The Cookie & Koko Show

the radio program. So on today's show, you're gonna hear from two people that are connected with Rush almost for the entire length of the radio show, but they were also very involved in Russia Lamba the television show. Both are very dear friends, both a very dear co workers of mine. Today you're going to find out who Coco

and Cookie really are. Whether you listened every day you are at the E I B Network and the Russia Bot program heard on over six hundred great radio stations where every now and then nation's leading radio talk show, the most eagerly anticipated program in Americans are the stories you've never heard from the people behind the scenes who

knew him best and loved him most. Brushwood Ball having more fundily human being, it could be allowed to have Rush Limbaugh, the man behind the Golden E I D microphone, hosted by James Golden. Hey, James Golden here. You might remember I told you a few weeks ago that my Pillow had sent me their entire collection. Well, you know what, it's amazing. They are so luxurious, and it's time that you experienced some of that luxury too. My pillow makes more than pillows. I love the pillow. I sleep on

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have to experience. Loging to my pillow dot com, click on the new radio listener specials. Use the promo code icon that's I C O N. You'll find lots of incredible offers there right now. That's my pillow dot Com promo code icon. Well, here we are Rush Limbaugh, the man behind the Golden e. I B Mike, I'm James Golden and today it's the Cookie and Coco Show. So yes, Now, over the years, all of you who have listened to the Russia Lambus showed have heard him refer endlessly to

both Cookie and Coco. And we have the and this isn't cocoa like hot Coco. This is cocoa like Ko Ko Coco. Yeah, GURUO Coco's right? Yeah, Okay, I can hear media matters right now trying to make something racist out of that. Oh well, let's explain to everybody Cookie, how you got the name Cookie? How did that happen? Okay, Well, when I was working on the Rush TV show, there was a story in the Washington Post about ABC News reporter COKEI Roberts that she had to go to a

gala um immediately after her report that evening. So she put on she had her evening gown under her raincoat, and they put her in front of a green screen with the Capital behind her, and she pretended to do a stand up live from the Capital in front of you know, the green screen. Well, the story got out and So on the Rush TV show, we did a skit where I was the E I B reporter, Cookie Gleason. Uh, and I did a report for E I B News,

and the green screen behind me kept changing locations. It went from the Capital to like the NBC News News car crash too. It just kept they kept changing it. So from that day on, I was always Cookie, and you know, Rush always called me Cookie. So that's how I got the name Cookie. All right, Now, what's your real name? No, my real name is Kathleen Gleason Priyas. And so there's gonna be a reveal here soon the second. So now let's turn to Coco and Coco. How did

you come about the name Coco? And and and and again that is not cocoa, like hot cocoa. That's like gorilla cocoa. Okay, okay. Oh. I came to the Rush TV show in and I was a production assistant and I was the low man on the totem pole, as they say, and uh, they were going to do a skit about Coco the sign language speaking gorilla, and Rush thought this was hilarious that they people thought a guerrilla

could speak sign language. So the bit was that Russia was going to do the story on the gorilla and I was gonna be in the little box in the corner, signing for other gorillas who were watching. And so they were looking for somebody to put on the gorilla suite. It turned out to be me. That'll be a chapter in my life story and never be afraid to put

on the guerrilla suit. So I put it on, and I had no idea what was going to happen, And so we just started the skit and Rush got one look at me in that guerrilla suit in the corner of the screen and he just cracked up. He could not stop laughing. And we did the skit and people

loved it, and he just kept laughing. It was like one of the few times that Rushed, you know, kind of lost it, you know, because he always was the king of cool, you know when he was performing, and and we just went did this skit and he was having the greatest time, and he laughed and laughed and laughed. And then from that point on, I was Coco. He would see me, and he didn't know my name before that, he didn't know who I was before that. I was just another guy on the TV show. But after that,

every day I'd see him, Coco, how are you? And that was it. We were we were friends from that point on. He just we just clicked and we always had that memory and I was always Coco. And your real name is It's George Pryas and there's no Gleam but yeah, sorry, wait, wait a minute, and let me go backwards. And Kathleen, you said your real name is what Karl clean PRIs? I mean Glee in there? But you know, so there's a story here. So when did

