Rush who?
I'm not interested in Rush.
A few here like to drag down the debate to personal attacks, well ok, mostly two people, most of all rjbudz and secondarily craigsub.
Craigsub, at least, posts a mix of argument and insults, though he runs screaming like a young girl from the facts he doesn't like, unfortunately.
(See post 51 in the economics thread and his explicit refusal to discuss the facts).
In this thread, while Craigsub is pretty ironic to say to anyone that they're misusing facts when he's the worst offender I see of this, his points are not too far off-target; Rush is a victim in large part, and I do have sympathy for him on his problems. However, he's also accountable for his utterly hateful, foolish, demagoguic rants against all drug abusers in the past. There's some poetic justice in his looking foolish now.
I happen to have sympathy for all kinds of drug abusers, in fact. I'm lucky enough never to have used illegal drugs (beyond some drinking before I was 21, which was damned foolish). However, I feel great sympathy for those who are in bad situations who choose to relieve the suffering through drugs and make it far worse. I'd like to see far greater education for everyone to choose not to start on drugs, and free treatment for everyone to end addiction.
Of course, liberals like to look at the big picture, and with drugs it includes the connections to street gangs getting funding from the drug trade, drug warlords in Mexico and other countries to the south commiting terrible crimes with the funding of illegal drugs, the misery in Afghanistan is increased not only by it being the country's #1 product now - they're the world's largest supplier again after a drop in one of the few good effects of the Taliban - but there are all kinds of peripheral side effects from a new addiction problem among homeless youth in neighboring countries (I saw a devastating photo spread on this in National Georgraphic) to the harm to the legal crops of farmers damaged by anti-opium measures to the pressures on farmers to grop opium and risk prison.
Basically zero of this matters much to the right, outside of the political use of saying they're against drugs while doing little that's effective, but rather simply upping the sentences, always, on the heaviest minority-used drugs (there is no excuse for the sentencing gaps between powder and crack cocaine, as even right-wing officials admit), which happens to also have the benefit of taking massive numbers of minority voters off the voting lists.
Many on the left are too quick to indulge in schadenfreude and exaggerate the wrong of Rush in all this. That's unfortunate.
But look at the right-wingers, with as usual zero ability to post anything two-sided, instead with nothing but defense of Rush.
You don't see a word about his 'personal responsibility' to have dealt with the issue to avoid addiction.
You see the usual deceipt in implying he's not guilty of a crime, that he came clean to his listeners on his own rather than when he was exposed.
I've long said the current right wing has many 'cult' members, who simply side with their 'side', unaware even themselves of the extent of their bias.
Finally, let's debunk one last right-wing talking point. Jealousy has nothing to do with the attacks on Rush. It's like saying the US went to war with Hitler because they were jealous of his successes in gaining power and growing his economy. It's nothing but an attack on the critic. There is opposition to Ruch because he's a spokesman for evil, a sellout for the corrupt, the Tariq Aziz of the right wing. Alleging jealousy is simply a slanderous deceipt.
I wish Rush well in his recovery and encourage people to show restraint in the attacks on him related to it, while recognizing that some pointing out of his hypocrisy is appropriate.
