Dec. 19, 2006 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:07
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| Yes, if I knew then what I know now, I would have laughed at Dan Rather louder than I laughed at Saturday Night Live. | |
| If I knew then what I know now, I would never have supported the war on poverty that destroyed the inner city family. | |
| Anyway, we're back, ladies and gentlemen. | |
| Greetings, nice to have you. | |
| Rush Limbaugh, the excellence in Broadcasting Network 800-282-2882. | |
| If you want to be on the program today, and I know you do, uh the email address is rush at EIBNet.com from the UK Daily Mail. | |
| Children under 10 think being a celebrity is the very best thing in the world. | |
| But they do not think quite as much of God, a survey has revealed. | |
| It took a poll of just under 1,500 crumb crunchers over there, and the poll ranked God as their tenth favorite thing in the world with celebrity, good looks, and being rich at one, two, and three, respectively. | |
| It is the second year running that God has come in at number 10 in the annual survey of National Kids' Day, but being rich was number one last time. | |
| Being a celebrity is far and away, and number one this time. | |
| God did come up again as being the most famous person in the world, according to the Crumb Crunchers, beating uh President Bush into second place, uh killing and wars had the list under Crumb Crunchers list of the very worst things in the world, followed by drunks, bullies, illness, smoking, stealing, divorce, and being fat. | |
| Dying is in tenth place of worst things in the world. | |
| In the poll of crumb crunchers, ten and under in the UK. | |
| Now let's take a look at this business about being a celebrity is the very best thing in the world. | |
| If they did such a survey in this country, would you expect similar results? | |
| I wouldn't be surprised if the number one thing that young people, ten or under twelve, or who know, whatever age, uh, it would indeed be to become a celebrity. | |
| It's one of the things that explains uh some of the behavior that we see running rampant. | |
| Uh I mean uh look at Diana's funeral. | |
| You know, that that was a classic illustration now. | |
| We're not talking about crumb crunchers under 10. | |
| I mean, that was one of the most amazing sights I have ever seen. | |
| How many hundreds of thousands or millions were it? | |
| Was it that lined the streets? | |
| And everybody thought, incorrectly, by the way, that this was due to an outpouring of love, devotion, and gratitude, and sorrow for uh the unfortunate princess. | |
| While in fact, there's no question there was some of that. | |
| It was one of the most televised events in the world, and everybody wanted to be part of it. | |
| Everybody wanted to be part of the event. | |
| Nobody wanted to be a spectator. | |
| Everybody wanted to be in it. | |
| Everybody wanted to be able to say they were there. | |
| They probably had their TVOs or VCRs running, hoping that their face ended up on camera during the procession, during the funeral, all of these things that took place. | |
| So there's there's no question, and you know, I remember saying on this program, and it may be ten years ago or more, I arrived in New York City in 1988, uh, so naive about so many things. | |
| Boy, you talk about wishing things you could change. | |
| Uh I uh and I don't, I mean, because you can't. | |
| I mean, everything that happens leads you to where you are, and most honest people, if uh if they get the question, what could if you had it redo over in your life, what would it be? | |
| Uh most honest people saying, Oh, I think everything that happened led me to where I am, and if they're happy with where they are, that'll be their answer. | |
| Uh but I arrived in New York in 1988 from my adopted hometown of Sacramento. | |
| I had so many m m uh mistaken notions about media. | |
| Uh and I've talked about this in the context, if if I ever write another book, I know what one of the books might be. | |
| Take a bunch of various topics like success and what I thought it would be versus what it really is, fame, what I thought It was going to be versus what it really is, uh fame, what I thought it was going to be, and how you get it versus how you really get it. | |
| And it's that area, I'll give you a little hint. | |
| Ten, twelve years ago or whatever, uh I thought, simply as a consumer of media, that whenever I read a profile of someone anywhere, newspaper, or magazine, or saw one on television, I assumed that it was because that person had uh distinguished him or herself in achievement, had achieved something noteworthy that set that person apart from all others who did the same kind of work that person did. | |
| And I thought the media were people that were constantly scouting out these success stories, or uh in some cases the the negative examples, but I thought they were real sleuths. | |
| And that they were really out there investigating and turning uh up every stone, uh looking for the absolute best, and little did I know how wrong I was. | |