that happen? Well you know how these things happened, Jane, No, I don't. That's why I oh, my goodness is so personal. Yeah, you know, we met on the TV show and you know, became friends. In the beginning. She didn't like me, but you know, I guess, I you know, was it the gerrilla suit? It might have been. It might have been

that might have been the turning point. I don't know, but we became friends and then at some point, you know, we started, uh you know dating at the very end when that TV show ended in ninety and then um, we were together everything one Yeah, it was only fifty six short months of dating. Yeah, yeah, we always we hear a lot about that fifty six months and so so you are you are the E. I B. S married couple right now? Okay, before TV so the TV show. Let me just go back Russia Num by the TV

show which is where I met both of you. Was we were taping at Unitel Studios on Street and Russia's work day was really amazing during that time as and and correct me if I'm if I'm losing any of the details here, Rush would get a normal time. You you guys were already at the TV show location and we were at the radio shop, those of us who were working just on the radio. While working on the radio show and would later come over to TV with him, but he would do his show prep for the radio show,

and then there would be a telephone meeting. Is that how it happened to figure out what was called meet up? And how long did that meeting run? Usually? Um, well, I would say about ten minutes because he knew wanted to do. Yeah, it was all him. He was the man with the ideas, he was the you know, it was all him. I mean James, you know, the greatest entertainer, the greatest performer, you know, the greatest radio showever, Rush

did it all. Yeah, And he would tell us and which is not regular for producers were supposed to produce. But with Rush, he you know, he would say I want to do this this. Yeah, he really was. I mean, you know, God bless Roger Als and Dick Menser. They were they were wonderful, and you know, they gave a lot of great ideas. And but Rush Brush was the man. It was him, And there were no writers. Rush was the writer. There were no writers. Rush did it all.

Some of the things that Rush wanted and that you guys were able to implement and make happen have later showed up on other TV shows long after Rush decided he didn't want to do TV anymore. Some of the concepts that would develop doing Russland while the TV show went on, and you saw them in various places. I saw something one day on The Daily Show, which I rarely watched, and I'm like, wait a minute, first, did

that all that stuff used to do? The thing with the picture with the changed the lips, remember that that changed? Then that became like a standard on late nights we take a picture of Bill Clinton and put somebody else's mouth there. But it still looked like Bill Clinton talking, but the mouth would move and say thanks, that wasn't open. And then we used to put Rush in a box

to react to audio clips that we would play. He would he would be looking up at those, and then we would look up at the you know, Clinton or whoever was saying something stupid, and he'd been making faces and reacting. It was so funny and the studio audience loved it. And then remember Robert Reich, whenever we did

a story about him, he had a box. We had a picture of him and he could barely see over the bottom of the pure and most of that stuff James that would come up in the production meeting at four fifteen. Roger would come into the production meeting and he could get Rush go on a little bit, you know, like Rush would say something to him about, you know, he wanted to do a story and Roger will, it'll be funny if we did this, you know, like Roger

was outside of the box thinker. I mean, he brought the Fat Lady in to sing on the fifth day of the television show because everybody said Russia's show will never make it. So Roger had this grand scheme and on the fifth day, we would call our anniversary show. We made it five days, and we would have a tremendous, huge anniversary party. And we brought a fat lady in who was gonna sing or not saying if we made was Roger's idea. We have gotten our own gorilla, and

we will have this gorilla sign language. There it is. Could you get a eight, jill all just a second? The gorillas signing and I'm not even saying anything. Okay, Now, this, Ladies and Gentleman, this is an actual newspaper story, Ladies and Gentleman, from the Northwest Herald in Crystal Lake, Illinois. It's a story about a third grade class and a third grade stop laughing over there, pleaser disjects the section that failed a drug test. Over there was that's why

we haven't a little in the dark. Okay. Now, the teacher of this third grade classes a and named Mike Pincover, and it is we should take the picture out of the cameras and there thanks. You know. The sad thing is that the liberals are understanding this. You know that liberals are saying it's limball guy makes sense for the

