RUSH: Tom in Riverside, Connecticut? Great to have you, sir. You’re up first. Very important. First call of the day sets the tone oftentimes.

CALLER: Hey, Rush, how are you?

RUSH: Very well. Thank you.

CALLER: Good. I think you’re a little bit confused about gun control. And the reason why I say that, you mentioned before that the police officer that was shot as he was laying on the sidewalk didn’t have a gun. So with gun control that means, you know, the criminal or terrorist shouldn’t have a gun, either. So I’d like you to try to state your point on that.

RUSH: I wasn’t making a point. I was simply reciting a fact. The French cops — and I don’t know if it’s all of France or just Paris, but they’re not armed. They carry billy clubs and that’s it. It was about political correctness. The leftist, the PC belief is that armed anybody threatens people, and if you disarm then you won’t threaten people and they won’t use their guns against you. That’s how it works. That’s why we’re getting rid of our nukes. We’re getting rid of our nuclear weapons to show Putin and everybody else that we’re not gonna nuke ’em. And so the hope is they will get rid of theirs, too. Do you think they will?

CALLER: Yeah, well, I want to make one other point, Rush, if I can. I know you’re pressed for time, but really quick. I mean, I know in Chicago they have some of the strongest gun control laws in the country.

RUSH: Right.

CALLER: And we know that there’s not a lot of crime going on there.

RUSH: Yeah. (laughing) Okay. We got a gun control guy here. And look at what happened. How many of you were surprised, by the way, when you heard that the French cops don’t have guns. You were surprised? Literally, you had no idea? Well, Tom didn’t, either. Can’t believe that. But maybe that’s what gun control does, take the cops’ guns away from ’em, and the bad guys won’t shoot anyone. That’s what the left will have you believe.

Why would you take guns out of the hands of cops? Why would you do it? To understand why, you have to understand liberalism. You have to understand political correctness. You have to understand the convoluted thought process that leads you to believe disarming the cops improves security. Only if the cops are the bad guys in your eyes does that makes sense.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: You know, I’m looking at my e-mail during the break here, and I’m being told by a lot of people they had no idea that French cops were unarmed. Okay. Well, let me add to that… (chuckles) By the way, just to fall deeper into the insanity here, Bloomberg News said that the terror attack in Paris shows the need for even stricter gun-control laws. So the cops on the scene yesterday didn’t have any guns. No weapons. Meanwhile, the terrorists had rocket launchers, grenades, RPGs. They had Kalashnikovs.

They were weaponized.

They were militarized.

This was an attack, obviously the result of serious military training and rehearsal. I’m looking at the e-mail, and it’s stunning how many people are shocked that the Paris police didn’t have any guns. Well, let me add to it, then: The two cops who were shot, do you know how they arrived on the scene? They rode their bicycles. That’s right. They came pedaling up. After hearing about this attack, and the cops are dispatched, the two who were shot showed up on bicycles.

In the midst of all this — I’m not kidding you — Bloomberg News says the terror attacks in Paris shows the need for stricter gun control. Yeah, we got the guns out of the hands of the cops, but somehow the criminals still have them. The left cannot… I mean, how many times have I told you this story? I’m at a fashionable, Fifth Avenue New York dinner party at the home of a moderate Republican. Big name. You’d know it. I apologize for never mentioning these names, but it’s out of respect for these people.

They didn’t invite me to have these events discussed. But you would know the name. It’s not a name of anybody prominent at this moment. It’s a name from the past. Anyway, I didn’t know it at the time, but I’m invited to these things as a circus act. Here are all these New York moderates, and they may as well be liberals. Their friends are all New York liberals. And at the time, my program was brand-new. Nobody had ever heard of me.

There wasn’t any other conservative media.

This is before Fox News and before the blogosphere, and these people are just as curious as they can be. So I get invited to all these things, and it took me awhile to figure out that their curiosity was not really genuine. They just want to know, “Who is this kook? Who is this?” I ended up going as a circus act. I was there to entertain them, but that’s not what I was aware of. Anyway, when the conversations got serious, then they had to change their assessment that I was a kook.

I went from being a kook to a problem.

I’ll never forget the gun-control conversations. I mean, they were huge. Gun control and abortion were the two issues that moderate Republicans in New York leaned on me about more than anything else. They implored me that I had to be the one to do something about it. In fact, I was once asked — and very honored — to address the National Rifle Association convention. I think it was in Nashville or Memphis that year, and I agreed. Now, this would have been 1993, ’94, somewhere in that range.

It was before Fox News, before the blogosphere. Now, I can’t tell you the number of moderate Republicans who came up to me just in everyday life, not just these people hosting dinner party, and said, “Do you realize the opportunity you have?” I said, “What do you mean?” “Do you realize the change you could make in this country if you accept this invitation to the NRA and you go down there and tell them that they must, if they are to survive, change their attitude and start supporting gun control?”

I don’t think I’ve ever told you people this. But I had all kinds of people, including left-wing media types, telling me, “You want to put your name on the map? You’re big now, but you want to own the country? You go tell these people to stop! You be the one. You’re the biggest conservative in the country. They’ll listen to you. You go down and tell ’em that and you will be made forever.” I kid you not. Now, naturally I didn’t do it. Just the opposite.

But I remember at this fashionable, Fifth Avenue dinner party at the big dining room windows overlookin Fifth Avenue. Right beyond Fifth Avenue, of course, is Central Park — and the host, the prominent moderate Republican, came up to me and said, “You know, this gun control, we got to do it! There are just too many damn guns out there, and people listen to you. You have got to do something!”

