As we head on down the tracks and into the weekend, it's open line Friday and the Rush Limbaugh program.
Let's just keep it rolling.
And whatever you want to talk about, basically, whether I care about it or not.
That's the most succinct way that I can explain the rules today.
Telephone number 800-282-2882.
And the email address is rush at EIBnet.com.
Responding to public demand, a public outcry, an overwhelming outpouring of desire.
We have added to the t-shirt line at the Gitmo gift shop at rushlimbaugh.com.
As you know, we started the week with two t-shirts.
These are prison suit orange, by the way, our t-shirts.
Jumpsuit orange in color.
And there were two of them in sizes small to double X.
We had an outpouring of demand and requests for 3X and 4X sizes.
We have met that demand.
We've also added another shirt to the line.
The slogans are these.
On the back of each shirt, one says, I got my free Koran and prayer rug at Gitmo.
The other says, your tropical retreat from the stress of jihad.
And the third one says, my mala went to Club Gitmo, and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.
Now, you can get one, you can get both, you get all three.
You know, Father's Day is coming up.
I just saw a list of things that happened.
Do you know when Father's Day was signed into law?
No, it's amazing.
I did not know this.
Father's Day wasn't signed into law until 1972 by Nixon.
And guess what about Father's Day?
AT ⁇ T, well, two other facts.
$2 billion more in merchandise is sold on Mother's Day than Father's Day.
And AT ⁇ T records a record number of collect calls on Father's Day.
Collect calls on Father's Day.
So everybody still living off dear old dad, even on Father's Day.
Now, in addition to these three slogans, we've added sizes 3X and 4X, the 3X t-shirt $2,295, and the 4X t-shirts, $2,695, because of the, well, the added material necessary to manufacture these jumpsuit orange t-shirts.
So they're available.
Now, I understand that there may be such an overload of interest at the EIB store, some people not able to get in.
That frankly surprises me.
We have one of the largest server farms in all of the internet.
So I'm looking into that too to find out if there is something you're doing wrong or if there's a problem that we're having.
But regardless, if it is a problem on our end, you can trust the fact that it'll get fixed.
So go ahead and keep trying.
You might also notice that when you go to rushlimbaugh.com and visit the club Gitmo brochure, where you'll also find the Club Gitmo gift shop, you'll notice that we are also running side by side the five-day weather forecasts for Baghdad and Guantanamo Bay.
High temperature today, for example, in Baghdad was 114.
The high forecast today at Gitmo is slated to be 87.
That's for those of you sympathetic to Dick Durbin who are concerned about air conditioning being turned off and on in Gitmo.
We just want to illustrate the heat that our soldiers are working under on a daily basis at Baghdad and throughout Iraq.
So 114 in Baghdad today, 87 in Gitmo, five-day forecasts every day as part of the Club Gitmo brochure.
I mean, we're doing everything we can to encourage visitors to Club Gitmo and whatever we can put up there to make it enticing.
We're more than willing to do.
The Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Assembly has approved a ban on the so-called morning after pill on state college campaign.
This is a restriction that would be the first in the nation if it is approved.
The vote in the lower chamber late yesterday sends the bill to the state senate.
Both are controlled by Republicans.
The governor is a Democrat, Jim Doyle, said he's going to veto the measure if it reaches his desk.
The legislation would prohibit University of Wisconsin system health centers from advertising, prescribing, or dispensing emergency contraception drugs that can block a pregnancy in the days after sex.
The state university system has 161,000 students on 26 Campi.
Republican Representative Daniel LeMayhew introduced the bill after a health clinic serving UW Madison students, published ads in campus newspapers inviting students to call for scripts for the drug to use on spring break.
Thought they had to go do something.
Okay, when they're advertising the drug to students, go get it before spring break.
The Republicans said, whoop, up, this is not the intent here, and we want to try to get rid of it.
But the governor has vowed to veto this.
We will keep a sharp eye.
All right, get this.
