In MGM’s 1976 movie Network, aging newscaster Howard Beale, faced with declining ratings, is transformed through a unusual set of circumstances into a vociferous, investigative talk show host targeting the disaffected population of middle-class America. His talk show’s an instant hit: Until he speaks truth to power. After he’s reminded that there are interests far more important and entrenched than his controversial show, he’s told to kowtow to those interests or be fired. It seems that Rush Limbaugh’s editorial response to Sandra Fluke’s advocacy for free taxpayer-funded contraception-on-demand has now given him his “Howard Beale” moment: To succumb to apparently greater interests or steadfastly defend his principles.

There’s no denying that contraception one of a myriad of important social, medical, political, and economic issues confronting our nation, and I’m glad we live in a country were people can advocate their causes of interest. There’s also no denying Rush might have been better served to ratchet down his Sandra Fluke rhetoric a notch or two: “Free Speech” doesn’t mean “freedom from consequences”- as Bill Maher (Warning: Strong language) found out.

But, if free taxpayer-funded contraception-on-demand was so vitally important, why wasn’t it in the national spotlight during the six months the Democrats were ramrodding the Affordable Care Act through Congress?

The answer is easy: The “contraception issue” is merely the catalyst towards achieving a much larger, and disturbing, goal: Liberals want to silence an educated, widely known, well-respected, and influential voice of dissent during a critical Presidential election cycle. Failing that, their attack will at least divert Rush’s time & resources from focusing on far more pressing issues, such as this, this or even this.

Rush will certainly survive the Left’s attempt to silence him – he’s publicly apologized at least six times on the air during his long career, managing to emerge stronger and more successful after each. (BTW: Six apologies works out to one apology per 2,875 on-air hours, assuming 23 years of a 50-week work schedule comprising 5 broadcast days of 3 hours each… a rate that, to date, is less than this guy. But, I digress.) However, should the Liberal Left expand their targets to include lesser, less successful conservative personalities, they could be celebrating more than just Glenn Beck’s departure from Fox.

Here’s my take on what I suspect Liberals imagine when they dream about Limbaugh’s “Howard Beale” moment – it’s only a minor rewrite of Scene 153 from that awards-winning movie (my emphasis, of course):

RUSH LIMBAUGH (ON AIR) (sad, resigned, weary) [For over 23 years], I got up here and asked you people to stand up and fight for your heritage, and you did and it was beautiful…  It was a radiant eruption of democracy. But I think [this is] it, fellers.  That sort of thing isn’t likely to happen again.  Because, in the bottom of all our terrified souls, we all know that democracy is a dying giant, a sick, sick dying, decaying political concept, writhing in its final pain.

[The] United States is finished as a world power.  The United States [was] the most powerful, the richest, the most advanced country in the world, light-years ahead of any other country.  And I don’t mean the Communists are going to take over the world.  The Communists are [smarter] than we are [- they've already taken over].

What’s finished is the idea that this great country is dedicated to the freedom and flourishing of every individual in it.  It’s the individual that’s finished.  It’s the single, solitary human being who’s finished. It’s every single one of you out there who’s finished.

Because this is no longer a nation of independent individuals.  This is a nation of [three] hundred odd million… bodies, totally unnecessary as human beings and as replaceable as piston rods…

Not to worry, though: It’s not as if Liberals have ever conveniently silenced a conservative media personality with a Trumped-up charge at a critical point in a Presidential election cycle… just ask Jeff Jacoby about his July 3rd Boston Globe editorial on the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence.

Thanks for reading!