RUSH: Last night was incredible. I didn’t know what time the pregame stuff started on CBS. The game started at 8:30, and I thought, “Well, okay, pregame stuff will start at eight o’clock.” So at about a quarter ’til eight I turned on the tube to get ready for it and I found myself in the middle of the most incredible pregame show of a football game I’ve ever seen.
Now, remember, yesterday was 9/11. Ray Rice and Roger Goodell in the media trumped 9/11. Ray Rice and Roger Goodell trumped football. I don’t know about the rest of you guys out there, but I’m starting to get it. I’m starting to hear. It’s starting to connect. I’m not doing enough to stop wife beating. Wife beating is an epidemic. It’s happening all over the country, and it’s really, really happening in the NFL, and we are all responsible for it. And we have got to do something about it.
I have learned that I am not aware enough, that my conscious has not been raised enough, that I am not worried or concerned enough about this, that it is an epidemic, and that it’s happening all the time. Why, I learned that just since Ray Rice cold cocked his fiancee in the elevator, 600 women have supposedly died from wife abuse since February. I heard that on CBS in the pregame show last night. I heard that from James Brown, who I think wants to be the Bob Costas of CBS. Maybe he wants to be Bob Costas, period.
I’ve also learned, as I predicted, football is politics. Football has jumped the shark and has now become politics. I also learned last night that the media could not believe that Baltimore Ravens fans continued to show up wearing Ray Rice jerseys. The media was aghast and appalled that female Baltimore Ravens fans showed up to tailgate and watch the game wearing, with pride, Ray Rice Baltimore Ravens game jerseys. The media was so stunned, so outraged, that they actually sought to speak to some of these women. And the women said, “Hey, it’s a one-off. He apologized for it. She’s still with him. Get over it.”
Then the media was doubly shocked when, after the game, they went into the Ravens locker room to speak to Ravens players. They found a bunch of Ravens players who said, “We did this for Ray. Ray is one of our brothers. Ray made a mistake. He doesn’t deserve all that’s coming down on him. He’s apologized. He never lied to anybody about what he did. He told Goodell. He told anybody that asked what happened in that elevator. He has bled with his brothers in this locker room. He has helped us make this city what it is,” is what some of the players said.
The media is flummoxed. The media doesn’t understand why there isn’t universal disgust and hatred for Ray Rice and Roger Goodell. You know what else I learned last night, folks? I learned that when I make fun of the way Barack Obama cannot throw a baseball — and he can’t throw a baseball. He throws like a girl. He walked out there, the first pitch at the Washington Nationals wearing the mom jeans. I mean, it was comical. You know what I learned? I learned that saying that diminishes women and leads to domestic violence. That’s what James Brown in the CBS pregame show told America, that we’ve gotta stop making fun of men who throw like girls or calling them sissies, because that is going to diminish women and lead to more violence and death. Did you know that?
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RUSH: I want to finish with it ’cause, folks, it’s just crazy. We’re feminizing this game. It’s a man’s game and if we keep feminizing this game we’re gonna ruin it. If we keep chickifying this game we’re gonna ruin it. It’s gonna become something it was never intended to be, and so many men now, executives in the league and sports Drive-Bys are in a race to see who can be the most politically correct feminized guy. It’s comical to watch this.
Now, I’m wondering, James Brown last night had a monologue. We have excerpts of it. It went kind of long. We have the last half of the monologue. Well, let me read it to you first and then we’ll play the audio. This is a pregame show. By the way, this followed 20 minutes of Norah O’Donnell from the sidelines. She’s with the CBS early morning news show. She’s on the sidelines talking about this domestic violence stuff and the Ravens and Ray Rice and the commissioner. And then after that, they cut back to the studio crew is on site. It was James Brown, coach Bill Cowher and Deion Sanders.
