RUSH: Let’s get to what I was gonna start the program with, the hashtag, #BringBackOurGirls. As you know, Michelle Obama went back to the hashtag earlier this week. She went back on Wednesday and she did the hashtag again. I don’t know if she made a personal appearance somewhere. I don’t remember. I read the story. I don’t know if she held the hashtag sign up, had a picture taken or what, but reemphasized the hashtag. We had the story yesterday, 80 troops have been sent into Chad. Forty of the troops are providing protection for the other 40, and the 40 who are being protected are running the drone program, flying the drone and doing whatever intelligence gathering trying to find the 300 kidnapped girls taken by Boko Haram.
HAGEL: All those nations are — are sovereign nations. We can’t just parachute in. Well, I suppose we could.
ROSE: You have the ability, but not necessarily —
HAGEL: We’d want to — you have to be invited in to help them. We are working closely with the Nigerians. We just recently, a day or two ago, announced that we are putting 80 people in Chad. These are not boots on-the-ground people, but these are support people for drones, aircraft, to assist the Nigerians in finding those girls. Now, our 80 troops are armed because of their own self-defense and defending our assets there. But President Obama’s made it very clear we’re not gonna send boots on the ground.
RUSH: Right. We’re sending 80 troops to Chad, and they are on the ground. They’re walking on dirt, soil, earth, whatever. But we’re not gonna do that, so when Obama finds out that we did this, oh, you know how mad he’s gonna be. I hope he wasn’t watching Charlie Rose last night. ‘Cause he said we’re not gonna send troops there. We’re not gonna put troops on the ground, but 80 of them are there and they’re not suspended in midair and they’re not hanging there in parachutes. They’re on the ground, and they’re armed, but they’re not boots on the ground, even though they are. So Obama’s gonna find out about this, there will be another press conference next week, another investigation. Charlie Rose, however, doesn’t understand why we haven’t found these girls already. I guess. Listen.
ROSE: With all that, why can’t we find them?
HAGEL: I don’t know how many times you’ve been to Nigeria or that part of the world, but it is an immense part of the world. The canopy in those jungles are as thick as anywhere in the world. These are almost boundless areas, almost borderless, although there are borders, but there are about five countries —
RUSH: What is that? (laughing)
HAGEL: — in that area. Now, northern Nigeria is where those girls were abducted from and where they initially were. They may be, some of those girls, in other countries. We don’t know.
RUSH: (laughing) What is this? They’re almost boundless areas, almost borderless, although there are borders. (laughing) These people amuse me, ’cause they’re supposedly the smartest people in the world. Charlie is stunned, the hashtag, the hashtag. Why hasn’t Boko Haram given back the girls? That’s what those who believe in hashtag foreign policy are wondering about. My question is, did you hear him say here (imitating Hagel), “Charlie, I don’t know how many times you’ve been to Nigeria, but, I mean, it’s immense. Nigeria’s an immense part of the world.” It really isn’t. “The canopy in those jungles are as thick as anywhere in the world, almost boundless.” What he’s talking about is the rain forest, otherwise known as a jungle. The rain forest, the canopy, the jungle as thick as anywhere in the world. How can that be? I thought we had destroyed them all.
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