RUSH: You know, I think, ladies and gentlemen, we’re getting very, very close here to needing a new ribbon color to signify women abused by Harvey Weinstein. Two more. A French actress and now Kate Beckinsale have moved forward here, and she is the latest actress to come forward with a story about Harvey Weinstein who has now been accused of sexual harassment by over 30 women.
Beckinsale wrote on Instagram this morning that Weinstein first came on to her when she was 17 and that she believes even now that rejecting him hurt her career. She says: “I was called to meet Harvey Weinstein at the Savoy Hotel when I was 17. I assumed it would be in a conference room which was very common. When I arrived, reception told me to go to his room. He opened the door in his bathrobe.
“I was incredibly naive and young and it did not cross my mind that this older, unattractive man would expect me to have any sexual interest in him. After declining alcohol and announcing that I had school in the morning I left, uneasy but unscathed. A few years later he asked me if he had tried anything with me in that first meeting. I realized he couldn’t remember if he had assaulted me or not.” (interruption) What, does she look like so many others?
She says she had to continually reject Weinstein’s advances over the years and that he threatened her and others. Up to 30 known women. And I’ll tell you there’s collateral damage here. Matt Damon, Ben Affleck and all of these wacko — you know, we had caller about this yesterday, all these late night comedians, none of them covered the story, just like NBC didn’t cover the story.
They sent Ronan Farrow down to the New Yorker, and everybody’s now in a CYA mode trying to come up with lying excuses that people might believe. But they’re not gonna fool anybody. I’ll tell you, just like I said yesterday, this is a great opening, this is a wide opening, great opportunity to continue to prosecute the culture war in terms of identifying what liberalism is. (interruption) Cosby or Harvey Weinstein, who’s ahead? Well, that’s a good question. It’s getting close.
I mean, I think we have more names associated with Weinstein now. The difference in the two is that Cosby’s women largely are unknown to anybody. But Harvey’s women are all actresses and major, well-known now public figures and they’re all of a type, they’re all actresses, so forth. But in terms of the numbers, I don’t really know.
The Obamas in this, you know, folks, it gets more and more curious. And the other day, I think it was on October 9th, and here we are at the 12th, it’s either Monday or Tuesday, I opened the program with a heartfelt belief that one of the reasons this was happening — obviously Hillary Clinton lost. But they gave Ted Kennedy a pass. And why? Lion of the Senate. He was right on abortion. He was a leader of liberalism in the Senate, so it was worth preserving, even in 1969. Then, of course, Bill Clinton. They went to all costs to defend Bill Clinton. And, in the process, they literally ripped the entire foundation of feminism right out from under it.
And it sent a signal — this is the key thing, I believe — it sent a signal to other liberal guys and other guys that may not have been liberal at the time that if you are right on the issues, you’ve got a get-out-of-jail card. If you’re right and particularly on abortion, if you make it well known that you believe in a woman’s right to choose and even if you don’t care and even if your belief, honest belief is the opposite, doesn’t matter, you say that that is the one thing that matters to you most, and it is a get-out-of-jail card. It buys you insurance from being held accountable for any of this behavior.
You could even, if you wanted to, you could even take this back to JFK and Camelot where the same kind of stuff was going on in the White House then. And the media, to cover it up, created this image of Camelot at the suggestion of Jackie Kennedy, after, of course, the assassination. But throughout history the fact is that liberal media has gone out of its way to cover up this kind of behavior, and isn’t it ironic that this kind of behavior resides in the party that claims to be unalterably supportive of women’s rights. Opposed to workplace violence, opposed to rape, opposed to sexual abuse, any of these kinds of things.
The bottom line is that most of this has been going on inside that party. And that party is where it is supposedly believed that women’s rights are paramount. It’s why I raised the belief, how much of this is even real? How many of these guys in Hollywood actually are liberals? When the purpose of Hollywood is to get girls and then doing whatever you have to do and being whatever you have to be in order to get girls, if you think that you gotta be pro-choice and if you think you have to be supportive of every wacko feminist cause, and if that’s what it takes to succeed in Hollywood and to get girls, then that’s what you’ll do, whether you believe it or not.
I think that explains a lot of it. I don’t know how much. It’s phoniness is the bottom line. But what it has led to is that the vast majority of the truly abusive anti-women behavior actually exists and takes place in liberalism, among people on the left who all have an immunity from it. It’s kind of like along the same lines as Bill Gates or the Kennedys or Warren Buffett always being in favor of tax increases for people like them. What better way is there to keep the hordes from your moat, demanding to get your question house and take everything you’ve got. If you can convince them that you think you’re not paying enough taxes and that you support tax increases for the rich, then you will be left alone. And not only will you be left alone, you’ll probably be supported.
So Bill Gates, Buffett, any number of wealthy people — has it always surprised you to hear all these wealthy people claim they think they’re not taxed enough or claim that they’re eager to support tax increases on the rich? And it seems to make no sense. They didn’t get rich by paying high taxes. Why do they want to start paying high taxes now? The bottom line is, they don’t. They’re simply saying so to keep people away from ’em. To keep the hordes, the people with the pitchforks, to keep ’em bothering somebody else.
The Kennedys pulled this off. The Kennedys may be the greatest example of this kind of phoniness. Here you had this wealth that was generated from all the way back in the Great Depression, the important duty on scotch, which they continue to derive today, the Chicago merchandise mart, old man Kennedy selling short on purpose, which is perfectly fine, but it destroys people in the process. All this massive wealth was created, and the Kennedy family is what? They care only about the poor and the downtrodden, and that’s all they talk about. Then women’s issues came along, and they’re supportive of pro-choice and women’s this and women’s that.
Meanwhile, Ted Kennedy behaves as he behaved. Bill Clinton behaved as he did. How much of this so-called policy belief on the left is actually genuine versus how much of it is a construct for other purposes? Well, this to me is the opportunity we have here in delving deeper into the culture war and explaining why the people who are literally doing the greatest damage to it are somehow exempted from any of that and get away with blaming people who are not destroying the culture, i.e., conservatives.
And then there’s a story here on the Obamas. Headline: “‘Disgusted’ Obamas Were Star-Struck by Hollywood Mogul Weinstein’s Access, Cash.” This is the Washington Times. “The Obamas’ relationship with the movie producer went beyond campaign cash. Mr. Weinstein even arranged for Mrs. Obama to make a surprise appearance at the Oscars as a presenter in 2013.
“The live audience in Hollywood gasped and applauded when the first lady, dressed in a shimmering silver gown, was beamed onto a screen at the venue to make the presentation for best picture.”
Weinstein was giving a presentation, Harvey was, at a film school one day, and he had a piece of advice for the students. He said, “I never let anybody tell me ‘no,’ even the White House.” “Never let anybody tell me ‘no.'” Now, who do you think would be the person who could be of greatest service in helping casting couch movers and shakers navigate this crisis?
Who out there? ‘Cause if it’s Harvey Weinstein, there’s gotta be a lot of others, and we know it’s already Matt Damon, we know Ben Affleck, and there have to be others quaking in their boots. Who should they call for — (interruption) No. No. They don’t call Bill Clinton. No. No, no, no, no, no. I understand that knee-jerk response and reaction. Hillary Clinton is the expert in navigating these situations and having men accused of this stuff survive.