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Jan. 23, 2007 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:22
January 23, 2007, Tuesday, Hour #2
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Time Text
I still feel so bad that I tricked you people.
And sometimes it's necessary to do that, though, to really reach out of the radio and grab your attention.
Greetings and welcome back.
It's the Rush Limbaugh program.
Here we are at the one and only distinguished and prestigious Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies, the telephone number if you want to be on the program, 800 28282, the email address rush at EIBNet.com.
If you are just tuning in, you're wondering what did I do to trick the audience?
I told them that President Bush was going to tax a portion of health care benefits as income.
He was going to announce it as State of the Union address tonight.
And then I waited for a half hour to drop the other shoe.
The other shoe is there is a huge tax cut being offered to people who buy their own health insurance.
This is an effort to reduce the price and the cost because most people the average health care benefit, this is the average health care benefit for ye uh w employee today is 11,500.
So you got you've got uh uh benefits cost more and benefits that cost less.
And the proposal tonight, which the Democrats have already said is dead on arrival anyway, is that uh every dollar over 15,000 uh of health care benefits will be taxed.
And the the purpose here is to try to get people off of employer programs and buy their own for the express purpose of going shopping it, most people aren't gonna go out and buy $15,000 policies or even $11 or $12,000 policies every year.
Not going to do it, especially when most people think that health care is free.
And let's face it, most of people who have health care as part of their uh uh employment, you never see the money.
You just you get your card, you've got a copay, you got whatever you uh you know, deductible and this sort of thing, but the overall insurance, you don't pay for it.
You don't think.
You are paying for it, you just never see the money.
It's what the employer has to pay to employ you, and so it just it goes somewhere before it ever gets to you.
Now, what you can do, what a movement would be, okay, employer, instead of giving me the insurance, give me what it is it costs, and I'll go buy my own.
I don't think that's gonna happen.
So one of the one of the problems there, even if it weren't dead on arrival, as the Democrats say, and they run the Congress right now.
How many people do you think who who are under the impression, as far as all practicality is concerned, that health insurance is free, it's a benefit, are gonna go out and pay for it.
When with what?
I mean, how many families do you know that just have four or five thousand dollars hanging around, not used, to go out and buy health insurance.
Uh and probably if the employer does, as this program, if it happened, then it would as it progressed theoretically, hypothetically, uh I doubt that the employer would make up in salary what uh you no longer are going to take as a benefit.
Uh but we'd have to see how that worked itself out.
So the bottom line is, yeah, it's it it it's it's theoretically great in in the way that it would uh uh introduce market forces, but health insurance still isn't cheap, even if you do buy it yourself.
And uh the the number of people without vouchers.
Look, this is really the voucher program without vouchers, and I've been in favor of this for I don't know how long.
You get a voucher for whatever health care coverage you get every year, and then whatever you don't spend, you get to keep.
And that would encourage, you know, people shopping for medical services like they shop for everything else.
Uh but it's all moot, folks, dead on arrival.
The Democrats don't want any part of this, they don't want any part of market forces.
Private sector involved in this as little as possible is what they want.
They want the government, uh they want single pay, they want they want national health care.
Hillary's gonna rev that back up.
They want everybody dependent on them for health care.
And you know how big health care is to people.
I mean, it's it's it's something that people literally panic over if they don't have it, other than those who are choosing not to have it.
So big brew haha.
Democrats also, I gotta tell you people something.
Um, I know you're out there flexing your muscles, and you're feeling awfully big and powerful right now.
And you think you think you're gonna create another Vietnam here.
We're gonna get out of Iraq and you're gonna save the soldiers, we're gonna bring the soldiers home, and it's gonna be hunky-dory, it's gonna be peace and light, and we're gonna go back to pre-9-11, and the terrorists are all gonna love us again.
It's over.
You're gonna make this happen.
I guarantee you this.
If you people persist, and if you do in any way succeed in securing defeat of the U.S. military in Iraq, you have no idea the electoral hell that will descend upon you in November of 2008.
Mark my word.
You people had better be careful that you don't get what you ask for here.