| Little did I know how irrelevant achievement is to fame, and uh what some people would call PR or publicity. | |
| It derives from other factors. | |
| And you can't take the politics out of it, the orientation of the media versus whoever it is that they are writing or talking about. | |
| Uh and most certainly you can't take flax out of it. | |
| PR people who are out there hustling up these stories. | |
| And you can't take out the fact that there are quid pro quo's to the journalists or to the organization when such a story is done. | |
| I had no idea that there were PR firms out there that had clients and the sole job was to get their clients in the news as often as possible. | |
| I had no idea that people like Bruce Willis being photographed at the China Club at two in the morning was work. | |
| And if given the choice, he'd actually been in bed. | |
| But he had to be s well, he would two in the morning at a China Club uh to get his picture in the paper right before a movie comes up. | |
| I mean, that's how naive I was. | |
| And what I didn't understand is you can become famous or notorious without having achieved anything. | |
| Hello, Paris Hilton. | |
| If you have the right connections and the right PR people, you can survive on buzz. | |
| You can have a radio show that nobody listens to, and yet the media portrays it as relevant and important and big. | |
| You can have a radio show that everybody listens to, and the media will do their best to ignore it or disparage it or try to discredit it. | |
| Uh and one of the things I've learned is that the media is just like anybody else. | |
| If you suck up to them, your odds are much better of favorable treatment if you leak information to them, if you are a source for them so that they don't have to work and be sleuths and find things, that they'll hold you a little higher regard and higher esteem than if uh you uh assume uh what uh confrontational posture with them. | |
| Well, of course, I have taken a confrontational posture because I think they're horrible. | |
| And I think what they do is irresponsible in any case, and I point out I don't expect this is not a whine or a moan, I don't I don't expect fair treatment from these people. | |
| But I did is the point uh early on, based solely on achievement. | |
| I thought achieving in my industry would uh what would would garner me instant respect among others in the industry. | |
| I I was so naive. | |
| I should have learned all this in high school, but I didn't take note of it. | |
| And the reason that I didn't take note of it is because everybody that was in this business who had achieved was treated royally by people in the business and treated by uh royally by people in the media. | |
| But that didn't happen to me. | |
| It it uh I couldn't figure out why, and it took me a while to have it explained to me and to be understood uh personally on my own. | |
| So when I when I see this story about all these young kids who think being a celebrity would be the very best thing in the world, it's a little alarming because I can tell you that there's no ten-year-old or nine-year-old or eight-year-old who has the slightest clue what it really means. | |
| And and what life as a celebrity with fame is really all about. | |
| Most people what's impossible, most people can't till you live it, and they don't uh and yet the desire to do so is rooted in in uh the understanding of human nature. | |
| Everybody wants to be noticed, everybody wants to be the focus of attention, everybody wants to be loved, everybody wants to be treated like royalty, uh uh movie stars at the top, and they never get ripped by the people, the media in their own business. | |
| I mean, they are treated as experts on every um actor can go out and play a farm wife and two weeks later be testifying before the Senate on agriculture problems. | |
| People watch this. | |
| Wow, man, I would I would love to be living that. | |
| But the bad thing about it is that depending on who you are and how you do it, you don't have to accomplish anything to become a celebrity. | |
| And it can it's one of the those kind of people, it's one of the emptiest, most vacuous lives you can lead, and yet it is it is it is attractive to so many people, young people especially, uh, because of the way celebrities are portrayed in the media. | |
| Of course it looks cool. | |
| Partying all night, every night, uh running around, doing whatever you want at unlimited budget. | |
| Uh and of course, nothing is ever as it seems, nothing is ever as it appears to be to people on the outside. | |
| It's uh it's just it's one of these if I could grab hold of every one of these kids and instead of going, oh, that's so cute, little Johnny, you too want to be Paris Hilton at some point, and tell them, you know, you really don't understand uh what that's all about, and it's the fastest route to emptiness if that's your pursuit. | |
| Uh there are people, by the way, who have not, maybe they're famous because they're great. | |
| They're famous, but they're not celebrities. | |
| There are great people. | |
| Now I'm not I'm not totally wrong about that. | |
| There are many, many people who have achieved greatness and acclaim strictly and solely on the basis of achievement. | |
