I quite disagree with our host, who writes:

May Limbaugh Burn In A Thousand Fires

[..] I really don’t understand why people are so squeamish about wishing pain and death upon truly despicable souls. After all, we wish a thousand sufferings upon Osama bin Laden, right? Why not also Rush Limbaugh?

What would a thousand sufferings upon Osama bin Laden look like?  Torture, perhaps? Does advocating such a punishment become acceptable so long as we’re not the ones doing it? He “had it coming”, poetic justice, etc.?

It is natural to wish vengeance on those who strongly offend or have wronged us.  Picture yourself as the father of a girl who has been raped and murdered, and imagine that one year after the perpetrator is apprehended, you find yourselves alone in a room and have some guarantee that you won’t be connected to the scene. (or even without such a guarantee!) What would you do?

The human thing, I expect. But there is a reason we don’t allow victims’ families to be judge, jury, and executioner or prison staff. If asked to consider a different but analogous situation objectively, such a father—or relatives of those who were massacred on 9/11—would probably appreciate the wisdom of blind, dispassionate justice free of conflicts of interest.

The question then becomes: What should our attitude be in the vast middle ground between the passion of victims and formal justice? For instance when we empathize with their pain in a blog post, or a conversation among friends? And should it make a significant difference if we declare a wish for drastic retribution to be carried out by an abstract force of nature rather than volunteering or explicitly advocating others do the deed?

It is a truism that protecting free speech entails protecting vile speech, including that of would-be-censors like the religious right or the PC left. Similarly, promoting tolerance entails some tolerance of people who are themselves intolerant.  And in the particular case here, promoting decency requires a certain level of decorum towards indecent, despicable bile spewers like Mr. Limbaugh.

As Andrew Sullivan put it:

The only decent thing to do is to hope for [Limbaugh's] swift and full recovery so we can get back to exposing his blarney and bile. Get well soonest.

Now our host may choose to waive this decorum and belittle my concern as squeamish— so may many of you, for that matter. But to do so is to act as a wingnut—by definition.  And should it happen often, my opinion of you will approach my opinion of typical Limbaugh fans.