RUSH: Mary Ann in Albany, I’m glad you called. It’s great to have you on Open Line Friday. Nice to have you with us.
CALLER: Oh, thank you. I have to say that I don’t always agree with everything you say. I’ve listened to you a lot, you’ve had me on the phone quite a while. The reason I called was, I find it very — I’m not really sure what the right word is — I think you’re wrong about this MLB steroid controversy or what did you call it yesterday, McCarthyism? As an aunt of a young boy who’s aspiring to get into baseball, I certainly would not tell him that he should use any kind of unhealthy additive to his body.
RUSH: Right.
CALLER: You’re supposed to play the game naturally. You’re not supposed to drink anything, ingest anything. It’s supposed to be natural.
RUSH: Wait a minute. You can’t have Gatorade?
CALLER: Gatorade is nothing but a sugar water.
RUSH: Well, but it’s not good for you, all that sugar.
CALLER: Okay, so you’re telling me that sugar is going to bulk you up?
RUSH: No, I’m trying to point out to you that when you draw the line on–
CALLER: Okay, then you need to stop spreading this. You need to be more responsible to all the millions of people that listen to you —
RUSH: Oh, give me a break. Did you hear what I had to say about this today?
CALLER: I did, and I listened to what you said yesterday, and I find it very irresponsible of you —
RUSH: What did I say — shhhh!
CALLER: — to refer to this as something that’s called McCarthyism.
RUSH: Shhhh! The McCarthyism is publishing names of people who supposedly are guilty when nothing’s been proved about them.
CALLER: Of course it’s been proven. You’re not going to tell me that the owners of these teams know nothing. People are not that stupid, Rush. Other than maybe some of the people that listen to you —
RUSH: Mary Ann, Mary Ann —
CALLER: — and believe the things that come out of your mouth.
RUSH: Mary Ann, wake up. George Mitchell is not a court of law.
CALLER: Of course not.
RUSH: The evidence he collected is hearsay. It hasn’t —
CALLER: Then you know what? If this isn’t true, then the players can come out and sue him.
RUSH: And we’ll see if they do. But that’s not the point —
CALLER: It is the point!
RUSH: No, it isn’t. What is McCarthyesque about this is accusing somebody — actually McCarthyism is a bad term, because McCarthyism was accusing known communists of being communists —
CALLER: Then why did you use that word yesterday?
RUSH: Well, because it was a one-word way to convey what I thought about a simple phase of this. But I said so much more than that about this. You think I’m advocating —
CALLER: Are you honestly telling me —
RUSH: Mary Ann, let me ask you a question. Do you think I’m advocating steroid use?
CALLER: That’s what it sounds like, yes.
RUSH: How? How in the world do you get that?
CALLER: By not refuting what they’re saying, but not refuting what you’re saying.
RUSH: You don’t even know what I said. That’s what’s so frustrating here.
CALLER: I do know what you said.
RUSH: You think I said something that I didn’t.
CALLER: Let me ask you one question.
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: You are supposed to be a responsible adult. I understand you are not a parent, but I’m sure you have family members that have children.
RUSH: I am —
CALLER: If one of those children came up to you and said, ‘Hey, listen, Uncle Rushbo, I’m not hitting the ball like the rest of my teammates are hitting the ball, and what do you think I can do? I’ve tried lifting weights. I see a lot of my friends, they’re injecting steroids, do you think I should do it?’ Are you going to tell him, ‘Absolutely not’?
RUSH: You have to ask me this?
CALLER: I’m asking you that question.
RUSH: You have to ask me that question? There is nothing I’ve said, Mary Ann, that would indicate that anybody — you’re the first person in the history of the world that thinks I’m advocating steroid use.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: We go back to the Albany and Mary Ann. Mary Ann, you know what I think is really bothering you?
CALLER: Ugh! Please, don’t patronize me. But what?
RUSH: (laughs) You know, Snerdley says you’re so sweet and nice when you were talking to him, but you’re just —
CALLER: I am sweet and nice! But I just find what you’re saying to be very irresponsible.
RUSH: You don’t even — Mary Ann, I mean this with all sincerity — you really haven’t taken the time to listen to what I’m not actually saying.
CALLER: I ha– Believe me, I am not one — I am not a, uh, right-wing person, so —
RUSH: Doesn’t matter. None of that matters.
CALLER: And don’t — don’t use that against me! but I listen to your show as often as I can.
RUSH: It doesn’t matter! I’m not holding anything against you. You’re the one being contentious with me for no reason. I have given you no reason to be contentious here.
CALLER: Actually, you have. You have given millions of people reason to be contentious, because you are not —
RUSH: You’re the only one that’s called me and accused me of something I didn’t say.
CALLER: It is your…. It is your… That’s how you come across!
RUSH: Oh, jeez.
CALLER: I am an — I am an adult! I am a parent, and when I hear you talk about men and boys becoming emasculating (sic), when you say that this is —
RUSH: Here we go. You stick with it long enough, folks, and you get to the real nut of it.