| They used to be taught in history books. | |
| Now they've been replaced by people like Bill Clinton and Jamie Gorellick. | |
| Uh, but they that route is still there, and in each case, I don't care who you name, Einstein, uh, Jonas Sauk. | |
| Name any of these people. | |
| Their quest was not celebrity, their quest was not fame. | |
| They were oriented toward the pursuit of excellence to be the best they could be, following their passions. | |
| They achieved uh uh made noticeable changes in the world, and this is you know, you hear people say, Well, I want to make a difference. | |
| Bono's running, I want to make the difference. | |
| I just want to make a difference. | |
| He, by the way, Bono got stiffed by the Democrats in uh in a request for money for Africa. | |
| I have the story coming up. | |
| Sit tight. | |
| You say Bono made a difference. | |
| Um he can tell himself he made a difference. | |
| He's running around trying to get other people to give money. | |
| But is that really making a difference? | |
| A lot of young kids are looking, boy, that I want to matter. | |
| I want to be I want to be able to run around and make everybody think I care, but is he accomplishing anything? | |
| Is he really changing anything? | |
| No, the answer is no. | |
| I'm not questioning his intentions. | |
| I'm looking at the results. | |
| On the other hand, the people over there who actually passing out the TB drugs or donating them, who are educating people, uh taking steps to stop AIDS, who you've never heard about and you never will hear about because they're not seeking celebrity, they are making a difference. | |
| Of course, Hitler made a difference. | |
| So you have to be careful how you use the term and uh and throw it around. | |
| My only point here, folks, if you have a young kid, a young chow, who probably falls in the same category as his little crumb crunchers in the U.K., and you think they're oriented toward becoming a celebrity, don't be a celebrity parent. | |
| You sit them down and tell them there's no substitute for substance in life. | |
| Anyone can be vacuous. | |
| Anyone can be empty and accomplish nothing. | |
| We'll take a quick break. | |
| We'll be back in just a second. | |
| Stay with us. | |
| Merry Christmas, everybody. | |
| So happy that we are in the uh Christmas season. | |
| Favorite time of year here at the EIB network. | |
| All right, this is a story, interestingly, from the Las Vegas Review Journal. | |
| Democrats leave Bono disappointed, anti-poverty activist gets no promise of funds. | |
| By the way, speaking of Africa, you know who's made the biggest difference in Africa causing it's in the number of deaths are incalculable, and that would be Rachel Carson, who succeeded. | |
| She's no longer around. | |
| She succeeded in getting rid of DDT. | |
| Hello, malaria, perhaps AIDS, who knows what kind of pestilence now runs around and rules Africa simply because one woman got everybody panicked in this country over DDT. | |
| And of course, you know, panicking and in crisis mode. | |
| That's nothing new. | |
| Uh and and now everybody's looking at maybe reintroducing DDT. | |
| It's like 50 million deaths in Africa can be attributed to Rachel Carson. | |
| And that's only recently now are people starting to look at it that way. | |
| For years and years and years, Rachel Carson was one of the greatest heroines of American society. | |
| She cared about the children and pesticides which were poisoning people. | |
| Then we had Merrill Streep and LR. | |
| And we scared everybody about apples. | |
| Alr is simply a substance that the apple growers put on her to make them appear more red or redder. | |
| And Merrill Streep's up there testifying before Congress. | |
| What are we doing to our children? | |
| What are we doing to our children? | |
| I'll never forget it. | |
| It's just meanwhile, Bono is running around and he's uh he's trying to raise money and so forth, which is fine, but you know, I like to put these things in perspective. | |
| So Bono went to Washington last Thursday, had a meeting with Democrats, including the Senate uh majority leader, Dingy Harry. | |
| And they got a photo up out of it, but not much else. | |
| Bono was on Capitol Hill to seek assurances that one billion dollars in planned U.S. spending to fight AIDS and malaria in Africa would not be lost if Congress freezes agency budgets in the coming year. | |
| Bono said he also was seeking to close a commitment gap between what President Bush has requested for anti-poverty efforts and what Congress has agreed to spend in the past. | |
| After meetings with uh with Dingy Harry and Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats in the House Appropriations Committee, Bono said he came away empty-handed. | |
| I'm alarmed we could not get a commitment from the Democrat leadership to prevent the loss of one billion dollars in the continuing resolution. | |
| I don't know who to blame. | |
| Democrats are blaming Republicans, Republicans are blaming Democrats, but the million people who were expecting mosquito bed nets don't know who to blame. | |
