Behold America! The face of a new generation of doucebags!
Jim Geraghty of the National Review has almost as many chins as his hero Rush Vinegar-and-Water Limbaugh. But that in itself isn’t enough to make him America’s Next Top Douchebag. Rather, his rhetorical stylings in the National Review earn him the Douche Scouts merit badge for baldest liar. Here’s the winning passage:
Here’s the thing: If Rush is an “addict”, then the President of the United States is a “cokehead.”
Both men have had issues with consuming mind-altering substances in violation of the law in their past; both have overcome those past experiences and gone on to lead productive and successful lives. (Rush, in fact, managed to do so while overcoming a near-miss with a loss of hearing, a torturous development for a man whose entire livelihood is in radio.)
As I’m sure Jim knows, doing a couple of lines is very different from extended use of heroine. As much as the moral(ly bankrupt) right would like to think any habitual action is addictive (I’m personally addicted to oxygen — can’t get enough), everyone knows that drinking coffee is not necessarily addictive, and it probably won’t kill you. But tell that to a devout Mormon! Your doctor (assuming you can afford one now that you’ve lost your job) will tell you more than 10 drinks a week is alcoholism, but to get you on your feet again they’ll prescribe Lexapro, an anti-depressant that requires months to wean you off should you decide to live “drug free.” (Remember the episode in To Kill A Mockingbird where the old lady had to be weaned off her painkillers — that is, heroine?)
Citizen Geraghty is pulling the oldest and lowest trick in the rhetorical book: equate two things that have a surface similarity but are profoundly different in degree as a way of minimizing the impact of the worse offense. Rush was a drug addict; Obama was not. Rush is morally corrupt because he thinks he’s above HIS OWN LAWS; Obama is forgiving because he recognizes his own weaknesses — and has overcome them. Geraghty is a douchebag — not only because he writes for the National Review (which would be cause enough), but because he can lie out of both sides of his mouth at once.
One more comparison for you: Obama is the President of the United States, Rush Limbaugh is a radio talk-show host.
This recent obsession with Rush Limbaugh is truly bizare and not a little pathetic. A secure and confident administration, which had the country’s best interests in mind, would not be wasting time and energy attacking some radio talk-show host.
There are few things douchier than making a blow-hard argument that doesn’t actually hold a drop of water. Someone missed out on taking basic 9th grade logic.