Oct. 29, 2011 - The Political Cesspool - James Edwards
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Welcome to the Political Cesspool, known worldwide as the South's foremost populous radio program.
And here to guide you through the murky waters of the Political Cesspool is your host, James Edwards.
Welcome back to the Political Cesspool Radio Program, ladies and gentlemen.
Third and final hour here.
Now upon us, it's Saturday evening, October 29th.
I'm your host, James Edwards, coming to you tonight from Nashville, Tennessee, downtown Nashville, Tennessee, no less, right in the thick of Country Music USA.
I'm up here for a speaking engagement back on the road for the first time since September when I was out of town, I believe, for about nearly 17 consecutive days and a number of different engagements.
I'm here in Nashville.
You know, of all the places I went back in September, I did not visit Nashville, which is only three hours down the road.
Nashville is kind of like a home away from home for me for many reasons.
Been here countless times over the years.
But I'm in Nashville tonight, so making up for missing a Nashville in September.
And as fate would have it, I'll be back in Nashville next Saturday night for a completely different meeting.
Completely unrelated to where I am tonight, but it just so happens that they fall on back-to-back weekends in the same city.
Next weekend, I'll be up here for a Council of Conservative Citizens meeting.
And then I am home for the rest of the year.
No more trips, at least as far as I know.
Again, thanks goes out to my impeccable team, Keith Alexander and Bill Rowland, for their contributions to the show this evening as they hold down the fort to AM 1380 WLRM Radio in Memphis, Tennessee.
Our special guest this evening, Alana Mercer, author of Into the Cannibal's Pot, an interesting book.
Alana made her second appearance tonight with us, her encore appearance, and what I hear was a lively interview.
I look forward to listening to it for myself at thepoliticalfestpool.org and the broadcast archives.
And I encourage you to do so as well.
If you're tuning in late and you missed maybe a little bit of tonight's show, remember it's available to you free of charge for a week at thepoliticalfestpool.org.
After a week, they go into the Pay-to-Play archives, very small fee, I think $4.99 a month and $30, $40 a year for unlimited access to the Political Festival archives dating back many, many years.
And so, in fact, if you missed the Pat Buchanan interview after tonight, the only way you're going to be able to get it is right there in those broadcast archives.
And that is what I want to talk to you a little bit about here, you know, recapping everything that's happened since Pat's much publicized appearance with us seven days ago.
Of course, he was on during the first hour last week for about a half an hour.
The attacks began literally the next day.
Media Matters, Pat Buchanan's publicist team, the book publishers, counted 16 unique and separate attacks on Pat Buchanan by Media Matters, which is a very left-wing, radical, egalitarian outfit.
16 attacks on Pat Buchanan in 12 days.
And of course, a couple of those centered around the fact that he had appeared with us, who they hate equally.
Media Matters kind of got the party started.
Since then, it has been in a lot of different places.
It has certainly become a national news story.
Huffington Post, Russia Today, I think the European Union Times, a lot of other online publications, pretty big political publications, Washington Times, Washington Post.
Three dueling petitions.
There are three separate individual petitions out there by, again, a very radical leftist group petitioning that MSNBC fire Pat Buchanan.
And if you just want to check it out for yourself, you can go to thepolitical cesspool.org.
We've documented all of this for you, kind of like a catalog.
We've cataloged it.
Check it out, numerous articles.
And, of course, Pat had appeared on our show twice before.
And twice before he had suffered similar attacks.
But I think this time it was a little bit more vicious.
And for the first time ever, he was asked about it on another program, which I'll play for you right now.
It was on National Public Radio.
It goes out to 160 stations across the nation.
The Diane Ream show asked, Pat Buchanan was asked two days after his appearance with us, what was going on.
Can we play it?
Here's an email from Pat who says, you've recently received criticism for appearing on the political cesspool radio program, which describes its ideology as pro-white and has been criticized by the Anti-Defamation League as being anti-Semitic and white supremacist.
