Yesterday we picked up on a story from Michael Calderone about how Rush Limbaugh had taken the unusual step of encouraging his listeners to call their congressmen and complain about the health care bill. Then he gave out the Congressional Switchboard number. (more...)

Rush Limbaugh is putting his mouthpiece where his mouth is, so to speak. In an almost unheard of move (it's apparently only happened once before) Rush Limbaugh announced the Capitol switchboard number on air and encouraged his listeners to call their local representatives and push back against health care. Rush Limbaugh, many of you probably already know, has the largest radio audience in the country. Needless to say the lines were apparently jammed. (more...)

video I think it's safe to say that over the eight months or so the health care debate has brought out the angels of the country's...angrier, sometimes crazier, not always politically correct angels. Also, everyone has their own plan. Rush Limbaugh has said he will flee to Costa Rica if the plan passes (insert punchline of choice here). Meanwhile Glenn Beck is taking a sink (almost literally) or swim attitude when it comes to health care coverage. (more...)

It has become an almost tiresome game to tabulate and record the classless reactions of those on the left or the right when a political figure meets with mortal peril. Whether it's conservatives celebrating Ted Kennedy's death with animal feces, or liberals crossing their fingers for Rush Limbaugh's chest pains to take a wrong turn, it's apparent that ghoulish attention-seeking is not limited by political ideology. With that fact well-established, I had decided to recuse myself from this pastime, until I saw conservative blogger Dan Riehl's vile take on Senator Harry Reid's wife, Landra, and her recent car accident.

It's so vile, in fact, that I'm having trouble zeroing in on a particular quote. Let's start with this one:

If Democrats want so badly to abort babies because of (healthcare costs), why are we bothering with someone who has a broken neck and back at 69? It sounds to me like she's pretty well used up and has probably been living off the taxpayers for plenty of years to begin with. Aren't we at least going to get a vote on it?

Read the whole thing on an empty stomach, if you must. What takes the cake, though, is that when Media Matters gives him the attention he so desperately wants, he has the stones to feign outrage. Just say "Thank you."

Before any of you even start, please spare me the "satire" excuse. This isn't about the logical merits of Riehle's metaphor, although even by that standard, his post is a miserable failure. It is about gratuitous cruelty, in service to the almighty hitcount. His title entreaty veers dangerously close to incitement, as well. We'll all cross our fingers that none of that hospital's staff reads Riehle's blog.

In fact, I hate to even give the guy traffic, but I do hope that if you decide to check it out, you let him know what you think. I also hope that the bookers at news organizations keep this in mind next time they're mulling a Riehle guest spot.

The point here is not to vilify conservatives. In all of these situations, the vast majority of people on each side react with decency. Obviously, though, there is some reward for those who exploit tragedy to score snarky points, or they wouldn't keep doing it. Riehle, for example, wears Media Matters' denunciation like a badge of honor. The message that humanity doesn't stop at the imaginary border between left and right needs to be delivered to these people by someone they care about.

Update: As Riehl points out, I added an "e" to his name 3 out of 4 times in this post. I regret the error, and thank him for pointing this out.  Keep him in mind if you ever need a copy editor.

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Former John Edwards aide and faux-baby-daddy-for-hire Andrew Young was handed a relatively stiff sentence today, as a judge ordered he and his wife to be jailed for contempt for up to 75 days. At issue is Superior Court Judge Abraham Penn Jones' suspicion that the Youngs have failed to turn over all copies of an alleged sex tape featuring Edwards and mistress Rielle Hunter.

Meanwhile, on Fox News' Your World, host Neil Cavuto waxes poetic about "small people" (like Young) making the "big people (Edwards) feel small." Has Cavuto already seen the tape? (more...)

audio We wrote yesterday about Dan Rather and the tricky language associated with race. Well there's no tricky language here - just a blatantly racist comment by radio host Rush Limbaugh, using a play on words between embattled former Rep. Eric Massa and the offensive slang term "massuh." (more...)

Michael Moore's disenchantment with the Democratic Party and the Obama administration he had appeared to become comfortable with has hit an all-time high. While Moore's troubles with the party are nothing new (he has tweeted his sorrows in the past and, during the 2008 election, highlighted the ways the party could lose his support), his latest statements in an interview with Raw Story indicate that Moore is ready to make a definitive break from the Democrats and, perhaps, move to support a third party in the future. (more...)

