All Episodes
Previous Next
Nov. 12, 2007 - Rush Limbaugh Program
33:59
November 12, 2007, Monday, Hour #2
| Copy link to current segment

Time Text
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the Iowa Caucus is the Hawkeye Cauckey.
January 3rd, the night of the Orange Bowl.
We don't know yet who's going to be in the Orange Bowl, but it will be a BCS team versus a BCS team.
It'll be the second and last bowl game of the season.
The national championship game will be on Monday, January.
I guess the cauckey occur in people's houses, right?
So I guess they could have the Orange Bowl on while they're cauckeying.
Well, some of them occur in people's homes.
Some of them go to school centers and so forth.
Greetings, folks, welcome back, Rush Limbaugh, the EIB network, the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
By the way, a correction.
And this really disappoints me.
Nancy Pelosi has not endorsed Barack Obama.
She introduced everybody.
Grab the soundbite.
This is what I have to correct.
It's soundbite number eight.
This is Saturday night in Des Moines, the Jefferson-Jackson dinner.
This is Pelosi introducing Barack Obama.
My fellow Democrats, please welcome the next president of the United States.
So Pelosi introduced every speaker as the next president of the United States, which is stupid, but nevertheless, she does.
So she hasn't endorsed Obama.
I knew it was too good to be true.
I just knew it was too good to be true.
Oh, can you imagine the fireworks?
I should have suspected something because there would have been fireworks if that had happened.
All right.
Last call, talking about a soundbite of Michelle Obama that's going to air in its entirety tomorrow on PMS NBC, Mika Brzinski introducing or interviewing Barack's wife, Michelle.
And the question came up, how come black voters are supporting Hillary far more than your husband?
And her basic answer was they're inferiority complex.
They don't have a fear of success.
They just don't think it's our time.
They never think it's our time because they've been raised to think that things like that are too good to be true.
They're never going to happen.
Which caused me to speculate with the caller.
You know, it's kind of like why in the early days were so many whites supporting Obama over Hillary, and the answer was given to us by a columnist, David Ehrenstein, I think is his name, in the Los Angeles Times, referring to Barack Obama as the magic Negro.
The Magic Negro in lore is a Negro that allows white people to embrace and support, even though they don't know anything about the person.
Hadn't been around long enough, it's a way for elitist white liberals to think of themselves as really good people and not be racists by pointing out they support the black guy.
And he was writing a piece lamenting this.
Of course, this came after Al Sharpton refused to endorse Obama.
And it also came after Joe Biden had referred to Obama as, I'm paraphrasing, finally, we got a guy who's clean and articulate in the race.
And that really angered Sharpton because Sharpton showers and is thus clean.
And he can speak.
But apparently he took it as an insult.
So we put all these liberal events together, ladies and gentlemen.
We came up with a parody tune sung by white comedian Paul Shanklin to Puff the Magic Dragon, Barack the Magic Negro.
I just love that.
Sharpton can't stick with the lyric line.
He has to start protesting in the middle of the song.
And of course, the background singers kind of keep him on the lyric line by continuing to sing the song.
So that's it.
Barack the Magic Negro, placing last half hour's comment in context and in perspective.
Obama was on Meet the Depress yesterday with Tim Russert.
We have some sound bites here.
First question from Russert.
When you say raise the cap, and this is the payroll tax in Social Security.
When you say raise the cap, right now you pay payroll tax in the first $97,500.
If you increase that for people to pay Social Security tax on their full income, about 10 million people, some could pay as much as $5,000 a year more.
How's that going to play in November?
I've got a friend, Warren Buffett.
You may know.
The guy made $46 million last year.
This is public information because he's concerned that he is paying a lower tax rate than anybody else in his office.
And he has said, and I think a lot of us who have been fortunate are willing to pay a little bit more to make sure that a senior citizen who is struggling to deal with rising property taxes or rising heating bills, that they've got the coverage that they need.
So Barack Obama is out actually talking about raising taxes, the payroll tax on Social Security and citing Warren Buffett as his reason for this.
His friend Warren Buffett.
Of course, in politics, everybody's your friend, including your enemy.
And I just, you know, the Democrats continue to step in it.
They're going to have big problems on this.
