Rush Limbaugh's condescending treatment of a listener who disagreed with his sentiments on torture and President Obama was picked up by MSNBC's Keith Olbermann who laid into the conservative radio host on his Wednesday show.“If you miss one word as you repeat the catechism to Rush Limbaugh, you're out and you're out of the movement, which is the Republican Party," asserted Olbermann, adding, "Everyone’s going to miss one word eventually. Everbody’s going to wind up being out. It’s going to be Limbaugh and that slave camera that shoots him. That’s it.”
Earlier this week, Limbaugh lit into one of his callers, a self-identified veteran and Republican, after he said this:
"No matter what Obama does, you will still criticize him because I believe you're brainwashed," said the caller, who identified himself as Charles from Chicago to Limbaugh. "You're just -- and I hate to say it -- but I think you're a brainwashed Nazi. Anyone who could believe in torture just has got to be - there's got to be something wrong with them."Limbaugh responded with, "You know, you're just plain embarrassing and ludicrous. But it doesn't surprise me that you're the kind of Republican that our last candidate attracted. Because you're no Republican at all based on what the hell you've said here."
Media Matters has the audio and a full transcript of the Limbaugh and caller conversation here.
Commenting on the exchange to Olbermann, The Nation's Chris Hayes said it represented a philosophical divide in what remains of the Republican Party in the U.S.
"Right now, I really think you see a fissure between the right wing coalition in the people who want to kind of double-down and follow Limbaughism off the cliff…and then the people that have some sense that this is actually going in the wrong direction," Hayes said.
He added, "I don't think there’s an iota shame in Limbaugh or in Limbaughism. There’s a large part of the conservative base that doesn’t feel it has anything to apologize for."
