In Mo., 'Rush fans are with him'

CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. - Rush Limbaugh's hometown boasts a splashy mural of its famous native son along a Mississippi River flood wall.

But before he gained celebrity and riches on the airwaves, "Rusty" Limbaugh pitched Little League baseball and Blake Esicar played first base, a lineup immortalized in a black and white snapshot Esicar proudly displayed Saturday in his family's meat market.

"Rusty could throw quite a curve ball," Esicar said, then shook his head.

"I just know he's dealing with quite a curve ball now, and we're just praying for him," he said.

Limbaugh, who often reminisces warmly about his upbringing in Cape Girardeau, startled his national radio audience Friday by acknowledging an addiction to prescription pain medication and announcing he was leaving the air for a 30-day rehabilitation program.

Esicar was driving his delivery truck when he heard Limbaugh's announcement.

Because of Limbaugh's past antidrug declarations and his family's stalwart local reputation, "it was a really big surprise to me," Esicar said. "But it's sinking in now."

The town of about 35,000 leans heavily Republican, and one radio station rebroadcasts Limbaugh's show for anyone who may have missed it.

On Saturday, even local Democrats were giving Limbaugh a break.

"Mostly the Democrats wonder whether Rush's following will stay with him. While I expect some will be disillusioned, they'll stick with him," said former Missouri Secretary of State Bekki Cook, a Democrat who once practiced law with Limbaugh's late father.

Justin Buchheit, 23, a graduate student, said he was raised Republican and shares many of Limbaugh's views. But he wondered how an admission of drug use would play with Limbaugh's conservative fans.

"We love Rush in Cape, but the general public may be less impressed with him now that he has admitted a drug problem after being so tough on drug users on his show," Buchheit said.

In the past, Limbaugh has decried drug use on his bluntly conservative show, often making the case that drug crimes deserve punishment.

"Drug use, some might say, is destroying this country. And we have laws against selling drugs, pushing drugs, using drugs, importing drugs. . . . And so if people are violating the law by doing drugs, they ought to be accused and they ought to be convicted and they ought to be sent up," Limbaugh said on his short-lived television show on Oct. 5, 1995.

Down at the flood wall with the big Rush mural, a club's bicycle ride was wrapping up and cyclists were musing about how to balance the smiling image against the drug revelations.

As cyclist Jay Moore loaded his bike on the back of his pickup truck, he said he remains a Limbaugh admirer.

"People that are Rush fans are with him no matter what - and that goes double in Cape Girardeau," he said.

9-million people abuse prescription drugs.

From 1995 to 2002, there was a 163 percent leap in emergency room visits related to abuse of prescription drugs.

3-million teenagers between the ages of 12 and 17 abuse prescription drugs.

Prescription drugs play a role in 25 percent of all overdose deaths reported in the United States.

- SOURCE: Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Agency

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