| They just know that a promise made by the United States to keep their families safe is in danger of being broken next year. | |
| A day later, Bono considered uh reconsidered his tough comments and took uh softer tone in a follow-up. | |
| Uh Bono said Friday that Dingy Harry acknowledged a difficult situation with the congressional budget, but he sincerely pledged his best efforts to improve the situation. | |
| Bono said, Reed uh made my day, taking me onto the Senate floor and leading me through the history of that great room. | |
| Um so anyway, uh Bono frozen out democrats, the party of compassion, the party of understanding, the party wants to solve suffering. | |
| Sorry, Bono, Republicans messed it up for us, and we can't guarantee you the fish nets, the mosquito nets or what have you. | |
| By the way, a uh an L train has uh has uh derailed in Chicago, ladies and gentlemen. | |
| No report of injuries yet, although there might be some who's still waiting on details. | |
| Uh no word on whether Barack Obama is at the scene or plans to go to the scene uh with without Obama on site, if there are injured, do they have hope? | |
| If he is on site, the odds are they might have hope. | |
| If they if word can get to them, don't hurry. | |
| Relax. | |
| Barack Obama is here and he's on the scene. | |
| Now some might say that Obama's no, no, no, the local local matter. | |
| I've got international concerns here that uh far supersede, but you're not working. | |
| It's the break. | |
| Uh Chicago's your home. | |
| We'll see if he shows up. | |
| Depends on how dad it is over there. | |
| Hollywood, uh, California, Brian. | |
| I'm sorry, Ryan, you're next on the EIB network. | |
| Hello. | |
| Hey, how are you doing, Russ? | |
| Fine, thank you, sir. | |
| It's amazing I'm talking to you. | |
| I'm gonna have big stories to tell all my friends now. | |
| Um I just had a comment on uh Miss America. | |
| I just I just everyone that I heard Colin just uh seems to want to uh punish her for having a few drinks and one call. | |
| No, no, no, there's only been one caller. | |
| Nobody wants to p nobody wants to punish her. | |
| Well, she he doesn't seem that the caller didn't seem like uh we should just take it away because she went out and had a few drinks. | |
| I mean, she's 20 years old, and it's like no one I I mean, I just got a lot of it today from other people, I guess too. | |
| But she's 20 years old, it's like no one remembers what it's like to be young and and having fun. | |
| And if you're gonna drink under aging, New York's the place to be because you're not driving anyway. | |
| I know what some of you people... | |
| She's not driving anyway. | |
| Uh New York's place to be if you're gonna do. | |
| Uh I know what some of you people are thinking here, but he does have a point. | |
| I'll explain when we come back from this brief time out. | |
| I can't I really can't believe this this Miss USA thing is still dominating cable coverage. | |
| It's either that or these poor guys that uh they lost out there on Mount Hood. | |
| I mean, that's the extent of the news. | |
| And and I want you to compare that to what you hear on this program, ladies and gentlemen. | |
| When you watch cable news during the day when when when the government is uh effectively shut down, you would think there's no news that I mean this breaking news with uh with the it's still breaking news. | |
| This happened two and a half hours ago, it's still breaking news. | |
| What happened with Miss USA? | |
| Or these poor guys out on Mount Hood, where that's been going on for weeks now or days. | |
| But yet look at the substance that you get on this program. | |
| Look at the very this not a slow news day. | |
| There's all kinds of stuff. | |
| How about the Baghdad economy is starting to boom? | |
| This is in the Newsweek International edition. | |
| Why people that live in Iraq have even gotten Bush style tax cuts, it says. | |
| And the and the and the Iraqi economy is booming despite the wall. | |
| And despite all the chaos and so forth. | |
| How does one splain this? | |
| Well, we'll do our best in mere moments. | |
| But I want to go back to what this guy said about uh Tara Connor. | |
| He said, Look, we've forgotten what it's like to be 20. | |
| I mean, when you're 20, that's when you can go out, have an all-night blowout with whatever number of bottles of booze you want, still get up and put in a full day of productive work the next day. | |
| The time you hit 28, 2930, you can't do that. | |
| Certainly can't do it when you're 40 or 50, although you know, we know people who try. | |
| Uh look, 20 year olds make mistakes. | |
| Everybody makes mistakes. | |
| None of us are perfect. | |
| Come on. | |
| She just had a few drinks. | |
| At least she was in New York where she wasn't driving. | |
| If you're gonna do something like this, now there were who who said it who who um who put out the allegation of cocaine? | |
| Where did you hear that? | |
| Who? | |
| Uh oh, oh, that's right. | |
| Uh there have been allegations, and that she's got to go out there to go drug test, or she's gonna get a drug test. | |
