GOP & Prostitutes
Janeane Garafolo, in rare form, psychoanalyzes Rush Limbaugh on MSNBC’s “Countdown” with Keith Olbermann.
OLBERMANN: A conservative male Republican governor, Mark Sanford, has basically called comedian Rush Limbaugh an idiot. Comedian is more interested in finding out why woman don‘t like him. Quoting him, “I own the men. What must I do now to own the women?” In our third story in the COUNTDOWN, Limbaugh once again fails the primary test of psychological health, can you correctly gauge how the world views you?
Public Policy poll found that 56 percent of men held a favorable view of Limbaugh, but only 37 percent of women feel that way. That‘s one of the largest gender gaps encountered by that polling organization in the past year. So Limbaugh seized on the opportunity. “This takes us to the age old question, what do women want? Not even Freud was ultimately able to answer that question,” he said, “so we will have a female summit to ascertain what I must do to attract women.” Save your jokes.
Today, when a female caller to his so-called summit suggested that Limbaugh seemed pompous, comedians reaction to the constructive criticism, “this pompous stuff, that criticism irrelevant. The woman has never listened. I‘m not pompous. I‘m not changing that.”
And accused women critics of not listening enough to his show.
As for Governor Sanford, who recently said, quote, anybody who wants him, meaning President Obama, to fail is an idiot. Limbaugh acknowledged this was directed at him, since he repeatedly wishes aloud for the president‘s failure. Comedian says that Governor Sanford actually agrees with him. He just can‘t admit it in those words.
Joining me now to revel in the fun is comedienne, actress and activist Janeane Garofalo. It‘s good to see you.
JANEANE GAROFALO, POLITICAL ACTIVIST: Thank you. Thank you for having me.
OLBERMANN: So then, I‘m going to see if I can do this with a straight face. What must Rush Limbaugh do to attract women?
GAROFALO: I want to say a couple things first; 37 percent is a shockingly high percentage of…I‘m shocked by that. Secondly, this transcends gender. He is an unappealing person. The problems with Rush Limbaugh, as we were discussing during the break, it would take a neuro-scientist and a behavioral psychologist to sort that out. Failing that, let‘s you and I discuss.
He is a narcissist who also struggles with self-loathing. That is clear. That is his prime maneuver. That‘s the issue. He pretends it is politics. But there is something very, very wrong with Rush Limbaugh. He knows this. Most other, quote, unquote, Republicans or conservative don‘t have self-awareness. I think he does. He really dislikes himself. And the type of people that respond to his message have a whole bunch of other problems, too.
But he‘s…I think he‘s trying to get women…I think he is trying to meet somebody right now. This whole charade that we are going through – - and we are even giving it too much credit discussing it. But I think he would like to meet a nice lady right now.
OLBERMANN: Your “24″ and formerly “Larry Sanders Show” colleague is no longer in the picture?
GAROFALO: I think she actually just thought it would be funny to learn more about him. She said that he did suffer from low self-esteem. That was her impression of him.
OLBERMANN: It seems like that‘s a long way to go to find that information out.
GAROFALO: I don‘t think they really did go on a date or something. Mary Lynn (ph) is too nice. She‘s very easy going and very affable. I think she just wanted to be nice to him. She felt sorry for him. She is more kind than I.
OLBERMANN: We will move it away from the personal here to this question: as I said, your easy, check your own sanity at home test is what do people think of me. We all get it wrong to some degree. If you have categorized women as basically femi-Nazis, castrators, babes, the hot or the unattractive…those are the only groups…and you wonder perhaps why women might not be responding to you more than 37 percent approval, how could you get it that wrong? Or is he just making that whole part of it up too?
GAROFALO: I think he is just, you know, throwing enough you know what against the wall to see what sticks. Somebody is going to respond to him. But the type of female that does like Rush is the same type of women that falls in love with prisoners, like Richard Ramirez or Squeaky Fromme. Good example, Charles Manson. Eva Braun, Hitler‘s girlfriend. That is exactly the type of woman that responds really well to Rush. There will be some Eva Braun‘s out there that will respond really well to this cattle call right now, or to this clarion call…is that the right word…he‘s putting out there.