A conservative, a moderate, and a liberal, and a libertarian teamed up in the House yesterday to prod President Bush to set a timetable to withdraw from Iraq.
This, as the Washington Post, Mike Allen says, strikes a rare tone of unity on a day when tensions about national security provoked marathon brawling on the floor.
What do you mean, unity?
Four members out of a 435-body member body is unity?
The resolution sponsored by Representatives Walter Jones Jr., North Carolina, Neil Abercrombie, Democrat Hawaii, Dennis Kucenich, Democrat Ohio, and Ron Paul, a Republican of Texas.
The resolution calls for Bush to begin drawing down troops in Iraq by October 1st, 2006, but it does not set a date for complete withdrawal.
Why not next month?
Why not August 1st?
Why not, what is this?
October 1st?
That's the month before the elections.
Walter Jones, a congressman's son who voted for the war, sits in the Armed Services Committee, represents the huge Marine base at Camp Lejeune, said he believes that in the long run, his constituents will think that we as a nation have a responsibility to take a fresh look at goals for Iraq.
I think the president could really declare victory in the next six months if he wanted to.
Okay, they can declare victory today.
They can declare victory and get out anytime you want.
We have audio soundbites on this.
First up, Dennis Kucinich on CNN's Inside Politics.
Do you know what's wrong with this, Mr. Sterdley?
I mean, just from a standard tactical position, what is wrong with this?
Forget the politics of it.
I don't care about the politics.
Exactly right.
You set a date certain that you're going to start withdrawing people out of there.
You know what's going to happen?
The insurgents will just go lie back and have some piña collad or whatever they drink.
They'll stop negotiating.
They'll stop any movement towards settlement, if there is such a thing.
They'll even roll back the hostilities.
They'll try to get us to move out even faster.
The sooner that they think we'll leave, the better for them.
If they know for certain we're going to leave, and then they just wait for us to go.
And man, then they run over and take over the country.
Anybody remember Vietnam?
So with that in mind, here is Dennis Kucinich, one of the four representing the new unity in the House.
On Inside Politics yesterday, the host, CNN, Tom Foreman, said, Look, you think this thing can work?
Can you make this happen?
Well, today with this resolution, it's the beginning of the end of the war in Iraq.
Of course, we can make it work because it's a bipartisan resolution.
The only way we can affect the beginning of the end of the war is to work with people on both sides of the aisle.
That's what this has done.
Our troops have done everything that they can.
It's time to thank them and ask them to come home.
Today, with this resolution, it's the beginning of the end of the war in Iraq.
What arrogance?
Kucinich, you don't have a thing to say about this.
Not as one member of a group of four.
You haven't started the beginning of anything.
The president is soon to make the rounds once again of the country.
He's going to be making a bunch of speeches, powerful speeches on Iraq and why we're there.
It's just one of these things.
Summertime comes along, people start thinking about driving around to grandma's house or the beach or whatever.
And so he's going to remind people once again, it doesn't sound like the president's going to take the word of Dennis Kucinich and his other guys and look at it as the beginning of the end.
So Foreman, anyway, Foreman said to Kucinich, look, many people out there, military families that I know, their immediate response is going to be, this is exactly what happened to Vietnam.
The politicians got involved.
They took control out of the hand of the generals, and it was disastrous.
Well, the occupation is counterproductive.
Our troops are being caught in the middle right now.
I think that we owe it to them to thank them for their service to our country and to bring them home.
I think most of the American people today would agree that it's time for the troops to come home.
But what we've done is to put in place a plan that is actually in alignment with some of the metrics the administration established.
This plan would say that you'd have to start beginning to bring them home no later than October 1st, 2006.
It's a plan that provides, it's a workable plan, it's bipartisan, and it recognizes that the occupation at this point is counterproductive.
It does no such thing.
It asserts it.
It asserts that four members of the House think this.
It doesn't establish or recognize that the opposition, that the occupation is counterproductive, and it isn't an occupation to begin with, Congressman Kucinich.
