Michelle Malkin

MALKIN: Yes.

RUSH: — relative to your age?

MALKIN: Yes. This is the first time that I had ever met Chris Matthews, and the first thing that he said to me as I sat down at the table is, ‘Are you old enough to be on the show?’ and he kept badgering me to tell him my age and I was flabbergasted by such naked chauvinism and as I mentioned he has a wife who’s very prominent female TV journalist who is known as a voice for working women, and I really wonder what she would think if she had heard her own husband making such blatantly sexist comments.

RUSH: Now, you sure he wasn’t just trying to compliment you?

MALKIN: Uh, no. I know the difference. (Laughing.)

RUSH: (Laughing.) Okay why did they want you there? Why do you think they wanted you? If you sit down and your perception is you’re insulted the moment you sit down, and then you know what happened after that, why did they want you there in the first place, do you think?
MALKIN: Well, they said that they wanted me to come and talk about two topics: the swift boat veterans and my book and the reason why I was there in the first place is that I, you know, was able to go on a competing network — I am a Fox News contributor — during my book tour. So they knew that I was there to talk about the book, and in fact Matthews had chitchatted with me a little bit before the second segment began about Japanese-Americans.

RUSH: Now, did you get thrown off the show —

MALKIN: Yes.

RUSH: — before your segment ended or before it was scheduled to end?

MALKIN: Yes. They had told me from the start and then right as — before I sat down that it would be for two segments and that the second segment would talk about my book and I was summarily dismissed at the end of that first segment.

RUSH: How did he do that? What did he say to you?

MALKIN: He just said, ‘You’re off,’ and so somebody escorted me off, and this is interesting, because I mention it on my blog. As soon as I left the room he dispatched one of his staffers to go and try to find the book Unfit for Command, and of course they went to an office where I had left my copy and snatched my copy up — copy of it and were desperately flipping through it to see if what he said was true.

RUSH: Now we’re jumping the gun a little bit. But the first thing that strikes me about this is they don’t have at MSNBC their own copy of this book.

MALKIN: Yes.
RUSH: They had to go get your copy.
MALKIN: Yes. They didn’t ask you for it? They just took it?
MALKIN: They just took it. It was quite flabbergasting but I guess this is how they operate.
RUSH: Well, we played some sound bites of your appearance right before the end of the first hour and it was the two segments of that. Well, we broke it up into two segments but it was the interchange where he kept — he just would not believe that you were actually were trying to make the case that John Kerry purposely quote, unquote, “shot himself,” that Matthews had never heard anybody go so low as to make an accusation like that. “Nobody’s ever heard of that!” and it was clear he has not read the book, doesn’t know what a self-inflicted wound is particularly as described by the swift boat vets.
MALKIN: Right. Bingo. I had specifically referred to “self-inflicted wounds” and I was trying to give him the context and it to talk about the incidents that are described in the book very explicitly about how those shrapnel wounds were apparently sustained by Kerry. He wouldn’t let me finish. He kept trying to stuff his warped interpretation down my throat and I tried as hard as possible not to let him do that and —
RUSH: Well, here, I tell you what, for people just joining us let’s play the sound bite of that so people get a flavor for what it was that you went through. Let’s just back up sound bites 10 and 11 right together. Here they are.
(BEGIN CLIPS)
MALKIN: Did you read the book?
MATTHEWS: I’m asking a simple question.
MALKIN: I’m saying that some of these soldiers —
MATTHEWS: I’m asking you a question.
MALKIN: — and I’m answering it. Some of those —
MATTHEWS: Did you shoot himself on purpose?
MALKIN: Some of — some of the soldiers have made allegations that these were self-inflicted wounds —
MATTHEWS: No, no no one has ever accused him of shooting himself on purpose.
MALKIN: — that these are self-inflicted wounds.
MATTHEWS: No, no, are you saying —
MALKIN: I’m saying —
FORMER SAN FRANCISCO MAYOR WILLIE BROWN: Chris, that’s the most irresponsible saying that —
MALKIN: — I read the book —
MATTHEWS: Are you saying he shot himself on purpose? I want an answer “yes” or “no,” Michelle.
MALKIN: Some of the veterans say — yes, some of the veterans say that —
MATTHEWS: No, no one has ever accused him of shooting himself on purpose.
MALKIN: — that these were self-inflicted wounds.
MATTHEWS: I’ve never heard of that. Tell me where that —

MALKIN: It’s self-inflicted wounds on —

MATTHEWS: This show —

MALKIN: — on January 19, ’69.

