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Laura Ingraham calls Rush Limbaugh 'national treasure', trolls say 'a treasure that needed to be buried'

'A true friend for 25 years. An inspiration. A patriot. Worked til (sic) the end to save the America we all love. An irreplaceable national treasure. Thank you, Rush,' Ingraham wrote

Laura Ingraham, the host of Fox News' 'The Ingraham Angle', paid tribute to conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh who died on Wednesday, February 17, after fighting a long battle with cancer. She soon got slammed for calling Limbaugh an "irreplaceable national treasure" on Twitter.

"A true friend for 25 years. An inspiration. A patriot. Worked til (sic) the end to save the America we all love. An irreplaceable national treasure. Thank you, Rush," Ingraham wrote on Twitter and also released an extensive statement on her website titled, "A Rush of Emotion, the Loss of a Friend". Her tweet was met with an array of negative reactions, mostly from people who openly admitted that they will not miss Limbaugh's presence in the world. 

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"National treasure?" one of them said, while another noted, "Get better friends." A user commented, "More like good riddance" One more wrote, "Not a patriot. Nor a treasure." The next remarked, "We lost an advocate of hate." One more said, "The devil has a new friend." A commenter tweeted, "I can't help but think of my favorite Rush Limbaugh moment... Today. :)"

A person reacted with, "A treasure that needed to be buried." Another commented, "Truth in the US will get better & conspiracy theories will lessen without him." One more remarked, "Couldn’t have happened to a more deserving person." One tweet said, "Birds of the same feathers ...."

On her website, Ingraham reflected on her time with the prolific talk radio host, praising him for becoming a "touchstone for conservatives."

"There are no words to adequately capture the man that was Rush Limbaugh," she wrote on her website. "Even though we knew this day was coming, typing the word 'was' in reference to him seems horribly wrong, an impossibility. Millions of us have relied on his wisdom and perspective for decades, and many of us cannot imagine another election without hearing his voice."

She continued, "His unbridled talent, his unwavering patriotism, his uproarious sense of humor, his boundless enthusiasm for his craft, his endless love for his listening audience, his defiant perseverance — gave us comfort and inspiration."

She recalled hearing about Limbaugh while she was attending law school and first met him in person in 1995. "I was still in law school when I remember my father going on and on about this radio host Rush — 'I’m telling you, ya gotta listen, Laura!' When I finally tuned in, on the drive from Charlottesville to DC, I was instantly hooked. Who IS this guy? Where did he come from?" she wrote.

She added: "The first time I met Rush was 1995, at his WABC radio office, as part a group of other Republican women, who were thrilled to meet him and quite chatty. He was already a conservative superstar. After about 15 minutes, he looked at me and said, 'Don’t you have anything to add?' My response: 'Yes, Rush. I’m thinking if you really work at it, you might actually make it in radio.' We were friends ever since."

The Fox News host praised Limbaugh's support of Trump, writing that "it’s hard to see how [he] would have won in 2016 without" his blessing. "From that famous guitar lick (the Pretenders’ 'My City Was Gone') at the top of every hour to his final sign-off, America was blessed to have Rush’s 'talent on loan from God' for as long as we did. But, sadly, for those of us who will sorely miss his friendship and his reassuring voice, the loan was finally called in," Ingraham concluded.