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April 26, 2006 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:38
April 26, 2006, Wednesday, Hour #1
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Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 24-7 podcast.
Hell, I guess I can admit this now.
I gave it my best shot yesterday, folks, but Tony Snow got the gig.
And I want to congratulate him on that.
I thought I had it.
It was so close.
It was close as a gnat's eyelash out there.
And I left yesterday thinking it was mine.
But life goes on.
I return to the golden EIB microphone at the Limboy Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
Great to be back and great to be with you.
The telephone number is 800-282-2882 and the email address, rush at EIBnet.com.
Actually, I had a great day yesterday.
And at the end of the day, I found myself in Philadelphia.
A friend of mine and I spent the day today yesterday doing some interesting things.
And he said, have you ever been to South Philly and Nick's roast beefs?
I said, no, I've never even heard of it.
He said, you got to have the best roast beef sandwich ever, anywhere on the planet.
And I said, fine, let's go get a bunch of them and take them to the airplane and head on home.
So we went to Nick's old original roast beef at 20th and Jackson Streets in South Philly.
And I walked in there.
And it's just, it's a great little neighborhood joint.
And I walked in there with my buddy, and the guy behind the bar immediately looked at me and said, Rush.
And I put my, shh, don't say anything.
This is Philadelphia.
And I looked up on the wall and they got all these pictures.
And it had no pictures of Donovan McNabb.
They had pictures of Wilbert Montgomery and Ron Jaworski of the Eagles.
And they had Smoke and Joe Freesia on the walls and some stuff.
So anyway, we ordered some roast beef sandwiches.
And I got to tell you, folks, the cell job I was given under exposed me to the expectations.
There's no way there can be a better roast beef sandwich anywhere in this country.
And they were great to us in there.
Tom Rosamondo was the guy behind the bar and the manager was in there.
And everybody in the place was nice as they could be.
We're only in there for a week.
I actually stopped and ate a sandwich in there before we went to the airplane to come back home.
And I'm going to send them an autographed picture for the wall.
And they said, don't worry, we'll keep Donovan off.
I said, no, no, no, no.
Get a picture of Donovan up there and put it up there if you want to.
But I wanted to thank them.
It's a fabulous.
It's the kind of thing I wish to share with everybody that I've could, but I don't know how.
And they ship.
They told me they ship all over the place.
But I just had to tell you about this place because their roast beef sandwiches.
I took them to flight crew last night, and they were just, you know, just everybody that tastes these is blown away by them.
So once again, thanks.
Now, Tony Snow, what are you looking at me this way for?
I was in South Philly.
You go down Broad Street, you go to Broad Street and Jackson, you take a left, you go to 20th and Jackson to park the car.
You go in, you come back out, you got on Broad Street, you go by the old Spectrum, the Wachovia Center, the Eagles and Philly's ballparks, and you head on out to the interstate, head back down the airport, and come home.
South Philly.
Well, I was in New Jersey most of the day.
And my friends, where would you rather be?
New Jersey or South Philly?
I'd rather be in South Philly.
At any rate, Tony Snow got the gig, ladies and gentlemen.
Here is the President of the United States announcing this today.
He's not afraid to express his own opinions.
For those of you who read his columns and listened to his radio show, he sometimes has disagreed with me.
I asked him about those comments.
And he said, you should have heard what I said about the other guy.
I like his perspective.
I like the perspective he brings to this job, and I think you're going to like it too.
And here's what Tony Snow had to say.
A few nice words about the Press Corps.
Obviously, honeymoon period will last here for, well, a while.
This is Tony.
One of the reasons I took the job is not only because I believe in the president, because believe it or not, I want to work with you.
These are times that are going to be very challenging.
We've got a lot of big issues ahead, and we've got a lot of important things that all of us are going to be covering together.
And I am very excited, and I can't wait.
And I want to thank you, Mr. President, for the honor, and thank all you guys for your forbearance.
And I look forward to working with you.
Thanks.
Mr. President, what does this choice say about what you think you need in the second term?
That was David Gregory.
Mr. President, honeymoon's over.
