Hey, speaking of Fashion Week, what is it with this renaissance? Do you know what this art show is in New York City? John Podhoretz… This thing 
Every tree in New York has been planted. New York was laid out, or Central Park was laid out and designed. So here comes Christophe or Christo, whatever. Christophe is a hair designer, right? He could have done it! They hang (interruption). You know what I’m talking about, Mr. Snerdley? What do call these? They look like giant pink sails. They look like giant pink sails that are above you as you walk through the park, through a section of the park, and like (interruption). No, they’re not like canopies. I don’t think they’re canopies. It’s like big orange shower curtains is what it looks like, primary. It’s called The Gates. Yeah, big orange (interruption). It’s many years and many millions in the making, and it’s a fine, fine work of art, and as John Podhoretz pointed out yesterday, New Yorkers are too caught up in being hip and too “in” to say what they really think about it: It’s stupid.
So they gotta go walking through there and go, “Ooh, ahhh,” and think that it’s the most magnificent, fabulous piece of art they’ve ever seen when it’s stupid. It’s like hanging the golden arches in Central Park in fabric and claiming that it’s art. And so the New York left is all taken with this. “Ahhhhh!” Peter Jennings, in fact, was seen walking his dog through this thing, making comments that it’s good to see people go out and support this kind of revolutionary art. Now, I read the other day, I just finished the Da Vinci Code, ladies and gentlemen. I’m a late arrival to this book, but there was a sentence in this book that I’ll never forget, a lot of sentences in this book that I won’t forget, but there was one sentence in this book particularly relevant to this discussion today. You know, I’ve always tried to define art for people, and I’ve always said, “If I can do it, it isn’t art,” and I could do this. If somebody gave me $20 million I could go out and buy a bunch of orange shower curtains or sheets or whatever and hang them up on poles, but because my name isn’t Christo, it wouldn’t be perceived as art. The line in the Da Vinci Code was that art is simply the… I’m going to have to paraphrase this. But art is simply man’s ability to… What’s the word? Not recreate. (interruption) No, no, no, no, no. Art is simply man’s ability to reflect himself the natural beauty around us. Paintings, we paint people. People themselves are beautiful, but a painting is considered to be a replica. Art is the human replica of the beauty of nature. Well, if that’s true, and it sounds good to me, there’s nothing beautiful and nowhere in nature are there orange shower curtains hanging in a forest when you get right down to it. So I don’t see how it’s art.
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RUSH: Dolores in New York City. Hi, I’m glad you called, and welcome to the program. Hi. Yeah.
CALLER: I’m very excited to be on your program. I’m a regular listener.
RUSH: Thank you.
CALLER: And I just caught on what you were saying about Christo’s Gates in Central Park.
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: I actually worked on that exhibition. I worked on the installation.
RUSH: How long was that work of art in — well, how long was that a work?
CALLER: The installation, how long did the installation take?
RUSH: No, from the moment of exception, somebody figured they wanted to hang —
CALLER: Twenty-six years.
RUSH: You’ve got to be kidding me!
CALLER: They tried to convince the park for 26 years. They came up with this idea and they persisted, and eventually Bloomberg I guess two years ago said, “Heck, why not.”
RUSH: Yeah, he was running for reelection.
CALLER: Well, that, too. But as a regular listener and also a regular user of the park, I’m in the park every day because I have dogs and I walk there, it’s very dreary in the winter.
RUSH: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
CALLER: And so to have this installation, it really livens up the place. But, you know, when I was doing the installation, there were a lot of camera crews, a lot of German camera crews and so I got interviewed, and, you know, they ask you what is your opinion, and I said for me this was a celebration of freedom, because Christo is from Bulgaria originally and Jeanne-Claude, his wife, was from France. Notice they did not become citizens of France. They became citizens of the United States.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: They lived in New York for 40 years.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: And, you know, for me, I said this is — imagine the Iraqis, they had to go vote, and they were going to get blown up or killed, and these people, they’re very creative, and —
RUSH: Wait, wait, wait. Dolores, hang on just a second.
