In response to Limbaugh's claim that soldiers who oppose the occupation are "phony soldiers," votevets.org put out this ad. In the ad, an Iraq vet named Brian McGough responds to the "phony soldier" claim. McGough, who suffered a traumatic brain injury due to a bomb in Iraq, ends the ad by saying, "until you have the guts to call me a phony soldier to my face, stop telling lies about my service." In a response to the ad, Limbaugh claimed that McGough can't think for himself, and then compared him to a suicide bomber.
Limbaugh called the ad,
a blatant use of a valiant combat veteran, lying to him about what I said, then strapping those lies to his belt, sending him out via the media in a TV ad to walk into as many people as he can walk into.
Before, I questioned if there was really a need to make a big deal of words, be they "phony soldier" or "General Betray Us." Now I can see the real danger to what these right wing demagogues say. As Limbaugh's comments show, Limbaugh is an amoral, inhuman demagogue. He will trash anyone who criticizes the GOP. It doesn't matter if they served on a swift boat in Vietnam, if they lost 3 limbs in Vietnam, or if they suffered a traumatic brain injury in the mess Limbaugh helped create.
Honestly, even I wasn't sure that Limbaugh could say something so inhuman. I see little, if any, difference between this and some of what was said to Vietnam vets when they returned home.