Do you regret appearing on the program?
And does MSNBC, where you're employed, approve of your appearance there?
Well, this is Abe Foxman runs the Anti-Defamation League.
And I think he's called me even worse names than he's calling this radio station.
So I really don't credit.
I think there's an awful lot of smearing being done by the Anti-Defamation League, frankly, over the years of individuals who simply disagree maybe with U.S. policy towards Israel and a lot of name-calling.
Now, on the radio shows, I've been on 100 radio shows directly and probably thousands through Sean Hannity and Laura Ingram.
Am I supposed to go and vet all the people on these shows and get the list from Abe Foxman on what shows I can go on to?
Now, I remember that show, I think it was Saturday night, and I listened on that because I'd heard things about it.
And they had one of the best pro-life ads by Ron Paul I've ever seen on that radio station.
And they also had an advertisement for the Mormon Church, which you have just been, in a way, defending, and rightly so.
It was in the Mormon church.
And I listened carefully to see, and the individual is very interested in the race issue.
But it was done, I thought it was not done, and I wouldn't be on a program if somebody started calling racial or ethnic names, or I rather might be on it, but I would say that's the last time we're going on that one.
Well, so there you have it, ladies and gentlemen.
There you have it, ladies and gentlemen.
That was an opportunity where a lesser man, when given the opportunity to grovel and fall on his sword and throw his friends under the bus, might have taken it if he thought it would cause the attacks against him to cease.
But what did Pat Buchanan say?
Well, he said a lot of things in a very short amount of time.
He said, basically, he listened to the show.
He'd heard about it.
And essentially, and I'm paraphrasing now, he just didn't agree with the false assessment that many of our left-wing detractors have given us.
He stopped very short of saying that the interview was done very tastefully, but he just said that obviously, you know, he wasn't going on a show where people hurl around racial epithets, which, of course, we've never done.
And he complimented some of the ads that run on the network.
And I tell you, these are great ads.
He mentioned the Ron Fall ad.
We've played it tonight, and it truly is, as Pat said, really one of the best pro-life ads that has ever been created.
And we're proud to run it, as well as the advertisement for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Bill Rowland was talking about how a lot of people are attacking Mitt Romney over the fact that he's a Mormon and that they're trying to use that against him.
Some of his rivals are, as far as I'm concerned, and Mitt Romney certainly is an establishment left-of-center Republican.
He's a liberal Republican in many ways, but the best thing he has going for him is the fact that he's a Mormon, as far as I'm concerned.
I mean, this is the one redeemable quality that I see in him.
And so Pat was talking about it, not to chase that rabbit, but Pat was complimenting us in many ways on NPR and taking the fight to the ADL.
And that's what we're going to talk about when we come back.
Taking the fight to our enemies.
Pat not only defended us, he counterpunked.
We'll pick it up there when we come back.
Jump in the Political Cesspool with James and the Game.
Call us tonight at 1-866-986-6397.
And here's the host of the Political Cesspool, James Edwards.
All right, everybody.
Welcome back to the Political Cesspool Radio Program.
James Edwards recapping all of the fallouts of the Pat Buchanan interview last week.
We talked about it briefly during the second hour, a little more comprehensive review here.
Now, of course, as we established during the first segment, as you know, Pat appeared with us last week for about 30 minutes.
The day later, last Sunday, the attacks began.
Petitions began swirling, calling for his dismissal from the MSNBC, numerous articles, big news story.
Pat goes on national public radio to 160 stations across the country.
Not only does he defend us, but when asked about his appearance on the show, in contrast to the fact that some of these left-wing anti-Christian organizations have denounced us, he said, well, look,
as you just heard in the clip that was played, you know, the anti-defamation league, there's a lot of smearing that goes on with the anti-defamation league, a lot of name-calling that's based that's targeted towards people who perhaps have a different opinion of American foreign policy that doesn't necessarily match the anti-defamation league.