That's a trick Democrat word thrown in there designed to fool people, but it is not an occupation whatsoever.
So once again, we're learning just who among us has the stick-to-itiveness to see something that we start all the way through.
Isn't that something you teach your kids?
Finish what you start.
Finish what you start.
If you don't teach your kids that, you might start.
Finish what you start.
Not these guys.
Oh, no, no, no.
It's counterproductive.
We shouldn't be there.
We're the evil United States of America.
We're causing the whole region to go south.
We don't need to be there at all.
Counterproductive.
The gentleman is clueless, has no idea what he's talking about.
He's just an anti-war lib.
And the press, of course, eats it up.
Back after this, don't go away.
Number 28 on the Forbes magazine: Top 100 Most Powerful Celebrities, Rush Limbaugh, the EIB network.
I was number 31 last year, moving up three spots this year.
I never used to talk about this list, ladies and gentlemen.
It used to be called the top 100 wealthiest or highest earning, whatever it was, celebrities.
And since I wasn't number one on that list, I was embarrassed and never talked about it.
They changed it to the top 100 most powerful.
I'm more comfortable mentioning this.
It's Open Line Friday.
Here's Marcus in Tucson.
Nice to have you, sir.
Welcome to the program.
Thank you, Rush.
It's an honor and a privilege to be speaking with you.
Thank you, Chef.
Well, I have one main question here, and that is, why is America trying to focus or seeming to try to focus more on Dick Durbin's assertions about Gitmo when I lost my aunt, my mother lost her sister, my uncle lost her father, and my cousins lost their mother.
And this is why this happened.
This is why we're doing this.
And frankly, I don't give too in a rain barrel about how we treat the people who treated us in that manner.
I want to know why you think that America has become so short-sighted and is in the world.
Oh, there's nobody who cares about the world.
I have an easy answer to this.
There may be more than one, but the easy answer is we're not allowed to see pictures of it anymore.
The networks have all decided it's too gory.
It's too gruesome.
It's too shocking and frightening to children.
And so we don't see regularly the pictures of the two aircraft flying into the World Trade Center, the damage done to the Pentagon or the remnants of the crash at that field in Pennsylvania.
We just don't see it.
You know, we, Pearl Harbor Day, December 7th, 1941, remember it every year.
We've had movies about it.
We've seen pictures.
There's a memorial out there.
You can still see oil bubbling up from the USS Arizona.
It's haunting if you've been out there.
I have, of course, as a well-traveled and powerful, influential member of the media, number 28, by the way, on the Forbes list.
But we can't see any pictures of 9-11.
We're not allowed to.
And if we did, if they showed us pictures of 9-11 every day, I guarantee you people wouldn't forget it and they wouldn't lose the emotional attachment to it that has occurred, I think, in the instance of many people.
Marcus, I appreciate the phone call.
Thanks much.
Who's next?
Anchorage, Alaska.
This is Adam.
Hello, sir.
Hey, Rush.
Mega Dittos here from the great state of Alaska.
And you actually helped make my college experience bearable.
My question is, democracy and freedom work so well here in America because we fought for it.
We died for it.
You know, our blood was shed.
How can we be assured that the Iraqis will have that same appreciation since we've been initiated?
We can't be assured.
There's a lot of faith here.
I'll tell you why I'm willing to try it.
See, I ask this question of people constantly.
You thanked me for getting you through the college experience.
So you're relatively young.
I don't know how much you've traveled internationally, but if you haven't, you someday will.
And when you travel the world, you will see a stark difference in almost every aspect of the human condition when compared to this country.
Even if you go to the civilized parts of the world, Western Europe, Japan, you will see a marked difference in the quality of life.
And for the moment here, I'm not talking about political circumstances.
I'm just talking about economic.
You will see civilizations that have been around far longer than we have, who are not nearly as advanced.
You will see civilizations and cultures that are on the road to where we are, but they're not really near it, and they have been at it for thousands of years longer than we have.
