Rush Limbaugh's Foreskin

First, my apologies for making you think about Rush Limbaugh's genitals. If I could make you unthink it, I would.

Why am I talking about Rush Limbaugh's junk today? Simple. It's because he thinks the government wants our foreskins.

Let's quote the corpulent fart-balloon!

RUSH: By the way, leave our penises alone, too! This is getting out of hand. There is a story that some officials in the Obama administration are pushing for circumcision for all boys born in the USA to fight HIV/AIDS. Not that I'm against circumcision, but it's a family's decision. Leave our penises alone, too, Obama! [...] So here's Obama out there saying we have to have circumcision of every young boy born in the country.

Trust me Rush, nobody wants your flaccid penis.

Some background would be sensible at this time.

The CDC (known to fearmongers as "officials in the Obama administration," apparently) are debating whether to recommend male circumcision as a potential way to reduce the transmission of HIV. They haven't made any recommendations at this point, and may or may not end up actually recommending it.

So yeah, that part about Obama "saying we have to have circumcision of every young boy born in the country" is quite simply a lie. Nobody's saying that. Nobody will say that, ever. If the CDC recommend circumcision, it's about as relevant as when they recommend not eating a dozen eggs every day. Decent advice, but it's up to you whether or not to follow it.

The evidence does suggest that male circumcision decreases the relative risk of transmission of HIV via penile-vaginal sex. But these studies are mostly on African populations, where there's a greater rate of HIV in the population, relatively few circumcised males (compared to the US), relatively little condom use (thanks, Catholic Church!), and where the majority of HIV infections are transmitted through heterosexual sex. In other words, it may not work the same in this country.

Notably, circumcision doesn't appear to make much difference in penile-anal sex. Since the majority of HIV cases in this country are found in males who have sex with males, we have a very different situation. We also have a lot more circumcised men, a lower rate of HIV, and more condom use. What works in Africa may not make any difference here. Or it may. That's why it's being debated.

There's this weird thread running through an awful lot of conservative bullshit these days, and this is yet another example. For some reason, conservatives seem to believe that whenever anyone even tangentially associated with the government makes a recommendation, that means they're going to force you to comply with it.

This is, of course, ridiculous. Even if they actually wanted to force everyone to get circumcised (which they don't, because c'mon), it's not like the CDC have a legion of jackbooted thugs they're going to send out with foreskin-snippers to make sure all foreskins are harvested (for use in kosher hot dogs).

Going a step further, even if you're batshit crazy and think that CDC goons are really going to come after you with pinking shears, it wouldn't work. It's just not something people would comply with if they're not willing to do it otherwise. For a guy who thinks the government is incapable of doing anything right, Rush sure seems to think they're capable of some pretty extraordinary things.

Of course, the idea that the government would force men and boys to cut off their foreskins is just totally objectionable. Yet Limbaugh has no problem at all with telling women what to do with their genitals. Seems like a little double standard there. Or for Rush, maybe I should say a teensy-weensy little "are you sure that isn't a Jujube?" double standard.

Furthermore, what's up with these conservatives constantly focusing on things that make them so terribly easy to ridicule? Does Limbaugh not realize that his status as a Viagra-popping sex tourist means that when he makes up lies about circumcision people are going to make dick jokes at his expense? Similarly, are teabaggers blind to the fact that taping teabags to their hats makes them laughingstocks?

Concerned citizen or scrotum aficionado?

You can't make up stuff this stupid. If you did, nobody would believe it.

Should I even go over the long history of white fears about black men cutting off their penises? The history of lies about sexual abuse perpetrated by black men being used as a fear tactic to fight racial integration? The implicit racism in this whole "a black man is going to cut off your penis!" bullshit?

Nah, dick jokes are less depressing.

Hooray for Teabagging!

It's hard to know where to begin with this whole teabagging thing.

Once upon a time, it took effort to make fun of Republicans and Libertarians. Not a whole lot of effort, admittedly, but the jokes at least didn't write themselves.

Over the last few years, however, the right wing in this country has done its best to become not only completely insane, but also totally clueless about how others perceive them. That's comedy gold, but sort of too easy. Let's try to resist making the easy jokes as best we can. Leave that to the newscasters.