OLBERMANN: He is trying to get a date.
GAROFALO: He is trying to get a date. Lucky for him, he is wealthy. He is wealthy enough that someone…he dated Campbell Brown. Is that wrong? Some CNN woman.
OLBERMANN: No, it was Darren Kagen (ph), the old sports caster who worked in the morning studio.
(CROSS TALK)
GAROFALO: She dated him. So either she suffers from Stockholm Syndrome, like Michael Steele, the black guy in the Republican party who suffers from Stockholm Syndrome, which means you try to curry favor with the oppressor.
OLBERMANN: Talk about self-loathing.
GAROFALO: Yes. Any female or person of color in the Republican party is struggling with Stockholm Syndrome. That‘s a whole other issue. We don‘t have time. Let‘s go back to Rush Limbaugh.
OLBERMANN: And Mark Sanford. Is there some hopeful thing in here, that even in code, he is criticizing Limbaugh. He is saying that anybody who says he hopes the president fails is an idiot?
GAROFALO: Well, if Rush were open to that kind of criticism, which I think he likes…like I said, he is a narcissist. He enjoys his name being bandied about, no matter what context. Rush Limbaugh, of course, is an idiot. That has nothing to do with what he just said. He…his reason for being is sort of to air out his laundry list of problems that make him an idiot. Does that make sense or have I started babbling? I get so…
OLBERMANN: I think I know what you mean. But why is he causing all of us to suffer along with him?
GAROFALO: He is a misanthrope, right? He is a hater of humanity and also a hater of himself. Why we all have to get dragged into this is one of the great questions. He brought up Freud. Freud has been debunked about his what women want thing years and years ago. He really needs to get more contemporary in his references.
OLBERMANN: Although that represents a very liberal extreme of Rush‘s set of references.
GAROFALO: Freud?
OLBERMANN: The idea that there is something to psychotherapy and that there might be some way you can improve the brain without just smoking cigars.
GAROFALO: Like I said, Rush Limbaugh will go to his grave unfixed. Human frailty, let‘s go with human frailty. It is human frailty that makes it be a conservative. You know what I mean? Whoever the person is, and this transcends gender and skin color, people that cleave unto the conservative message or to the modern day Republican party, there is something wrong with them. That is what makes them go…
Have you ever heard the phrase the Constitution follows the flag. Wherever the American flag flies, the manifestation of the Constitution follows. Wherever the jerk is, the manifestations of conservative follow. Does that make sense?
OLBERMANN: John Dean wrote about this. It is not conservatism anymore. It is authoritarianism.
GAROFALO: It is authoritarian message and people that follow the authoritarian message. It is the unrestrained id. It is whatever is wrong with us. It is whatever the flaws in human being. I‘m a narcissist that suffers with self-loathing. But I prefer to channel my issues into a much more positive direction.
So I do identify with Rush on the level of narcissism and self-loathing combined. But I‘m a far better person than he is. I don‘t say that with arrogance. I say that because it is fact, scientific fact.
OLBERMANN: Thank goodness it is. Janeane Garofalo, political activist, currently of “24.” Thanks, Janeane.
GAROFALO: Thank you for having me.
OLBERMANN: Thanks for being a better person.
Topics: GOP & Prostitutes
“Garafalo: Rush Limbaugh Is a Self-Loathing Narcissist”
Well, there’s a lot there to hate!
I think that Garafalo is correct; Limbaugh is a self-hater and people-hater of any group or anyone he doesn’t understand, and this is why he is popular with the angry, middle-aged, white republicans.
Apparently the republican women have more sense than the republican men! (I bet some of them voted for Obama, too!).
What’s with Garafalo? I used to think she was so attractive, the tattoos are not a good look for her and I dig girls with Tats. I was just watching the video of her and Olbermann who I used to love and now I think is one of the most biased individuals on television. They are talking about Limbaugh and how he is a self loathing narccist. I used to despise Limbaugh but after this whole stimulus fiasco and watching his address at CPAC I have changed my mind. Garafalo and Olbermann I have come to the conclusion are just as bent as they say Limbaugh is. I also do not watch Football Night in America any more because Olbermann is on the show. I have no more fantasies about Janeane Garafalo there is a reason you and Franken tanked on Air America, because you have no idea what you are talking about.
