RUSH: Let’s go the audio sound bites here, just to document what took place over the weekend. As you know on Friday on this program, I offered to mediate the dispute between Terrell Owens, the wide receiver of the Philadelphia Eagles, and the quarterback, Donovan McNabb. This offer to mediate was taken seriously by the Associated Press and others in the media. Just to give you a little background, here’s a montage from Saturday’s ESPN of McNabb and Owens’ comments about each other, just to illustrate the rift — and of course, they’ve got their first preseason game tonight, the Eagles do. They’re in Pittsburgh for the Steelers. Here it is, just to give you an idea what’s going on with these two guys.
OWENS: They’re trying to pit the whole city against me about me being greedy.
MCNABB: I’ve been defending him ever since this thing started.
OWENS: It’s not in my contract that I have to be happy. I have no desire to talk to Donovan. He calls the plays; I run the routes. He threw the ball; I caught the ball.
MCNABB: Just keep my name out your mouth. You ain’t gotta like me.
OWENS: Everybody wants to call me hypocritical, all the quotes where he says he didn’t want to talk to me.
MCNABB: I’ve never known for a hypocrite, you know, to reach out to somebody after comments had been made earlier. I reached out to him. All I ask is that he respect what I do.
OWENS: I’m really tired of the dishonesty, the political scenery to make me look bad. What a difference a year make; that’s all I can say.
MCNABB: Like he said, “What a difference a year makes.”
RUSH: Now, that’s Terrell Owens and Donovan McNabb. You can see the size of the rift here. It’s gotten worse. McNabb is, for the first time, showing some signs of actually being irritated by all this, and all efforts to heal this rift have failed — and I’m pretty confident I could do it. I’ve got a couple things up my sleeve that I think could work. I’d have to talk to both of these guys, though, at the same time to do it, at the same time in order to pull it off, at least to give it a chance. I made that offer on Friday, and CNN Headline News covered it over the weekend.
COMMENTATOR: Finally, guess who wants to help Terrell Owens and Donovan McNabb work together? A man associated with peace, harmony and tranquility: Rush Limbaugh. Hey, wait a minute. Wasn’t he the guy who back in 2003 said McNabb is popular because the media wants to black quarterback to do well? Limbaugh says he’ll be the moderator if Owens and McNabb iron out their differences on his radio show.
RUSH: Uh, that is pretty close to what I did say. You notice in the media reports over the weekend they finally got it right what I said? I never made one racist comment or racial comment at all about McNabb. I was simply talking about the media. And if I were talking about it to McNabb, I would say, ‘Look, at the time I think the media was telling everybody you were doing better than you were, pure and simple. I think they’ve got a social reason for wanting you to do well.’ I would not back down. It’s precisely because I would not back down from this that I would have credibility in trying to mediate the rift. Last, ESPN. This may be a first, since this all happened. They were forced to mention my name on Sportscenter.
COMMENTATOR: Just when you thought the Terrell Owens situation had become untenable there’s an offer for mediation. Rush Limbaugh wants T.O. and Donovan McNabb to join him on his radio show so
RUSH: In fact, I’ll even extend the offer. I’ll do it off the radio. It doesn’t have to be done on the radio. If they don’t want to do it in public on the radio, I’ll mediate wherever they are or wanna go. I can do it. Here’s Fox and Friends, sports guy Brian Kilmeade this morning.
KILMEADE: A new name has joined the Terrell Owens circus: Rush Limbaugh. He told listeners on his radio show that he wants to help T.O. and Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb settle their differences. Limbaugh made the national news in 2003 when working for ESPN when he said McNabb was overrated because the media wanted to see a black quarterback succeed. He’s invited both players to come on his show and settle their ongoing feud — and I hope they do.
RUSH: Do I expect this to happen? No. I certainly don’t expect it to happen, but I wanted to put it out there as a serious offer. I mean it. Go to the website. Read the transcript of what I said on Friday. I don’t need to repeat all of that. But, you know, we don’t need this on the eve of the NFL season, and clearly efforts to bring these two people together have — have failed. By the way, one of the reasons I think I could do this is because in me, they do have something in common. Neither of them is particularly fond of me, and I don’t care what it takes to bring them together. They’re probably not fond of me because of misunderstandings, but if there is that in common, we understood to find something these two guys once again have in common, and if that can be me, I’m more than willing to do it for the sake of the Eagles, the NFC East and the upcoming National Football League season. I mean, somebody’s gotta get Terrell Owens straightened out. He’s going to blow the whole rest of his career here if he doesn’t understand what he’s got and realize how to get more, and that’s what he wants. He wants to get more. Somebody’s gotta tell him how to do that in a way that can make it pay off. So I again extend the offer, and it does not have to be on the radio. I realize they would not do it on the radio. If it did, fine, but if they want it to happen somewhere else, I’m available.
