My Club G'itmo Initiation

I listen, obviously, to a lot of news talk radio. Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Glen Beck, Hugh Hewitt, Laura Ingraham, and even Air America if I can find it (for comic relief).

I've never, however, bought merchandise from their websites or gear stores. No "Factor gear" from Bill O'Reilly. No newsletters. No subscriptions to program webcams. None of that. Maybe a book or two that I could have gotten at a bookstore. But no merchandise.

That's changed. I made an exception. I ordered a "Club G'itmo" t-shirt from the Rush Limbaugh EIB store.

On the front it says: Club G'itmo.

On the back it says: "Your tropical retreat from the stress of Jihad".

Funny. Satirical. And it makes a point.

I bought the shirt as a reaction to the outrageous statement made by my Senator, Dick Durbin, on the floor of the U.S. Senate where he compared the US military run detainee camp at Guatenmo Bay Cuba (G'itmo) to the regimes of Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot and their treatment of prisoners. It was inaccurate, inappropriate, and deeply offensive.

Limbaugh has been running a satire since then about "Club G'itmo", making the point that the treatment of these 500 animals taken from the battlefield trying to kill Americans is actually pretty good, comparatively. Despite the overblown stories in the media about abuses at G'itmo. If a Koran was abused, as the stories claim, it's only because they have a Koran because we provided it to them. We give them prayer mats. We let them pray 5 times a day. And they get dietary meals sensitive to their religion that are better than what our troops are eating in the field. Hence, the effective satire of "Club G'itmo" to counter Durbin's anti-troop tirade.

So, I bought the shirt. It's bright orange, and sure to draw attention.

Today, I got to wear it out into public for the first time. I had to shop in some department stores and I wondered if the shirt would elicit comment. Not on the first wearing, however. There will be more outings in the shirt, to make my statement.

I'll have to find Senator Durbin's office in our area and wear it there to register my contempt for his statement and offer my opinion that he should resign.

So, I'm now initiated into Club G'itmo. Thanks, Rush.