All Episodes
Previous Next
Jan. 20, 2006 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:22
January 20, 2006, Friday, Hour #3
| Copy link to current segment

Time Text
That's absolutely right.
And you can be on with us by calling 800-282-2882.
And ladies and gentlemen, this final hour on Friday, the final day of the week, I'd like to spend it talking about a controversy that's come up.
And it has to do with Jack Abramhoff.
He's the Washington lobbyist who's pled guilty to charges of conspiracy, fraud, and tax evasion.
And this man has showered the coffers, the campaign coffers of both Democrats and Republicans.
Matter of fact, a lot of times a lot of people want to make it an entirely Republican affair, but it turns out, according to a Washington Post article, that Abranoff has given $1 million to Republican congressmen and senators and $758,000 to Democrats.
Now, you find a lot of congressmen right now.
They're saying, well, what are we going to do about the influence peddling in Washington by lobbyists?
And many of them, many congressmen and many politicians are seeking to distance themselves from Abranhoff.
You know, it's kind of like the kid who got caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
These congressmen are giving the money back.
They're giving it to different charities.
They're saying, we don't want any evil Abranhoff money.
And they plan to take measures against the lobbying abuses.
Matter of fact, Senate Majority Leader Bill Friss, in reaction to Abramhoff's guilty plea, he's pledged to examine and act on any necessary changes, these are his words, to improve the transparency and accountability for our body when it comes to lobbying.
Now, ladies and gentlemen, whatever actions Congress might take in the matter of lobbying are going to be just as disappointing in ending influence peddling as their bipartisan campaign reform act of 2002.
Sometimes people call it the McCain fine goal act.
Whatever Congress does with respect to lobbying, all that is going to do is change the form of influence peddling.
Just as the McCain fine goal bill just changed the form of influence peddling.
So, now fellow Americans, let's ask ourselves the question.
Let's not be bamboozled by Congress.
Let's do our own analysis.
And our own analysis might start off with the question, why do corporations, unions, and other interest groups fork over millions of dollars to the campaign coffers of politicians?
Why do they do that?
Is it because these groups have a special or extraordinary interest in making sure Congress upholds and defends the Constitution of the United States?
Or might it be that these groups that number into thousands lobby organizations just love participating in the political process?
Do you think that's the reason that they fork over millions of dollars to these people?
If you do, then you probably believe that babies are delivered by storks and that there is a Santa Claus and there is a tooth fairy, if you believe that, if you would give affirmative answers to that.
Now, I think a much better explanation for the millions of dollars going into the campaign coffers of Washington Politician lies in the awesome growth of government control over our lives,
the government control in terms of starting up businesses, the government control of employment, the government control over our property and other areas of our lives.
Now, when Congress has that kind of control, then they have that kind of power to grant favors to different Americans.
The greater the Congress's power to grant favors, the greater will be the value of being able to influence Congress.
And, ladies and gentlemen, there's no better influence of Congress than money.
Now, you say, well, Williams, what are you talking about?
Well, what favor do these lobbyists want from Congress?
Now, here's the generic answer to this.
They want to go to Congress.
They want to get Congress, under one ruse or another, to grant them a privilege or a right that will be denied another American.
That's the generic, that's the favor that they're looking for.
A variant of this favor or privilege is that they want to get Congress to do something that would be illegal or criminal if done privately.
Okay, for example, let me just give one example, among thousands of examples.
Now, you take a company like Archer Daniels Midland.
Okay, now, if that corporation, I'm just using it, I'm not picking on, I'm not singling out that corporation as the only person doing it, they all do it.
Now, Archer Daniel Midland, if they use goons and violence to stop people from buying sugar from a Caribbean producer of sugar in order to raise the price of sugar so that they can sell more of their corn syrup as a sweetener, well, they'd wind up in jail.
That is, if they just got guns and say, Williams, pointing this gun, I dare you to buy some sugar from a Caribbean producer, they'd go to jail.
Okay, now if they line the coffers of a congressman, they can buy the same result without risking imprisonment.
That is, they just have Congress.