first time. And I've been watching okay on each episode of Russia Lumba the Man behind the Golden EI B Microphone, we follow Russia Lymball's biographical journey with the help of some of his friends, family co workers. Today is a real treat. We're gonna look at the very impactful, influential Clinton years. When you hear Russia Lamball in history, in history books, there's always going to be a link with President Bill Clinton. Who to walk us through those years

than Mary Mattlin. The Life of Russia Limbaugh, Chapter eight, narrated by Mary Madaline. You wouldn't note at the time, but in the election, a battle for the ages is born, and not between incumbent President George H. W. Bush and its challenger, a young, smooth talking Democratic governor from Arkansas. That election was over. Now at this point a political chess match for the ages began between that very governor, now President elect Clinton and the hero of this story,

talk radio icon Brush Limbaugh. It is it's fundamental to remember that here are the Clinton's admitting their paranoia because they didn't know how to deal with a non supportive media, and all it was was just me on the radio and some other local talk show guys in the wall spreet journal at a Trump age, and they're acting like

it is the biggest threat to their existence ever. In the process, Rush became the number one voice of Conservativism, a mantle literally passed on by none other than President Ronald Reagan himself in a treasured written letter. Russia's political savvy, combined with an uncanny reality based ability to make the complex understandable, helped the Party of Reagan get back on track.

In fact, with Russia at the helm, the GOP one long shot landslide victories across the fooded plane, up and down the ballot, plus the House majority for the first time in over a half a century, now known as a Republican revelutionation in it was the peak. It was huge. I'll tell you what shocked me, and it really did. Clinton was flying into St. Louis in on the Air Force one. He's doing an interview before he arrives with the morning crew at camel X, our affiliate St. Louisi,

starts complaining about me. You got Russia, Lindball coming up here. When you guys finished, you get come up at news. You a three hour three hours everyone and nobody's gonna say anything other way. No trick detective. Here's the President of the United States, for the biggest bully pulpit in the world, complaining about some guy in the radio for

three hours. It's no coincidence that the Rush Limbough program, as you note, actually began during the Reagan administration, and though the Clinton years were filled to the brim with easy fodder for Rush to feast on, he spent the years after battling a misperception that the show's success was primarily built on the daily melodrama dished up by the Clintons. In reality, the show's popularity exploded long before the presidency

was even a twinkle in Bill Clinton's eye. I can't tell the number of people who believe that this program arose to its current heights because Bill Clinton won the election. This program got off the ground and became the most listened to radio talk show in three years before Bill Clinton ever fought about running for rof. In the end, Rush reminded his listeners that his program never depended on the party that was in power. I've often had a phrase,

my success doesn't depend on who wins elections. I can't control who's gonna win elections anyway, Regardless who's in the White House or not. By the way, just because your team wins doesn't mean they don't screw up the whole objective. Hears to have a good show, Rush Limbaugh hosted far more than a good show. In fact, for decades after the Clinton administration had come and gone, he probably carried the conservative tords forward, both on the air and off

the air. Through the Stand Up for Betsy Ross campaign, you changed the lives of dozens of hero families in need. The campaign benefited the Tunnels Are Towers Foundation. Tunnel to Towers bills mortgage free smart homes for our nation's most catastrophically injured veterans and first responders to give them their independence.

For gold Star families and fallen first respond to families with young children, Tunnel to Towers pays off mortgages in full for these families and provides them with the comfort of a home when their world has literally been turned upside down. And thanks to this campaign to Stand Up for Betsy Ross campaign, you have seemed to it that we have been able to send a charitable donation in total of five million dollars to Tunnel the Towers. Your kindness,

generosity and patriotism brought hope when it was needed. Most but more of America's heroes in their families need your support. Donate eleven dollars a month to Tunnel to Towers at T two T dot org. That's the litter t the number two T dot org. Let's tell people what you were responsible for on the russlan Ball radio show and you came over after TV. That happen? Actually, um what?

