OpinionJournal has a reasonable take on the Rush Limbaugh prescription painkiller controversy:
All the facts are not yet in, but it strikes us that what people are really waiting to see is whether he will take the consequences of his actions like a man.
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But it’s worth detailing what Mr. Limbaugh has not done. He has not expressed outrage at leaks about a criminal investigation. He hasn’t sent his wife out to accuse critics of manufacturing the thing out of whole cloth. He hasn’t attacked the housekeeper who sold her story to the National Enquirer. And so on.
As for the rest of us, there have always been two ways to read the parable about the woman caught in adultery and not casting the first stone. The first is to argue that standards simply don’t matter. The other way–the way it has been read for 2,000 years–is to remind us that we are all human, fallen creatures.
We’re fairly sure we know which reading President Bush was taking when he called Mr. Limbaugh a “great American” and said he hoped he would “overcome any obstacles.” After all, this is a President who not too long ago fought a drinking problem. The accusations about abusing pain-relieving drugs are more serious because they point to breaking the law, and they hurt not only Mr. Limbaugh but the millions of those who looked to him for better. It does not excuse anything he may have done to say America will not know the full measure of the man until we see how he responds.
Sounds about right.
