Should Limbaugh Apologize For "Slut" Comment?

As you've no doubt heard by now, Rush Limbaugh is taking a lot of heat for calling a Georgetown University student named Sandra Flake a slut. The question now is, will he apologize.

But the question shouldn't be WILL he apologize, it should be SHOULD he apologize. Let's not make any assumptions about guilt until we look at the facts.

Here's what happened. Nancy Pelosi held a hearing at which Miss Fluke spoke on the issue of Obama's mandate that insurers provide birth control free of charge. Here's the relevant portions of her comments.

"Forty percent of the female students at Georgetown Law reported to us that they struggled financially as a result of this policy (Georgetown student insurance not covering contraception)."

"Without insurance coverage, contraception, as you know, can cost a woman over $3,000 during law school."

So, 40% of women are having so much sex that they can't afford the $1,000 a year it costs them to buy birth control. (The law school program lasts 3 years, so $3k divided by 3 gives us $1k per year.)

But hold on, is that really how much is costs? I did some research, and the costs vary. If you have insurance, the co-pay for the pills can run $5 - $40, which means they will pay between $60 and $480 a year on birth control ($180 - $1,440 over three years). Not $1,000 a year. Without insurance, the pills cost between $20 and $50 per month, which means they will pay between $240 and $600 a year on birth control ($720 - $1,800 over three years). STILL not $1,000 a year... in fact, the cost of birth control comes in WELL under her claimed expense of $3k over three years. And since the cost of the birth control pill doesn't run $1,000 per year, let's assume she's not referring to them. After all, we wouldn't want to assume she's lying to make her case look better, would we? That would be cynical and uncharitable...


So now let's look at what it means if she was referring to the cost of condoms. Again, according to my research, the cost of condoms vary. If the women choose to be frugal and purchase Lifestyle condoms, they can get 100 for the low price of $24.99... or $0.25 each. That means that, in order to spend $1,000 on condoms in one year, a woman would have to purchase 4,000 condoms, which means she's having sex (4,000 / 365) 10.95 times a day. If she isn't being frugal, she can get 100 Trojan condoms for $61.99... or $0.62 each. At that price, $1k would buy 1,612 condoms, which means she's having sex (1,612 / 365) 4.4 times per day.

Interesting. So, here we have a woman who is, as best as we can determine, talking about having sex 4 to 11 times per day... and she's upset Limbaugh called her a slut?

In fact, Limbaugh did more than simply call her a slut, he commented on the absurdity of people demanding the government mandate that their expensive sex lives should be entirely subsidized at no cost to them.

"Three thousand dollars for birth control in three years? That's a thousand dollars a year of sex - and, she wants us to pay for it. They're admitting before congressional committee that they're having so much sex they can't afford the birth control pills!"

He's assuming that Flake is referring to birth control pills, but as we saw, the costs of the pills don't match what she claims to spend on birth control. In truth, his comments about "so much sex" don't make any sense, because the cost of the pill doesn't increase with frequency of sex. The cost of condoms does, however, and in this example the numbers are absurdly high.

So back to the question I initially posed. Based upon what we now know of what happened, do you think Limbaugh was wrong? I mean, Miss Flake is asking that her sex life be paid for, so is it beyond the pale that we look at what that sex life might entail? I honestly don't think so.

Should Rush Limbaugh apologize for calling Sandra Flake a slut? Or should Sandra Flake apologize for demanding that her sex life be paid for by somebody else?

What do you think?

UPDATE: I've been reading articles all day long about how Limbaugh "slandered" or "personally savaged" Miss Flake. "Humiliated" is another word for what he did to her. But as I pointed out, when looked at carefully, is he really wrong?

Another thing that's happening is that Flake is being called a "birth control activist." Let me be clear, she is no such thing. Nobody is arguing that women shouldn't have birth control. What I object to, and what I presume Limbaugh objected to, is that Miss Flake is arguing that women are entitled to free birth control that is paid for by somebody else. That is, the rest of us fund her sex life. And I'm sorry, but that's just not right.

Whether you agree or disagree with the individual mandate, Obama and his supporters claim it's a way to inject personal responsibility into the system. Well, where is the personal responsibility that this woman has to obtain her own birth control for her apparently active sex life? Why should somebody besides herself and the man/men she sleeps with shoulder that burden?

It's clear that her "testimony" was little short of exaggerated propaganda to make a political point. As I pointed out in my original article, birth control pills don't cost $1k a year as she claimed, and if she's really using that many condoms than Limbaugh's comments weren't anything but the truth.

Remember the big blow up about taxpayer funded abortions under ObamaCare? Rather than pushing for individual responsibility, they are destroying it. So we have to pay for women's birth control so they can have an active sex life? And if they get pregnant, we have to pay for their abortion, too??? How is this even close to logical?