And I'd like to say this as well.
Pat Buchanan, as he mentioned on the show last week and on that NPR clip, has been, since the book went on sale October 22nd, Pat has, excuse me, went on sale October 18th.
Pat has been on hundreds, hundreds of radio programs across the country.
You want to talk about him defending the Political Festival radio program.
This is kind of like, you know how the three stooges would do the two fingers in the eye routine.
Out of the hundreds of radio shows that Pat has been on to promote this book, only one is featured on his official website, Buchanan.org.
And that is the interview he did with Years Truly a week ago tonight.
Yes, the Political Cess Pole interview with Pat Buchanan featured prominently on Pat Buchanan's own website, and the left hates that.
They absolutely hate that because, you know, this is a guy that had a puncher's chance at becoming president of the United States in 1996.
And they would like to dismiss us as reactionaries, as extremists, as all of these things.
Whereas, of course, we believe we are very traditional Americans with very traditional views.
To have Pat Buchanan's endorsement in that capacity is very, very big.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, old friends in Montgomery, Alabama, did announce the interview as well.
Pat's book team fired back saying that they love the publicity that the left-wing organizations are putting on them because it's only generating more buzz for the book.
And it's an honor, in fact, to be attacked by such radical organizations and that they want to be on that side.
And so here we go again.
Pat defending his appearance with us, defending our work, and then counterpunching these hateful organizations that seek to smear and defame.
I think it was a great gift to Pat Buchanan, as I said in the second hour, not only gave the show, but these ideas that we advance too.
Not since Sam Francis has someone with such mainstream credentials been so closely allied with the, as Richard Spencer calls it, the alternative right.
Now, if you haven't gotten enough, Pat Buchanan.
It's been saturation coverage on our website this week.
But if you haven't got enough of him, you want to hear another interview with Pat Buchanan?
I believe my friend and yours, Mr. Sam Bushman, has him on tab.
Is it Tuesday, Sam?
Is that right?
Is that still on the table?
To your knowledge.
Are you there, Sam?
Well, we'll get Sam in a minute.
I do believe, though, that Sam Bushman does have Pat Buchanan.
I just didn't have my mic up and ready.
I'm sorry.
Yeah, I should have given you the warning that I was going to pull you into the fray here.
Pat's looking to be on the Liberty Roundtable.
Yes, he is.
He's going to be on, I think it's Tuesday.
We're still working on the date.
He changed the date once because he's got just too many places to be at once.
I think it's going to be Tuesday.
I'm verifying with his publicist and stuff like that and verifying on Monday, but it should be Tuesday.
If not, it'll be shortly thereafter.
A brand new interview, perhaps as early as Tuesday here on the Liberty News Radio Network, LibertyRoundtable.com.
You can check out the Sam Bushman show.
Of course, Sam now making regular drop-ins with us on Saturday nights as he sits in the network studio out there in Utah.
So perhaps again, ladies and gentlemen, as early as Tuesday, you'll hear an all-new interview with Pat Buchanan, this time with Sam Bushman sitting on the opposite side of the table.
And Sam, you know, we've been promoting Sam's show as the show to keep you filled in on all the news that is news in American politics from the conservative side of the fence, the America First side of the fence, in between our weekly broadcast to you on Saturday.
And Sam is no slouch.
Sam, I understand, and I want to make this known to the audience, you were selected by Talkers Magazine as one of the top radio hosts in the country.
I certainly didn't make that list.
Yeah, they had a top 250 list, and I got on that list for 2010.
It was kind of fun.
And, you know, one of the difficulties we all face in talk radio, if you don't have some of the big gun mainstream grandfathered in by the FCC radio stations, then you have a hard time proving your listenership and your ratings with Arbitron and all this kind of stuff.
So one of the things for us that was really nice is then when advertisers say to us, hey, you know what?
How big are you guys?
Instead of pulling out all those numbers they try to prevent us from getting, we just simply say, well, we're one of the top 250 hosts of the nation.
