Pathetic

[Milk3]

"Comedian Wanda Sykes pulled no punches as she skewered conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh at the White House Correspondents' Dinner -- but her morbid cracks set some guests' cringe-meters off the charts.

Sykes accused Limbaugh of treason, compared him to Usama bin Laden and wished for his physical collapse as she roasted the favorite target of liberals Saturday night at the Washington Hilton."

"He's not saying anything differently than what Usama bin Laden is saying," she continued, before addressing the guest of honor, President Obama. "You know, you might want to look into this, sir, because I think maybe Rush Limbaugh was the 20th hijacker. But he was just so strung out on OxyContin he missed his flight."

The crowd groaned, Obama smiled and Sykes may have noticed a little discomfort in the room.

"Too much?" she asked.

But then she piled it on:

"Rush Limbaugh, 'I hope the country fails' -- I hope his kidneys fail, how about that? ... He needs a good waterboarding, that's what he needs."

OBAMA JOINED THE CROWD IN LAUGHING AT THE CRACK about Limbaugh's "kidneys."

But White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs suggested Monday that Sykes' bit was considered in poor taste.

"I don't know how guests get booked," Gibbs told reporters. "I haven't talked to the president (about it), but my guess is there are a lot of topics that are better left for serious reflection, rather than comedy -- no doubt 9/11 is part of that."

"This woman comes up and says, 'I hope Rush Limbaugh dies,' and everybody giggles," said Tim Graham, director of media analysis with the Media Research Center.

National Review columnist Jonah Goldberg called it "particularly awful."

Sykes' publicist was not immediately available for comment."

An editor with Britain's Daily Telegraph who was at the dinner wrote that liberals will give Sykes a pass, since her target was a right-wing talk show host. And he marveled at Obama's response.

"That's way, way beyond reasoned debate or comedy and Obama's reaction to it was astonishing," wrote Toby Harnden. "Imagine if a comedian 'joked' that Obama was a terrorist who was guilty of treason and should be tortured and allowed to die. There would justifiably be an outcry."

Comedian Wanda Sykes Draws Fire With Cracks About Rush Limbaugh's Health, Patriotism - Presidential Politics | Political News - FOXNews.com

[CoeburnCane]

"That's way, way beyond reasoned debate or comedy and Obama's reaction to it was astonishing," wrote Toby Harnden. "Imagine if a comedian 'joked' that Obama was a terrorist who was guilty of treason and should be tortured and allowed to die. There would justifiably be an outcry."

Two things here:

1) Wanda Sykes is a comedian. It's her job to make people laugh, not to be politically correct. The White House Correspondents' Dinner is known as an arena for comedians to come in and do things roast-style towards political figures on both sides of the aisle, including the president. If someone thinks it's in "bad taste", they need to get over it because her whole schpiel was a routine of jokes, not national policy. She's not there for "reasoned debate", she's there to tell jokes.

2) People DID make an absolute ton of jokes regarding terrorism and Obama in the right-wing media and privately in photoshops/e-mail forwards. Those people weren't made a big deal out of because people recognized that stuff was done out of stupidity, and giving any notoriety to it only gave it credence & legs. Sad part is, people who made those jokes regarding terrorism/Obama probably meant it a lot more than Sykes meant a single word she said regarding Limbaugh or any other right-winger.

For people who poke fun at "tree-hugging hippie liberals" for being too sensitive, looks like a lot of the right doesn't like it when the shoe's on the other foot.

[sup-rbeast]

Thing is, she's not far from the truth...Rush is about as far right wing as you get without becoming looney..

[R13]

Wow, only you and pvvike would be stupid enough to defend Rush Limpballs. Cane hit the nail on the head, she's a comedian and that was funny stuff. Do you hear the shit that guy says? What about when he mocked Michael J Fox? Whenever he isn't popping the vicodin, he says a lot worse than that. Whatever happens or is said about that joke, is well deserved. Hope to hear more of this.