Rush gets... nothing

So yet another celebrity is getting away with drug use/possession/fill in the blank with no jail time and a mere slap on the wrist. What a surprise! Hey, what can you say about Rush that hasn't already said? He's such an easy target (pun totally intended), it's almost not even fun.

To be clear here, I'm not deriding him for being an addict. Hey, we all fall down in life and make mistakes. Having severe pain and getting hooked on painkillers could happen to any of us. It's all of his moralizing and put downs of addicts before he became one that pisses me off. It's almost perfect that he became an addict in the end - like Karma coming back to bite him in the ass. For something like the second time in my life yesterday, I went to his hilarious Website to read his statement and I had a good laugh.

It's kind of fun to look back at some of his drug-related statements when he still claimed to occupy the moral high ground. I remember when Jerry Garcia died. "Just another dead doper," intoned Rush.

For even more fun, let's review one of his comments from one of his books. I heard this on Sirius Satellite yesterday, and this wasn't paraphrased by someone, this clip was played in his voice from one of his audio books. This is Rush, regarding drug addicts and legalizing drugs:

"Consider drug abuse - a lot of people say we should legalize cocaine and heroin. It would take the crime out of it, and hopefully as a result some of the violence associated with it. And besides, people who are inclined to use drugs are going to do so anyway, regardless of its illegality. But the fact that people are going to ignore and break laws is not a valid argument for decriminalization. The state would then be sanctioning, even promoting conduct that is harmful to society. It's easy for people to say that if they shoot up on heroin to say that the only people they are hurting are themselves. But that's not true. If someone becomes an irresponsible human being and a worthless citizen, he is directly or indirectly affecting everyone else who is willing to live up to responsibilities of citizenship. Drug abusers destroy their families. The government-funded health clinics have to take care of them if no one else will. If we legalize these vices we erode the societal support for prohibitions against crimes such as murder. The erosion of the moral fabric of society is a gradual insidious process. It happens bit by bit, almost imperceptibly."

What a dick. So in other words, "Drug abusers are a drain on society, unless you have lots of money like I do and don't have to go to a clinic." I suppose he also tells himself he wasn't a real addict because he never bought the drugs from a dealer and they are prescription drugs. Right. He had his Haitian/Ethiopian/whatever she was housekeeper score his blue M&Ms. Long before he got hooked on Oxy, WE all overdosed on his righteous indignation.

Of all the people who derided Clinton as the next coming of Satan, Rush is the most joyful addition to the growing list of hypocrites who have fallen from their moral high perch. Hey Rush, say hello to Henry Hyde, Newt Gingrich, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and Tom DeLay. You are now in an exclusive fraternity of "men" who are now largely ignored by the masses; yes, you still have your followers, but you never can claim to be representative of the keepers of the moral majority. You're now largely... irrelevant.

And that's a high I can't get enough of.