You gutless wonders and the Republicans that are joining them running around with these resolutions.
Don't have the guts to withhold funding, don't have the guts to pull the money out of there.
But you have to get on record for whatever personal selfish reason.
The General Petraeus said today that this resolution is going to give hope to the enemy and demoralize our troops, and that got Hillary Clinton all hot and bothered, got her very mad, played her soundbite last hour.
Number of other Democrats, they're getting agitated, particularly because Lieberman and his line of question is really calling uh the Democrats out on this, and these wayward Republicans as well.
Let's go to the audio sound bites here.
Uh, I want you to hear Amon Al Zawi.
Well, yeah, you'll hear him in the background.
Uh it's actually a CNN report, Nick Robertson.
Uh, and I guess we could say this is Zawahiri's pre-buttle uh to President Bush's State of the Union address tonight.
Well, I'd be any shitty.
So many ways, this is vintage.
I'm an Al Zawari criticizing President Bush in Iraq, saying, why send 20,000 uh troops?
Why not send another 50,000 or 100,000?
He said they'll be defeated anyway.
Yeah, he's taunting Bush out there.
What do we mean?
20,000.
Give us 50, give us a hundred thousand to kill.
You're gonna lose them anyway.
Uh, in his pre- and of course the drive-by media was just salivating and excited as they could be over this.
Who does this sound like, by the way?
Aimon Al-Zawahiri, send us twenty thousand, give us fifty, why not another hundred?
They'll be defeated anyway.
Uh, we have heard this somewhere before.
You can put a hundred thousand troops in, and you're gonna up the casualties, up the stakes, increase the violence, uh, and not get a resolution.
Yes, it was John Carey, ladies and gentlemen, who served in Vietnam.
This was a little over a month ago in December 2006 on the Today Show.
David Gregory was interviewing Lurch, who was in Damascus, Syria, negotiating with terrorists.
I. Uh Basher Assad.
And Gregory's question was more troops would not do enough in your estimation to shore up Baghdad, at least give them Maliki government a fighting chance.
You could put a hundred thousand troops in there.
All you're gonna do is up the casualties.
So he once again uh on the same page with Al Qaeda.
John Kerry and the Democrats, whether they know it or not, their instincts lead them to say things that end up being parroted and repeated by Al-Qaeda as though Al-Qaeda are Democrat allies.
Of course, Al Qaeda was pushing for Democrats last November in the elections.
Up next, I've told you that Mrs. Clinton, with her announcement saying that she wanted this national conversation, and uh so forth, all a replica of her uh New York State campaign for Senate,
her listening tour, the whole thing is designed to make sure that she doesn't get any questions, because she doesn't want to answer serious questions, and the press doesn't ask her serious questions anyway, but she wants the focus to be supposedly on you.
Yes, and what you want and what you want to tell her, and then she can react to that, and she can control by the way which of you she appears before, and which of you she chats with, and which of those of you she chooses to uh address and responds.
It's a totally uh captive audience.
It's a closed ceremonial type thing, if you will, and nobody that's gonna cause any trouble or be provocative will be allowed in these conversations.
And I have evidence here uh that the media already uh has lost the testicles in Hillary's testicle lockbox, And you'll hear it right after this.
Don't go away, folks.
My friends, if you thought the news from the Sundance Film Festival yesterday was shocking.
Wait till you hear about the latest movie drawing raves.
It involves a graphic scene of the rape of a 12-year-old.
And there are people very much concerned that they they actually used a 12-year-old actress in this scene.
And people are worried.
Hey, are we going a little too far?
And they interview her, and she's talking about how important it is and what a beautiful film it is.
Um just on the march all over the place, and it's still Redford out there saying that somehow America needs to apologize to him and his community.
Anyway, let me I want to go through this scooter Libby stuff for a second because now, you know, this this this whole trial has been turned into a political fiasco, thanks to the special prosecutor.
As you know, Patrick Fitzgerald in his opening statement today alleged that Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, Scooter Libby, lied and destroyed a note showing Cheney's early involvement.
