CALL IT A FAILURE TO COMMUNICATE
From time to time I try to break the monotony of my writing style with a fresh voice, a guest contributor with a worthy message to post. Such is the case with my friend Richard Armendariz, who adds to the log of obituaries for the late Rush Limbaugh; the subject—smoking tobacco—is painful for me personally. I managed to kick the addiction after twenty years. My father and my two brothers did not, and they paid the price with early deaths. And I miss them. With that always on my mind, here’s Richard’s ever-timely caveat:
Rush Limbaugh had a great deal of influence over his 20 million listeners who frequently accepted his words as the gospel truth. Much like Trump, his number one fan who awarded him the Medal of Freedom, Rush had no qualms about lying to or misleading his faithful followers, even if it exposed them to danger.
Limbaugh frequently railed against drug users and argued that they deserved punishment; if they were doing drugs they should be accused, convicted, and sent to prison. But when it was revealed that he was addicted to painkillers, it became a different story. No, he did not reveal his addiction voluntarily; he was outed by a housekeeper's allegations that he abused oxycontin and other painkillers. He was arrested and charged with fraud to conceal information to obtain prescriptions. The charges were dropped only after he participated in a drug treatment program and paid $30,000 for the costs of the investigation
Before his diagnosis with lung cancer, Rush had downplayed the health risks of smoking, and argued that second-hand smoke did not harm people. He also revealed that he started smoking cigarettes as a teenager, and that he stopped smoking them when he was older, after a bout with bronchitis, only to start again later smoking Cuban cigars, which he did for many years. (How he obtained those contraband Cuban cigars during the embargo is unknown.)
Limbaugh continued to argue that smoking was not as harmful as claimed, and that people were exaggerating its ill effects. He said that smoking takes 50 years to kill people, if it does at all. Besides, he argued, not everyone who smokes gets cancer, ignoring the many other causes of death attributed to cigarette smoking. Everyone who smoked dies, he joked, but so does everyone who eats carrots.
If Limbaugh had any sense of compassion for his fans, he could have advised them of the true dangers of smoking before he died. Evidently that act of concern for others was not in his makeup.