So self-loathing is now a reason that anyone’s opinion can be disregarded? Check out Garafalo’s history of quotes and comedy routines about herself. I suppose everything she said here is now invalidated, based on that standard.
M@
limbaugh is Traitor.
Being an extreme conservative is not about politics or religion: it’s about anger (always mad, upset, distraught about something), enemies (more important than friends because it gives them clear objects to hate and attack), and privilege (although I appear to hate to admit it, I’m better than you therefore I resent you).
It’s not surprising so many people are ultra-conservative: their lives are filled with anger, bitterness and resentment. They can’t/won’t trust others. Winning makes them feel good. Right or wrong is beside the point.
Look past the politics and you’ll see a boiling pot of poisonous emotions.
rush at least has a sense of humor, olberman and garofalo take themselves very seriously. a former sportscaster and a failed comediene get to psychoanalyze the most popular talk radio host in history, now that’s funny. if rush was as mean as they are he would buy msnbc and turn it into a conservative network. will obama ever say or do anything that these two won’t agree with?mindless liberals thinking that they are doing good by taking care of me. only problem is i don’t want to be taken care of. idiots.
@Jim,
Thanks for making my point.
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GG, make your point? here i was thinking i made my point!!! i said nothing hateful, unless you think the truth is hateful. with you libs there has to be victims, without victims you can’t exist. my point was rush is a bit of a buffoon,, but olberman and garofolo are bigger ones. of course, now they are victims, being a part of a group of buffoons makes them so. i suppose you will want to join them.then obama can save you too, even if you don’t want to be saved.
The meme that liberals are obsessed with victimization is just projection by conservatives. The foundation of the conservative narrative is built on victimhood. If you actually listen to their rhetoric stripped of its nationalistic jingoism, what you hear is whining about their victimization by big government, the tax man, the New York elite, Hollywood liberals and, best of all, the “liberal media.”
For example, during the Stimulus debate, Eric Cantor and the other GOP congressmen complained constantly about their mistreatment by Obama and the Dems. “We had to vote no on everything because the mean ol’ Democwats were mean to us.”
Have you ever really listened to Joe the Plumber? All he does is whine. He’s the biggest victim on the planet — except for Sarah Palin, who blamed everyone in the McCain campaign but herself for her dreadful performance last year. She was introduced to the nation blaming the media for reporting the story that she — an advocate of abstinence only — let her 15 year old daughter get pregnant by the son of a meth dealer.
After Prop 8 passed, the right-wing Mormons who donated millions to repeal the civil rights of gay people claimed to be victims because sunshine laws exposed their donations to the hate campaign. They were so invested in their victimhood that they filed a lawsuit to overturn the sunshine law, the primary purpose of which is to prevent laundering money through campaign donations.
Why couldn’t Bush find WMD? He was the victim of bad intel by the CIA. And when he became a national laughing stock after the “Mission Accomplished” fiasco, he blamed it on a staffer. Poor Georgie. Bush never admitted a mistake, blamed everything bad that happened on others. Another word for that: victim.
When Cheney shot his friend in the face, it was the friend who apologized for all the trouble he’d cause poor Dick. When John Kerry made a reference to the fact that the Cheneys’ openly gay daughter was gay, Lynne felt so victimized that she called him an “awful man.”
During Iran-Contra, Reagan blameshifted responsibility for the scandal to Ollie North and others. Poor Ronnie was victimized by his own staff who duped him into selling weapons to the Iranian terrorists. Earlier in the Reagan administration, they invented the War on Drugs to take the heat off poor Nancy’s obsession with White House china — and we’re still paying billions for the bogus “war” and her victimhood 29 years later.
Sean Hannity rose to fame on his victimhood, claiming to have been attacked for his right-wing views by liberal academics in college. Laura Ingraham and Michelle Malkin also became famous for their victimhood at the hands of college liberals.