By the way, one other thing, War on Women, are these guys beating up their wives, are they all Republicans? Are they? Are they voting Democrat, do you think? I mean, well, who’s really conducting the War on Women here? Who’s actually doing this? Who has brought all this about? All this supposed abuse on women that takes place in the NFL, who are these guys? Think they’re voting Republican? I kind of doubt it. (interruption) What? (interruption) Yeah, I did. I did just ask that. I did just ask that. Are these guys who are engaging in domestic violence, which is a War on Women, are they voting Republican or are they voting Democrat? I think the odds are they’re voting Democrat, aren’t they?
I’m sorry, they’re the ones politicizing this. I’m doing nothing but following along. And they’re the ones that have this stupid War on Women meme, accusing the Republicans of it, and I don’t see any Republicans accused of this. Anyway, James Brown. The host of the CBS pregame show started out by saying, “Two years ago I challenged the NFL community and all men to seriously confront the problem of domestic violence, especially coming on the heels of the suicide of Kansas City Chiefs player Jovan Belcher and girlfriend Kasandra Perkins, yet here we are again confronting the same issue again of violence against women.”
Now, I didn’t see James Brown. I don’t watch pregame shows anymore because they’ve gotten away from football. I mean, they’re artificially laughing at jokes that aren’t funny. It’s kind of juvenile so I tune in for the games now. So I missed James Brown and his initial national plea to men to stop beating up women. But I remember the Jovan Belcher circumstance. It happened on a Friday, Kansas City. He got drunk and went home and he murdered — there wasn’t any suicide here — he murdered the mother of his child and went to the Chiefs facility and committed suicide.
So James Brown says, “Two years ago I challenged the NFL community and all men to seriously confront the problem,” yet here we are again. “Now, let’s be clear,” he said. “This problem is bigger than football. There has been, appropriately so, intense and widespread outrage following the release of the video showing what happened in the elevator at the casino. Now, wouldn’t it be productive if this collective outrage could be channeled to truly hear and address the long-suffering cries for help from so many women, and as they said, to do something about it. An ongoing, comprehensive education of men about what healthy, respectful manhood is all about?” And our audio sound bite picks up at that point.
BROWN: It starts with how we view women. Our language is important. For instance, when a guy says, “You throw the ball like a girl,” or, “you’re a little sissy,” it reflects an attitude that devalues women. And attitudes will eventually manifest in some fashion. More than three women per day lose their lives at the hands of their partners. That means that since the night of February 15th in Atlantic City, more than 600 women have died. So this is yet another call to men to stand up and take responsibility for their thoughts, their words, their deeds, and, as Deion says, to give help or to get help, because our silence is deafening and deadly.
RUSH: Have there been 600 murders, spouse abuse murders since February? I mean that’s the statistic he cites, but I missed the source of the stat. I don’t know. I think we would have heard about that. Unless the perps are Democrats, then you can’t hear about it because the Republicans are doing the War on Women, right? (interruption) Well, now, don’t smirk in there. There’s all kinds of crime we don’t hear about because it doesn’t fit the narrative of white on black.
We don’t hear about the crime in Chicago, for example. We don’t hear about black-on-black crime. We don’t hear about black-on-white crime. We hear about white on black crime. So I don’t know. I heard this last night, first time I’ve heard it, 600 women are dead since February, spousal abuse, why haven’t we heard this? Why is there this deadly silence? If it’s true. But of course the main takeaway is you gotta stop making fun of the way Obama cannot throw. (interruption) How does it demean women, what do you mean?
Well, when you say he throws like a girl, you are diminishing women. You’re effectively saying that women can’t throw, and you’re making fun of a guy for looking like a woman who can’t throw. So you’re you’re diminishing women, and when you diminish women that leads to them getting beat up. That’s what James Brown says. When you diminish women by making fun of the way they can’t throw that’s gonna lead to them getting abused.
At any rate, now, CBS, folks, they may have scored big ratings, I don’t know, with this pregame focus on domestic abuse and violence. But I’m tuning out of it. This is not why I watch football. I have no desire. This is not why most people watch football, is to be preached to by another branch of the media who are trying to move a feminist and politically correct liberal agenda forward. I have no desire to subject myself to it. I don’t need a lecture on domestic violence. Not during a game. There are other venues for that.
