The Charlie Kirk Show - What Rush Taught Us About Thanksgiving with James Golden

00:00:00.000 Hey, everybody, happy Thanksgiving.

00:00:01.000 James Golden joins us for a flash episode to remember Rush Limbaugh.

00:00:06.000 It's a great short conversation.

00:00:08.000 I hope you enjoy it.

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00:00:40.000 Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.

00:00:42.000 We are thankful to you.

00:00:43.000 Thank you for supporting us, for praying for us, and being there for us.

00:00:46.000 Bo Snerdley, James Golden is here.

00:00:48.000 Buckle up here. 0.99

00:00:49.000 We go.

00:00:50.000 Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.

00:00:52.000 Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campus.

00:00:54.000 I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.

00:00:57.000 Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks.

00:01:01.000 I want to thank Charlie.

00:01:02.000 He's an incredible guy.

00:01:03.000 His spirit, his love of this country, he's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created.

00:01:10.000 Turning point USA. 0.65

00:01:11.000 We will not embrace the ideas that have destroyed countries, destroyed lives, and we are going to fight for freedom on campuses across the country.

00:01:20.000 That's why we are here.

00:01:23.000 Welcome to this special Thanksgiving episode of the Charlie Kirk Show with my friend, the legendary James Golden, otherwise known as Bo Snerdley.

00:01:23.000 Hey, everybody.

00:01:33.000 James, welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show.

00:01:36.000 Charlie, it is so good to be here, especially Thanksgiving.

00:01:40.000 Wow, what a great, what a great treat.

00:01:41.000 Charlie, I love your casual look.

00:01:44.000 Thank you.

00:01:44.000 I appreciate that.

00:01:45.000 You know, sometimes you just got to be able to move about, you know, and the suit and tie, you know, maybe I maybe I could graduate to just the polo shirt like Rush used to do, right?

00:01:56.000 Maybe, yeah, right.

00:01:58.000 Right?

00:01:58.000 Yeah.

00:01:59.000 Just the polo shirt.

00:02:00.000 But can I say something?

00:02:02.000 You just mentioned Rush.

00:02:03.000 Let me just say something to everybody that doesn't know.

00:02:06.000 Rush really made a big deal of how much he enjoyed meeting you, Charlie, and how vital he thought you were to the future of this nation.

00:02:17.000 And I've told you that too many times over.

00:02:21.000 Rush and I had many a discussion about you, Charlie.

00:02:24.000 We both talked about you to each other and what our expectations.

00:02:29.000 Yeah, we have expectations of you, what our expectations were, because what we see in you, what Rush saw in you, what I see in you, and I've told you this from the very beginning, you're a natural leader of people.

00:02:29.000 I'm sorry.

00:02:42.000 You have a charisma about you that you can't, I mean, look, you can't teach anybody how to do this.

00:02:48.000 You have natural leadership qualities.

00:02:51.000 And what you've been able to do with Turning Point and what you've been able to do just in the past few years with organizing people, especially young people in this country, is nothing short of phenomenal.

00:03:02.000 Thank you.

00:03:03.000 And Rush loved the time that he spent with you.

00:03:06.000 He talked about you on the air and how impressed he was with you and what you're doing.

00:03:13.000 And we just are all so grateful to you and the work that you're doing, moving the conservative, not just conservative, but you're moving a very optimistic American message into the next generation and into the future.

00:03:30.000 Well, thank you.

00:03:31.000 That touches me.

00:03:32.000 And we miss him.

00:03:35.000 But I want to say, James, you played a role in the growth of Turning Point.

00:03:38.000 You spoke at our conferences for years when we were just a small little group at the local hotel, remember?

00:03:44.000 Oh, yeah.

00:03:45.000 You would always show up.

00:03:46.000 And look how far we've come.

00:03:49.000 It's really amazing.

00:03:50.000 So thank you for saying that.

00:03:52.000 And you have a book out, Rush on the Radio.

00:03:56.000 Tell us about that.

00:03:57.000 You know, it is what I hope Charlie to do is to give people a behind-the-scenes look at who Rush Limbaugh really was, not as defined by his critics on the left who never listened to the program,

00:04:12.000 who never took the time to really delve into who Rush Lumbaugh was, what he was about, and also to give people kind of a behind-the-scene looks at what it was like working with him and a bit about my own background and how we came to work together.

00:04:28.000 So, one of the things that I hope that we accomplished in this book is not only was Rush an amazing professional at what he did, he earned every single accolade that he got in terms of as for his success as a broadcaster and as the best broadcaster of our times.

