Rush Limbaugh made the following statement.

So [Barack Obama has] moved on to health care. This is highly visible, it's news leading, gets a great focus, plus it has the great liberal lion Teddy Kennedy pushing it. Before it's all over it will be called the Ted Kennedy Memorial Health Care Bill.

Democrats and other liberals are outraged.

Let's examine this statement really quickly.

First, Senator Kennedy has been an advocate of socialized/nationalized medicine for a couple of decades now. He remains so in what are undoubtedly his last days, as he battles a very serious form of cancer that is likely to take his life sooner rather than later. There is nothing wrong with acknowledging those facts, is there?

Secondly, it has long been a strategy employed ON BOTH SIDES OF THE AISLE to name a piece of legislation in such a way as to make a vote against it seem wrong rather than principled. For example, the renewal of the Voting Rights Act had the names of several prominent civil rights leader attached to it, including that of Rosa Parks. It doesn't matter that the reauthorization was seriously flawed because it used 1964 election data rather than 2004 election data to determine the existence of racial discrimination today -- how do you justify a vote against legislation honoring Rosa Parks? Similarly, names like the Freedom of Choice Act, Employee Free Choice Act, and USA PATRIOT Act are intentionally designed to make a vote against a piece of legislation difficult. Why wouldn't supporters of whatever legislation ultimately emerges on healthcare name it after Ted Kennedy? They would be utterly foolish if they didn't -- especially if Kennedy has taken a turn for the worse or passed on when the legislation reaches the floor.

What you really had then was a fair comment on the strategy likely to be used to get this legislation through Congress when the time comes for it to be voted upon.

So where is the problem in what Limbaugh said? I don't see one -- well, except for one. That is that the comment can be twisted into making fun of Kennedy's medical issue and impending death. Limbaugh does neither -- but that doesn't stop folks from claiming that he has done so. Indeed, one liberal I know was absolutely outraged by the Limbaugh comment, as presented by liberal commentators/"journalists", until hearing the actual comment -- which is why the media is not placing the phrase "Ted Kennedy Memorial Health Care Bill" in context. After all, the media still remains in the tank for Obama.

I'm curious, though -- would it be possible to pass the Mary Jo Kopechne Anti-Drunk Driving and Bridge Safety Act at the same time as the health care bill?

H/T NewsBusters (twice), Radio Equalizer, STACLU