Towards the end of the television show, Rush asked me to bring in my resume and he said to me, listen, I am looking for an executive assistant like William F. Buckley has. Her name is Frances Bronson, and she's fabulous. She reads his mind, she you know, knows his every move. That's the kind of person I'm looking for. Would you be interested in work in doing that on the radio show? And I was like, okay, um, yeah, I would love to do that. You know, I was grateful to be

able to continue to work with Rush. Uh and now on the radio show, I got to learn radio. It was great, you know, great opportunity for me. So I joined the radio show and I was in my little cubicle doing my Francis Bronson work, which was like making calendars and typing things up and getting coffee. And after about five days I made a list of some other things that I wanted in my cubicle. It was TV,

cable boxes, VCRs. And I went into him and I said, do you is there any way you would consider getting me this list of items for my cubicle. And he looked at it and he said, well, my business partner, John Accident is coming over this afternoon. I'll discuss it with him, uh and and we'll get back to you.

And I was so grateful. I was like, okay, great, thanks because James, as a as a person working in TV, I was not used to have a job without TV like I was always you know, listening watching hear in TV. So sure enough, after their meeting that day, Russian John came out of his office and Rush had my list in his hand and he said, cookie, good news. We've improved approved the entire list. And I was like yes.

So I got my good friend Frank Jeliah to come down, use of course, the great engineer bath Hacker to come down and hook me up. And boy did he hook me up? Are you putting there as many VCRs as we could and as many cable boxes, and I got to record my heart out. So that's how I started pulling audio for the show. I would try to find things that were outrageous and that I knew would make Rush crazy, you know, and that meant recording them on

a VCR tape giving the tape to either. At the time, it was Marie Wallisburg, who was just a wonderful person who's at CNN now that she would you know, edit the tape for me, and we would do a little cue sheet for Rush, telling him who what went him wear, and you know, transcribe the sound, and we'd give it to him. And it was like a little buffet, you know. It was like he would pick maybe cut one or cut five or nothing, or all of them, and he would bounce off of them, you know. And that's how

it started. And then, uh, as as we got going, there was the famous Gravitas montage, and I'm sure you remember that. That's when Vice President Dick Cheney appointed himself to be the running mate for Bush, and the media all said he brings gravitas, right, George, he brings gravatas. And so I heard like a few of them, like four of them, so I strung them together, maybe Sam Donaldson and you know, Wolf Blitzer and four people saying it, and then I kept hearing it and hearing it so

that I just continued to make this huge montage. Then they brought Joe in to do some of the you know, the editing for me, to do all the editing for me actually, So yeah, that's where the gravitas, the famous gravitas. I gotta brag about her a little bit. I mean, now, you know, when people do montages, there's all kinds of services out there that you can search keywords and stuff

on the internet. There was no none of the She used to watch these shows and record them on a VCR tape and then right down the time, like we'd be you know, you know, at night at home or whatever, and and you know, we'd be watching you know, Larry King Live, and somebody would say something and she'd write it down and then she, you know, Joe would have to go rewind that tape eight hours and find that one word. There's no transcripts or anything. You know. That's

how that all started. And this whole industry now does this, and there's whole businesses that are devoted to providing these things. You know, she started it at her desk there with the VCR. So that's right, Kathleen. I mean those momtages not only changed the trajectory of the show, they changed the trajectory of what people on radio started doing. You had another one. What my favorite? And I love the Gravitas, but my favorite is the Taurus sell Kathleen, and so

loved it. He loved it. You can see it when he whenever he played it, it would just light him up. He'd smile. It was explained the Tauris Selly bit to people, Oh my gosh, that is so funny. Well, John Booty helped me with that, I have to say, and we talked about what I wanted to do, and that was taking the prosecutor right, George listing the charges against Torres Sally Sally then Senator Torres Sally from New Jersey correct, and he had given a very passionate speech on the

