Rush Limbaugh makes a total fool of himself

Before good old Rush goes off on one of his diatribes, he really should make sure he knows what he's talking about.  But I guess that's too much to ask.  At least this time there enough computer literate folks who can rub his nose in it.

His latest is the claim that the Democrats put the Stimulus Bill in a pdf format so we can't keyword search it, so we won't know what it REALLY says.

Um....

Have you tried Ctrl F?

From Mediamatters for America Blog

During the February 13 broadcast of his syndicated radio program, Rush Limbaugh claimed that Democrats "have reformatted the bill -- they've made it a PDF [Portable Document Format, created by Adobe Systems] file when they posted it. Now, for those of you that don't use computers, basically what that means is that it cannot be keyword searched. A PDF file is essentially a picture of a page. And, so, you can read every page, but you cannot keyword search it. It's not a text file as legislation normally is as posted on these public websites. They don't want anybody knowing what's in this." In fact, PDFs are searchable in multiple ways. In its Help Resource Center for Adobe Reader, a program that reads PDFs, Adobe Systems writes: "You can run a simple search, looking for a search term within in a single file, or you can run a more complex search, looking for various kinds of data in one or more PDFs. You can run a search using either the Search window or the Find toolbar. In either case, Reader searches the PDF body text, layers, form fields, and digital signatures. You can also include bookmarks and comments in the search."

Original Post by nomoreexcuses:

1. I would like to point out the hypocrisy that republicans weren't complaining about not getting to read the bills during the last administration.  So they think that what is good for the goose, is not good for the gander. I'm a democrat, and I'm complaining about it...does that count?

2. As mentioned in another post above, these people have dozens of staff members, some paid and some unpaid, who read a section of the bill and summarize what it says - so as long as they read what their own staff gives them (condensed version), and as long as they hire competent staff, they usually know what is in the bill.  Ironically, there are republican congressmen who voted AGAINST the bill, and then sent out a press release to their local news outlets bragging about the money that would be arriving soon in their district.  Again - that is sick, sick hypocrisy.  Vote no and take credit too. Gross. Do you really think that even with all the staff members that they had the time to review and completely understand the over 1000 pages in the bill? If so, okay...I'll just respectfully disagree.

3. This legislation was discussed in congress and on every news outlet for the past month, given that it was written and distributed before Obama was even sworn in.  That is a far cry from the Patriot Act that was introduced and voted on 5 minutes later during a time of national hysteria that the past administration wished to exploit. And you believe everthing you hear in the news? I trust my representatives will have all the facts and information before giving an informed vote...maybe that's expecting too much.

4. Being able to read legislation isn't what Rush was complaining about in the first place.  His statements were to mislead people into thinking that democrats were not acting in a transparent manner, which is not the case with this issue, at least and is truly laughable coming from him. I get that...he was complaining about the format...which is of course stupid. However the basis was the concern in not being able to properly review the documents and giving an uninformed vote.

Seriously...what's with the attitude? Why get all snippy with me because I think that our representatives should have the time to properly review legislation and make an informed vote? Do you think they shouldn't?

I read posts like this and think "republican hating democrat"..."nanana, we are now in power...deal with it"... maybe I'm reading too much into it and hope this is not what you are meaning to sound like, because that's one of the reasons we're in the mess we are in now, the republicans acting the same way.

try reading it in a non-snippy voice, really - i'm not being snippy

i'm not a democrat and i definitely am not going to support 'whatever democrats do' -- i'm fairly unsatisfied with democratic leadership, but i haven't yet been able to forgive republicans for what they've done in the recent past -- i am already disappointed in a few things about obama, but using a pdf format for posting bills online is not one of them

10 staff members, 100 pages each -- how long should that take?

You bring up a good point though.  Senators often rely on their chief of staff to delegate important and time-sensitive tasks.  If a senator didn't have a good chief of staff, if the work didn't get delegated, then that senator might have to cast a vote without knowing what the legislation says, which ought to be illegal.

However, it's hard to take complaints from republican congressmen seriously when they were happily voting on bills written by lobbyists that they never read and never worried about reading.

don't know what the answer is but the economy is going downhill so fast that i'm not sure that anyone really knows how to stop it whether they read the legislation completely or not before infusing funds into the economy.  It truly is a mess......I just hope that these funds can stop the economic hemorrhaging in our country.  Frankly, I don't care who takes credit or who gets blamed - all i really care about is that we take steps to get out of this mess before the whole dang country is eating their meals from a soup kitchen.

The real travesty is this 787 billion is a band-aid. I suspect that's why it could pass so quickly.

While I understand your concern Rache - and agree a careful and considered approach is ideal -  I think in this instance there was very little else to do. A lot of this money will be used to prevent further layoffs of vital personnel throughout the country. The states will benefit the most - in the form of continued entitlements and services.

That a talking head like Rush Limbaugh has the ignorance to turn it into 'us vs them' demonstrates how ridiculous he is.

Good point AKgal: Except I don't know if we're equipped as a society to buckle down and ride this out as our elders did in the First Great Depression. We are too far removed, I think, from our ability to 'live off the land'.

Original Post by rachd:

Please don't try to turn this into a past administration vs current administration issue, or a democrat vs republican issue.

Good luck with that. 

 I've never read so many sanctimonious comments in my life than this website.

Oh great folks. Let the cat out of the bag, people like Rushie are not supposed to know that pdf's are search-able, now someone's gonna squeel to him. Only those in the 'know' were supposed to be able to unlock the secrets in this document.