And you'll ask yourself, why?
Why is this?
And the first thing you'll do is say, what is it about the United States geographically?
What is it about the United States that enables us to be the leader of the world?
And you'll start looking at things like, well, is it because of our agriculture?
Is it because of our natural resources?
Is it because of the cooperation so many people on one continent have because we are part of the United States?
So our Kansans freely trade with Missourians who freely trade with Californians.
We're all Americans.
This is that.
And then you'll say, well, wait, it can't all be that because we don't have nearly enough oil to supply our own needs.
We have to get that from elsewhere around the world.
And then you'll say, eh, it can't be that because when I go to the store, I see all kinds of products made in China and Japan and Mexico.
So what is it?
You'll ask yourself.
What is it about us?
And then you'll ask yourself, are we different human beings?
Is there something about us as human beings that makes us different than, say, human beings in Africa or Asia or Europe?
And then you'll have to conclude, no, because a human being is a human being.
Regardless what a human being looks like, regardless what a human being's skin color is, or where a human being's born, we're all human beings.
We're no better than any other group of human beings, collectively or individually, anywhere else on the planet.
So why?
Why are we so far advanced in every which way, politically as well?
Let's bring the political system into that.
And you will conclude, Adam, as I have, after many experiences and asking yourself these questions, that there's one thing that sets us apart from all these other people, and that is freedom.
We as human beings here are allowed because of the freedom we have compared to other human beings on the planet to maximize our potential as human beings, our creativity, our industriousness, our talents.
Now, sure, we have shackles on ourselves here.
I mean, we got restrictions and regulations, but it's nothing compared to people that live in totalitarian regimes run by dictators and thugs and so forth.
It is, therefore, the conclusion, a theory is that guides our policy, President Bush's policy, I'm sure, is that a human being has a natural yearning as a result of creation to be free and to be the best he can be.
But society, culture after culture, generation after generation, when you tamp that down, step on it, you suppress it for generation after generation after generation.
Now in Iraq, it's being put to the test.
And I think it's succeeding.
I think the Iraqis themselves are heading along much faster than we did in getting a constitution.
I wouldn't say this is a lost cause, just the exact opposite.
I think that what's going on over there is a sight to behold, and it's a model for the rest of that region.
Thank you.
It's Open Line Friday.
Great to have you with us.
The telephone number 800-2822882.
The email address is rush at EIBnet.com.
A reminder, we have responded to public demand and added 3X and 4X size t-shirts at the Gitmo gift shop at rushlinbaugh.com.
These are the burnt orange colored jumpsuit colored prison jumpsuit colored t-shirts.
They each say Club Gitmo on the front.
There are three different slogans on the back from which you can choose or get all three.
The 3X size t-shirts, $22.95.
The 4X is $25.95.
All the others are $19.95.
So I wanted to let you know we're responding to public demand on this.
A request was made Tuesday.
And bamo, look at how quickly we are able to make them available to you.
Reuters tells us that trust between the French and the Americans has slumped to its lowest level in 17 years.
A survey out there, an opinion poll released today, the TNS Saufre survey of 1,000 people in each country showed that only 31% of French people have any sympathy for Americans, down from 39% in 2002.
And only 35% of Americans like the French, a drop from 50% in 2002, according to the poll.
It was published today in the Le Monde newspaper.
And so for all of you Democrats, John Kerry, you want to keep talking about our allies, the Germans and the French.
Keep talking.
Keep talking because you're talking to 35% of the American people who will be sympathetic to your concerns.
I love this next story.
In fact, I got the two stories here because they are companion stories.
A new draft communique on climate change for next month's Group of Eight summit in Scotland has been watered down to remove plans to fund research and put into question top scientists' warnings that global warming is already underway.
Its text has been changed from a previous draft, which itself had no specific targets or timetables for action.
And it also explicitly endorses the use of zero-carbon nuclear power, another development that will dismay many environmentalist wackos.
