GOODMAN COLUMN MISSES THE POINT

Editor, Times-Dispatch:

In her column about Rush Limbaugh's addiction to painkillers, Ellen Goodman
makes the tragic mistake of saying conservatives simplify life into categories
of right and wrong while liberals talk of strengths and weaknesses.

Conservatives believe one has the ability and possesses the inner strength to
control and change one's life. The majority of liberals accept misconduct as a
weakness that everyone else should overlook. Rush admitted he has a problem and
is taking action to correct it. He is not lying about it. He is not blaming
society for it. He is accepting responsibility for it and that is what liberals
can't seem to understand! That is the honorable thing to do.

Ms. Goodman's implied effort to equate Rush's dependence on
painkillers to an addict's addiction to cocaine or heroin is misguided
and follows a typical liberal "thought wave" - think dirty, find the
weakness, and go for the jugular. The first person in the comparison
is trying to live a productive life while the latter is self-serving
and is trying to escape from life.

Ms. Goodman described Rush as the voice of the "angry white man." He
expresses a lot of my views and I am not an angry white man or a
soccer mom. In the true conservative fashion I will tell her what I
stand for. I believe in the overwhelming strength of the human spirit
to overcome obstacles, in accepting one's responsibility, and in being
honorable. Rush exemplifies those attributes. I am a proud,
middle-class (as defined by liberal standards as making $30,000 per
year or more), working white woman.

Diane Schulz

midlothian