You know, that's just that's just really I mean that's just over the top.
I'm now seeing the same video for the second time in five minutes on a different network.
Two different networks with the same video.
This Ivy League professor who is charged with uh beating his wife to death, they got video of this guy walking his dog and the dog.
The video they've got video of the dog pooping.
And then they get video of the professor picking cleaning up after the dog.
I mean, could we can we just have a still shot?
I mean, do we have to see this?
Anyway, greetings, uh ladies and gentlemen, it's L. Rushbow here observing while you live.
800-282-2882 and the email address rush at eIB net.com.
From Blossburg, Pennsylvania, six-year-old Carland Dunbar barely touched her dinner, but not for time-honored six-year-old reasons.
The pasta was not the wrong shape.
She didn't have an urgent date with her dolls.
The problem was the letter Carlin discovered tucked inside her report card saying that she had a body mass index in the eightieth percentile.
The first grader didn't know what index or percentile meant, or that children scoring in the fifth through eighty-fifth percentiles are considered normal, while those scoring higher are at risk of being or already overweight.
Yet she became convinced that her teachers were chastising her for overeating.
Since the letter arrived, Georgiana Dunbar, her mother says my tea two-year-old eats more than she does.
She's afraid she's gonna get in trouble.
The practice of reporting students' body mass scores to parents originated a few years ago as just one tactic in a war on childhood obesity that would be fought with fresh, low-fat cafeteria offerings and expanded physical education.
Now, inspired uh by impressive results and a few well-financed programs, states like Delaware, South Carolina, and Tennessee have jumped on the BMI bandwagon, turning the reports into a new right of childhood.
Legislators in other states, including New York, have proposed them as well, while some individual school districts have adopted the uh practice.
Holly, 17, said, I don't care how big I am.
It's not what you look like, it's who you are.
Is this not amazing?
I mean, even if you cast aside the good intentions here, have I guess we have.
We've just be parents, some parents have just become so distanced that that the schools are supposed to do everything.
You get did you believe you believe parents needing a note from school telling them their kids' body mass index is off the charts in order for the parents to do something about it, and now they're instilling panic in these kids and uh maybe turning this little six-year-old into an anorexic, because she's afraid she's in trouble despite what her mother says, because of course what her mother says is wrong.
What the school says is what's right.
The school says that it must be right.
She can't trust her mother, can't trust her father.
Well, there's no mention of the father in the story, which shouldn't surprise us.
He's probably a predator out having an affair somewhere.
Nevertheless, uh I mean, this is I just I apply my own childhood to this, and I remember if I were in the sixth or seventh grade, first or second grade, whatever it is, and with my report card was a note telling me my parents were fat, my parents are going to school.
What the hell are you doing up here?
You think I don't know this?
It's none of your business.
I'm handling what just mind boggling.
I want to say a couple things here, if I if I might about the troop surge.
At least the president's speech coming on Wednesday, which will announce whatever the plan is.
Because I said earlier in the uh in the very busy program today that we played audio sound bites from Nancy Pelosi and some others, and by the way, some Democrats are distancing themselves from her on this, but regardless.
The President is coming up with a way here to try to win this.
He's uh shopping around for ideas.
He's got new generals, and the surge idea seems to be one that has a lot of consensus of support behind it.
Now, there's some people suggesting that wait a second, if all we're going to do with this consensus is prop up the Shi'ite government, saying wipe out the Sunnis, then aren't we just going to end up with another Iran, basically, which is primary Shiite.
So wait a minute, that's not what we ought to be doing here.
I I I don't quite follow the the full reasoning on this, because whether we're there or not, that's what's going to end up happening.
It's places of Iraq.
But we're trying to eliminate the impediments here to moving on with this country feeling and being free to decide its own affairs.
And the Democrats just seem like this is an unnecessary provocation.
We're talking about victory here and an ultimate U.S. withdrawal, and the Democrats think this is an argument.
They think it's something they have to oppose.
It's stunning.