An anonymous source saying that it would be a serious problem for Tony Blair said, the texts are getting weaker and weaker.
There are no targets, no timetables, no standards, and even the money is gone.
Blair, who has pledged to put the fight against climate change at the heart of Britain's year-long presidency of the G8, visited three G8 leaders in two days this week to drum up support.
But the G8 leader is already cooling on global warming and the United States, the Bush administration getting to blame.
Of course, on this program, the Bush administration gets the applause and support because everybody knows that all this is a back alley route to the back pockets of the U.S. Treasury.
And also, there's a, I don't know if you people in Rio Linda, I got a note for some friends in Robert, Louisiana, and they said parentheses, this is the real Linda of the East.
Robert, Louisiana.
Have you ever been to Robert, Louisiana, Mr. Snird?
Apparently, they were proud to say that it's the real Linda of the East.
But at any rate, I don't know if you and Riolinda read, but if you do, and you see this story, it's going to cause you a problem.
Because if you look at this word wrong, you think the story is about ice cream and cake, and it's not.
Desertification, I'm pronouncing it that way so you'll understand.
The correct pronunciation is desertification.
Comma, dust, our globe threats.
New report.
Desertification, desertification threatens to drive millions of people from their homes in coming decades, while vast dust storms can damage the health of people continents away.
This, according to an international report yesterday, desertification has emerged as global problem affecting everyone, said Zafar Adil, assistant director of the UN University's Water Academy and a lead author of a report drawing on the work of 1,360 scientists in 95 nations.
Two billion people live in drylands, vulnerable to desertification, ranging from northern Africa to swathes of Central Asia.
Storms can lift dust from the Sahara Desert, for instance, and cause respiratory problems for people as far away as North America.
Well, you know, it's about time Africa is going to get blamed for something rather than we getting blamed for causing something to happen in Africa.
So those of you with respiratory problems, you can blame it on the Sahara Desert now.
Just a lot of sand and dust up there gets kicked up by windstorms, been traveling around the globe, various wind patterns.
You inhale it.
Ergo, you get emphysema.
They've been trying to blame this on tobacco for the longest time, but now we know the Sahara Desert is a likely culprit.
Here's another thing.
Overgrazing and overplanting of crops, swelling human populations and misuse of irrigation were contributing to desertification, the report said.
Estimated that 10 to 20% of dry lands were already degraded.
Global warming, widely blamed on human emissions of heat-trapping gases from cars, factories, and power plants, was likely to exacerbate the problems in coming decades by triggering more floods, more droughts, and heat waves.
Wait a minute.
I thought this was about dust.
I thought this was about desertification and dust.
Now we're talking about floods.
Growing desertification worldwide threatens to swell by millions a number of poor, forced to seek new homes and livelihoods, said the report.
This gobbledy gook never ends.
It just never ends.
These pointy-headed intellectual liberal elites are just comical.
As though none of this stuff has ever happened on this planet before.
Sahara Desert's been around for how long?
Ever since the aliens came and built the pyramids.
Ever since that happened, we know it was there then.
We know the Sahara was there in a time of King Tut.
I just, you have to laugh at this.
All these horrible things all of a sudden happening for the first time.
And note that it coincides with the existence of the United States, Western democracies, who are capitalists.
I never heard this because I don't know anything.
Fortunately, and thankfully, I don't know anything about birth.
So I've never heard this wives tale.
But doctors and nurses who work in the delivery room should not fret anymore during the next full moon because a new study has found no evidence to support the common belief that births and delivery complications spike during full moons.
Have you ever heard this?
Have you heard this, Dawn, as a mother?
It's an old wives' tale, but you have heard it.
At least you've heard about it.
I haven't heard about it because being in airplanes does what?
Spikes births?
Being in airplanes during full moons or just anytime?
Just anytime.
Well, I guess if you're in an airplane during a full moon, it's bad.