CALLER: I want to say I’m very nervous.
RUSH: I know, but I just want to make sure I’m understanding. You’re comparing Christo’s courageous work of art here with the Iraqis going to vote?
CALLER: I’m comparing the act of when you live in a real freedom environment, that we live in, in this country —
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: — we take advantage — I mean we take for granted our freedom every single day.
RUSH: I agree with that.
CALLER: We’re a bunch of whiners when we have to go wait in line to vote ourselves. And so what I was saying, that here these people are, they live in, and I live in, and you live in this environment that you conceived of your show. I mean, when you live in an environment where you’re not in fear you can do incredible things.
RUSH: Don’t misunderstand me. I mean, they can do whatever they want in Central Park, if they want to roll toilet paper in the trees and call it art in Central Park, I have no problem. I’m a big freedom guy, as you know. I’m just, just… You know (laughing).
CALLER: Have you walked in it, or you’ve just seen it on TV?
RUSH: I’ve just seen it on television, still shots.
CALLER: It’s a very different feeling when you walk through it because I usually tread the same path every morning, and it’s like, “Oh, my God, I want to go here. I want there.”
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: You just want to explore the park more. And I just think it’s, you know —
RUSH: Why would this make you —
CALLER: — going to the moon, and how many years ago —
RUSH: Oh come on now, you can’t compare hanging a bunch of these — what are these, anyway? They’re not shower curtains but look like it.
CALLER: It’s a fabric. It’s like a polypropane —
RUSH: Folks, in case you don’t know. Christo is the guy who puts fabric on sidewalks in places and calls it art. So now he’s put the fabric in the air.
CALLER: He wrapped the Pont Neuf Bridge in Paris a number of years ago.
RUSH: That’s right. He wrapped the bridge.
CALLER: And the Reichstag in Berlin.
RUSH: Oh, yes, I remember that. See, that’s the guy we’re talking about. If you like it, yeah, if it enhances your — by the way, before you go, Dolores, did you watch the dog show last night, best in show?
CALLER: I couldn’t because I was up in LA. After all, one does live in New York, you know. But what was the dog show?
RUSH: Well, you just said you had a job, the kennel club, dog show, Westminster Kennel Club, biggest dog show of the year was at Madison Square Garden. I was wondering if you watched it.
CALLER: I didn’t go but I did understand. My dog is also a member of the Good Dog Foundation that they had some program on that. Did you see that?
RUSH: The Good Dog Foundation? I’m very familiar with that.
CALLER: Apparently somebody was being awarded, and I missed that, but —
RUSH: Yeah. Well, you can’t do anything. I mean —
CALLER: I don’t know if I made my point as succinctly as I really wanted to make is that —
RUSH: You made your point so well, Dolores —
CALLER: We can be free to do wacky things as if it’s zany —
RUSH: Wacky things, exactly right, wacky things. But if you want to look at it as art you’re more than welcome to. I don’t, but I think it’s… You’ve been great. You’ve opened a lot of people’s eyes who may not have known what I was talking about in terms of how people perceive it. I’m glad you called. I appreciate it so much. This is Tom out in Long Island. Nice to have you. Welcome to the program, sir.
CALLER: Hey, Rush, nice to talk to you.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: I just wanted to say that I’m up there, I’ve been up there last week, and —
RUSH: Up where? Where?
CALLER: Up in Central Park. I work up there. I work in the area.
RUSH: Oh, okay.
CALLER: And the only thing that I got to say is: Every time you drive on a road, you see construction. Construction is orange. They’ve made the whole Central Park look like a construction zone.
RUSH: I hadn’t looked at it that way, but I see your point.
CALLER: It’s like the whole park looks like it’s under construction. They took this beautiful park and made it look like it’s under construction.
