A Rush to Slander
As word spread last Monday that Rush Limbaugh was part of a group bidding on the St. Louis Rams, CNN anchor Rick Sanchez reported that the king of talk radio had once said that slavery "had its merits. For one thing, the streets were safer after dark." At the same time, another racist Limbaugh soundbite was zipping around the Internet. Limbaugh, it was claimed, once said: "You know who deserves a posthumous Medal of Honor? James Earl Ray [the assassin of Martin Luther King]. We miss you, James. Godspeed." MSNBC's Rachel Maddow had cited that one on air in June.
Just one problem: These quotations were utter fabrications. The Media Research Center traced their origin to "pranksters who tampered with Limbaugh's Wikipedia page several years ago. . . . Recently, the [slavery] quote was cited by St. Louis Post-Dispatch sportswriter Bryan Burwell in an October 7 column about Limbaugh's joint effort to purchase the St. Louis Rams. Other sportswriters soon cited the quote as well, including Detroit Free Press columnist Drew Sharp writing in the October 12 USA Today."
Limbaugh promptly informed the media that the quotes were false, but news organizations were reluctant to retract and apologize. "We want to be fair to Rush," Sanchez said on Tuesday, before quoting Limbaugh's denial. "So, Rush Limbaugh is denying that that quote has come from him," Sanchez said, as if this were some he said/she said dispute.
On Tuesday, the NFL commissioner said of Limbaugh's bid, "we're all held to a high standard here, and I think divisive comments are not what the NFL is all about." On Wednesday, Limbaugh was dropped from the group bidding on the Rams.
After the damage had already been done-and after the left-wing website the Huffington Post had pulled the quotations Thursday when it was unable to verify their accuracy-CNN's Sanchez, MSNBC, and the popular left-wing blog Think Progress got around to issuing retractions on Friday.
The phony Wikipedia quotes also appeared in a 2006 book, 101 People Who Are Really Screwing America, by Jack Huberman. As we went to press Friday night, Nation Books, the publisher of the book in which the quotes may have first appeared in print, had not yet responded to multiple phone messages inquiring about the false quotes. THE SCRAPBOOK assumes Limbaugh's lawyers will have better luck getting in touch.
'Fool Moon Rising'
Thomas Fluharty's peerless illustrations and paintings have been gracing this magazine's covers and pages for a decade now. His first was the September 27, 1999, Pat Buchanan cover shown here; the most recent was last week's faux-Rembrandt, "Obama Contemplating a Bust of Carter."
Fluharty's career has taken many twists and turns over the years. Before he became one of our regular contributors, he was a self-described member of "the usual gang of idiots" at Mad magazine. He has also done covers for Sports Illustrated for Kids, Time, Der Spiegel, and U.S. News & World Report.
But it's his latest venture we want to commend to your attention. With his wife Kristi, Thomas has written a children's book, Fool Moon Rising, filled with the ravishing illustrations that are his trademark. THE SCRAPBOOK was utterly charmed by the sample pages that can be viewed at the book's website, foolmoonrising.com (where there is also a link for orders). But we don't want to scant the story, which comes with a moral: It's "about the moon stealing the sun's glory; children learn about the importance of humility and the dangers of pride."
We can't vouch for the reaction of your children and grandchildren, but as Thomas and Kristi are raising five daughters, we're guessing the book has been thoroughly focus-grouped by young readers, as the marketers say nowadays.
Diet COLA
Remember when President Obama pledged to begin a "new era of fiscal responsibility"? Last week, he made a decision exposing that phrase as a joke. A bad one.
Because of the recession, the Consumer Price Index has declined over the last year. The trustees who run Social Security therefore determined that a cost-of-living-adjustment (COLA) wasn't necessary in 2010. Makes sense. After all, deflation means you can buy more with less. And at a time of record public debt, such economizing ought to be welcome news for a president who says he's fiscally responsible.
But Obama wants to spend the money anyway. Last week, he proposed sending seniors checks for $250, at a total cost of at least $13 billion, because of the recession. By this logic, of course, the president ought to support sending $250 to every American. Except Obama's decision isn't logical. It's political and cynical. He is caving to the senior lobby, maybe to thank AARP for supporting his health care reform, maybe to buy the affections of the seniors opposing him. Whatever the reason, he's spending more money the government doesn't have on a well-organized special-interest group, and giving "responsibility" a bad name.
Fee Injury
Democrats will bore you silly with talk about "bending the cost curve" of health care spending. The way to lower costs, they believe, is through government controls, back-room deals with pharmaceutical companies, taxes on medical equipment and personal incomes, and cuts to Medicare. The Congressional Budget Office says that Max Baucus's health bill, which promises all of the above, will be "deficit neutral." But just how serious are the Democrats about reducing entitlement spending?
Not very. Consider the Senate Democrats. While the Baucus bill promises to lower costs, another bill, sponsored by Debbie Stabenow and scheduled for a vote this week, does exactly the opposite. Beginning in January, Medicare is set to reduce payments to doctors by 21 percent, with further reductions in the future. The Stabenow bill, which the White House and congressional leadership support, would restore the cuts and add more than $200 billion to the deficit over the next decade. The Democrats are playing three-card monte with health spending, taking money out of the system in one bill and adding it back in another. It's yet another reason to oppose Obamacare-based on Stabenow's example, does anybody seriously think Democrats in Congress will ever accede to entitlement cuts? And it's yet another example of the Democrats' condescending attitude toward the public they claim to represent. With a con job like this, they must take us all for suckers.