RUSH: Michael in Fort Worth, I’m glad you waited. Great to have you on the program, sir. How are you.
CALLER: Hey, Rush, Merry Christmas. It’s such a pleasure to speak with you.
RUSH: Thank you, sir.
CALLER: I wanted to share an inspiring story about how your Rush Revere books are changing the life of a young boy in one of the most impoverished neighborhoods in Fort Worth.
RUSH: Wow. This I want to hear. Fort Worth, Texas.
CALLER: Fort Worth, Texas. Correct.
RUSH: Okay.
CALLER: I mentor a 10-year-old boy named Jeremiah. He’s a fifth grader, and his family, he was born into generational poverty. He’s family’s been in poverty for many generations. He doesn’t really like school, doesn’t have any passions, really, and he’s not even taught history. And so I bought the Rush Revere and the Brave Pilgrims book for him for Thanksgiving, and he absolutely loved it.
RUSH: Now, wait a minute. I would normally like to hear that, but I have a question.
CALLER: Sure.
RUSH: He’s been taught no history, you have discovered no passions, generational poverty, Fort Worth, Texas. How did you come to mentor this young man?
CALLER: So my girlfriend and I are actually starting a nonprofit to educate at-risk youth. And I was in one of the schools volunteering and I came to love this kid, mainly because I saw the dire need that he was in. I mean, no father, seven-plus family members living in a tiny, cramped home, and it’s also one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in all of Texas, so I just had a heart for him and I wanted to help break the chain of generational poverty.
RUSH: So generational poverty, no passion, no real education.
CALLER: Correct.
RUSH: Ten years old. What grade is 10 years old? Fifth grade, did you say?
CALLER: He’s a fifth grader.
RUSH: Fifth grade. So you decided to make this kid a project, you began mentoring him, and you grabbed a Rush Revere book. Which one?
CALLER: Rush Revere and the Brave Pilgrims. I got it for Thanksgiving.
RUSH: You got it for him for Thanksgiving?
CALLER: Correct.
RUSH: And is he able to read?
CALLER: He is. He struggles in reading, but he is able to read it, yes.
CALLER: He loves it. So just to give you an example, we used to come over, he just wanted to throw a football around. It’s really the only thing that sparked his interest is football, which is pretty normal. He comes into my house now, he doesn’t have a computer at home, he runs straight for the computer and he will search anything and everything about history. Wars, world leaders, what countries are like.
It was a change that was day and night after I came back from visiting my family for Thanksgiving that I had never seen. And, just so you know, in breaking generational poverty, one of the most important things is that a child has a passion. And he has a passion for history that I fully believe was sparked by your book.
RUSH: Wow. I’m almost speechless. I would be except I have to take a break here. Please don’t hang up. ‘Cause I need to learn more about this.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Now, back to Michael in Fort Worth, Texas. I happen to agree with you about passion. You know, using myself as a personal example, I knew when I was 8 that I loved radio. I knew when I was 8 I wanted to be on radio. Who cares why, although it is interesting, but I’m not gonna waste the time. I knew. And ever since I’ve wished that everybody could find their passion because when you find your passion, that becomes your energy source and that becomes what you commit yourself to. And, if this young man at 10, you don’t know the favor you’ve done for him by helping him identify a passion at his age, especially given the other circumstances of his life.
CALLER: Well, I’m thankful for you, too, for having that passion yourself, for wanting to educate the youth the proper way. He doesn’t get that education. You gave it to him.
CALLER: Yeah. That is a good question. We haven’t really delved into it, but my guess is the fact that you connected to it on a level that he cares about. I think that educators have a hard enough time trying to connect with kids, period. And so when you’re able to connect something that he never gets to hear, in a way that he loves. I just think that that resonates with kids in general.
RUSH: This is fascinating, because you’ve described a 10-year-old in abject generational poverty, which means he’s had nothing, and he’s in large family, and he had no passion, and he didn’t know any history, which means he’s just basically existing, and there’s no point to his life, as far as he’s concerned. He knows he’s alive and he’s gotta go to school every day, but he hasn’t really connected with the world. And, man, that’s horrible.
And I can understand it. So the first thing that he glommed onto that gave him something that he didn’t have that fired him up to want to know more, I mean, that’s just awesome. I’m so blown away by this. I tell you what I want to do. In addition to your new iPhone, whichever one you want, I’m gonna send you the other four books in the series for him.
CALLER: My gosh, thank you. He will love that.
RUSH: In fact, I want to put together a whole bunch — we’ve got a little gift package we put together for young readers from Rush Revere and Liberty, and I’m gonna put one of these together, plus the audio versions, too. They’re on CD. So you could get him some kind of a, you know, portable CD player and he can listen to them and read them at the same time and maybe get a different take out of them.
CALLER: Rush —
RUSH: If he likes the first one, he will guaranteed like the next four.
CALLER: I’m sure you can imagine how much that means to a kid who doesn’t generally have Christmas, so thank you so much.
RUSH: Well, I think I have a pretty good grasp of the situation. Unfortunately, it’s the case for way too many young people. When you have no — this is why people — I’ve always said that people are desperate to find meaning in their lives. Everybody wants their life to mean something, whether it’s a conscious awareness or not, and that’s why I’ve always known that the way liberals sell climate change works, because they tell people it’s their fault but then they offer them redemption. You can save the planet if you join us in doing X, Y, and Z, and that gives their lives meaning.
I mean, what could be more important than saving the planet? And so that’s how they get them. ‘Cause it’s crucial that people think that their lives have meaning and a purpose and that there’s a reward or some sort of reality to achieving something and to learning something and becoming functional. So you are doing more for this kid than he could ever possibly understand at this age. So let me ask you, what kind of phone do you want, 7 or 7 Plus?
CALLER: 7 Plus would be great. Thank you so much.
RUSH: Who’s your carrier?
CALLER: AT&T.
RUSH: AT&T. So take your pick of colors.
CALLER: Well, it will be for my girlfriend, and I think the white-on-white would be wonderful, if you have it.
RUSH: The closest to white-on-white is silver. So silver-white, AT&T, 7 Plus.
CALLER: Thank you so much.
RUSH: Hang on. Now, we need to get your address so that we can get the phone out to you. The phone will come under separate cover from the books and the package of stuff that we put together, but give Mr. Snerdley that address, and we’ll get all of this out to you. The phone you’ll have tomorrow, the other stuff, couple, three days, but you will have it, and thank you, Michael, thank you so much for the call. I really, really appreciate it. So does Kathryn. She’s gonna hear about this and she’s gonna be doing hoops.
CALLER: Thank you.
RUSH: You bet.