If you're not familiar with the whole "Tea Party" thing yesterday, let me sum it up for you. See, these brave patriots are mostly angry about taxes, but they also hate the deficit, as well as other things (like black people). The majority of them have had their taxes lowered by their elected representatives, which is obviously upsetting.

As you'll recall from grade-school history classes, early American gangsters once railed against "Taxation Without Representation" and dressed up as American Indians in order to dump tea in Boston Harbor, to protest Britain's Tea Act. Also, they were probably drunk.

The commonality between the colonists and modern tax-evaders is really striking, isn't it? Except for the "Without Representation" part. Or most of the other parts, actually. But maybe some of them were drunk?

Anyway, let's take a look at this Telegram article, cleverly entitled "Taxes not their cup of tea." (Oh, Telegram headline-writer, you are a stitch!)

It's about a "Tea Party" in Worcester yesterday, which supposedly attracted 1,500 people (though you wouldn't know it from the photos, which you really must see).

Quoting time!

“I heard about this watching Glenn Beck on TV,” said Ms. Stearns, a Worcester mother of three who stood next to her son, Elijah, 10, who held his own placard exclaiming, “Obama Spends, Jesus Saves.”

Actually, Jesus advocated giving away all your stuff. No going to heaven for you, Elijah!

Here's an interesting quote:

“Think of what our founders did,” [event organizer Kevin] Mandile said to a cheering crowd, speaking over the cacophony of automobile horns blown in solidarity. “They took on the most powerful country in the world, and won.”

“… I’ve even heard that the Department of Homeland Security considers the Tea Party an extremist organization and a threat. We are a threat, to the crowd in Washington.”

Is that thing about the DHS true? I could only find it being promoted by right-wing blogs, who aren't exactly known for their fact-checking skills.

Whether or not it's true, is it really smart to go threatening the government? I appreciate a good revolution as much as anybody, but generally revolutionaries try to actually do something, and not just dress up in silly costumes and whine about taxes.

Also, remember a few years ago when anybody who dared criticize Bush in any way was called a "traitor" and had their patriotism questioned? That was for criticism, not calls for armed insurrection (which you don't find in this article, but are certainly happening). The people who called folks like me a traitor back then are the ones calling for a revolution now. Would it be too much to ask for a little logical consistency?

Yes, it would.

Jodie Chapin of Northboro, who carried a framed photograph of former President Ronald Reagan, stood at the base of the granite stairs to Worcester Memorial Auditorium with her daughter, Juliet, 11.

“Ronald Reagan would not have allowed things to get to the point where we would have to do this,” she said. “He epitomized the Free World. He is the hero to all the people here. He was a proud conservative who believed America was a shining city on a hill.”

Oh what the fuck, people? Why don't you just form a new religion, call it "Reaganism," get the religious tax exemption, and shut the fuck up?

While you're at it, maybe you shouldn't whine about the deficit while lionizing Reagan, who took the deficit from 2.3% of GNP to 5.6% of GNP, adding more than a trillion 1988-era dollars to it. Hell, even with his disease-ravaged brain, Reagan himself recognized that he screwed up.

Look, conservatives, we need to have a talk.

I know you guys are new to this whole "revolution" thing, because "conservative" and "subversive" are basically antonyms. So let me offer you some advice for your next horribly misguided public spectacle. If you just follow these simple guidelines, you should be fine.

1. First and foremost, don't name your protest after a slang term for a sex act. If you're considering Dirty Sanchez immigration protests or Angry Pirate anti-piracy rallies, you might want to reconsider.
2. Making protest signs is an art. You want to be brief, but clever. It also helps if they make sense. Additionally, you should probably not endorse slavery on your sign.
3. Costumes are always a nice touch, but giant furries with huge penises are probably not going to draw a lot of people to your cause.

There are obviously more than just these three guidelines that should be followed, but they would at least be a good start.

Once you get the blatantly ridiculous bullshit out of the way, we can get into more esoteric stuff like "actually understand the historical events you refer to," "don't contradict yourself mid-sentence," and "for God's sake, just shut the fuck up already." But we have to start somewhere!

In conclusion, teabagging rocks!


PS. Note that this post contained almost no jokes about scrota. Yay, self-control!