Rush Limbaugh thinks you have as much right to health care as you do a stay "in a five-star hotel." Rush Limbaugh, man of the people, strikes again! Actually, more like man of the 10 room, 5th Ave penthouse apartment, which you definitely don't have the right to stay in unless you have $13,950,000 handy. Behold, Casa Rush. You can view all the pictures at Cocoran, in the meantime here is a taste of what's in store. No word on whether this means he is actually leaving New York. (more...)

video On last night's Countdown, Keith Olbermann made a special appearance to update his viewers on his father's medical condition, and to respond to critics of his "Life Panels" Special Comment from last week, singling out Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck. As is often the case, much of the criticism has been focused on how the message was delivered, rather than the substance of it. Keith gave his critics more credit than they deserved, and took on what little substance they offered. (more...)

video While certain conservative media figures of late have been using the health of Keith Olbermann's father as a way to further their talking points on these supposed liberal "death panels," you have to admit that it works both ways. As in Keith Olbermann using an entire 9-minute segment tonight to talk about the decisions he made with his father's doctor, and how under the proposed health care bill these discussions would be able to be billed to insurance companies. (more...)

Rush Limbaugh, bastion of compassion, weighed in yesterday with his views on the health care reform summit and the woes of people who are not covered. In particular, Rep. Louise Slaughter, who during yesterday's Summit hightlighted the plight of one of her constituents who was forced to use her dead sister's dentures. Rush, suffice to say, was not moved. (more...)

I know, you're probably thinking what I was, "He's not actually calling her a tool, is he?" In a tease to commercial on last night's Countdown, Keith Olbermann did a short meditation on how "Former Half-Governor Sarah Palin" could end up being a tool for Republicans, a tool for Tea Partiers, and a tool for Democrats in the midterms. Had he left it at that, he would have completed a did-he-or-didn't-he, deniable slam on Palin. Instead, much like his Carrie Prejean self-love slam, he just couldn't resist hanging a lantern on it. (more...)

video Wow. So, Glenn Beck's CPAC keynote speech on Friday was apparently so powerful it united Jon Stewart, Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin...against him. I'm not sure what that says about Beck except that he really has managed to carve out a place all his own in the media landscape these last few months and he maybe is making some people nervous. Well not Jon Stewart per se ('gold mine' might be a better description), but it's certainly interesting to hear Rush Limbaugh (ever so gently) push back at Beck. Sign of things to come? Is Beck on his way to becoming the Frankenstein of the right? The tone of both Levin and Limbaugh suggest they were less than thrilled at Beck's conservative bashing/reality check (videos of all three below). (more...)

Video Speaking of conservative in-fighting: tonight Bill O'Reilly responded to the gauntlet thrown by Rush Limbaugh on the conservative pundit's radio show Friday, in which Limbaugh did an impression of The Factor host, saying "We need to give socialism a fair shake...we here at The Factor are going to give socialism, even communism a fair shake!" Harsh words, Rush. See Limbaugh's parody and O'Reilly's surprising response is below. (more...)

Joe Scarborough is getting a little tired of the accusations that naturally follow from being one of the last remaining conservatives on MSNBC. The Morning Joe host wrote a column on Town Hall making an impassioned defense of his conservative ideals, aptly titled "Am I Not Conservative Enough?", mostly directed at Media Research Center's Brent Bozell. (more...)

Fox News analyst Sarah Palin continued her tap-dance-like rationalization about who can and cannot use the word 'retard' last night on The O'Reilly Factor. "I want to give you a chance to clarify something I've been getting a lot of mail on," said Bill O'Reilly. Alas, I'm not sure clarification is what he ended up getting but here's part of what Palin had to say (video below). (more...)

Imagine you had a beetle infestation problem and you needed a non-toxic way to deter their invasion into your home. Researchers at Northern Arizona University have determined that playing Rush Limbaugh, and other "loud and annoying noises" are a remarkably effective deterrent to beetles' livelihood. Rock music works too, but that's somewhat to be expected, and not nearly as fun of a headline. (more...)

The Daily Beast took a stab at one of the harder sciences of the media world last night, publishing a list of the top 25 most influential right-wing journalists in America. It is a pretty comprehensive list, with all the usual suspects - Matt Drudge, George Will, almost everyone on Fox News prime time - making appearances, and both conservative and libertarian columnists taken into consideration. "What unites them all, broadly," writes columnist Tunku Varadarajan, "is their influence on the public debate, and their place on the political spectrum—which is somewhere to the right of center." (more...)

I know I used that joke yesterday, but Jon Stewart's observation about the marketing of outrage has a direct bearing here. His guest on last night's Daily Show was baseball legend Willie Mays, and the interview was very illuminating. So much of what we cover here centers around whatever "outrageous" thing is being said by people like Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, or Keith Olbermann, and while sometimes it truly is an outrage, hearing Mays talk about his experience in the segregated baseball world put that all in perspective. (more...)

