You said on Lawrence O'Donnell that there needs to be a conversation.
The 'conversation' goes on daily, 5 days a week, 3 hours a day. But it isn't a conversation, it's a monologue. A hypnotic, cultic, venomous injection of angry hate directed to all that is Progressive, Democratic, and Liberal. It's name is Rush Limbaugh.
After all these years of hearing excerpts and reading transcripts, I finally bit the bullet and started listening to the entire 3 hour show every day, for 10 days or so. Now less, because it's so sickening, and it worms its way into your subconscious, which is what has happened over the last 20 years to the millions of people who listen to him.
Limbaugh is not just a commentator, he is a Savonarola in the true sense of the word, inciting Civil War. He is a performer in a new and unique way - filling three hours daily with a stream-of-consciousness rant aimed at Liberals, feeding on cherry-picked news, 'opinions,' and 'wild speculations.'
His venom could be called an additive; an accelerator for any kind of hatred of the Liberal, the Flexible, the Nuanced. He studiously avoids specifics; while wildly projecting his own defects onto the enemy, he always changes the subject before the hypocrisy becomes too obvious. This occurs during phone calls, which occasionally veer into areas that would provide a target.
His act is pure P.T. Barnum style pseudo-religious incantation, with preludes, crescendos, and codas. A word, phrase, or nickname, all derogatory, will be repeated thirty or forty times in a segment, to bludgeon whichever Democrat Liberal he's targeting. He cuts to break with "Liberals are Evil. Liberals want to destroy America." Using hypnotic technique, he cultivates outrage and fear in his listeners, in a thousand tiny ways, with verbal winks, groans, and eye rolls. He does it slowly, gently, and continuously. And he is magnetic. I find myself eager to hear his latest, eager and slightly nauseated.
Like Kurtz in the steaming jungle, seething with madness, Rush commands a daily cadre of devotees, sharing and inculcating his miserable world view. A deaf man [with cochlear implants] projects his own flaws onto his targets, him and his microphone, in his tiny, billionaire-funded bubble.
Like the perverts who take animal shelter lapdogs and feed them to vicious pit bulls for entertainment [true story], Rush does the same thing with words: bludgeoning Liberal targets with jeering, snarling, derisive, fact-free rage.
When he takes callers, they are obsequious, and their obviously coached questions simply tee up talking points for Rush to riff on for the next hour.
I urge anyone who has not actually listened to the Rush Limbaugh Show, Progressive or Republican, dedicate some time to really learning what is at the root of this deeply influential and corrosive social force.
Senator Sanders, I don't know what the solution is. If we can't outlaw Corporate Looting, can we outlaw Incitement to Treason?
Mr. Maher, I urge you to actually listen to Rush's show all the way through a few times, to get the gestalt. His pernicious influence aside, one has to admit he has perfected a new kind of entertaining - 'Sociopathic Monologue,' we could call it.
Here's some material:
The difference between Sarah Palin and a Pit Bull?
A pit bull eventually stops whining. [Bill Maher]
The difference between Sarah Palin and Charles Manson?
Neither one actually killed anyone... [Caroline Casey]
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