Posted on 01/12/2004 4:29:11 AM PST by tornado100
Several months have elapsed and I thought it might be interesting to re-examine the plight of radio megastar Rush Limbaugh. In my previous article on Limbaugh's troubles entitled "Limbaugh's Secret Life", I was initially criticized for accepting The National Enquirer's contention that he was addicted to prescription narcotics. Heck, I was also skewered for surmising that the conservative icon was likely to be subject to arrest, pursuant to his drug activities. In hindsight, I think my points were well taken. My article came out about five days before Limbaugh publicly acknowledged his addiction and need for rehabilitation. And now criminal charges against Rush might be unavoidable, if the Palm Beach prosecutor has his way. I have no crystal ball, just plenty of life experience. In fact, I'll be quite happy if I'm wrong about this situation. However, there's no need to fret -- even if Limbaugh takes some type of plea, he's looking at court supervision rather than jail time.
Now for some pertinent background information --The National Enquirer vets its front page exposés of celebrities with a phalanx of attorneys, certainly more thoroughly than anything that you would read on the front page of The New York Times. That's a sad commentary on our modern culture, isn't it? Common sense dictates that the tabloid was not going to place itself at the mercy of Limbaugh and a libel suit. The National Enquirer couldn't afford to be wrong. That said, I rightly judged that the essence of the story - Limbaugh's significant addiction to painkillers - had to be accurate otherwise the publication would not have gone to print with it. But what about those that categorically reject anything published in The National Enquirer, claiming that it's all pure drivel rife with abundant sensationalism? I'll readily concede there's a lot of innuendo and spinning that's intended for pure titillation purposes in The National Enquirer - But the lead stories (such as the Limbaugh piece) often contain significant morsels of truth, which is directly attributable to decent investigative reporting by journalists such as David Wright and oversight by attorneys. To some degree, The National Enquirer and its sister paper, The Star, get a bum rap. Many "junk paper" aficionados point out that the supermarket tabloids sell millions of copies each week precisely because they deliver genuine tidbits to their readership.
Since Limbaugh's return from residential treatment, he's verbally eviscerated the tabloid for relying on the statements of a couple who had "blackmailed" him. His anger toward the tabloid is totally understandable. However, it's important to note that although The National Enquirer didn't get everything right in their article on Limbaugh, it certainly got much of the story right - at least the key elements. As an aside, Limbaugh violated a fundamental precept in life that you should never, ever permit yourself to be blackmailed. And it demonstrates Limbaugh's depths of despair in his attempts to manage a dire, no-win situation. Ultimately, it was really Limbaugh's responsibility to have gone directly to law enforcement authorities if he was being blackmailed, but he chose not to do so. Clearly, he wanted to avoid scrutiny of his own drug involvement.
Despite Limbaugh's shortcomings, his fans have remained profoundly loyal. Rush's audience numbers are peaking at an all-time high due to his incisive political analysis that's the best around.
(Excerpt) Read more at gopusa.com ...
Couldn't begin to speculate. I'll go ahead and tell you publicly after all: I have never used any anti-depressants, and used no drugs of any kind, prescribed or otherwise, during that crucial period.
I used prayer when urges hit. I called my NA support list people. I called my Sponsor. I went to meetings. After time, the urges got smaller and more managable.
You are obviously claiming to be able to read his mind.
Is your second statement a stand alone (independent of your first statement), or is that the 'mind-reading' conclusion you arrived at as a result of a false belief (the first statement)?
Since you claim to be able to read his mind, and have also said that his tone has changed (I, personally, haven't noticed any such change) since those first days when he got back, maybe you would be so kind as to show the rest of us how his thinking (and tone) has changed from what he said the bottom line is when he first got back, here:
"You can boil it down to one real simple essence: I can't be responsible for anybody's happiness but my own, and if I allow somebody else the power to determine my happiness, then...well...that's something I don't want to do. I can't do [it] any longer. I put myself first. Doesn't mean be rudely selfish. It just means I can't depend on other people to make me happy. I have to do that myself. I'm the only one who has control over that."
Karl Marx laughed at the clueless and admitted how much he depended on them. Hahahaha
I'll bet you perceive these words as quite irritating, since they give no hope to those who want to use Rush to promote their agenda to his vast listening audience:
"You can boil it down to one real simple essence: I can't be responsible for anybody's happiness but my own, and if I allow somebody else the power to determine my happiness, then...well...that's something I don't want to do. I can't do [it] any longer. I put myself first. Doesn't mean be rudely selfish. It just means I can't depend on other people to make me happy. I have to do that myself. I'm the only one who has control over that."
Hahahaha
Golly, Matchett. I seem to really be pissing you off here. I don't mean to do that. I'm just drawing my experiences that I have had, in the rooms of NA (of which I just returned from one *just now*) to speculate -- and I do stress, speculate -- on Rush's present recovery.
The reason it seems obvious to me that he hasn't gotten the First Step1 yet, is he has not surrendered to his addiction. Oh, he paid a good deal of lip service to it at the beginning, and heck, we've all seen the addict that learns the "proper" thing to say -- who then goes out and uses. I have lost friends in this program who have done just that.
But when he begins blaming all sorts of people around him -- which you cannot deny he has been doing lately -- for various predicaments he finds himself in, he has not surrendered. It is axiomatic to an addict that part of surrender is a complete surrender into the consequences of his using.
Took me a long time to understand that. Rush is just doing typical textbook-addict behavior.
Now, I suspect, because you seem to have something invested in this, that this will send you into a paroxym of posting, and pinging strings of people (to serve as fellow hecklers?), but I don't care. I really don't. I'm going to call this disease as I see it, and since Rush matters to me, I'm going to apply my life-lessons to assess where I speculate he is at.
Enjoy or ignore, I really don't care.
1 The First Step of Narcotics Anonymous: "We admitted we were powerless over our addiction and that our lives had become unmanageable."
Thank you, EveningStar. I think Matchett thinks I am attempting to denigrate Rush. How very opposite of my intent that it is. He is a fellow recovering addict. I wish he was in my Home Group. I just got a year clean, so I don't feel comfortable Sponsoring yet, but for him I'd make an exception. I want to see him succeed.
Plus, he is an icon for me. He turned my viewpoints around. He has done more good for Conservatism than any one other person, William Buckley included.
Matchett won't change my mind on my opinion of his progress. Ya can't bullshit a bullshitter, and I was one of the best. We in NA often see right through crap, cuz we been there, spouted that.
see, my best friend was a junkie for years.
Is he/she alive? Are they clean?
Thank you sir. But, they are not my words. They were taught to me by other addicts who have decades clean. Since they have this success, and since I didn't, I decided to heed their advice. How incredibly lucky for me that I did -- I might be dead right now, otherwise.
This means they are on a witch hunt for sure.
Sir -- and I mean this in the most inoffensive way possible -- but you have anger issues.
Don't look to the darkest possible motive in every person. Not all of us will be able to measure up to the bar of "raw evil" you set for us.
I appreciate your worry, and ask if you could include me in your prayers every now and again. Being clean from drugs is difficult, but wonderful. Thanks.
That's very catchy...reminds me of a conjugation!
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