RUSH: Folks, there’s new evidence in. National Football League ratings are down structurally, which means they’ve now fallen two years in a row. They started to fall before the kneeling protests began. They’ve fallen so significantly that the broadcast networks are having to provide make-good commercials. You know, when you buy a spot for an NFL game, they guarantee you an audience. If they don’t deliver the audience, then they owe you as many spots as it takes to get the audience saturation you paid for.

And they’ve been having to do that. So their problems go beyond just the fact that politics has begun to corrupt the game. Yesterday on ESPN, the commissioner, Roger Goodell, was asked, “Some people say maybe a reason why there’s been a dip in the ratings was the social activism we saw in the anthem protests.” Now, this is the commissioner of the NFL. Listen to what he says.

GOODELL: The incredible thing for me was it certainly opened my eyes, the ownership’s eyes to things that are happening in our own communities that our players felt needed to be addressed that they are not only articulate about it, they fully understand it. They are engaged. They’ve done a tremendous amount of work. And they believe we can make our communities better by working together. And the ownership is proud and I was proud to join them, and not just understanding these issues and listening to their point of view, but supporting them.

RUSH: There you have it. The commissioner of the NFL speaking for the ownership of the NFL saying they were proud of the anthem protesters. Proud of the anthem protests. NFL ratings are structurally down, meaning two years going now, and they’ve got more problems than just people tuning out because they didn’t like the protests.