By Zachary Pleat

Rush joins Beck in hyping a supposed GE/NBC conspiracy concerning WH security breach

Apparently feeling that a cartoon is more important than a major presidential speech on the war in Afghanistan, Rush kicked off his show today by complaining that President Obama's address on the war would pre-empt tonight's showing of A Charlie Brown Christmas (now scheduled to air December 8). Not to worry, though, for Rush declared he was just concerned about America's children, and then he said Obama's ears are so floppy that the children would think they were watching a cartoon anyway. He also introduced his newest parody, focusing on the troop levels Obama plans to dispatch to Afghanistan.

After declaring that former Vice President Dick Cheney -- who apparently best represents the GOP's core values to 0.125 percent of Republicans -- is right about whatever criticism he decides to offer about Obama, Rush took issue with a Washington Post article about Obama's address from West Point tonight. Rush also claimed that Obama doesn't like the military and that “it's a nagging annoyance to him.” Naturally, Rush claimed that Obama's stance on Afghanistan encouraged the Taliban.

Deciding to treat us to the benefit of his logic and wisdom, Rush engaged in the kind of gossip that most rational people don't consider news, citing the National Enquirer to discuss Tiger Woods' car accident. Rush then followed Glenn Beck in alleging a conspiracy involving NBC, GE, and the couple who crashed the White House state dinner last week, claiming it was all being done to provide cover for the Obama administration.

Rush blames Bill Clinton for letting bin Laden go

Back from a break, Rush continued an earlier attack on Democratic Rep. Maurice Hinchey for his comments about the recently released Senate Foreign Relations Committee report on our failure to capture Osama bin Laden at Tora Bora and claimed that the report is nothing but political cover for Obama with his base on Afghanistan. However, as The New York Times reported, this Senate committee report is based in part on a 2007 U.S. Special Operations Command report. Rush then used a Wall Street Journal editorial to bash Sen. John Kerry's timing on the release of the Foreign Relations Committee report. In the middle of all this, Rush amazingly declared that he has always believed that bin Laden was killed at Tora Bora, apparently contradicting the reported beliefs of the U.S. intelligence community. Later on, Rush claimed that his proof that bin Laden is dead is the fact that Obama hasn't captured him yet, and of course, in right-wing strawman land, Obama can do anything. Next, Rush blamed Bill Clinton and Richard Clarke for letting bin Laden go.

Apparently on a Wall Street Journal kick in his first hour, Rush then read in full a Journal op-ed by Fouad Ajami, a senior fellow at the conservative Hoover Institution. Rush interrupted his reading of the article a couple of times to rant that Obama was raised to hate the United States, something Rush seems to state just about every week:

LIMBAUGH: Mr. Obama was born and raised on the notion that this country is unjust and immoral, that it discriminates, that it is unfair, that it is bigoted, that it is racist, that it has stolen the world's resources. It is the cause of poverty around the world. He believes all of this. It is easily understood when you see him running around the world apologizing for this country. He is essentially thinking he's making friends by telling these people that hate us that he understands the hate and that their hate's justified.

Rush continues to claim “Climategate” proves global warming is “a hoax”

After briefly complaining that Obama has mentioned the cost of our wars several times and actually plugging for the “lefty website” CostofWar.com, Rush read in full a Politico op-ed claiming that the White House is more or less writing the media's script for coverage of Obama. Incidentally, Media Matters has repeatedly pointed out that Politico often functions as a GOP bulletin board. Rush used this piece to claim that in fact, Obama never agonized over the decision to deploy more troops to Afghanistan and did not have real meetings with military, security, and diplomatic advisers over the decision.

After another break, Rush took a caller who wanted to talk about the deployment of more troops to Afghanistan, since he has a son in the Marines who is slated to deploy in January. Rush changed the course of the discussion once the caller mentioned that he cannot see a difference between the Democratic and Republican parties, wanting to “nip this in the bud” and declaring that a third party is not the way to go. Later on, Rush pontificated several times that third parties go nowhere. Rush then took another caller who talked about Afghanistan, specifically seeming to cite the Senate Foreign Relations Committee report about the failure to nab bin Laden at Tora Bora. Rush argued with the caller, not seeming to believe that he was an independent voter because he was “parroting” Kerry. Rush then reiterated for a second time his belief that bin Laden died at Tora Bora. A little bit later, Rush felt the need to confront head-on the accusation that bin Laden slipped away at Tora Bora, reading a 2004 New York Times op-ed by retired Gen. Tommy Franks. Media Matters pointed out at the time that several of Frank's claims contradicted news reports on this matter.

Rush gets scared of talk of a conservative third party

Seemingly preoccupied with talk of third parties, Rush continued to savage the idea of a conservative third party, arguing that conservatism is in ascendency and that they can take the Republican Party back. Rush said he's for a third party only if someone like Ralph Nader runs on the left again. Rush then appeared to tie the tea-party movement to the GOP, claiming that “there would be no tea parties” if the Republican Party were the same as the Democratic Party. Trying to emphasize the differences between the two, Rush declared that the Republican Party is not trying to harm the intelligence community. Former undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame might disagree with that. Rush continued his tirade against a conservative third-party movement, stating that it would guarantee a Democratic majority in perpetuity.