What does this choice say about what you think you need in the second term?
Now, on the Fox News channel, of course, they had to do some analysis of all this.
And their host, John Scott, was talking to Senator George Allen.
And here's his reaction.
I like Tony a lot.
The best thing that Tony's going to do is bring the pulse of the American people into the White House in those deliberations.
People like Laura Ingram and Tony and Rush Limbaugh, they understand what's going on in the real world.
And I think that's going to be very helpful for the White House as they develop policy to move this country forward.
So I congratulate Tony.
Great choice by the president.
And I think it'll be good for the American people, too, to have one of their advocates clearly in the White House.
Well, this didn't sit well with a number of liberal activists, among them Lanny Davis and Steve McMahon.
So Fox, when I got Lanny Davis on the phone along with Steve McMahon, and the anchor, John Scott, said, Lanny, Tony Snow, what does he bring to the table?
Senator George Allen did Tony Snow a great disservice about five minutes ago by lumping Tony Snow together with two of the venomous, hateful voices on the far-right-wing fringe of talk radio, namely Laura Ingram and Rush Limbaugh.
Tony Snow is as different from those two in terms of avoiding hate and being a decent man as could be.
I hope that the Republicans don't try to label him as a right-winger because he's a conservative, but he's a man of fairness, he's a man of integrity, and I think he will have a great deal of credibility on behalf of President Bush.
So I'm sorry, Tony, your first day has to get tarred and feathered here by the Democratic activists here taking out after Laura Ingram and I, the all-knowing, all-caring, all-sensing, all-feeling, all-compassionate, all-concerned, not an ounce of hate in me, Maha Rushi.
The template is just predictable.
A hate-monger, venomous, far-right-wing fringe.
Only the biggest media show in the country here, folks, the far-right-wing fringe.
Steve McMahon decided to get in on it, too.
John Scott says, Steve, in fact, some of the opposite's been happening here.
Great many Democrats have been circulating quotes from Tony, quotes in which he criticized the administration.
I'm not sure what the point of that is.
I think Lanny's absolutely right, though, to lump him with Rush Limbaugh or some of those on the right is pretty unfair to Tony because he is a conservative, but he's a principled, pragmatic conservative, as opposed to a rigid, ideological one who spews hate and tries to divide the country.
The fact that he has disagreed with the Bush administration on a number of policy issues proves that he is no Rush Limbaugh.
And Steve McMahon, that comment proves what an idiot and dolt that you are.
If you think that I'm sure they do.
They don't listen to this program.
They form their template of what it is based on their stereotypical view of conservatism, and then they plug anybody into it.
But as you people know, because I've heard from you over the course of the last five years, I have been highly critical of this administration on a number of things.
And you've been mad at me for not standing in unison with the president during those times.
And then at other times, you get mad at me for not disagreeing with him.
I mean, I'm, you know, I sit here sometimes, my head swims.
I say what I say.
Anybody can listen to what I say.
You don't need a password.
You don't need a super secret receiver frequency to hear this program.
You just turn on your radio.
And yet that seems so difficult to do.
Note also that, and by the way, Steve McMahon, you might remember we had a soundbite from him.
He was talking about how the American people know that there's no hope for them anymore.
There's no hope for the future of their country economically and all these things.
And I was just stunned because the essence of being an American is optimism.
The essence of being an American is that tomorrow is always going to be a better day.
The opportunity for it to be a better day than the day before is always there.
And it's what defines this country and sets us apart.
But note how he defines conservatism.
Tony's a conservative, but he's a principled, pragmatic conservative as opposed to a rigid ideological one who spews hate and tries to define the country.
Steve, I don't like you insulting Tony this way because when you call him a pragmatic principled conservative, what it means is he cowers in fear to people like you and will end up trying to make you like him on your terms.
That he'll go out of his way to make you, Steve McMahon, a liberal like him just because he doesn't want you to dislike him.
He doesn't want you to think that he's one of these ideological right-wingers.
The arrogance and the condescension of these people on the left, especially the last three years, do you want to talk about spreading hate?
You want to talk about spreading lies?