Fitzgerald said that Cheney told Libby in 2003 that Joe Wilson's wife worked for the CIA, and Libby spread that information to reporters.
When that information got out, it triggered a federal investigation.
But when the FBI and a grand jury asked about what the defendant did, Fitzgerald said he made up a story.
Libby says, hey, I was working at national security.
Don't remember the details of this.
Far more important things were going on.
Now, Cheney was not indicted.
There was no crime committed based on the original purpose of the investigation.
This is a process crime, and now, even though Cheney's not indicted, he's not even an unindicted co-conspirator in the opening arguments.
I'll tell you, I if you those of you who watch Chris Matthews, they may have to put a straitjacket on him and a bucket nearby to control the spittle.
This is this opening statement of Fitzgerald is giving them their Fitzmas.
Here's Cheney.
Cheney deeply involved.
Not indict- this reminds me what they did to Ed Meese when Mies was in the Reagan administration.
I don't remember the total details, but they tried, had a special prosecutor on his some loan that he that he took out for a house in uh in California.
That was all about the appearance of impropriety.
And after the investigation was concluded, and there were no charges, the prosecutor still went on television.
Well, they might not have found anything, but we still think he's a rat.
And we still think he's dirty.
And we still think he's guilty and dis well.
Go ahead and destroy the guy, even though your own investigation proved nothing.
Fitzgerald's investigation about the original charge of outing a covert CIA agent.
There was no covert, and the leak was from Richard Armitage.
But now his name doesn't even get mentioned.
Fitzgerald knew all this.
Now it's time to rake Cheney over the coals.
In an opening statement.
Here is the latest.
Attorneys for Scooter Libby said today that Bush administration officials tried to blame Libby for the leak of the CIA operative's name to cover up for Carl Rove's own disclosures.
The prosecution insisted it was Libby who lied about his role in the case.
As the trial opened with a preview of each side case, it was clear the jury will be tasked with sorting through conflicting statements.
The lawyer Theodore Wells for Libby in opening statements said Libby went to Cheney in 2003 and complained that the White House was subtly blaming him for leaking Valerie Plann's identity to Robert Novak.
They're trying to set me up.
They want me to be the sacrificial lamb, Wells said, Recalling the conversation between Libby and Cheney.
And he quotes Libby as saying, I will not be sacrificed so Carl Rove can be protected.
Let me tell you what I think is going on here, ladies and gentlemen.
I think what is happening here is that Libby's lawyers have figured out that some of the jurors, and Fitzgerald wanted these jurors hate the White House.
They hate Bush.
They hate Rove.
They hate Cheney.
So they're trying now to distance Libby from the White House and part of the Rove team.
They I uh if that's the case, and look, the lawyer's job is to get their client acquitted.
And if and we we know about the jury selection in this trial because you know Fitzgerald wanted all the Bush-hating jurors he could get, and uh the defense got rid of as many as they as they could as they could identify, but there's still some Bush haters and White House haters on this jury.
It's a D.C. jury.
What do you expect?
And so it's obvious here that the legal team for Libby is doing everything they can to make it look like, hey, he's not part of that white house much.
They set him up.
They set him up to save Rove.
Which not a bad legal tactic, but I'm just it is uh it is going to feed the drive-by media.
This is like giving a great white shark as much raw meat as he can handle.
You know, some days I sit here and it j you look out there, and it just appears everything's disintegrating right around us.
And that's because there's no elected conservative leadership in Washington that provides standard for everybody to get in line and follow.
There just isn't everybody's wandered off on the reservation doing their own thing, uh in the Republican Party to Libs are who they are.
So it's um it it's gonna it, folks.
I told you after the election, it's gonna get a lot worse before it gets better.
I knew what I was talking about then, as I always do, and I know what I'm talking about now.
But anyway, this whole this whole trial is nothing now but a political fiasco, and that's thanks to the special prosecutor and the way he has sought to go about this.
This is a political crime that he is actually trying, it's a political crime he couldn't find any evidence for, so he found a process crime, and he's gonna use the trial of the process crime to make it look like it's all about politics.