Senate floor denying it all. And you know when I was crying, Yeah, I go crying about his childhood. And we interspersed the prosecutor listening all the things that he did, you know, watch of cash gold watches. And then you have Touris Sally saying something like when I was a boy. This goes back a eighteen two thousand one. This is a This is a montage of Senator Toura Sally, the guy you had just heard a press conference where he

denied corruption charges. What we did after every denial, we we inserted cut ins of a lawyer for the guy who had corrupted trus Eli brand Simon, who was listing this is not ts Eli's lawyer, it's the guy who tried to buy trs Eli. It's his lawyer documenting what trus Eli did while torris Elli is denying it, all to challenge my integrity is beneath contempt. I do not deserve this treatment. She watches a Rolex watch, diamond earrings

for his girlfriend. I have never television set ever, Oriental rug, grandfather claw, other antique items, done anything suits at any time. Parks to me fourteen deliveries of the envelopes of cash to tors Eli's house to betray the trust of the people of the state of New Jersey. Now let's move over to the internet side. George, you were over at Fox and then you were with us. How did that happen. Kathleen had said to me that, you know, they're looking

for somebody. You know, it was there was two thousand and they were looking for somebody to start a website for Rush because you know Rush, he wanted to be on the cutting edge of everything and websites were starting to get popular then, and so she said, you know, you should go for this job. And I thought about it, and I I said sure. So um, I had worked, as I said, with Matt Rudge, so I knew a

little bit. He taught me a lot about what he did and and you know, the news business, and and so I went and I interviewed with John Axton and they decided to give me the job. So basically, at that time Rush's website there was a website. It was that picture of Rush where he's standing pointing to the golden EIB microphone, and that was it. It was just

that picture. That was a still thing. I started in June of two thousand and I. Um, my first day, I sat with John Acton and Brian Click click and they had a you know, plans for how we're going to build a website. And I was gonna be in charge of the content, and so, you know, they really had no idea what I was gonna do. They said, well, why don't you go listen to the show. You know, they had a little room for me. Um. I didn't even have an office then, we barely had the internet

in the office that we were in. UM. And I, you know, I sat and I listened to Rush for three hours with I made a word file and I still have it someplace, and I just kind of my concept was that, you know, we're gonna just cut up Rushes radio show in in like the form of a website with articles, and so I would just listen and to what he was doing, his topics, and I wrote the headlines down on this word file. And then my idea was, also you incorporate his nicknames and the things

that he said. So I'd say the truth detector, Clinton says this, or or you know, uh, doctor of Democracy, you know, blah blah blah. And I made this little sheet, like a little you know, eight or nine story sheet. And after the show, I went back into John and Brian and I showed them what I did and they were like, wow, this this looks pretty good. Let's send it to Rush. And so we sent it to Rush

and he says, I like it, go for it. And that's how it stard And so then we built a website from the bottom up, and um, you know, I started hiring some staff. I hired Dean and Mojoe, and that was at the beginning there. Um, and we just started, um translating Russia's UH radio show to the to the Internet. Every day. Yeah, we gotta transcribe, you gotta transcribe. Well,

in the beginning, we didn't have a transcriber. We were we were recording the show on cassette tapes and like playing it back and trying to write down what Rush said, and then we would do like little intros into the into audio. And then one day Russia is like, let's just transcribe the show. I want full transcripts on the website.

And the suits at Premier at that time they weren't, you know, too thrilled with that, because you know, they thought that that might add fodder to the people that were you know, media matters was just starting then, and you know, they were a little leary about translating everything Rush said for people to pick it over and find things to object to. But Rush had the opposite view, which was that if we printed transcripts of everything he said, he would be proven, you know, he'd be able to

prove that he was taken out of context. And he was really visionary in that because, you know, we started printing transcripts of the show and we have a great transcriber who did it for us for twenty years, Mark kissling Berry. He's like the Babe Ruth of caption erst Yeah, he's the fastest. He's in the Guinness Book, were all the records. He's great um. And so we had the greatest radio show host of all time with the greatest caption er, and we would just translate it to the web.

Every day we print those transcripts, we cut them up into different articles with headlines, and then we later we added the Ditto cam and we added the Rush twenty four seven subscriber service, and we had one of the first podcasts, and we just built that site into something that Rush was really really proud of and we were really proud of, and it was it was a very unique experience to be able to have one job was to listen to one man talk for three hours every

day thing about Russia's you know, James and Kathleen knows is there. There were no meetings, there was no direction given. He just assumed that I was going to get it right.