Of course I’m against wife beating. I’m also against mixing social issues with broadcast of sporting events, too. But that line has been blurred now. Remember the days, folks, when it was said by people in the NFL that I was not welcome, that the NFL doesn’t want political people. And the NFL does not want divisive people. We can’t have people who are divisive in the NFL. And now look. What is the NFL? It’s become nothing more than the latest extension of the Democrat Party leftist agenda.
“Sixteen Female Senators Push NFL on Violence — Sixteen female Senators signed a letter Thursday urging NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to institute a zero-tolerance policy for domestic violence. They said they are ‘shocked and disgusted’ by the video” of Ray Rice. They wrote in the letter: “Tragically, this is not the only case of an NFL player allegedly assaulting a woman even within the last year.”
They don’t want any second chances. The letter says, “If you violently assault a woman, you shouldn’t get a second chance to play football in the NFL.” And Richard Blumenthal, a Senator from Connecticut, he wants a full-fledged investigation of this, US Senate investigation of this. Sorry, this is not why I watch football. This is going to be the death of this sport. It is no longer an escape. It’s no longer about great athletes. It’s no longer about amazing athletic achievement and drama.
It’s now become about guns and gays and domestic violence. These are the topics that we are all going to be lectured on all season long. A press conference for a practice squad signee in Dallas because he’s gay? The never-ending refrain on the Washington Redskins name, and now this? Guns, gays, domestic violence, these are topics that I frankly don’t be need to be preached to about. I don’t need to be lectured, and I certainly don’t want to turn on a football game and end up being accused of all kinds of social misbehavior.
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RUSH: Just to sum up, Mr. Snerdley says, “There’s no way they can misquote you on what you just said, but they will anyway.” Let me restate it. Not restate it; repeat it. I resent that the venue of football pregame shows, and now even the game, I resent that this venue has become a lecture to the viewing audience on guns, gays, domestic violence, political correctness.
I resent the implication that wide swaths of the viewing audience are guilty of this. I resent that a football analyst is delivering this from a hoity-toity position of moral perfection. It insults me. It insults me for everybody watching this to sit here and essentially be lectured and preached to about not caring enough or being guilty of it or not doing enough.
Did these people just figure out this week that domestic violence was wrong? They’re acting like they never heard of this before and it’s the latest outrage they’ve run into. I think I knew domestic violence was wrong when I was six or seven years old. So did most everybody else. Or maybe it’s some misguided effort to save the NFL. I don’t know. But this monologue that James Brown gave would be far more valuable if it was directed to whoever it is perpetrating these crimes, not the audience.
Anyway, let’s go to the phones. People have been patiently waiting. We’re gonna start in Miami. This is Dan. Great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: Good afternoon, Rush.
RUSH: Afternoon, sir.
CALLER: Been listening to you since you started. Big fan. Thanks for doing what you do.
RUSH: I really appreciate that. That’s a long time.
CALLER: Yep. Enjoyable. Listen, you know the expression, “A picture tells a thousand words,” and you were talking earlier about radio versus TV.
RUSH: Right.
CALLER: I remember how when I was a little boy the Vietnam War changed when somebody got shot live on the air. I’m convinced abortion would be illegal if it were seen. So why, if the facts of this case regarding Ray Rice have been known for a few months, why does the fact that the video has come out, the video now trumps everything? As horrible as it is, it’s not any different than what was known, maybe the facts are debated a little bit, but it’s not any different than what’s been known for a few months.
RUSH: I actually think there’s an answer to this question. You’re absolutely right, the pictures change everything. I mean, the coach of the Ravens admitted that. As you correctly said, that’s the culture now. The Vietnam War, I’ll tell you what began the end of the Vietnam War. It was not Walter Cronkite saying that some operation failed. It was a picture of young children burned by Agent Orange fleeing an explosion in TIME Magazine. That’s what did it. You’re right. Naked girl running away from disaster with her skin burned by Agent Orange.
Ray Rice only got two games. That’s the root of this. The suspension was thought to be insufficient ’cause everybody knew what happened in that elevator even though we didn’t see it. We didn’t see it but knew what had to happen because what we did see was an unconscious woman being dragged out of there like one of the Bertha Butts sisters. In fact, this is a point a lot of people are making, why did we even need this video? You had to know what was going on in there.