00:04:49.000 And he earned that through hard work, through perseverance, through not giving up when there were many times where his career could have stalled permanently, but he just kept going at it.

00:05:01.000 And then he had the most amazing success.

00:05:04.000 So, yes, Rush was the most important broadcaster to me of our generation.

00:05:10.000 If it were not for his success in reviving AM radio, first of all, when it was on its death throes, and then his program brought in a rash of other talk shows.

00:05:24.000 It grew talk radio into a medium that played a large role in shaping and still does America's body politic and also our culture.

00:05:36.000 But he also impacted what we see on television and the cable news landscape and the publishing landscape, especially for conservative authors, because of the multi-million sales he had as an author.

00:05:54.000 And then with children's book with he and his wife Catherine, this man left an amazing footprint for American radio, television, and print.

00:06:07.000 And that just touches the surface of it.

00:06:10.000 I mean, my political journey started listening to WLS in Chicago, Rush Limbaugh, from, it would be, let me think about this, it would be from 11 Central to 2.

00:06:22.000 Just make sure I get it right.

00:06:22.000 That's right.

00:06:24.000 And my lunch used to be from 117 to 2.03.

00:06:29.000 And so I used to go to my old Silver Ford Explorer and listen to Rush.

00:06:34.000 And I was like, who is this guy?

00:06:36.000 He gives me the courage and the confidence to say what I really believe.

00:06:40.000 And that was when Rush was just dominating.

00:06:45.000 That was back in 2010, 2011.

00:06:47.000 Not that he never stopped dominating.

00:06:49.000 He was always dominant, but that was a time when he kind of really created the Tea Party movement.

00:06:55.000 And in some sense, it's when all of a sudden AM radio then became an actual political movement, which was something that was really special.

00:07:04.000 And so this being Thanksgiving, James, talk to us a little bit.

00:07:07.000 And again, the book is, I want everyone to pick it up, Rush on the Radio by James Golden.

00:07:12.000 Talk to us what Rush used to do on Thanksgiving or the day before Thanksgiving that he really got famous for.

00:07:19.000 Rush wrote in his first book, The Way Things Ought to Be, a chapter about what he called old dead white guys.

00:07:28.000 Well, in it, he talked about the original Thanksgiving and how what we learned in school, Thanksgiving, the Native Americans coming to save the pilgrims' butts, wasn't the real story of Thanksgiving.

00:07:41.000 The real story of Thanksgiving through the eyes of William Bradford and the first colony that tried to successfully come here and start economy.

00:07:52.000 And they failed the first time because they tried a collectivism approach, a socialist approach, where everybody would work collectively toward one greater goal.

00:08:05.000 And what happened was that some people were lazy.

00:08:07.000 They didn't see the benefit of working hard so that others benefited.

00:08:11.000 And as a result, the first attempt to colonize led to horror.

00:08:18.000 I mean, starvation, difficulties in the wintertime.

00:08:21.000 Now, Bradford, William Bradford, saw the error of his ways.

00:08:25.000 And what they tried next was an approach where every family would have their own plot of land to work as hard or as little as they wanted to.

00:08:37.000 And what this produced was prosperity because people saw the value in working for themselves and how an individual effort took over and prosperity came.

00:08:53.000 And this is what they were thankful for, the success.

00:08:57.000 And they shared this bounty with the Native Americans.

00:09:01.000 That was the true story of Thanksgiving.

00:09:03.000 If you want to boil it down to the parlance today, it was the battle between socialism and capitalism.

00:09:09.000 And capitalism won.

00:09:11.000 And as a result, in American society, we still, to a large degree, or to some degree, have a capitalist mentality where it is up to you and your individual achievement and desire and ambition to succeed.

00:09:27.000 And if you have all of those things, America is still a land of opportunity.

00:09:34.000 That's so beautiful.

00:09:35.000 And Rush would, he had a famous, you know, kind of Christmas series he would do and a famous Thanksgiving series he would do.

00:09:42.000 Talk to us more about the man of Rush, you know, that Rush was.

00:09:47.000 Just his optimism, doing three hours of radio a day, I could say from personal experience, two hours is a lot.

00:09:53.000 He would do three hours, almost no guests, callers on only one day, Open Line Friday.

00:09:58.000 Just talk to us about the man.

00:10:00.000 How much prep did he put in?

00:10:01.000 How much study did he do?

00:10:03.000 Tell us from your inside perspective.

00:10:05.000 I'd be so fascinated by that.

00:10:07.000 Rush never stopped working.