MATTHEWS: — is not a show for this kind of talk. Are you accusing him of shooting himself on purpose to avoid combat or to get credit?

MALKIN: I’m saying that that’s what some of these —

MATTHEWS: Give me the names.

MALKIN: Patrick Runyan and William Zaldonis in ‘Unfit for Command.’

MATTHEWS: And they said he shot — Patrick Runyan, you mentioned the names — and they said he shot himself on purpose to avoid combat or to take credit for a wound?

MALKIN: These people have cast a lot of doubt on whether or not –

MATTHEWS: That’s ‘cast a lot of doubt’ is just complete nonsense.

(END CLIPS)

RUSH: At what point in — this was the first segment. Was this near the end of the segment when he was prepared to tell you, ‘You’re done’?

MALKIN: Yes.

RUSH: All right, now, explain what you were trying to say and what you were not given a chance to say.

MALKIN: Right. Well, on page 35, the book Unfit for Command mentions these two men, William Zaldonis and Patrick Runyan and their comments make clear that it wasn’t clear where the enemy fire came from if it came from, and, you know, here is Zaldonis and Runyan both saying they were too busy to notice how Kerry was hit and it raised questions about where the shrapnel came from, and of course that wasn’t just from some right-wing operatives. It was from the Boston Globe account, and of course when I mentioned this that the Boston Globe had raised some of these same questions — and the Boston Globe is by no means a White House operation — he had nothing to say.

RUSH: Michelle, the Boston Globe is the official biographer of John Kerry.

MALKIN: (Laughing.) Of course!

RUSH: Well, now, is this the grenade-in-the-rice incident with Rassmann? Is that what this is?

MALKIN: No, that’s another —

RUSH: Oh, that’s another self-inflicted possibility? Ooooh.

MALKIN: (Laughs.) Right. And of course, I was trying to get to all of those, but he didn’t want to hear it, and we saw what the outcome was.

RUSH: Okay, now, what’s your take on this? He invites you on to talk about the book, the swift boat book. You obviously have your own book on internment. I would think that he probably hadn’t read that, either, and would be just as desirous of trying to tear you apart on the premise of that book but here you come in the first segment and they just don’t give you a chance. I mean, this was almost like the way I saw O’Neill treated on Crossfire last week by Lanny Davis and James Carville. They brought him on and they started accusing him of the same things and not letting him answer and then accusing him of not having the guts to answer. They bring you on last night and accuse you of believing that he actually shot himself in order to get medals when you’ve never said that and nobody else has ever said that. I think it’s a coordinated response to try to discredit any conservative commentator who might have credibility with an audience. I think they tried to do it with O’Neill. They tried to do it with you last night. Did you have any suspicion that this was what your fate was on this program last night?