| Trump Trump announced that. | |
| And so uh there are uh allegations that she's out there uh using cocaine uh as well as uh swapping spit with the Miss USA teen uh and uh you know a little romance going on there while they're consuming adult beverages. | |
| Now at some point some people are gonna say, wait a second. | |
| You can't just sit there and say, it's a 20-year-old girl, and this is what 20-year-old girls do, and you gotta allow for this. | |
| We all remember what it was like to be 20. | |
| Well, in the old days, and they're not that far back, in the old days there was this thing called responsibility that went along with being singled out as one special woman in the country. | |
| Uh in this case, Miss USA. | |
| And the there there are people who remember those days, and there are people who think, you know, just because of uh what might be an average of human behavior doesn't give everybody a free pass from adhering to responsible behavior. | |
| Uh especially when you're Miss Miss USA or when you're Miss America's. | |
| Now I know those pageants are not highly thought of anymore, and they're not as don't have quite the uh reputation and standing that they did. | |
| Believe me, this is gonna help Trump try to revive the standing of the U.S., or at least the popularity of it, maybe not standing or the substance of it. | |
| But nevertheless. | |
| Uh when people are willing to say, come on, twenty. | |
| We all remember what it was like when it was twenty years old. | |
| It's it's getting uh more and more difficult to have standards that you want to maintain and then and then apply them. | |
| Because to apply standards means you must be judgmental. | |
| And judgmentalism is really frowned upon in this country right now. | |
| Nobody has the right to judge anymore. | |
| We have such a we have we are so focused on the imperfections of all of us. | |
| We are so focused on the on the fallibilities of all human beings. | |
| And look, it's happening in education. | |
| The high achievers. | |
| You're out of luck. | |
| We're not going to speed you up. | |
| We're not gonna we're not gonna uh plan our education system around you. | |
| In fact, we're gonna hold you back because to promote you in the face of all these other mediocre students would make them feel horrible. | |
| We're just not gonna have this. | |
| So there is an attempt that's been going on a long time for sameness. | |
| Equality of outcome as well as equality of opportunity. | |
| And that's what public education has largely become equality of outcome. | |
| It's just not fair that some people are better than others. | |
| It's all rooted in uh in uh in class envy. | |
| But there is um there's there's a more openness and willingness here to excuse uh and forgive this kind of behavior uh than there used to be, and it's because everybody well I've done the same stuff. | |
| I mean, why don't how can I come out and say So nobody's willing to be judgmental anymore? | |
| Uh well you can think one way or the other about that, be it good or bad, uh, but it is going to erode standards, it is going to erode institutions that have contributed to the greatness of the country. | |
| But these things are cyclical. | |
| I mean, at some point we'll all get sick and tired of every award winner being a reprobate and demand the standards be applied again. | |
| Well, we will. | |
| Uh here's Gail, Gail calling from Olive Branch, Mississippi. | |
| Welcome to the EIB network. | |
| Merry Christmas, Rush. | |
| Same to you. | |
| Uh I call because Senator Hillary has insulted my intelligence. | |
| Uh the Bill and Hillary team had eight years in the White House with access to intelligence. | |
| And if she can uh after nodding faithfully next to her husband's warnings about Iraq, if she can say that she was duped by President Bush, then why can she be not duped by our enemies? | |
| And why is she smart enough to be president? | |
| Well, you're asking the wrong questions because those questions, the answers to them make Hillary look very bad. | |
| Um and you're you're absolutely right, by the way. | |
| The the Clinton administration announced the same threats in 1998, and the media was parroting those threats, not not arguing with them. | |
| And Democrats and Republicans in the Senate were agreeing with the president, something had to be done. | |
| The Republicans were not treating Clinton like the Democrats treated Bush. | |
| That's a great question. | |
| Where was Hillary when her husband was sounding the same warnings back in 1998, 1999? | |
| Uh but what Hillary knows is it's called Lewinsky, uh uh back then, and uh there were there were strategic reasons here for sounding those warning bills. | |
| But she knows the intelligence is what it was. | |
| She she knows uh that Bush didn't lie. | |
| She knows that Bush didn't make any of it up, and that's your point. | |
| She's just taking the uh opportunity here of 2020 hindsight. | |
| The reason she's doing it, obviously, uh is for her upcoming soon-to-be announced, I'm sure, presidential campaign. | |
| Uh she's she has the freedom of changing her mind. | |
