Radio hawks never wore uniforms

To the editor:

Cape Girardeau's pre-eminent sacred cow, Rush Hudson Limbaugh III, during his radio talk show of Aug. 3, characterized the losing candidate in an Ohio congressional race as "a liberal hiding behind an American uniform." This was a reference to the man's past service in, I believe, Iraq, and, of course, to that rightist gasbag's seeming belief that nothing liberal is American or patriotic.

Someone please ask Mr. Limbaugh which is worse:

* To be "a liberal hiding behind an American uniform."

* To be a vociferous hawk who, during the Vietnam War when he would have had many opportunities to eviscerate some Commies, avoided putting on the uniform altogether because of a cyst on his backside. (See Al Franken's book on Limbaugh.)

None of the vociferous hawks featured on the local right-wing brainwash radio station -- Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Neal Boortz, Rusty Humphrey, Michael Savage -- so far as I know ever put on the uniform. As kids, we used to josh those others of us who instigated conflict while remaining outside it by ascribing to them the sentiment, "Let's you and him fight."

What kryptonite is to Superman, military service is to these guys -- although they are always touting service in the military as the very acme of patriotic expression. Very much the pity it is that these tough-talking poseurs do not perceive the vast chasm between what they say and what they do -- and the horse-laughs this causes among thinking people.

DONN S. MILLER, Tamms, Ill.