Congress just simply does the dirty work for them by enacting sugar import quotas and tariffs.
Another favor that they get from Congress.
The two most powerful committees of Congress, the committees that Congressmen fight to be on, The two committees are the House Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee.
Now, these committees are in charge of tax favors.
A tweak in the tax code here and a tweak in the tax code there might mean millions of dollars.
So you can get your tweak in your favor if you line the coffers of a congressman or a senator.
Now, there's another insidious part of this favor granting by Congress.
It's called, it's bad cop, good cop.
It's kind of extortion.
Now, Congressman might come up to me, Williams, and say, let's say I'm the owner of a corporation.
Congressman Joe might come up to me and say, well, Williams, Congressman Bill is planning some kind of environmental regulation or some kind of OSHA regulation that's going to cost you millions of dollars.
Now, I'll fight this guy on the floor if you give me a campaign contribution.
And so I'll fight Congressman Bill on this bill if you give me a campaign contribution.
Now, Farmer Joe, I mean, Congressman Joe and Congressman Bill, they may get together on this in advance.
They say, well, look, I'm going to try to push some bill called OSHA 123 on your company and say, hey, that's a good idea.
I'll go there and I'll tell them I'll fight you if they will pay me off.
And then I'll tell your people that I'm going to have EPA 123.
And you tell them you can get some money from your constituent by saying you'll fight me if they give you some money.
This is nothing less than extortion.
Now, what's the solution?
Well, the solution is to take that kind of power away from Congress.
Eliminate that kind of power.
I'm not quite sure how we eliminate it.
I believe that the best way to eliminate it is to force our congressmen, our representatives, to obey the United States Constitution because in the United States Constitution, there are no provisions for favor granting and privilege granting in the United States Constitution.
But maybe it's too difficult to get Congress to obey the United States Constitution.
And an idea was suggested to me by Nobel laureate Friedrich Hayek, very eminent.
He's dead now, but a very eminent economist.
We were having dinner one night, and I asked him, I said, Professor Hayek, if you could write one law that would help protect Americans against the increase in growth of government, what would that law be?
Hayek just smiled, and he says, I would just write one law.
He said, that law would be that whatever Congress does for one American, it would have to do it for all Americans.
And so I asked him, I said, could you explain?
He said, for example, Congress pays some Americans not to raise pigs.
He said, now, we should have a law that if Congress pays some Americans not to raise pigs, well, any other American not raising pigs ought to get the same amount of money.
He said, Williams, you would get some money because you're not raising pigs, are you?
Well, I think I would like to see a bill introduced on the floor that Congress had to treat every single American equally.
If it gave one American a food stamp, give every American a food stamp.
If you gave one American special parking privileges, give every American special parking privileges.
And so if we had such a law, We wouldn't have all this privilege granting by the United States Congress because they just would not have that kind of power.
We'll be back with your calls after this.
We're back, and you can be on with us by calling 800-282-2882.
And let's go to the phones.
There's Holly from Louisiana.
Welcome to the show, Holly.
Hi, Mr. Williams.
Thank you so much for taking my call.
I really appreciate it.
I'd like to just reverse directions a little bit, if I might.
Hello?
Yeah, yes, yes.
Matter of fact, Brett Winterbull said that you wanted to talk about the subject we were talking about the last hour.
Right, right.
I'm an education major, and I left class and immediately got in my car and turned on my radio to get my daily dose of Rush, like I always do.
And I felt like I'd had a bucket of ice water just thrown on me.
Because Rush was not here.
No.
No, you're very, very interesting.
It wasn't so much that I'm an education major, and I'm starting what we call at the University of Louisiana, where I attend, our block courses.
And this is my first semester of methods courses, and I'm very excited about it.
And I was in class, and I was so inspired by what my professor, who, by the way, is a very fine woman, was saying.
And I was so excited about my chosen profession, what I was going to be a part of.
And then you heard me.
I was so proud of my choice.
And I was so inspired, and I couldn't wait to get out there and be a part of this.
I'm the daughter of an educator.
My mother and father-in-law are retired educators.
And I see the struggle they've been through.