MALKIN: No, I really didn’t. I had no idea that the conversation was going to go that way, although I had listened to him give the third degree to Larry Thurlow just a few segments before, who is a PCF veteran, who’s also mentioned in the Unfit for Command book and I saw what he was trying to do there.
RUSH: He didn’t move Thurlow. He didn’t move Thurlow off his point.
MALKIN: No. No he did not. But I’m not — he accused me of being a Bush spokesperson, and his colleague Keith Olbermann (Latest Rating: 0.5) called me an “idiot” on his own show following the Chris Matthews show, implied that somehow I was an operative for the swift boat veterans out there to ply this line about Kerry shooting himself, and they just carried on with these lies, and they’re really —
RUSH: They tried to associate you with them is what they did.
MALKIN: Yes! It’s ridiculous. Especially — all they had to do was call the producer and get the truth about the circumstances of how and why I was booked.
RUSH: So they went and got a copy of your book, after they threw you off the show, and Matthews was thumbing through it to see if what he had said was true?
MALKIN: Yes. And so they call me “irresponsible”? (Laughing.)
RUSH: (Laughing.)
MALKIN: They really got to change the name of the show to “Slimeball” or “Spitball” because that’s what they threw at me.
RUSH: Why did Olbermann call you an idiot? Nobody watches that show, either, so…
MALKIN: No, nobody does, but apparently he was just so carried away and —
RUSH: It was because your appearance on Matthews’ show earlier he called you…?
MALKIN: Yeah.
RUSH: So you had a carry-over effect.
MALKIN: I guess so. (Laughing.)
RUSH: Michelle, you should be proud. Careers are made over this thing.
MALKIN: Well, it doesn’t make me happy that this is how it turned out but I’m just disgusted —
RUSH: You know something, Michelle, in all candor, there would have been a time 15 or 20 years ago when you’d have had nowhere to go to tell the story.
MALKIN: That’s true.
RUSH: You would have had nowhere to go to be able to get the truth of this out and embarrass these people and shine the light back on them, and you can now, and you’re one of the reasons why that’s the case. So, you know, it’s a win-win when you look at it. The bottom line: it must have been — and, by the way, I mean, I’ve seen some of the tapes of it. You didn’t look flustered. You looked maybe a little angry, but nobody intimidates you, and I’ve marvelled at this because you take on topics that a lot of people will not dare touch — because of political correctness — whatsoever. So I mean, I’m sure it was unpleasant, but aside from being a character builder, you I think showed yourself to be above that fray all night long on this program. You ought to be very proud of it.
MALKIN: Well, you’re kind and you’ve served as quite a role model —

RUSH: Well, I’m kind, but I’m also right. Never forget that. Now, we’ll take a break and come back and talk about your book, because that — folks, this is a fascinating premise.

COMMERCIAL BREAK

RUSH: Say, Michelle, are you aware of a statement that Matthews posted on the MSNBC website last night about your appearance?

MALKIN: On his blog, yes. He basically cast himself as the truth teller and repeated his claims of wanting to keep irresponsible comments off of his show.

RUSH: Here’s what I have here. He said, ‘One of my jobs on Hardball is to cut to the truth, cut through to the truth of the tonight on Hardball one of our guests pushed the idea that John Kerry had won his Purple Heart by deliberately shooting himself.’ (Laughing.) Nobody’s ever said that, nor did you! (Laughing.) You weren’t given a chance to explain it. ‘The charge is without merit and baseless as our guest under close questioning herself admitted. We’ll keep covering these issues…’ (Crumbling up paper.) You know what’s happening? These people are cracking up, Michelle. They cannot deal with the truth. They don’t want to defend the charges because they can’t, so they have to discredit those who carry those charges forward, and you were in that position last night.

MALKIN: Indeed, they are really in full desperation mode, and it really was a wake-up call to me to see firsthand how absolutely batty they have been driven by alternative media sources, including you and talk radio, the blogsphere, Fox News. They can’t —

RUSH: Yeah, their monopoly is gone —

MALKIN: Yeah.

RUSH: — and they’re never going to get it back and they don’t know how to operate when they don’t have a monopoly.

MALKIN: They can’t deal with it.

RUSH: Anyway, let’s get to your book here in the few minutes we have left here. I know you have written extensively on immigration and you have tried to alert the people inform country with klaxons and warning bells that despite 9/11 we’re still admitting potential terrorists, known terrorists into the country. The open border situation has not improved any. You’ve really tried to shine all kinds of light on that. Now comes the book In Defense of Internment. Give us the synopsis.

MALKIN: Well, it’s really an extension of my thesis in my first book, which is that we continue to put all sorts of other values ahead of national security, and one of it is this PC mind-set that we should protect hurt feelings and not offend anyone and even if it comes at the price of, again, our very own safety and survival kidnap. And what I did with this book is show that the internment card, which is often played by critics of the Bush administration, is completely specious. The idea that what happened during the World War II was simply the result of racism in wartime hysteria is wrong, wrong, wrong, and I give people an eye opening amount of evidence to show them that there’s a brainwashing that we’ve received over the past three generations is just not true.

RUSH: Give us some of the evidence.

