Don't Hide Your Light Under a Bushel Basket

I had a Facebook chat recently that made me laugh out loud, so I thought I would share. Because that's not obnoxious or anything, right? Trying to get additional giggles out of conversation leftovers?

Anyway, names have been removed to protect the innocent and all that jazz. Here's the background: one of my friends, we'll call her New England, posted a petition on her Facebook account to ask Republican leaders to denounce Rush Limbaugh. Someone she knows (let's see, clever pseudonym...), we'll call him Dummy, spewed PAGES of vitriol and invective in response. A mutual friend of New England's and mine decided to taunt him. She will henceforth be known as Same Name.

In case you live under a rock (no offense, Coober Pedy!) and don't know why anyone would be posting a petition to protest Rush Limbaugh (besides the obvious, I mean). Here's the fulmeroar*: Sandra Fluke, a student from Georgetown University Law School, testified before Congress on the necessity of including contraception in health care plans.

Rush Limbaugh responded to her thoughtful, intelligent testimony with crude assumptions and insults. In his cloacal ramblings, it's clear that he misunderstands how the mandate is being funded. He thinks it's paid for through taxes. Nope. The mandate requires that private, non-church/temple/mosque/compound employers include contraception in their plans, and if they choose not to, that the insured has the option of obtaining it directly from the health care provider, at the provider's cost, which they would be okay with, 'cause guess what? Birth control pills are less expensive than BABIES.

Taxpayers funding health care plans that provide birth control may be in our futures, what with the introduction of universal health care. Although, I repeat: birth control pills are less expensive than BABIES.

The problem in oh, so, so many ways, is that Rush Limbaugh has way more access to the ears and minds of America than, say, C-SPAN. This means an unfortunately large swath of people believe what Rush said is true. And one of them has access to the Facebook page of my friend.

Here is the conversation that Same Name and I had about New England's page after the fact:

Same name: Dear lord, have you seen this craziness re: [New England]'s post?
I know it's wrong to poke a bear, but sometimes it's just so, so hard not to.

Me: I did -- she sent me an e-mail about it (including [her brother]'s response). That individual clearly needs some kind of medication or hug. Or medicated hug. And he needs to learn that he's misinformed about who's paying for what.

Same Name: Medicated hug is brilliant. I really need to stop before he hunts me down and kills me. I imagine him like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man coming for me.

Me: Yes, and he would also be sucking his thumb. And waving a box of condoms at you. So, is this the kind of non-mommy-group intellectual stimulation you were looking for? Because if so, you know, FAIL. Also, I think medicated hugs should be applied by pandas wearing capes.

Same Name: More brilliance. Where's the petition to get that covered by universal health care?

Me: It would pass in a heartbeat.


...and, scene.


*One of Super Ninja's former co-workers totally ganked up the word falderol, which was so perfect, I now choose to use fulmeroar.