Time - Man of the Year/Time_Man_of_the_Year_Compact_Publishing_3YX-Disc-1_Compact_Publishing_1993.iso/moy/102692/1026461.000

Text File | 1993-04-08 | 6KB | 142 lines

                                                                                SHOW BUSINESS, Page 79

An Interview with Rush Limbaugh


By MARGARET CARLSON and Rush Limbaugh.


    Q. You're unabashedly for Bush and against Clinton. Given
13 million devoted listeners, why is your guy 15 points behind?

    A. I don't say that I have influence. I was totally
opposed to the 1990 budget deal, and it still happened. I'm not
an activist. I do not give out congressional phone numbers. I
do not urge behavior. No tea bags. This is entertainment. And
in strict marketing terms, does it hurt me to be the only guy
not making Dan Quayle jokes?


    Q. Weren't you for Pat Buchanan when he was running
against Bush in the primaries?

    A. That was my effort to send the President a message. The
Republican Party and George Bush got in trouble when they moved
to the left, when they signed on with the civil rights bill with
its quotas and the tax increases. He let down people who
elected him. And so he then attracts the Wimp II image.


    Q. But isn't the problem that the President has stayed too
far right instead of moving back toward the center as the
general election gets closer?

    A. Liberals lose presidential elections, conservatives win
them. People look out over America and see over $1 trillion in
transfers of money from producers to nonproducers, and it hasn't
worked. And they see a continuing decadence. Most people don't
look at Willie Horton and see a victimized black. They see an
attempted murderer and a rapist, and they don't want people like
that out of jail early.There's a seething undercurrent out
there of people who are simply fed up with the intolerance of
people on the left for people who wish to have decency and
decorum in life.


    Q. I know you're not a hater, but don't you think you come
across as mean when you call feminists ugly women who can't get
dates?

    A. No, it's not mean. I once wrote a newspaper column when
I was in Sacramento, and I said feminism was established so as
to allow unattractive women easier access to the mainstream.
There is a profoundly held, truthful belief rooted in there that
is, in my mind, compassionate and sympathetic to women. But you
have to think about it yourself in order to get it.


    Q. I'm thinking.

    A. Because of the shallowness of our society and because
of the biological differences in men and women, attractive
women have an edge at the outset. They are the first noticed in
social situations, and they are highly thought of in business
situations. It's just a fact. And in many cases attractive women
have not had to prepare themselves as well intellectually
because they've got these other things to rely on. Meanwhile you
have women who don't think they fit into the category of
attractive, pretty, beautiful, whatever, who nevertheless are
intelligent and bright and witty, and who have devoted
themselves to education, and they care seriously about advancing
through life as much as anybody else does. And they are just fed
up that a bunch of bimbos are either married to high-profile
people or are employed by high-profile people and they aren't.


    Q. So women go to law school because they're ugly?

    A. I'm not saying that. I'm saying feminism was
established, that the idea was, "Goddammit, we're going to have
to have a political movement here to get what we're entitled to
because it's not fair, we're not getting it out there."


    Q. Isn't it like unionizing: people who can't assert their
individual rights can assert them in a group? And women who only
follow the traditional path have no protection when men go off
and leave them, and then they have no career?

    A. So what's the question?


    Q. Well, even if you don't approve of women working for,
as you might call it, life-style reasons, how about working so
that they have a career to fall back on?

    A. Absolutely. In both of my marriages, I never once
insisted that my wife remain home. Whatever my wife wanted to
do, she did. Be it go to school, be it go to work.


    Q. Then the only thing you disagree with feminists on is
abortion?

    A. It's the most profound disagreement. I will never, ever
accept that abortion is justified because a child might suffer
or it is unwanted. Those are two of the most selfish,
unpredictable reasons to abort a child that I can imagine. And
they cut to the quick of why I'm opposed to it. If that were
applied, Beethoven might not have lived. Jesse Jackson might not
have lived, for crying out loud.


    Q. I've never known a woman who is happy about having had
an abortion. I have met women who are relieved that a child
isn't being brought into this world who will have to rely on a
mother who isn't going to be there, who has not the means or the
wit to raise a child.

    A. And I'll tell you, to prove my point about the pro-life
or the pro-choice crowd, here on the one hand you've got
liberals who want 12 weeks of unpaid leave to have a baby. But
don't make them wait 24 hours to decide whether they're going
to give birth because "Well, we may not be able to afford the
24 hours because it's going to cause us to miss work and to have
to get a hotel room." Well, how are you going to afford three
months without a paycheck for parental leave if you can't afford
24 hours off to decide whether to have it?


    Q. Are you going to be like Buchanan and go from being a
pundit to a politician?

    A. I've never wanted to run for elected office because of
what you have to do to get there and while you are there. It
doesn't strike me as fun, walking around with shackles. I could
not walk around with my hand out. You have to pay back with
policy. I couldn't do it.