Rush Limbaugh and the Business of Opinion

I work in the studio at KGVO everyday and I can honestly say that in the last six weeks or so I have not received an anti-Rush call. It's possible I received one or two, but if so, I can't remember them. I thought the issue was dead. It was quite surprising to me then, when I heard Jim Adair of Adair Jewelers in a recent ad saying that he wouldn't be "bullied" by those against Rush. Where did that come from?!

The ad is a response to a campaign called rushoutofmissoula.com, which is advertised as an anti-hate campaign. I have visited the site in the past, but didn't realize that it had any traction . . . I'm still not sure that it does. Prominent local politician Dave Strohmaier (who has agreed to visit with us on the Talk Back show tomorrow) has thrown his support behind the anti-Rush campaign.

So, now that everyone is caught up on what is going on, I'd like to add my comments. I don't plan on joining any campaigns for either side (I publicly denounced what Rush said myself when the events were playing out) and I support the anti-Rushies ability to use free-speech to try to get their message out. The problem I have is the war of moral superiority that the campaign is using to meet its political ends. The anti-Rush campaign is not a moral campaign, it's a political one. The reason they would like to muzzle Rush isn't that he said debasing things about women, if that was all it took to draw moral outrage we would see it driven against other commentators as well:

So feel free to sign the petition, but realize the drive here is not to discuss an issue of morals, it's to silence the political comments of an individual for political reasons. The real moral discussions behind this issue (I mean the original issue of government involvement in healthcare) are questions like "when does life begin," which many on the left are afraid to talk about and afraid to leave in anyone's hands but the governments.