I've been getting pretty frustrated with the usually reliable Keith Olbermann's inability to nail Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin on Limbaugh's use of the term "retard." Sure, he has posited Palin as a hypocrite, but several times he has repeated Rush's and Palin's dueling assertions that he was "quoting" Rahm Emanuel, or that he was being "satirical," without really challenging it. Luckily, Stephen Colbert actually knows what the word "satire" means, and deployed a pile of it on Palin and Rush last night. (more...)

Hyperbole must be over. How else does one explain the extremely disappointing bits that Jon Stewart and Keith Olbermann did on Sarah Palin last night? Handed (thank you, I'm here all week) 3 days of Palin material that rivaled anything George W. Bush ever gave them, Olbermann could barely manage a molecule of spittle, let alone a lather, and Stewart deployed his seldom-used Nerf™ jokes.

Have these Sovereigns of Smackdown gone soft? Are these Sultans of Snark running scared? How is any of this supposed to result in an outraged rebuttal on Palin's Facebook page? (more...)

There's a neat symmetry to the fact that, the day after Keith Olbermann responded to gleeful rumors of his own demise, he posits the end of the line for Sarah Palin. Emboldened by the release of thousands of Palin emails, the inauspiciously racist kickoff to the Palin-headlined "Tea Party Convention," and Palin's truckling response to Rush Limbaugh's cowardly "retard" litany, Keith asks if the countdown is on to the end of Palin's political career. (more...)

Yes, this is another "Retard-gate" post. Why? Because while I agree that Palin is right to condemn Rahm Emanuel's use of the term "retarded," and I agree that Sarah Palin's failure to call out Rush Limbaugh is hypocritical, I still think everybody is dropping the ball on this.

With very few exceptions, nobody has standing to feign outrage over this, not Palin, not Rush, and not Keith Olbermann. In fact, I think Limbaugh almost has a leg to stand on. (more...)

video I think Sarah Palin may have painted herself into a rather uncomfortable 'politically correct' corner this week. As valid as her outrage over Rahm Emanuel's (and many, many others) derogatory use of the word "retarded" (last November, behind closed doors) may be her tepid response to Rush Limbaugh's very recent, very public use of the word yesterday leaves a lot to be desired. Let's compare shall we. (more...)

As reported earlier today, Sarah Palin is using her Facebook page to denounce Rahm Emanuel's casual and pejorative use of "retarded" on the president's detractors. Yesterday Rush Limbaugh got in the act, flaunting the "political correct" movement by repeatedly using the more offensive term "retard." This was reported last night by Keith Olbermann, who asked why Palin hasn't yet come down on Limbaugh? Let's hope that this story is only getting started because it could be really fun. (more...)

video Hats off to Rush Limbaugh, leading the 21st Century feminist charge in his roll as a judge for this year's Miss America pageant. It was hard work! Says Rush: (more...)

The Miss America 2010 Pageant is over, and aside from Miss Virginia Caressa Cameron, the winner in Las Vegas was hot-button pop culture references. Miss Alaska made a quick and cheery Sarah Palin takedown, while other contestants skewered Tiger Woods and leathery Jersey Shore star "The Situation."

Maybe it's too much to expect consistency in a pageant world that has Rush Limbaugh a counterpart of Perez Hilton, but what ever happened to World Peace?

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I long ago lost track of the number of times that I've described something, or someone, as sounding like something you'd read in the The Onion, such has been the state of the news cycle since June (remember the Beer Summit?). However, what you are about to read actually is from the Onion. It is a fake* op-ed piece penned by an imaginary* Rush Limbaugh, though likely there are parts to it some folks very much wish were real...at least the part where fake Limbaugh expresses some regret over his recent Haiti comments. (more...)

Today, we go Inside the White House Press Corps to speak with ABC News White House correspondent Yunji de Nies. Before joining ABC News, the UC Berkeley Journalism grad worked for 2 years at ABC's New Orleans affiliate, where she did extensive reporting on Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. Now, as part of ABC News' White House team, she's on the cutting edge of political reporting that combines the reach of a television network with the agility of new media. In our exclusive interview, Yunji talks about covering the President and Rush Limbaugh at the same time, taking cameras out of the briefing room, and makes a confession about her TV viewing habits. (more...)

Ann Coulter added her unique style of punditry to Geraldo At Large this weekend. When asked by guest host Kimberly Guifoyle to react on Rush Limbaugh's controversial comments on the Obama administration's politicization of the situation in Haiti, Coulter recoiled. "Stop asking me about Rush's statements...I've made some controversial statements too!" Indeed, Coulter didn't just seem indignant, she admitted as much. (more...)