MALKIN: Well, there was a lot of evidence from magic messages, and these were cables that were high-level Top Secret diplomatic traffic from Tokyo to its consular offices in the west coast and it shows that there was this vast espionage network being organized using first generation and second generation ethnic Japanese. There were a number of troubling incidents where Japanese-Americans had gone over to the side of the Imperial Forces and, you know, the other myth, of course, is that it wasn’t just ethnic Japanese who suffered under these kinds of homeland security measures. There were 31,000 enemy aliens interned in justice department camps, and nearly half of them were of European ancestry, but nobody knows about them.

RUSH: Half them were of European like Germany?

MALKIN: Yes, actually Germans, Italians, Hungarians, Romanians and their American-born children and they lived side by side with ethnic Japanese in these same camps but none of them get got reparations under the 1988 law that Reagan signed.

RUSH: What’s always interested me about this is that the internment policy was administered, orchestrated by a Democrat, FDR —

MALKIN: Yes! Yes. Yes, it was.

RUSH: — and yet it’s condemned today by the very people who hold FDR up as one of their icons.

MALKIN: Right, and one of the interesting things is, of course, they favored all of his liberal domestic policies but they are quiet when it comes to the kind of drastic measures that he undertook to make sure that the country was safe and that its sovereignty was protected.

RUSH: Are you suggesting this happened today with certain populations?

MALKIN: No, and I make clear that I’m not saying that we should round up in camps all Arab- and Muslim-Americans but what I am saying is that we cannot disarm our homeland security officials and prevent them, when they need to, from using ethnic and racial and religious categories, and I find it highly ironic that the same people who absolutely oppose this kind of ‘profiling’ when it comes to national security have noooooo problem at all when the government uses race or ethnicity classifications to achieve their own liberal social engineering goals, like affirmative action on campuses or handing out business contracts to minorities, or engineering diversity in a police department or fire department.

RUSH: That’s really interesting. It’s one of the things that fascinates me about this, because that is a big disconnect but right in the middle of it we have an event, a profound cataclysmic, catastrophic event called 9/11.

MALKIN: Yeah.

RUSH: And if there is — it seems to me that those who are in opposition to actually doing something that might prevent it from happening again have to pretend it didn’t happen in order to hold the positions that they hold.

MALKIN: Right. There is a big disconnect, and a lot of these people are also what I call ‘hindsight hypocrites,’ because if you listen closely and read closely what they said — and I’ll give you a specific example. Maureen Dowd, after September 11th, after it came out that the FBI ignored an FBI agent who said we should canvass Arab Muslims in flight schools, excoriated FBI agent the FBI and Robert Mueller and said, ‘Now we know the FBI was too inept and too passive and not aggressive enough and too timid in doing the racial profiling it needed.’ Where did she think such timidity stems from? Oh, perhaps the New York Times editorial board which would have been the first to call the Bush administration jackbooted thugs if they had in fact taken up this FBI agent’s recommendation before September 11th to profile? Hmm.

RUSH: Yeah, in fact, you could draw several analogies. So many Democrat hawks today would not have approved had we known five days before what was going to happen 9/11 they would have not approved an invasion of Afghanistan to stop it because they would have accused Bush of simply making it up because he’s such a weak president early on that he wanted to establish himself as a warmonger president making all this intelligence up. There’s nothing we could have done to stop it because the left is not going to recognize the threat beforehand — and after, is the thing that scares me.

MALKIN: Yes, that’s right. They always want to have it both ways.

RUSH: Michelle, hang on. I got to break. Can you hang on just through one more break and we’ll wrap this up, because I know you’ve got some other things to do but we’ll be right back, Michelle Malkin, and we will conclude. Stay with us.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: We welcome back for closing moments Michelle Malkin, well-known author and columnist and the new book is In Defense of Internment. Now, the title is provocative because people on the face of it might think you’re making a case for it and you said you’re not. You’re trying to show that there was a reason, a solid reason, behind it in World War II and that it served a purpose. It helped secure victory and therefore as a policy ought to be considered today in some form?