The commissioner says, “Well, Ray Rice was ambiguous. He may have said he slapped her.” Now, Ray Rice’s people, “No, no, no, no, Ray did not lie. Ray told the commissioner he hit her.” So this is dicey. But the two-game suspension was judged to be insufficient, and then the video on top of that focused the fact that the suspension was not big enough and therefore that people weren’t taking it seriously enough, and then it was just open season. The politically correct social architects had their open door, and they stampeded right through it.
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RUSH: A brief break here at the top of the hour. We come back, there just a couple more loose ends, humorous audio sound bites, actually, from the national lecture last night on domestic violence and all the men who are engaging in it.
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RUSH: You know what I’ve noticed this week? In the midst of the Ray Rice NFL domestic violence thing, a bunch of callers have succeeded in fooling Mr. Snerdley and have gotten through here attempting to entrap me. A bunch of Media Matters type people and a bunch of left wingers are calling up and suggesting some of the most outrageous things hoping I will agree with them so that they can then say that I said it on the radio.
Remember the guy who called earlier this week and said, “Hey, what would have happened if the gay guy had beaten up or had been beat up, what do you think of that? What do you think the league would do?” I recognized it as host entrapment right off the bat. And there was another one yesterday, I forget what it was. (interruption) Well, I forget what it was. Oh, yeah, picking on Ray Rice ’cause he’s black. All kinds of attempts here to entrap me. But I’m too swift for these efforts.
I’ve often told people don’t try this at home. It is much more challenging and difficult than it looks. But I suspect that we’ll have even more such attempts. And, Mr. Snerdley, this is not a criticism. Don’t misunderstand. I mean, anybody can get lied to, and we believe the best of everybody who calls. We believe the best of everybody in this audience. So if you want to try, 800-282-2882 is the number. If you’re tired of all this stuff that is being talked about and you want to talk about something else, that’s what Open Line Friday is for, so have at it.
New research published in the Journal of Family Psychology says that, “contrary to media and public opinion, women commit more acts of violence than men in 11 categories.” Now, this is really politically incorrect, and I can assure you that you will not be hearing any of this because it does not fit the soap opera narrative.
Here are the 11 categories in which women commit more acts of violence than men. Throw something, push, grab, shove, slap, kick, bite, hit, or threaten a partner with a knife or gun. Women do much more of that than men in those 11 categories, according to the Journal of Family Psychology. “The study was based on interviews with 1,615 married or cohabitating couples, and it was then extrapolated nationally using census data, and it found that 21% of couples reported domestic violence.” The Washington Times says that they then confirmed the study.
Now, I don’t want to get anybody in trouble here, but, ladies and gentlemen, I have several African-American friends who have weighed in to me on this Ray Rice situation, and I’m almost afraid to tell you what they’ve told me. I’ve held this close and have not repeated it. These are conservative guys. These are responsible guys. You would not believe. If there’s a refrain, if there’s a theme to what all of my black buddies have told me about this, it is this. “Hey, Rush, has anybody told you what they’re arguing about in that elevator?”
“No. Why does that matter?”
“Believe me, Rush, it matters. What were they arguing about?”
“Well, I don’t know. Do you?”
“No,” they said, “I don’t know, but it believe me, it matters. I mean, that just didn’t happen in a vacuum.” And then I can’t repeat other things I’ve heard because there’s no win in it. I’m just telling you that there’s a body of thought out there that does not universally join the chorus of condemnation of Ray Rice on this. That’s not me. I’m not weighing in on it. I’m just telling you, people tell me there are other opinions besides James Brown. There are other opinions besides Bob Costas. There are other opinions besides any of these sports people on television or in the media.
There are other opinions out there. You’re just not hearing them. I am. It would not serve any purpose because this is not a safe environment for me to repeat what I’m hearing. But, believe me, it goes against the grain of all the political correctness that we’re hearing out there. And I’m not validating it by telling you this. I’m not suggesting anything. I’m just sharing with you what I hear.