Some people believe that maternity wards are more crowded during certain lunar phases, especially during a full moon, but the notion didn't hold up under scrutiny.
Dr. Jill Arless of Mountain Area Health Education Center in Asheville, North Carolina, did not find any connection between the lunar cycle and births in a review of more than 500,000 births in North Carolina.
You can look at your calendar for the full moon closest to your due date and still not have any better idea about when your baby will be born than if you picked the new moon the first quarter to last quarter or any day in between, said co-author Shelly Galvin.
We really don't know what starts the process of labor, but we do know that whatever it is, it probably has nothing to do with the phases of the moon.
Well, that's comforting.
We don't know what starts the process of labor.
How about birth?
Can I help out here?
Brian in Stevens City, Virginia.
Welcome to the program.
Hey, Rush Dittos from a young conservative.
Thank you, sir.
Hey, the reason I'm calling a duo 180 for a second about this Natalie Holloway thing.
You know, I feel really horrible for what's happened to her.
But I tell you, I get really tired of hearing all the major news stations.
It's all the chaperones, chaperones.
You know, maybe this might ruffle your feathers a little bit, but, you know, and not to be stereotypical, but this girl, she's not a child, you know, and these kids went not as kids.
I mean, these are adults.
And, you know, we might not want to admit it, but eventually you have to cut the strings and start being accountable for your decisions.
And, you know, if people honestly think this girl went down there just to watch TV in her hotel room, they're crazy.
How do you know?
We don't know what was going on down there with the drinking and things.
You know, sure, you're not trying to smear her character, but how do we know?
How do we know?
How old is she?
How old is this?
I'm not really following the story.
I think she's 18 or 19.
Well, 18 or 19, she's not legally an adult yet.
She wouldn't be until she's 21.
You mean like legal adult, like as an 18?
I mean, 21.
No, no, no, no, but in terms of she's still a teenager, 18, still a teenager now.
Let me address this in two ways.
One thing you're talking about is the never-ending news coverage of it, right?
Right.
Yeah, I mean, you can't escape the never-ending news coverage.
And the second thing you're talking about is, hey, okay, she's got free will.
She went down there with some bugs and things happened.
You know, why all of a sudden are we going to go into hysterics about it over what's happening here to one person?
Is I got that right?
Am I summarizing it correctly?
Yeah, you got it.
Well, the media answer is easy.
This is a made-to-order story for the new 24-7 cable news cycle.
Made to order.
And plus, look at the reporters that get to go down to Aruba and cover it.
You've seen the stand-ups from Aruba.
They're out in some place called Palm Beach, Aruba.
And who wouldn't want to be down there?
I granted you going to go cover the story, but it's just, it's made to order.
It's no different than the latest car chase.
You know, these things, it's the runaway bride all over again.
In this case, there's no jilted lover at the altar with about 1,400 bridesmaids out thousands of dollars each and 60,000 guests or whatever it was.
But you still have the mystery here of what happened to her.
It's a mystery.
And in the age prior to cable TV, this story would not have made the TV.
Nobody would know.
What's her name, Holloway?
Natalie Holloway.
Nobody even knows she's missing other than the people in her local town when the local newspaper would be writing about it, maybe local TV, but it wouldn't make the cycle.
But today it does.
24-7, a lot of time to fill with news.
And so it's made to order.
Now, as to whether people are talking about sending kids down there with chaperones and this sort of stuff because of this, and whether Aruba is a dangerous place to go now, that's a natural human reaction.
I got an email today.
I have some friends out there, and I've known them for a long time.
I haven't seen them in a while, but their young daughter, I remember their little daughter, was just junior high when the last time I saw her.
Now she's living in San Francisco.
She's dating some guy.
And my friends are not sure of this guy.
He's whining and dining her and really going, really doing it upright.
And he's telling her things about himself that they're not sure are true.
And they think I might be able to find out something about who this guy is.
And so I wrote him back and I said, I don't know how old your daughter is.
Please tell me.
But at some point, you know, it's her life.