They're going to have big problems on illegal immigration and taxes, folks.
And he's out there proposing more and more taxes to solve Social Security.
And, you know, I really think that this is a discussion, an extension of this discussion would do a Republican candidate well.
It's a discussion on taxes and working more than it is on Social Security.
But it all ties together.
Obama is reading right out of the socialist playbook here.
A lot of us who have been fortunate are willing to pay a little bit more.
People like myself and my friend Warren Buffett are willing to pay a little bit more.
This is a promotion of the leftist idea that anybody who succeeds in this country did so not because of hard work, because they were fortunate.
As Dick Gephardt once said, they are the winners of life's lottery.
Nothing but good luck.
They were lucky.
It all just fell into their lap one day, like winning a lottery.
They expended no effort to achieve their wealth.
This is the attitude that people like Obama have.
This is not about sacrifice.
This is about vision.
Why is it that Democrats always look at the future of the country and say, we've got to sacrifice?
We have to roll back.
We have to do this.
And we have to punish ourselves.
What is the point?
Why must the American attitude be one of self-punishment born of guilt?
There's no need for this.
These guys, and Obama included the list, do not have the slightest concept or understanding, or at least they're not willing to say so if they do, of the whole concept of American exceptionalism.
You know, America is not about sacrifice.
America is about vision.
These are things that, and they keep talking about vision, but their vision is one of apocalypse.
It's one of doom and gloom.
You know, we're not a village here raising everybody's children in a communal way.
You know, for these people, everything that happens that's good is nothing but luck.
It's not the result of any ingenuity whatsoever.
And there's a reason for framing this topic in exactly this way.
The Democrats have to convince idiots who might vote for them that the high achievers are just lucky ducks, as we used to say when our kids, or when we were kids, they have to portray that because they play the class envy card all the time.
And so they routinely will make the case that anybody who has a dollar more than anybody else is just lucky, not the result of hard work, because the Democrats have to convince their voters that whatever their economic circumstances are, it's not their fault.
They just haven't been lucky.
It's so much easier to win the idea of income redistribution if the rich people just got that way by luck.
But if they just got that way by luck, then what's the problem in taking it from them?
But if you promote the idea that success and wealth, whatever you want to call it, are the result of hard work, ambition, application, devotion, and so forth, then it makes it a little tougher morally to go out and take it.
But if you construct it in such a way that people are just lucky, winners of life's lottery.
It's not fair that they should have what they have and I don't take it from you.
And that's why they have to continue to portray it this way.
So there's nothing new here.
There's nothing brilliant.
There's nothing new in terms of change, generational change, force of direction or any of that.
This is just right out of the Democrat playbook, and Obama is just the latest guy reading from it.
Nothing new here whatsoever.
It's impossible for liberalism to offer anything new.
So we're just asking these lucky people when it comes to Social Security taxes.
These people have just been plain lucky.
We're just asking them for just a little bit more.
Just a little bit more.
Who can argue against that?
Is the thinking behind this?
Quick timeouts.
We'll continue after this on the EIB network.
One more Barack Obama soundbite from Tim Russert yesterday on Meet the Press.
So after saying, yeah, me and my friend Warren Buffett, yeah, we have a lot of money.
We can pay more.
Sure.
Russert says, so you would not be afraid to say, we have a problem with Social Security, and I'm willing to raise taxes on some to help fix it.
The best option would be to make sure that those who are in the best position to help solve this problem are willing to do so.
A tax increase for some.
Well, tax increase for people like myself, probably.
Well, see, he says here, the best option would be to make sure that there are those who are in the best position to help solve this problem willing to do so.
How about we finally hold accountable the people who have made the problem?
It is not the people paying taxes who have caused the problems in Social Security.
It is the people who devised the program, who have expanded it, who have failed to deal with it responsibly, who are now beyond any accountability.
And so those of us who pay taxes, who had nothing to do with creating a problem or making it worse, are now going to be made to pay for it.
But you see, this is where the Republicans need to get in gear.
Because basically what he's saying here is that those who have the ability are just lucky.
And of course, if they have it, we should be able to get it.
And if you create a mindset in your stupid idiot voters that it's just luck and nothing else that determines success, then it makes it much easier to go take it from those people than if you promote it as reality.
