Hypocritical Rush Limbaugh's Drug Abuse

Topic: Laws, the Courts and the Legal System, as they apply to hypocritical right wingers like Rush Limbaugh:


by Ellis Henican, Newsday

You can't accuse the prosecutor of rushing to judgment. This has to be the most carefully investigated criminal case in drug-war history.

And now we know what Rush Limbaugh stands accused of - violating the drug laws of the state of Florida. And we know the precise allegation that supports the conservative talk-show host's arrest.

It is "doctor shopping," fraudulently and illegally concealing information from multiple doctors to obtain massive doses of prescription painkilling drugs.

Prosecutors seized Limbaugh's records after learning that he received about 2,000 painkillers, prescribed by four doctors in six months, at a pharmacy near his Palm Beach mansion.

Limbaugh's attorney, Roy Black, says his client's arrest on Friday is all part of a plea deal in which the case will ultimately be dismissed if Limbaugh pays a fine and stays in drug treatment for 18 months.

Pretty sweet deal, huh?

But is this punishment enough for someone who violates the drug laws?

I certainly think so. If Rush hurt anyone with voracious OxyContin gobbling, it was mostly himself.

Is treatment more effective than prison time? Usually, yes, all the research says.

But what does Rush think? Is he a drug-war dove or hawk? Where does he stand on coddling drug users like himself?

Well, the usually talkable radio host wasn't talking at all when he walked out of the office of the state's attorney in West Palm Beach late Friday afternoon after posting $3,000 bail.

But thankfully, Rush has been quite chatty in the past on the issue of illegal drug use and its appropriate punishment. He's no druggie softie, that's for sure.

Actually, it turns out that Rush Limbaugh is quite a law-and-order guy when it comes to America's drug miscreants. So he must be steaming mad about the - let me use the word - liberal disposition of his own case.

"Let's all admit something," Limbaugh said on his short-lived syndicated television show almost 11 years ago.

"There's nothing good about drug use. We know it. It destroys individuals. It destroys families. Drug use destroys societies. Drug use, some might say, is destroying this country."

So far, so good. And Rush was just warming up.

"And we have laws against selling drugs, pushing drugs, using drugs, importing drugs," he said. "And the laws are good."

That's right, he said "the laws are good."

Good why?

Rush Limbaugh explained. "Because we know what happens to people in societies and neighborhoods which become consumed by them. And so if people are violating the law by doing drugs, they ought to be accused and they ought to be convicted and they ought to be sent up."

Accused? Convicted? Sent to prison? People who disobey the drug laws?

Now those are words Rush Limbaugh must regret saying.

The date was Oct. 5, 1995. I quoted these words in a column when Rush was first being investigated. So much time has passed since then, I guess I have to quote them again.

Rush was on a tear that day about the threat of illegal drugs. And he put the issue in stark racial terms. Blacks and whites break the drug laws in roughly equal numbers, he said, adding that black drug users go to prison far more often than the white ones do.

But that doesn't mean police and prosecutors should ease up on the blacks, Limbaugh roared.

"What this says to me," he told his viewers that night, "is that too many whites are getting away with drug use. Too many whites are getting away with drug sales. Too many whites are getting away with trafficking in this stuff. The answer to this disparity is not to start letting people out of jail because we're not putting others in jail who are breaking the law. The answer is to go out and find the ones who are getting away with it, convict them and send them up the river, too."

Funny, he didn't sing the praises of treatment.

He didn't come out in favor of 18-month dismissal deals.

He certainly didn't speak up for liberal drug policies.

And here we are, and there he is.

Copyright 2006 Newsday Inc.

Source: Newsday
http://www.newsday.com/news/columnists/ny-nyhen304722336apr30,0,5672935.column