CALLER: The real nut of it? No! You have… See…
RUSH: This is what you’re really mad about. This is what you’re really mad about, that I have said men and boys have been emasculated by people like you.
CALLER: No, not at all, because one thing I can honestly tell you is that I don’t treat any man any differently than the way they treat me —
RUSH: (sigh)
CALLER: — and my children are involved in sports, and my nephews are involved in sports, and I can tell you my nephew got a scholarship to a —
RUSH: This is hopeless.
CALLER: — very, very well known school to play hockey and the last thing on their team —
CALLER: — is any of them being emasculated. They are taught to win.
RUSH: I am trying.
CALLER: You are trying. Okay, go ahead. You’re trying what?
RUSH: To get a word in.
CALLER: Okay. Go ahead.
RUSH: (laughs) I think what you’re really upset with me about is that I’m not condemning the same people that you think everybody else is condemning: i.e., these players. But my analysis of this went far beyond that. This steroid stuff has been around for years. The names on this list, some of them are surprised; some of them aren’t. That’s not the point to me. The point to me is, why now and why —
CALLER: (exasperated) Oh my God!
RUSH: Wait. Let me finish this. I think the whole purpose of this ought to make you mad. I think the purpose of this report is to exonerate past behavior in Major League Baseball, because now they’ve put so many names on the list, Mary Ann, you can’t punish ’em. You can’t asterisk them. You can’t disqualify them. You can’t say Bonds should be asterisked and not anybody else. It’s impossible.
CALLER: They all should be asterisked!
RUSH: You can’t do it, is the point.
CALLER: But they should! Bud Selig and — and Cooperstown… I live near Cooperstown.
RUSH: Well, now —
CALLER: Everything changes now.
RUSH: Now, that might happen because the sportswriters who are really miffed about all this may not elect some of these guys to the Hall of Fame. There’s gonna be fallout for ’em, don’t misunderstand. I’m talking about the league and baseball as a business. This really, aside from his legal troubles with perjury in San Francisco, this really exonerates Barry Bonds, and nobody is looking at it that way, but it does. I’m not saying it should. I’m not saying that he’s not guilty. I’m saying in terms of everybody was focused on him, and he was the one guy really cheating more than anybody else. We now know that’s not true. We’ve always known it isn’t true. Now we’ve got a couple other, three other, big names on this. So Bonds is no longer a single villain. If you look at this from a business standpoint, a public relations standpoint, this is the best thing that could have happened for Bud Selig because Bud Selig is exactly what liberals think George Bush is. He’s indecisive. He sweeps things under the rug. He pretends that they’re not there.
CALLER: Well, it’s all about money!
RUSH: What?
CALLER: This is all about money.
RUSH: Of course, it’s about money! This is a huge business.
CALLER: But you — I — I just — I think what aggravates me more than your political views, set aside —
RUSH: Ugh.
CALLER: — what annoys me is that you’re not —
RUSH: You know what? I think you really like me. I think that’s the thing. You like me a lot, and you’re frustrated by it, and you’re fascinated by it at the same time. You actually like me a lot.
CALLER: Rush, I don’t know how your head fits through the door most days —
RUSH: It’s a big door.
CALLER: — but I find you to be funny, yes. I can laugh at you. I don’t agree with your political stance at all. I can’t say ‘at all.’ There’s a few things I do agree with you about.
RUSH: (chuckling)
CALLER: But most days when I listen to the radio, you infuriate me, and, uh, some of your commercials that I didn’t necessarily hear on my local radio station as I was listening to while I was on hold, my… I actually my — heart is racing because it made me mad, but that’s beside the point.
RUSH: Those are some of the funniest parodies going in modern American media!
CALLER: It’s not parody.
RUSH: Yes, it is!
CALLER: It’s really insulting.
RUSH: What do you mean? Give me an example.
CALLER: Um, well, you know, I will give you one example that I heard you um…
RUSH: That’s good. That’s what I asked, one example.
CALLER: Uh, ohhh, who was it that you made? Somebody came on and parodied Obama’s mother, mama jokes?
RUSH: Oh, that was Al Sharpton. That was, see —
CALLER: I think that’s horrible! As… I mean, I could never — and I have never, ever — said anything about somebody else’s mother.
RUSH: Oh my God, no!
CALLER: My husband lost his mother two years ago.
RUSH: Tell me it isn’t so.
CALLER: No, I — I think that’s wrong!
RUSH: I am glad to get calls from people like you, because it helps center me. It helps me realize what I’m dealing with out there when people hear things out of context and do not understand the point.
CALLER: Oh, no! You shouldn’t make fun of somebody’s mother. Do you have a mother?
RUSH: I did have.
CALLER: Okay. Would you want somebody now saying, you know, ‘Your mama’s so fat that, you know, when they squeeze her, gravy comes out’ or something?
RUSH: Mary Ann?