And just to say that we're like the bottom of the barrel on campus.
Now, of course, now not everyone is at the bottom of the barrel, but most of the people are education majors are.
I mean, do you deny the facts?
These are just the facts.
That is, education majors have the lowest SAT scores of any other major.
I don't know the statistics.
But that's available.
I come into contact every single day, and I see their dedication to just their chosen profession, but to their college careers as well.
Wait a minute.
Wait a minute.
An idiot can be dedicated.
So the fact that you're dedicated doesn't necessarily mean that you can be dedicated trying to put square pegs in round holes, but that doesn't mean that you're intelligent or academic gift.
Look, look, the point is that there's no dispute whatsoever that education majors score the lowest SAT scores.
Then, this is also available.
You can just do searches on the internet, do Google searches, when people who have education degrees, when they graduate and take a GRE, graduate record exam to get into graduate school, or the LSAT exam or the MCAT exam, they score the lowest of any other major.
I don't know about that.
But that's true.
I'm trying to speak from a perspective that I'm not aware of.
I'm only speaking to you from the perspective.
I'm not going to take you to the program.
Okay, but you have to become aware of these perspectives.
Matter of fact, let me give you one more, actually a personal experience.
When I was teaching at Temple University, I used to teach a master's course for people who are going to be business majors.
And this one guy, you know, he was friendly and he was jovial.
And he used to come by my office, you know, cracking jokes.
And I said, what kind of work do you do?
He says, I work in South Philadelphia at a high school.
And he started talking about his colleagues and ineptness and things like this and how he talks to them.
And I say, aren't you afraid you're going to be fired?
He said, no.
It was an elementary school he's working in.
He said, no, because I'm the only teacher that can do long division.
That's Asinard.
Okay, wait a minute, wait a minute.
That's unfortunate, isn't it?
Okay, look.
If that was the case, then yes, I would think that.
Look, one more question.
One more question.
Look, and you can verify this yourself.
There's the California Basic Education Skills Test.
I mean, that's the test for people to take who are going to become teachers.
Right, I heard you with the script.
Okay, now, what do you think about a question like that being on a test to become a teacher and people missing that test?
That's absolutely ridiculous.
I think you're going to have idiots in every single field.
I think that's the first part of our, what we have here in Louisiana, and it's basically the same thing, same theory, but we call it the praxis.
Now, I've taken the first part of the praxis, which that sort of question, had it been asked, it would have been on the first book.
We had nothing even remotely.
Okay, well, okay.
Check out the, it's called CBESS, I believe it's cbest.org, California Basic Education Skills Test.
I mean, these are facts that we have to confront.
As long as we're saying that, oh, we have wonderful teachers, all the teachers are smart, et cetera, et cetera, we're not going to cope with one aspect of our education problem, and that is fairly low-quality people in there teaching our kids.
I mean, and there's one publication I can't think of right now, but it's a publication a guy wrote of notes to parents from teachers.
And if you look at the grammar in those notes, you would not accept that from a ninth grader.
And so the point is, these things are not very comfortable to talk about.
But if we're going to make changes in our education system, we have to be willing to talk about them, number one, and make changes.
And this information I just gave the listeners, and I gave it to you, Holly.
This information is readily available through checking out Google.
Just do LSAT and major.
You know, just put LSAT major or G-R-E and major.
We'll be back with your calls after this.
We're back, Walter Williams, filling in for Rush.
And Rush will be back on Monday.
And you can be on with us by calling 800-282-2882.
And Holly, stay tuned if you're still listening.
We're not going to talk about education, but we're still going to push back the frontiers of ignorance.
And we're going to welcome Ron on his cell phone from Mount Joy, Pennsylvania.
Welcome to the show, Ron.
Dr. Williams, it's an honor.
Thank you.
And I am very much inspired by your conversation, but I'd be violating the contract I have with your call screener to talk about anything other than my original reason for calling.
And that is when you talk about passing a law, one single law, for all Americans, the law that comes to mind for me would be something in terms of a fair tax, a national sales tax, eliminate all this tax code and corporate taxes and level the playing field.
