Billions of ones and zeros have been spilled over Rush Limbaugh, but my favorite comments came from the thouroughly ludicrous  Jay Nordlinger, who effused:

One of the creepiest, most disturbing things about the “war on Rush” — particularly as orchestrated from the White House? Limbaugh is a private citizen. A reader wrote, “The same people who gasped because the FBI surveilled John Lennon are more than happy to have government employees — including Emanuel and Gibbs — conduct a campaign to demonize and diminish a radio personality for political purposes.”

Rush is a big boy, and he can handle it. But still . . . There is something creepy about bringing the weight of the government down on a radio host, even if that host is prominent, influential, and brave.

“Bringing the weight of the government down”? One might get the impression from Nordlinger’s little fantasy that the Obama administration was sending the IRS to audit Limbaugh instead of building him up as the leader of the Republican party. I defy Nordlinger and his correspondent to name one person who gasped when government surveilled John Lennon but praised the Obama administration’s response to Rush Limbaugh.

Should Obama begin a new COINTELPRO to go after rightwingers, I will be among the first to denounce him, but I don’t see that happening quite yet.