They worked hard, struggled.
They had a dream, they had ambition, and they pursued it.
Now, after all of that, you're going to blame them for problems created by the elected political class?
That is what's wrong with all this.
Look at, I really, I look at this presidential campaign and the Republicans have a gold mine just waiting for them to tap, to take these people out, whereas all the conventional wisdom has a Democrat winning the presidency next year.
And, of course, what is conventional wisdom?
Conventional wisdom is nothing more when you boil it all down to consensus.
And what did Margaret Thatcher say about consensus?
Consensus is the absence of leadership.
Consensus is everybody conforming to get along.
So there won't be any riffs.
So there won't be any waves made.
John Ashcroft is speaking to the Young Americas Foundation in California over the weekend.
He basically made the same point.
You look at a leader, you'll find somebody who's outside the consensus.
And all these Democrats are sort of the consensus.
The drive-by media is part of the consensus.
Get this.
They have a little piece here from John Friedman, his media web blog at Market Watch.
And I guess Time Magazine brought in a bunch of people to help him come up with a list of potential people of the year for the ultimate person of the year.
And this guy says, after attending Time's discussion of who should be their magazine's person of the year, I have reached two conclusions.
One, Al Gore looks like a shoe-in.
And number two, Time Magazine's blowing a major journalistic and marketing opportunity by bestowing only one award.
Now, folks, I'm not taking any of this personally, but I don't know how I can not be at least on the list of consideration for Time Magazine's person of the year.
I'm a Nobel Peace Prize nominee myself.
I didn't win it.
But look at, I mean, I don't want to brag.
I don't want to go through the whole list of things here.
But it is I who have single-handedly turned the Democrat nomination process on its ear.
Two weeks now that Mrs. Clay, she never had two weeks in a row of this kind of stumbling and attention, not when she was running for the Senate and not when she was running as co-president.
I single-handedly, ladies and gentlemen, turned a smear attempt by the United States Senate majority leader into a slapdown of the United States Senate.
The Drive-By Media didn't cover it.
The influence that this program exerts throughout the political process, the optimism this program spreads throughout the country.
I know it'll never happen, folks.
I mean, I never even get put on Time's 100 Most Influential People of the Year list.
Whoopee Goldberg makes it, whose radio show is now failing big time, being canceled all over the place.
She doesn't care.
She's only using it to get back on television, which she's done at The View.
CNN, Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
I am not making this up, and this is not a parody.
If CNN chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta had his way, when you unwrapped your new iPod or iPhone this Christmas, there might be the following warning label.
Surgeon General's warning, ingesting or inhaling your iPhone or iPod earbuds may be hazardous to your health.
The November, what does CNN think of its audience to send the chief medical guy out there and warn people not to eat their earbuds from their iPods or iPhones?
The November 9th CNN American Morning warned of the dangers of iPods.
The screen read, iPod and iPhone danger.
Can they hurt you?
Hey, if you've got an iPod or an iPhone, there's a new study out this morning raising some health concerns about the ubiquitous white earphones and also what's inside the phones themselves.
Gupta reported that the cord connecting the earbuds to your iPod contain phthalates.
According to the Litigious Center for Environmental Health, phthalates are a substance often used for increasing the flexibility of plastics, but according to an article, phthalates may hinder the sexual development of mammals.
Who's eating the cords?
Who is eating the earbuds?
Gupta ended by saying the immediate takeaway is don't eat your iPhone or your earbuds or breathe them in, he said.
My friends, I was not kidding about this.
Earbuds and wires on your iPhone or iPod from CNN, warning not to eat them or breathe them in because they got phthalates in them.
He said, you know, not such good news for Apple there, but again, remember, as we have been talking about, it's really hard to quantify just how much of a risk these phthales are, Gupta said.
Most of the studies have been done on animals.
There's not a human trial that's actually showed that they might be harmful, but a lot of people are worried about it.
We got no evidence of phthalates causing any damage.
We got no evidence that people are eating their earbuds for their iPhones or the cords attached to the earbuds.
And frankly, we don't know how one would breathe them in.
The tests have only been done on rats.
Why?
Why?
I try to put myself in these newsrooms.
So where does.
