Talk show host Ed Schultz and actor Doug Hutchison show behavioral indications of alcoholism. (So does a 16-year-old girl’s parents.)
Under watch:
In an early 2009 piece on white collar crime, The Economist magazine suggests there may be some truth in something those who have read my books would predict: “Many [Club Fed and other white collar] prisoners suddenly discover, post-conviction, that they had a drinking problem….” I would add that those who don’t figure this out might benefit from greater introspection. In the spirit of The Economist’s discovery, a couple of recent stories follow for which the evidence of alcoholism is in the behavior itself.
MSNBC talk show host Ed Schultz, who took a week-long unpaid leave of absence after calling a talk show host on the other side of the political spectrum, Laura Ingraham, a slut. While he apologized for his slur, this is not the first time Schultz has exhibited behavioral indications of alcoholism. In 2010, he had what was reported as a “meltdown” in the network’s newsroom, shouting at staff, “I’m going to torch this [bleep]ing place,” apparently furious over the network for running election-night promos that didn’t include him. One MSNBC staffer commented, “It was like Mel Gibson had entered the newsroom.” When he was told by the NBC and MSNBC brass that if he did anything like it again he’d be fired, he reportedly broke down and cried. As detailed in Drunks, Drugs & Debits: How to Recognize Addicts and Avoid Financial Abuse, extreme nastiness, verbal outbursts, an “it’s all about me” attitude, others drawing parallels to known alcoholics and hyperbolic emotional states are each in themselves terrific indicators of hidden alcoholism. Cumulatively, they are compelling.
Actor Doug Hutchison, 51, marrying aspiring country singer Courtney Alexis Stodden, 16. I’ve observed over the years that the wider the age differences in spouses, the greater the likelihood of addiction in one or both. Anything much over 15 years should get our attention; a difference of 35 years, except for Playboy playmate Anna Nicole Smith marrying J. Howard Marshall (who was 62 years her senior), is about as wide a difference as we ever see. Why would this be a clue to alcoholism? The older spouse, usually the man, gets to say “Look at the young hot babe I snatched!” and the younger one, generally the woman, says “Look at the successful, powerful, wealthy older man I landed!” Both are ego-inflating, which is the reason we can’t pinpoint one or the other as the addict but must look at both. In this case we should also look at the parents of the 16-year-old, since one of them had to approve of the marriage. I personally know of at least two non-addicted couples with a nearly 30-year spread, but have seen numerous others with large age differences involving alcoholism. (Hutchison played Percy Wetmore in “The Green Mile” and also appeared in “24” and “Lost.”)