RUSH: Well, I very much enjoy these different artistic impressions of this work of art. Shower curtains, construction zone. You guys, you’re making any point. You couldn’t have done a better job, Tom.
CALLER: When you’re driving on the highway and you see orange construction zones, you know, cones —
RUSH: Yeah?
CALLER: — orange barrels —
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: — it’s construction.
RUSH: Exactly right.
CALLER: The whole park is construction now.
RUSH: Yeah. Well —
CALLER: I don’t know how you call it art, but some people look at it as art, God bless them.
RUSH: That’s exactly right. Art is in the eyes of the beholder. I mean, don’t forget in the last 16 years we’ve had art, a crucifix in a jar of urine was art, elephant dung on the Virgin Mary at the Brooklyn museum was art, New Yorkers told us so, and it’s really, really, really good art if it’s funded by the federal government via the NEA. Mike, your turn next from Tucson. Welcome to the program.
CALLER: Hello?
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: Hi, Mr. Limbaugh.
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: Thanks for taking my call.
RUSH: You bet, sir.
CALLER: I was also calling to defend Christo’s installation as a work of art.
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: You made a comment earlier about art being somewhat reflective of nature?
RUSH: It’s our attempt to — and I can’t think of the word that was in the book that I read, the Da Vinci Code, but art is the human attempt to recreate the beauty around us.
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: And I don’t know where this has been recreated, I don’t know Christo saw fabric and shower curtains in a forest to recreate it. Obviously has been places that I haven’t been.
CALLER: (Laughing.) Well, I think in a way does do that in terms of how it repeats color and form, and he’s done some other things. I’m not a Christo expert by any means, but he’s done some installations with the umbrellas and wrapping buildings and stuff.
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: And it looks to me like what he basically does is he takes these sort of natural forms and forces us to look at them in a different context.
RUSH: Hm-hm.
CALLER: And so —
RUSH: But I’m getting confused here because I thought a tree was beautiful in and of itself. Why do we have to now gaze around an orange piece of fabric to see that a tree is beautiful? But, see, this is just me. I’m probably too literal to be a fine art connoisseur and as such… But that’s, you know, it’s a harmless thing. I just think what’s funny — and I don’t mean to be putting anybody down here — I just find it funny to listen to people who think that it’s just wonderfully a cultural thing and supremely unique to hang fabric in a park and consider it great art and listen to people explain to us why they consider it so. I just get the biggest kick out of that. Because I think what it adds up to is all these people trying to be the smartest people in the room. They love hearing me say that it’s dense and I don’t get it because it proves that I’m a simpleton, that I don’t see the finer things in life (laughing). It’s black and white, yeah. I’m too big. I’m a black-and-white simpleton which is why I don’t get the orange shower curtains in the park part.
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RUSH: Jeff in Altoona, Pennsylvania, welcome to the program. Nice to have you with us, sir.
CALLER: Thank you, sir.
RUSH: You bet.
CALLER: I was just thinking that that is a frivolous waste of money and that we could have purchased a lot of body armor for the troops or —
RUSH: Well, but wait, wait, wait. Just a second here, Jeff, you realize that the artist, Christo, used his own funds, $20 million of his own money for The Gates in Central Park?
CALLER: Well, that to me seems like a double standard. If the Bush administration raised their own funds and spent it on an inauguration, then why can’t he spend it on the troops?
RUSH: It’s actually an excellent point. When the Bush administration raised $20 million of private sector money for the inauguration, there were howls of protest over insensitivity. How could this happen when there’s so much suffering in the world and so many American soldiers at war? You could say the same thing here. How dare New York City accept $20 million for an art show in New York, Central Park, when there are homeless people, especially now that Bush is president, wandering the streets of New York? There are still people that need help from the tsunami, and yet New York let somebody spend $20 million of his own money on — I still don’t know what to call this. Shower curtains in the park, whatever it is. But yeah, there’s all kinds of ways we could have fun with this, my friends, and we gleefully intend to. (Laughing.)
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