Rush started off his third hour by taking a sexist potshot at the editorial staff of The Washington Post for publishing an article on loneliness. He then attacked Obama's upcoming unemployment summit, using an American Thinker blog post to complain about the private-sector experience of Obama's Cabinet appointees. Interestingly, the Congressional Budget Office just officially estimated that an additional 600,000 to 1.6 million people were employed in the country thanks to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Next, Rush continued to claim that Senator Mary Landrieu was bribed with $300 million in needed federal Medicaid assistance, and then continued to claim that the stimulus money is a “slush fund” to re-elect Democrats. Rush then made the incredible claim that the stimulus money is “a threat to our democracy”:

LIMBAUGH: Looking for ways here to illustrate and dramatize the porkulus. Just how much money 800 billion dollars really is. And of course, we've -- we're told we've got a couple hundred billion in TARP money that hasn't been spent. So we've got basically a trillion-dollar slush fund for the executive branch, Obama to use. Now, even the liberals in Congress, and even some in the state-controlled media were shocked when they learned that Mary Landrieu was bribed with $300 million for her yes vote on Obamacare. But even that is chump change. The liberals have much, much street money to buy votes now. And that, more than anything, threatens our democracy.

Rush continues to push Alex Jones-esque conspiracy theories

Back for the final half-hour of his show, Rush gleefully reported that Phil Jones, head of the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit is stepping down, pending an independent investigation that “he overstated the case for man-made climate change.” Rush then proudly mentioned that his favorite climate-change-is-a-cover-for-global-government conspiracy theorist, Lord Monckton, released a report on “Climategate.” Unsurprisingly, Monckton was recently pushing his load of garbage on noted 9-11 truther Alex Jones' radio show. Rush himself has recently promoted Jones' website.

Rush rounded out his show today by crowing about an AP report that Sarah Palin's book, Going Rogue, has gone “platinum.” Of course, it helps to sell books when major retailers and conservative publications are deliberately losing money to try to get rid of their stockpiles of a book.

Zachary Aronow and Kate Conway contributed to this edition of the Limbaugh Wire.

Highlights

Outrageous comments

LIMBAUGH: You can count me among those who think bin Laden is dead, by the way. I have always thought it, just like I've always known that global warming is man-made hoax.

[...]

LIMBAUGH: Mr. Obama was born and raised on the notion that this country is unjust and immoral, that it discriminates, that it is unfair, that it is bigoted, that it is racist, that it has stolen the world's resources. It is the cause of poverty around the world. He believes all of this. It is easily understood when you see him running around the world apologizing for this country. He is essentially thinking he's making friends by telling these people that hate us that he understands the hate and that their hate's justified.

[...]

LIMBAUGH: Now, to Obama and his paid hacks on TV today. Tell me, I want to know: How many people has Barack Obama liberated? You say he's such a great president, he has such a command of all these foreign policy issues and military issues. How many people has Barack Obama liberated from bondage? Reagan liberated Eastern Europe. Reagan liberated Latin America. Bush 43 liberated 50 million Muslims. Obama hasn't liberated anyone, and he won't. Barack Obama likes Fidel Castro. He likes Hugo Chavez. He likes the dictators in the Middle East. He bows down to them. He kisses up to them.

[...]

LIMBAUGH: Looking for ways here to illustrate and dramatize the porkulus. Just how much money 800 billion dollars really is. And of course, we've -- we're told we've got a couple hundred billion in TARP money that hasn't been spent. So we've got basically a trillion-dollar slush fund for the executive branch, Obama to use. Now, even the liberals in Congress, and even some in the state-controlled media were shocked when they learned that Mary Landrieu was bribed with $300 million for her yes vote on Obamacare. But even that is chump change. The liberals have much, much street money to buy votes now. And that, more than anything, threatens our democracy.

“Socialism” watch

LIMBAUGH: Anybody who is voting for anybody else in the Democrat Party is an -- a liberal. Or a progressive. The progressives call themselves that because “liberal” in politics is a dirty word. It's a harmful term. They come up with all other kinds of labels for themselves to hide who they really are. But who they really are in the modern parlance, modern lexicon, is liberal. If they are in the Democrat Party and voting for Democrats, if they don't know what they're doing or if they do know what they're doing doesn't matter. They're causing the problem. They are facilitating the problem. They are all leftists.

Some may be further left than the liberals you say are not as further -- far left as the progressives, but they're all voting Obama. They're all voting for Harry Reid. They have empowered Nancy Pelosi. They made Howard -- Harry Reid -- they empowered Howard Dean to become chairman of the Democrat Party, and he's out there saying that capitalism's dead, socialism is the order of the day, and so forth. So, in my attempt to communicate to people who think they're independent, who are moderate, who are not as ideological as I am, who I wish would become as ideological as I am -- the whole point of global warming debate is to say these people who have been caught engaging in fraud are the same people that are running the United States of America, proposing health care.

I don't want to get into distinctions here because it doesn't matter. We have an ideological chasm in this country, and the left, the far left, the kook fringe, whatever -- the combination of the American left is the greatest threat that we have right now. And the only way that that threat's going to be understood is through a simple, understandable explanation of who those people are. So, that's why I say: progressives -- eh, just trying to cover up the fact that they're leftists. They're socialists, they're Maoists, they're Marxists. They're all liberals, as far as I'm concerned. They're all leftists.