You want to talk about the fringe?
I mean, the Democratic Party's base is their fringe kook population.
It's just the exact opposite of what they say.
But nevertheless, all this aside, congratulations to Tony Snow, and we'll be watching eagerly.
He does say that one of the conditions for taking the job was that he's not just going to be an explainer.
He's going to actually participate in policy discussions and have a role in formulating some of that policy in the remaining number of years, a thousand days, whatever it is in this administration.
So sit tight.
We'll be back and continue with all the rest right after this.
Dawn, put the needle point down in there.
I'm going to grab a phone call a little sooner than I usually do.
Mark in Erie, Pennsylvania on the Rush Limbaugh program.
Hello.
Mega Dittos, Rush.
Thank you.
Mark here.
Hey, listen, I was curious about this movie that's coming out this week about Flight 93 this weekend.
Yes.
It starts tomorrow.
Yeah, tomorrow, okay?
I thought it started Friday, but whatever it does.
Is it true that they're going to donate a portion of the take of the movie to the fund for memorial for I think 10%?
10%.
10%.
Is it just this weekend they're doing it?
No, no, no.
I think 10% of the total take.
For as long as it runs.
As long as it runs.
And I don't know if that includes DVDs.
All I know is it's 10% of the box office.
Had you seen the movie yet?
Oh, yes.
I saw a super secret screening.
Did you now?
Last week I saw it.
In fact, they had a premiere of this movie last night at the Ziegfeld Theater in New York.
They had 1,100 people in there.
And the reaction, at least as reported by the people coming out of that place, is exactly what I thought it would be.
People thought they were leaving a funeral.
It is an intense, dramatic portrayal of what happened.
You know what's going to happen as you watch it if you know your history.
It's mind-numbing, and it's great.
You know, all these debates about is it too soon?
No, it's too late.
Yes.
My wife and I have not gone to the movies for 20 years, but we're getting out a thing to go see this thing because we think it's the right thing to do.
Well, you should.
I'll tell you, it's the terrorists are not portrayed sympathetically as Hollywood has been wont to do in many productions since 9-11.
You end up despising these people.
You're inspired by the people on the plane that take it down and try to wrest control from the terrorists.
I don't want to give too much of it away.
Not a whole lot of gore.
There's some, but not a whole lot.
There's nothing gratuitous in it in that sense.
But it's powerful.
It's well done.
And there were people walking out of the New York theater last night sobbing.
There were people in tears.
Other people weren't saying anything.
They had a lot of families from United 93 sitting in the back of the theater watching it last night.
People who have seen it in advance, as I did, think that it's better than their expectations were.
Also, I interviewed the writer of the movie and the director, Paul Greengrass, for the upcoming issue of the Limbaugh Letter.
And I'm thinking that tomorrow, because the movie opens tomorrow, we don't do this very much, but I think in this case, I wouldn't mind playing just a few short excerpts from this interview.
I'll give you an example of one that I would like.
Mike, I'm sure you've still got the raw footage, if you will, hanging around there.
Mr. Greengrass was, and you should know this, by the way, and he was unabashed in admitting this to me.
He's very liberal.
He's from Great Britain, maybe Ireland, I'm not sure, but he's made Suddy Bloody Sunday movie in 2002 about the IRA.
Very much interested in terrorism, and he was fascinated, as all liberals are, when we began discussing the movie, that he actually got along with me.
It's one of the most fun things I do: talk to a bunch of liberals who are prepared for whatever, and they end up enjoying themselves, and he made remarks about that.
But he also made no bones about the fact that he's very liberal, but you won't see any of that in the movie.
Well, depending, you cannot watch this movie, Mark, without attaching your own current political perspective to it.
Unlike if you had been able to see this movie two days after the event, you might not have the same political perspective that you now have five years later.
And so there's a couple scenes in there that I think the left will be able to, the kook fringe left will be able to point to and say, see, see, see, it's all Bush's fault.
But most people watching this are going to just have an overwhelming, deep involvement in this thing.
And they're going to end up despising the people who should be despised.
And the movie makes no bones about who's responsible here.
