RUSH: I got a lot of e-mails today. ‘Rush, would you comment on the Stephen Colbert business before Congress today?’ Yeah, I’ll be happy to comment on it. I should preface this by telling you I have never watched the show, so I only know about Colbert by reputation. So before I comment, let 
me ask a question to make sure I understand this correctly. I’ve never watched The Daily Show, either. I’ve never seen that. I don’t even know what number Comedy Central is on my DirecTV tuner. But anyway, isn’t Colbert’s shtick that he is a faux conservative? A faux Republican? I mean, he’s there to make fun of Republicans, right? His shtick is that we’re stupid, arrogant, all of the cliches — racist, sexist, bigot, homophobe all that — right? Is that pretty much what his shtick? (interruption) Okay.
Then this is not an accident today, and it’s not just Zoe Lofgren, the committee chairwoman, wanting to be entertained. Now, you could look at this one of two ways. You could say, ‘Here we are in the midst of a total economic meltdown, Congress’ approval ratings are at an all-time low, and they have a comedian up in character to talk about immigration to mock the people who are in favor of closing the border, to mock people who want to correct our illegal immigration problem, to mock.’ I think in the midst of an economic downturn you could say that this is just a thumb in all of our eyes. But at the same time I think there’s a point here. If I understand Colbert correctly — and you really gotta tell me if I’m wrong about this — but if Colbert’s shtick is to make Republicans look like idiots then it makes total sense he would come up there and say what he said today at an immigration hearing on whether illegals ought to be allowed to pick fruits and vegetables.
So I think Colbert’s appearance is nothing more than a political attempt to discredit people who are opposed to open borders, who are opposed to amnesty. I think it’s why he was brought up there. The Democrats asked him up there. He goes up there in character. He makes conservatives who favor closing the borders and oppose amnesty look like idiots. I think a lot of people look at this and say, ‘Wow, is that really funny. Why, he wanted to introduce his colonoscopy into the Congressional Record.’ Yeah, but what’s his character? What do people who watch Colbert think he is? So I don’t think this is just the House wanting to entertain itself and have a few yuks. I think, as with everything the liberals do, it is an effort to divert attention from their own failures and to make us look like a bunch of Looney Tunes and idiots.
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RUSH: Here is Jay in Bangor, Maine, as we start on the phones today on Open Line Friday. Hello, sir.
CALLER: Hi, Rush. Good to speak with you.
RUSH: Thank you.
CALLER: I just want to mention to you, sir, that if one gets an invitation to speak to Congress based on being funny, then you warrant a State of the Union address and address to the United Nations and a Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech. Because there is nobody funnier than Rush Limbaugh, because your humor is based in the truth.
RUSH: Well, thank you, sir, very much. (laughing) Of course, I will never be invited to address Congress. I will never, of course, win a Nobel Peace Prize. Now, let me walk that back a little bit. I was on the verge of being asked to testify about cochlear implants and deafness before some health committee in the House. It never went anywhere. This is back when the Republicans ran the show. It never went anywhere. (interruption) I was nominated for the Nobel prize, true, and should have won. I mean given who won it, given that the hoax and a hoax master won the thing, I shoulda won the Nobel Peace Prize. But, my friends, look, you and I… This ruling class, country class stuff, it’s real. And I am as far removed from the ruling class as any peasant is.
I was saying to somebody, I think even you the other day: If… Now, this is of course hypothetical and does not mean anything. If I were as successful as I am as a liberal, I would have movies, television shows. I would be invited to be the White House press secretary, all kinds of stuff. The big clique, the ruling class, if I were one of them, you would not be able to get away from me. I’d be all over the media if I decided to do it. But here we have… Look at all of us in the conservative media. (interruption) Yeah, but not by invitation. I’m ‘all over the media’ being mocked or being used as a foil or what have you. In their minds they’re mocking. They don’t know what they’re doing as they use me but in their minds they’re mocking me and trying to harm me.
My only point is this: What is the purpose of media? The purpose of media is to draw a crowd. Newscasts, I don’t care what show you’re talking about, they want to draw a crowd. Ratings. Then you want to hold that crowd so that you can charge advertisers healthy and, in my case, confiscatory rates. Look what we on the conservative media have demonstrated. Do we not draw a crowd? Big crowds, loyal crowds. Our audiences love us. We have a connection with our audiences that the left-wing media would only dream of. They’re losing audience left and right — and there are fixes for them. What do you think would happen…?
This is just a hypothetical. I’m saying this to make a point. What do you think would happen to the CBS Evening News if I became the anchor? What do you think? They would have ratings and it would probably be #1. They probably know this, but there is no way it will ever happen. Why, they’d be caught dead. For a whole host of reasons it will never, ever happen. You could take any certifiably popular, demonstrably so conservative media figure anywhere, and you will not find that person, except as a joke, being invited to appear or help left-wing media causes or even so-called mainstream media. There is a dividing line. I mean, it’s plain as day, and it’s never, ever going to change, pure and simple. (interruption) Ah, look, Snerdley… Snerdley is sitting there saying, ‘Don’t be too sure about that.’
