Jackson Browne and John Hall / Possible Congressional Condemning of Rush Limbaugh

Left to Right: John Hall, Jackson Browne, John Amato, Lucas Gardner, Howie Klein

Just got back from a fantastic show/fund raiser at Rob Light's house in Encino. The fund raiser was for John Hall, and the show was by Jackson Browne. John also spent a good deal of time on stage with Jackson and they had a great, great set. Mr. Browne's vocals sounded particularly good; he has an amazing head voice.
Before the show, John Amato (from Crooks&Liars), Howie Klein (from downwithtyranny) and I got to have a chat with John Hall where we talked primarily about the infamous moveon.org ad. Congressman Hall had voted to condemn the ad, which seemed incongruous with his otherwise stellar voting record. During our talk, he defended his positioned and gave us further clarification beyond "yay" and "nay".

The Moveon.org ad, he said, was counter-productive to the Democrat's cause. The controversial headline of the ad distracted people from the valid points laid out in the paragraph below, Hall thought. Furthermore, he believes it gave the Republicans fodder for their ridiculous party line that Democrats don't support the troops (which is funny, because we were pushing to give them more time off).

Hall also pointed out that he is pushing forward a bill to condemn Rush Limbaugh for calling two, now-deceased soldiers "phony soldiers". I believe that condemning Rush would be a fantastic idea. My father listens to him and thusly I grew up listening to him, too. Rush is a fat, slobbering, hypocrite. When I was in the Dominican Republic it was well-known "secret" that Mr. Limbaugh came to Santo Domingo to have sex with people of a "younger disposition". It makes sense that he's deaf in one ear from codeine abuse - if he had two functioning ears he would kill himself if he could hear all of the shit that comes out of his mouth (one can only hope for giant strides forward in hearing restoration). But I digress.

Though the motion to condemn Rush is fantastic, one has to wonder what exactly it accomplishes except a congressional "slap on the wrist". When Howie asked Congressman Hall if voting on bills to condemn people's actions was a good use of congressional time, Hall replied "Probably not". I happen to agree with him. I also agree that the moveon.org ad gave the Republicans fodder for the endless white noise that they spew instead than talking about substantial issues.

But here's a question: If Congress condemns moveon.org for an advertisement, and they may condemn Rush Limbaugh for something he said, then why not publicly condemn Blackwater Security for killing civilians and allegedly smuggling guns?

Left to Right: Jackson Browne, John Amato, and Lucas Gardner (photo by Howie Klein)