Why did Newt shut down the federal government in 1995? He said it was because Clinton made him sit at the back of Air Force One with Bob Dole. Poor Newt.
Clarence Thomas claimed to have been the victim of a “high tech” lynching. Robert Bork claimed to have been treated unfairly during his nomination hearings too. Bwaahh!
All of this is nothing new. Back in the 1950s, Sen. Joe McCarthy, the quintessential conservative — surly, cruel, self-hating and closeted — spent the short years of his life after he was shamed out of office salving his victimhood with booze.
madison, while there is truth in some of what you say please notice that the conservative ‘victims’ are individuals. the libs make victims out of groups of people. gays, women, illegal aliens, blacks, hispanics,people without health insurance, why even terrorists have been made a class of victims. i neither follow the left or right, i think for myself, i didn’t like bush and so far am underwhelmed by obama. sometimes i think i’m the only one left in america that isn’t a ‘victim’.that in itself would qualify me as a victim under the libs.but, sadly, i refuse to be victimized.
Conservatism is groupthink — why do you think they call themselves Dittoheads? Its methodology is to promote order at the expense of liberty. Left unobstructed, conservatism ultimately leads to corporate oligarchy — a system that can be described as hour-glass shaped, with a tiny, elite overclass on top that holds 99 percent of the wealth, a small middle class of professionals and merchants to provide services to the elite and a huge underclass held in servitude at the bottom.
Over the course of U.S. history, the “victim” groups mentioned above have irrefutably been targets of violence and oppression by the right-wing white, paternalists: the antebellum slave-holding Democrats (who were the last successful American oligarchs), the anti-Irish and anti-Catholic “Know Nothings,” the Civil War era Confederates and Copperheads, the Jim Crow era White Citizens Councils and their KKK terrorist arm, the Dixiecrats and today’s Neocons, Christian nationalists and Neo-Confederate Republicans.
The idea that liberals created these victim classes is as ridiculous as it is integral to the aspiring oligarchs’ propaganda. So long as they are forced to allow voting, conservatives will require the support of poorly educated whites, who, unlike well-informed people, often fail to understand that helping the right replace the republic with a corporate aristocracy diametrically opposes their own self interests. (Rush, Hannity, O’Reilly, Rove et al are all products of the working class who foolishly believe that if they help oligarchs like Bush, Cheney, Rupert Murdoch and others overthrow the republic now, the oligarchs will look after them when they take over.)
Rush and the Fox News propagandists function to keep low-info whites seething with anger over imaginary victimization by the so-called liberal elites and by convincing them that they are in a zero-sum struggle for success with minority groups. (Jesse Helms’ “white hands” ad is a classic example of this.) The propagandists sneer at education, enforce distrust in all sources of information but their own propaganda outlets and incite hatred and paranoia — all of which makes Dittoheads programmable so that they will vote against their own economic self-interests.
A classic example of this was in 2004 when George Bush — the worst president since his maternal ancestor Franklin Pierce — did not deserve to be elected, as events since then have clearly and irrefutably shown, so Rove added anti-gay ballot measures in key states, including Ohio.This hate-based bait drew hate-addicted voters (who, in a bizarre development that will befuddle future generations, have become convinced by right-wing religious leaders that gay marriage somehow victimizes them) in droves and tilted the election toward Bush, preserving the oligarchs’ momentum for four more years.
If you want to see what America would look like if the right wing were allowed to succeed, look at Mexico, where a tiny number of corporate oligarchs control all the wealth, supported by services from a small middle class of professionals, managers and merchants in a class structure that sits on top of uncountable masses of poor people who barely eek out a subsistence living. (The newest group that American right-wing propagandists have pitted against low-info whites, ironically, is the Mexican underclass swarming across the border in flight from the same oligarchical system Bush, Rove, Rush and company are hellbent on forcing onto the United States.)