| A, she's a woman, and we all know that uh that alone grants you the right to change your mind whenever and for whatever reason, without question. | |
| Secondly, she I'm sorry, go ahead. | |
| I was just going to say it's it's not their lack of knowledge, it's their feeble response. | |
| And I'm a woman too, but uh I wouldn't trust her. | |
| I don't either. | |
| I don't trust her as far as I can throw her. | |
| And I don't believe she trusts herself, because uh she's easily duped. | |
| Well, I don't think she looks at herself that way. | |
| You know, royalty and queens and so forth do never think of themselves as dupable. | |
| They do the duping. | |
| Uh everybody else is just a plebe uh uh, you know, uh that you condescend towards and and have uh contempt for, hold in contempt. | |
| But anyway, that's that is an excellent point, and you're you're very wise to bring it. | |
| And uh you don't you don't think it makes her the smartest woman in the world, but see what has she ever done to establish that anyway? | |
| I was this is part and parcel of what I was talking about in the monologue when I opened the hour. | |
| Mrs. Clinton's demonstrated nothing to garner the image or credit of smartest woman of the world, and yet that's her image. | |
| Who created that? | |
| That that was created out of whole cloth. | |
| It was created and promoted with a willing media. | |
| It's not based on achievement, it's not based on substance. | |
| It's totally based on spin. | |
| That's a great example, too. | |
| She's not the smartest woman in the world. | |
| It's not possible. | |
| May I respond to that? | |
| Sure. | |
| Maybe the major media is easily duped. | |
| Well, yeah, they are, uh especially by people on their side. | |
| There's no question they're easily duped. | |
| But at the same time, they consider themselves part of the elite and undupable. | |
| Uh and that it's their job to, you know, make sure that the the plebs and the the hoy ploy don't learn too much about what's going on. | |
| Uh it's it's they're liberals. | |
| I mean, they're l whether in the media, whether in office, whether they're in the environmental movement, whether they're wearing Hollywood, they're liberals and they're liberals first. | |
| And there are characteristics that all liberals have. | |
| One is this superiority elitist complex that that combines an arrogant condescension towards everybody else, towards average. | |
| I mean, they'll set up all kinds of rules for society to live by from which they exempt themselves. | |
| Look at the environmental movement. | |
| All of these restrictions, you and I, we gotta be out there driving hybrids or electric cars or whatever. | |
| Do you think do you think that the Hollywood people promoting this are going to give up their toys? | |
| Do you think Ted Kennedy's gonna start driving around on one of those things? | |
| It's not gonna happen. | |
| Uh it's it's they don't have traffic jams in their lives. | |
| You know, they there's no such thing as a red light. | |
| They've got escorts wherever they go, and you know, traffic problems and tie-ups, that's for you. | |
| And they'll give us great things like HOV lanes and mass transit to alleviate our traffic problems, while they exempt themselves from most of these things. | |
| Thanks for the call out there, Gail. | |
| A brief timeout, ladies and gentlemen, we'll be back and continue in mere moments. | |
| Your host for life. | |
| Going nowhere until every American agrees with me, until every letter to the editor of any newspaper in the country praises me. | |
| Rush Limbaugh on the EIB network. | |
| Back to the phones now. | |
| This is Keith in Terre Hot, Indiana. | |
| Nice to have you, sir. | |
| Oh, how are you doing, Russ? | |
| Snow. | |
| Thank you very much. | |
| I just wanted to make a quick comment on this whole Miss USA thing. | |
| I I I pretty clearly remember being 20 years old, and I didn't know any women that looked or acted the way this girl does. | |
| And if I had, then my ex-wife wouldn't have had a chance. | |
| She probably would have saved me a whole lot of trouble. | |
| You know the thing, here's the way to look at this. | |
| And I I understand uh uh in a way, in in a human human nature sense, people just they they see something like this and they feel guilty if they start demanding that standards be adhered to, or if they start judging it all, because everybody knows that they've done something like this to one degree or another. | |
| They've all and uh most people would be would be mortified if the whole world knew about it. | |
| And so there's there's this there's this lack of of uh courage, if you will, to uh enforce standards because nobody thinks that anybody can achieve them. | |
| But the problem with this is, and I want you all to think about this. | |
| Now I have spoken at great length on on this program about my belief that high expectations are incredibly valuable and necessary in order for human beings to become the best they can be. | |
| If you have great expectations of your kids, and I'm not, you know, you know you're not lauding it over there. | |