The only in today's Democratic Party could victory in a war present a problem for the Democrats.
And yet it certainly seems to have done just that.
The Democrats are talking about uh w we we shall not escalate this.
We don't want to escalate our involvement.
Let me tell you something.
If we pulled out of there, like the Democrats and Reed and Pelosi want to do with their redeployment idea, you know what the result would be?
The result would be a huge escalation of violence in Iraq.
The argument that cutting the number of American troops will help stabilize Iraq is like arguing that the best way to put out a spreading fire is by pulling out the firemen and pulling out the water and grounding the airplanes with the suffocating anti-flammable dust that they throw on these things.
It just doesn't work.
You don't fight a fire by retreating.
Pulling out the firemen in the water, and yet that's the Democrat philosophy here.
The result would be catastrophic.
It is apparent that the President has decided that the situation there requires that we redouble our efforts to provide order and uh and security.
Uh but the the Reed Pelosi line of thought is that withdrawing American troops will bring the war to a close, meaning we're the only reason there's a war going on over there.
If it weren't for us, why there would be peace and tranquility in that country.
We just get us out of there, and this is typical of the liberals too.
Blame America.
Whenever there is warfare, blame us.
By the way, there's another fascinating story in the stack today, Peter Beinart of the of Time magazine.
You know, all these years we've heard Bush is a cowboy, he's going it alone, he's uh he's not listening to allies.
This is a piece in Time magazine that praises Bush and Americans for using allies in defeating the uh uh Somali and the warlords in Somali, uh Somalia and the and the Al Qaeda there.
I mean, it's it's um uh well, no, it's not quite that.
Let me let me it's it's it's more hypocritical than even that.
But there's just one thing I noticed in the New York Times uh yesterday, they've got a military correspondent there, Michael Gordon, and I asked some people, because what he wrote stunned me.
As I'm surprised it ended up in the New York Times, I asked some people about this guy's credentials, and uh some people I spoke to said that he's actually quite good and knowledgeable.
And this is the point he made about the upcoming surge.
Quote, but you know, this I'm not uh actually uh was on meet the press.
It was not in the Times, it's a Times reporter.
He said, but you know, we only have 15,000 troops now in Baghdad, a city of six million, only fifteen thousand troops who are involved in the operation to try to stabilize the city.
So twenty thousand is doubling that force.
It's not inconsequential.
Uh which, you know, that's a pretty good response to Biden's argument that we've tried the surge idea and it's failed.
Uh I was stunned when I read that we've only got 15,000 troops involved in the stabilization operation in the city of Baghdad, and the surge is gonna double that.
that in a percentage basis or however you wish to define it, as as uh Robert Gordon or Michael Gordon said on Meet the Press yesterday is not uh inconsequential.
So at any rate, the president is uh doing what he has always pledged to do, and that is to try to win this, and the Democrats once again are providing themselves uh as as the opposition to victory, are positioning themselves that way in some cases, not all.
Yesterday on Meet the Press, Tim Russert was talking with Senator Biden and said, Senator Biden, let me start with you.
If President Bush calls for more troops in Iraq, uh so-called surge, Joe Biden will say, and then Biden interrupt.
No.
But there's not much I can do about it.
Not much anybody can do about it.
He's commander in chief.
If he surges another 20, 30 of whatever number he's going to into Baghdad, it'll be a tragic mistake in my view, but uh, as a practical matter, there's no way to say Mr. President stop.
See, disagreeing with Pelosi, he doesn't think they have any way to stop Bush from doing this.
Pelosi says Bush has to go negotiate with them before he can do it.
But once again, this is just nonsensical.
More troops won't matter.
Uh, more troops won't make a difference, more firefighters wouldn't put out the fire.
It's silly.
Uh Stenny Hoyer then decided to distance himself from the Queen Bee on defunding the trips.
This is Fox News Sunday.
Britt Hume said, Do you you think there will come a day in the not too distant future when there will be an effort coming from the House to cut off the funds for this war?