Your reaction, sir.
Well, I think that The income tax, the way that we tax now, I think it is a national disgrace.
I think that our founding fathers anticipated the potential abuse of it in the Constitution.
They said no direct taxes, and we had to amend the Constitution with the 16th Amendment to allow for an income tax.
And I think that our founding fathers would be rolling in their graves if they knew that we were so stupid to do that.
Sure.
But however, a lot of people talk about the fair tax.
And I think that there's much to be said for the fair tax.
I think it's H.R. 25 being pushed by Congressman Linder.
Yes, sir.
There's much to be said about it.
But the only way that I would go for a fair tax, this national sales tax, is under the condition that we repeal the 16th Amendment.
Because if we don't repeal the 16th Amendment, we're going to have a sales tax and an income tax.
Good point.
Now, but however, having said that, I think that the major issue that Americans should confront is not the tax side of government, but the spending side of government.
That is, from 1787 until 1920, except during wartime, the federal government was only 3% of the GNP.
Today, it's over 20% of the GNP and possibly higher than that, depending on what numbers you're looking at.
Now, if the federal government remained at 3% of the GNP, well, then any old tax system is okay.
Even the old income tax system is okay.
It's not going to be burdensome.
But if government spending, let's say hypothetically, becomes 50 or 60 percent of the GNP, then any tax system is going to be abusive.
Then, Dr. Williams, you've just suggested to me that I widen my horizon to number one, the fair tax.
And I would commend to anyone the reading of this very simple book and a very simple procedure which does away with so much stupidity, it's unbelievable.
Number one, implement the fair tax.
Number two, revoke the 16th Amendment.
And number three, pass a balanced budget amendment.
No, not a balanced budget amendment.
You're okay so far, but you made one error.
Not a balanced budget amendment.
What we'd like to have is a spending limitation amendment.
That is limit federal spending to a certain percentage of GNP.
Now, I was on a very distinguished panel with Milton Friedman, Bob Bork, and Niscannon, and a bunch of other people in the late 70s, and we wrote a spending limitation amendment to the United States Constitution.
And matter of fact, Senator Luger introduced the amendment that we wrote to the Senate, and it passed the Senate in 1982, but however, it did not pass the House, and it was reintroduced in 1986, and didn't even pass the Senate.
Now, what our amendment said was that the federal government can spend, I believe it was something like 18 or 17 or 18 percent of GNP.
They could not spend any more than that.
The treasurer could not write a check for any more money than 17 percent of the GNP.
Kit asked me: was there war exception?
Yes, there was.
There was an emergency exception where there had to be a supermajority vote on the emergency, and it could only be valid for one year, and there had to be a supermajority the next year.
There was an exception.
Now, when we were writing this amendment, my proposal, see, I'm one of these radical people like the framers of the Constitution.
My proposal was let's limit federal spending to 10% of the GNP.
And people will ask me, why 10%?
I say, well, if 10% is good enough for the Baptist Church, it ought to be good enough for the United States Congress.
But our political pros said that would just never sell.
So the point is our true protection is to cap federal spending because, and I don't want to get into, it's too much, too much, it'll take too much time right now for me to get into the argument why the budget is always balanced anyway.
That is in any kind of true economic sense.
There's never a deficit unless you believe in Santa Claus or the tooth fairy.
But that's a subject for another conversation.
Matter of fact, I might do a column on it.
I might do a column on it.
So you guys just look at my website, walterewilliams.com, or either a Jewish World Review, one of these sites that carry my column, and look for, let's see, what am I going to name it?
I think I'm going to name it what James Madison would have been proud of Williams writing.
That's what I think I'm going to do.
He's my favorite founder.
Let's go to one more call.
Let's go to Randy from Tennessee.
Welcome to the show, Randy.
Hi, Walter.
Hey, thanks for taking my call.
I sure appreciate it.
Thank you.
I like the program today.
And what I'm calling about is thanking you for touching base on this April Moff thing.
I really hope that the media in our country and people like you don't forget about this thing and let the politicians just kind of shove it under a carpet someplace.
No, I write about these people all the time.