| I'm not talking about being celebrity parents or so forth, but or if if the kids have teachers or somebody around them that that really respects them and has high expectations, uh the odds are that human beings will respond to those high expectations because they want to please people. | |
| If they're not interested in pleasing themselves, they will want to please people, uh, particularly the people they respect. | |
| The problem with laughing about this and sweeping it under the rug, which I understand Because most people think they're fallible, is what's happening to expectations. | |
| When did they become so low? | |
| Or when did the trend to lower expectations start and what's going to be the result of it? | |
| Now, in this case, you could say, either seriously or cynically, come on, rush, high expectations for a beauty queen. | |
| Give me a break. | |
| But in the old days, I keep, you know, I vowed when I was a kid and I got older, I would never use the phrase in the old days or in the good old days, and I'd never be a parent that told my kids, don't have any, thank God, that I had to walk 10 miles through the snow and so forth. | |
| As we all heard growing up. | |
| But I remember when the Miss America passion was a huge deal. | |
| And winning it was a huge deal, and it was an honor, and it required a certain kind of woman and comportment and behavior. | |
| And it did require some talent. | |
| Not just BIM bet status in the two-piece. | |
| Now, obviously things have changed. | |
| I'm not, this is not gee, if I'd have known then uh what I know now, I'm not wishing to turn back the clock. | |
| But there are consequences to everything. | |
| And I think for parents who are raising kids with high expectations, who are trying to inculcate in them that there is virtue in trying to make as few mistakes as you make, and that there is value in teaching them that there are consequences to actions that you take, as opposed to this. | |
| Most young people are going to look at this and she skated, cool. | |
| They're going to think she got away with it, and the and they're going to draw a lesson from it. | |
| Uh and then they may draw lessons from other examples like this in life. | |
| I'm just telling you that in terms of forget the country for a second, because I mean, many people think that's lost. | |
| But just in your own family or in your in in your city or your little town, your neighborhood, or whatever, uh, there are many people who and more than you would realize, who are still holding to notions that it is a good thing to prepare a young person to have high expectations and to try to do the best they can most of the time. | |
| Uh and to teach virtue and responsibility and this kind of thing, and they watch this kind of stuff and they feel undercut and undermined. | |
| The same thing can happen when your kids come home from school and you're not there, and they turn on the Oprah show, and there's that idiot Al Gore poisoning their minds on global warming with absolute lies and BS. | |
| It's just as destructive as this crazy thing that's going on here with the perhaps even more so if you want to know the truth, because there are probably more people that watch the Oprah show that are going to see this thing with uh Tara Connor, even though it hijacked the cable news for two hours today. | |
| So there's, I mean, the examples here of kids being assaulted with uh with images that are uh, shall we say, and ideas that are not the least bit uh uh positive or productive is something that parents are trying to raise kids responsibly or facing each and every day. | |
| Yes, Mr. Sturdley, you know, I you're you're you're frowning in there, and you're looking at me like I've gone off the deep end, and I've I frankly think that this has been a brilliant, as most of them are, ad-libbed monologue. | |
| And I he's in there, he's clearly thinking that I've lost off my rocker or something here today. | |
| You probably think I was out partying with her last night, right? | |
| And that's why I'm not making sense today. | |
| Let me make a brief timeout, we'll be back after this. | |
| Singing along with the Christmas music from Manheim steamroller Rush Limbaugh behind the golden EIB microphone in the Attila the Hunter Cave. | |
| Some of you might be agreeing with Snerdley Sterling says this is just a bimbo in a swimsuit that doesn't mean anything about the country. | |
| I can't believe what I'm here you're saying. | |
| I mean, look at the garbage that was going on drug-wise and culture-wise in the 60s when we were growing up, compared to now, and I said you can't look at it that way. | |
| Donald Trump thinks this is big. | |
| Trump thinks that he's gonna teach life lessons to all kinds of people with this episode. | |
| Uh, and everything's cumulative. | |
| If this were just one incident, yeah, no big deal, but it's the product and the byproduct of other things. | |
| But I'm telling you, there are parents because it's all all over television. | |
| It's gonna be over entertainment tonight, inside edition, and what have you. | |
| We gotta go. | |
| I'll be back in a minute. | |
| Not enough time to say what I want. |
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