And I told my friends, if you really are worried about this guy, the last thing to do is tell your daughter that.
The best thing to do is act like you're interested, but you don't really care.
Because the more you oppose this guy when you don't even know him, the more you're going to drive her right into his arms.
Now, if then there's the fact here that this is happening in San Francisco, there may be other things to worry about out there rather than marriage and this sort of stuff happening too soon, given the daily news out of the Bay Area and what city council out there is permitting and allowing.
But it's the same thing here.
I mean, Natalie Holloway, I mean, she's 18, 19 years old, and she went down there on her own.
And, you know, family's obviously concerned.
Because people are susceptible to the news cycle, and it is a mystery.
And I can understand why people get drawn to it and want to, just like they did the runaway bride.
How many people, Mr. Snurdley, how many people do you think were out there saying, stop all this coverage of the runaway bride?
I don't care.
I've heard enough about.
But every time there was a report, they tuned in to see what the latest was.
Just think about it.
Quick time out.
We'll be back in just a second.
Don't go away.
By the way, speaking of news, we're all tired of.
Does anybody care about Tom Cruise and whether he's getting married or whether his relationship's fake or does anybody care?
Does anybody care about Madonna and Kabbalah?
Does anybody care about Anana?
Does anybody care what Nicole Kidman's doing anytime she's doing it?
Does anybody care?
Well, I mean, it's all big news.
It's huge out there.
Ashley in Annapolis, Maryland, welcome to the EIB Network.
Hello.
Hi, Rush.
How are you doing?
Good.
I am calling to tell you about my high school environmental science textbook.
In the back, there was a chapter about the different types of economic systems, and it listed the characteristics for a company operating in a capitalist economic system.
One of those was withholding dangerous information from consumers about possible hazards with a product.
And another was exploiting the environment in any way possible.
And personally, I was very angered by that.
Our teacher was pretty balanced and basically told us that the book was crap.
But the book was mandated by the county.
And so every student in our county that took that course read that book.
What county in Maryland is Annapolis in?
An Arundel County.
Oh, it's not Montgomery, huh?
Because that's where the weird stuff happens.
This is not exactly normal.
Well, there's been a long pattern of this.
I don't know if you're old enough to remember or young enough.
You ever watch Captain Planet on Saturday morning?
Well, what do you think that was about?
Captain Planet was all about inculcating young minds with the evils of corporations.
It's a Ted Turner cartoon.
And you're fortunate you've got a teacher here that's putting this in perspective.
Oh, definitely.
Well, you're also fortunate you're able to recognize what a joke it is at the outside.
I laughed out loud.
I thought it was hilarious.
Well, that's the great, keep laughing at it, Ashley.
You really just keep laughing at it.
You'll have more people curious why you're laughing than why you're mad.
Nobody even thought twice about it.
That's what bothered me more than anything is nobody understood why I was angry about it.
Well, start laughing about it, and they'll ask you, what's so funny, Ashley?
They will.
And then you say, I can't believe what I'm reading here.
This is asinine, and it's in our textbook.
And they'll say, what do you mean?
And bamo, you own them, and then you can start telling them why what's in the book is wrong.
And just the fact that it wasn't an economics textbook.
The book was not supposed to have anything to do with economics or capitalist systems or anything.
It was supposed to be about the environment and, you know, Earth systems.
Well, of course.
But, Ashley, that's the point.
The new home since the fall of the Soviet Empire, the new home of socialists and quasi-communists is the environmental movement.
It's right there in your book.
It's an attack on capitalism.
Make no mistake about it.
Quick time out.
Laugh at them, Ashley, and they'll ask you why you're laughing.
Back after this.
That's got a scathing note.
Rush.
You need to brush up on your pronunciations.
Robert, Louisiana is pronounced Robert.
I disagree.
If Robert, Louisiana is the Rio Linda of that region of the South, there's no way it could be pronounced Robert, spelled Robert, because the residents couldn't figure it out.