So, you know, from that point of view, it's really made a difference for us.
You know, it's very impressive.
And of course, this is the authority on such things as far as the establishment is concerned.
You know, a very prestigious publication naming Sam one of the top talk show hosts in the country.
And of course, Sam has many advantages over me, not the least of which is that great radio voice.
Here I am with this very, very normal voice.
And Sam, you know, comes on, you know, with a little very white, you know, a little very white routine there with that nice booming baritone voice.
And, you know, how can I compete with that?
You know, one of the good things is the way you talk, though, James.
Your delivery is smooth.
It's easy to follow and understand.
You don't slip over your words.
You've got a great vocabulary.
You know, when people are listening, they don't always look for, say, the radio Glenbeck voice or this or that.
What they listen for is when people are easy to understand, when people can lay it out on the kitchen table, when people have a vocabulary of the paint of picture, that's radio.
Oh, I appreciate that.
Coming from a man that's one of the top talk radioists in the country, I do appreciate that.
And folks, you should appreciate all that Sam Bushman is and does for us as well.
And again, we can't plug his good work enough.
But there you have it, Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. until 10 a.m. every weekday.
You can catch him at LibertyRoundtable.com.
And if you tune in this week, we believe currently right now, schedule is subject to change, of course.
But on Tuesday, Pat Buchanan will be revisiting Liberty News Radio at this time on the Liberty Roundtable and an all-new interview.
I want to bring this up, James, which is kind of interesting as well.
You mentioned if we could have Ron Paul, and if he was black, how they wouldn't be able to ignore him, and you kind of in some ways wish he was black for that reason, just pointing out the unfairness of the playing field they've set up with this racial manipulation that they do.
I also wonder, where would Herman Cain be if he was white, sir?
Well, that's what we said.
He wouldn't even be on the table.
I think if he was white with the credentials that he had, and let's, you know, he's made money.
He's done well in life.
I mean, no one can take that from him.
But, you know, we're talking about the president of the United States.
I mean, there are right now, you know, no more than 10 people that have been identified as potential candidates for this office.
There's Obama, and then there's, you know, a handful of Republicans.
And he's one of the top 10 in the whole country to serve as president, having never been elected to anything.
He's not, I wouldn't say he's stupid, but he's certainly not intelligent to the extent that you would like your president to be.
And, yeah, so I think if he was white and he had the same exact resume, same exact portfolio, views on the issues.
He would be laughed off the stage and not even mentioned to get zero coverage.
I think that's, you know, that's blunt, but that's accurate, Sam.
I'm known for blunt talk radio.
But I bring it up because it just shows you how unfair and how manipulative they are.
And it also goes to show how fair we are when it comes to, hey, if Ron Paul's black, we'd vote for him.
And if Kane was white, I wouldn't vote for him.
Well, that's right.
And again, you know, when you start talking in such hypothetical and abstract ways, if a frog had wings, you know how the rest of that sentence goes.
But, you know, so I guess it's unrealistic to say, but it is true enough.
Anyway, I hear our music.
You're playing our song.
Let's take a break.
We'll be back.
It's a special week for the political festival for another reason, too.
And I'll tell you why in just a moment.
We've been working hobby.
To get on the show and express your opinion in the political cesspool, call us toll-free at 1-866-986-6397.
We gotta get out of this place.
If it's the last day we are.
All right, everybody.
You know, I was giving a talk today at this meeting that I'm at, and my topic was very simple this time.
Typically, when I go to a speaking engagement, I have to say something intelligent.
I have to prepare remarks, and it has to center around a certain theme.
My topic today was just essentially, tell us what you've done on the radio in the last year.
You share with us some of the highlights.
And I truly think that the success and longevity of our work here is pretty substantial.
Today is October 29th.
On October 26, 2004, that was the night of the first broadcast of the Political Festival.
It was just over seven years ago, this evening, that I first took microphone in hand and hosted this show.
