Thursday, March 05, 2009

BARACK OBAMA

Do Obama's Fans Really Want to Make an Issue of Opponents' Drug Use?

Joan Walsh of Salon rips Rush Limbaugh as "a thrice-divorced, drug-abusing, Parkinson's-mocking, cigar-sucking egomaniac, a poster boy for meanness, overindulgence and excess." She alleged that at CPAC, Rush was "hopped up."

Timothy Egan, writing in the New York Times, "Polling has found Limbaugh, a self-described prescription-drug addict who sees America from a private jet, to be nearly as unpopular as Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who damned America in the way that Limbaugh has now damned the nation’s newly elected leader."

Bill Maher, not too long ago: "I give Rush a wide latitude because he’s a drug addict."

A letter to the editor in Colorado Springs: "When their chosen national committee chairman is forced to publicly kiss the bloated backside of a drug-addicted, anti-American blowhard such as Rush Limbaugh, real Americans are grateful this party is not running or representing our nation."

And the guy who has been talking up Rush as the leader of the party — the guy who shares a daily conference call with White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, CNN commentator James Carville, and ABC News This Week host George Stephanopoulos — Paul Begala: "The real leader of the Republican Party in America today is a corpulent drug addict with an AM radio talk show, Rush Limbaugh."

Here's the thing: If Rush is an "addict", then the President of the United States is a "cokehead."

Both men have had issues with consuming mind-altering substances in violation of the law in their past; both have overcome those past experiences and gone on to lead productive and successful lives. (Rush, in fact, managed to do so while overcoming a near-miss with a loss of hearing, a torturous development for a man whose entire livelihood is in radio.)

(If our friend Larry Kudlow enters the Senate race in Connecticut, I would not be surprised to see others who have no problems with Obama's past drug use try to argue Kudlow's past experiences are disqualifying.)

So I'll ask our friends on the other side of the aisle to refrain from using the term "addict" in reference to Rush, as I'd hate to see our president casually referred to as a "cokehead" on a regular basis.

Or had they forgotten President Obama's descriptions of using "blow" in his younger days?

03/05 10:04 AMShare