Maybe every once in a while he'd say, hey, uh, I like this headline better, or do this different way, but hardly ever, it was just, you know, he let us go, He let us add graphics to what he said, and he trusted us that we weren't going to do something that was out of step with what his he was doing, and it just really became like this kind of like symbiotic thing where we'd listened to him and we'd know what to do and and you know, we did it for for twenty years. The greatest just the

greatest boss. The kind of job does your boss just let you just you know, let you do what you want to do and not you know, just you have an idea, you come up with an idea, you're able to illustrate it, and when he does it, he does your idea hundred fifty times better then you did it. And it's it's amazing. It's a great feeling. It's a great feeling. Yeah, it just he was the greatest that now this is where I want to, uh to ask

you guys, we've talked about what you did. And by the way, with the website, George, you know, for years rush always told us he's not going to do a website until he can understand himself how to monetize it properly, because this is a business. And and that's what he did, and that's what you brought to the table, a way to do it in such a way that it became part of the enterprise and it wasn't a loss leader away.

It was actually added to the bottom line. And that was one of the things everybody in the radio industry then the TV industry, websites were thought of to be loss leaders and Rushi did not want that. And that was one of the mandates when I when I came in there was that, you know, we were going to make this a business that worked. And the reason it did was because rush knew that the content was what was gonna make it, and he was gonna make it

and that that's what you know. People thought that they wouldn't pay for the rest twenties four seven subscription service when you can listen to free on the radio, um, but rush knew that people would because we were providing them something that was unique. You could only get Rush in one place and uh, and it worked. And he was visionary as as he always was. He like you said, he didn't want to just do something that everybody else was doing. He wanted to try to blaze a new

new path and we did. And then after that a lot of radio show hosts would try to do you know, a lot of people did what we did, but rushed it at first. I see, this is the thing that that that blows my mind. And and with you too. Everybody that works for Rush could have done something different and been highly successful at it because they have so much talent. But when they came on with Rush, this is where they called home and it became a family, and it became we want to all do the best

for us. She's that you're feeling on it too. Oh yes, And I you know, I I sort of ran the I don't know why, but I just sort of tried to run the website the way Rush ran things, which was we were going to just improv it the way he did. And we weren't going to have tons of meetings. I mean we had some, but we didn't have many, and we just knew the mandate was that Rush comes first and that we're gonna follow Russia's lead because Rush was gonna know what was gonna work. And that's what

we did. And so it was such a great atmosphere and it was such a great little team. Ali came on, you know, I think a year or two after the rest of us, and because we were doing we needed more people. It was it was too hard. Rush said too many things in three hours. We had this close knit team, and like everybody else in the organization, there was very little turnover. We were all there for twenty years. We were there because Rush kept us there. The Rush

is so compelling. He was so and some of these people weren't even conservatives or or I don't even know. We never even talked about that. It was just he's just you know, once you start listening to him every day. For everyone, who would want to do anything else. I mean, it was a great job. I mean, what who would It's no, I don't I don't know if any other job like it, and you know, I don't think I'll

ever see another job like it. It. It's just because nobody else is compelling enough to say so much in three hours that you know, really you could. You could write a whole newspaper based on what he he said. And that was sort of one of the things we we thought about the website. You know, we're not any different than the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal of the Washington Post were rush, you know, and we're doing it with four people and they're doing it

with five thousand people. But you know, what he's saying is, you know, to us and to the audience, is is just as important, if not more important, because he's the only one saying it. You can go to it, like he used to say, you can go to the New York Times, Washington Post, ABCC. He has, but there was only one Rush slumba dot com and that's where you where you you got those his opinion on things, which was groundbreaking. Turns out I knew this was happy. You

can just sensed these things. November was our biggest traffic month of the year at Russia Limbaugh dot com. We had a record number of millions and millions and millions of page views. So that is continuing to just go gangbusters. And I'm really proud of it because we're proud of the website. It is a plethora of data and information. It's a it's a it's its own encyclopedia set when

you get down to it. Just the daily content of every brother, the transcript, the voluminous content in this program, documented and preserved each and every day, and researchable by everybody who goes to the website. If you heard me say something on a previous program, you can't quite remember what it is, you can keyword search it and find the exact thing that I said. The literal voluminous content