I don't want to anticipate that, uh, Britt.
Democrats and Republicans are going to support the troops.
We're not going to put the troops in any greater risk than they currently are.
We're going to make sure they're supplied, we're going to make sure that they have the resources they need.
Not if you listen to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.
They want to pull them out of there.
So there's already some fractures here.
Anybody heard from uh Hoyer today?
Anybody seen Stenley Hoyer today?
I haven't.
And the House isn't in session today.
So much for the five-day work week they promised.
Uh football game tonight, you know, it couldn't work today, because they have the football game tonight, which doesn't start till 8 15 Eastern.
Today couldn't work today.
Uh because of the football game.
And that was the reason that they gave.
Yeah, hang on here just a second.
I gotta find this.
Uh well, it's here somewhere.
All these stories on tax cuts today, uh, and the uh and the New York Times is paving the way here for Democrats to raise taxes.
The story Bush tax cuts offer most for very rich study fines.
So this is the wind up to allow the Democrats the cover to raise taxes out there.
Families earning more than one million dollars a year saw their federal tax rates drop more sharply than any group in the country as a result of Bush's tax cuts, according to the Congregational Budget Office.
You know what this means?
It means Zilch Zero Nada.
The rates, which were reduced from 39.6 to 35 percent have resulted in the rich paying an even bigger bite of the total federal tax bill than they were paying when the top rate was 39.6 percent.
Which the Times has to begrudgingly admit, but deep in the story.
Though tax cuts for the rich were bigger for those uh than those for other groups, the wealthiest families paid a bigger share of total taxes.
That's because their incomes have climbed more rapidly and the gap between rich and poor has widened and it has not, and we had the story last week.
The gap between rich and poor has remained static for a number of years.
It's another myth that is out there.
But so what if it has?
When has it not?
When is the gap between where is the law that says the poor are supposed to be as rich as the rich?
Would somebody give me that law of physics or economics or any other law?
Somebody explain this to me.
Stupid presumptions made by a bunch of Marxist liberals, all for the purposes of exploiting class envy.
Uh middle income, middle income groups, families in the middle fifth of annual earnings, who had incomes of uh average incomes of fifty six thousand two hundred dollars in two thousand four, saw their average effective tax rate edged down to two point nine percent in two thousand four.
But that's that's unfair.
The rich are only paying thirty-five percent.
That's not fair.
Middle class is gonna two point nine percent.
That's that's not fair.
That's okay, but thirty five percent is unfair.
You know, we have at Rushlimbaugh.com on our home page all the details of who pays what in taxes.
And lo and behold, the New York Times publishes it in this story.
The top one percent of income earners paid about 36.7% of federal income taxes.
The top one percent paid 36.7% of federal income taxes and 25.3% of all federal taxes in 2004.
The top 20% of income earners paid 67.1% of all federal taxes.
By contrast, families in the bottom 40% of income earners, incomes below $36,300, typically paid no federal income tax and received money back from the government.
Despite all of these facts, in the New York Times, the headline, Bush tax cuts offer most for very rich, and that leads us to the House changing rules clearing the way for tax increases.
One of the leftover rules in the House was that tax increases require, to this day, a two-thirds vote.
But the Democrats got rid of that on the first, well, one of the first key procedural votes in the Democrat-controlled House last week established legislative rules that will make it easier to raise taxes now by a simple majority vote.
Straight party line vote received little attention Thursday as Nancy Pelosi was elected speaker.
But conservative tax cut advocates said that it opened up a huge loophole in a Republican-imposed rule drawn for the 1994 contract with America, which requires a supermajority or three-fifths vote.
I was wrong when I said two-thirds, three-fifths vote uh to raise taxes.
Now they can waive that with a vote of a simple majority.
So essentially, a simple majority is all it will take to raise taxes.
And this got no uh no mention whatsoever in the reporting up until now, which takes us to Nancy Pelosi on Face the Nation again, Bob Schiefer, who was eager for tax increases because he's an idiot.
