EDITORIAL : CELEBRITY RULES; BEING FAMOUS COMES WITH SPECIAL PRIVILEGES THAT THE REST OF AMERICA DOESN'T GET.

BEING a celebrity is worth a lot more than money these days.

It can mean the difference between jail time and movie time for drug addicts, and it can wipe the slate nearly clean for basketball stars with a penchant for assault and battery.

Being a celebrity means you can flaunt the rules and laws that govern the rest of society.

If you don't believe us, choke your boss and see whether you get to keep your job at full pay like Golden State Warriors star Latrell Sprewell.

Or repeatedly violate probation, and see how quickly a get-tough judge sends you to jail except when you are making movies. Then, you're escorted by sheriff's deputies who treat you like royalty, a la actor Robert Downey Jr.

In the case of Sprewell, arbitrator John Feerick decided attacking his coach - twice - did not warrant a year's suspension. We shudder to think what would.

In addition, Feerick ruled that sitting out 68 games and losing $6.4 million in salary ``conveys a message that violence in the NBA will be dealt with severely but always with due regard to principles of fairness.''

Fairness? What's fair for the coach who was attacked? What about due regard for respect for authority?

NBA Commissioner David Stern's point is well taken: any regular person would be fired immediately for attacking his or her boss, unless you play in the NBA.

As for Downey, his behavior is not nearly as puzzling as that of Malibu Municipal Judge Lawrence Mira, who sentenced him for repeatedly violating his probation.

When Mira ordered Downey in December to serve six months in jail for violating terms of his probation for a 1996 drug conviction, he told the 32-year-old actor: ``I'm going to incarcerate you, and I'm going to incarcerate you in a way that's very unpleasant for you. I don't care who you are. What I care about is that there is a life to be saved from drugs.''

But since those harsh words, Mira has let Downey out of jail to work on movies on four occasions in the past two months.

Is this time off for good behavior?

Sheriff Sherman Block says Downey has been a difficult and manipulative prisoner.

For a young man who has been in and out of courtrooms and treatment programs and who told the judge that the fear of jail and death had not been enough to keep him off drugs, Downey's special treatment could be more of a death sentence if he sees there's really no punishment for drug abuse.

Right now, about the only punishment for celebrities in America is that these people have to live with themselves. The rest of us have to live by the rules.