CALLER: What? You can’t make fun of somebody’s mother. You just can’t!
RUSH: (laughing)
CALLER: It’s not… I’m a mommy! You can’t make fun of mommies! You can’t.
RUSH: (laughing)
CALLER: And I think you need to be more responsible on how you say things, because I know you have a lot of people on the right who want to take and suck these things in that you say, and run with it. But when it comes to —
RUSH: All right.
CALLER: I think what bothers me —
RUSH: (laughing)
CALLER: — and let me just get this last point in — is that you have millions of people who are parents that have children that may be involved in sports, and by not —
RUSH: Now we’re back to that.
CALLER: Hang on!
RUSH: I did not advocate steroid use!
CALLER: Hang on!
RUSH: I did not advocate steroid use. I never have done so, wouldn’t do so.
CALLER: No.
RUSH: You have totally missed the point because you don’t listen.
CALLER: I do listen.
RUSH: You are too busy talking. You do not listen.
CALLER: I do listen.
RUSH: The Al Sharpton parody of Barack Obama is brilliant. It spins off Joe Biden. Why am I wasting time? It spins off Joe Biden insulting Obama by saying he’s ‘articulate’ and ‘clean.’ It made Sharpton mad and he was upset because he’s clean and he was a presidential candidate.
CALLER: But that’s him.
RUSH: And then you had a black LA Times columnist refer to Barack Obama as a ‘Magic Negro,’ and what you heard is a series of parodies to illustrate that it is liberals —
CALLER: No, what I heard is somebody taking a stab at their mother.
RUSH: No, you didn’t! You missed the point. Mike, grab one. Just grab one of these things. I’m going to play it. We’re going to play it and you’re going to listen to this thing with me together on the phone, okay, Mary Ann?
CALLER: No, I can’t! It makes me mad.
RUSH: Where’s your guts?
CALLER: I have a lot of guts. I’m a parent.
RUSH: You can gut it up for 45 seconds, Mary Ann. I know you can.
CALLER: Okay.
RUSH: You can gut it up. You’ve been gutting it up with me for ten minutes.
CALLER: I have! And you aggravate me every day. But I alls (sic) I want, the point I want to get across —
RUSH: I don’t think I do. I think you’re so fascinated with me you can’t stand it.
CALLER: Oh, honey, if that’s what you need for the day —
RUSH: See? See? Honey! You just called me honey!
CALLER: If that’s what you need from a Democrat from upstate New York to make your day, there you go.
RUSH: (laughing)
CALLER: But the one point I want to get across…
RUSH: No, your points are over. We’re going to listen to this. Is it ready? Listen to this, Mary Ann. Here comes. I just told the engineer, grab one at random.
(playing of Al Sharpton spoof)
RUSH: See, the context is, Mary Ann, that he’s so mad that Obama’s getting all this praise and Sharpton’s not, and he wants Obama to come out and talk to him and debate him about the issues, and Obama is ignoring Sharpton, and this is the way we chose it parody it because it was funny.
CALLER: I get satire. I get parody. You just can’t knock somebody’s mo-therrr! You can’t.
RUSH: You don’t know the real —
CALLER: Find something else to parody. I mean, you humiliate Hillary on a daily basis.
RUSH: It’s not about Obama’s mother! That parody is about Al Sharpton! Sorry. Al Sharpton. Here, listen to this one.
CALLER: (interrupting)
RUSH: No, Mary Ann, I want to treat you here. You’re my guest. Listen to a couple stanzas here of this song from Al Sharpton. You’ll really like this, too.
(playing of Barack the ‘Magic Negro’ spoof)
RUSH: Okay, that’s enough. What do you think of that, Mary Ann?
CALLER: That’s horrible. That is just… How do you even think that is remotely funny? I find no humor in that, and that’s what I mean. You are —
RUSH: When’s the last time you did laugh, Mary Ann?
CALLER: I laugh at you every day, from 12 to three —
RUSH: It’s not nice to laugh at people like that.
CALLER: — and three to six. I laugh.
RUSH: You shouldn’t laugh. Why are you laughing at me? You’re not supposed to laugh at people on the radio. That’s not nice.
CALLER: I laugh every day. I laugh at my children. I laugh at my husband.
RUSH: I’ll bet that’s true.
CALLER: Oh, now you’re getting nasty.
RUSH: (laughter) Mary Ann, I would love to continue this. I really would.
CALLER: Okay, but I just… Alls (sic) I’m asking is that you need to be more responsible on how —
RUSH: Yes, ma’am.
CALLER: — you, you know —
RUSH: Yes, ma’am.
CALLER: — spread the word —
RUSH: Yes, ma’am. Yes, ma’am.
CALLER: — as you said.
RUSH: Yes, ma’am. Yes, ma’am. Here’s a responsible hang up.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: By the way, Mary Ann, I want to thank you for a wonderful call. If I were your husband, I would say, ‘Honey, vacation time. We are going to Aruba. Pack light.’