Limbaugh the unashamed

I've been busy, so by the time I heard about Rush Limbaugh's vicious attack on Sandra Fluke I thought it would be too late to comment (and frankly, redundant). Leave it to Rush, though, to keep the thing going by standing firm behind his characterization of Fluke as a "slut" and a "prostitute" who, in return for federally subsidized contraception, owed the taxpayers a free sex tape.

Standing firm, that is, until the advertisers started jumping ship. And kept jumping. Finally, enough of them bailed out that Rush had to make pretend amends.

"For over 20 years, I have illustrated the absurd with absurdity, three hours a day, five days a week," he wrote. "In this instance, I chose the wrong words in my analogy of the situation. I did not mean a personal attack on Ms. Fluke."

Bullshit, Rush. You very much meant a personal attack on Ms. Fluke. You're just sorry that your reflexive hatemongering hit the fan this time.

Or rather, your employer is sorry (that you cost it advertisers). You aren't. You never are.

Whether it's racism or misogyny, you delight in playing to the basest, most hateful and most hurtful instincts in your consciousness. You claim hyperbole is needed to ensure that your audience is not merely informed (if that's the word to use), but entertained as well. Everything outrageous about your show is defensible, in your mind, as exaggeration for the purpose of humor.

But "slut" as you used it is not humorous. It's just vile. Most of us know that.

So do you, for that matter. The thing is, you can't afford to admit it. You'd also have to admit that your show's aim isn't to be humorous. You'd have to admit that your show's aim is to be inflammatory.

You'd have to admit that you mean every word you say, that you know exactly the effect each of those words has, and that you aren't sorry for any of them.

That honesty just might cost you your outsized profile in the national consciousness. And you won't risk that because as that profile goes, so goes your income.

And so the rest of us are treated to yet another tedious non-apology from you. Yawn.

At this point, I don't give a shit about Limbaugh's fake apologies (should he bother to give them). What I'd really like to hear is an apology from his listeners. They are the reason he's still on. What's their excuse for enabling his bitter spitefulness, if not that they share his hostility and bile?