MALKIN: Well, yeah. The subtitle is ‘The Case for — quote, unquote — Racial Profiling in World War II and the War on Terror,’ and I think the bottom line, the two main themes I want people to carry away when they try and connect the dots between the past and the present is that a nation paralyzed in wartime by political correctness is a nation in peril, and I fear that we have that sort of paralyzing mind-set today. I really think that America should stop apologizing when it protects its borders, when it protects national security, and when all of these civil liberties Chicken Littles and these ethnic mongers say that their feelings are hurt and that they are offended, I would remind them that there is nothing more offensive than what happened on September 11th, and that the people who died on American soil, 3,000 of them, should not be treated as collateral damage in pursuit of this PC mind-set.

RUSH: Now, you’re taking this, I guess, a book tour but you’re going to be touring college campi, correct?

MALKIN: (Giggles.) Yes, I will be doing hand-to-hand combat and going into a lion’s den. I really feel that college students have been cheated and if we’re going to have a valid debate about civil liberties and national security, they need to be armed with the truth.

RUSH: So you’re going to Berkeley. That’s your first stop?

MALKIN: (Laughs.) Uhhh, yes.

RUSH: Now what’s the date of that?

MALKIN: I believe it’s September 5.

RUSH: September 5?

MALKIN: Yes.

RUSH: Wow, that’s like around Labor Day.

MALKIN: Right, yeah. The campuses will just be opening up, and the conservative students newspaper out there. The California Patriot has generously welcomed me.

RUSH: So now is it student body wide or is it a conservative group our speaking to?

MALKIN: They’re sponsoring but it will be open to the entire student body and the public.

RUSH: I remember attending, when I lived in Sacramento there was — you know, UC Davis is dangerously close there —

MALKIN: Right.

RUSH: — and I went to a couple of Firing Line debates that Bill Buckley had and there were a couple of other (conservatives). I remember Jeane Kirkpatrick came into a lecture, and they just tried to shout her down. They just would not let her speak, and she just overcame it — especially in the question-and-answer session. You’re probably going to face much the same thing. It sounds like that’s what you want. Sounds like you want to engage these people because you don’t think they are being.

MALKIN: Yeah, I don’t think it’s worth it if you aren’t engaging them mano-a-mano, and really it will be quite revealing to see how these acolytes in liberal education and liberal arts colleges treat me.

RUSH: One of the things that the audience, Michelle, in my closing moments here with you is curious about, you are actively involved. You’re writing. You’re researching. You’re studying things and you’re observing the campaign from up close. How do you see this election? Do you have a feel for it yet?

MALKIN: Well, I think it will be a close one, and I do have to say that there are a lot of conservatives that I’ve heard from that are worried about some of this PC bending over on the part of the Bush administration but I have a lot of sympathy for all of the rank and file homeland security officials at all levels in this government because they really are damned if they do and damned if they don’t. The bottom line is, we really need to put an administration in place that understands the need to put homeland security over hurt feelings, and I will be voting for Bush but hoping that he does a lot more to be unapologetic about what we need to do to secure our country.

RUSH: Is there anything — and I don’t ask this facetiously — is there anything as you look at the Kerry campaign with your primary focus and interest on homeland security that entices you? Is there anything that gives you any comfort there?

MALKIN: No.

RUSH: Because I heard some reservation from you about Bush.

MALKIN: Well, yeah, and I’ve been quite open especially in my criticisms of his open borders policies — criticism which is shared, as I say, by a lot of rank and file border patrol agents and —

RUSH: Politics. It’s all politics.

MALKIN: Yes.

RUSH: Sadly.

MALKIN: But the idea of Attorney General Ted Kennedy is very, very scary to me. (Laughing.)

RUSH: How about Howard Dean as secretary of Health and Human Services? Not a patient. Secretary.

MALKIN: Yeah. Actually something that Willie Brown who’s the former mayor of San Francisco who was also on Hardball for my segment said, I think was the most revealing of the comments on that exchange in Hardball, and he basically said that John Kerry had core personality and political deficiencies because he was not equipped to stand up to warfare in politics. And he basically said the bottom line was, and I reiterated what he said, is that if he can’t stand up to his fellow veterans, can we really trust this man to stand up to Islamic extremists who are trying to kill us every single day?