at russi lumbaw dot com. I'll stack it up against any media website in terms of actual substantive content, not just what the news was, but what I thought of it, not a daily basis. Let me just ask you this and we'll we'll we'll end on this note. I want both of you to think about for the second some of your favorite memories of Russia. And if there's one thing in particular that you want the world to know

about Russian law, what would it be. Let's start with you, Kathleen m h. I mean twenty nine years I have, that's it's hard. Um. I would say my favorite memory was after my daughter Grace was born in two thousand and seven after she was born. That Thanksgiving, Rush invited George, Grace and I to spend Thanksgiving with the Limbos in Palm Beach. And it was spectacular because we got to meet all of his wonderful family and spend time with them.

And he used to invite seventy five or eighty family members and he put them up at the Breakers and he would entertain them for the entire weekend. And he invited us UH to attend, and he was so generous to us, right, George, it was unbelievable. Like we had had a dinner on the Friday after Thanksgiving at the golf club, the local golf club that he belonged to, and he before dinner, he invited George and I uh to to come up to the front of the room and he was crying and carrying on, and there were

there were some other people. Matt Drudge was there, there was some other you know friends was there, and and Coulter and Rush stood up and he spoke about George and I and our contributions to the show and the people that we were, and it was unbelievable and unexpected and amazing. I mean, can you imagine games you know

what that was like for us. And then the next day he invited us over to his home to watch a football game, a college football game, and George and I we were supposed to be there at one o'clock. We were scrambling around at the breakst time to get up. We were late as always, and we're on our way and I said, George, we're going to his house for the first time, and we don't have a gift. We got to bring a house warming gift or something to

say thank you. So George said, we'll stop at Green's Pharmacy. So he ran into green Swarms. I said, by the best thing you could buy to bring, you know, because Rush like like the best. So George came out with a beautiful five pound box of Whitman chocolates. It was the sampler, you know, you get a little plate, and I, I know, I know, we're late, and I'm like, we really we're gonna so embarrassing. Yeah, and I'm looking out. You got when you go to somebody's house, you have

to bring something, even if it's rush limball. So we pull up at the gate and we were let in, and we didn't realize that that at that time when we were let into the gate and we parked, we took a little longer in the car to get ourselves together and to get out of the car, and we rang the doorbell. The door opens and it's rushed and he's like, welcome. It sure took you a lot of time to get out of the car. And we were like, yeah, yes, we bought you this box of candy. And he's like, wow, well,

thank you. And he proceeded to take George and I out to the terrors where all of his entire family and he said, everybody, everybody, can I have your attention? All of you people comment Thanksgiving and you never bring me anything, and came for the first time and they bought nice box and candy and that was just that was the great day. I think that was one of the greatest days in my life. That's just funny. He was so funny, and he was so funny, and he was so and he loved the tease. Oh he would

tease me to I mean, and I loved it. I loved it. I mean, I'm just James unbroken that he's that he's gone, and he suffered so terribly because he was just the greatest man just that my life is. You know, I feel like such a big loss, you know, and I'm sure the listeners feel the same way, you know. I mean, he loved the audience. He would stand after the television show every single night and greet every audience member. What other you know, talk show host performer would greet

every audience member, Rush Limbaugh did, That's right. He would sign autographs, he would Oh, James, I can't tell you. He was just the most professional, wonderful person. Just I'm sorry, and you and me and George, you talk about a guy, I just you know, there was just nothing like him. He was just, you know, so generous. Everybody that you've

talked to us said that. But he can't say it enough, just how generous he was with his his time and his just the way he his nature with you and just I don't know, we we had such a unique relationship with him because we, you know, being married and having the same job, and Kathleen's job was to watch all of the know when Rush was used to say on the air, um, you know, I don't have to

watch these cable shows. I pay people to do it. Well, we were those people, yeah, you know, but George I'm sorry to interrupt, but even the thing people don't realize about him was that Rush was a very shy person, and he was a very private person, but he was unbelievably generous, so much to the point where he would

be in his office doing show prep. He would open the New York Post and he would see that maybe something happened to a firefighter or a policeman, and he would come out and he would say, Cookie, I want you to find this family. I want you to find the widow, and I want to know how much money I can give them to help. I want to write them a check so that every one of those children their home is paid off and they all go through college.

