Posted on 11/25/2003 1:09:09 AM PST by kattracks
Edited on 05/26/2004 5:17:31 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
November 25, 2003 -- A sneak-attack caller yesterday launched Rush Limbaugh into a defense against charges he was a hypocrite for demanding tough sentences for drug users while he himself was taking black-market pain killers. "It's not hypocritical because my behavior doesn't determine the value of right and wrong - nobody's does," Limbaugh told listeners.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Mainelli used to be the program director of WABC in the early 90's....Rush's heyday. He knows Rush pretty well.
Comprend-day?
The reason for this is that they are "red meat" topics for conservatives. You should have added the Clinton's too.
I've noticed for many years a list of topics Rush Limbaugh rarely touches. He rarely discusses abortion except in political terms. He rarely discusses homosexuality, except in political terms. He rarely discusses religion. He rarely mentions UFOs or alien invasions. And he's said very little about illegal drugs - proof of which is that his enemies had to go back eight years to find a relevant quote with which to tar him.
I think his reasons not to discuss illegal drugs are two-fold. He probably believes that topics like abortion, homosexuality, religion and illegal drugs are hot-button issues that many lesser talents use to generate an audience and he probably believes he is above that.
But secondly, and more importantly, he realized his own hypocrisy and so self-censored himself, the same way Bill Bennett never mentioned gambling when commenting frequently about declining morals, the same way Newt Gingrich hid in the background whenever Clinton's adultery was being discussed. Most people with high moral standards understand implicitly that to rail against something that they are engaging in makes them a hypocrite so they just don't discuss it.
Their silence, in and of itself, speaks to a level of hypocrisy but it doesn't match those who openly and explicitly condemn behaviors that they themselves engage in. Perhaps that is why some feel his behavior was hypocritical while others do not.
Illegal drugs was not a frequent topic on Rush's show. If it was and he condemned those who abuse drugs, I don't think anyone would argue that he wasn't a hypocrite. But he stayed quiet about the issue instead to avoid the hypocrisy he surely felt inside.
Now, as to the other issue about his "good deeds" keeping him out of jail, I've never argued that he should be insulated from the law in any degree. But I also don't believe he should be prosecuted or punished beyond what an average citizen would face. To date, he has not been arrested, charged or had his day in court. The lynch mob that argues to either throw him in jail or release every other druggie now sitting in jail are creating a strawman to whip up support for their own agendas. I'm willing to trust the Florida law community to charge him if they think they can get a conviction and to leave him alone if they think they can't.
That's not an attempt to excuse or exonerate Rush. It simply is a request to allow due legal process to work as it should with anyone. If the evidence shows that he broke the law and a court convicts him, he should serve the same time as any first-time offender.
But, then, I have high moral standards.
Baloney, he still endangered an employee, regardless of their past. BTW, nowadays, Rush Limbaugh is a KNOWN drug pusher....ho ho ho....
Modern liberalism, even as its philosophers hold that no act is objectively sinful, treats hypocrisy as a serious sin. Why? If nothing is sinful, why is hypocrisy sinful? Hypocrisy is sinful -- that is, damaging to the soul -- if the moral principles the hypocrite voices then violates are true. But liberals tell us those principles aren't true, that humans can depart from them without damage to their character. So what's the moral problem with violating a moral code liberals consider false in the first place?
Hypocrisy is a moral problem, but liberals can't reach that conclusion on the basis of liberal moral philosophy. In order to denounce it, they have to suspend their customary moral relativism and borrow the principles of conservative moral philosophy. Then, once the target of their moral outrage over hypocrisy is thoroughly eviscerated, they abandon those principles and return to a skepticism about right and wrong in which all forms of deception, including hypocrisy, are defensible.
Liberals on the hunt for hypocrisy carry an air of moral superiority. Why? Do they assume hypocrisy is a lower moral state than their standardless self-indulgence? Aristotle, among other moral philosophers, considered it a higher one. The hypocrite, whom Aristotle would call "incontinent," can retrieve his soul; the shameless see no reason to try, and therefore are morally hopeless.
``The self-indulgent man," he wrote, "is not apt to repent; for he stands by his choice; but the incontinent man is likely to repent…the self-indulgent man is incurable and the incontinent man curable; for wickedness is like a disease such as dropsy or consumption, while incontinence is like epilepsy; the former is a permanent badness, the latter an intermittent badness."
Aristotle compares the incontinent man to a "city which passes all the right decrees and has good laws" but fails to put them to use, whereas the licentious man is like a city which passes "wicked laws and puts them to use."
The latter is the city hypocrisy-hunting libertines seek to build., and woe to the conservatives who don't join them. Rush Limbaugh is their latest prey. The Washington Post this week recounted a "hilarious" evening Al Franken spent at a D.C. bar mocking Limbaugh. Franken, said someone at the bar, "does a great impression of Rush Limbaugh in a 12-step program. He said, 'Rush is having problems with the step where you acknowledge a higher power. He's wondering if you can acknowledge yourself as a higher power.' It was hilarious."
This is morally sicker than the abuse of painkillers, and probably not curable in Franken's case. Franken hates Rush not for breaking the moral law, but for once upholding it. Conservatives love the sinner and hate the sin; Franken hates the sinner and loves the sin.
Liberalism is an ongoing childish project to make conservatives cry uncle, and hypocrisy charges are the means of twisting their arms. The liberals' purpose in catching a conservative out in some hypocrisy is not to say, "You stepped away from the moral law you espouse. Go back," but to say, "You stepped away. Now keep leaving it and endorse our libertine laws." They don't see a soul in distress, but a potential convert to their libertinism. They nab conservatives not to save them but to silence their criticism of the liberal city Aristotle described. A city that sees no sin except hypocrisy. A city that takes pride in passing immoral laws and keeping them.
Hypocrisy is wrong, but a society which decides to live up to its standards by not having any is worse.
Hello Sam Cree.
Well.....its not that Bush doesn't oppose big govt programs. He promotes them.
You are correct that once in a great while such as currently with the expansion of socialized medicine, Limbaugh will complain about republican policy.
He complains but he still supports the gop.
He supports the gop in spite of the fact it does the same things the democrats do.
Regards
J.R.
You come to a different conclusion so you accuse me of ignorance of the topic. I listen to the boss bloviator and head republican cheerleader quite often. Often enough to know that your comment to me is his standard response to his critics.
Maybe you listen too much?
Party doesn't matter he smacks them equally on this issue.
I agree that in the case of the current bush led expansion of socialized medicine limbaugh has been complaining.
He complains but he still supports bush and the gop for implementing democrat policy.
That is hypocrisy.
Many claim that that we must continue to support the gop when it spits in the face of conservative principles because the democrats are worse.
The democrats are worse, but given enough time in power the republican party will take the country to the same place.
Regards
J.R.
What devastating effects?
Hannity is a mirror; his "thoughts" are reflections of what he hears elsewhere, often from Rush. In the past, Rush has taken strong stances against much of the Bush spending on education, the farm bill, and more recently medicare.
But that amount of cash would lead anyone to believe legitimate accounting is being avoided.
Additionally, it is not laundering since no illegal source exists. It makes no legal sense for that charge to be brought.
I don't disagree but I've heard that law enforcement routinely assume an illegal source and bring charges on that assumption. The defendant is then required to prove otherwise.
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