One of the things that I'd like to pull from the interview that I recall is that Greengrass was telling me that what I want to do is start a conversation about what we do about this.
We must come to a consensus about this.
And I said, well, Mr. Greengrass, your movie answers what we should do about it.
Your movie, plan its day, answers what we should do about it.
We don't need consensus.
We need leadership.
I said, half the country doesn't think we're at war.
Half the country doesn't want to think we're at war.
Half the country doesn't believe we got a problem.
Half the country thinks the enemy's in the White House.
I said, consensus isn't going to happen on this.
We need leadership.
Your movie gives the answer.
And you kill the terrorists.
You kill them before they have a chance to do what it is they intend to do.
Speaking of which, have you seen the video of Zarkowi?
Zarkawi finally showing his face for the first time.
Everybody's going, gaga.
It's not that that interests me about Zarkowi.
There's a newspaper interview or a story in the New York Times, and they review his video.
And the New York Times says Zarkawi mocked President Bush and accused him of lying to the American people.
Indeed, the new Zarkawi video accuses President Bush of arrogance and said the president had become a liar to your own people.
You claim that everything's under control, and it appears afterward that you are lying.
Now, who does that sound like?
It sounds like Democrats.
How about Howard Dean, Al Gore, Jimmy Carter, Harry Reid, Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, who served in Vietnam, by the way, Carl Levin, Nancy Pelosi, and on and on and on.
Sounds like Saddam at his trial in Baghdad.
Bush lied.
I had no weapons of mass destruction.
Bring me Senator Kennedy as a character witness over here.
I've made this point countless times on my program with great effectiveness, my friends, because that's what I do.
That's why I'm effective.
This new video by Zarkowi is an excellent opportunity to remind all of you that sounds just like the DNC is writing his scripts now.
It's absolutely amazing.
Bob, in Hayward, Wisconsin, nice to have you on the EIB network.
Hello.
What a privilege.
I've waited 15 years to say dittos, Rush.
Thank you, sir.
I'm wondering, I am so sick and tired of hearing people say that it's too soon.
It's too soon.
It was not too soon for Fahrenheit 9-11, which was total spin, but it's too soon now to show the reality, which can only anger people more about what happened.
I would imagine it's probably going to give the president a little more support.
Where is all this it's too soon coming from?
Where's the well, that started when they put together a two-minute or 90-second preview, a trailer, and the trailer ran during other movies originally in theaters on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, Liberalville.
Most of Manhattan is, but the Upper West Side, I mean, that's that.
And they came at people in the movie, came out screaming, it's too soon.
And everybody started asking, is it too soon?
The reason it's too soon is because the left is not through trashing Bush and his culpability and his responsibility for 9-11.
The reason it's too soon is because the movie doesn't blame Bush.
The movie doesn't blame the United States government.
The movie blames the terrorists.
You cannot watch this movie without concluding that the terrorists committed terrorism, which is what terrorists do.
So it's too soon.
They try to know.
Our psyche, our emotions can't handle it.
It's too soon.
You imagine this being said after Pearl Harbor?
Five years go by, we can't watch film of the attack.
It's too soon.
Hell, we had already made plans to wipe the Japanese out by then.
Back after this.
Stay with us.
Back in the saddle here, the EIB Southern Command, Rush Limbaugh, America's anchorman, utilizing talent on loan from God.
By the way, somebody, drive-by caller, somebody who can't stay on the air to make the comment, said that the 10% of the proceeds that go to the Flight 93 Memorial are only from the weekend take, the first weekend, not the entire run.
So whichever it is, the first weekend take will no doubt be the largest take of the whole run, the way these things work out.
Regardless, it is 10% of the weekend take, according to a drive-by caller, David Moore, Oklahoma.
Welcome to the Rush Lindbaugh Program.
Nice that you're with us.
Raj, fabulous to talk with you this morning.
Thank you, sir.
I'm an optimistic conservative, and I truly believe that the Tony Snow appointment is a win for conservatives and for conservatism.
I think it's a sign that the president isn't trying to appease the media, isn't trying to cave, isn't trying to play along to get along.