Last night on The O'Reilly Factor, Bill welcomed two radio hosts to discuss "misguided" attacks on President Obama's response to the tragedy in Haiti. He lead the Impact Segment by calling out "some conservative radio people," but vying for public enemy #1 (along with Pat Robertson, of course) in terms of insensitivity, is none other than Rush Limbaugh. On The Factor, conservatives agreed: the attacks are over the line. (more...)

audio Well if you thought Rush Limbaugh could not get any more disgusting, or heartless, or offensive you would be wrong. There is, apparently, plenty more where that came from. (more...)

video Get ready. This is the sort of storyline we can probably expect to see emerging in the next few weeks. Since Tuesday's earthquake in Haiti a number of media folks on the right have been taken to task for questioning how much financial help the U.S. should be dolling out to Haiti, a "corruption" ravaged country that has that prior to this week had very little infrastructure, and now basically has none (things are so dire that U.S. airplanes bearing aid had to be turned away yesterday because the airport in Port-au-Prince was unable to handle any more traffic). It's not, of course, a question of Americans' generosity (it never is), but it will likely soon become a question of where the money is going and how much of it the country is willing to spend in a recession. (more...)

video The tragedy and devastation unfolding in Haiti has brought everyone together. The constant bickering and finger-pointing of opinion journalism seems both irrelevant and inappropriate in the face the unfolding disaster. Except, as Jon Stewart points out, not everyone has risen above the partisan fray. Last night, Stewart called out some of his favorite targets: Rush Limbaugh, Pat Robertson, and of course, Rachel Maddow. Whaaaaa? (more...)

Much has been written on this site about the despicable comments of Pat Robertson (who said that the Haiti earthquake was the result of a pact with Satan) and Rush Limbaugh (who, among other things, urged his listeners not to donate to relief efforts), both of which came up at today's White House press briefing. Press Secretary Robert Gibbs' responses were properly calibrated to the importance of these men at a time such as this.

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video As the carnage in Haiti rightly dominates the news, the seeming cliche´ that this "puts it all in perspective" really can't be made enough. The horrified shame that Rachel Maddow displayed at the idea that the Haitian ambassador might think that Pat Robertson speaks for all Americans was remarkable. A smaller such moment, on last night's Countdown, spoke volumes about the triviality of the current political media. (more...)

When Rush Limbaugh was hospitalized with chest pains, his fate uncertain, Rachel Maddow, myself, and many others urged transcendence of partisan rancor as a naturally decent response. Now, barely 2 weeks later, Limbaugh is using the heartrending tragedy of the Haitian earthquake to score points against President Obama, and even urges people not to donate to the relief effort. This is shockingly low, even for Limbaugh.

Emblematic of this right vs. left insanity is the fact that the left chooses to focus on the sizzly "black people" quote at Media Matters, and completely misses the really disgusting parts: (more...)

According to a new business profile in the Financial Times, conservative magazine and daily website Newsmax thrived in a year filled with media misery, scoring $35 million in revenue, after $25 million in 2008, and scoring a much-anticipated Sarah Palin endorsement in a chat with Sean Hannity. Speaking of Fox News, does this sound familiar: "liberal media" alternative excels in increasingly partisan news space? Bingo. (more...)

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World Net Daily correspondent and conservative radio host Lester Kinsolving, with an assist from NBC's Mike Viqueira, threw more hilariously loaded questions at Robert Gibbs from behind his signature shotgun mic. He touched on some subjects sure to tickle the sensibilities of the birther/global warming denier/dittohead set when he asked Press Secretary Robert Gibbs why it was so cold out, did the President visit the hospital that Rush Limbaugh stayed in in Hawaii, and...just what hospital was the President born in?

A lot of people make the assumption that questions asked by reporters are automatically reflective of that reporter's beliefs, or the credibility they give them. In Viqueira's case, at least, it was tongue-in-cheek:

Lester: Just two questions. Considering -- considering the continuing reports of record worldwide cold, how does the President believe that there was justification for the millions spent on that conference to try to promote acceptance of global warming?

MR. GIBBS: Well, I think one only has to step outside here or visit where I used to work in Chicago to understand that climate change is -- and the record temperatures that climate change is likely causing is with us.

Lester: Thank you. While he was in Hawaii, did the President visit the hospital where he was reportedly born, which is which one? (Laughter.)

MR. GIBBS: I don’t believe I saw any pool reports of hospital visits.

Mike: Robert, you attribute today’s weather to climate change?

MR. GIBBS: I don’t know what specifically causes today’s snowfall --

Mike: Or the cold that’s gripping the nation you attribute --

MR. GIBBS: I would say that there are, even in places that are used to getting very cold weather, record cold. I think scientists will tell you that whether it’s in and around this country or throughout the world that our weather patterns have been affected by our change in our climate, yes.

Rush Limbaugh returned to the radio today, and he was back to form. After first noting how many Democrats quit on the day he returned, he moved to his hospital visit - and how it was completely unlike Obamacare, despite what others have said. (more...)