I can’t tell you, Snerdley, the number of people since I started this program in 1988 who have been telling me, ‘You know, it isn’t going to be long before you’re mainstream’ and they’ve wanted it to happen. They’ve wanted me mainstream. They’ve wanted to be accepted by all of these mainstream types from Hollywood to Madison Avenue and they’ve hoped for it, because that’s how they’ve defined my finally reaching the pinnacle. And I’ve been telling them since 1988 (actually 1990, ’91), ‘It ain’t going to happen.’ (interruption) No, ‘mainstream’ as defined by tradition. I know that I’m the mainstream and they’re the oddball kook minority. ‘Mainstream’ in the traditional legendary sense of mainstream. That’s actually the dirty little secret: We are mainstream, and they are the minority shrinking oddballs. They are the genuine extremist kooks. They are the genuine kooks. They’re everything they say we are. Reactionary? They’re the ones that are racists. They’re the ones that are sexists. They’re the ones where all the bigotry is located, plus all the greed. So just a little point of illustration.
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RUSH: Turlock, California. Patrick, great to have you on the EIB Network, sir. Hello.
CALLER: How you doing? Great to talk with you. Basically I just wanted to touch on the Ag industry and Stephen Colbert and all that mess going on right now.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: Well, it’s a pretty well-known secret among the Ag industry, which I’m kind of involved in. I’m out in the middle of it here in Turlock. All the machinery and equipment already exists to harvest pretty much every crop we grow, and there’s really no excuse to have any migrant workers out there anymore. I don’t know why nobody ever even talks about that. It’s really weird. I mean, if you go to Europe and Germany and France and pretty much every crop they grow is harvested with machinery and equipment and not with manpower because they don’t have the manpower. So I don’t know why it’s never even brought up here.
RUSH: I have no clue.
CALLER: Yeah. That’s just it. Nobody even brings it up. Why doesn’t anybody talking about why do we have the equipment to harvest this? Why aren’t we doing it?
RUSH: Why do you think?
CALLER: I don’t know.
RUSH: Well, come on, take a stab at it.
CALLER: We’re harvesting like it’s the 1800s. It’s bizarre.
RUSH: You’re out there in the agriculture part of the state, take a stab at it.
CALLER: I’m kind of wondering if the government promises a lot of the farmers subsidies not to use that in order to keep the illegals here. I’m trying to understand.
RUSH: He’s right that farms in Europe do not use migrant workers. Okay. You’re right. Farms in Europe do not use migrant workers.
CALLER: They don’t have ’em.
RUSH: They use machines, automated.
CALLER: Yeah.
RUSH: In the United States, it’s apparent they don’t want to go automation. They want to use migrant workers. Why do you think they would want to use less migrant workers?
CALLER: We’re still harvesting our crops like it’s the 1800s. It’s absurd.
RUSH: But why? I’m asking you.
CALLER: Honestly, I don’t know. A lot of the farmers get lots of subsidies and so do the dairies, and that might have something to do with it.
RUSH: Well, you’re talking about —
CALLER: I don’t know all the ins and outs of it.
RUSH: You’re talking about subsidies to grow things and put it in a silo or to not grow things.
CALLER: I’m not that deep in the Ag industry; I don’t completely know. I’ve never understood it, and a bigger thing I don’t understand is why isn’t it even talked about.
RUSH: Okay, so you’re not big in the Ag industry. (chuckles) Forget agriculture.
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: Why. Would. Government. Want. Migrant (i.e, illegals) in the country doing anything?
CALLER: Well, obviously I think the Democrats wanted it to guarantee votes.
RUSH: Well!
CALLER: And not to mention — I wish you’d bring this up, too — does anybody know that NBC owns Telemundo? Everyone illegal alien here is money in their pockets. It’s not that they’re so nice. They just want to get paid. It’s bananas. I can’t believe it.
RUSH: (laughing) Yes, you can. You understand it.
CALLER: Well, I understand it, but I don’t know why nobody else brings it up. Nobody else connects the dots. I mean, come on.
RUSH: Well, now, wait. Are you talking about the Telemundo-banana dots or are you talking about the immigrants, illegal immigrants in the country period so they’ll register for Democrats to vote?
CALLER: Well, that’s exactly it.
RUSH: Because everybody brings that up, everybody brings that up.
CALLER: They do everything they can to make ’em citizens to get them in here legally. Yeah, it’s pretty obvious it’s what the Democrats do.
RUSH: Well, let me tell you. The dirty little secret is if the Democrats could figure out a way for them to vote even if they didn’t have to be citizens, they’d do it.