Far Out on a Limbaugh

[Executive summary: Rush Is Not God.]

At American Thinker today, Paul Shlichta raises an interesting parallel between the Democrats' tendency to demonize and the classic passage from the pages of 1984:

The Hate had started. As usual, the face of Emmanuel Goldstein, the Enemy of the People, had flashed on to the screen...The programmes of the Two Minutes Hate varied from day to day, but there were none in which Goldstein was not the principal figure...Goldstein was delivering his usual venomous attack upon the doctrines of the Party--an attack so exaggerated and perverse that a child should have been able to see through it, and yet just plausible enough to fill one with an alarmed feeling... Before the Hate had proceeded for thirty seconds, uncontrollable exclamations of rage were breaking out from half the people in the room ...In its second minute, the Hate rose to a frenzy. People were leaping up and down in their places and shouting at the tops of their voices in an effort to drown the maddening bleating voice that came from the screen ...The Hate rose to its climax. The voice of Goldstein had become an actual sheep's bleat, and for an instant the face changed into that of a sheep...

In particular, the Democrats' unending, utterly baseless and irrational hatred toward President Bush has absolutely no basis other than the fact that he represented everything that they loathe, abominate and despise.

But now he's gone. Oh, what to do, what to do?

Simple: find a new Goldstein:

With Bush retired from public life, Obama needs a new scapegoat. Evidently, Rush Limbaugh has been chosen. Calling him "the voice and the intellectual force and energy behind the Republican Party," White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel is obviously trying to set up Limbaugh as the next hate icon for the minions of Big Other. Simultaneously, vicious attacks on Limbaugh were launched from several Democratic sources. It has been claimed that Obama's strategists are making an explicit effort to "turn the [image of the] Republican Party into a Limbaughesque caricature."

But there is a serious problem with that from our POV. Not necessarily that it will work (even though their venom practically drowned the Bush Administration) but that, with the increased focus on Rushbo, the Republicans may spent too much time defending him--to the exclusion of finding new leaders and policies to lead us out of the Wilderness and back into Canaan.

Our problem is that (1) we need a Moses; (2) Rushbo is not he; (3) we can't let a professional (but very successful) blowhard be the defining voice of the movement.

As the author said: "[h]is caricaturable physical appearance and past drug and marital issues have made him vulnerable to jeering".

This simple observation of an obvious truth drew this from one dittohead, one Eric E. Rumsey, posting in the comments:

While this may be true, Is this the author's idea of respect? You sound like a liberal commenting on his appearance, (many may not find you particularly attractive). .... But was this your idea of RESPECT? Are you really David Frum in disguise? It's "so-called" Conservatives like you that we have had enough of. You dishonor the name Conservative. I contend you are not a Conservative sir. You are a Conservative like Obama is a moderate.

That's just like Conservatives at our worst: trying to read out of the party everyone who thinks differently from themselves. As for the Rushoid dittohead faction, they are idolators, and have made Rushbo their idol--not like Joe DiMaggio, but rather like the Golden Calf. If we can't criticize his obvious faults, then that makes us no better than the stupidest Obammunist. Worse, in fact.

Clearly Rush Limbaugh is a necessary thumb that the GOP presently needs to suck on as it sits in its corner.

He is not, however, by any stretch, the leader of the party, nor is he its future. He's an entertainer, nothing more.

If we don't get our act together, that future will be in political outer darkness.

What do we need to do first and foremost? Repent and believe the Good News. Any attempt to have a conservative movement that ignores our Judeo-Christian heritage is doomed to failure.

Second, we need to recognize that the primary struggle here is not the salvation of capitalism but the defeat of the population decimators. Why is our economy collapsing? Well, isn't the fact that we are missing some 25 million workers between the ages of 18-35 just a BIT of a clue?

Third, we need to dump our political retreads and/or kick them upstairs and find us new leaders who have a clue as to what is REALLY going on. And what is going on is nothing less than the latest mutation of the atheocratic socialist virus.

Rush will not save us, and if *we* make him our golden calf, we may get what Dathan got (if we haven't already). Let us not sell our inheritance for a pot of message.