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By Erick Posted in Rush Limbaugh | War — Comments (6) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

At Senator Kyl's office's request, I'm happy to paste this transcript from a Fox News interview he conducted earlier today:

JON SCOTT: Senator Jon Kyl, he is also the Republican Conference Chairman. Senator, you too are defending Rush Limbaugh.

SEN. JON KYL: That’s right. It has been a mischaracterization of what he [Rush Limbaugh] said from the very beginning. Of course, intentionally so. He did not say that all the troops who disagree with the war or the president are phony troops, he was referring to a specific soldier who it turns out was a phony soldier and who had been discussed in his program before the conversation that resulted in the controversy. It is a politically generated controversy by Democrats who want to change the subject from the “Petraeus-Betray Us” ad which they got a lot of criticism for because they’ve been supported by MoveOn.org and didn’t want to criticize the ad.

Read on . . .

JON SCOTT: That seemed like a much more personal, much more direct slap at the general rather than this, comment by Limbaugh, which if you leave off one s, of what he said it is not a controversy at all.

SEN. KYL: Well, that’s right. They had been discussing this one particular case which was very unfortunate, a young man who was very critical of the war and claimed to have fought in Iraq, I think he claimed to have fought in Iraq. It turns out that he hadn’t. He fought like six weeks and was never abroad. He had been dubbed a phony a soldier. That is what the comment was about. Neither Limbaugh nor anyone else would claim – just to show how silly this is -- that any soldier that disagrees with the president is a phony soldier.

JON SCOTT: Have Democrats succeeded in changing the subject and Capitol Hill?

SEN. KYL: Well, to the effect that we're talking about it to some extent may suggest that. But for them to come up to the Senate floor and single out this one talk show host shows how desperate they are to try to change the subject. They are not going to be able to change it because time after time they show themselves to not be supportive of the troops. The latest evidence today? The chairman of the Appropriations Committee in the House is talking about withholding the funding for the troops until he gets the president to change his Iraq policy. This is the funding that literally provides the food for the soldiers today in Iraq. It is the funding the president has asked for not for the pentagon or defense department, not for next year. The funding for this war effort right now that the troops are engaged in.

JON SCOTT: What about the idea of maybe reintroducing that sense of the Senate resolution about the General Petraeus ad? Will Republicans entertain that notion?

SEN. KYL: In some sense we need to move beyond all of this personal attack business and talk about the actual issues. Right now the issue is are we going to fund the troops? And a lot of Democrats are saying no, not until you change your policy. That does represent a division in Democratic ranks because up until now they have been willing to argue about a change in the mission, a gradual withdrawal. But they have not been willing to say we are not even going to send the money over there to feed and house them and make sure they’ve got the equipment they need while they’re fighting. Now there seems to be a sizable chunk of the Democratic majority that is actually willing to not fund the troops. That is a dramatic change.

JON SCOTT: Senator Jon Kyl, Republican of Arizona. Thank you.