But see, Randy, and I hate to cut you short on this, but see, our big problem, my big problem, or my goal, is to try to convince my fellow Americans on the moral superiority of liberty and limited government.
Now, I believe that we see politicians behaving the way that they do is because I think that many Americans want them to behave that way.
Many Americans believe that government should be in the business of taking one person's property and giving it to another person to whom it does not belong through the tax code.
Now, so Randy, you might say, well, not we people in Tennessee.
Do you believe that in Tennessee?
No.
Yes, you do.
Your fellow Tennesseans believe that.
Imagine, for example, okay, let me ask you a question, Randy.
Okay, I'm running for the Senate.
I'm going to run for the Senate in Tennessee.
And I'm going to go back and forth across your state, and I'm going to tell the people in Tennessee: look, I've read the United States Constitution.
I know what Congress can do and what it cannot do.
So if you elect me to the Senate from Tennessee, don't expect from me to bring back aid to higher education money, meals on wheels, highway construction funds, et cetera, et cetera.
Do you think I'll get elected to the Senate from Tennessee?
I get your point.
Okay, so because I wouldn't be doing.
I guess, well, okay, I missed the point.
But What I'd like to say is that our politicians, they don't, once they get to Washington, they're not paying attention to the constituents anymore from the states that they're from.
They don't even know who these people are.
All they pay attention to are the special interest groups.
These are the people with the money, and these are the people that motivate the politicians.
Well, look, Randy, we're up against the clock right now, but everybody is a special interest.
Everybody is a special interest.
That is, at your university, there's a special interest.
That is, people want more buildings.
For the old geezers like myself, there's a special interest.
We think that young people should buy us prescription drugs and things like that.
And so we're all special interests.
So what I would like see us all do is say, let's back off, and we're going to obey the United States Constitution.
We'll be back to your calls after this.
We're back filling in for Rush, and he'll be back on Monday.
And you can be on with us by calling 800-282-2882.
And let's go back to the phones.
And Chuck on his cell phone from Pennsylvania.
Welcome to the show, Chuck.
Thank you very much, Mr. Williams.
There's one thing you said that Jack Abernoff gave money to Democrats.
And I haven't seen any proof where he's given himself one dime to any Democratic senator or congressman.
That does not happen.
What about directed money?
I mean, you have this guy, Byron Dorgan, who is a Democrat, isn't he?
and he's given $67,000 back.
Why is he doing that if he didn't get any...
He's giving it to whom?
He's giving it to whom?
I mean, he's getting rid of it, getting out of his coffers.
Well, the thing of it is, you said Jack Abramoff is giving money to Democrats, and that's not true.
Oh.
Okay, well, okay, well, he's not making that statement.
Okay, right.
Okay, do you agree that he's directed Indian tribes to give money to certain congressmen and senators who are also Republicans?
And that you're speaking about a senator from Nevada, am I correct?
No, There's a Washington.
Wait, a minute, wait a minute.
Only one person talking.
Wait a minute, only one person talking.
Now, if you go to, I'll give you everybody the source.
It's Washington Post, and it's, let's see, it doesn't get updates, but Washington Post and the article is called How Abramoff Spread the Wealth.
And it turns out that the total amount of directed money went to Republicans from the Indian tribes directed by Abranoff was $1 million and $758,000 to Democrats.
Okay, the thing of it is.
The thing of it is what?
Okay, let me answer.
I mean, all of them were involved.
All I want to do is make a statement.
Pardon me?
I want to answer your question.
Okay.
Okay.
Now, you're saying that Indian tribes are given to Democrats, too.
No, no, no, no.
Wait a minute.
Abramoff directed them.
Well, Abramoff has not admitted to doing that yet.
So I don't know where the Washington Post, which is notoriously incorrect.
And it's information.
And it's actually notoriously liberal.
No.
Not the Post.
I'm sorry.
Not the Washington Post.
Okay.
Let's forget about that for a moment.
But what do you think about my proposal of treating every American equally?
That is, if Congress does for one American, he has to do it for all Americans.
You know, I have no problem treating all Americans equal.