Okay, so somebody puts out a fax, little press release: warning, warning, iPod, iPhone, phthalates, earbuds, cord, and they send a medical correspondent out to do a report on it.
Am I missing something here?
Is there an epidemic out there of people eating their iPhone and iPod earbuds?
I've never heard of it either.
And I certainly, I still can't figure how you would breathe them in.
You would, you would, don't give me this.
People are starving out there, Rush business.
Tommy in Brooklyn, I'm glad you waited.
Tommy, you're next on the Rush Limbaugh program.
Hi.
Hey, Rush, Megadittos from New York.
Thank you.
Listen, I'm really nervous here, so you got to help me out.
Talk about Barack.
I was listening to, actually, I was watching Meet the Press, and I couldn't believe when he said that he doesn't like Christians.
Actually, he didn't even say he didn't like them.
He says we didn't like them.
And I take that to mean that the entire Democrat Party doesn't like Christians.
Tommy, I missed that segment.
What was the question?
Do you remember?
I really don't remember the question.
I just caught it, and I was like in shock.
I couldn't believe that he actually said that.
You know, he didn't say I don't like Christians.
He says we.
And like I said, I'm taking it.
Okay, I have just been told that it was on the question dealing with reaching out.
And Obama said Democrats need to do a better job of reaching out to people, quote-unquote, we don't like.
And that's where he claimed evangelicals and the Christians.
Yes.
Hey, Tommy, the way to look at this is: thank you, Mr. Obama.
You've been honest.
You don't like Christians.
Rush, could you keep playing that?
Because you have to let everybody know.
I mean, they keep saying how they love everybody.
Yeah, we know that's a crock.
Can I ask you one more question?
Yeah, of course.
Could you put out the same challenge to CNN that you put out to MSNBC with Wilflitzer and see if he can finally get Hillary to basically, well, not basically, but state what position she's taking on these licenses?
Because I'm still dumbfounded.
Oh, no, they're going to be.
I don't need to put the challenge out there.
I've been there, done that.
That did that two weeks ago.
And they'll at some point, you know, there's going to be another debate.
Somebody's going to ask this question if not a journalist, one of her opponents will bring this back up.
This is not going to go away until she answers it.
And in fact, I've got somewhere here in the Hillary stack.
I've started every day now.
I've got a Hillary stack.
And I weighed into it very, very carefully because of the potential onsaught of blue funk, which happened a couple Fridays ago.
But somewhere in this stack, when I get the courage to look at it, somewhere in this stack is somebody, oh, it's Dan Balls at the Washington Post on a blog, B-A-L-Z, for those of you in Rio Linda, Dan Balls.
And he's going on and on about how Mrs. Clinton's answer goes on and on for 30 seconds to two minutes and nobody can understand it, and how it is an excellent illustration of obfuscation, trying to have it both ways.
I'll find that because it is interesting.
You'll never see the day in print, but it is on the Washington Post website.
Thanks, Tommy.
This is Reggie in Chicago.
Hey, how about Rex Grossman?
Ha ha!
Thanks for taking my call, Rush.
I wanted to chime in on the Republican side of the primary process.
I read this morning on the Drudge Report that they had an article from the New York Sun that Mayor Giuliani is losing his front-runner status to Governor Romney because Governor Romney's leading in the polls in Iowa, what else, New Hampshire, Michigan, Nevada, and South Carolina.
Is it possible for Mayor Giuliani to lose all of those and still win the nomination?
Well, no.
You've just named if somebody loses Iowa and New Hampshire, I mean, especially if the winner is a surprise, even if the second place finisher is a surprise in either of those places.
And the whole thing's shaken up.
So, you know, I'm still, the analysis on that, you lose all those states.
There's so many front-loaded states here that it would be, well, it's not a guarantee.
No, it wouldn't be a guaranteed loss just by virtue of the votes there, but it would be the old momentum factor that would then emerge and might lead to performances in future states down the road less than what polling numbers indicate he will do.
So what if Governor Romney just wins Iowa and New Hampshire?
I mean, what's going to happen after that then?
I mean, is he going to have a lot of momentum?
No, they'll have to like, you know.
No, you mean Rudy?
Would he lose momentum?