You may have to raise taxes to some people in the upper income levels in order to cut taxes from some below there.
We're not going to start with uh repealing tax cuts, but they certainly are not off the table for people making over half a million dollars a year.
So they may see their taxes go up.
Okay.
Yeah, they may see their taxes.
Eager talking to the Speaker of the House about taxes going up.
This thing called a presidential veto out there, Bob.
Uh Barbara Boxer was on Wolf Blitzer's show, and uh he said to her, Are you ready to accept the president's demand not to raise taxes?
I certainly don't think we should extend tax cuts to people earning over millions of dollars.
Ridiculous.
They don't want it, they don't need it.
We have deficits as far as the eye can see.
Debt that we've never had before.
Oh, come on.
Cut me some slack, give me a break.
Debt that we have never seen before.
We're getting all these cliches now.
Deficits as far as the eye can see.
Remember hearing that back in the Newt Gingrich day, even the Reagan Reagan years.
That was a favorite Democrat refrain.
Something else the Democrats are talking about doing is eliminating the uh the uh uh tax exemptions that big all gets.
And a lot of Democrats in the Senate are worried that could end up raising prices at the pump.
The Democrats in the House don't care about that.
It's got to get even with big oil.
And they keep talking about a windfall profits tax on big oil.
By the way, do you know the the uh etymology of the phrase windfall profit?
You know how all these phrases, an old wives' tale, they all have roots.
There's a reason for all these things.
Here is the explanation for the windfall profit.
Apparently, in colonial times, the Crown precluded the colonists From using any lumber one foot or wider except whereby act of God, such as a severe storm, a tree falling on one's own property.
If that happened, the colonists could use the tree that fell down on their property during a storm, or they could sell it for a significant amount.
So if you had a big storm on your property back in colonial days, and a lot of trees fell down, the resulting monetary reward was called a windfall profit.
It was a good thing.
It was a beneficial thing to a property because they had limits on how much lumber they could use.
But if an act of God came along and knocked down a bunch of trees, well, they could use whatever they there were no limits on it.
And they could sell it or use it for their own construction purposes.
Hence windfall profit a good thing.
Look what it's become today.
We'll be back and continue.
Stay with us.
Well, the big CES.
The consumer electronic show going on out in Las Vegas today.
Actually all week.
Everybody is also eagerly anticipating Steve Jobs keynote tomorrow at the uh Apple Mac World Expo.
I know I am.
But for different I gotta be patient.
It'll uh we'll know by one o'clock tomorrow, one to three o'clock what's gonna happen.
Anyway, the the big deal at the uh CES show.
Sharp has introduced a 108-inch LCD TV, which is a high definition TV.
And some people say L C D is better than plasma, it's personal preference.
108 inches is nine feet.
That is not insignificant.
It's chump change to me, but it is not insignificant.
Nine foot television, liquid crystal display.
I'm not getting one.
I'm my my screen's already 14 feet.
I I don't that's why this is chump change to me.
But I mean, this is for other people.
This is 14 feet, yes, in in uh yeah, it's rear projector, it's not LCD, but why would I get rid of a 14-foot screen and replace it with a hundred and eight-inch television?
I mean, I it's no, it's not a sharper picture.
That's you guys.
You guys, I'm telling you, it's not, you have to see this to believe it.
I am one of two people in the country to have this projector.
I've got a glass screen with the white of the screen between two pressed pieces of glass.
This looks better than any plasma out there.
It's unbelievable.
Why do you think people stayed and watched eight hours, six hours of 24 episodes till 2.30 in the morning?
I didn't serve Allen Brothers steaks, I served Alan Brothers hot dogs.
But no, who wants to go home and watch these things in a scrubby little 35-inch television sets?
I'm only kidding.
But it's incredible.
I I am um and this this is this is gonna be the year of HD.
They're all focusing on HD out there.
