Jon Stewart on the Limbaugh-Fluke controversy

As Rush Limbaugh continues to hemorrhage sponsors despite his repeated half-assed “apologies” for his four-day-long misogynistic attacks on college student Sandra Fluke, I thought an apt way to cap it all off would be with Jon Stewart’s characteristically brilliant take on the matter:

My transcript: (click the [+/-] to open/close →)

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JON STEWART: We begin with a warning. I know many of our viewers with busy lives often use the time of this program to reconnect with their significant others with laughter and, perhaps, a little bit of sexytime. I guess what I’m saying is I know a lot of you … do it while the show is on.

Tonight, you may wanna postbone those activities. Because while the show will still be employing the Spanish fly that is a comedic take on political news, we will be mixing it with the electrodes-to-your-genitals that is this cat: human cold-shower Rush Limbaugh.

See, as you probably heard, Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown University law student, testified before Congress about how she supports the government mandate for health insurers to include contraception as part of women’s preventative healthcare, even in Catholic institutions, relating to her own situation utilizing birth control, and the situation of a friend, who needed it to regulate an ovarian cyst.

These efforts were rewarded with some words from the aforementioned Mr. Limbaugh, which I will now play for you while taking certain prophylactic measures, myself. [Puts on a yellow Hazmat-style suit.] If you have one of these at home, I suggest you put it on now. Go ahead.

RUSH LIMBAUGH: Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke said that it’s too expensive to have sex in law school without mandated insurance coverage.

[…]

What does it say about the college coed Susan^[sic] Fluke who goes before a Congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex? What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? Makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex.

[Stewart’s suit is now smeared with “mud” (or “feces” … you decide). He takes the suit off cautiously.]

STEWART: Is he done? Wow. [puts the suit away] Wow, that almost got on me.

What is even going through Rush Limbaugh’s fevered mind to get from “young woman trying to get a private institution to cover contraception” to “prostitution slut having constant sexy-sex on my dime”? You gotta misunderstand so many things. One, he seems to believe that anyone using contraception is automatically having a ton of sex! And that contraception is something a woman has to pay for every time she has sex! And that the woman is nevertheless benefiting financially from having all that dirty, contraceptive-fueled dirty sex!

Personally, I don’t get too worked up about the things Rush Limbaugh says, because he is, and has been for many years, a terrible person. [New graphic: “Extremely LOUD & Incredibly GROSS”]

Prior to this kerfuffle, any woman that pertain to women’s health, or work, or role in the world is, in Rush’s world, a “feminazi”. That’s what he calls – that’s his baseline for rhetoric. They’re “feminazis”. Someone who would … herd you onto a train to go to an Indigo Girls concert. So, it’s Rush Limbaugh. Is it particularly vile Rush Limbaugh? Of course. That’s like saying, “There’s a particularly pungent bucket of raw sewage mixed with rotting cow guts and typhoid” – he’s a terrible person.

[Stewart goes on to skewer Gingrich, Santorum and Romney for their mealy-mouthed approach to Rush Limbaugh, and hits on other conservative pundits who mischaracterize Fluke’s testimony and insult her, exposing their hypocrisy (such as how Megyn Kelly castigates Fluke for wanting to be paid for having sex, despite strongly defending paid maternity leave a few months earlier).]

Of course, chances are nonetheless slim that the present firestorm will result in anything more than more contrived displays of contrition before everything goes back to pretty much the way it was beforehand. But there’s always the possibility that some people may turn away as they finally realize the sort of rancid manure that lies beneath Limbaugh’s skin.

Tags: Rush Limbaugh • Jon Stewart • The Daily Show • Sandra Fluke