No, I meant if Governor Romney wins in Iowa and New Hampshire, isn't he going to have like a boatload of free press or earned press or whatever they call it?
Well, no Republican's ever going to get that.
If Romney wins either of those states, there will be articles about, hmm, maybe people willing to overlook the Mormon factor.
Right.
Because the whole point of the Republican primary process, as far as the media is concerned, Reggie, is to destroy them all so that whoever wins it doesn't have a prayer during the general election.
If Rudy happens to win, hmm, it must be that Iowans and people who live in New Hampshire don't mind a guy who had three wives and whose kids hate him.
That will be the focus of the story.
If it's Huckabee, well, I guess the people of Iowa are not concerned that somebody else from Hope, Arkansas might win the Republican nomination and who's got a weight problem.
He lost 100 pounds a long time ago.
Can he keep it off?
Things like that.
But Huckabee.
If Ron Paul wins, you know, which who knows a guy raised $4 million in one day.
Nobody can figure that out.
If Ron Paul wins, then the press coverage will be, hmm, maybe the Republicans in Iowa and in New Hampshire really aren't worried about mental instability.
Whatever.
They will never give free and open-ended coverage and flying coverage to the Republican nominee.
If Ron Paul goes libertarian, you know, he ran as a libertarian some years ago.
He joined the Republican field.
If he goes libertarian, it forms in essentially a third-party vote, then the press will be giddy.
Ron Paul, unhappy with treatment in Republican primaries, Savage's party, sabotages party by going third party, guaranteeing Hillary another president elected with less than 50% of the vote, just like her husband twice.
Yay.
Am I still on, Rush?
Yeah, you're still on.
Oh, I was going to say, has anybody ever lost those states and went on to win the nomination?
Is what I'm asking you.
Well, why didn't you ask that in the first place?
That's not what you asked.
Is there anybody that's lost those states and gone on to win?
I'm sure there is.
There has been.
Okay.
But look, look at this time, 2004.
Howard Dean was roiling the race.
He had all the money, supposed all the money, the internet contributions, goes into Iowa and loses it.
And then I endorsed him, and that was it.
Bill Clinton came in second.
Where was it in Iowa?
And was the comeback kid?
But Rudy.
It was New Hampshire.
That was after the 60 Minutes fiasco with the lamp falling on him staged.
But yeah, you can lose those and still win.
But Rudy's not going to come in second in Iowa.
He's 50.
What?
Rudy's polling fourth or fifth in Iowa.
I don't think he's going to win Iowa for sure.
He can withstand a loss in the Hawkeye Coke guy.
Come in second in New Hampshire.
Look, if you come in fourth or fifth in Iowa and you finish second in New Hampshire, look at the move Rudy made after fourth or fifth.
And then they'll get into the bit about how, you know, people in New Hampshire must have been turning a blind eye to somebody who recommended a guy who's just been indicted to Homeland Security.
They'll come up with all those.
Trust me on this.
Don't doubt me.
The Drive-By Media's objective is to destroy every Republican candidate except the ones who cannot win anything.
Hey, Mike, you got Audio Summit 23 delivered into your confines yet?
Well, we have it standing by.
We got the Barack Obama bite that was referred to by a previous caller.
Tim Russert, this is Obama on people that quote unquote, we don't like.
Russert's question.
You had a group of supporters on a Bible tour in South Carolina headed by a singer called Donnie McClurkin, a clerkin, who said that homosexuality was a curse and that he had been cured by prayer.
Do you believe homosexuality is a curse?
Do you believe that it's something that you were born gay or that you can change your behavior?
I do not believe being gay or lesbian is a choice.
And so I disagree with Reverend McClurkin.
But understand, Tim, part of what I hope to offer as president is the ability to reach to people that I don't agree with.
And the evangelical community is one where the Democratic Party, I think, we have generally seen as hostile.
We haven't been reaching out to them.
And I think that if we're going to make significant progress on critical issues that we face, whether it's education or health care or energy or our foreign policy in this country, we've got to be able to get beyond our comfort zones and just talk to people we don't like or just talk to people we like or people that we agree with on every single issue.
Might have been a slip up there.
I think it was a little faux pas that he tried to gracefully cover, reach out to people that we don't like.
But you know what strikes me here?
The evangelical community is one where the Democrat Party, I think, we have generally seen as hostile.
Do you ever stop to think that they, Mr. Obama, might see you and your party as hostile?
You think maybe they were minding their own business one day.
You came along and started insulting them.
And they might look at you as hostile.
Anyway, that's Barack Obama.
That's what that controversy was about.
Laura in Erie, Pennsylvania.
Great to have you on the EIB network.
Hello.
Hi there, Rush.
Mega optimistic dittos.
I wanted to give you an opportunity to clarify something you'd said earlier when you were talking about Mr. Senator Obama's sacrifice.
And I know what you mean, and I think he means more taxes for the rich to go to the poor.
And we know they've misused those taxes.
But the word sacrifice, I think this is a perfect day to clarify and to just applaud those that are truly the ones that have given the ultimate sacrifice on Veterans Day that we, of course, this is celebrating Veterans Day today.
It was actually yesterday.
Of course, we were talking about uniformed men and women who've volunteered or have been drafted, have served in combat.
There's no question that's a sacrifice.
But that's not what Obama's talking about with sacrifice.
Obama's definition of sacrifice is to take from people who've been luckier than anybody else and have a lot and make them give it back.
The whole line is, you know, I want to give something back.
Why?
People who are successful are already giving plenty.
I don't mean this in a selfish sense, but their definition of sacrifice is them taking things from people they don't like who have much more than they think they should have.
And that's what America wasn't built on that kind of sacrifice.
America wasn't built on socialism.
I agree.
That's what I was talking about.
I appreciate the opportunity to clarify.
Yeah, I thank you for all you do, and you've shown us that if they stop taking our money, then maybe we can truly give it to the causes that we feel, you know, like your contribution to your charity for sons and daughters of people who have given the ultimate sacrifice.
Exactly right.
And continue to do that and know that every person that's ever served this country in uniform deserves just the richest blessings and applause from all of us today.
As do their families.
As do their families.
I am a retired major, and I just completely am in awe of those that continue to do that every day.
So are we all.
I know.
And, you know, Barbara Ledine, who's a friend of mine, has written a piece, Human Events, Military Families Celebrate Veterans Day.
And it's really, we'll link to it at rushlimbaugh.com.
It's really poignant.
What about a boy who was captain of his football team who now as a man learns how to maneuver on prosthetic legs and dreams of coaching a high school team?
And those who are wounded or killed, their moms look at their before photos and know that honor, courage, commitment have to suffice because that's all there is.
That and love.
It's really, really great because she is a military mom.
Her son, her husband's Michael LeDean, and their son's a Marine in Iraq.
And she starts up by saying, I vaguely remember that when I was young, Veterans Day was a day of respect, a day when men wore poppies in their lapels, and 11 minutes after the 11th hour on November 11th, bells tolled, sirens blared, people stopped what they were doing and remembered the valiant soldiers who gave their all for our freedom.
How distant and quaint that all seems now.
It's a way of measuring how America has changed.
Now I'm a military mom.
I choose to ignore the popular culture's perception of the military.
I rely on what and who I know.
I know that I am grateful that I'm blessed to have a son in the U.S. Marines on his second tour in Iraq who is uninjured and inspiring to us and to all who know him.
I know that there are moms who are not so lucky, and Veterans Day brings them unavoidably to my mind.
Getting through this weekend must be a lot tougher for the mothers of this war's wounded and dead than it was when men wore poppies and everybody stopped to commemorate the nation's loss.
I don't know how these moms get through Veterans Day.
So I agree with you totally, but I don't want to forget the families of all of these people ever because as Barbara writes, all they've got are pictures, memories, and the love.
And all of this in a period of time now where a major political party's significantly sized base has devoted the last four years to impugning the honor and the courage and the character of all those in the U.S. military.
Quick time out, folks.
We'll be back.
Wrap up this hour after this.
By the way, how smart are the Democrats?
Rank-and-file Democrats expressed dismay last Friday over Pelosi's latest anti-war strategy.
Some members reluctant to vote around Veterans Day to bring the troops home.
Weren't going to give them any more money unless Bush promised to start the troop withdrawal.
It's going to be another stinging defeat for them on this.
▲
Export Selection