Steve Benson for May 13, 2010

who was gonna go to Costa Rica when health care insurance reform passed? lets pass the hat and get him a ticket on Afriqiyah Airways!

And it’s highly toxic…

Who is this Limpbaugh character anyway?

All the leftys are Nandy unless it jives with their idiology. I only heard him put up a hypothetical about the oil rig. Things that he espouse to be true, most times are and if you could prove him wrong on any thing he has asserted to be, that would be something. But as usual all the leftys can do is spout the inuendo perported by the lame stream media and not even listen to the man himself.

Ah, the smell of bull to carry us through the afternoon.

ANandy and davesmithsit are listening to each other (and Rush) too much. We’re certainly not proposing revoking the First Amendment – we’re using it to comment on the phenomenally ignorant or willfully obnoxious comments by Rush. davesmith, it was a stupid “hypothetical,” clearly aimed at trying to put blame on the greenies. And you don’t mention the other two comments, I notice, including his really boneheaded remark, as anyone who’s looked at the Alaskan coast post-Exxon-Valdez would know. I’ve read up on Rush’s comments before.

I have not heard any of the ‘offending’ comments, for I don’t listen to Rush’s program.

However, I have speculated on these very pages, immediately following the explosion, that the explosion seemed to be way too powerful to have been caused only by natively present fuel(s), and ambient air as oxidizing agent.

I also speculated that if it was in fact an explosion aided with high explosives, that it might have been the work of enviro-terrorists, who are known to have effected a host of like sabotage acts …

That said, I’ll reserve the final opinion until we have gathered all the data. The “conclusion” aired to date don’t square with the simple question of the level of rapid release of energy …

“The fire was on a ship *(not under it on it) full of people with no place to hide.”

You must be thinking about some other incident, on another planet maybe?

The problem is the limbauciles hear it, repeat it, and it gets picked up second or third hand and STILL gets cited as “fact” when there is of course no basis but bombast and demented ego.

The First Amendment by the way FIRST defends us FROM religion, THEN grants freedom to practice as we wish, THEN goes on to guarantee freedom of speech, but that does NOT include slander, libel, treason, or incitement to fear, riot or rebel.

Dipsticks tell the truth about whether our engines are protected, or our REAL rights. Some people would rather believe absurd “facts” and intellect coming from a suppository.

In this cartoon, Lumbaugh looks like the worm/talking @ss/judge from the “trial” sequence of The Wall.

Infotainment. He’s not there to give ideas, just to get ratings.

^Of course! These right wingers found out a long time ago that the more outragous the claim the more people will tune in to see what else comes out of your hole.

The fact that Rush Limbaugh is a morbidly obese drug addict that sports a wildly popular radio station with many devoted (simpleton) listeners is no reason whatsoever to want him silenced.

He is no more, no less than a money whore. Our great republic is terribly fond of such ilk.

He needs chemicals to achieve an erection. The adoration of his dittoheads just won’t do the trick.

Liar,liar, pants on fire ain’t about his hard on, it’s about his hemorrhoids.

Bruce, you may have seen my point? I didn’t name anyone as a “suppository”. It is the derivative “understanding” propagandists create by what they often didn’t actually “say” that keeps them away from court, and inflaming their “fans”. Our post-9/11 society had many inside and outside government supporting fear over logic. It seems we’re trying to turn that corner. Times Square may reflect we’re ready for a sense of proportion?

The “settlers” DID come here to escape “religion by government”– and that suppression of freedom, which is where the First Amendment, AND Article VI come from, needs to be in our minds today.

Rush used to make a lot of veiled threats against drug addicts and their dealers, until he got busted, and did “community service”. Listening to him for a week, there was the “environmentalists blew up the oil platform” insinuation, followed by the appropriate “disclaimer”, followed a week later by denial of what he’d said, three days in a row. He constantly uses language to incite, and is NOT “just an entertainer”. Coulter of course is much worse. I actually respect some of O’Reilly and Beck’s views and exposition, though I don’t agree with them. Bill may well be the most “reasoned” of the “clan”.

BTW, stebon, fishing in the sound is still nothing like before the Exxon Valdez spill. The food chain is still horribly “disrupted”, and NOT RECOVERED. This Gulf tragedy may well turn into the most devastating “event” in the history of the south coast. Due to lack of currents, the bomb awaits off-shore, so far causing damage we DON’T see. Even if stopped soon, the impact will be far greater than from the Valdez incident.

