Insanity Nation

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By now you’ve probably heard Rush and his wingnut hoards are claiming the recent gulf oil spill was an inside job, perpetrated by the Obama White House. Further, he said, “I have been informed that President Obama is sending SWAT teams to the Gulf oil rigs.” He didn’t say who informed him of this.

And just because I’m thorough, I did a news google to find if anyone but Rush has been informed of the SWAT teams. And the answer appears to be no; everyone who is repeating this news got it from Rush. Remarkable that he would be the only one to be informed of this. (/sarcasm)

If you actually read the transcript of Rush’s radio show linked above — and I’m not necessarily saying you should — you see it’s like a rolling hallucination. The story gets better even as he tells it. He begins by saying the incident might have been either an accident or an act of terrorism, but he complains the Obama Administration would use it to its political advantage. But then a few paragraphs into it he is suddenly “informed” of the SWAT teams. Exactly why one would need SWAT teams to control an oil spill is not clear, but let’s go with that. And a few sentences later he’s saying the oil spill may have been “intentional.”

And then we get to:

RUSH: Wow. All right, so SWAT teams, we’re sending big sis down there, Janet Napolitano, to look at all the valves and stuff, make sure they’re properly greased. He-he-he-he. Ahem. And Lisa Jackson is doing the same thing. So obviously the regime is open to the idea that this is not an accident. The regime is open to the possibility that this could well have been on purpose. Don’t forget, the original Earth Day, 40 years ago, was inspired by the river in Cleveland catching fire. Forty years later, the day before Earth Day this year, the Gulf is on fire. Coincidence? Jury’s still out. The regime is on the case, soon to tell us what happened.

He ends by arguing that oil spills are not a big deal, because they cleaned up the Exxon Valdez spill with dishwashing liquid and paper towels, and anyway some owl once flew into the window of a fire truck in Wentzville, Missouri, and all it needed was a little rehab.

Really, you can’t make this stuff up. And I can’t make it up. But Rush can. I guess that’s why he earns the big bucks. And the fun part is that Paul Krugman predicted someone on the Right would blame the oil spill on Obama before Rush actually did it.

Meanwhile, Newsbusters is in a snit because Bill Maher called Rush “the Louis Farrakhan of White People.” Which is a funny line, even though I doubt Farrakhan is half as crazy as Rush. I take it that in Wingnut Liberty and Freedom Utopia comedians will be censored, because allowing comedians to spout ridicule of Rush Limbaugh is an affront to freedom and liberty and stuff.

Two other rightie-driven stories — you can read about the Obama sex scandal at Gawker (best comment — maybe the other woman was helping him forge his birth certificate). And the Right also is trying to pump the meme that the oil spill is “Obama’s Katrina.” But I thought the Haiti earthquake was Obama’s Katrina? I guess that one didn’t stick.

24 thoughts on “Insanity Nation”

  1. What Rush won’t tell you is that HE was the reason for the river catching fire in Cleveland all those years ago.
    It seems that Rush was skinny-dipping in the river earlier that day, and after he got out, the grease from his fat carcass, and the oil from under his droopy man titties, was a floating on the water and was set on fire by a smoker casually tossing a lit cigarette butt off a bridge and into the river.
    It’s a fact! I was informed of that just now.

    Uhm, what the Hell is a SWAT team going to do to an oil rig that’s on fire? Yell, “STOP, fire, or I’ll fire!,” and fill the platform full of lead (which BP then won’t be able to sell as unleaded).
    I think Rush has finally jumped himself jumping the shark.
    It’s time for EIB to make him p-i-s-s into a j-a-r again.
    SWAT teams?
    Oy vey…

  2. Ol’ Rush is desperate. He’s got nuthin’, so he’s pulling utter nonsense out of thin air. He usually spins half-truths to make a case for something, but with this oil rig disaster, he’s simply fabricating. He can’t disappear the evidence that Halliburton had something to do with the rigging, he can’t hide that BP pretended to be up front about the leak, when in fact they were short-selling the actual amount of oil being leaked. Rush has not one leg to stand on. So he goes for the biggest whopper he can think of. Typical.

    All he needs is a hook for his listeners to hang onto. All they need is a sound bite to repeat over and over, and it doesn’t matter that they got it from Rush. They’ll run around like parrots, squawking his lies, looking all the more foolish for it.

    We should be spending every bit of energy and manpower on stemming the damage from the oil spill. If Rush was a human being, he would call out to his minions to do whatever they can to help in the effort. But that won’t happen.

  3. Oh, c’um on youse guys, EVERYbody knows the BP rig fire was an inside job done by that non-American Muslim baby killer occupie-ing the Whitehouse.
    Obama is sending in the SWAT teams (Swahili Watusi Angolan Terrorists) to take over the Gulf oil production rigs.

  4. I wonder if there will ever come a time when Limbaugh’s listeners will stop allowing him to make fools out of them on a regular basis.

  5. Maher’s wit is usually spot-on, or even a bit too over the top for me at times, but Rushbo’s pompous, drug addled, angry clown act makes Farrakhan look like Lincoln.

    This is the same slimeball that claimed Michael J Fox was faking it.

  6. Well, Ol’ Rush is feeling a pinch right now with the new kid on the block, who’s taken over top spot with the Party. He could either out crazy Beck or try to inject some reason and sanity. Looks like he’s opted for crazier. It won’t work. That train has already left the station with Beck at the controls.

