{"id":26745,"date":"2007-09-05T01:01:01","date_gmt":"2011-05-19T05:00:24","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-05-19T05:00:24","modified_gmt":"2011-05-19T05:00:24","slug":"thompson_on_leno_seems_wrong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2007\/09\/05\/thompson_on_leno_seems_wrong\/","title":{"rendered":"Thompson on Leno Seems Wrong"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

RUSH: Andy in St. Cloud, Minnesota, welcome to the program, sir.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Rush, it\u2019s an honor to talk with you. I\u2019ve been listening since I was a kid and I\u2019d like to think I\u2019m following in your footsteps to some degree.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Thank you very much, sir. It would be very difficult to do, but I admire the effort.<\/p>\n

CALLER: I\u2019m (laughing).<\/p>\n

RUSH: Was that being rude? Was that being rude?<\/p>\n

CALLER: I\u2019m from Missouri, work in music radio in Kansas City, and now I host a conservative talk show. So anyway, I want to hear what you have to say about Fred Thompson before going to the debate today. I missed the program yesterday, I must confess, but what do you think about that and his appearance on Jay Leno? I read an article just recently that said he\u2019s losing some support because of his indecisiveness when it comes to how he\u2019s going to make his announcement.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Losing support because of his indecisiveness? Fred Thompson? You\u2019ve read stories that that\u2019s happening to Fred Thompson?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Yeah, I was just reading an article on Fox News about that just a few minutes ago.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Oh. Well, it\u2019s on Fox News, it must be true.<\/p>\n

CALLER: (Laughing.)<\/p>\n

RUSH: (Laughing.)Look, normally we don\u2019t repeat previous programs. That\u2019s what the website\u2019s for. It\u2019s $49.95 for a full-year subscription with the newsletter, but, in your case, you\u2019re so nice and you\u2019re from Kansas City, so I\u2019ll make an adjustment. What I said yesterday was I\u2019m not fully decided on this. This is my instincts. But I\u2019m not crazy about presidential candidates announcing their candidacy on these late-night shows, Leno or Letterman. I know why they\u2019re doing it. Thompson has been very up-front and honest about why he\u2019s doing it. He\u2019s saying, hey, look, I can reach far more ordinary Americans on Jay Leno\u2019s show than are going to be watching the debate tonight from New Hampshire on the Fox News Channel. Well, there\u2019s no question. But the debate may draw, what, two, three million people, if that? Leno\u2019s audience is five or six million, something like that, and of course it\u2019s not political, the audience. It\u2019s not as political as an audience that would be watching the debate. That is understandable, and we live in a telegenic age, presidential candidates have to do well on TV. The one thing about it that bothers me — and I\u2019m not rooted in fuddy-duddiness here, although it may sound like it to some of you but — is I think the office of the presidency has a certain stature, and I don\u2019t like to see it linked or tied to pop culture. Pop culture is by definition one of the low common denominators of our society. <\/p>\n

If a president won\u2019t go on The Tonight Show as president, he shouldn\u2019t go on as a candidate. I guess it\u2019s one of the things I\u2019ve always noticed. Presidential candidates will go do all kinds of things that once they become president, they\u2019d say, ‘I\u2019m not going to go see the Butter Princess at the Iowa State Fair! What do you mean?\u2019 <\/p>\n

‘Well, sir, you did it when you were a candidate.\u2019<\/p>\n

‘Yeah, but I\u2019m going to wait \u2019til I\u2019m a candidate again, but I\u2019m president now and I\u2019m not going to go sit around and get my picture taken with the Butter Queen, or what have you.\u2019 <\/p>\n

You know damn well that presidents don\u2019t go on The Tonight Show. So why should they as candidates? When you link the stature of that office to the pop culture, I don\u2019t think the damage is instantaneous, but it\u2019s just a slow erosion of the stature of the office. It\u2019s just my instinct here. It could be anybody. This is not directed at Fred Thompson. I was watching Meet the Press Sunday, and they had Mary Matalin on there with James Carville and Bob Shrum and Mike Murphy, and they were talking about this, and they all thought it was perfectly fine and normal. I was a little stunned, but their job is to get people elected and get them exposed to as many people as possible, and what Thompson\u2019s trying to do here, I know, is everything as unconventional in a campaign as he can do. He\u2019s announcing late, going on The Tonight Show to announce, so forth and so on. Anyway, I hope that answers the question out there. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: Andy in St. Cloud, Minnesota, welcome to the program, sir. CALLER: Rush, it\u2019s an honor to talk with you. I\u2019ve been listening since I was a kid and I\u2019d like to think I\u2019m following in your footsteps to some degree. RUSH: Thank you very much, sir. It would be very difficult to do, but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nThompson on Leno Seems Wrong - The Rush Limbaugh Show<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2007\/09\/05\/thompson_on_leno_seems_wrong\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Thompson on Leno Seems Wrong - The Rush Limbaugh Show\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"RUSH: Andy in St. Cloud, Minnesota, welcome to the program, sir. CALLER: Rush, it\u2019s an honor to talk with you. 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