RUSH: I had forgotten this. In 1988, of course the program began, I had forgotten, I did this interview on Connecticut Public Access TV. Back then I was willing to appear anywhere to promote the program. There was a TV show on Connecticut public access TV called Miggs B on TV, and the host was Miggs Burroughs, and he interviewed me, and he said, ‘You have a segment called ‘The Homeless Update.’ You’re misunderstood. I mean, that segment’s misunderstood. Your whole point of it is misunderstood a lot.’ Cut two.
RUSH ARCHIVE: Well, I knew it would be, and it’s understandable that it is misunderstood. For one thing, the whole piece is a contradiction. On the one hand, here’s this song sung by a guy — the song’s recorded in the fifties, I believe, and it’s by Clarence ‘Frogman’ Henry, and he sings three different ways. He sings as himself in the song, then he sings as a woman. (singing) ‘Ain’t Got No Home.’ And then he sings as a frog, and in all three cases he hasn’t got a home and he hasn’t got a girl and he hasn’t got a girl frog or he hasn’t got a date or hasn’t got this. And so you put that song juxtaposed with a picture of an actual homeless person, and it could be construed that I’m making fun of the homeless. The thing that I try to do to set my program apart is, other than just being me, is to add music elements to it. Music in a talk show is something that most people aren’t used to hearing, so it will stand out. And all I’m trying to do is grab people’s attention for what I say. And I know that they’re going to be so mad hearing the song that it’s going to take awhile before they begin to understand the message — but that’s okay. I’m prepared for it to take a long time. The bottom line is for them to get the message.
RUSH: Exactly, exactly right. However long it takes for people to get the message. That was October — I don’t even know what — this had to be after August. This had to be, you know, in the fall sometime. Connecticut Public Access TV: Miggs B on TV, which takes us, by the way, ladies and gentlemen, to real-day news events, the homeless crisis in Denver. I want to take you back to this program and me July 2nd of this year, my comments on Denver’s plans to deal with the homeless during the Democrat convention.
RUSH ARCHIVE: This is crazy. The homeless are your voters! The homeless are people that you turn to. They’re living a life of misery and they are the people that you think make up the country. They’re suffering from the Bush administration policies and all of this. So you want to get them out of the way? No, don’t get ’em out of the way. Give ’em some walking-around money. If you’re going to give them some flat screens go out and give them some cigarettes, buy them some adult beverages so they can watch television, a little popcorn, and while you’re at it, put some voter registration cards in the homeless shelters while they are watching your convention. In fact, make registering to vote a requirement to get into the homeless shelter. The Democrats are losing touch. They used to be smarter than this.
RUSH: The homeless are their voters. Soup line America. These are the people the Democrats need to broadcast prominently as representative of all of America, because of the predatory lending practices that have led to the subprime mortgage crisis. So this morning on the Fox News Channel, America’s Newsroom, we have a portion of a report by Alicia Acuna about Denver’s plans for the homeless during the upcoming convention, and the cohost is Megyn Kelly. She says, ‘There are rumors that the city may be trying to hide the homeless during this convention. Is that a confirmed fact?’
ACUNA: There’s actually quite a debate here. We talked to an outreach officer who works with the homeless here and he told us that the city is actually going to try to highlight this segment of society during this convention, not hide them. They’re going to bring in big-screen TVs so that the homeless can come in and watch the speeches and try to participate in some of the convention ongoings. We’ve also been told that there are plans for free movie tickets for the homeless. We’ve heard of rumors of tickets to the zoo, tickets to the museum. There are critics that are charging that the city really isn’t trying to be nice. Folks, are saying, ‘Really, you just want to be nice to these folks? We think you’re just trying to sweep the city clean, trying to get this uglier side of life off of the streets, away from the delegates, away from the journalists so that people don’t have to see it.’ So that’s the debate.
RUSH: (laughing) They are taking my idea almost verbatim. They’re now debating it, the two sides are, ‘Hey, let’s promote ’em, let’s give ’em movie tickets, give ’em TVs, let’s let ’em watch the convention.’ They’re not going to admit they’re going to give ’em voter registration cards, that’s going to be done on the sly, and the side, ‘We don’t want them anywhere around here.’ (laughing) It’s just amazing the impact of this program all over this country.