And, you know, there aren't many organizations of any stripe who have been able to stand the test of time in today's political climate and economic climate for that long, but much more than simply survive.
We've thrived by every standard of measurement.
And I think folks who know our show know the basics, obviously, that we try to provide very professional and polished commentary on taboo issues that many other programs won't touch.
We're syndicated on a legitimate radio network that carries our program to different affiliates across the country.
Our audience is substantial, and to say that we receive a media attention above and beyond our own sphere of influence is an understatement.
And you look at what we have going for us, obviously the legitimacy and the credibility that comes from being on AM and FM stations, the legitimacy years ago that CNN gave our show, and the fact that no other alternative right or paleoconservative organization has been hammered as much by the SPLC and the ADL over the course of the last seven years in this show.
But even they have begrudgingly acknowledged that what we've been able to do is pretty remarkable.
As much as they oppose our ideas and as much as we oppose theirs, a few months back, I remember the Anti-Defamation League, for all the horrible and wicked things they've said about me, even they compared me to George Will, this very prestigious liberal commentator, for my ability to articulate ideas.
The SPLC, you know, they've been like a puppy dog nipping at my heels for seven years now, pestering me every step of the way.
But even they have conceded that they find me to be charming and articulate, and I have a smooth delivery, and these are their words and not mine.
I'm able to articulate our ideas very smoothly.
But it's not just America's most prominent hate groups, the ADL and the SBLC, that have given our work coverage.
Far from it.
Typically, on our anniversary, I always have all the hosts and staff come in.
And this is actually the first year we haven't done this.
They have a little on-air birthday party.
Used to we'd bring a cake to the studio and all wear birthday hats and now we're seven and I guess we've outgrown those things.
I'd like to have done that tonight actually, but I was on the road and didn't have the opportunity to get everybody lined up.
But we would have everybody come on the show, the hosting staff at least, and share, reminisce about their favorite guest interviews, some of their favorite moments in the history of the show over the course of our run.
And I think now at seven years, the list of highlights has become almost too big to cover in a three-hour show.
So I'm going to do for you what I did for my audience today at the speaking engagement.
I'm just going to share with you what the Political Festival has been able to do over the course of the last 12 to 15 months, essentially the last year, maybe a little bit longer.
Obviously, the Pat Buchanan thing is a news story, a national news story that we're still currently right in the middle of and very proud to be.
So that's something that's very current that's been a feather in our hat.
But back in June of 2010, let's just start there and move forward, June of last year, Keith Olbermann named us as the worst person in the world, and we received that honor as a result of our work with Tim Adams and the whole Barack Obama birth certificate, brouhaha.
Worst person in the world by Keith Olberman, shortly thereafter he joined the unemployment line, as you know.
Also shortly thereafter, for our sake, the political festival became a very major issue in the Arizona primary between John McCain and J.D. Hayworth.
As you'll remember, we had Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babu on, and this was a sheriff that had, for all of his fault thereafter, had done many good things with regard to border security.
So we had him on the show, and he came on at the time very enthusiastically.
And because not only he was a sheriff, but because he was appearing in some of John McCain's senatorial campaign ads, the media descended upon McCain and Babu as a result of Babu's appearance with us, which resulted in our show being a focal point and the biggest political news story in Arizona for weeks.
In fact, J.D. Hayworth has sent out a press release condemning our show, as so many people do, and encouraging John McCain to dump the support of Paul Babu.
So it was a very big story.
Also, a few months ago, as everyone will remember, Mel Gibson's father, Hutton Gibson, appeared on the show again.
And this was actually an interview that went viral.
It gained publicity for our show when he came on last fall and issued his strong condemnation of the current Pope.
This was a story that was written about in no less than 105 different newspapers around the world, according to Google at the time.
Several Hollywood tabloids.
We were spoofed on the Jimmy Kimmel live comedy show.
