Outrage! Umbrage! Personal Affront! Filth and flarn and filth! Fie!

You know what? I didn't give a flying fuck about that MoveOn.org ad in the New York Times, and I don't give a flying fuck about Rush Limbaugh's stupid "phony soldiers" comment. Don't get me wrong—I think what Limbaugh said was a pile of mean-spirited horseshit just like everything else that comes out of the stinkhole he calls a mouth.

But, frankly, it's not nearly as bad as at least a dozen other things he's said over the years that I can think of right off the top of my head, things that were directed at people who are already socially and politically marginalized, things that did not rouse the Congress to leap into action to defend these people like they're now defending soldiers whom we're told deserve Congressional defense because they are the toughest, strongest, most heroic people in America.

Does that seem at all backwards to you?

Does it seem at all backwards to you that Senate Democrats have written a letter to Clear Channel Communications asking for its CEO to "publicly repudiate [Limbaugh's] comments," but didn't make any fuss when two assholes on XM Radio talked about fucking Secretary of State Condi Rice and First Lady Laura Bush to death? Does it seem at all backwards to you that Congressional Republicans didn't give a shit about that at all, despite it being said about the two most prominent women in their party, but went completely apeshit because an advertisement said something less than flattering about a general?

If Congress has decided to busy itself with condemning nasty talk, doesn't it seem backwards to you that it would start with going all fainting couch on our asses over fairly benign shots across the bow at soldiers, whom almost everyone in America already agrees are generally deserving of respect, while whole groups of people—ethnic minorities, women, gay men, transgendered people, brown-skinned immigrants, adherents of minority religions, atheists, and members otherwise oft-disenfranchized and largely powerless groups—are routinely spoken about in dehumanizing epithets and expected to suffer all manner of verbal abuse, threats, and belittlement?

And doesn't it seem just completely, totally, utterly backwards to you that Congress cares more about what's said about soldiers by civilians than how soldiers are treated by their own government? Where's the month-long news cycle about unprotected vehicles? Where's the month-long news cycle about body armor? Where's the month-long news cycle about sexual assault against female soldiers in the war theater? Where's the month-long news cycle about veterans' care? Where's the month-long news cycle following up on the conditions at Walter Reed, and exploring the conditions at other recuperative centers? Where's the month-long news cycle about VA funding? Where's the month-long news cycle on Bush having defunded traumatic brain injury research? Where's the month-long news cycle about families torn apart by extended tours, by deaths, by catastrophic injuries, by severe post-traumatic stress disorder? Where's the month-long news cycle on any of that?

That, I care about.

And so should our Congress—at least as much as they care about stupid fucking adverts and stupid fucking bloviating gasbags.