Hooked on Rush

Popular radio show host Rush Limbaugh revealed today that he is addicted to illegally-obtained prescription painkillers and is entering a rehabilitation program for substance abusers.

His supporters have “rushed” to defend their idol, running around clucking about how this is really all no big deal. Well, I’m sorry to say, it is a big deal, and the legions of Rush Limbaugh devotees are just going to have to deal with the pain. It’s always devastating to find out your idol has feet of clay. “Say it ain’t so, Joe!”

I, however, am not among the breast-beaters and sackcloth-wearers who are crying in the streets over their toppled god. Frankly, I never understood what was so great about the Rush Limbaugh program. The man was a self-admitted entertainer, not a real political thinker; his brand of rubber-chicken, Chamber-Of-Commerce conservatism has as much to do with historic and traditional conservative thought as Coors Light has to do with real beer - they contain the same basic ingedients, true, but one is watered down for easy-drinkin’ smoothness, with no bitter intellectual aftertaste.

(Speaking of Coors Light, why was it that so many of the good ol’ boys that called in to Mr. Limbaugh’s show with their “cawmints” seemed to be drywall contractors cellphoning from their pickup trucks while driving home to Lewisville? Limbaugh’s listeners were good people, mind you, but not the deepest thinkers in the world.

Not that there‘s anything wrong with that. My point is that Mr. Limbaugh’s show was meant as mass entertainment, not serious politics.)

I guess one reason I never got hooked on Rush (to make a bad pun) was that his fan base kind of freaked me out. Cults-of-personality just make me feel weird. The frenzied worship many of Limbaugh’s fans showed towards him in public was positively embarrassing at times: behavior on the level of the kids who wear Star Trek uniforms to school or spend hours writing elegies in Elvish for fallen Glorfindel of Rivendell. In sci-fi terms, Rush Limbaugh was the Gene Roddenberry of American conservatism, with his own brand of Trekkies; it must be a bummer to realize that the Great Bird of the Galaxy is just another Hollywood sleazebag like everyone else in showbiz

The problem is that people have a natural tendency to make their heroes into larger-than-life supermen, and in so doing they set themselves up for inevitable disappointment. Limbaugh is not the political genius his followers see him to be — he is a showman. I agreed with a good bit of what Mr. Limbaugh had to say on the few occasions when I tuned in to his show over the years, but it was obvious to me from the beginning that most of it was pure schtick, complete with sound effects, zingers, and catchphrases. (The latter were the most cringeworthy; I always found talk of “el Rushbo”, the ”Maharushi”, and the “Golden Microphone” to be intensely stupid, and his constant talk of “excellence” conjured up images of the kind of profound Mission Statements one sees plastered on the walls of companies run by sleazy go-getters. “SlimeCorp — Maximizing Excellence!” Give me a break!)

Anyone who took Limbaugh seriously has got to be hurting right now; finding out that anti-drug Rush is a closet pill-popper has gotta be like finding out that Art Bell doesn’t really believe in the Chupacabra. I feel for his fans — but I hope they’ve learned the lesson in all this: all men are flawed; never get too excited about any one man.

My prayers go out to Mr. Limbaugh’s loved ones. May God grant him a speedy recovery, and may those who looked upon him as more than human finally get the message.

True liberty and equality (not absolution from personal responsibility) meshes perfectly with conservatism. Thomas G. West explains this quite well in "The Conservatism of the Declaration of Independence".

Thank you for posting that interesting link. I disagree with West's analysis of equality, but his points are well-taken nevetheless. As a partial rebuttal, I refer you to “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity” by James Fitzjames Stephen, who writes:

First, as to the proposition that justice requires that all people should live in society as equals. I have already shown that this is equivalent to the proposition that it is expedient that all people should live in society as equals. Can this be proved? for it is certainly not a self-evident proposition.
I think that if the rights and duties which laws create are to be generally advantageous, they ought to be adapted to the situation of the persons who enjoy or are subject to them. They ought to recognize both substantial equality and substantial inequality, and they should from time to time be so moulded and altered as always to represent fairly well the existing state of society. Government, in a word, ought to fit society as a man's clothes fit him. To establish by law rights and duties which assume that people are equal when they are not is like trying to make clumsy feet 1ook handsome by the help of tight boots. No doubt it may be necessary to legislate in such a manner as to correct the vices of society or to protect it against special dangers or diseases to which it is liable. Law in this case is analogous to surgery, and the rights and duties imposed by it might be compared to the irons which are sometimes contrived for the purpose of supporting a weak limb or keeping it in some particular position. As a rule, however, it is otherwise. Rights and duties should be so moulded as to clothe, protect, and sustain society in the position which it naturally assumes. The proposition, therefore, that justice demands that people should live in society as equals may be translated thus:--"It is inexpedient that any law should recognize any inequality between man beings."
This appears to me to involve the assertion, "There are no inequalities between human beings of sufficient importance to influence the rights and duties which it is expedient to confer upon them." This proposition I altogether deny. I say that there are many such differences, some of which are more durable and more widely extended than others, and of which some are so marked and so important that unless human nature is radically changed, we cannot even imagine their removal; and of these the differences of age and sex are the most important.
The difference of age is so distinct a case of inequality that even Mr. Mill does not object to its recognition. He admits, as every one must, that perhaps a third or more of the average term of human life--and that the portion of it in which the strongest, the most durable, and beyond all comparison the most important impressions are made on human beings, the period in which character is formed--must be passed by everyone in a state of submission, dependence, and obedience to orders the objects of which are usually most imperfectly understood by the persons who receive them. Indeed, as I have already pointed out, Mr Mill is disposed rather to exaggerate than to underrate the influence of education and the powers of educators. Is not this a clear case of inequality of the strongest kind, and does it not at all events afford a most instructive precedent in favour of the recognition by law of a marked natural distinction? If children were regarded by law as the equals of adults, the result would be something infinitely worse than barbarism. It would involve a degree of cruelty to the young which can hardly be realized even in imagination. The proceeding, in short, would be so utterly monstrous and irrational that I suppose it never entered into the head of the wildest zealot for equality to propose it.
Upon the practical question all are agreed; but consider the consequences which it involves. It involves the consequence that, so far from being "unfortunate necessities," command and obedience stand at the very entrance to life, and preside over the most important part of it. It involves the consequence that the exertion of power and constraint is so important and so indispensable in the greatest of all matters, that it is a less evil to invest with it every head of a family indiscriminately, however unfit he may be to exercise it, than to fail to provide for its exercise. It involves the consequence that by mere lapse of time and by following the promptings of passion men acquire over others a position of superiority and of inequality which all nations and ages, the most cultivated as well as the rudest, have done their best to surround with every association of awe and reverence. The title of Father is the one which the best part of the human race have given to God, as being the least inadequate and inappropriate means of indicating the union of love, reverence, and submission. Whoever gave the command or uttered the maxim, "Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long in the land," had a far better conception of the essential conditions of permanent national existence and prosperity than the author of the motto Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity.
[Source]

I also recommend that you read The Conservatism FAQ by James Kalb. Food for thought may be found there.

Again, thanks for the useful link.

I have been a ditto head for 10 years and I must say that I am very dissapointed in Rush for 2 reasons. First he didnt come clean until he was caught. Consevatives have a major problem with people who admit to their problems and beg for forgiveness after they are caught. Rush knew he had a problem, he went to rehab twice,he should have come clean long ago. Like it or not Rush has made himself a public figure and he has a responsibility to his fans and his cause. Those of you who think he hasn't done consevatism any damage are living a dream. He may not have hurt true conservatives but he has damaged our credibility with those who are on the fence. They will now say that we aren't any different than the libs.
Second I am dissapointed that he continued to demonize drug use when he himself had a drug problem. Granted the drugs were prescribed and he had a physical problem but he should know better than to put himself in the position of being called a hypocrite.
Having said all of that I will pray for Rush and hope for his recovery. He can rescue his reputation if he handles his return with humility and humor. He should face whatever consequences of his actions like the man he is. If he has broken the law admit to it and pay the price. I shudder to think of a Rush with his mind not affected by drugs, he could do great things.

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