Let’s go back to the audio sound bites on this and wrap this up, and then we’re gonna move on. I mentioned that the media is just outraged and shocked and perplexed that fans showed up last night wearing Ray Rice jerseys. This kind of dovetails what I’m talking about. A lot of Baltimore Ravens female fans, “Hey, it was one time. He apologized. She’s still with him. Come on, man. He has helped this team win.”
A Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reporter went in the Ravens locker room last night and tweeted some of what the Ravens players were saying. One tweet. Ray Fittipaldo is the reporter for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “The win over the Steelers was dedicated to Ray Rice. Several Ravens told me afterward, quote, “Ray’s still a great guy,” receiver Torrey Smith said. “He’s a model man. He made a huge mistake, but he’s still a great person.
Ravens linebacker Terrell Suggs — I happen to like Terrell Suggs. I think Terrell Suggs is a riot. Did you see how Terrell Suggs came out? He wore a gladiator helmet during player introductions last night. He’s gonna get fined for that, that’s a uniform violation, but he doesn’t care. He came out, Terrell Suggs taunts Tom Brady for having a supermodel wife, “Oh, man, I’d love to be Tom Brady. I would love to have Tom Brady’s wife. Tom Brady is beautiful. His wife is beautiful. Look at me. Think I can ever get a woman like Tom Brady?”
I just love this guy. He taunts the Steelers fans when he goes to Pittsburgh. Terrell Suggs said, “It was a very emotional game. He’s done a lot for this city. We love our brother.” More from the Ravens locker room. “We wanted to get that win for Ray,” said rookie running back C. J. Mosley. “He was part of this organization for a long time. He put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into it.” The media is shocked. They couldn’t believe it.
See, the media gets on something, and they think, like I pointed out about this Redskins name thing. The thing the media does, they start from a position, an attitude that everybody agrees with ’em, that the majority of thinking all over the country is what they think, and therefore when they run into somebody doesn’t, they are the oddball, they’re the kook, they’re the racist or they’re the bigot or what have you. When in fact the majority of this country couldn’t care less whether the Redskins change their name.
But the media starts out with the assumption that everybody’s outraged by it, as they are. Same thing here. And when they find that what they believe isn’t universally believed or accepted, they’re shocked and stunned. So we have a montage here of info people from CNN, NBC, CNN CNN and NBC, basically expressing shock in one degree or another.
MICHAELA PEREIRA: Were you surprised that so many female fans were showing their support by wearing Ray Rice jerseys?
ANDY SCHOLES: I was shocked. I couldn’t believe it. I saw hundreds of people wearing them.
PETER ALEXANDER: A surprising number of female fans were still wearing Rice jerseys.
MARIA SHRIVER: Wow.
NATALIE MORALES
ThatÂ’s horrific. That…
MARIA SHRIVER: Wow.
NATALIE MORALES: …is horrific.
BETTY LIU
: Impacting female fans, do we see any evidence of that?
KAVITHA DAVIDSON: Not in the slightest. It’s really unfortunate.
BETTY LIU: In yesterday’s game, you saw many of them wearing his jersey, right, the number 27.
JEFFERY TOOBIN: The morons wearing the 27 jerseys, I mean, come on.
SUNNY HOSTIN: Come on.
JEFFERY TOOBIN: How stupid is that? I mean, you know…
SUNNY HOSTIN: Really?
JEFFERY TOOBIN: Really?
RUSH: That’s Jeffrey Toobin and Sunny Hostin, she’s at CNN. The morons wearing the 27 jerseys. If you don’t agree with ’em, you’re a moron. The point is, you know what these media people don’t get? I think, just a wild guess, I think over half of these people that show up wearing Ray Rice jerseys are just saying (raspberry) to the media. I think it’s all media backlash. I think it’s people saying (raspberry). I think it’s people, “Hey, look at me! Look at me!” I think it’s people trying to tick off the media, and it’s working. He-he-he. It works.
Okay. So let’s see. Goodell’s next. This was on CBS This Morning on Wednesday. Norah O’Donnell, “Do you wish you had seen this videotape before it was released by [Walter Cronkite] at TMZ?“
GOODELL: Absolutely.
