James,

I don't have access to the Rush show on a regular basis, but I think I would be right that he is conservative and moralistic and sees issues in black and white only (no shades of grey to get in the way) and expresses his opinions firmly.

ASSUMING that, he would undoubtedly have had only bad words for drug addicts and drug sellers whenever the subject came up. It would also be interesting to hear what he had to say when Elvis died, considering the drugs it was exposed that he took regularly. I seriously doubt that he (RUSH) had much quarter for drug addicts, whether the addiction was started as a result of a DOCTOR's prescription or not. Surely such addicts were weak of both spirit and morality.

William Bennett, who seemed to be acting as if he thought he was the (moral) conscience of the nation (U.S.) spoke about many things immoral but he says that he never spoke against gambling. When it was found out that he had a gambling (ooops, the word today is 'gaming') addiction he 'confessed', acknowledged it was excessive, and swore off the 'stuff'. He justifies that he was not hypocritical on the basis that he never railed against gambling. Yet gambling IS on the list of vices commonly acknowledged by virtually all Christian religions AND his (Bennett's) theme was consistently 'back to the true Christian values that built the country'. Mr. Bennett can say he was/is no hypocrit all he wants, but most of the rest of the people who hear him will think otherwise regardless.

A financial columnist here railed on for years about the excessive cost of Medicare here (covers everyone for true illness/disease/disability). Then one day her nephew developed some critically serious illness that took months in hospital and the work of numerous specialists to eventually overcome.
When the battle was clearly won she wrote in her column that she had been totally wrong about Medicare and acknowledged it value from both the financial and effectiveness perspectives. THAT is an example of not being hypocritical... she didn't 'preach' one thing while 'living' another and she did reverse her well known position after personal experience.
Too bad that people can always have strong and vocal opinions on things about which they clearly are misinformed, but that's for another thread.

In the case of both Mr. Limbaugh and Mr. Bennett they both were living one reality while clearly espousing an opposite one. THAT IS HYPOCRITICAL, no matter how it came about.

regards

>It is interesting that you would think that. According to Rush, he had back surgery about 7 years ago that did not fix his problem. Doctors prescribed pain killers to allow him some sort of relief from the pain. Long term usage to those types of pills causes addiction. Not using the pills is not a good option because of the pain. I have family members that have had similar experiences and I can tell you that it is easy to get hooked on these pills and very difficult to get off. Remember, the doctor gave them to you so you could feel better. I wonder if you had chronic pain, how you would react? You may think that Rush is a hypocrite but I have extreme sympathy for him having to endure the pain all the time because I have seen what it can do. I also believe that Rush showed a lot of class making that announcement to his audience the way he did. I am not sure that I could make such an admission if I had the same problem.
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>>Rush Limbaugh just announced on his show that he is taking a 5 week hiatus because he is entering a drug rehab center to treat his addiction to prescription medication. What a hypocrit.