[Ecommerce] Limbaugh Discovers Constitutional Right to Privacy

[James Love]

This from Morons in the news..

http://web.morons.org/article.jsp?sectionid=1&id=4369

Morons in the News: Limbaugh Discovers Constitutional Right to Privacy
Posted by amused spatula on Dec. 23, 2003
(28 comments from readers)

     "There is no right to privacy specifically enumerated in the
Constitution" -- Rush Limbaugh

Rush Limbaugh is a hypocrite.

You might recall that in response to the decision this year in Lawrence
and Garner versus Texas, which established that people have a right to
sexual privacy in their own bedrooms, free from the meddling of state
laws criminalizing their adult, consensual sexual behaviour, Rush
Limbaugh said, "There is no right to privacy specifically enumerated in
the Constitution." We reposted an article about this detailing lots of
rights we take for granted that aren't specifically enumerated in the
Constitution and how the word "privacy" in colonial times meant doing a
toilet.

It turns out that Limbaugh has miraculously discovered a Constitutional
right to privacy when it's his privacy in question. As you probably
know, Limbaugh is being investigated for illegally obtaining thousands
of doses of Oxycontin to feed his drug addiction. As part of that
investigation, prosecutors wanted access to his medical records. I
agreed that it wouldn't be appropriate for the records to be made fully
public, but that as part of an ongoing criminal investigation it was
proper for records pertinent to the investigation to be subpoenaed.

But Rush "No Constitutional Right to Privacy" Limbaugh's lawyers, led by
Roy Black argued that releasing his medical records to prosecutors
violated Limbaugh's Constitutional right to privacy. Judge Jeffrey A.
Winikoff disagreed, saying, "The court knows of no less intrusive means
to obtain the clearly relevant information than the methods the state
employed here." He added that the state had acted in good faith.

Maybe what Rush meant to say that there was no Constitutional right to
privacy for law-abiding homosexuals, but there is a Constitutional right
to privacy for conservative radio talk show host prescription drug addicts.

---Nick

--
James Love, Director, Consumer Project on Technology
http://www.cptech.org, mailto:james.love@cptech.org
tel. +1.202.387.8030, mobile +1.202.361.3040