March 4, 2012: Former Bush White House Advisor: Limbaugh’s Attacks on Female Law Student ‘Crude, Rude, [and] Piggish’

Peggy Noonan, a conservative commentator and former advisor in the first Bush administration, denounces talk show host Rush Limbaugh’s three-day vilification of Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke (see February 29, 2012, March 1, 2012, and March 2, 2012). On ABC’s Sunday morning talk show This Week, Noonan says: “What Rush Limbaugh said was crude, rude, even piggish, it was just unacceptable, he ought to be called on it. I’m glad he has apologized (see March 3, 2012). I guess there will be a debate now about the nature of the apology. But what he said was also destructive.” Noonan says Limbaugh’s statements “confused the issue. It played into this trope that the Republicans have a war on women. No, they don’t, but he made it look they that way. It confused the larger issue which is the real issue, which is ‘Obamacare,’ and its incursions against religious freedoms, which is a serious issue. It was not about this young lady at Georgetown.” [Media Matters, 3/4/2012; TPM LiveWire, 3/4/2012]