RUSH: Let’s start in Jacksonville, Florida. Up first is Jason. Thank you for the call, sir. Great to have you with us.

CALLER: Hey, good afternoon, sir. Thank you for taking my call.

RUSH: You bet.

CALLER: You’ve got a good show. I really like it. Congratulations on your 24 years.

RUSH: Thank you, sir, very much.

CALLER: Yeah, I’ve only been listening about a year, and you make a lot of good points. I guess sometimes, I don’t know, I’ve heard you say you’re persuasive, you’re trying to persuade folks. I know what you’re doing. I think you have a much better show, though. You had a kid call in here last week about some potato chips and too much air in the bag, and he tried to speculate that it had something to do with President Obama. And I just… I don’t know, man, I mean that’s been going on for like years and years and years and years. I just don’t know why you didn’t shoot that kid down and let him know —

RUSH: Well, I’ll tell you why, the young man was 12 years old, and it’s obvious that his parents had put that idea in his head. And you’ve only been listening a year. It’s a very tough thing, you have a 12-year-old on the phone, I try not to contradict parents. I tried to treat that as lightheartedly as I could. I can’t figure out what Obama would have to do with so much air in a bag of Lay’s potato chips.

CALLER: Thank you, I’m glad. I just want to get to two more points and I’ll get off the show. As an American citizen, I pay a lot of taxes, a lot. I do a 1099, I don’t do 1040-EZ, lucky people. If Romney didn’t pay taxes for the last ten years, it most certainly would bother me, because he’s going out here telling us that he knows how to… you know, his thing is money. He comes from money. He knows how to deal with money. Our country’s bad economically right now —

RUSH: Yeah, but wait. There’s no evidence he didn’t pay his taxes.

CALLER: I’m not saying he did, I’m not saying he did. All I’m saying is — in fact, you’re very right. And by the way, the name Dingy Harry is awesome, that’s an awesome nickname. It’s clever. But if he’s wrong and Romney has paid taxes, then I think he should be brought to justice for that, but if he has not paid taxes, he is no better than these illegal immigrants that are coming to this country and not paying taxes, and getting all the benefits and then trying things —

RUSH: Why do you feel it necessary to participate in what is obviously an attempt to smear Romney? How could he have not paid taxes over the last ten years? This is not even possible. It’s not possible. He would have been audited by now. After having paid so much for so many years, it’s stupid, the guy wants to run for president, he doesn’t pay taxes for ten years? You’re unwittingly falling into the trap here of helping to perpetrate a smear.

CALLER: I don’t want to fall — see, my card affiliation, see, my party — you can help me out with this. My card, I just got it in the mail the other day. It says NPA. What’s that? No party affiliation?

RUSH: I don’t know.

CALLER: Yeah. It used to, I thought, say “swing” on my card, but it says NPA. And, see, I’m not left, and I’m not right. I’m somewhere in between, and what I do is I —

RUSH: Look, look, I got a commercial break here. Hang on. Don’t hang up.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Okay, back to Jason in Jacksonville. You were talking about your party affiliation.

CALLER: Yes, sir.

RUSH: Okay, I looked it up. NPA means “no party affiliation.”

CALLER: Right.

RUSH: You’re right.

CALLER: Right, okay. Yes. I’m not all the way left and I’m not all the way right. I’m not one of those people. But since I’ve been listening to your show —

RUSH: Wait, wait, wait. What does that mean, you’re not one of those people? You’re not all the way left or all the way right, what does that mean?

CALLER: I’m not extreme anything. I’m not an extreme leftist; I’m not an extreme right. And I’ve been listening to your show and how you describe these certain liberal behaviors. And I’ve been seeing a lot of it, and it’s amazing when you go out and you hang around certain people, and you see these attitudes and the way they behave, but I don’t necessarily think that you can stereotype people that way. I think people vote based on their emotions, based on what’s going on, the —

RUSH: Oh, they vote for all kinds of reasons.

CALLER: Yeah, all kinds of reasons. I don’t think it’s just necessarily —

RUSH: Not everybody voting is very bright. I mean you gotta factor a lot of things in this.

CALLER: Yes, sir. Let me ask you one more question. I know this isn’t a sports talk show. But what do you feel — I just want to get your belief on, what do you feel about, let’s go with football, because I know you like football, and football is about to start. How do you feel about athletes holding out for more money? What do you think when you hear about athletes holding out? They’re under contract and they’re holding out for more money.

RUSH: I think that they should do it, particularly with the new CBA and the NFL, the length of time first-round draft choice, second round, the length of time that the team has an option on him has gone from three to four years, basically they’ve got one window to make it. They’ve got one window. After they play out their original contract, unless they hold out, they’ve got one window to score based on the average lifespan of an NFL player and so forth. You’re up against the contract and, you know, whether to morally adhere to it or to ask for more based on performance. But my attitude over this has changed over the years. I used to think that it was disloyal to the team to hold out. Now I think if you’ve got the leverage, use it.

CALLER: Absolutely. One last question, sir. How did you get started in the business that you’re in today? How did you get started in this business?

RUSH: How did I get started?

CALLER: Yes, sir.

RUSH: My dad and mom bought me a thing called a Remco Caravelle that allowed me to broadcast in the house. It’s a little toy that allowed me to broadcast in the house on any AM frequency that I set it to. I could play records and there was a little microphone, and they’d sit around and listen to me. I wanted to do that ever since I was eight years old.

CALLER: Oh. That’s interesting.

RUSH: I went to Dallas, Texas, when I was 16, and I got my first class radio telephone license, which was then a requirement by the Federal Communications Commission. I was down there for six weeks, had to pass all kinds of arduous tests. I was the youngest one in the school by five years. I actually got out in four weeks. I aced it. I was so motivated. I was so inspired. I wanted to get that license and I wanted to get back home and see if I could get on the air.

CALLER: Well, congratulations, sir, you did just that. Hey, I really appreciate your show and you have a great day, sir.

RUSH: Thanks for the call. Jason in Jacksonville, Florida.