So I want you to get that number and come back to me with it, and you must tell the family. They're never allowed to tell anybody that I did that for that And he did that numerous times. He did that so many times. You know, he just was amazing, right, I mean, we're just blessed. I mean we wouldn't be together, we wouldn't have our family if it wasn't for you know, if we didn't come together with him, and he gave us the opportunity to work together as we wouldn't know you.

We love you an inspiration to us. I mean, you're amazing. You represent us. You know you fearlessly represented us on those dark days in February. You know you're amazing what you're just let me just say something. You know. Something else Rush did for me too, was allowing all of us to come together, and Kathleen let me um, let me just in in today with us with another story. Um. Through meeting you, Kathleen, and of course George, but through meeting you, Kathleen, I got a chance to meet your

family too. You got a chance to meet your mom. And your mom was a saint and I'm not saying that, like what a beautiful, wonderful human being who was just so gentle. Her spirit was just so so warm and loving. And your mother gave me a hand painted I don't even know what you call, and it goes over your doors. It's flowers, It's right, It's a door, hand and hand painted it. And she gave me, she gave me one

of her hand painted door. And every place that I have been since then, one of the first things I have ever done when I moved into a new place was put that above my front door. Mama Gleason is above my front door right now, because she and I will never ever ever forget your mother either, for just what is. And we can see where your love and where you come from, and where you're from, where your family comes from. And now you and George have this

wonderful family and we know where that's going. So thank you so much. But you know, just so we I don't end crying. Can just tell you one short little thing, um, just one more thing. And I have to tell you Rush's family and James you and your family too. I mean, god, just beautiful people. But Russia's mother, Millie, Oh what a fabulous lady. She was right, and she of course I got to be friends with her right away on day five of the television show. So we were always keeping

in touch as you did too. And one day she called the office to speak to Rusty, which wanted, you know, hi, this mill In Limbaugh. How are you, Kathleen. I want to speak to Rusty and uh, and you know, we got talking and talking and she said, how's your mother? And I said, oh, you know, Millie, she's great. She's about to go on a riverboat cruise on the Mississippi, and she she said, she is, well, I'm gonna go down and greet the boat. When is that? And I'm like, well,

I don't know. I'll call my mother, but you don't have to do that. You don't have to greet her boat. She's just gonna be on the boat going on. Well, no, oh, that's what we do. That's what we do. We go down and we waved to the people as they go along the Mississippi. We greet the boats. Well, sure enough, James, I told my mother, and my mother is like, Cathy, that is so nice. I can't believe it. And I told my mother to make sure when you get to Cape Gerardo, you go to decide the boat and you wave.

And sure enough there was Milly. She was there with all her blue haired friends, a whole bunch of them waving. Joni waven and my mother's waving. And you know, James, that was that generation. They were. They were just the best, right they. I mean, if I said to George, George, We're gonna go down to the rat and River and go wave at a boat, Georgia said, okay, exactly so, but I think you know that was million. Yeah, but thank you James, thank you, thank you, thank you both

for me dumb memory. It really has been and I'm sure I'm sure that the that our audience is going to absolutely love it. So thank you both of you. I love both of you so dearly. We love to change. You're a love. Thank you so much for joining us for this episode of Rush Limbaugh The Man Behind the Golden E I B Microphone and are very special thanks to my dear friends, my dear co workers Coco and Cookie,

George and Kathleen. On our next episode, you're going to hear from the most famous political odd couple in American political history, James Carvel and his wife, the lovely Mary Madlin. That's coming up in our next episode, Old Russia. Limbaugh The Man Behind the Golden E I B Microphone is produced by Chris Kelly and Phil Toward the best producers in America. Production assistant Mike Mamone and the executive producers

Craig Kitchen and Julie Talbot. Our program distributed worldwide by Premier Networks, found on the I Heart Radio app or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. This is James Golden, This is both Snrving. This is James Golden. I'm honored to be your host for this and every single episode of Russia. Limbaugh, the man behind the Golden E I B microphone, thank you for being with us.