I hope there's a shakeout soon, by the way, in this, you know, we got a Betamax VHS problem shaping up with high definition DVDs.
We get HD DVD, DVD, we get Blu-ray.
Uh and they're out there competing, and until one of these formats settles in as the standard, it makes no sense to go out there.
People are begging me, Rush, go make an investment so that you will determine which one wins and bring down the price.
Well, that's a box that has both.
Uh that's that's fine.
Until one of them shakes out, they're they're not they're not going to be able to uh start mass producing already-made movies on DVDs.
It's just is this the way the way of the world?
Uh I don't know how long it's gonna be.
Maybe if there's if that one box that plays both, you're still gonna have they're not compatible.
I mean, they're too I mean the the the HD DVD has less still a lot of data, but less data than a Blu-ray does.
Uh but at any rate, I'm this is this is the toy Stuff in my life that excites me.
And of course, I want one of these things now, but I'm not an idiot.
I'm not gonna I bought Betamax.
And it still was better than the VHS machine out there in terms of functionality and picture quality, but VHS won because they came out with their machine at 800 bucks.
It had four hours recording time.
The Betamax was at one hour, and you had to go buy some little cradle adapter to make it two hours.
Akio Morita, who was then the founder, chairman, and CEO of Sony...
Just could never be made to believe that people would want to play movies on a VCR.
And that's why they would need more than an hour playback or record time.
So even the brilliant masterminds.
What I'm I'm I'm carrying what scar today, she says.
What what?
The Betamax scar?
I'm not carrying you think I'm carrying the Betamax scar to this day.
Why?
Because I won't choose between HD DVD and Blu-ray.
I'm not carrying the scar.
It wouldn't I mean I just want to move forward, and I know we're not going to move forward as fast as we will until this format battle is decided.
And uh and is finished.
Here's this um here's this story where Peter Beinart I was telling you about return of the Nixon doctrine, as Somalia shows the U.S. is letting others do its bidding.
Here's why that can't last.
Now, for years, I mean literally years, the drive-by media and the Democrats have pounded us incessantly, complaining and whining and moaning that Bush was too eager to go it alone.
He was a cowboy, he was a frat boy.
He shot from the hip.
He was talking too much and taking too much upon himself.
He wouldn't rely on his allies.
He wouldn't work with the UN.
He wouldn't listen to allies, he wouldn't kowtow to them.
Now, Peter Bynart at Time Magazine is telling us in this piece that we're letting the Allies do too much in Savalia.
And now Bush is outsourcing American foreign policy.
And he says that we should be doing more and relying less on allies.
Excuse me.
You know, if you were on the left, you just have to know one thing.
Bush is wrong no matter what he's doing, and you are brilliant.
No matter what Bush is doing, just come out and say it's wrong, and you will be fetted, and you'll be invited on round tables on TV shows, and you'll get columns in Time Magazine, and you will be thought to be among the smartest peoples in the room.
Speaking of Somalia, try this.
Somali president arrives in Capitol for the first time in 40 years.
Somalia's president flew into the beleaguered capital of Mogadishu Monday.
Ten days after his forces, backed by Ethiopian troops, drove a rival Islamic movement from the city.
The arrival of the president who's 72 is highly symbolic.
He took offices in uh in 2004, but he's not set foot in Mogadishu for 40 years.
Uh ten days after his forces backed by Ethiopian troops.
Um this is a big deal in the war on terror, and and as usual, Americans know nothing about it.
Not much is being reported about it by the drive-bys.
But it's it's more correct to say Ethiopian troops backed by this president's Somali forces, because the recognized Somali government barely has an army.
If not for Ethiopia's tanks and the Air Force, the Islamists would still be in control of 90% of Somalia.
And then there's this from today as well, from Kismeo, Somalia.
A jungle hideout used by Islamic militants that is believed to be an Al-Qaeda base was on the verge of falling to Ethiopian and Somali troops, the defense minister said uh Wednesday.
This is the these guys all retreated.
