In a discussion during the March 23 edition of his nationally syndicated radio show, host Rush Limbaugh blasted three members of the Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT), who were rescued in Iraq this week in a British-led military operation, stating that “these self-absorbed, self-inflated, self-important people have made this all about them.” The three activists, along with a fourth colleague, whose body was found March 9, had been held hostage in Iraq since they were kidnapped in November 2005. As Media Matters for America has noted, when the activists' kidnapping was first reported, Limbaugh said, “I like any time a bunch of leftist feel-good hand-wringers are shown reality. ... I'm telling you, folks, there's a part of me that likes this.”

Later in his March 23 program, Limbaugh continued to attack the activists. He claimed that “these people, when they [the activists] go to vote, they're Democrats. They're liberals. They're socialists. They're anti-capitalists. ... But you know they vote Democrat.” In fact, of the four activists who were kidnapped, only one -- Tom Fox -- was American, and he was killed before the rescue. The other three were from Canada and the United Kingdom.

From the March 23 edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:

CALLER: Right, roger, that's right. You know, the thing is, the guys overseas that went on -- I don't know what unit actually did this; obviously, that's, you know, all classified and everything. But they probably don't care if these guys are ungrateful. That's not really their concern. What really, I think, probably concerned them is the fact that they're wasting their time -- instead going and getting terrorists and getting the bad guys and bringing this war to an end, possibly, over there, they're having to worry about these peace activists and devote time, devote money, devote assets to them instead of possibly going and getting terrorists on that same day.

LIMBAUGH: I mean, but, you know, that is exactly right. What you have nailed here is that these self-absorbed, self-inflated, self-important people have made this all about them. They've -- they -- they try to take every -- and I think this goes back to childhood. I think it goes back to the way they were raised. I think it goes back to a whole lot of things in their early days. Everything is about them. They want to be the focus of attention, and they don't mind taking the military off path and out of its mission, and they have no appreciation for it in the first place. I mean, just, totally ungrateful. It -- it's offensive. So I -- I'm -- I'm glad you called. I can -- you sound remarkably composed, given the details of this story. You don't sound like --

[...]

LIMBAUGH: Also, went to these -- this group's website, the Christian Peacemaker Teams. And for any of you that had any doubts -- we had Amy call in the last hour, enraged and upset what these people are saying. And I said, “Amy, let 'em speak. Let more and more people find out who they are and what they think.” And I said to her, and you heard me because you were listening. You are riveted to this program each day -- it's EIB airborne phenomena spread by casual contact, the only healthful addiction known to exist in America, by the way. And you heard me say that these people, when they go to vote, they're Democrats. They're liberals. They're socialists. They're anti-capitalists, probably from the hate-America, blame-America wing of their organizations. But you know they vote Democrat.

The CPT organization did not thank the hostages' rescuers in its initial March 23 press release, but it appended an addendum to the release later that day, stating: “We have been so overwhelmed and overjoyed to have [kidnapped activists] Jim [Loney], Harmeet [Singh Sooden] and Norman [Kember] freed, that we have not adequately thanked the people involved with freeing them, nor remembered those still in captivity ... We are grateful to the soldiers who risked their lives to free Jim, Norman and Harmeet.”