I said, “You know what, sir?” and I pointed out at Central Park. I said, “If you could convince me that everybody who obeys the law giving up their guns will also result in the people we can’t see right now over in Central Park giving their guns up, then maybe we can talk. Why are you hell-bent on the law-abiding getting rid of their guns? They’re not the problem. Do you think gun control laws are actually gonna get criminals to give up their guns? By definition, they have guns illegally, and they’re gonna continue to. And the more you disarm the law-abiding, the bigger targets you make them.”

None of this common sense mattered because their position on gun control was how they maintained entree into the highest strata of the elites. They are all elites; they wanted to continue to be thought of as elites. They wanted to remain elites, and being “right” on gun control and abortion were two things — particularly if you were Republicans — that you had to do to be accepted and welcomed by leftists in New York. So the actual common sense or lack of it… My argument, it didn’t even permeate. It wasn’t about that to him.

To him it was about getting rid of guns. “There are too many guns. We need to get rid of guns.” The whole concept of taking guns out of the hands of the law-abiding didn’t matter, didn’t permeate. The idea that the law-abiding would be at greater jeopardy because criminals by nature are gonna get guns illegally; they already do? That argument also failed to impress. Because it wasn’t about substance. It was about image. It was about style, not about substance — and it’s been the same thing with abortion.

But now here we have this attack over there yesterday with Kalashnikovs and military-style weapons. The cops are disarmed, they show up on bicycles, and Bloomberg News has a story that the reason is we still don’t have strict enough gun control laws in France. Today we got the New York Times with a story claiming the two biggest threats are blowback against Muslims in America. Oh, that would be horrible.

Of course, there never has been any, but it’s predictable every time there is a militant Islamic attack terrorist attack, the New York Times the next day is wringing their hands. “Oh, the potential blowback! Oh, no! Oh, the horrible things that might be done to Muslims. Oh, no.” It never happens. Yet it’s the New York Times worried about all this blowback, while the New York Times is encouraging this kind of blowback against the New York cops in their support of this mayor. Grand jury renders decisions on Eric Garner in Ferguson, Missouri?

The New York Times, liberal media, doesn’t like it. So they join forces with civil rights lunatics and start encouraging, hyping, feeding the rage against the cops — and they dare write a story today worried about backlash when they are the ones sponsoring it against the cops in New York City? What a pathetic sight! French police arriving on this scene at this magazine, which been decimated with military-style weapons, and here on come the gendarmes on bicycles with billy clubs.

And the Bloomberg News reaction is, “See? We need even stricter gun-control laws.” Do you know what USA Today did last night? USA Today on their website last night and in the newspaper today, published an op-ed by a radical Muslim cleric in London. He’s a regular lecturer on Sharia law. He is an acknowledged radical, he is a proud radical, and he believes that there should be Sharia law everywhere in the world. He distributes leaflets and pamphlets which say, “Behead those who insult Islam.”

He distributes pamphlets which say, “To hell with freedom of speech.” Yet he’s honored with op-ed space in USA Today. Why do you think that happened? By the way, let me say something: It may not be a bad thing, in the real world, if people would read it. I mean, here’s a guy who is a leading radical Muslim cleric, and he is explaining what they want. We don’t have to tell anybody. He’s doing it for us. He’s credible. He is who he is. It’s far different than say, me, telling what you intend.

You can say, “Eh, Rush, come on. Nobody thinks that.” But here’s the guy himself who thinks it, writing at USA Today. But that’s not why USA Today gave him the space. USA Today did not give him the space, I’m guessing, because they wanted militant Islam to be exposed. No, no, no, no, no, no. You know why they did it? “We must be fair. We must be fair! Militant Islam is under assault today because people misunderstand the nature of the attack in Paris!

“Militant Islam is under assault, and we must make sure that there is no blowback. We must make sure that there is not any violence. So we’ll be fair and we’ll give militant Islamic cleric — uh, what do we call it? — equal time to make his case! To show them we’re fair, to show that we don’t discriminate, to show that we take them seriously.” That’s why USA Today did it.

They didn’t do it hoping this guy would expose, for once and all, what we’re really up against. Oh, no! They did it from a purely defensive posture. “Hey, hey, these people are under assault. It’s only fair that we give them some space to defend themselves. It’s only fair ’cause we must prevent a backlash.”

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Justin, Jacksonville, North Carolina, great to have you on the EIB Network, sir. Hello.

CALLER: Rush, mega dittos. This is absolutely incredible. I’ve been listening for about 15 years and it’s the first time I’ve been able to get through, so thanks for taking my call.

RUSH: You bet, sir.

CALLER: I just want to say you’re actually on my bucket list before I get to my point. At some point before I die I feel I need to have a cigar with you.

RUSH: That would be fun. That would be fun. I love cigars. Cigars have brought more people together than — well, not sex, but it’s close.

CALLER: Yeah, I actually had my first cigar when I was in Afghanistan and just got hooked, and really love ’em. Anyway, so yesterday I was looking at the Drudge Report and I was looking at that security camera footage showing the police officer on the ground, getting approached by the terrorists. And I’ll tell you what, I gotta be honest, the very first thing that came to my head was “hands up, don’t shoot.” And I thought it was pretty appropriate considering all the stuff going on. You got all these riots over a false narrative, and here we have photo evidence of a crime being committed, a murder by these terrorists, and the New York Times wants us to put a little love in our hearts, wants us to be understanding?

RUSH: Well, yeah, they’re very worried there is gonna be a backlash. But I get your point. I mean, I’m interpreting this, he’s not joking, he looked at that picture and the first thing, here’s a real “hands up, don’t shoot.” This is a real “hands up, don’t shoot,” it really happened, it didn’t matter. He got shot and he died after arriving on his bicycle, the cop did. Anyway, Justin, thanks much for the call. I appreciate it.