Parade magazine has released its Most Generous Stars list. Here are the top 10 (out of 30):
1. Oprah Winfrey — $50,200,000: The Oprah Winfrey Foundation and Oprah’s Angel Network - education, health care, and advocacy for women and children worldwide.
2. Herb Alpert — $13,000,000: The Herb Alpert Foundation - music education, including the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music.
3. Barbra Streisand — $11,000,000: The Streisand Foundation - the environment, women’s issues, civil rights, AIDS research and advocacy.
4. Paul Newman — $10,005,000: Scholarship for Kenyon College, his alma mater, in Gambier, Ohio.
5. Mel Gibson — $9,899,654: Holy Family Church in Malibu, Calif.
6. Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt — $8,400,000: The Jolie-Pitt Foundation - New Orleans reconstruction, refugee aid, cross-cultural understanding.
7. (tie) Lance Armstrong — $5,000,000: The Lance Armstrong Foundation - cancer research, education and advocacy.
7. (tie) Michael Jordan — $5,000,000: Hales Franciscan High School, a historically black all-boys school in Chicago.
7. (tie) Eric Lindros — $5,000,000: London Health Sciences Centre, a Canadian hospital where the former hockey player was treated.
10. Rush Limbaugh — $4,200,000: Financial assistance to the children of Marines and law-enforcement officers killed in the line of duty.
Rush will be making their first U.S. television appearance in more than thirty years on Comedy Central’s “Colbert Report.”
The Canadian band Rush, which hasn’t performed on U.S. television in more than three decades, will play their classic “Tom Sawyer” on the Comedy Central show Wednesday (11:30 p.m. EST). The Geddy Lee-led trio, which is currently on tour, hasn’t played on U.S. television since 1975.
Rush is only the latest act to perform on “The Report,” which has steadily edged closer to “Ed Sullivan Show” territory. With increasingly frequent musical performances, “The Report” has grown a variety-show impulse, evident in other upcoming bookings. The rapper Nas will perform on July 23, Toby Keith will return for a second performance on July 28 and Crosby, Stills and Nash will play on July 30.
The Stephen Colbert-hosted comedy show was originally launched as a parody of conservative political punditry — and shows like “The O’Reilly Factor” do not make a habit of hosting music performances. But “The Report” circus has expanded into musical realms, often with its sonorous host joining in. John Legend, Neil Young, R.E.M., Tony Bennett, Peter Frampton, Willie Nelson, Barry Manilow, John Mellencamp, the Roots and Carole King have all performed on the show.
Cool. Here’s a video of Rush playing “Tom Sawyer,” albeit not on “The Colbert Report.”
Rush Limbaugh isn’t going to have any trouble affording good cigars, having just re-upped with Clear Channel through 2016 for $400 million, including a $100 million signing bonus. And you thought pro athetes got paid a lot.
Said to be Limbaugh’s most lucrative deal ever by far, the new agreement runs through 2016 and includes a previously unheard-of nine figure signing bonus. For those of you in Rio Linda, that means more than $100 million, upfront.
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Beyond infuriating the left, that staggering sum is sure to reinforce the widespread industry belief that talk represents one of broadcast radio’s only remaining bright spots. While several other major outfits are struggling to survive, Limbaugh and Premiere have provided a steady revenue stream for Clear Channel.
In fact, while advertisers have begun to abandon music radio for the Internet and other media, Limbaugh has recently added sponsors.
Clearly, I’m in the wrong business. Then again, if I could captivate 20 million listeners three hours a day for a couple decades, I’m sure I’d make more, too.
His body visibly wracked by tremors, actor Michael J. Fox appears in a political ad that was the subject of widespread discussion on Monday after conservative radio commentator Rush Limbaugh claimed Fox was “either off his medication or acting.”
A victim of Parkinson’s disease, Fox speaks out in the ad for Missouri Democratic Senate candidate Claire McCaskill, who supports embryonic stem cell research.
“I think this is exploitative in a way that’s unbecoming of either Claire McCaskill or Michael J. Fox,” Limbaugh said on his syndicated show.
On his Web site Tuesday, Limbaugh appeared to back away from his accusation.
“All I’m saying is I’ve never seen him the way he appears in this commercial for Claire McCaskill,” says Limbaugh. “So I will bigly, hugely admit that I was wrong, and I will apologize to Michael J. Fox, if I am wrong in characterizing his behavior on this commercial as an act, especially since people are telling me they have seen him this way on other interviews and in other television appearances.”
“As you might know I care deeply about stem cell research,” says Fox, who has struggled with Parkinson’s disease for more than a decade. “In Missouri you can elect Claire McCaskill, who shares my hope for cures.” source
Rush Limbaugh will not be charged for carrying a legally prescribed, legal drug, while legally traveling, prosecutors say.
Rush Limbaugh will not face charges in Palm Beach County for the bottle of Viagra found in his luggage that was prescribed in his doctor’s name, prosecutors said Wednesday. Charges could have nullified the conservative radio host’s plea agreement in a “doctor shopping” case.
Limbaugh, 55, was detained for more than three hours at Palm Beach International Airport on June 26 after he returned on his private plane from a vacation in the Dominican Republic. The state attorney’s office said Dr. Steve Strumwasser’s name was on the Viagra bottle, not Limbaugh’s. Strumwasser, who is Limbaugh’s psychiatrist, told authorities he “agreed to have his name on the label in an effort to avoid potentially embarrassing publicity for the suspect,” according to a filing by the prosecutor’s office. “Thus, the medication contained in the subject pill bottle was legitimately prescribed to the suspect by his physician,” the filing said. It is generally not illegal under Florida law for a physician to prescribe medication in a third party’s name if all parties are aware and the doctor documents it correctly, said Mike Edmondson, a spokesman for the state attorney in Palm Beach County.