00:10:09.000 And this was his work ethic was astounding.

00:10:13.000 Rush would get to the studio at 8 o'clock in the morning or 8:30-ish and prep right up until the time of the show.

00:10:20.000 So three hours.

00:10:21.000 Okay.

00:10:21.000 Wow.

00:10:22.000 But it didn't end there.

00:10:24.000 After he left the studio, sometimes we'd be around, the three of us that were there in there with him, Dorn Bacchinsky, our stenographer, Russia's stenographer, and Brian Johnson, his engineer in Florida.

00:10:36.000 We have another engineer in New York, Mike Ramone, who's been with us for 30 years, over 30 years.

00:10:42.000 And if we stayed around the studio, about 40 minutes after he left, Rush's printer would start firing off with stories for the next day.

00:10:52.000 And it could go on and on.

00:10:53.000 Now, he would take a break.

00:10:55.000 And I'm not saying he worked around the clock, but he really did work all the time.

00:10:59.000 He said, and he used to say, show prep, life is show prep.

00:11:03.000 Life is show prep.

00:11:04.000 And he brought so many things of interest to the show, things that interested him.

00:11:09.000 But more to the point to me was, this was a man that studied this medium.

00:11:14.000 He wanted to be a broadcaster at age six.

00:11:17.000 At age six, he had a little toy that was put out, I think, by Remco or one of the toy companies, where you could broadcast inside your house.

00:11:27.000 So he had the microphone, he had his toy set rigged up and would broadcast to his mother.

00:11:32.000 He knew what he wanted to do from the time he was a child.

00:11:36.000 And his skill set was unparalleled.

00:11:39.000 This man could make anything sound interesting.

00:11:42.000 He knew how to tell a story on the radio.

00:11:45.000 He knew how to make something compelling with just his voice and using his voice and his tremendous vocabulary and intellect.

00:11:55.000 But all of that success, Charlie, isn't the Rush Limbaugh story to me.

00:11:59.000 The Russian Bauha story to me is the human being that he was.

00:12:03.000 He was, despite the image of the bombast, the tongue-in-cheek bomb bastard that he used on the air, he was a very reserved, quiet, almost shy person, impeccable manners, always, always grateful for whatever the smallest thing that someone could do for him, always polite.

00:12:24.000 I saw this over three decades, the way that he treated people. 0.81

00:12:29.000 Okay, the generosity that this man had, unparalleled.

00:12:33.000 There are thousands of people around this country who benefited from Rush's generosity on a personal basis, but he wouldn't allow the stories to be told.

00:12:42.000 He said, People, please do not tell where you got this gift or where you got this money to pull you out.

00:12:49.000 He didn't want it known that he was doing all of this.

00:12:54.000 But then the talk radio audience and his audience under his leadership and other talk show hosts, Charlie, the millions, tens of millions of dollars raised over that 30-year period went for things like leukemia research.

00:13:10.000 Now, Charlie, leukemia doesn't have a political bent to it.

00:13:15.000 Leukemia can affect anyone from any walk of life, any age, any gender.

00:13:20.000 And so the help that people got from Rush Lumbar and the talk radio audience in finding cures for this disease, childhood leukemia, all sorts of leukemia, these benefit society.

00:13:31.000 He and his wife, Catherine, raised millions more to help the families of first responders, fallen first responders, so that the people that they left behind, their children, their spouses, wouldn't have to worry about having a house to live in or having a foundation so those kids could later go to school.

00:13:51.000 Again, there's no politics in that.

00:13:54.000 That's just doing good.

00:13:56.000 And that's what Rush Limbaugh was about.

00:13:58.000 He was a good, decent man.

00:14:01.000 I have my own personal stories of his generosity, even to me before I started working with him, which is in this book.

00:14:08.000 This was a man that was extraordinary.

00:14:10.000 And that's what I hope that we capture here.

00:14:12.000 An extraordinary man that was extremely gifted at what he did for a living, but was even more gifted by the very nature of the decent human being that he was.

00:14:26.000 A truly American story.

00:14:28.000 And I could say personally how generous he was and how magnanimous he was and so different than the caricature the media tried to paint him as.

00:14:39.000 You're right.

00:14:40.000 Reserved, just never wanted to dominate a room when he walked in.

00:14:44.000 It was totally different than you would think, right?

00:14:46.000 Right.

00:14:47.000 Than actually how he hosted radio.

00:14:50.000 So the last thing I want to ask you, James, is that Rush used to say, I'll tell you when to worry.

00:14:57.000 He never told us to worry.