    I kinda think I’m glad to see it. Two hate-radio asses trying to out-crazy each other? Kind’a like a Ponzi scheme — can only go on so long before befrore it crumbles. After a while all but the 25 percenters know they’re being had.

    But that could only be wishful thinking.

  7. Our dinner company has left, so I now have some time to comment a bit more than the silly remark I left several hrs ago.
    Back in the 70’s and 80’s, I worked in Marine Construction in Southern Ca. through the Pile driver’s union.In the mid 70’s, I caught a year long gig with Heally-Tibbitts, servicing platform Harry off Long Beach. I was on call 24 hrs. When the call came in, I would run down to the “yard”, load out supplies on a barge, which could be anything from drill pipe, drilling mud, cement, Schlumberger fishing tools, to food stuffs, hook up to a tug, then go to the rig and off load.”Harry” was in shallow water, and there was never a problem.

    Several years later, I caught a couple of days work on Platform Hondo; Hondo is in the Santa Barbara Channel, in just over 800 ft of sea water. Hondo was a big money job for welders and ironworkers, but it went over budget for a number of reasons. The next platform set was erected by foreign nationals from The Netherlands ( if I Remember correctly), to get around the troublesome unions.The “American” workers lost out. Remember that.
    I don’t recall any major problems with Hondo, except the wasted welding rods that were hurled at passing sharks, etc.
    While 800 ft. is pretty deep, it pales in comparison with the 5,000 ft depth of the BP rig that has just been lost. We had divers working at 800 ft, I believe the limit is around 1500 ft., after that, one relys on robotics.

    In ’78, the S.S. Sansenina, a supertanker hauling crude oil, exploded at it’s berth in San Pedro. I was hired as a diver, and worked for about a year helping to remove the wreckage and pumping crude oil off the harbor bottom; crude oil sinks.
    some components of crude float, but I chased oil around the harbor bottom for about 3 months.The oil from the tanker made a huge mess, and the inital exposion was made great business for the local window companies.

    I get a bit flustered when I hear a bloviating jackass like limbaugh use the term “we”, as in “we” are drilling off shore, etc. Limbaugh would not survive one shift in that environment.
    As far as “SWAT” teams inspecting oil drilling platforms; that is the job of engineers and certified inspectors, SWAT teams don’t inspect structures, they shoot people.

    The whole “Drill Baby, Drill” mantra makes me want to gag.
    Working off shore oil rigs is not for everyone; the work is dangerous, the days are long, and many times, you don’t go ashore until the job is done, which can be for months at a time.That crowd doesn’t know what they’re talking about, but they now have a taste of reality.

  8. Rush Limbaugh’s double isn’t Louis Farrakhan: it’s Charles Manson. Both manipulate other people into committing acts of violence to start a race war.

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  11. erinyes,

    Thank you. In the ’70s, I lived in Oxnard and had a friend that was a foreman on Union Oil’s ‘B’ platform. And I currently have a friend who is an electrician on some kind of oil transfer operation off the west coast of Africa.

    Your lengthy comment, plus my friends experiences plus whatever else I’ve learned has filled a good part of the picture. For example, I did not realize crude sank. Will it also do that in 5000′ of water?

  12. Thanks for the info, erinyes. Like chief, I did not know that crude sank.

    What happens to the components that sink? Do they just pool on the sea floor and smother everything? Do they break up over time?

  13. Chief, Muldoon;
    I was surprised also that crude sinks. My first duty on the Sansenina job was to secure a pump at the bottom of the fore peak tank, which held 50 ft of water (due to the breeched hull) and 10 ft of crude at the bottom. The crude did separate to a degree, but most of the pollution was a light sheen on the water surface with some globules, and large pools of oil on the harbor bottom.
    I suppose the water temperature was a factor, the explosion happened in December, when the water temp was in the low 60’s/ high 50’s.I was kept on long after the wreck was removed to suck up the oil on the harbor bottom, well into July. I’m sure the ambient temp at 5,000 ft of sea water is pretty cold, however, the oil could be under great pressure from the natural gas.I would expect large amounts of the crude to pool on the bottom near the well head, but due to the large volume, there will be fouling of the shoreline from the lighter components of the spill also.
    I worked for Fred Devine Diving and Salvage, a truly great group of professional salvage masters, I wish I’d taken more photos.

  14. Muldoon;
    From what I’ve seen, the bottom hugging pools indeed smother everything.
    Luckily, in L.A. harbor, the harbor bottom is mostly devoid of life due to the constant ship traffic.

  20. On the White House website, it says “Secretary Napolitano announced that this incident is a spill of national significance, the Department of Interior has announced that they will be sending SWAT teams to the Gulf to inspect all platforms and rigs, and the EPA is conducting air monitoring activities to gather information on the impact of the controlled burn on air quality.”

    Does it mean “SWOT”? I trust they aren’t sending what we think when we think S.W.A.T. It would be nice if they cleared that up.

  21. I don’t give a shit what Rush thinks or says but I do give a shit that millions of us believe him.

    Did I post this before? Smart people believe weird things because they’re very good at defending some beliefs which they have arrived at for non-smart reasons. I have some very smart friends who faithfully follow Rush and Beck and O’Reilly and Hannity. When I question their taste in media, they change the subject. I can only surmise that they realize they’re listening to bull shit, can’t defend it, but, hey, it brings them pleasure, which is hardly a reason one listens to the news, which is why they ‘change the subject.’

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