Rush Limbaugh should not be taken seriously. His $40 - $50 million contract necessitates attracting a lot of listeners. Promulgating entertainingly for three hours per day five days per week requires outrageous lies, distortions, and out of context verbiage thrown amongst the odd wisp of truth. Reasonable political commentary it is not. Although the choir seem to be convinced it is, which is what can make it dangerous.

I’m not so sure the framers of the first amendment had his brand of disinformation in mind. Free speech okay. What about fair speech? — Trout - “but that does NOT include slander, libel, treason, or incitement to fear, riot or rebel.”

zeke; Limbaugh is a liar, no doubt. But let’s keep his private life out of this, that’s playing the republican game.

Zeke referencing Rush’s contraband Viagra + three failed marriages = continence or competence (mental or physical)???

Reading comments on several articles on the Gulf spill, the diatribes from “Rush types” is amazingly loud, and wrong on the facts. It is also interesting how many “radicals” reject anyone, on any subject, who DOES KNOW what they’re talking about. (It’s called education and experience.) As noted by many folks, everyone has a right to their opinions, but not their own “facts”? That’s the danger of Rush/Coulter et al.

Bruce you laugh a lot–but for the correct reasons, I wonder…

cf, fat boy liar is profiting from public discourse…his private life has been sacrificed on the altar of entertainment. Ergo, all’s fair in love and war. Just ask our fence sitting conservative Bruce.

Like trout says…failed marriages and little blue boner pills…seems the simpletons approve.

^ An admirably copacetic life philosophy, Bruce!

Sometimes (espcially in Limbaugh’s case) words are like s#it,; the more they stink, the more people will notice.

What ever happened to conservatives being the champions of personal responsibility? Or does that only apply to the lower and middle classes?

What I’ve seen is a several corporations desperate to pass the buck and a bunch of “conservative” pundits all to willing to help.

^Of course! Corporations create jobs, don’t cha know! We can’t burden them with things like “responsibility” and such.

@ Stebon: what I’m seeing at http://www.evostc.state.ak.us/recovery/status.cfm is that some species have still not recovered (and as http://www.evostc.state.ak.us/recovery/longTerm.cfm suggests, some populations might not). And it’s only been what, a decade or two ;) ?

There is some recovery and adaptation, obviously; that happens whenever there is an environmental crisis. You might be surprised (or not) to hear that the heavily irradiated area in the vicinity of the Chernobyl reactor isn’t a barren wasteland either. Obviously, that does not mean nuclear safety is not important ;) .

Take a look at the Bikini Islands - the location of the biggest atmospheric nuclear explosions, to sink a number of WWII war ships … .the nature has reclaimed and repaired much of the man-made damage …

The fact is that a lot more oil seeps into the oceans naturally, from ocean floor crevices, than by man’s activity.

That doesn’t of course mean that we should not prevent oil spills, it only means that we should cut the histrionics.

First, with respect to the companies’ accountability:

That is a red herring - trying to make politicians look and feel as if they are solving a problem, but it does not exist.

Who paid out $ billions in excess of the silly $75 million liability limit, to clean-up and to compensate Alaska and Alaskans in the case of Valdez?

In fact, I don’t think that there is a single case where oil companies have not paid for the damages they caused or perceived to have caused, without the government meddling - if need be, the legal system goes into overdrive.

Second, with respect to the planet’s capacity to regenerate - the so called scientists have been crying doom and gloom for decades, over virtually all man activity.

And yet, the record is remarkably lopsided - the nature has outdone man time and again.

Remember Lake Michigan - but a few years ago it was dead as can be. You would not recognize it today … .

There are examples aplenty … .

The recovery of the Great Lakes, and the rivers feeding them was the result of NEPA, and other laws, actually signed by Richard Nixon, and fostered instead of flaunted by his administration. Had it not been for these laws, and others, Ehrlich’s dire predictions would have won him his bet.

I can’t think of a time I’ve gone to the pump and not seen who REALLY pays for all the oil company errors- as they rack up record after-taxes profits, almost every quarter. Naive and “conservative” go together as tightly as “neocon” and “the shaft”.

I’ve been following your discussion Bruce and Peter. I think the preponderance of evidence is with Bruce and the environment. Seems there has to be an over-reaction to get the Corporation’s and the public’s attention. Under react and the scene is set for greater risk-taking and more serious environmental disasters. And maybe what we are seeing now is not an over reaction, but an understatement of short and long run damage. I don’t have a clue what a giant plume of crude moving out to sea on ocean currents does to coral reefs, wildlife, fisheries, the beaches and to the economy . But then I don’t think anyone else knows either. My intuition tells me this cannot be good. Make em pay so it never happens again.