O’DONNELL: Why?
GOODELL: That’s why we asked for it on several occasions. Because when we make a decision we want to have all the information that’s available, and obviously when we met with Ray Rice and his representatives, it was ambiguous about what actually happened.
O’DONNELL: But what was ambiguous about her laying unconscious on the floor being dragged out by her feet?
GOODELL: There was nothing ambiguous about that. That was the result that we saw. We did not know what led up to that. We did not know the details of that.
RUSH: That’s really where this whole thing centers now because Ray Rice and a bunch of people on his side are out telling anybody and everybody, “No, no, no, no, there was nothing ambiguous about what I told the commissioner.” Ray Rice, “I was honest from the get-go.” Ozzie Newsome, general manager Ravens, “Ray was honest with us. He told us he hit that woman in the elevator. He has never lied to anybody.” But the commissioner says, “I didn’t see the video at first and Ray was ambiguous. He could have slapped her.” It’s a “he said, she said” situation now.
So now they got this investigation going on. It’s just a mess. Then, after James Brown lectured everybody on stopping making fun of the way guys throw, if they throw like a girl, said you can’t do that anymore. That diminishes women. James Brown, CBS Sports, if you make fun of a guy ’cause he throws like a girl, you’re diminishing women, and that’s gonna lead to abuse somewhere down the line. Gotta stop calling guys sissies and you gotta stop making fun of the way they throw if they throw like girls.
Now, after he engaged in that commentary, they then cut to the former coach of the Steelers, Bill Cowher for an analysis of the — (interruption) Well, I swear watching this show last night, I got the impression that there is an epidemic of spouse abuse in the NFL. That’s the impression I got. Here’s Bill Cowher.
COWHER: If the NFL is perceived to have a domestic problem, then it is our job, our obligation to make sure that we take an opportunity to change that image. We have to do the right thing.
RUSH: And then it was Deion Sanders turn.
SANDERS: My name has been attached to these accusations as well but I can honestly say unequivocally I’ve never abused — any involved in that nonsense. We could provoke change right now if we do the right thing. We must focus on really helping these guys at hand because it’s a lot of nonsense going on.
RUSH: Well, makes perfect sense to me.
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RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, I have a question. A thought just occurred, just popped up into my fertile cranial cavity, the deep, dark crevices of my — well, not dark, but the deep crevices of my mind. It’s a very simple question. It’s for the NFL spousal abuse. According to James Brown of CBS Sports and pretty much the rest of the sports Drive-Bys, spousal abuse in the NFL is an epidemic. It’s really bad out there. James Brown says that 600 women have died since February alone, not just in the NFL, but spousal abuse victims have died since February.
Now, the NFL has a bunch of players who are retired. We assume the problem isn’t new. Many of these retired players have been hired by — dadelut dadelut dadelut dadelut dadelut — the networks as commentators and analysts and play-by-play people. Many of them are on ESPN. Some are at CBS. Some are at NBC. ABC is not in the football game anymore, college football, but some are even there. Would it be proper to suggest that maybe these networks would want to conduct an investigation into some of their own employees to find out if some of this behavior has occurred prior to them being hired, and if said investigation reveals that some of their own employees have engaged in this behavior, should they not be suspended, fined, fired, what have you?
I mean, if we are to believe that there is an epidemic of spousal abuse in the NFL today, then there has to have been one last year and the year before ’cause it didn’t just happen with Ray Rice at the Revel Casino in New Jersey in February. It’s just a question. I mean, if they’re serious. Just a question. No, I’m not trying to stir anything up. I’m responding in kind here. I’m having my sensitivity raised.
I’m having my conscious level raised here. I am now becoming concerned, as a good citizen, and I want answers. Because, like Coach Cowher said, like Deion said, we have to do what’s right. We have to do the right thing. We have to take an opportunity to change that image. There’s a lot of nonsense going on, and we have to do whatever it takes to do the right thing. We gotta help these guys at hand, in hand, with hand, whatever Deion said.