Limbaugh's records to stay sealed
Host claims to be a victim of a left-wing conspiracy
The records were seized in order to determine whether the conservative talk show host was guilty of "doctor shopping" in his painkiller addiction case. He allegedly received thousands of painkillers prescribed by four doctors.
On Monday a Palm Beach Circuit judge rejected Limbaugh's bid to keep the records secret.
The following day the judge ruled that prosecutors could examine the records but not make them public, prompting Limbaugh to let loose a 20-minute diatribe on his talk show, saying that he was the victim of a vast left-wing conspiracy.
"The Democrats in this country still cannot defeat me in the arena of political ideas, and so now they are trying to do so in the court of public opinion and the legal system," he railed.
Limbaugh, 52, suggested that he was being persecuted more severely than other celebrities who abused drugs because of his right-wing views.
"I could give you the names of actors and actresses and sports figures and not one of them have been pursued in this circumstance," he said. (He did not give names.)
Limbaugh did name other figures later in the show, in a different context.
"We still haven't seen Bill Clinton's medical records, have we?" he said. "We haven't seen Howard Dean's records as governor for 11 years in Vermont."
But on Wednesday the judge granted an emergency motion by Limbaugh's lawyers to appeal the ruling and resealed Limbaugh's records.
In October, Limbaugh acknowledged that he had been addicted to prescription painkillers like OxyContin for years, and entered five weeks of rehab.