Shorter DA: Limbaugh committed no crime. Yet, he was detained for three hours and his name dragged through the press for something that was perfectly legal.
Rush Limbaugh was detained for more than three hours Monday at Palm Beach International Airport after authorities said they found a bottle of Viagra in his possession without a prescription. Customs officials found a prescription bottle labeled as Viagra in his luggage that didn’t have Limbaugh’s name on it, but that of two doctors, said Paul Miller, spokesman for the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office.
A doctor had prescribed the drug, but it was “labeled as being issued to the physician rather than Mr. Limbaugh for privacy purposes,” Roy Black, Limbaugh’s attorney, said in a statement.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection examined the 55-year-old radio commentator’s luggage after his private plane landed at the airport from the Dominican Republic, said Miller. The matter was referred to the sheriff’s office, whose investigators interviewed Limbaugh. According to Miller, Limbaugh said that the Viagra was for his use, and that he obtained it from his doctors. Investigators confiscated the drugs, which treats erectile dysfunction, and Limbaugh was released without being charged.
One could understand the fuss if Limbaugh were carrying Viagra in case quantities, raising the possibility that it was for resale. But, really, they’re detaining people for hours for a mismatched drug label? Indeed, devoting man-hours to reading the labels on drug bottles and cross-checking them with ID cards?
Further, granting that Limbaugh is a public figure, why are they having a news conference about what, at most, is a second-degree misdemeanor? Unless they’re charging people with something, one would think citizens have some right to privacy in these matters.
Crooks and Liars has video from an early report on this by Keith Olberman.
UPDATE: Much discussion in the comments about the nature of Limbaugh’s “probabation.” Commenter just me provides a link to the plea agreement. I’ve thumbnailed it below.
If he’s actually charged with a crime here, he’s clearly in violation of #1. One wonders if “the Dominican Republic” constitutes a violation of #9; methinks not. Of course, the reason Limbaugh was allowed to cop to a non-plea was not, as many commenters claim, he’s a bigshot but, because the prosecutors didn’t think they had enough to convict. That’s unlikely to change with the discovery of improperly labeled Viagra on his person.
UPDATE:Michelle Malkin agrees, wondering where the “privacy mongers” are on this issue. She also observes, “Why the hell is the Sheriff’s Office releasing the name of the drug–other than the attempted public humiliation of a conservative icon? Why wouldn’t it have sufficed to identify it as a non-narcotic prescription drug?” Indeed.
UPDATE: Limbaugh joked about the incident on today’s show, according to AP:
Limbaugh joked about the search on his radio show Tuesday, saying Customs officials didn’t believe him when he said he got the pills at the Clinton Library and he was told they were blue M&Ms. He later added, chuckling: “I had a great time in the Dominican Republic. Wish I could tell you about it.”
Later in the piece, we get some legal analysis:
This latest case may simply be dismissed if prosecutors can confirm with Limbaugh’s doctor that the prescription was indeed for Limbaugh, said Kendall Coffey, a former U.S. attorney in Florida. “It’s perhaps a little embarrassing but not highly incriminating,” Coffey said. In addition, possession of Viagra is in a “completely different universe than a matter that would involve Schedule Two (controlled) substances such as OxyContin” Coffey added.
According to the Drug Enforcement Administration, Viagra is not considered a controlled substance because “it’s not something you can be addicted to,” said DEA Investigator Maria Gilbert.
A three-year investigation into drug use by Rush Limbaugh ended abruptly when the conservative commentator was booked on a single charge of prescription fraud in a deal his attorney says spares him a trial. The charge will be dropped if Limbaugh continues treatment, attorney Roy Black said Friday. “He feels that a great burden has been lifted from his shoulders,” he said. “What he told me is that this is the first day of the rest of his life.”
Limbaugh surrendered at the Palm Beach County Jail and was booked on a warrant charging him with “doctor shopping,” when a patient illegally deceives multiple physicians to receive overlapping prescriptions. The 55-year-old commentator left an hour later, after he was photographed and fingerprinted and he posted $3,000 bail, said Teri Barbera, spokeswoman for the Palm Beach Sheriff’s Office. Under the terms of the deal with prosecutors called a pretrial diversion, to be filed Monday, Limbaugh will be cleared of the charge if he stays clean for 18 months and doesn’t violate any laws, Black said. Limbaugh has publicly acknowledged being addicted to pain medication.
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As a formality, Limbaugh entered a not guilty plea to the charge, spokesman Tony Knight said. The radio giant has maintained his innocence throughout the investigation. “He was in high spirits,” Knight said. “It was all a formality. It’s a concluded deal.”
I’m not sure I’d have used the phrase “high spirits” in this content. But, yes, I’m sure he’s quite relieved to have this behind him.
Under the deal, Limbaugh also agreed to pay the state $30,000 to defray the public cost of the investigation and must pay $30 per month for the cost of supervision, during which time he will continue regular drug tests.
This is an interesting provision and certainly not one available to most of us.
Black said Limbaugh has been drug free for 2 1/2 years. After 18 months, “he will not have any criminal record,” he said.
Interesting.
Prosecutors began investigating Limbaugh in 2003 after The National Enquirer reported his housekeeper’s allegations that he had abused OxyContin and other painkillers. He soon took a five-week leave from his radio show to enter a rehabilitation program and acknowledged he had become addicted to pain medication. He blamed it on severe back pain.
“The agreement that we entered into makes good common sense,” Black said. “The idea is to help the person overcome the addiction … There should be a recognition that people like Rush really should not be prosecuted.”
Agreed, although “people like Rush” is a rather vague concept. I would argue that we should not treat addiction, to any substance, as a criminal matter. Even if one opposes legalization of recreational drugs, the emphasis should be on those who distribute them.