I like the fact that Tony Snow is going to have an input in policy, and I think he's going to really get a chance to speak his mind not only to the president, but also to the press corps.
What do you think about some of these Democrat activists saying, hey, Tony's okay?
He's not an ideologue.
He's a principled, pragmatic conservative.
What's your reaction when you hear Landy Davis and Steve McMahon say that?
That they can see the writing on the wall and they're trying to get in.
And actually, the reverse is happening.
They're trying to get along with Tony so they can get a little closer to him if that might be possible and perhaps influence him in a different way than the normal.
I don't think they're going to intimidate him into trying to get along with them.
I think now they're kind of playing the opposite side of that game.
We'll see.
It'll be interesting to watch.
I think I hate to hazard a guess on this, but I think it isn't going to be long before they start savaging the poor guy.
It's just in the cards, folks.
They're going to start savaging him.
I don't know.
Well, I don't know that he goes to cocktail parties with them and try to butter him up, but the press corps is who they are.
And the target is George W. Bush, and they're not going to go soft in there, turn nice just because Tony Snow, who may be nice to them, happens to be the press secretary.
Now, one thing, Tony, reading what Tony said he wanted to do, he wants to increase the media's access to the president, knowing that they're a huge beast that has to be fed.
This is what he said.
We'll just have it, I don't know, we'll just have to wait and see what happens.
But look, folks, a tiger is a tiger, a snake is a snake, and the Washington Press Corps is the Washington Press Corpse.
And it doesn't matter who the press secretary is.
They did the same thing to Harry Fleischer.
They tried it with McClellan.
And we'll just see.
All right.
President Bush yesterday ordered a temporary suspension of environmental rules for gasoline, which are creating bottlenecks in the U.S. gasoline markets and announced a federal investigation into potential manipulation of gas prices that have topped $3 per gallon.
The president was responding to high fuel costs that are expected all summer, said that oil companies have a responsibility to American motorists and called on Congress to strip away tax breaks that the corporations are enjoying amid record profits.
The president said, listen, at record prices, these energy companies have got large cash flows.
They need to reinvest those cash flows into expanding refining capacity or researching alternative energy sources.
Okay.
I know what most of you are saying and how you're reacting to this.
Well, let me try it this way.
What is the price today for a gallon of snake oil?
Forget gasoline, forget ethanol, forget MTBE.
How many miles can you get on a gallon of snake oil, ladies and gentlemen?
I asked myself, was the Salem witch hunt this bad?
Did it rely on more ignorance and more fear and more pandering than this oil and gasoline price issue is relying on?
I mean, Salem, the Salem witch hunt, that was in 1692.
Here we are.
We're in the 21st century, my friend.
Or are we really?
Here are the rants that we have.
Brink up the oil company.
So Bush gave them everything that they wanted.
And then it's just not enough for Chuck Schumer.
Now Chuck Schumer wants to break up the oil companies.
Break up the oil companies, hit them with an excess profit tax, which the tax president says he's not going to do that.
Now the left's out there saying, we want investigations into how this gouging is taking place and we want lynching.
Stir them up.
And I said, there's just a bunch of snake oil being sold to people out there.
And I'm wondering what the mileage is.
And the liberals are the ones lighting the torches.
They're out of power and they want power.
Our guys are sadly following the mob.
They're in power and they want to keep it.
So the mob is setting.
It's like this United 93 movie.
People think there was a massive outcry of people who said, it's too soon.
It's too soon.
For all we know, one wacko leftist came out of the theater and said it's too soon, and it got amplified into a whole country thinking this by the time the drive-by media got through with it.
So our guys, sadly, are following the mob because they're in power and they want to keep power.
And the president, I mean, the more you love him, the sadder you are that he has to go along to get along.
He, of all people, knows the reality here, and his proposals do not address the reality.
His proposals are not the problem.
This is pure pandering, selling snake oil.
And if there's any excess here, it's not excess profits.
It's excess pandering.
We have a real world situation that's as basic as the law of supply and demand.