And that, the State of the Union tonight, the Democrats flexing their muscles against the war in Iraq, I tell you.
It might be worth it to turn on some cable news channels tonight just to see if some of these people don't have heart attacks in their glee.
Matthews is going to want to say so much in the first 20 minutes of his show.
Slow down.
It's just going to be a riot.
He's going to want to say so much, and he doesn't know he didn't have time to say everything he wants to say.
It's going to be like listening to chipmunks.
All right.
Audio sound bites.
We'll start with a montage of the fawning of drive-by media anchors Charlie Gibson, Katie Courick, and Brian Williams talking about Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.
You tell me if these anchors don't already have their testicles in Hillary's lockbox.
Senator I'd like to get your mission statement, if I could.
You are a strong, credible female candidate for president of the United States.
And I need no disrespect in this, but would you be in this position were it not for your husband?
There are some people who say another Clinton administration, even if it's a different Clinton, will feel eerily like Groundhog Day.
What would you say to them?
Senator Clinton, even those who approve of you as a candidate have questions about your electability, some of those people.
What would you say to them?
Is it any kind of a burden for you, Senator, that so many opinions are pre-formed?
Americans know Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Well, you're one of the few alive who has seen exactly the journey that is ahead of you.
I don't know if that helps or hurts.
Well, by the way, that cackling that you heard in there, that's Hillary laughing.
Uh her laugh sounds exactly like this rare species in Arkansas that's called the Arkansas Broadbeam.
And it's just, it shows up now whenever she speaks, that species seems to be around.
And that cackling, that that well, I don't want to say witch-like cackling, but it just Anyway, you you see the demonstration here that we have uh done for you at the EIB network.
Uh those are fawning qu really tough questions.
Really, the the closest I'm uh Charlie Gibson may not get his testicles back for a week or two here with this question.
Uh would you not even be here if it weren't for your husband?
Because the fact is Clinton would have never gotten where he got were it not for her.
And that's why she's entitled.
We have one more of these sound bites, and it's actually an answer that Mrs. Clinton Well, we got two or three of them, so we'll get to those right after the break coming up here at the bottom of the hour.
And EIB, obscene profit.
Timeout.
Stay with us.
Screams of joy at the very mention of my name, maybe panic and anger among some of you for the dastardly trick that I pulled on you an hour ago, and for which I have since apologized, but explained my very good reasons all programming oriented uh for doing so.
Welcome back.
Our next audio soundbite, Mrs. Clinton tells uh Brian Williams, oh no, no, no.
I I always plan to announce my candidacy before the State of the Union or nothing to do with uh Obama.
Well, you know, Brian, this is exactly how I intended to do this.
Once I made up my mind that I was going to contest for the uh presidential nomination of my party, uh I wanted to do it on the web.
I wanted to do it before the president's state of the union because I wanted to draw the contrast between what we've seen uh over the last six years and the kind of leadership uh and experience that I would bring to the office.
So you had always planned to announce before the president's state of the union is.
That was our plan, yes.
Well, that's really tough questioning.
Repeat what she said as your next question.
So you really plan to announce uh before the president, that was our plan.
Yes.
Obama had uh had nothing to do with it.
Also last night, we don't have the soundbite of this.
But uh Brian said, who who is the real Hillary?
And then you you hear that Arkansas broadbeam again, that rare species with that cackle.
And uh she said, you know, I'm probably the most famous person in the world that nobody really knows.
I was getting ready for my guests to arrive when I saw this last night.
I was testing the wine to make sure it was gonna spit it out when I s when I heard this.
Choked on it and spit it nobody knows who Hillary make me do it again.
Uh you know, folks, in fact, I I think that uh not to make this personal, but I think I am probably the most famous person that nobody knows.
Because what Mrs. Clint what are you frowning at, Brian?
You know it's true.
You know what?
Aside from people who know me, I mean, I'm I'm a I'm very famous.
Uh this is it's the way it is.
And a lot of the people who know of me but don't listen to this program have an impression of me that people who know me would not possibly understand or have.
That's why I say I am the most unknown famous person.
Now that everybody knows who and what uh Hillary Clinton is.
That's one of her problems.
That's why she doesn't want to tackle uh issues head on.
Uh because she's she's just she's just actually afraid of who she is in a in a political sense.
Now, uh up next is Meredith Vieira, also at NBC, this on the Today Show.
That was this morning.
And her question why do people seem to have that perception of you after knowing you uh for 15 years?
What I've tried to do in New York and been very pleased that I could uh get such a great response from the people of my state was to say, look, here's who I really am.
I may be the most famous person you really don't know.
Draw your own conclusion.
Don't draw it from what you hear somebody say on, you know, radio or cable TV.
Draw your own conclusion.
And that's why I'm engaged in this conversation.
You know, I started last night on HillaryClinton.com a web chat, and I'm going to continue it tonight and tomorrow at seven o'clock, because I want people to see me in an unfiltered way.
She on the web.
Not to put down the web.
But this she doesn't want to reach a lot of people.
Uh yeah, what is this unfiltered business?
Ever heard of cookies?
There's there's nothing there's nothing unfiltered about this.
I I and this bus this business, don't draw it from what you hear somebody say on radio or cable team.
Mrs. Clinton, grow up.
Don't start whining about this.
Everybody in public life has to deal with defamation and people lying about them and saying things in your problem is people tell the truth about you.
But it's just part of public life.
You know, she really does.
She's she's she's gonna be one of the impeti behind the uh fairness doctrine being re-implemented if we ever get to that, because she really thinks that talk radio killed her health care.
And it and well, I did.
I did.
There wasn't too much talk of it.
It was 1993, and there weren't nearly as many conservative radio programs then as there are now.
Maybe she had that crazy bus trip.
And we disrupt that bus to destroyed that bus tour.
We had every town it was going into.
We had people the bus was forced to take special routes.
It it bypassed some towns.
Uh the uh the the when she got to these towns, they were going to be closed sessions, supposedly of the general public showing up to support her health care, but they were all pre-arranged, and you couldn't get in there if uh if you were opposed to it.
This bus tour started in Seattle, supposed to end in uh Washington.
I don't remember, did it make it?
Or did they abandon it?
It got there.
Okay, it did get there, but boy, it it you know, it rolled in on fumes.
There was no great triumph when this thing was over.
And yeah, it busted, it was uh happening under cover of darkness, too.
That was never intended.
It was supposed to be a daytime thing with the bus moving around somebody could see it with all the pictures and and so forth, and uh they ended up having to slink around at nighttime for a lot, a lot of this tour.
All right, here's the uh next question from Meredith Vieira.
Senator Clinton, your husband said last night that he'll do whatever he's asked to do when it comes to your campaign.
Uh what do you want him to do?
He's been my uh greatest supporter and uh most uh effective counselor, and he will continue to do that.
But obviously he's a tremendous asset because he knows what the job is like.
He had great success on a number of difficult fronts uh when he was president.
So I'm gonna be looking to him for a lot of advice and guidance.
I'm glad I'm not testing wine now, because I would spit it out again.
What a what an insulting answer.
She was in the White House and she was a co-president on a number of issues.
She's testifying up there on health care at Capitol Hill.
She's acting like she's a you know, the here's the woman who said, I'm not gonna be Tammy Winnett, and I'm not gonna sit there and bake cookies in the kitchen.
And now what's happened to these Democrat women?
They want to be Ms. Mom.
A nation needs a mother, and uh the Queen Bee syndrome is causing a competition here between Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton to pull this off.
Best thing, and I'll say what she's told, and by the way, listen, we've got Clinton, because I know what her the there's only one thing she wants him to do.
And and I'll tell you, after you listen to this bite, you you tell me if he sounds thrilled here about this.
Uh this is what Clinton said.
He was a book party last night for Terry McCaulaff's uh Book of Dreams.
And Clinton was uh talking about his uh his excitement here that uh Hillary's made it official.
I wish her well.
I'll do whatever I'm asked to do.
I can only tell you this.
I know her better than anybody on earth, and she's got the best combination of mind and heart.
Now, does that sound thrilled?
Does this does this sound like he's revved up?
It doesn't to me.
Which leads me to conclude the one thing that she wants him to do, and that's keep his zipper up.
And that's the one thing he doesn't want to do.
He's depressed about this.
If he wants back on Air Force One to fly all over the place while she's in the White House as a roving ambassador to this intern or that intern, uh then he's gonna have to keep his zipper up all the way through 2008.
Well, just not get caught, but I mean that's you're running too big a risk because blackmailers out there everywhere.
Uh yeah, I mean I mean the the the news crews have body watch cameras on these people.
Uh I'm not saying he couldn't do it and get away with it, but it that if I'll tell you if that happened during the campaign, testicle lockbox wouldn't be enough to contain the body parts that Hillary would try to put in it.
So you know in addition to keep the zipper up, don't overshadow me.
Don't go out there and be charming and make these big crowds.
Don't do any more disaster relief, because that draws big crowds.
Uh if you do if you do anything, just go overseas and then finally get the money.
Uh that's what Bill's to do.
But man, keeping a zipper up for what almost two years?
That is a champ.
Back in just a second.
And we are back, El Rushbo here on the cutting edge of societal evolution, having more fun than a human being.
Should be allowed to have all right, let's go to the phones.
People have been patiently waiting in Marrian, Illinois.
Jay, thanks for waiting and welcome, sir.
Hi.
Hi.
Hey.
Rush?
Yes.
Yeah, so Jay, uh I am a fan, uh, but so don't take this wrong, but um uh, you know, I'm also I'm also a fan of President Bush.
And he makes defended decisions on the war of in Iraq.
And I've never heard anybody, and you have pointed these people out who say he's wrong, but they never have an answer.
But I've also not heard you ever come up with the perfect thing of hindsight of 2020, hindsight.
Come up and say, you know, you know, this is what should be done.
This will we I mean, never I mean, he has to come up and say and do and be held responsible.
Nobody, nobody ever comes up with an answer.
Now, you will point out that, but I've never had you come up with an answer as well.
And please don't take me wrong because I am a big fan, but I'm having trouble.
What are you complaining about regarding me?
What what what should he have done any different other than I mean you I mean, are you supporting him?
I mean, uh exactly what he has done, or I mean, because I've heard some of your shows.
How can you be how can you say that you're a fan and ask me if I support the president's Iraq policy?
Well, uh can you because you do point out sometimes that some of the things that he maybe he should or should not done.
No, I don't.
I don't second guess him on this.
What have you second guessing?
What have you heard me say?
You've never second guessed him on anything he's gone in Iraq.
Oh.
Okay.
I'm that I'm the same.
The only when he when he announced the maybe the most recent thing, when he announced he's getting rid of generals putting Petraeus in there.
Yes.
Uh and and so forth, I did I raised the question, okay, how long have you known that that they didn't have enough troops?
You know, I I asked that hypothetically, uh looking back, but you you why am I here today?
Am I still asleep and dreaming?
Of all the things I could be criticized for sabotaging Bush on a Hang on a minute.
I'm gonna take a drink of Fruit 2O here.
If I taste it, I know I'm awake.
Okay, I'm awake.
Whoo, baby, I knew things were disintegrating out there, but not this badly.
Jim in Cottage Grove, Oregon.
Welcome to the EIB network.
Yeah, uh I want to talk to you regarding the time you've spent in the military service.
Okay.
Ask away.
Well what branch of service were you in?
What branch?
I wasn't in the service, sir.
I did not serve, as I have said countless times.
Oh.
And so it what is your theory, sir, that since I didn't serve, I'm not entitled to have an opinion on the nation at war.
Oh, you're entitled to have an opinion.
I I just assume then that they weren't accepting fat asses and dope things back then.
Is that right?
You know what?
You know what, you guys actually amaze me.
You you guys won the election.
The whole Iraq thing, as far as the average person is looking at, is falling apart, and you're still mad.
You are still enraged.
Here's a liberal.
This is what happens.
It only took 30 seconds, less than 30 seconds for the name calling and the personal insults to come on a topic which I have discussed openly and candidly countless times for 18 and a half years.
We're gonna startly we're gonna have to start putting some limits here on the subject.
These people are just wasting our valuable busy broadcast time here.
I mean, these guys have never hosted radio talk shows.
They don't have a right to be on one or to comment on how one's done until they've hosted one.
Cindy in uh Moncton, Maryland, you're next on the EIB network.
Hello.
Hi, Rush.
It's a thrill, and I just want to say that I'm constantly praying God keeps you alive and healthy.
Uh, can I tell you what I call it about?
Yeah.
Uh health insurance.
I've purchased my own for over twenty years as a self-employed single widowed mother of two who homeschooled through most of the years, so it was costly to my budget.
Presently it costs me $1,400 a quarter with a high deductible.
But because I buy my own, which I have no choice, I don't have an employer.
I have to pay for almost every service that I receive.
So I understand my policy.
Therefore, when I get health care.
Sorry, I'm nervous.
When I get health care, I ask the doctor or the provider when they're assigning extra tests or medicines or whatever, the validity or the um necessity, I should say, of those things, and I attempt to discuss options so I can tell you something costing.
You know what?
I do the same thing because I I am self-insured.
Well, I'm stepping in here because I'm gonna you know you're you're nervous and I want to calm you down.
I did you don't you don't sound nervous at all, would have never known it had you not said it.
Okay.
But I look, but no, I it I same thing.
There is a pattern.
Uh you go to the doctor and you tell them what's wrong.
They got to do this test, and they're gonna do this test.
Go down to that machine and go down to that machine before you know it.
Yes.
And it it's just it's it's routine, and then they say, well, I mean, we're this is part of the diagnostic uh process.
Uh and it it may well be, but but if you sit down and talk to us, no, just what?
Just tell me what's necessary here.
And if they don't know what's wrong, then be prepared to, you know, go to the bank and get a loan.
But if they got an idea early on what's wrong, yeah, you're you're very wise.
What you're telling us, though, is how you shop it to reduce your cost because you're paying for the whole thing.
Absolutely.
And may I say that because I'm one of few in the overall numbers, they get mostly get very offended that I would dare to question these things uh because most people don't, and most do not understand their own health insurance policy, as uh also then validated by some other health care providers to me when they're not enamored with their own power.
Yeah.
Well, it's it's human nature, though.
I mean, if if patient comes in, and by now doctors know that, and by the way, doctors are getting savaged in this whole thing, too.
I mean, they're not they're not they're not making out like the bandits they used to.
No, but it's still about power and superiority.
The wrong assumption.
Well, now you're talking about doctor attitudes and uh, you know, and but but but they're not all house MD.
Right, I understand.
Uh but uh but nevertheless, nevertheless.
Nevertheless, uh with they know that every patient that comes in to see them is gonna submit this to insurance and the patient's not paying for it.
Absolutely.
And the patient is assuming it's all gonna be paid for with whatever co-pays and deductibles that there are.
And it's human nature that costs would spiral in such a circumstance when nobody thinks they're paying for it.
Nobody in this whole process thinks they're paying for it.
The magical health insurance company is paying for it, or the government's paying for it, or the ployer is paying for it.
They're not paying for it.
It gets paid, but they don't actually write the check, other than the copay and the deductibles and so forth.
It's like Daytona Beach, Florida.
They got a homeless problem.
You know what they're doing?
They're gonna create a homeless village.
They're gonna round up all homeless people, they're gonna put them in one place.
They think that's gonna solve a problem.
You know what's gonna happen?
More and more homeless people are gonna discover they're homeless.
Or more and more people are gonna discover they're homeless, they're gonna want to move into homeless village.
And then the people that live near the homeless village, which is gonna expand, are gonna leave and they're gonna move out to the burbs or wherever they go, and the whole population mix in Daytona Beach is gonna be changed forever because this homeless village is gonna be looked as a giveaway, and that's why people are gonna flock to it back in just a second.
All right, second hour in the can.
It's down, and we've got one more to go.
We'll come back and get right to it.
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