The uh Islamic radicals all retreated after their defeat, and they holed up in various hiding places just like they did in Iraq, waiting to spring their insurgency, and these people followed them and rooted them out.
And Peter Beinart writes a piece saying, our allies are doing too much.
The hell with that, Peter.
These people are defending their own country for crying out loud.
They're showing how to do it.
Force!
I don't hear anybody over there talking about redeployment.
Seems to me what was used here was a surge.
Here's Hank in Syasa, New York.
Hank, I appreciate your patience.
Welcome to the program.
Good afternoon, Rush.
Uh it's uh longtimer, first time caller.
I'm glad to hear from you.
I'm calling for a rotary phone.
Do you accept those?
Uh absolutely.
They're better than cell phones because they don't drop off the line, no.
That's right.
You won't drop off, but I didn't know you could still get one.
I know you can still use one.
Yeah, no, these are old ones.
Have you ever gotten rid of it, or is it an antique you went out and bought?
No, it's like 60, 1960.
And you've had it all those years.
Right.
Still working.
I love you, Hank.
Okay, get back to something important, which you I think you and I agree on it is Iraq.
Well, Shavalia's not chunk change, it's part of war on terror.
Right.
My son's in the in the military.
He's in the it's his first tour in Iraq.
He's been there for a little over three months.
Okay.
He called the other day, and we always have conversations, and he told me to download a report that's on the web.
And it's choosing victory, a plan for success in Iraq.
And it's by the American Enterprise Institute.
Oh, yeah, AEI.
What's it say?
It's well, I think one thing that everyone's missing, including probably the Republicans and the Democrats, that failure in Iraq will lead to, and we all know what's going to happen there.
It's going to be humanitarian catastrophes.
It's going to be more radical Muslim world.
But one thing they point out here is that stay in Iraq will likely lead to a damage to the morale of the U.S. military.
And I think that's an important consideration.
Well, it is.
You're right.
It is.
And why in the world Let me just ask you point blank.
You know that there are some people, and most of them belong to the Democratic Party, although not all.
Some are Republicans.
Of those in the Democrat Party, why?
This is not brain surgery to understand what you just said.
Why would what what would be the point in demoralizing the U.S. military?
Right.
We have a volunteer force.
Right.
And it's and it's you want to you want to keep them on your side and build up their prestige and also their uh their will to uh fight.
Exactly.
Yet that seems to be what they want to do.
What's the point?
I I think I told your screener that I could appreciate it if he would download this report for you so you could read it.
It's it's rather extensive, but it's a PowerPoint presentation.
Wait.
You asked the screener to download it for me?
So you could read it later.
You didn't think I could do this myself?
I'm sure you can, but I figure you're busy.
Okay.
I understand then.
If you had meant you didn't think I was capable, that I would have been hurt.
But we'll get the AEI report.
Look at this this this, you know, I have mentioned this before, and it's a long time ago.
I I believe that certain elements of the American left, and not all Democrats by any means, but certain elements of the American left actually seek American defeat on the part of the U.S. military.
They seek military incursions that go wrong, because they don't like the military, and anything that will embarrass it and get in the way of its future use and deployment, they are all in favor of.
That is a good point.
Pulling out now before victory would simply demoralize.
Everybody knows this.
Everybody knows it.
You just you have to ask yourself, why is it the Democrat Party is so invested in defeat in this mission?
Just ask yourself.
Don't even have to come up with the answer right away, folks.
Just ask yourself, because that is the question.
They can call it redeployment, they can call it de-escalation or whatever they want.
But their route leads to defeat.
Ask yourselves why they are so eager for that.
Backway are the fastest three hours in media, the Rush Limbaugh program.
A quick uh email here, dear Rush.
You're starting to become the I'm Richer Than You Are guy.
Nine foot screen is chump change, Allen Brothers, Grand Havana Club, cigars.
You criticize Clinton for that.
Signed Leonard.
Does he have a point?
Am I coming off like that?