And Dingy Harry and the Democrats cannot filibuster the law of supply and demand.
They'll try, but they can't do it.
It's very simple.
Demand is up and we need more supply.
And the left has done everything they can to prevent more supply.
It's really that complicated here, folks.
Nigeria is shut down their oil production.
They're 3% of the world's output.
They got terrorist problems over there.
We've got Katrina after effects.
We still have refiners.
The refineries are not at full capacity.
We have the oil fields out in the Gulf that are still not up to full production.
We're also going through this mess here of getting rid of MTBE by the 5th of May and switching over to ethanol.
Now, the reason that there are shortages of gasoline with ethanol, or have been, is because MTBE is an additive.
You can mix it with water and oil because they don't mix, but ethanol will mix with water.
And so it has to be added after the distribution process where there's no chance that water is going to get into the mix.
And so it's changed the way we distribute gasoline going to ethanol.
If ethanol is mixed too soon or too improperly or improperly at all, as the water gets into the mix, it will mix with ethanol.
That'll change the octane and give you the...
Remember when you used to see gasoline commercials?
Your engine knocking.
Well, don't buy that shell garbage.
Go out and buy our Texaco stuff from the man who wears the star because our octane doesn't cause knocks in your engine.
Well, until May 5th rolls around and until we finally make the switchover from MTBE to ethanol and finalize the mixing and the distribution process, there are going to be these temporary outages of supply at certain gas stations.
It has nothing to do with the overall supply of oil, has nothing to do with anything other than the switchover.
But yet it's being amplified and thrown into this missive max of hysteria to talk about our massive mix of hysteria to make people think that all hell's breaking loose here.
When in fact, it is the left that's done everything they can to prevent this country from meeting its own growing supply needs.
And they've gotten away with it for years until demand caught up with supply and now outstrips it.
Demand is outstripping supply in a lot of places.
Now, I heard the other day, and I haven't been able to source this, but I heard the other day that China and India combined are now using as much oil and gasoline as we did 10 years ago.
Now, you can't have that kind of new introduction on the demand side without there having some impact on supply.
And of course, the more demand, the more precious the commodity, the price goes up.
So what does the left do when another one of its core beliefs falls apart?
They shift the blame.
The war on poverty failed, and so they end up blaming greedy Republicans and tax cuts for the rich.
Urban education is an absolute disaster.
It's failing.
What do they do?
They blame greedy religious schools and private schools.
Energy prices are soaring.
And instead of blaming themselves, which they never do, they blame greedy big oil.
It's not what a Chucky Schumer says.
He either knows it's a bunch of BS or else he's a fool.
But let's go through the list.
We have trouble in the supply side in Nigeria, the Sudan, and Venezuela.
We've got the Katrina disasters.
Refiners are still behind.
All this boutique refining and EPA rulings, which is one of the president has done away with them or will in the near future.
And the no-solution solution of ethanol and ethanol conversion problems, ethanol shortage, high tariffs on importing ethanol to relieve the shortage.
Blah, blah, blah, blah.
For now, the politics of this is what interests me and the hypocrisy, the bouncing off the walls as politicians blame themselves or shame themselves, I should say, in an election year and try to blame Bush and try to blame big oil and so forth.
It's just maddening.
And yet, I have no doubt that they have concluded in the White House that his approval numbers are tied directly to the gasoline price.
There's no question in my mind that's what it's not Iraq.
It's not the war on terror.
It's the gasoline prices.
And that's also why people don't hear and don't accept the news of a strong and roaring economy.
You know, one of the most interesting things to me about this is that despite the price rise in gasoline and energy products, the core inflation rate is holding steady.
It's stunning everybody, the experts included.
But it's clear the president feels the need to get in on the pandering and the snake oil because there are larger concerns, and that is the midterm elections, the completion of his agenda, getting tax cuts made permanent, funding the war in Iraq and making sure that the war on terror continues.
So they've rolled the dice and they said, okay, we'll join the fray here on the gas price business, and I'll go out there and I'll make it look like I'm going to be tough on the oil companies.
Our oil company buddies, they understand how this works.
