After news broke that conservative talk show giant Rush Limbaugh had died at age 70 on Wednesday, many on the Left took to trashing Limbaugh and celebrating his death. Many on Twitter expressed ill-wishes, hoping Limbaugh would “rest in piss.” Many prominent celebrities shared fabricated quotes falsely attributed to Rush Limbaugh or took his remarks out of context to condemn him.
“Anyone referring to Rush Limbaugh as a ‘patriot’ is a white supremacist,” Kelly Mantle, a drag queen actor, tweeted with the hashtag “Rest in piss.”
John DiMaggio, an actor perhaps best known for his role as the robot Bender in Futurama (1999-2013), noted that “rest in piss” was trending on Twitter and then suggested he approved of the message.
HEARTBREAKING: Rush Limbaugh Dies at 70
“Rush Limbaugh once said Robin Williams suicide was because he was a leftist and not due to depression,” Tony Posnanski, a left-leaning writer for outlets like HuffPost, tweeted. “Rest in piss, Rush. You won’t be missed.”
While Limbaugh’s remarks following Williams’ tragic suicide involved musings about the “pessimism and darkness” of the Left’s worldview, Limbaugh later explained that he did not attribute the comic actor’s death to leftism. “What I did was analyze the coverage, which is what I do every day on this program, is analyze who the Left is. I didn’t presume to know why Robin Williams committed suicide,” Rush explained.
Others celebrated Limbaugh’s death with less crude messages.
Cenk Uyghur, host of The Young Turks, called mourning Rush Limbaugh “a ridiculous idea.” He attacked the idea of only saying good things when a figure like Rush dies. “People are talkling about forgiving [Rush Limbaugh] now and showing compassion. Why? He never showed compassion. He did the opposite. Forgiveness has to be earned. He didn’t even ask for it. He was so proud that he attacked women, gay people & black people for a living,” Ugyhur claimed.
Kirk Acevedo, an actor perhaps best known for his roles in Band of Brothers (2001) and Arrow (2012-2020), shared an unsubstantiated quote attributed to Limbaugh. “Slavery built the South. I’m not saying we should bring it back; I’m just saying it had its merits. For one thing, the streets were safer after dark,” Acevedo claimed Rush had said. “There’s is [sic] no place in this country or in the world for ideology like this!”
As The Post Millennial’s Chad Felix Greene explained, there is no evidence Limbaugh actually said this quote. Both Snopes and The Wall Street Journal ‘s James Taranto found no evidence Rush ever said such a thing. Yet that did not stop Acevedo from sharing the lie.
Rush Limbaugh Was My ‘Radio Dad’
Singer/songwriter Finneas tweeted his condolences — to the other residents of Hell. “Feeling very sorry for the people of Hell who now have to deal with Rush Limbaugh for the rest of eternity,” he wrote.
“Rush Limbaugh was a foul f**k rat who spread nothing but hate & terror throughout his career. His radio show poisoned hundreds of millions of people’s minds. He’s a racist, a misogynist, & homophobe. His death brings me joy,” Tony Atamanuik, an actor best known for his mocking portrayal of former President Donald Trump, tweeted.
Feminist writer Andi Zeisler also celebrated Rush Limbaugh’s death. “Rush Limbaugh was a sh**ty, cynical person who did everything he could to make the world meaner, dumber, and more divided. I’m glad he’s dead and I wish it had happened a lot sooner,” she tweeted.
“It’s easy to make fun of Rush Limbaugh right now, but it’s important to remember that he also brought a lot of people a lot of joy by dying,” comedian Mike Drucker tweeted.
The Legend of Limbaugh
Brittany Packnett Cunningham, an MSNBC contributor and Black Lives Matter-adjacent police reform activist, blamed Limbaugh for the Capitol riot. “I don’t have anything to say about Rush Limbaugh, which is a lot kinder than he ever was in life. I will say is this: the fingerprint of his life’s work is all over Jan 6, the last 4 years, and the increasingly rabid, unrelenting cruelty of the last decades. Connect the dots,” she tweeted. She likely was subtly accusing Limbaugh of abetting “white supremacy.”
British-Australian actor Harry Cook seized on remarks for which Limbaugh later apologized and celebrated the radio host’s death.
“Rush Limbaugh had a radio segment called ‘AIDS Update’ where he’d read out the names of gay people who had died and celebrate with horns and bells. So the whole ‘don’t speak ill of the dead’ thing doesn’t apply to this absolute f**king monster. Let him rot,” Cook tweeted.
Limbaugh himself admitted he went off the deep end in attacking AIDS and mocking people who tragically died from the disease. Rush really did mock AIDS victims in a recurring but short-lived “AIDS Update” segment in 1990. According to The New York Times, the segment only lasted a few weeks and Limbaugh expressed deep regret over it.
“It’s the single most regretful thing I’ve ever done,” Limbaugh said at the time, “because it ended up making fun of people who were dying long, painful and excruciating deaths, when they were not the target. It was a totally irresponsible thing to do.”
Rush Limbaugh often chased controversy and did occasionally get himself into trouble. He made mistakes and he owned up to them. Yet it seems leftists consider his true crime to be his steadfast advocacy of conservative values, his suspicion about big government, and his relentless quest to expose the lies of the Left.
Rush Limbaugh also proved extremely generous. In 2008, a New York Times reporter wrote that the radio giant left “the most massive tips I’ve ever seen. The last few times his tips have been $5,000.”
Rush Limbaugh “likes to throw down the most massive tips I’ve ever seen. The last few times his tips have been $5,000.”
This was in 2008 piece.
Over the decades, Limbaugh left millions-of-dollars in tips.
That's character. https://t.co/Xg6bYCFoKj
— Mike Cernovich (@Cernovich) February 17, 2021
Americans can disagree about Rush Limbaugh’s legacy, but the searing hatred of “rest in piss” and the false accusations many celebrities have hurled at the radio giant after his death are despicable.
Tyler O’Neil is the author of Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center. Follow him on Twitter at @Tyler2ONeil.
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