Rudy's Two-Minute Rant About Ferret Owners
May 2, 2007 -- 3:14 PM EST // // Post a Comment
Trust me, you've never heard anything quite like Rudy Giuliani's rant about ferrets. It's much, much worse than you all can imagine. I know -- I was there.
Let me explain. Via Atrios, Ana Marie Cox over at Swampland points to a rather odd moment in Vanity Fair's profile of Rudy Giuliani, in which Rudy is quoted unloading on a ferret owner on his radio show as Mayor in the 1990s. VF quotes a few lines of Rudy's startling rant, then moves on.
But the sheer demented nature of Rudy's diatribe is only appreciable if you read the whole thing from beginning to end. How do I know this? I was listening to Rudy on the radio on that day in 1999 when he went off on the ferret owner. Indeed, I was the first to write about it as a reporter for The New York Observer, and it's since entered New York lore. Am I patting myself on the back? Hell, yeah -- this was far and away the best and most important story I've ever broken. Biggest scoop of my life. (Update: That's a joke.) So without further delay, here's the full transcript of Rudy's ferret rant:
The following exchange occurred on Mayor Rudolph Giuliani's weekly radio show on WABC-AM on July 23. The caller was David Guthartz, a ferrets' rights activist who was upset by a June 29 directive by the city's Board of Health making it illegal to keep ferrets and a range of other animals as pets.Mayor Giuliani: We're gonna go to David in Oceanside.
David Guthartz: Hello, Mr. Giuliani, we speak again.
Giuliani: Hi, David.
Guthartz: Let me introduce myself again, David Guthartz, executive president of New York Ferrets' Rights Advocacy. Last week when we spoke, you said a very disparaging remark to me, that I should get a life. That was very unprofessional of you. Here we're trying to get something seriously done–
Giuliani: I, I–
Guthartz: Without you talking over me, we're trying to get something very seriously done–
Giuliani: David, you're on my show. I have the right to talk over you.
Guthartz: But here's the thing: We're trying to get an important issue taken care of where the city is violating state law and I asked you last week if you care about the law.
Giuliani: Yes, I do care about the law. I think you have totally and absolutely misinterpreted the law, because there's something deranged about you.
Guthartz: No, there isn't, sir.
Giuliani: The excessive concern that you have for ferrets is something you should examine with a therapist. Not with me.
Guthartz: Don't go insulting me again!
Giuliani: I'm not insulting you. I'm being honest with you. Maybe no one in your life has ever been honest with you.
Guthartz: I happen to be more sane than you.
Giuliani: This conversation is over, David. Thank you. [Mr. Giuliani cuts him off.] There is something really, really, very sad about you. You need help. You need somebody to help you. I know you feel insulted by that, but I'm being honest with you. This excessive concern with little weasels is a sickness.
I'm sorry. That's my opinion. You don't have to accept it. There are probably very few people who would be as honest with you about that. But you should go consult a psychologist or a psychiatrist, and have him help you with this excessive concern, how you are devoting your life to weasels.
There are people in this city and in this world that need a lot of help. Something has gone wrong with you. Your compulsion about it, your excessive concern with it, is a sign of something wrong in your personality. I do not mean to be insulting. I'm trying to be honest with you and I'm trying to give you advice for your own good. I know you, I know how you operate, I know how many times you called here this week. Three or 4 o'clock in the morning, David, you called here.
You have a sickness. I know it's hard for you to accept that, because you hang on to this sickness, and it's your shield, it's your whatever. You know, you gotta go to someone who understands this a lot better than I do. And I know you're real angry at me, you're gonna attack me, but actually you're angry at yourself and you're afraid of what I'm raising with you. And if you don't deal with it, I don't know what you're gonna do. But you called here excessively all week, and you called here at 3 o'clock in the morning. And 4 o'clock in the morning. Over weasels. Over a ferret.
So I know this is difficult and tomorrow one of the newspapers will write how mean I am and how cruel I am and all this other stuff, but I believe, because my father and mother taught me this, that you should be honest with people. And I am giving you the benefit of 55 years of experience having represented hundreds and in some cases thousands of people on either side in the courtroom, having handled insanity defenses and cases.
You need help! And please get it! And you don't have the right to call here at three o'clock in the morning, harass the people on my staff, because of your compulsion. So, David, see what you can do to get help. But we can't help you. We don't have the professional expertise to help you. Now we're gonna move on to Richard in the Bronx.
I don't know if David called Rudy's office at 3 in the morning or not, but either way, you have to be pretty whacked out to reach the pinnacle of New York politics but still take great pleasure in stomping all over someone for two straight minutes merely because he's asked you not to take his pet away from him.
Update: I didn't see this before, but here's the audio, courtesy of Oliver Willis. And everyone, I'm not saying that this is some big "gotcha." The idea that this was a big "scoop" was meant as a joke! Just saying it makes the guy (Rudy, not the ferret owner) sound like a total whack job who reacts rather badly when his penchant for heavy-handed government comes under gentle criticism.
Update II: And, yes, Rudy's rant was also funny as heck.
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