It happens to them every time this situation arises.
But the one place the president doesn't appear to be flexible at all is when it comes to immigration.
So they hear you on a port deal.
They don't hear you on immigration.
They hear you on gasoline price.
Two out of three ain't bad.
Back in a moment.
Here we have more bad news for the Democrats.
Sales of new homes soared in March by the largest amount in 13 years.
New home sales rebounded strongly in March.
Home sales up in all areas of the country, led by a 35.7% surge in the West.
Sales rose 10.9% in the Midwest, 6.9% in the South, and 4.7% in the Northeast.
So the Libs have to wait a little longer for the economic collapse that they have been attempting to engineer.
Ladies and gentlemen, they think they've got it with the gasoline price.
Now, I want to go back to the snake oil business, this analogy, if you will.
Because let's look at the anti-war template of the left.
How fond are they of saying, Bush was wrong on the war, he was wrong on everything.
Right?
So, as usual, we sit here, we get in the defensive mode.
No, he wasn't, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Need to turn the tables.
How wrong has the left been on end war?
How long wrong has the left been on nuclear power?
How wrong has the left been on offshore drilling?
And how wrong have they been on building refineries?
And I'm not talking about talking point wrong.
I mean, really, really substantively wrong on things.
They and their allies are as much to blame.
And when I say allies, I don't just mean the environmentalist wackos.
I'm talking about tax authorities because the federal governments and state governments combined make more money on oil than gasoline sales than the oil companies make selling gasoline.
And they do it with taxes.
Details of that coming up in a moment.
Everybody from Al Gore on down, this is the environment template.
Everybody from Al Gore on down, Al Gore on up, I mean, he's at the bottom, has told you that we Americans care more about the pristine frozen tundras in NWAR than energy prices.
Well, if that's the case, what's the fuss about here?
Why is the left fussing about prices?
They're getting what they want.
They're getting high prices, which they hope will translate to less use.
We're not drilling in NWAR.
We're not drilling anywhere.
We're not exploring anywhere domestically.
So why all the fuss about gas prices?
Well, because they're a bunch of damned hypocrites, and all they're doing is trying to focus your rage and anger on the Bush administration away from them.
And then you've got people like Kerry or somebody said, we need shocking tax increases to curtail energy use.
They have that template.
The bottom line is this.
It's all going a little bit too far.
Of all the federal and state taxes, guess which state is the greediest?
Of all federal and state taxes, which state is the greediest?
And it's the one with the biggest panderer.
New York.
Right you are, Mr. Stergley.
The state that gave us Chucky Schumer, the state that gave us Hillary Clinton as senator.
Chucky Schumer, the man who pretends to be fighting greed.
New York State, ladies and gentlemen, does not tax gasoline per gallon like other states.
New York taxes gasoline per dollar.
And that makes New York the highest taxer of energy prices in the country.
According to Fox News, New York State tax 62.9 cents per gallon because you have to calculate the tax per dollar.
So the New York tax goes up.
The level stays the same, but the more you have to pay to fill up your tank, the more taxes you're paying.
62.9 cents per gallon in New York for gasoline on top of 18.4 cents federal.
That's over 80 cents a gallon in taxes for New York and the feds on a gallon of gasoline.
So like any witch hunt here, folks, from Salem to snake oil, the real problem is not just the panderers, it's those who join in the pandering.
And of course, I understand why this is taking place.
The Republicans in power, they want to stay in power.
Democrats out of power, they want to get their power.
But I'm beginning to wonder if our two-party system of Democrats and Republicans needs to be recast.
I'm wondering if we already have a three-party system.
Democrats and Republicans versus conservatives.
Back in a moment.
Get this, folks.
We'll have details coming up soon.
The Senate just now voted to divert some of the money that President Bush requested for the war in Iraq to instead increase patrols against illegal immigrants on the nation's borders and to increase security at the ports.
An amendment cutting Bush's Iraq request by $1.3 billion to pay for new border patrol agents, aircraft, and some fencing at border crossings was adopted on a 59 to 39 vote in the United States Senate.
The first hours in the can.
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