Is Rush Limbaugh That Important?

What’s the point?  That’s the question I have.  Why would Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) come back to Washington DC on Monday and get right onto the floor of the United States Senate to blast—not Al Qaeda, not the revolutionary government of Iran, but—talk-show host Rush Limbaugh, the jaunty conservative optimist of the air-waves?

Now we know that the “phony soldier” issue, the idea that last week Rush Limbaugh criticized all members of the armed forces opposed to the war, was raised by Media Matters, which is, as Noel Sheppard writes,

an organization is linked directly to Bill and Hillary Clinton, as well as billionaire leftist George Soros.

OK, that’s their job, to conduct a Clintonian politics of personal destruction.  That’s what they were hired to do.

But what is so outrageous?  Suppose it were true?  Doesn’t Rush Limbaugh have a right to criticize people he disagrees with and call them phonies?  Without the Senate Majority Leader rushing out onto the floor of the Senate to criticize him?

So you have to wonder.  What is really going on here?  What has changed in the last month?

Well, we know.  In the last month the Democratic presidential candidates have switched sides on the war in Iraq.  They no longer advocate getting out immediately.  They propose to keep US troops there.  Because the Bush strategy seems to be working.  And because they don’t want to get on the wrong side of the American people for the 2008 election.

But what do you do about all the netroots and the liberal partisans that you’ve riled up about the war for the last six years?

You execute a misdirection play.  You sicc them on Rush Limbaugh.

You have to wonder.  Rush Limbaugh is an amazing talent.  His “jaunty optimism” does more to keep the conservative base cheered up than anything else going.

But is Rush Limbaugh so important that the Senate Majority Leader must pause in the execution of the nation’s vital legislative business to criticize an off-hand remark by a media celebrity?

What is going on here?

The other interesting thing about the “phony soldiers” issue is that it mostly concerns veterans who have been trying to obtain VA benefits for which they are not entitled.  Here’s a report from the US Attorney’s Office of Western Washington on Operation Stolen Valor.

U.S. Attorney Jeffrey C. Sullivan today announced some of the results of “Operation Stolen Valor,” a year long effort to investigate and prosecute those who lie about their military service for financial gain or other reasons.

Here are the names of the targets of Stolen Valor as given in the US Attorney’s statement:

• Jesse Macbeth, 23, Tacoma, Washington
• Reggie Buddle, 60, Puyallup, Washington
• Larry Lewis Porter, 52, Seattle, Washington
• Roy J. Scott, 71, of Port Angeles, Washington
• Merrick K. Hersey, 64, of Vancouver, Washington
• Michael D. Heit, 58, of Harrington, Washington
• Elvin J. Swisher, 70, of Idaho
• Carlos Riosvalle, 83, of Portland, Oregon

Notice the ages of these folks!  They were indicted or sentenced for crimes including: “Altered Military Discharge Certificate,” “fraudulent claims of military service,” “Unlawful Wearing of United States Military Medals and Decorations,” and “Theft of Government Funds.”

So they were accused of doing things like altering their discharge certificates to obtain government benefits for which they were not entitled. 

Phony soldiers indeed.

UPDATE 10:19am: Rush agrees! The attack on him is a ploy to distract the liberal and anti-war base from the fact that the Democrats in Washington have utterly betrayed them.