Original Post by kathygator:

The real travesty is this 787 billion is a band-aid. I suspect that's why it could pass so quickly. I agree.

While I understand your concern Rache - and agree a careful and considered approach is ideal -  I think in this instance there was very little else to do. A lot of this money will be used to prevent further layoffs of vital personnel throughout the country. The states will benefit the most - in the form of continued entitlements and services. Well...it depends. Example...Money is going to states for unemployement benefits, however states have to already have certain programs in place, only 4 states match these requirements. Texas for example, will need to implement extra benefit programs in order to get the money, but the cost to implement the programs will most likely be more than we will receive in aid from the package and taxes will need to be raised to pay for it. That's just one example though...

Original Post by octo-luv:

Oh great folks. Let the cat out of the bag, people like Rushie are not supposed to know that pdf's are search-able, now someone's gonna squeel to him. Only those in the 'know' were supposed to be able to unlock the secrets in this document.

 I had a quick look and all mention of this has disappeared from his website.  By the way, that website is horrifying.  I'm still shuddering.

Back to the question at hand. There are several ways to distill a document into a PDF file.

 I am a Network Admin and on more than 1 occasion have created PDF's that are not searchable on text.  One reason you may want it not seachable is to prevent the search engine spiders from indexing the file. This would keep it from being located by googling specific phrases contained in it. Another reason is to prevent it from being downloaded and the text being modified.

I can't believe I am actually going to slightly defend him, but I actually did access the PDF of the bill and I could not use Ctrl F either - maybe it saved as image versus OCR text??  There were a number of locations where there were pen inserts for newer sections which may have caused it to be saved in a less searchable format.  My office got $150 M for the stimulus and we are freaking out planning to get it obligated and done within the desired time frames.

(I am reading this entire thread snippy-like. It's more fun that way.) Rush Limbaugh is an idiot. So was Pres. Clinton. Republicans and Democrats all have the capacity for complete stupidity. And everyone makes mistakes. Sooner or later.

humans period... have a complete capacity for stupidity.

the funny thing about people like rushie & billy, well rushie opens his mouth too much before wanting to think (there's a slight difference of people who dont think before they speak and people that just dont want to plain want to), so he has more of a chance to say some really stupid things. and people like pres clinton, well he's a politician that was in charge of america for 8 years, so his mistakes are pretty open, altho he's not the stupidest pres. not that i would compare the two.

& on the full pdf, can't seem to get it, my computer just hangs. maybe too many people trying to access it, sometimes my internet connection gets brain farts or maybe its some sort of conspiracy. but ive found a good few sites that have it broken down into different pages/sections that are search-able.

but rushie was picking on pdf's in general, that thay are not searchable & are only pictures of pages, which was the point of ridicule.

Original Post by monarch777:

(I am reading this entire thread snippy-like. It's more fun that way.) Rush Limbaugh is an idiot. So was Pres. Clinton. Republicans and Democrats all have the capacity for complete stupidity. And everyone makes mistakes. Sooner or later.

 the problem with Limbaugh is that what he says is calculated and very well thought out.  He has evil intent and preys on the uneducated who seem to believe everything he says.  He deliberately misleads which is far different from "making a mistake".

The only thing different about this incident is that Adobe users everywhere are able to call him out on it.  He's a liar with an intent to defraud the public.

i agree with clairelaine ^

and in reference to other comments, i also have not yet forgiven former President Clinton either (not for his marital infidelity - that had no effect on me and i didn't care a fig about it - i mean for some of his actions as president which affected all of us, and still do to this day - people talk about how Clinton managed a budget surplus, and that's true, but look how easily it was undone.  The only enduring thing that Clinton gave us was NAFTA, WTO, uncontrolled immigration, & the true beginning of the assault on the middle class.)

You all know that Clinton was one of the most intelligent presidents right?  I think you can disparage him for a lot of things, both personal and presidential, but I dont think any of us can complain about his level of intelligence.

Limbaugh on the other hand-- I think Rove is feeding him the scooby snacks.

sure, i agree that he is intelligent, in the sense that he is capable of quick reasoning, thorough comprehending, and effective communicating

i wouldn't put limbaugh and clinton in the same category of buffoons, not at all

i hadn't thought of it, but maybe you're right about rove.  Was it rove who thought it would be smart to criticize nancy pelosi's mouse in the recovery package? 

one thing you've got to admit is that when republicans get their talking points memo, they really stick with it - no matter how nonsensical it is.  that is group cohesion!

Original Post by clinder:

I can't believe I am actually going to slightly defend him, but I actually did access the PDF of the bill and I could not use Ctrl F either - maybe it saved as image versus OCR text??  There were a number of locations where there were pen inserts for newer sections which may have caused it to be saved in a less searchable format.  My office got $150 M for the stimulus and we are freaking out planning to get it obligated and done within the desired time frames.

 

 It's searchable with the 'binnoculars' on the side panel.

Yes, I am as ignorant.  I tried today with both the binoculars and Ctrl F and both methods worked.  I really don't know what happened yesterday - I did try.  And, although I am no where near expert, at least I am not afraid of technology....

Heh. Trust me. I had to try it before posting advice. You just never know with these new-fangled interwebs. :)

Keith Olberman on MSNBC is going to make Rush (for the upteenth time) one of his

'Worst Persons In The World'...for this mistake... I hope Keith or his staff read CC!!!! haha

P.s whoever posted that Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh should procreate!? the image of that was horrible, yuck! yuck! yuck! :) good laugh though.... 

 heheeheee Soraya