Limbaugh: Throw the Nitwit Seven Overboard

By DHinMI

For anyone who thinks the Republicans "won" the Nuclear Option battle, consider Rush Limbaugh's reaction:

So here's the bottom line. McCain is the de facto leader now, because McCain controls these six other nitwits. And, I'll tell you what this is, folks, mark my words, this is pay back to Bush for 2000. Got his little South Carolina buddy Lindsey Graham in tow. He slam-dunked Frist. Up until last night everybody was talking about the fact that Frist was going to ace out McCain, the Republican primaries, by exercising the nuclear option, and now McCain, it is said, has aced out Frist. He slam-dunked him, I don't know if he's aced him out, but he slam-dunked him, there's no question. Frist, a decent guy, was trying to do the right thing, and he is the first casualty in what was an early primary fight. I mean, there's no question, and you can't take that aspect out of this, either. These guys all want to be president, every senator up there thinks he should be anyway. McCain's really got it bad because of what happened in 2000. And so we know he's going to run in '08. And telling me that won't take precedence over Senate comity and Senate tradition and whatever else that might be on the agenda? Of course this will take precedence over that, but his dancing like this is going to destroy him with the base and party faithful once primary time comes around and I know he's banking on the fact that by then this will be but a blip on the radar screen.

You know, it may be time, folks, I'm just going to throw these things out here for you to consider, it may be time to treat McCain and Graham and Warner and all these others exactly as they would have treated their colleagues, as they would have treated these nominees like Myers and Henry Saad, throw them overboard, because those two nominees are gone, Saad and Myers are gone, that's part of this deal. You're not hearing about the nominees that have been thrown overboard...Nevertheless, there's a judge named Kavanaugh and one other that may also have been tacitly thrown overboard in this deal so you're basically stuck with three out of ten. So maybe you treat McCain and all these other people as they would have treated these judges, just throw 'em overboard.

Those are not the rantings of a man who thinks the Republicans snookered the Democrats, those are the rantings of someone who thinks Harry Reid snookered John McCain, and John McCain followed up McCain-Feingold with this, which Limbaugh calls "McCain the Middle Finger."  (Cleverness isn't a Limbaugh strong point.)  He's already got a quasi-poster on his website of The Nitwit Seven.  And he's calling on Frist to bring all of the nominees up for votes, even if they only get votes from the 48 real Republicans. 

Let the internecine war begin...

Comments

[DHinMI]

It's REALLY hard to edit-down Limbaugh, because the guy has no idea how to boil down a point and make it succinctly. It's hard to sound like a blowhard in print, but he manages the feat.

[DemFromCT]

Well, he's got, what, 4 hours of time to fill with hot air?

[DHinMI]

But without all the pauses, it only takes about 15 minutes to read.

[Mike S]

Today was the first time I have been able to listen to more than 5 minutes of the dopers show. The only time I laughed harder all day was just 5 minutes ago when I put Hugh Hewitt's show on and listened to people saying that the country will now fall apart because the Constitution has been destroyed.

I only wish I lived in the South so I could here the Appolyptic ranting of the wingnut ministers that I expect will occur this weekend.

[Petey]

"For anyone who thinks the Republicans "won" the Nuclear Option battle, consider Rush Limbaugh's reaction"

Does it occur to the many who take the "Limbaugh/Dobson are pissed, therefore the Dems won" approach that folks like Limbaugh and Dobson directly benefit by whipping their followers into a frenzy no matter what the merits?

I find it difficult to think that otherwise intelligent people don't understand the intentional uses of outrage by the right wing demagogues. See Newsweek, Ward Churchill, etc for any necessary clarification. The VRWC runs on perceived victimization the way cars run on gasoline.

If the object of the game is to make the blood vessels pop out on the wingnuts foreheads, then yesterday was a good day.

If the object of the game is to gain better position for the judiciary battles, and to gain better position for the 2006 elections, then yesterday was a pretty bad day.

-----

And even if we decide to set the merits of the thing aside and focus entirely on the propagandistic aspects, I think those in the high command who urge the left to paint yesterday as a "win" for propaganda reasons are being quite shortsighted.

[emptypockets]

I thought the objects of the game were (a) to win and (b) not to lose. One out of two ain't bad.

Actually, that's not true. I think the object of the game is to make a government that benefits its citizens and the country's future. With that objective, it is not obvious to me there was any way to win here except by walking away and doing something productive.

(Which is basically what I've done with respect to news and blogs the past couple weeks; just poking my head in now to see what's new.)

I'd suggest the real winners here are any candidates running as outsiders in 2006, with a stump speech about how the do-nothings in Washington sit and debate and filibuster over a handful of judges, when back here in (insert local city name) real folks have no jobs, credit card debt, can't afford college, and don't know if they're safer than they were five years ago.

I think this was a no-win, and at least we didn't lose.

[DHinMI]

Not losing was the goal, regardless of how people understood it. As things look now, we didn't lose, and in not causing us to lose, the Republicans have some big internal problems. I'll take that any day of the week.

[emptypockets]

DHinMI, I agree with you but it makes me sad to appreciate that our sights are set so low that not losing is all we want. One could see the turmoil over this compromise on the left as between those who wanted to win and those who wanted just not to lose. Sadly, the reality is that Democrats hold such little power that not losing is a major accomplishment. I think it's ok to be sad about that.

It reminds me of why I let myself get excited over the DNC chair race a few months ago: finally, a contest that a Democrat would be sure to win. (Although I also remember the Onion headline from just before Iowa: "Democrats Somehow Lose Primary.")

[Petey]

"Not losing was the goal"

If the goal was to positively influence the composition of the judiciary and/or the outcome of the 2006 elections, we lost big time.

On Monday afternoon I thought it was likely for us to lose either politically or substantively over the next 24 hours. But never in my wildest nightmares did I imagine we could find a way to lose both ways.

Now we have a situation where psycho-Federalist judges like Janice Rogers Brown can't be filibustered unless there are ethical or temperamental issues. And we also have a situation where there isn't a public Republican overreach/mess to take to the voters in 2006.

Is the goal here to make ourselves feel better by repetitively chanting that we didn't lose? If so, I'm happy to go elsewhere to let the morale boosting continue...

[praktike]

Yeah, but Petey, how often is the outrage and faux-victimhood directed at other R's? It seem like it's good strategy to encourage the GOP to defeat itself.

[Petey]

"how often is the outrage and faux-victimhood directed at other R's?"

In the case of McCain, frequently.

"It seem like it's good strategy to encourage the GOP to defeat itself."

OK. Well now at least I understand what's going on. We're supposed to pretend we won so the GOP will tear itself apart.

I think it's naive in the extreme to imagine that's going to work at this moment in time. And if that was the strategy behind the deal, Harry Reid's head ought to be lovingly placed on a pike.

Maybe next we ought to accept a SS deal that involves benefit cuts. That'll really tear apart the Republican coalition.

[Trapper John]

Petey's right . . . but, IF -- and it's a big if -- Brown were to go down, the dynamic would be very different. Barring that, we are in awful shape.

[Trapper John]

FWIW, the Kavanagh news is great. A minor victory, but still.

[Petey]

"but, IF -- and it's a big if -- Brown were to go down, the dynamic would be very different."

The news today was that Lindsey Graham wasn't talking about Brown when he said there was a nominee who wouldn't have the votes...

[praktike]

"The news today was that Lindsey Graham wasn't talking about Brown when he said there was a nominee who wouldn't have the votes..."

Haynes, right?