Jimmy Kimmel spoofed our program and Hutton's appearance on it by using a clip from our show on that nationally syndicated television broadcast.
And I received an invitation personally to appear on Entertainment Tonight.
I gave an interview to CNN earlier this year about my take on the infamous Glenn Beck rally that took place last August.
Peter Brimelow and I, Peter Brimilow, a friend of mine, former editor of Forbes magazine, he and I were the two that were selected by CNN to give a paleo-conservative take on the Glenn Beck rally.
And this continues an odd couple relationship that I've had with CNN dating back to 2007 when I was, at least for a time, appearing as a regular commentator on CNN's television programs, the Palazzo show, specifically, before Paulazahn preceded Keith Olberman in the unemployment line.
Nick Grifton, been on the show a couple of times this year, or within the last 12 months, I should say.
Very big show there.
Rachel Maddow, MSC's militant resident lesbian, did a segment on us on MSNBC a few months back.
We were favorably acknowledged by Jerome Corsi in his book, Where's the Birth Certificate?
Of course, Jerome Corsi has had a number one best-selling book on the New York Times list, and of course, being favorably acknowledged in yet another bestseller stems back to the Keith Olbermann story, that they were related.
We were sought out just, I believe, back in June, three months ago, four months ago, however long it was now, by Warner Brothers, the movie studios themselves.
You know, we have a Confederate History Month series each April.
And Warner Brothers re-released Gods and Generals, a great movie, by the way.
Folks, if you've never watched Gods and Generals, came out in 2003.
It is a fantastic movie, very objective about the war between the states and indeed pro-South in many ways.
And so Warner Brothers, this is the seventhennial anniversary of the War Between the States.
Warner Brothers re-released Gods and Generals and used us as a partner in promotion to help promote it.
And we were very excited to be able to work with an organization of that size.
And it just goes on from there.
So we do this show thanks for the support we're able to draw from the audience.
You, of course, make it possible.
We do this show every week.
And every now and then, even more than every now and then, quite regularly, we're able to make these Viking-type raids into the establishment.
We're already very mainstream being on AM radio, but we're able to make these Viking raids into even bigger establishment country.
And folks, I gave you a little laundry list there.
It was vast and varied.
I hope you were able to keep up with it.
But that's just what we've been able to do essentially in the last year.
And of course, my book came out last year, too.
You know, that's another thing that's happened within the last 12 to 15 months.
And the book was certainly a great success.
And we're able to do all that.
You take that publicity and that coverage that we've been able to generate, you multiply it by the number of years we've been on the air, which is seven, and you begin to get an idea of the kind of reach this show is able to consistently have.
And we would never, ever, collectively, all of us listening to this show tonight combined, would not be able probably to pull the money that would be necessary to buy that kind of publicity.
You know, we're talking about millions of dollars worth of advertisements for our show.
And make no mistake about it, every now and then, when people hear about our show through some of these attack pieces or some of these other instances that occurred, they become new listeners.
And we are always bolstering our ranks.
We can do much, much more.
And I will continue to do more as we build this show into the future.
Having just celebrated another birthday, we look forward to another great year.
We've got to take a break.
We're going to wrap up the show right after this.
Stay tuned, everybody.
Welcome back.
To get on the Political Cesspool, call us on James's Dime, toll-free, at 1-866-986-6397.
And here's the host of the Political Cesspool, James Edwards.
You know, I'm an obsessive, compulsive type of guy, and I'm a hostage of tradition.
And just having heard myself in that last segment, I'm so disappointed in the fact that I betrayed tradition tonight.
And it wasn't by neglect.
It was just, I guess, busyness.
I can't believe after just thinking about what we're doing in the commercial break that we didn't do the annual birthday blowout extravaganza that has become a rite of passage at this time of year as we celebrate our on-air anniversary.
But maybe we'll do it.
Maybe we'll have a belated birthday.
I was on the road after all.
So maybe Junior will have a seven-year-old party next week, but we'll see.
