Hey Rush, Why Didn’t=t You AJust Say No@?

 

What is the world coming to?  During the past few months two of America=s leading spokesmen for conservative beliefs have admitted they were addicts!  First there was Bill Bennett, the man who has spent the past twenty years or so castigating those who have succumbed to various addictions, saying that they merely made a choice and therefore must be punished.  Bill finally came clean and admitted he was addicted to gambling.  By the way, Bill, how=s your cigarette addiction coming along?  And where have you been lately?  I’ve missed seeing you on Larry King Live and other talk shows, prancing about with your holier than thou attitudes, telling Americans how to live their lives.  Well, I hope you are doing well these days and have those two addictions under control.  I have no time for you now, since none other than Rush Limbaugh has admitted he is a drug addict.

Rush, as everyone knows, has been preaching his brand of conservatism over the AM airwaves for a long time now.  As several books and commentaries have pointed out, most of what Rush has been saying is pure bullshit, but that doesn’t=t matter, since his listeners, aptly named Adittoheads,@ don=t care about factual evidence.  They just want to hear a lot of bombast against the dreaded Aliberals@ who are destroying the country with their loose morals.  But now Rush has shown that he is human after all, by admitting he has a drug problem. 

Don=t get me wrong, for I have a great deal of sympathy for people with addictions.  My liberal background and humanistic values are the reason for such sympathy.  I know, as all the experts have known, that addictions cannot be easily overcome with pure will.  You cannot Ajust say no.@  Addictions arise from a variety of social, psychological and biological factors that play a huge role in our lives.  However, the conservative philosophy, with its firm belief in free will, cannot possibly handle such explanations.   Behind this view is a view of the family that can be described as the traditional nuclear family with the father in control as the major breadwinner.  There is, under this system, a Astrict father morality@which is based in part upon the belief that in order to become a Agood@ and Amoral@ person a child must learn to obey the rules and respect authority.  Proper behavior is taught through the use or threat of punishment.  Within such a system the exercise of authority is itself moral; that is, it is moral to reward obedience and punish disobedience.

According to the conservative view, there is a Amorality of strength.@  Moral strength can be seen as a metaphor.  The metaphor suggests that the world is divided into Agood@ and Aevil and in order to stand up to Aevil@ one must be morally strong and one becomes morally strong through a system of rewards and punishments which teaches self-discipline.  A person who is morally weak cannot fight evil.  If one is too self-indulgent he or she is immoral.  Welfare is immoral, as is crime and drug use, and therefore should be punished.  Therefore, it logically follows that crime and drug use are the result of moral weakness, a lack of self-control.  A person with proper self-discipline should be able to Ajust say no@ and those who do not must be and deserved to be punished.

Given this conservative belief system, you would expect that those who claim to be Aconservatives@ would apply these rules to themselves and Ajust say no@ to addictions.  Rush himself has said as much over the years.  Here=s one juicy quote from Rush: ADrug use destroys societies. Drug use, some might say, is destroying this country.  And we have laws against selling drugs, pushing drugs, using drugs, importing drugs. And the laws are good because we know what happens to people in societies and neighborhoods which become consumed by them.  And so if people are violating the law by doing drugs, they ought to be accused and they ought to be convicted and they ought to be sent up.@