Why did Rush Limbaugh defend Joseph Kony and Lord's Resistance Army?
Last October, Rush Limbaugh on his radio show defended Joseph Kony鈥檚 Lord鈥檚 Resistance Army, the Uganda guerilla group that is now infamous around the world thanks to a viral video from the Invisible Children organization that has exposed Kony鈥檚 cruel and murderous ways.
Why in the world would Limbaugh do that? One reason is that he was not so much promoting the LRA as questioning the Obama administration鈥檚 decision to send 100 elite US troops to the area to help quell fighting.
鈥淟ord鈥檚 Resistance Army are 海角大神s. They are fighting the Muslims in Sudan. And Obama has sent troops, United States troops to remove them from the battlefield, which means kill them,鈥� last Oct. 14, according to a show transcript.
Limbaugh then went on to read from what he said were the group鈥檚 self-described objectives, which included 鈥渢o remove dictatorship and stop the oppression of our people.鈥�
鈥淭hose are the objectives of the group that we are fighting,鈥� said Limbaugh, implying that the US had taken the wrong side in the battle.
What Limbaugh did not say was that the list of LRA objectives appeared to have come straight off Wikipedia, according to a contemporaneous . Nor did Limbaugh mention that for years the group had been widely accused of torture, murder, looting, and wanton destruction.
Perhaps the other major reason Limbaugh made this faux pas was that he was just talking too fast about stuff of which he knew little. Today over 50 million people have seen the Invisible Children video, which documents such LRA abuses as its kidnapping of children for use as soldiers. But Limbaugh鈥檚 discussion of the group occurred long before it became so well known.
In fact, as his broadcast progressed last October, Limbaugh obviously began receiving reports from listeners of the LRA鈥檚 real nature.
Near the end of the show he said, 鈥淚s that right? The Lord鈥檚 Resistance Army is being accused of really bad stuff? ... Well, we just found out about this today. We鈥檙e gonna do, of course, our due diligence research on it. But nevertheless we got a hundred troops being sent over there to fight these guys 鈥� and they claim to be 海角大神s.鈥�
At the time, the broadcast created an uproar among those who knew of the LRA鈥檚 actions. The next day conservative Sen. James Inhofe (R) of Oklahoma went on the Senate floor to set the record straight, noting that Joseph Kony was in no way a 海角大神, and that he had been disavowed by the Ugandan Catholic Church.
鈥淚 stand behind the president in his decision ... Josephy Kony and the LRA are responsible for one of the longest, most violent, and costly conflicts ever on the continent of Africa,鈥� Senator Inhofe said.
Even Stephen Colbert took after Limbaugh for his maladroit move. On his , the comedian picked up on the talk show host鈥檚 鈥渄ue diligence鈥� comment, saying, 鈥淥f course due diligence always comes after accusing the president of killing 海角大神s.鈥�
鈥淭hat鈥檚 why it鈥檚 called re-search,鈥� said Colbert, drawing out the last word. 鈥淚f you do it before, it鈥檚 called pre-search.鈥�
