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May 16, 2006 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:15
May 16, 2006, Tuesday, Hour #2
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Time Text
I want to share a headline here with you.
And and see I just I mean, when you hear this, dig deep to find your gut reaction.
Democrats plan to inject spirituality into agenda.
Now, what's the first thing?
What's the first thing that crosses your mind when you hear, or if you have a chance to read it, Democrats plan to inject spirituality into agenda.
Uh greetings.
Uh ladies and gentlemen, we're back.
Broadcast excellence rolls right on uh uh uh 133 in about a half hour from now, a little bit more than a half hour, we will have uh Vice President Cheney uh on the program for a few minutes uh to discuss the um the immigration reform uh proposal the president made last night in his speech and what's going on uh in Congress as uh as it affects that.
And I tell you, uh if if you missed the first hour of the program, let me sum it up for you very quickly.
There's one place, and I know that there are a lot of you uh out there who uh just you're so angry at the Republicans, you're gonna throw the bums out, or you're not gonna vote, or you're not gonna send the money and all.
I understand all that.
But I'm gonna tell you something.
Based on this, this is frightening stuff what is happening in the Senate with their so-called compromise bills uh on immigration, and it is apparent to me that we cannot surrender control of the House of Representatives.
The House of Representatives is where is is is where right now the conservative movement, such that it is, uh, exists in Washington.
That's the one place where the Senate and whoever else in the White House down the road can be checked.
Uh the the House immigration uh proposals make sense.
Uh they've they've got the sense of uh reason about them, a sense of reality.
I mean, folks, look at this.
We're we're we're we're we're talking about a hundred and seventeen to two hundred and seventeen million new legal immigrants, and some of that will be comprised of illegals being made legal during the period in 20 years.
Two-thirds of the population added to the current population in 20 years.
Now, this is not the 1800s.
This is w in the eighteen hundreds we didn't have massive welfare programs.
We didn't have uh uh a lot of uh uh these these things that are gonna that this number of people put pressure on.
We had a lot of territory that was not developed in this country.
We had a lot of wide open spaces we could handle all of this.
Um uh that kind of immigration.
It's different ball of wax now.
Uh and you and you can't simply treat immigration today as is as it was treated in the eighteen hundreds or even in the early nineteen hundreds, because back then people had sponsors.
There was a system uh the the acculturation, the assimilation was uh uh a part of it, so the old melting pot would be met.
This this is just adding workers, and I uh you know the Democrats um are just standing around uh acting as spectators.
They are not proposing anything at all.
They're sort of like this is gonna make some of you mad.
Colin Powell.
Uh you remember back the days Colin Powell had 70% approval ratings?
Well, it was understandable he didn't even chosen a party at that point.
They were talking about Colin Powell for president.
And I th I uh I was not on the bandwagon.
Larry King giving me all kinds of grief for not being on the Powell bandwagon.
I'm never on a conventional wisdom bandwagon because there was a problem.
He hadn't even told us what party he was a member of or going to join, and then he hadn't he hadn't taken a position on any issues.
And I said, once he does that, once he tells us what his view on his abortion on abortion is, once he identifies a party, that 70%'s gonna get smaller, it's gonna get a lot smaller.
Well, the Democrats almost have the same circumstance now on immigration.
They're they're bystanders.
They're simply bystanders and spectators, and they're sitting out there throwing bricks and rocks at Bush, and they're they're thinking that the Republican base is gonna split apart on this, the Republican Party is gonna split apart on this, and so they're they're implementing the cardinal rule when your enemy is in the process of what you think is destroying himself, get out of the way and let it happen.
And I'm telling you, this cannot be allowed to happen in the House of Representatives.
Uh i i i whatever anger you have, the th it's imperative uh because that's that's that's where the conservative movement now is.
Uh and the Democrats simply they're looking at all this as a bunch of new voters.
Well, yeah, I mean they are.
They're they're they're as excited as they can be.
Uh but I'm told you this you a lot of these nitwits out there think this is 1880.
We didn't have entitlement programs, we didn't have free medical care.
Uh We had large land areas to settle.
There was a requirement that people come here legally, have sponsors, have skills, be clean of all medical afflictions and all that.
You know the number of people who didn't get in here because they are sick of some kind?
It used to be much different than it is now.
And, you know, a lot of people say, well, there's...
We have this romantic attachment to uh immigration system because after all, Mr. Limbaugh, we are a nation of immigrants.
Yeah, well, what we're talking about now in this stupid Senate bill is rejecting the immigrant system that we have had through most of our history.
We are not copying it.
We are bastardizing it.
What, Mr. Snerdley?
What?
I don't care.
I don't the the how the House doesn't have provisions for the guest worker program.
They'll gonna work that up.
It doesn't matter.
The House is not proposing 200 million new immigrants over 20 years.
That's folks.
I don't have any humanity.
You know me.
I'm the servant of humanity.
I mean, I I I I love humanity, but and and I uh none of this has anything to do with ethnicity or anything else.
Don't confuse it here.
We our our social welfare system is already stretched.
I'm telling you, Barron's magazine has come out and they have said that this is the first year now that the Social Security Surplus does not cover Medicare payments.
Everything we've heard about uh these programs coming due down the road is true.
They are gonna happen at some point.
Look at some people say, but rush, but rush, all these new people.
Why, why that's great because it's gonna add to people we've had people call say this.
It's gonna add to the Social Security contributor roles.
All these new workers, we make them legal, they're gonna be paying into Social Security.
And there I'm gonna get my benefits.
You're forgetting the drain.
They're all going to have children.
They're all gonna be they're gonna be uh minimum wage or not very much above it.
The drain on the Social Security and other safety net programs is gonna far outweigh whatever contributions these people end up making via payroll taxes.
Look, folks, if if these people, let's use the people coming from Mexico illegally, if they were a net plus to the Mexican government in the same way you think they're gonna be a net plus to us, Mexico would be building the wall to keep them in.
Now you're gonna have to get your head screwed on right about this.
Some of you people out there, and I know you've called here, you've talked about it, you wait a bit.
Yeah, well, you you're right to be worried about it, but the solution you've got, legalizing illegal immigrants is only going to put a strain on it like you can't believe.
Uh Garrett.
What do you mean we must have a civil debate?
I'm being civil.
Actually, we're not having a debate.
I am monologuing.
There is no debate here.
I am a benevolent dictator.
We'll have debates when we go to the phones.
Uh and so forth.
I got to go to the audio sound bites very quickly.
Uh in fact, number seven first.
After the State of the Union address on January 31st, uh CBS anchor Bob Schiefer revealed the latest flash poll numbers on President Bush's remarks.
Now, remember, this is not necessarily reflect the feelings of the country, because traditionally we found out in recent years, more Republicans watch when a Republican makes the speech, more Democrats watch when a Democrat makes the speech.
But did our viewers tonight approve of President Bush's proposals?
77% approved.
23% did not.
So we said at the time, Bob, why even do the poll?
If you're going to trash the credibility of the poll before you release the results, why are you going to give us the results?
And by the way, I don't remember them ever saying after a Clinton State of the Union address, and by the way, you know, we really hate to tell you this because uh the uh Republicans don't watch Clinton, only Democrats do.
No, they just ran the poll as though it was a honest reflection of the American people.
At large watching a Clinton speech.
Well, here's Bill Schneider on CNN's Anderson Cooper last night.
They did a flash poll on the president's immigration speech.
We interviewed people both before and right after he spoke.
Keep in mind that those who watched the speech were more Republican than the country as a whole.
A lot of Democrats just do not watch President Bush speak.
Now, the overall reaction was 40 percent very positive, 39 somewhat positive, only 18 percent negative.
When we looked among people interviewed before the speech, 42 percent said they had a positive reaction to the president's immigration proposals after the speech, that jumped to sixty-seven percent.
But don't listen to our poll because as we told you, Democrats hate Bush and they don't watch him speak.
This is only Republicans.
Why Bill, why even put the results out if you're going to discredit and trash your own poll?
You and She for both.
Note the technique.
Note the similarity from network to network, drive by to drive by.
Just basically telling us their polls worthless, telling us not to believe what the poll says.
But they see they they committed beforehand, they promoted the poll, so they had to give us the results.
Now, drive-by print media, as I as I mentioned in the first hour, just give you some headlines here at New York Times.
President's middle path disappoints both sides of sharply divisive immigration issue.
As I said last hour.
You know, we hear from these political professionals that this is a nation made up of moderates and independents.
The great unwashed, the great undecided.
Yeah, we got the Democratic base, we got the Republican base, but they cancel each other out, and everybody that knows what's going on, running for president, they know they got to go out and get the big middle.
We're a nation and the independents and the moderates are celebrated as the people that are not partisan, they're smarter than everybody else in the room.
They decide things issue by issue by issue.
Well, let's just check now.
If New York Times would praise Bush as a great moderate here, oh, struck the right balance, then his approval numbers ought to skyrocket if this is a nation of moderates, right?
We'll wait and see.
Keep a sharp eye on the uh future results.
Uh John Pedoritz, JPOD, New York Post, Middle Ground is the theme of his piece.
Uh Los Angeles Times, uh Bush, his critics overreach on immigrants.
Well, that's a columnist.
Uh never mind.
Elizabeth Buemiller, New York Times.
Behind Bush's address lies a deep history.
This is a sympathetic piece.
Uh about Bush and how he still believes in the power of an immigration to invigorate the nation.
And all the way back when he was governor of Texas, he's been very consistent about this, and he's actually a very compassionate, thoughtful guy on this.
One of the things that worried me, I'm in the New York Times starts liking you.
Oh, you might be doing something wrong.
Washington Post liked the speech too.
One nation.
We're unified.
Uh Bush seeks middle ground on immigration.
It seems like in the drive-by media today, the phrase it pays is middle ground.
So uh they liked it.
Bill Schneider's uh flash poll, sixty-seven percent of you apparently like the president's speech.
Uh I'm telling you all eyes on the Senate, because that's that's where the real danger in immigration reform uh is lurking.
I remember Vice President Cheney here at 133 Eastern, uh, as we start the um the first break at the bottom of the hour.
Back after this, don't go away.
America's anchor man serving humanity simply by being here, simply by showing up on the one and only excellence in broadcasting network.
All right.
This uh this headline, Democrats plan to inject spirituality into agenda.
Folks, if you have to inject it, uh, it ain't real.
If you have to go out and put your spirituality in a syringe and go and shoot up, which is what injected means.
Uh, then it's not there in the first place.
And a headline says it all, but the story is even better.
A conference geared to help Democrats infuse God into their politics begins tomorrow at all souls Unitarian Church in D.C. with the unveiling of a spiritual covenant with America.
The spiritual activism conference aims to equip liberals to operate in a political arena where religion has played a more prominent role since 2000, says Rabbi Michael Lerner, big former buddy of Hillary's, founder of the Jewish magazine Ticoon, and the chief conference organizer says, while we support the liberal agenda, uh, we're going to a much deeper level with this spiritual critique.
We want to bring in non-utilitarian frameworks that sees other human beings as embodiments of the sacred.
After some 1,200 conferees received copies of the Covenant, which is an alternative to Newt's contract with America.
They're expected to discuss it Thursday in meetings with members of Congress.
Rabbi Lerner said, We're not we're not taking a liberal agenda and sticking on some Bible quotes.
It's a it's a whole rethinking on how to do liberal and progressive politics in a in a whole different language.
A guest list for the conference uh includes anti-war activists like Cindy Sheehan, who will help lead a prey in for peace uh out outside the White House on Thursday afternoon, a pray-in.
That's not what it's called.
So the Democrats want to inject spirituality into their agenda.
All right, to the phones, people patiently waiting here.
Uh David in Charleston, West Virginia.
I'm glad you called, sir.
Welcome.
Oh, thank you, Rush.
It's an honor to be on your show.
Thank you, sir.
Uh let's not call because uh in in your opening monologue, you said that the president you thought the president was a sincere leader, uh giving a sincere speech, and I found that just to be the opposite.
I mean, he blamed all the problems, essentially, as you said, throw through them back on Congress when he uh Congress has appropriated money for additional border guards.
He refused to spend part of it, 500 even higher.
They've appropriated money for additional beds for uh for detention of d of even terrorist suspects that they catch.
For two years, he's refused to spend the money.
Uh enforcement against businesses.
Now, listen to this.
It's dropped from 5,000 a year under his administration to less than ten.
Less than ten businesses a year.
They can't find them when they had to shut down because of this uh immigrant march.
But the Federal Government can't find them.
They can't enforce the law when one social security number is being used ten thousand times.
He says this is a country of law.
It's only a country of laws for us, the American people.
I take it.
Okay, hold it.
Hold it.
I get your point.
I get your drift.
Let me just ask you a question.
Very simply.
What did you want to hear last night?
I wanted to hear that he was going to build a double wall across that border to close the border and give us border security.
And then after that, he could deal with the illegal immigrants that we have and the future.
That's what I want.
I wanted the House bill.
And right now I'm not represented anymore except by Shelley Moore Capito.
Because it seems like the President and the Republicans in the Senate, they represent Mexico.
They don't they don't represent me.
Well, I agree with you by the Republicans in the Senate.
Uh is these these guys are a bunch of compromisers and moderates.
Um way too many of them there.
That's I I think you are being represented in the House.
We all are.
That's that's to me uh the imperative here as all this uh all this goes forward.
All right, so you you didn't get what you wanted as the you didn't get your double wall.
And uh you you you I don't know if you had an honest expectation that I mean did you actually expect the president was going to uh offer that last night?
Well, I thought if he listened to the people to the 70, 80 percent of the people who want that border closed, yeah, he might actually think about that.
Instead, he gives us smoke and mirrors and kind of spits in our face for voting for him.
Yeah, but he's never indicated that he's gonna build a wall.
And the the leaks that uh that the government, the White House put out yesterday about the speech didn't didn't get anywhere near the fact there's gonna be a wall.
Uh we knew about the National Guard.
Uh we knew uh some of the other elements uh of the speech.
I think the leaks were not all that uh accurate.
Um but but nevertheless, uh the the uh uh things that you want, I mean you you you know that you uh you weren't gonna get in this speech last night.
So it does raise questions.
I raised the question yesterday.
What is going on?
You talk about 70, 80 percent of the people who want the border closed, and yet CNN's flash poll last night, 67% said they like the proposal, like the speech.
I'd be interested to see uh if there's a poll that we think we can trust down the road about this speech last night, what people actually think of it.
Uh uh that's why, you know, I I think the speech last night was sort of uh not really the point anymore.
Uh what's going on in the Senate is the point.
Uh with this compromise bill.
Um look, uh break is coming up.
We'll ask Vice President Cheney some of these questions, because he's next uh when we get back, and then we'll get back to your calls.
800-282-2882.
Don't go away.
And welcome back, Rush Limbaugh and the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
And once again, uh we are thrilled and honored to have with us the Vice President of the United States, Dick Cheney.
Mr. Vice President, welcome back.
As always, great to have you here.
Well, good afternoon, Rush.
All right, question.
Um uh is the is is the is the president, are you and the president uh the administration aware of the uh uh uh dissatisfaction on the whole issue of illegal immigration that exists uh uh uh not just within the Republican base but within the country at large.
Uh yes, we are, I think, Rush.
Um in my travels out around the country I've found for a long time now uh immigration, uh illegal immigration in particular to be a big issue, and it's true uh no matter what part of the country you go to, you of course you find it down along the border in Texas, Arizona, New Mexico.
But I also was out in the Seattle area the other day and and talked to several folks out there, and it was a significant issue up there, too.
It takes different forms, different places around the country, but it is a tough issue.
It's complicated, it's important, and uh so there are uh I think legitimate concerns out there on the part of a lot of folks.
What why do you think so many people and I just I'm I'm just judging from uh telephone calls I've had, and when I make trips to California like you just mentioned, I can't get away from the subject.
Uh it's all anybody wants to talk about, particularly in uh in Southern California.
Why is it that so many people don't think that the uh steps the President uh is outlining and has outlined over the years will address the seriousness of the problem.
Well, I think part of it is th that a lot of folks aren't aware of what's already being done.
Uh I mean the President pointed out in his speech, uh, for example, that since we got to office, we have uh arrested, turned back, uh sent back across the border some six million illegals.
Uh that's a huge number.
I mean, there's a huge amount of effort that's gone into that.
We've had a very significant increase in resources.
It's just that the problem is so big, there's still a lot more to be done.
And to date, we've not yet been successful at getting a comprehensive approach out of the Congress that uh would allow us to address some of these issues.
So we've been doing what we could administratively, we've been doing what we could with uh uh appropriations bills, but in terms of basic legislation, we've still got a ways to go.
The House has acted, Senate has not yet acted, and then of course we'll have to get something out of the conference, and what the President did last night was lay out a fairly precise program in terms of what he'd like to see.
Well, let's talk about what's going on in the Senate.
There are a number of bills there.
The compromise bill we're being told is Hegel Martinez, two Republicans proposing this bill.
Uh Robert Rector at Heritage and Senator Sessions, who I know you respect, uh both did uh joint analyses of this bill and and what they project using conservative estimates is anywhere from over the next twenty years one hundred and ten to two hundred and seventeen million uh legal immigrants uh uh entering the country and illegals as part of that number being uh granted legal status.
What what is the public policy purpose for doing that in these kinds of numbers?
Well, I haven't seen uh their analysis uh rush, and at this point, of course, what you have in the in the House bill is uh specifically a border enforcement bill, which you've got in the Senate bill is uh bill that uh goes after border enforcement, but also and you've got Hegel Martinez and there's uh Kennedy McCain there.
A lot of proposals kicking around.
They have the Senate has not finalized its package yet, so we don't know what's going to come out of the out of the conference.
Uh obviously uh we're gonna want to look at it very carefully to make sure it does achieve the objectives the president's talked about.
Well, it uh just if you haven't seen it, let me give you the bare essentials.
Uh Senator Sessions did his own analysis.
It's a six hundred and fourteen-page bill.
I know it's got to be conference, but this is a pretty uh radical starting point.
They have uh anywhere from a hundred and seventeen to two hundred seventeen million legal Americans.
That's two thirds of the population over the next uh twenty years if this bill were to become law and if the president signed it as is.
Now hopefully these are people who would uh attain legal status.
No, this is a this is a combination of both.
This is a an increase in the number of illegal immigrants as well as added to illegals who would then be made legal over that twenty-year time frame.
And it also allows uh it for exponential growth because these people would be allowed to bring in their family members as well.
And one of the big concerns here is this is the strain this would put on an already stretched social uh safety wear uh uh welfare net and this this sort of thing.
And and so these numbers are just striking to be uh add two-thirds of the country's population in twenty years.
Uh I don't think we can handle that financially, and certainly not uh uh in an assimilation way.
Right.
Well, if that's the case, I would hope that would inform the debate and that Congress will consider those kinds of uh of uh impacts very carefully before they finally pass something.
We'll certainly weigh in them.
Well, Senator Sessions is uh I think the floor debate today is spent some time uh really working the numbers, and he thinks most senators aren't even aware of these numbers, and he's going to do his best to make them aware during the debate.
So hopefully uh that's true.
Now um let's talk about the National Guard.
Uh six thousand guardsmen, what's the length of time uh that it is expected they will be needed.
Well, the the total proposal is to run for one year in terms of of uh using uh the National Guard uh and over that period of time we've added uh uh some three thousand uh border patrols since we got here.
We're gonna increase that by an additional six thousand.
That's a fifty percent increase in the border patrol over where we are today.
Uh and the National Guard would be in effect to supplement uh what's there already in terms of the border patrol during that period of time while you recruit and train additional border patrol officers.
That is the guardsmen as a temporary measure.
Units uh it is expected would go down as part of their regular training rotation, and this would be uh uh for up to six thousand at any one time, uh the way they'd handle their annual training exercise that would go down in support of the uh the border patrol themselves.
Um let me ask you this on behalf of my audience simply because of a number of emails.
People don't think that this number of six thousand, which probably will add up to two or three thousand on duty at any given time is actually going to make uh much of an impact.
What would you say to them?
Well, it's a uh i it's not just about the National Guard.
You've already got a large number of folks working down there under the auspices of the Border Patrol.
We've got uh big investments going in now in terms of additional technology in terms of uh sensors and and uh uh aerial vehicles, unmanned aerial vehicles and so forth, uh as well as fences.
One of the very useful things the guard can do uh is what they did there in San Diego a few years ago when they installed uh section offense there that's uh turned out to be a very effective that particular section has been very effective.
Uh basically was built uh by guard troops.
So there are a lot of things they can do to support the effort and to beef up the effort that's already underway, and I think that's the intention with respect to the guard.
It's not a be-all and end-all of uh the operation.
Um I think a lot of our folks who sign up for military service don't sign up to go stand on the border for two or three years uh of active duty.
But this is a way to use the resources of the National Guard to support uh the uh professionals who are otherwise involved in that activity.
We think it makes sense.
It's been done before to some extent in the the counter-narcotics area.
It's not a new concept to have the guard working the border in support of uh federal officials.
As as uh all of you in the administration discuss the issue and and formulate a plan.
Uh do you ever has it ever has a wall, uh an actual wall ever been given given serious consideration?
It is uh given considerious serious consideration, not a a wall, for example, from ocean to ocean.
Uh there are a lot of places out there where it doesn't make sense.
There are other places where it does.
Uh uh, I'm told I'm not an expert in this by any means, but that uh when you get into uh build up urban areas, uh fences, uh security barriers might be a better word for it.
Um are in fact an important part of the overall plan and need to be part of it.
There are other areas where you've got vast spaces out there where you need other kinds of arrangements.
You need roads to be able to patrol.
You can use remote cameras.
You can use unmanned aerial vehicles.
It's partly a matter of getting technology to it as well, too.
But it is a very complicated problem.
We're talking just about one piece of it, just the border security part of it.
But you've also got to address, I think, some of the basic economic incentives that attract people in the first place, all those folks who want to come here for the jobs that they can find.
working in the United States for a lot more than they can make in Mexico or some place in central America.
We think you've got to address all those aspects and facets of the problem and where appropriate uh fences or security barriers uh make good sense but uh I think the experts got to go through and figure out what's the best technique or procedure for uh for each part of the border.
Let me ask you a quick uh political question two prongs to it.
Uh the Dubai ports deal American people spoke out loudly against it.
We don't want any part of it it got killed uh the illegal immigration deal is generating just as much negative response but uh the American people are not getting the reaction the same reaction from government to that uh that that they got on the Dubai ports the a little confused asking questions what's different here we're talking still talking security.
The second thing is uh Democrats, Mr. Vice President frankly getting away with being total bystanders and spectators on this they offer no solution themselves yet they continue to sit around and criticize uh uh the administration and the Republicans over this is there plan to deal with them politically on this well we're uh it is a very tough issue there's no question about it.
You mentioned the Dubai Ports deal, Rush.
That created a firestorm of controversy.
And so Congress quickly backed provisions that would have made it impossible to go forward.
And, of course, the folks at Dubai Ports withdrew their proposal.
The fact is that from the perspective of United Arab Emirates and so forth, I've worked closely with those folks that have been very good allies of ours.
I don't want to go back and and re redo the whole Dubai uh ports operation but the fact of the matter is I thought there was a a very strong emotional reaction there.
I can understand the emotional reaction but it didn't didn't bear much uh resemblance to the basic fundamental facts.
What we have here, I mean is that I suppose there's a difference between trying to govern and solve a major problem which is what the president and those of us who work for him are trying to do versus um the the Democrats in this case who don't have any responsibilities or at least aren't willing to take any responsibilities and want to sit on the sidelines and take pot shots.
This is an important problem for us to to deal with we got some eleven or twelve million illegals in the country.
It is a national security problem.
It's also an economic problem.
If you could round all those folks up tomorrow and put them back over the border, you'd have a big hole in your workforce.
It it is uh not an easy uh simple proposition.
If it was it would have been solved a long time ago.
It's one of those tough uh intractable problems where you're gonna make progress three yards in a cloud of dust.
We need to get started.
Uh we need to get uh border secured that's our top priority but then we need to also deal with these other aspects of the problem.
Mr. Vice President thanks for your time I wish we had a little bit more but I know you're on a tight schedule and it's uh it's thrill with uh w uh whatever time uh we have work with you whenever so thanks very much for being with us now and and uh we look forward to the next time all right it's good to talk to you Rush you uh render great service out there by uh hosting these debates thank you sir very much we'll be back we'll continue in just a moment here uh on the EIB network CNN just put the latest results of their poll up on
their uh website seventy nine percent of those who watched had a very favorable or favorable view of the president's speech last night those who support the president's policies uh increased from forty two to sixty seven percent after that speech last night that's on uh on CNN Beth in Acton, Massachusetts welcome to the E IB network hi.
Hi Russ, How are you?
Fine.
Thank you very much.
Oh, um, boy, it's raining here, but I'll tell you, talking to you makes the sun come out.
You know, speaking of that, I've been watching, I feel so bad for you.
I'm watching video tape of all this flooding up there, and I'm wondering why is there no criticism of Bush and FEMA on this?
How how long has it been raining and the flooding been going on up there?
Uh about a week.
And we got it last spring too.
It's it's really, you know, we can cope with it.
So this is New England.
If we can't cope with the weather, we should leave.
I know, but it well, the hurricanes of weather.
Yeah.
You know, and and and and this is a disaster up there.
This flooding, people being evacuated, and I just I'm wondering where FEMA is and where the criticism of Bush is on this.
Well, don't say anything.
I mean, no, I'm just um obviously I'm making a a uh a facetious point.
That's not why you called, but you you uh you reminded me I was gonna make that point.
So now get back to what it was that you called about.
Well, I know exactly how to deal with the illegal immigrant problem.
And can and thank you so much for letting me talk, by the way.
Um the IRS does a very good job of going after people who don't pay their taxes.
Then why can't we set up a similar system to go after businesses that hire illegal aliens?
And it's very easy for businesses not to hire them because you just go online and go to the something called the basic pilot program and put their social security number in it, and the basic pilot program will tell you whether or not the person is legal, and then don't hire them if they're not.
But if they if there's a business hiring people who aren't legal, fine them in such a way that the fine pays for the cost of dealing with the businesses in the first place.
Right now, this is an interesting comparison that you've made.
Uh the IRS can do it, then why can't we do it uh with uh finding illegals?
Here's the the the relevant facts about the IRS.
Number one, they don't catch every tax cheat.
Yet this country has one of the I mean it's we we we probably set the record in voluntary compliance, and we do so out of nothing but pure fear.
Because when the IRS does audit you, they put you through hell.
And when somebody has been audited, they tell everybody what it's like, and nobody wants to go through an audit because there's a possibility that even if they don't owe any more money, the government's gonna tell them they do, and then what do you do?
Um there are but they're not catching every tax cheat.
They are limiting, they don't have enough agents to run around and monitor everybody either.
Uh they can't possibly it's it would be physically impossible.
So they have used fear now, and it's taken years and years and years for them to affect this level of fear on the part of every taxpayer out there.
Uh but they're more effective than the nothing that would be going on if they weren't there, and it would be more effective to do that than to do nothing.
And then the second the second thing that I think would really work is to get rid of all entitlements for anyone who is not a citizen and to make the punishment for carrying, you know, a f a false ID and pretending to be a citizen very serious.
You know, not just getting fined everything you own, but getting shifted right out of the country in a big hurry and sent somewhere you don't want to go.
You know, if if Sandwich is a very good thing.
Well, I'm look at I'm all for that, but I'll tell you it's never gonna happen.
And I don't mean to be the Democratic Party is never going to let that happen.
The Democratic Party is trying to recruit the very people that you've just described.
Please, Russian, all due respect, I am not a Democrat.
I may live in Massachusetts, and that's because my husband's job is here, and I'm a nurse, so I can work anywhere.
I didn't choose to live here.
I I grew up here, and my family were ardent liberals, and my husband is a decent conservative man, and my oldest son bought a book you wrote.
Wait a minute.
Wait a minute.
Wait, oh that's great.
I appreciate that.
But I didn't accuse you of anything.
No, no, I know you didn't, but you converted me.
And you're you're my only news source.
And and so I my feeling is you make me hopeful that things like this can happen because you're out there informing people.
If you go online and you go to numbers USA dot com, they they have a report card for all the politicians for who is hard on illegal immigration and who isn't, and you can decide who you want to vote for.
Well, we're gonna deal with that too.
I've got to run because I'm out of time here.
But I appreciate you noticing that we are uh optimistic and hopeful and filled with good cheer on this program, and and there's nothing that's gonna change that either.
I'm bombarded with negativism all day, but it just bounces off.
Back after this.
All right, we're gonna move on to other things uh when we get to the next hour.
I know you have uh those of you on the phone still want to talk about this, and that's fine.
But I am going to introduce um other items out there as we uh canvas the country.
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