My dearest Rush,

Blimpbaugh is getting a lot of unexpected mail today. John Feehery, a Republican strategist, has addressed an open letter to Rush asking him to be specific in his plans for the Republican party and for the country.

And Ralph Nader is demanding rent!

Dear Mr. Limbaugh, The Associated Press reports your new contract with Premiere Radio Networks will enrich you with at least $38 million a year over the next eight years. You are making this money on the public property of the American people for which you pay no rent. You, Rush Limbaugh, are on welfare. As you know, the public airwaves belong to the American people. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is supposed to be our trustee in managing this property. The people are the landlords and the radio and TV stations and affiliated companies are the tenants. The problem is that since the Radio Act of 1927 these corporate tenants have been massively more powerful in Washington, DC than the tens of millions of listeners and viewers. The result has been no payment of rent by the stations for the value of their license to broadcast. You and your company are using the public's valuable property for free. This freeloading on the backs of the American people is called corporate welfare. It is way past due for the super-rich capitalist -- Rush Limbaugh from Cape Girardeau, Missouri -- to get himself off big time welfare. It is way past due for Rush Limbaugh as the Kingboy of corporatist radio to set a capitalist example for his peers and pay rent to the American people for the very lucrative use of their property. You need not wait for the broadcast industry-indentured FCC and Congress to do the right thing. You can lead by paying a voluntary rent -- determined by a reputable appraisal organization -- for the time you use on the hundreds of stations that carry your words each weekday. Payment of rent for the use of public airwaves owned by the American people is the conservative position. Real conservatives oppose corporate welfare. Real corporatists feed voraciously from hundreds of billions of dollars in corporate welfare gushing out of Washington, DC yearly. Whose side are you on? Freeloading? Or paying rent for the public property you have been using free for many years? I look forward to your response. Sincerely yours, Ralph Nader PO Box 19312 Washington, DC 20036

H/T SF Hansen

The conservative love affair with Hillary Clinton

Andrew Sullivan has figured out why there is a sudden outpouring of support for Hillary Clinton (often expressed as a vitriolic distasted for Barack Obama) among conservative Republicans like Limbaugh, Buchanan, Scaife and Rove. They want her to win so they can beat her.

I hate to give any credit to this gasbag, but...

Rush Limbaugh is encouraging Republicans to switch party affiliation and vote for Hillary Clinton in a mobilization of his dittoheads called Operation Chaos designed to disrupt the Democratic campaigns. He's claimed victory in Ohio and Pennsylvania, and while no one in the news media seems to be taking his claims seriously, the news media is not necessarily the place to search for real answers.

Chickenhawk profiteers

There's nothing more obscene, more despicable than the promoters of war who wear their patriotism on their sleeves, constantly talk about supporting the troops, opposing terrorism and "Islamic extremists,"while sacrificing absolutely nothing for the cause.

That list begins at the top with Bush and Cheney but trickles down in a murky stream of effluent past blathering sphincters like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Laura Ingraham, Michelle Malkin, Ann Coulter and locally Jim Vicevich who have exploited the war, exploited the bravery of the troops, exploited the patriotic feelings of their listeners, exploited bloodlust and fear, exploited terrorism and who have exploited death and destruction for their own ratings, their own book sales, their own punditry fees, their own profit. Though they would deny it, no less than Halliburton or Sikorsky, they have made money at the cost of others lives.

Over at firedoglake, attaturk pins war enabler Michael O'Hanlon.

Yes, but do they look slimy and clueless enough

Bill Curry does a good job of dissembling the Republican objections to S-CHIP. He, and his friend Colin McEnroe, on whose show Curry appears frequently, have been vigilant in emphasizing that it's not enough to point out the cruelty of Limbaugh and Malkin. It's important to get them to discuss the substance of the health care issue, instead of simply maligning a 12-year old "victim" of the current S-CHIP program.

It puts me in mind of Swift's A Modest Proposal, and we need a writer who is clever enough to portray the Republicans and the conservatives, and George Scrooge Bush, as the unfeeling, illogical monsters they are.

A phony soldier addresses a chickenhawk

Rush Limbaugh was recorded calling soldiers who opposed the law, "phony soldiers," now vets are beginning to speak up.

And there are calls to have Limbaugh's show removed from Armed Forces radio.

Where's the congressional resolution to condemn the armchair patriot.

We're making a list, checking it twice...

Keith Olbermann and Senator Jim Webb discuss the newly uncovered proof, the Spanish "Downing Street memos," which prove that George Bush intended to attack Iraq long before there was a UN resolution, and long before he admitted to the American people that he would do so.

What's more, Webb, who served in the military in Vietnam and the first Iraq War, gives his opinion of the chickenhawks who are chomping at the bit for war in Iran, and calling military dissenters, "phony soldiers."