I just want to see the truth get out there.
And there's misinformation.
Well, the truth is out there.
And I mean, if you check this Washington Post article, matter of fact, it says it gives the top 20 individual recipients of Abramoff-directed money.
Now, how are they defining Abramoff-directed money?
Wait, wait a minute.
I think that the politicians are doing it.
That is, you have to tell us why a.
Where's Dorgan from?
I think you said that.
Politicians.
Therefore, what you're saying is the Washington Post is repeating what the Republicans are trying to say.
They're trying to spread the blame now when they know that the other ones that are in trouble for this are the Republicans.
Okay, Chuck.
Chuck, let me ask this question.
There's one Democrat that's been indicted.
Wait a minute.
Let me ask you this.
Wait, wait, look, look, I'm going to drop the dime on you unless you act nice.
Okay, I'm trying to act nice.
Okay, now, why would Byron Dorgan from North Dakota, why would he be giving back $67,000?
Because you're trying to paint him the same way you're painting out.
No, no, I'm just asking a question.
Why would he give back $7,000 saying he doesn't want to have anything to do with Abramoff?
You'd have to ask him.
He hasn't confirmed with me.
Oh, okay.
Okay.
Well, when he confers with you, call in again.
Let's go to John from Bloomfield, New Jersey.
Welcome to the show.
Hi, Dr. Williams.
I want to thank you for your wonderful suggestions about Christmas gift giving.
I've been married for 41 years, and this is the first time I got it right.
Oh, I've been married 46.
Okay, now, what did you give your wife?
Oh, well, you know, you said it should be something practical, and it's the gift wrapping that counts more than anything else.
Yeah, that's right, yeah.
Well, she has a back problem, and like Mrs. Williams, her doctor advised her not to lift anything heavy.
So I followed your suggestion, and I got her one of those child snow shovels.
and you wrap the nice yeah that's what Ms. Wake It was beautifully wrapped.
I knew it was going to be cold out there while she was shoveling the sidewalk in the driveway, so I wrapped it in a full-length pink coat.
Oh, no, no, no.
Oh, come on.
That doesn't count.
But that's fine.
That's a wonderful idea.
But it just doesn't match mine.
Now, do you notice I what I notice is that with that little children's shovel, that takes my wife a longer time to clean the driveway.
Yes, it does.
Yeah, that's the only problem.
I'm thinking about hiring an 18-year-old girl to help her.
You better watch that.
But thanks a lot, John, for calling in.
Hey, by the way, you know, a lot of people consult my website, and I just never believed that it would be envy in the rush audience.
Let me just tell you, I get letters like from some of you guys that are just plain jealous of my good looks.
Some of you guys say, you know, Walter, you ought to be ashamed of having the picture of your son on your website.
That's not my son.
That's me.
I'm just plain, youthful, and handsome.
And one guy said, I see you do a lot of Botox.
I didn't even know what Botox was.
I had to ask somebody what Botox was.
And so, you know, as Mrs. Williams says, and it's a little bit racial, too, a lot of people say, well, how come you look so young?
Well, Mrs. Williams says, black don't crack.
Now, I don't know whether she's being racial or not, but anyway, she said, we'll be back on your calls after this.
We're back, wind up the last minute or so.
You know, when I was talking to Randy of Tennessee, you know, one of the tragedies that has happened in our country, that is, as I was telling him, I was using the example, I'm running for the Senate and I'm saying I'm not going to bring this back and that back and billions of dollars back to Tennessee.
Well, the people of Tennessee would be acting absolutely correctly in terms of their own interests.
And the reason why is that if I don't bring back billions of dollars to Tennessee, that doesn't mean that Tennesseans will pay a lower federal income tax.
All that it means is that Kentucky will get it instead.
And so here's the problem, ladies and gentlemen.
Once legalized theft begins, it pays for everybody to get involved because those who don't get involved will wind up holding, for those in the rural area, you'll know what I mean, the brown end of the stick.
And that is the tragedy for our country.
That is, we've got to a point where it pays economically for everybody, all Americans, to get involved in legalized theft.
▲
Export Selection