Tell me the truth out there, Snerdley.
Am I sounding like Bill Clinton's I'm richer than you are?
Well, I was trying to, darn it.
Okay.
Uh no, okay, and finally get the well, not finally, but this is from uh what is this?
I don't know what is AP or somebody.
Maybe it's not.
I have no clue where this is from, so it may not even be true.
The headline cover up City's own condoms.
Mayor Bloomberg is about to unveil New York City's own NYC brand of free condoms in packets with a variety of colors representing the different subway lines.
Oh, I guess it's New York Post to the New York Post today.
Gotham will be the first city to have its own signature municipal condoms, officials believe.
The distribution of millions of condoms made of standard lubricated latex will help promote safe sex and to prevent AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.
And the blue line condoms, of course, never get to use because it's always down.
Yeah, I need an A-train condom.
Anyway, this is all.
This is this shows behind the times.
The spray on condom is the future here.
You why this thing is gonna it's gonna take off.
Finally, this.
No, not finally.
I mean, finally, before getting back to the phones.
I warned you people about this.
This is from January 3rd.
A five-year-old Canadian boy can have two mothers and a father, and Ontario court ruled last week in a landmark case that redefines the meaning of family and examines the rights of parents in same-sex relationships back in 2005.
I warned you people of this very thing happening.
Where would the line be drawn?
Where would the liberals draw the line on the right to privacy?
I mean, if you can uh marry somebody the same sex, can you marry a third person of the same sex?
Can you have a marriage of four people?
If you're gonna destroy and blow up the definition of marriage, then it can include pretty much anything if it occurs under the rubric of the right to privacy.
You're either for privacy in the bedroom or you're not.
And if your bedroom's private, then maybe even incest will end up being okay.
The liberals need to be asked.
What are the limits?
What limits are you willing to go for on the right to privacy?
Bigamy, polygamy, incest, where are you gonna draw the line?
That was uh me on the subject of gay marriage back in 2005 in August of that year, and here it is.
Five-year-old Canadian boy can have two mothers and a father.
I keep telling you, once this stuff stuff uh stuff starts, it never recedes.
Dan in Prescott, Arizona.
I'm glad you called.
Welcome to the show.
Hi, Rush.
Hi.
Oh, what an honor, sir.
Mega retired U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer Ditto's to you.
Thank you very much, sir.
Hey, uh, just a quick note to my former shipmate John Kerry.
While I was on active duty, I was able to get my associate's bachelor's and master's degree as an enlisted man.
My son is currently on active duty in the Air Force, uh, getting his associate's degree, and he's gonna go on to, and he's getting ready to deploy to Baghdad.
So I'd like to say hi to him.
Well, God bless you and him, sir.
That's tremendous.
Anyway, the point I wanted to call about was uh I know it's been beat to death with uh Madam Speaker Nancy Pelosi and uh taking care of the children and taking care of the country, which I didn't realize the speaker of the house was uh the same time multitasking.
Oh boy, she is great.
Yes.
I remember distinctly on the morning of 9-11, seeing our commander in chief sitting with a child on his lap, reading to children, being informed of what happened, springing into action, and he got crucified by the drive-by media for being distracted by children when he should have been running the.
Well, that's because he was still reading to them after he learned of the news.
And he said that he didn't want to shock them or scare them by bolting out.
Right.
But nevertheless, you're exactly right.
George W. Bush was lampooned and made fun of.
See, men reading to kids, come on, let's face it, that's not manly.
Not in public.
Fathers doing it in the privacy of their own homes while the mother is outside the bedroom making sure it happens is another thing.
But a president reading to kids in Florida in the third grade.
That ain't cool.
I mean, that's that's the image.
And Michael Moore and all these people uh made fun of that, and yet here Pelosi is credited for being able to do that and run the country.
Same time.
Take care of take care of the country at the same time.
I don't I just don't believe it.
Esther is still talking.
I don't know why it surprises me.
I guess I don't understand how you can talk when I am.