Misspeak or?

I hate it when I can't find the remote control for the TV in the dark cave of my office, especially when I accidentally get stuck watching the moronic, Bill O'Whiney wannabe, Joe Scarbrough, before I can turn the set off.

But when it happened tonight, I noticed he was interviewing Rush Limbaugh's attorney, Roy Black (a man I've respected in the past for some of his representation), who repeatedly referred to Rush in the present tense as needing and using pain medication.

Didn't Rush stop all these drugs? Didn't he just finish rehab? Did he hire a new maid? Did he buy his own pharmacy or pharmaceutical company?

Considering how careful lawyers are with their language, I doubt it was merely an accidental slip that Mr. Black kept referring to Rush's pill popping in the present tense. But then, perhaps Rush needs to pop 50 Oxycontin a day to handle the cognitive dissonance of insisting for years that criminals had no right to privacy while he insists he does, or all the names he's called the ACLU over the years when the ACLU has stepped in to help on his side in his court fight (and Rush has gratefully accepted that help from an organization Bill O'Reilly just called a major fascist group).

But, boys and girls, if you were in Rush's position and your lawyer got on TV and announced you were still using, you probably would not be sitting in your lush Palm Beach house tonight as he is. You'd have your collective asses sitting in police lockup.

It must be a grave left-wing conspiracy, to use Rush's phrase, that allows him to be treated so much better than anyone else - save for Jeb's daughter or GW's tipsy twins - would be.