But we do have one member of the Cesspool staff tonight.
And I have Bill Rowland on.
Keith was on tonight.
We didn't get a chance to pull any of them of their favorite highlights over the years as a result of their association with the program.
But we do have Peter Scoop Stanton tonight.
Pete, you typically participate in our birthday reminiscing session.
Hit me with it.
Okay.
Good evening, James.
Good evening, Accessful Family.
Tonight is a great night, besides Access Pool celebrating seven years of excellent radio.
Tonight is also my daughter's birthday.
Oh, congratulations, Pete.
And as you mentioned, we are certainly all a family here.
Our audience is our extended family.
And from all of us to you and yours, happy birthday to your daughter.
I had no idea.
Yeah, thank you very much.
In terms of great Cess Pool shows, I mean, just about every single one's a great show.
Well, what the audience do not get to see is what happens off the air.
I can honestly say that when, James, when you brought me on, it's like my dream came true.
Ladies and gentlemen, what you hear on the air is exactly what you hear off the air.
Except off the air, you hear a couple of salty words come out of my mouth.
You were a sailor after all, Scoop.
So, you know, his vocabulary has been corrupted by the Navy.
But besides that, that is true across the board.
I mean, what you see with us, and I've said this time and time again, we play no characters on this radio program.
We're not on here to fill a false persona.
This is who we are off the air.
We're just as gregarious, just as congenial, just as friendly, just as happy-go-lucky, but still with a sense of duty to our cause.
So, you know, I really believe that folks can develop, for lack of a better word, a relationship with us because we are who we are, and I think they can relate to that.
Exactly.
I mean, back in 2007, when I first met the Cessbool crew, I mean, it was like I was home.
Then you came out here to Washington, D.C.
And despite your success as a radio talk show host talking at the National Press Conference, you and I were just sitting shooting the breeze, like, hey, what's up?
You know, it's nothing.
What's up with you?
And that was great.
I mean, here we are at the National Press Club, and you're speaking, you know, where Nelson Mandela and Janet Powell Powell and other movers and shakers of this planet have spoken.
Our heroes.
And then we're talking about, oh, I've got to go pick up my daughter.
Oh, I was a little bit late coming in last night.
I mean, that's who we are.
Well, it is.
You know, that was actually, I'm glad you mentioned that because that was certainly something that should have made the best of the last 12-month list was, of course, that great meeting of the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., where I had the opportunity to speak at the National Press Club of all places, the Holy of Holies.
And yeah, you know, after we were done and the cameras and the lights went dark and there we were just talking about life and family.
And that's certainly a misconception that our detractors have is that I guess they believe that when we just sit around brooding all day, just marinating in hate and viciousness and all of these things that we just go through life miserable and thinking about how we can discriminate against someone.
I mean, that's the way, that's certainly the picture they paint of us when they write about us.
But the truth is the exact opposite.
You know, we do a radio show because it's the least we can do.
And in ways, it's the most we can do.
I mean, if I had a way to better apply myself, I mean, if someone handed me a congressional seat, I might have to go and fill it.
But, you know, the radio show is certainly accomplishing a lot of good, as people know.
But also, it's still very, I say the least we can do in so much as it's still a small sacrifice in the grand scheme of things.
I mean, you know, I have to suffer a lot of name-calling.
That's still not a sacrifice compared to what our ancestors, our founding fathers, had to endure to carve this country from a wilderness and make this nation.
But, you know, off the air, when we're not doing the show, you know, people think we're just brooding around hating people.
No, we go out.
We go and do karaoke like you were talking about that time you came down in 2007, Scoop.
Me and you and the other members of the staff, my wife, we all went out to our karaoke bar.
We sang Run Around Sue by Dion.
We really love life and we live the full life.
And we have people who love us, and we have friends who love us, and we have a faith that sustains us.
And, you know, we do this in service to a cause greater than ourselves, but it certainly doesn't define us as human beings.