Fascism, which can be defined as the integration of corporations and government and the elimination of democracy, easily coexists with oligarchies. Listen past their patriotic jingoism and watch what Reagan, the Bushes and the other oligarchs do when they attain power: They gut the government, strip rights from individuals in favor of corporations and hand the nation’s wealth over to business interests through outsourcing and deregulation. By this standard, Bush and the Republicans in Congress were enormously successful over the past decade.
Again, looking past their rhetoric and judging by their actions, either they were the most incompetent pols to control the government since the Grant administration or they deliberately set out to bring on the recession we’re experiencing now. Watch the actions of the Republicans in Congress now as they do whatever it takes to obstruct an economic recovery, even if their obstructionism forces their white, low-info constituents into bankruptcy and homelessness.
Economic disorder is how fascists upend societies. It wasn’t hatred of Jews, per se, that brought Hitler to power. He was elected with the votes of 6 million unemployed Germans who had become convinced by Hitler’s propagandists that Jews had caused their economic plight. The truth about who the true “victims” were in Germany was not revealed until it was far too late.
Like him or not, Obama is an obstacle in the march to oligarchy. That is why Rush is so desperate for him to fail.
Madison, Obama is no obstacle to oligarchy because that economic disorder you cite in how fascists (and you don’t even know what they are) upend societies is Obama’s raison d’etre, from his days as “community activist” working with south Chicago slumlords who impoverished the area. Fascism is a leftist ideology, not a rightist one. To see how America would look with a right wing victory you’d have to look at the multifold strengthening of the economy in the 2000s – a strengthening the left was always in denial about because it was a Bush surge, the kind the left has never and can never bring about.
Mexico is not right by right-wingers, it is run by left-wingers.
Mexico has been run by one-party rule, for all intents and purposes, for decades. That party, the PRI, is the conservative party.
Fascism is the opposite of a liberalism. (You’ve been reading too much Jonah Goldberg.) Fascism:
Liberal extremism is statism. Worst offender would be Stalin.
Your facts on Obama are incorrect too. He is not the liberal you’re trying to make him to be (as I suspect you know). We’d be better off if he were. (And the idea that slumlords are liberals is just laughable.)
Also incorrect on the economy. In the early 2000s, Bush took the $600 billion Clinton surplus and flushed it down the toilet with his amoral, senseless war and corporate welfare hand-outs.
i got a feeling madison isn’t going to shut up. too bad, i always like a good debate, but madison is so impressed with himself its hard to talk with him. ah, probably either a college student or professor, no one else could possibly be that impressed by themselves.
Yeah, those damn educated people are ruining the country. But I’m neither a student or a professor, just a vigilant citizen.
but very impressed with yourself. plus, i too am a vigilant citizen, not so impressed with you or ANY of our politicians.
Changing the subject to me personally is a familiar right-wing tactic: If you can’t argue the substance, get personal. It’s funny that in the next post after I wrote that the standard definition of fascism as including “suppressing opposition and criticism,” you wrote, “i got a feeling madison isn’t going to shut up.”
The notion that liberals nurture victimization any more than right wingers do is patently bullshit. Except for the country clubbers (ie. the most liberal Republicans), every wing of the conservative movement is dominated by victims. The Christian nationalists and Mormons carry on incessantly about how they’re persecuted by liberals who won’t let them hate in peace. The tax-haters are victimized by poor people (but don’t mind it when the government give welfare to corporations). The racists are victimized by affirmative action. The border paranoids are victimized by illegals stealing their jobs. The low-infos resent just about everyone who’s better off than they are.
The fact is, politics is about getting needs met. At the most fundamental level, that’s what politicians do. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that both sides have interest groups centered around trying to right wrongs and improve their lives.
It’s puerile and easy to label those interest groups as victims, and as I said at the outset, conservatives’ blathering about liberals and victims is just projecting their own foibles onto their enemies.
Look — a new documentary by a right-wing filmaker that focuses on Sarah Palin as a victim:
Poor Sarah. Katie Couric and Norah O’Donnell were mean to her.
Which brings us to the conservatives’ other pompous self-delusion — that they always take personal responsibility for their own mistakes and failings. In fact, the opposite is true.
