RUSH: Art in Westmont, Illinois. Great to have you on the program, sir.

CALLER: Rush, I’m honored and humbled to be on your program.

RUSH: Thank you, sir.

CALLER: Yeah. I see you’re working on new regional tea, and that’s fruity and nutty flavored.

RUSH: (laughing) Fruity and nutty, no, but we do have new flavors coming. Nice try.

CALLER: Okay.

CALLER: I got a couple things for you, but the first thing is I know your disdain, hate for RINO Republicans. What’s your opinion of Fox News Channel’s talking heads who seem to be more and more RINO, and I’m thinking particularly of Chris Wallace, who I almost was screaming at with his interview of Chris Van Hollen and Jordan, and he was trying to push the Republican Jordan to say that he would not vote for the debt ceiling crisis. Greta Van Susteren always seems to have these irrelevant Republicans like Grahamnesty and McShame on her program who matter not, and I was just wondering your opinion of this programming of RINO talking heads.

RUSH: Well, the people who do guest programs, you know, they’re into it themselves, and they can have the guests on that they want. I don’t know that there is an official position at Fox News that RINO guests have to take precedence or anything. I’ve got my own theories. You could ask me about any show, you know, why does CNN do what it does, why does MSNBC do it the way they do it, why does Fox News do it the way they do it, and I’ve got my own theories because, you know, I’m a highly trained broadcast specialist and I am well versed in this. I know more than anybody else about this. I know why people do things. I know why formats are done the way they are and I know that most people do what they do from a posture of defense or fear.

I don’t care if it’s a broadcast outlet or if it’s you living your life. The number of people who are take-charge self-starters are few. That’s why there are few leaders and lots of followers. Nothing wrong with it; it’s just the way it is. And so if you are in a federally regulated business — cable really isn’t federally regulated, but the long arm of the government can reach you in any number of ways. When you’ve got this kind of regime, and it’s quite understandable that if you’ve got a bottom line you have to make financially that there are certain things that you might do to keep the baying hounds, the wolfhounds at bay. That’s what I mean by programming in fear or in defense or what have you.

I mean a lot of people throughout my broadcast career, for example, thought that they could mollify critics by giving the critics ten or 20% of what they were demanding. That would be balance. It never works that way. Stake a position, be who you are and deal with the fallout. Now, that’s easy for me to say because I don’t have to answer to anybody but me. But people who have to answer to boards and all this, they’ve got whole different pressures that they operate under, and it’s their business and they can run it as they wish based on what they think they have to do to stay in business.

Look at CNN. Here’s a network that is in last place, proudly. They’re proudly in last place. “What do you mean, Rush, proudly in last place?” There is a badge of honor. The execs at CNN, not Time Warner, big difference, that owns it, the execs at CNN are held in the highest regard by other liberals for valiantly hanging in there against this Fox juggernaut and not caving. Even though nobody watches, it’s still courageous to keep promoting the cause even if you lose your shirt, as long as some other division in the company can make up for your loss, which is what happens. CNN International does well, other elements of Time Warner do well. It’s a very, very complicated thing. The idea that a lot of broadcast outlets are in it for the cause is a big mistake a lot of people make.

What? Everybody staring at me. I gotta take a break. Nobody will tell me. Not even that. I’m not even all that long.