And I think sometimes the left hatred of what we stand for certainly consumes them much more than our work consumes us.
We do what we do because we love it.
But we do have lives outside of this and happy ones.
Yeah, I couldn't say it better myself.
But another thing is that we literally sacrifice.
Nobody on the session gets a salary.
I mean, I joke about the time, you know, I want a 10% raise, but 10% of nothing is absolutely nothing.
Nothing from nothing leaves nothing, as the old song says.
Right.
And, you know, it's unfortunate we have to pass around the hats.
However, again, this is a great cause greater than ourselves because as myself and you, our fathers, we want to make this place better for our kids.
But, I mean, things are not going the way it should be.
So that's why, you know, despite...
Yeah, they're certainly not going to go the way that they should if we don't apply ourselves.
And I don't know at the end of the day when the good Lord calls me home at the end of my life, I don't know if all of my best efforts are going to be enough to even slightly turn the runner.
But I do know I can receive my eternal reward knowing that I did everything that I had the ability to do.
I mean, I could go outside and bang my head against the pavement and run for president, but that wouldn't be practical.
Doing this radio program is producing tangible and real results that people can see that they can invest in.
And, you know, you said, you know, certainly we don't get a salary.
But there are costs associated with doing the show.
We have production costs.
We have overhead.
And it's overhead that's met by the good graces of our audience, and we're all pulling together.
But, Pete, you know, I don't want to deter the conversation too far off its present course because I always love reminiscing.
I always love sharing.
No, seriously, though, sharing with the audience, particularly on our birthday, talking about some of the highlights, some of the great behind-the-scenes moments that perhaps people who aren't part of the team with us would be privy to.
But I do enjoy delivering to the audience some personal reflections and giving them a little bit of an insight to our lives because I believe that's important.
We should not eat, live, breathe, and sleep politics.
As important as it is, and I spend a full-time job working on this show each week, certainly at least 40 hours a week managing the website and preparing the program and doing all these things.
And that's important.
But I also like to take time from time to time on the show and let audience see who we are when we're not doing this.
And I think we give them a peek into that window when we have conversations like this on the air.
But I got to, before we run out of time, Pete, you ran into quite the celebrity yourself there at the Dulles airport a couple of days ago.
Who flew in?
It's none other than former Vice President Al Gore Jr.
How close were you to Al Gore?
I would say about 10, maybe 10 feet at the most.
Did you get to say hello?
Did he look at you?
No, he was looking at the ground.
He had iPods in his ears.
It looked like somebody did something in his wheaties, a term I'm not going to use over the air.
And he went with a great discretion scoop.
But so did he have secret service detachment?
I mean, how heavily secured was he?
I'm just curious to know how this works.
And I'm also going to point this out.
I don't know what his security detail is, but he had a couple people with him.
I don't know if they're secret service or not.
He jumped into a hybrid sport utility vehicle after flying overseas from Europe.
However, that hybrid vehicle was going to a private area for private plane owners, and he was taking a private jet back to the volunteer state of Tennessee.
And I found out through talking to somebody else at the private airfield that's at Dulles International Airport provides free shuttle service.
So Mr. Gore's people, or Dot himself, contacted somebody, asked for a hybrid SUV to drive from wherever to the airport, and then drive about one mile to the private airfield so then he can get in his non-hybrid private jet and fly back to Tennessee.
So there you go.
So Mr. Environmentalist Mr. Global Warming couldn't reduce himself to flying carpool on a commercial jet.
I mean, first class isn't even good enough for Al Gore.
He's got to have the, and he can't take the airport shuttle either.
So again, the hypocrisy of the left is staggering.
And I understand he was the former vice president, but I think truly no one cares.
But Pete, you being 10 feet from Al Gore is the closest any of the political successful miscreants are ever going to get to the former vice president.
So my hat's off to you.
We're out of time tonight, ladies and gentlemen, for the rest of my staff and crew.