00:14:59.000 Talk about that.

00:15:00.000 Okay.

00:15:01.000 And what he said, the actual quote, Charlie, was, I'll tell you when it's time to panic.

00:15:05.000 There, yeah, you're right.

00:15:06.000 This was in response.

00:15:07.000 This was in response to a caller who called into the show and asked Rush, is it time to panic yet?

00:15:13.000 And this was back several administrations ago.

00:15:16.000 And after trying to dispel this person's fears, Rush said, Listen, I'll tell you when it's time to panic.

00:15:24.000 And for years after that, people would call in when we had these various shifts in administrations and we'd have things going on like they're going on now underneath the Biden administration, where things look particularly desperate.

00:15:37.000 And then ask Rush, Rush, is it time to panic?

00:15:39.000 And he would say, no.

00:15:41.000 And it wasn't time to panic for Rush for one simple reason.

00:15:44.000 He believed ultimately America, the goodness of America, and because of the goodness of Americans, would prevail.

00:15:53.000 That no matter the difficulties, he was always optimistic that the people of this country, the good people of this country, outnumber those who don't like living in this country and who wish this country ill.

00:16:06.000 And that the good people of America, those that were interested in seeing the traditions of America continue and our institutions, our finest institutions continue, would prevail.

00:16:20.000 And so, no, it is not time to panic.

00:16:23.000 And I maintain that if Rush were here right now, that is what he would be telling those that felt the sense of panic: no, this isn't a time to panic.

00:16:32.000 And he was always optimistic, and he always believed our best days were ahead of us.

00:16:37.000 A relentless cheerleader for the country.

00:16:39.000 And I argue he was the most influential conservative, elected or not elected, for 30 years running.

00:16:46.000 He had more power than presidents.

00:16:48.000 And I'm not diminishing Trump or anything, but the audience that Rush commanded when he would do a segment blistering a Republican senator, that was worth more than running $100 million of attack ads for some rhino in Kansas or whatever.

00:17:04.000 It was really special.

00:17:06.000 Rush on the radio.

00:17:07.000 We have two minutes remaining.

00:17:08.000 James, anything you wanted to make sure you mentioned to our audience on this Thanksgiving about Rush or about the book?

00:17:13.000 I want to mention how grateful I am to have worked with a man of Russia's caliber, how grateful I am that I have contact with so many Americans who also listen.

00:17:24.000 I say, you know, I'm a fan just like you are.

00:17:27.000 I just had a better seat.

00:17:28.000 I had a seat in the studio where I could watch this man.

00:17:31.000 How grateful I am to know so many people such as yourself, Charlie, because of this program.

00:17:37.000 How grateful I am for this country and for what this country stands for in the world.

00:17:41.000 We have to define Russia's legacy. 0.88

00:17:44.000 We cannot leave that to the left.

00:17:46.000 That's our job.

00:17:47.000 And Charlie, once again, I just want to thank you for all the work that you're doing.

00:17:51.000 And, you know, Rush, I call him a second generation founding father.

00:17:55.000 That's what he is.

00:17:56.000 He is a second generation American founding father.

00:18:01.000 And I love Rush Limbaugh.

00:18:02.000 Our entire staff loved this man, which is why we stayed with him.

00:18:06.000 And we want to stay with his memory and make sure that memory has its rightful place in American history.

00:18:12.000 Amen.

00:18:12.000 Well, James, thank you so much for joining us.

00:18:14.000 Happy Thanksgiving, everyone listening.

00:18:16.000 Again, the book is Rush on the Radio.

00:18:18.000 Everyone, go pick up a copy.

00:18:19.000 Great Christmas gift as we're heading towards the end of the year.

00:18:22.000 A tribute from his sidekick for 30 years.

00:18:25.000 America remained a freer country thanks to Rush Limbaugh.

00:18:30.000 And James, you were his right-hand man, call screener and advisor.

00:18:34.000 And it was a beautiful thing.

00:18:36.000 So thank you so much, James.

00:18:38.000 God bless you and have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

00:18:40.000 You too, Charlie.

00:18:41.000 Thank you so much for having me.

00:18:42.000 You bet.

00:18:42.000 Talk to you soon.

00:18:46.000 Thanks so much for listening, everybody.

00:18:47.000 Email us your thoughts.

00:18:48.000 Freedom at charliekirk.com.

00:18:50.000 God bless you guys.

00:18:50.000 Speak to you soon.

The Charlie Kirk Show - November 24, 2021

What Rush Taught Us About Thanksgiving with James Golden

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