RUSH: I think that’s… You know, we’ve all made our own version of that point. I mean here he is supposedly behaved heroically and valorously in Vietnam and incurred all this enemy fire, and yet he won’t engage the swift vets. He won’t even deal with their charges. Look what he’s trying to do. The latest move is they’re trying to get the book publisher to withdraw the book!

MALKIN: Yes.

RUSH: They’re trying to intimidate TV stations into not running the swiftvet ads. I mean, it’s, it’s — I always thought the liberals believed that it was ‘the seriousness of the charge that mattered,’ that must be dealt with, not the ‘nature of the evidence.’ In this case they don’t want to deal with any of it because apparently they can’t. But I think we’re getting a very interesting view of the unfiltered view of John Kerry. He is arrogant. He is selfish and he is elite, and it’s like he says what it’s going to be. Well, somebody challenges it. (Kerry sing-song voice impression) ‘How daaaare you challenge meeee!’ and, ‘Off with your head!’ or some such thing. I think it’s actually a great thing that’s happening because it’s illustrating who he is. The whole campaign of Kerry’s has been designed — I mean, whenever he was at the convention what does he think is going to happen. He’s strutting around there like Eisenhower leading these guys. You know, he retook Boston Harbor in that cruise bottom media up to will be a swift boat he’s got all his bands of brothers and they’re sitting there wondering today why we can’t get back to the —

MALKIN: Right, he said, ‘Bring it on,’ and the swift boat veterans certainly did. He’s melting down and his water boys in the media or melting down with him.

RUSH: Well, and you were great last night. I have to tell you. You withstood the insults and you withstood the assault and we’re all proud of you, and I’m grateful you had time for us today.

MALKIN: Thank you. I’m grateful. Thanks, Rush.

RUSH: That’s Michelle Malkin, and it’s Open Line Friday here on the EIB Network, and we have only taken one phone call to date, at least in this hour so let’s go ahead. Where do you want me to go, Mr. Winterble? Shake two in there! Here we go to Reading, Pennsylvania. Doug, I’m glad you called. I’m glad you waited. Welcome to Open Line Friday.

CALLER: Hi, Rush. How are you doing?

RUSH: I’m fine, thank you.

CALLER: Along the same lines of the interview with Michelle, if reelected, do you think President Bush will really put some teeth into securing our southern border — and our northern border for that matter?

RUSH: Uhhhh, I can only say, ‘I hope so.’ You heard her say, express her reservations about the open border policy, particularly with Mexican immigrants, and I think we all know that that was an attempt at politics. That was an attempt at reaching out to the Hispanic vote, and it hasn’t worked. I don’t think it’s worked. You know, we always hold out hope. You look at second terms, and I’ve always looked at a president’s second term as if we elected guys and only had one term and they didn’t have to worry about reelection. Just go pedal to the metal and do what’s right and to hell with it because you’re not running for reelection anyway. What generally happens in second terms is that presidents are automatically dubbed, uh…sitting ducks. What is the term. Waffling? Lame ducks, because they aren’t running for reelection, and so nobody has to do what they want to do and everybody is maneuvering and running to get the next set of candidates elected president. But I think if you look at — you know, you look at Reagan his second term. They had the so-called Iran-Contra scandal.

With Bush I think there is an opportunity to do — depending on the outcome of the election, and depending upon the margin of victory, and I saw something last night, I think it was National Review Online. I’m not sure it was there. I think it was. They’ve done a little review of Senate races and their quick uptake is there’s a possibility of a net gain of two seats for the Republicans in the Senate. Now that’s not going to give us 60, and you can’t do anything in the Senate without 60 votes and some of the majority on the Republican side are actually liberals from the northeast — Lincoln Chafee and Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe — but it’s possible. You know, the Supreme Court nominations are going to be key. There are going to be some retirements there in the second term, whoever is president the next four years. That’s key. Whether or not Bush would actually change his focus on the immigration policy in the southern border with nothing to lose, but you can’t really say that, either, because they start thinking about their legacies, and they start thinking about the president’s Hall of Fame and so forth. So really I don’t know how to answer the question other than say, ‘I hope so.’ It’s a long way around to getting there but that’s my answer.

END TRANSCRIPT

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