[2log] Smoke and Furors

Not that anyone should really be surprised at this point by the thunderous hypocrisy emanating from the mouth of Rush Limbaugh and those of his ilk, but there's a particularly sinister aspect to his current rantings that I can't help but marvel at.

If you listen to Limbaugh and other conservative talkers (which everyone who claims to hate them really should do--it's one thing to read their quotes in articles about other topics, and quite another to hear them in context), you'll find that the only front on which they feel comfortable fighting the Obama administration is "fiscal conservatism," a philosophy which they would have you believe is the cornerstone of our Constitutional freedoms. This is because previous issues which they have claimed are the cornerstones of our Constitutional freedoms (namely the dangers of gay marriage, illegal immigration, and hawkish national defense) seem to be non-starters at the moment. As such, Rush devotes much of his "three hours of radio brilliance" (Rush's own description of his show--he also touts his "fertile exploding mind" and "talent on loan from God") to ranting and raving about the amount of money being taken from the pockets of taxpaying Americans without their consultation or consent. The same is true of Hannity, Janet Parshall, and so on throughout the cacophony of the right-wing radio universe.

Which is all very well and good, until you consider that the people who listen to these programs are served with relentless ads between programming segments for a non-stop stream of services requiring nothing more than the listener's credit card number and their faith in the dubious claims of the various companies:

Freedom222.com
A service of "Premier Team International," which is featured on such watchdog sites as RipoffReport.com and Scam.com.
Mega Life and Health
A company which purports to offer health and life insurance to individuals who are unemployed or whose companies do not provide it. The radio ad closes with a rapid-fire disclaimer which discloses that Mega Life and Health is run out of a home-office in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and is not legal in certain states.
CredEx
CredEx claims to offer common-sense debt-relief solutions. Just call them up and give them access to your credit accounts and they'll be glad to assist you. Should you be concerned that CredEx is also the name of a collection agency? Possibly.

Add to this the fact that you have to pay to listen to Rush on-line, and you have to wonder how the conservative talk-radio listener base hasn't figured out that it's Rush and others like him who have designs on their wallets, not the Fed, which, in all likelihood, in fact recently gave them a tax cut. By comparison, NPR, which Rush and the like love to bash, does not air commercials (advertising is generally limited to 15-second underwriting spots, which are read by station anchors and not produced by the companies supplying the underwriting funds). Additionally, most of NPR's current and archived content can be downloaded or streamed for free from its website or those of its various partners.

Rush would probably say that people should be free to spend their money as they please, and that choosing to spend it on listening his show or the various shady services that advertise thereupon has nothing to do with the injustices of the government's use of our tax dollars on such outrageous practices as energy-saving high-speed commuter trains. Amen! That money should go to strange anonymous Internet companies so that they can mine my data for their own profit! After all, small businesses are the backbone of our economy.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to my live Internet-stream of gameday audio from the Astros-Nationals game. If you are interested, the same services can be yours for only $14.95/mo.