Presto! False Associated Press Reporting Makes Limbaugh's Bogus Pushback Sound Perfectly Reasonable

September 29, 2007 -- 1:10 PM EST // //

This is just sad.

The Associated Press has now covered the controversy surrounding Rush Limbaugh's now-infamous assertion that soldiers favoring withdrawal from Iraq are "phony soldiers." Unfortunately, the AP's reporting on Rush's pushback on the controversy is outright false -- so bad, in fact, that it goes much farther than even Rush himself did in falsifying the actual meaning of his original remarks.

As Steve Benen notes over at TPM, Limbaugh is now trying to explain away the "phony soldiers" comment by saying that he wasn't referring in general to pro-withdrawal troops, but to specific phony soldiers whom the left is using for propaganda purposes. Limbaugh has posted a transcript of the controversial radio episode, and in it, he refers to these specific "fake soldiers" later in the broadcast.