RUSH: I want you to hear these. We’ve got three sound bites about this NARAL ad. First up is Brooks Jackson, who used to do this at CNN, used to fact-check all these political ads. He got hired away by the Annenberg Center, FactCheck.org. CNN reporter John King investigated the new NARAL ad yesterday, talked to Brooks Jackson, and here’s Brooks Jackson reaction to the NARAL ad.
JACKSON: “False” is strong language, and we use it very seldom. Usually ads are “misleading,” “twisted,” “distorted,” but this one is just downright wrong in the total impression it tries to create.
RUSH: Okay, so the Annenberg says it’s false; it’s wrong, and, “We don’t often say that about these ads but this thing it’s just downright wrong in the total impression it tries to create.” So John King reporting for the record now for CNN says the ad is false.
KING: The facts do not show that Roberts quote, “excused violence.” He did argue for the first Bush administration in the 1991 case that, “violent abortion clinic protesters had not violated federal anti-discrimination laws, saying such crimes should be prosecuted in state courts; Virginia in that specific case. The White House also points to this Reagan administration memo Roberts drafted in 1986, Saying, “Abortion clinic bombers should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. No matter how lofty or sincerely held the goal, those who resort to violence to achieve it are criminals.”
RUSH: Okay, so CNN’s done its official investigation now. John King has rendered the ad a lie, a falsehood, talked to Brooks Jackson, a former CNN guy. He says the same thing at the Annenberg Center, and now let’s go to Lou Dobbs Tonight — and I love Lou, and I think Lou is in a tough situation here, because they dumped on Lou, they made him explain the CNN policy on this ad.
DOBBS: At CNN we should point out it’s policy on this, the ad is absolutely wrong, according to the Annenberg watchdog there. CNN says it accepts advocacy advertising from responsible groups from across the political spectrum who wish to express their views and opinions about issues of public importance. So that viewers can further research claims made within the ads, the messages must identify the name of the sponsoring organization, usually by displaying a website address. John King, I want to thank you for helping our viewers ascertain the validity of the claims of that particular ad. We hope you will do so with more to come.
RUSH: The bottom line is, “We’re still going to run the damn thing.” (Laughing.) Poor Lou! Did you hear him reading that statement? I mean (laughing) it accepts advocacy ads; we don’t care whether they’re right or wrong! You know what, grab our ad. I ought to see if I can get this on. Is it ready to go? I ought to see if I can get this ad on CNN.
LEGENDARY EIB ANNOUNCER JOHNNY DONNOVAN: Don’t believe Rush Limbaugh (Whisper: “Limbaugh”), or FactCheck.org when they debunk our ads. Our ad ran on CNN, so it must be true. Not only did Judge John Roberts defend an abortion clinic bomber, but Judge Roberts drove the bomber to the clinic himself! (Whisper: “Drove him.”) He used his own cell phone to trigger the explosion, just like the terrorists in Iraq. (Whisper: “Terrorists.”) Stop Judge Roberts from getting on the Supreme Court before he kills again. Paid for by George Soros and NARAL friends of Nancy Pelosi.
RUSH: (Laughing) What do you think our odds would be? They ought to be pretty good. I mean, if they’re running a NARAL ad this thing ought to be a slam-dunk. We need to have a website and what did he say we have to have? Advocacy advertising from responsible groups across the spectrum that wish to express their views and their opinions so the viewers can further research claims made within the ads. The ads must identify the name of the sponsoring organization, usually by displaying a website address. We could do that. You know, and I’d spend $125,000 to see if we can get the ad run on CNN. Well, the problem is (interruption). Not one time, Mr. Snerdley. I have to get a week’s worth. Need the same deal that they gave the NARAL people. We’d have to put some video together. We could do that. We’d just put some pictures together of explosions and fires and bombs and so forth, a cell phone at the right place in the ad, and, you know, John Roberts, a stealth picture of him in a car driving away from a crime scene or something. Yeah, we could do that.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: All right, Frankfort, Illinois, it’s Jim. Jim, is it Frankfort or West Frankfurt?
CALLER: It’s Frankfort. I’m up near Chicago.
RUSH: Oh, that’s right. West Frankfurt is down where I grew up. Okay.
CALLER: Right, down in the south end.
RUSH: That’s right.
CALLER: What happened yesterday, Rush, was I was listening to another talk show, and a gentleman called in and was just beside himself that he had listened to a radio show — I guess it was in Detroit — and he even said the time. He said it was about quarter to three Eastern Time yesterday, that they played this awful, awful commercial, and as he went on and described what this commercial was about on the radio, it became really apparent that it was one of your parodies that he was describing, and he took it as the real thing.
RUSH: Mmm-hmm.
CALLER: So it was pretty amazing. That this guy was just indignant.
RUSH: Well, what show did he call?
CALLER: Can I say?
RUSH: Sure.
CALLER: It was Sean Hannity’s show.
RUSH: So he called Hannity and he was complaining to Hannity, but what did Hannity do?
CALLER: Hannity, well, he kind of believed him. I don’t think he realized what was going on, but he said he would look into it and find out how they could possibly be running ads like this. The way he described it, it was one that you just played that said that he actually — they accused Judge Roberts —
RUSH: Let me play it for you again and you tell me if this is the one you think the guy was describing. We have that ad ready to go? We’re playing it out of rotation here. All right, see if this is the ad. (playing of the ad)
LEGENDARY EIB ANNOUNCER JOHNNY DONNOVAN: Don’t believe Rush Limbaugh (Whisper: “Limbaugh), or FactCheck.org when they debunk our ads. Our ad ran on CNN, so it must be true. Not only did Judge John Roberts defend an abortion clinic bomber, but Judge Roberts drove the bomber to the clinic himself! (Whisper: “Drove him.”) He used his own cell phone to trigger the explosion, just like the terrorists in Iraq. (Whisper: “Terrorists.”) Stop Judge Roberts from getting on the Supreme Court before he kills again. Paid for by George Soros and NARAL friends of Nancy Pelosi.
RUSH: Okay, Jim in Frankfort.
CALLER: That would be the one.
RUSH: That’s the one, and the guy that called Sean believed the ad, thought it was real?
CALLER: Yes, he did. Yeah, well, I think you ought to get it on CNN. I think it would be great.
RUSH: (Laughing.) Apparently people will believe it. Well, that just makes it a good parody. But, you know, we’ve had a lot of these parodies lately, and all of them are believed to be real by some people, we have found out. That’s a testament to their effectiveness I think, they’re so good and they so closely approximate and sound like the things that they are parodying that people believe it. If somebody heard this ad yesterday and actually believes it, it means that they are, after awhile, believing the left is actually capable of running such an ad. Now, I took great, great precautions here to make sure everybody knew this was a parody, putting my own name in it, by saying, “Hey, folks, listen to this,” and playing it. But some people apparently believe it. I don’t know that Sean necessarily believed it, and if he did, it didn’t take him long to figure out what it was and what was going on, but I haven’t gotten to the point here where I’m going to say this is a parody before we air these things. And believe me, there will be more coming. We’re constantly working on these, and the idea would be now — since CNN has admitted that the NARAL add is a fraud and they’re still running it based on some policy — it would just be a hoot to try to get this ad placed on CNN using their policy that they articulated via Lou Dobbs on his show last night. I don’t know. We’ll think about that.