospital from his ninth floor room at the Kahala Hotel and Resort late Thursday night. A CNN reporter said at about 11:40 PM EST, via Twitter,

“Limbaugh complained of chest pains. Sources say he told medical crews he was taking medication for a back problem. Still serious condition.”

Another CNN reporter, Ed Henry, said, also via Twitter, that Limbaugh was taken to Queens Medical Center in Honolulu.

Twitter exploded with the news of Limbaugh’s possible heart attack, with hundreds of tweets posted every minute for hours.

I’ve followed Rush’s attacks on gays and the gay community over the past year. And just as I was honest when Oral Roberts passed a few weeks ago, I will be equally honest now. Here’s what I said about Roberts:

“While I believe in having respect for the dead, I also believe in speaking the truth. And I also believe that we dig our own graves. Roberts leaves a legacy of hatred and homophobia that scarred millions in this country. Many will condemn me for saying that, but I believe he would be proud of my condemnation.”

And I say exactly the same about Limbaugh. Limbaugh spoke ill of many people. He excoriated homosexuals, and repeatedly condemned us. I thought I’d share with you some of Limbaugh’s hate speech:

“Bend over grab your ankles” regarding President Obama.

On the Iowa Supreme Court decision that a ban on same-sex marriage was unconstitutional, this rant:

“This is why an electoral majority needs to happen in order to defeat these people, and even after they’re defeated, they try to go around it in other ways, getting judges, like unanimous decision in Iowa today, with the Supreme Court, unanimous, that a ban on gay marriage is unconstitutional. Now, I guarantee you, if we could go dig up James Madison and say, “Mr. Madison, did you intend for the Constitution to say people of the same sex could get married?” And I guarantee you he would have the reaction, “What are you talking about? Are you sure you’re asking me about the Constitution?””

And from my March 5th post:

“…five of Rush Limbaugh’s most offensive, anti-gay, homophobic, bigoted comments:

1. Aired a song about Senator Barney Frank called “Banking Queen“.
2. Democrats will “bend over, grab the ankles, and say, ‘Have your way with me’” to African American and gay voters.
3. On the Mark Foley scandal: “In their hearts and minds and their crotches, they don’t have any problem with what Foley did. They’ve defended it over the — over the years.“
4. Openly gay students are “trumpeting” their sexuality, “inviting dissent”.
5. “When a gay person turns his back on you, it is anything but an insult; it’s an invitation”


Lastly, there’s this one, which I have yet to figure out how many sensibilities it offends:

“…let’s say we discover the gene that says the kid’s gonna be gay. How many parents, if they knew before the kid was gonna be born, [that he] was gonna be gay, they would take the pregnancy to term? Well, you don’t know but let’s say half of them said, “Oh, no, I don’t wanna do that to a kid.” [Then the] gay community finds out about this. The gay community would do the fastest 180 and become pro-life faster than anybody you’ve ever seen. … They’d be so against abortion if it was discovered that you could abort what you knew were gonna be gay babies.””

So, Mr. Limbaugh, glad you’re OK. I’m not glad you’re still a bigot, you’re still a hateful liar, and you’re still on the air. America deserves better.