But don’t get me started.
Olberman should take off the Grouch Marx glasses ,nose and eyebrows before he calls someone else a comedian.
hey madison, just so you know, changing the subject is something both right and left do. once again, i’m not impressed
Back at ya. But I did want to pass along this op-ed today in which Jonah “Doughy Pantsload” Goldberg whines about Rush Limbaugh being a victim of liberal bloggers, The Tired War on Rush Limbaugh. He also claims Rush was a victim of an attack by the Clinton administration.
All this victimization could explain why Rush ingested so much OxyContin that it caused him to go deaf.
Enjoy!
now you have made me a victim madison, i will await my portion of the stimulus package, since all victims need to be saved. of course if i don’t get my share i will remain a capitalist and go about what i have been doing all my life, paying taxes to help other victims. of course i am willing to do nothing, like other victims, if the government bails me out.
Madison, that was truly incredible. You got Jim through the 5 stages of grief. I think he’s made it to acceptance, since he’s admitting he’s a victim!
(Well, not really, because he’s blaming it on you – I guess he didn’t quite get that part about “taking responsibility”.)
Good job though! I liked your well-thought out and reasoned responses.
The only comment I would make is that Republicans/conservatives tend to do a better job of using emotion (particularly, fear) to their advantage in political persuasion than Democrats do. Drew Westin wrote a great book about it – I think you’d enjoy it, it’s called “The Political Brain.”
hey jose, what you failed to see was my sarcasm. seems to me the only thing i grieve for is the loss, over the past 20 years, of my country. and i’ve lost it to both extremists on the right and the left. of course you being a victim of a group [the group being idiots] you would not understand sarcasm.
Hi Jim,
I got the sarcasm. That’s why I said, “Well, not really…” because obviously you DON’T get what Madison said, since you were being sarcastic. Clearly, you’re the one having trouble taking responsibility for your own actions and words, and your ad hominem attacks on Madison after you failed on facts is evidence that you are, therefore, an authoritarian (i.e. – extremist). So you’re still in denial.
That’s ok – Rush Limbaugh, multi-millionaire that he is, thinks is just a ‘regular guy” that isn’t an extremist either (also in denial). Because of course, he “loves this country” yet can’t fathom how “liberals have destroyed it.” Ummm… why do you love it if they’ve destroyed it, Rush?
And I liked that last little shot at the end you took at me – that I’m an idiot? Oh, that hurt!! Ouch!! (In case YOU missed it, that’s sarcasm.)
Oh. Gee. I guess I DO understand sarcasm.
i am no extremist, i think limbaugh is a buffoon, as i do olberman. they are one in the same. i am an individual who has made his own path in life without the governments help but believe the government should help those in need. i do not believe that the government should help those who refuse to help themselves. our government is now in the banking business, the auto business, and can’t wait to take over healthcare. remember this jose, the government that gives you everything can take everything away. unlike limbaugh i am rooting for obama to do well.i hope you do too. its been fun.
The difference is, there’s an easy way to tell when Rush is lying: His lips are moving. Olbermann’s facts are all sourced because, unlike Rush, Olbermann is an actual journalist. Rush is simply an entertainer.
I did have a penny drop the other day when I heard Rush describe Pres. Obama as being “impressed with himself.” Interesting turn of phrase. Again, a right winger projecting his own foibles onto others.
[...] National Convention “literally look[s] like Nazi Germany” and recent speculation by Janeane Garafalo and Keith Olbermann that “Eva Braun, Hitler‘s girlfriend … is exactly the type of woman that responds [...]
Nice job, Madison. Your comments were reasoned and not overly flippant.
Jim, don’t believe anything you hear. Look at the facts. Bush totally screwed the pooch with the economy based on the Phil Gramm/Grover Norquist deregulation and privatization. Neo-liberalism (a la Bill Clinton) is better, but not great by the majority of us. Look at the median income over the last 40 years – by the way, you know the difference between median and mean, right?
If you pursue knowledge long enough, you’ll realize that Chomsky is a brilliant person.
Thanks Madison for being intelligent and articulate.