It's Rush Limbaugh and the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
And, of course, I, utilizing talent on loan from God, fastest week in media.
It's already Wednesday.
Great to have you here.
Phone number 800-282-2882.
Email address, LRushbo at EIBNet.com.
A quick programming note.
Because of popular demand, you know, last night after the primary results in Florida, the drive-by media all night and into the day, the newspapers proclaimed me the big loser, even though I was not on the ballot anywhere.
And the question was today, was I going to concede or move on?
And I announced, I let off the program by announcing I will not concede.
I vowed to continued fighting, and we're going to replay this announcement of mine that we opened the program with at 2.33 Eastern Time.
But now I want to welcome back to the program Vice President Dick Cheney.
Always, as I say, a pleasure and thrilled to have you here, sir.
Welcome back.
Well, good afternoon, Rush.
Good to talk to you.
Good to talk to you.
All right.
A couple things.
Now, we got you for a limited amount of time, and I want to race through a couple of things.
I see here today an AP story that the House of Representatives has voted to delay the demise of the wiretap law by two weeks.
So we've got a two-week extension on FISA.
You know, we're in the middle of a presidential election year, and a lot of people's attention is focused on that, not on FISA and the efforts that you and the people in the administration are doing to continue to detect potential attacks.
What's the status?
What's the big deal about two weeks?
Well, the legislation is absolutely essential, of course.
They passed a six-month extension last August, which expires on Friday.
And with the idea that they would finish up the legislation by Friday, they've had six months to work on it.
One of the main things we need in there, for example, is retroactive liability protection for the companies that have worked with us and helped us prevent further attacks against the United States.
Like the phone companies.
That's the most controversial part.
Right.
And so far they haven't been able to get it done.
So what has been agreed to is to give them 15 more days to wrap it up and finish it up here.
The president's been holding their feet to the fire.
They claim they can get it done in 15 more days.
And the battle right now is focused on the Senate.
The House has already passed a version of it.
But we do badly need this legislation.
It's been essential in terms of protecting the country against further attacks.
One of the most vital things the president's done since 9-11.
And it would be a tragedy if this authority weren't extended.
The opposition of the Senate primarily from Democrats, correct?
Correct.
People who don't want to, I guess, want to leave open the possibility that the trial lawyers could go after a big company that may have helped.
Those companies helped specifically at our request, and they've done yeoman duty for the country.
And this is the so-called terrorist surveillance program.
It was one of the things that was called earlier.
It's just absolutely essential to know who in the United States is talking to al-Qaeda.
It's amazing this program that's been very well managed.
We haven't violated anybody's civil liberties.
It's, in fact, a good piece of legislation.
Yeah, it's amazing that it's a political issue.
I want to ask you, is the Democrats' opposition to this oriented toward payback for a big constituency of theirs, the trial lawyers?
Is it purely political, trying to damage George W. Bush because of their pent-up resentment at his success?
Or is it something else?
There's a story.
I forget where it is.
I just finished reading it.
It's a politico.com.
They say with Rudy Giuliani's defeat last night, that the politics of 9-11 are finished.
Over, that nobody is going to succeed running on 9-11 and thus the continued threat.
Is this really part of an effort by some in the Senate to try to convince the American people we don't face a threat anymore and there's no reason to run the risk of violating people's civil liberties, blah, blah, blah.
All right.
Well, it's been focused especially on the Democrats and the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Pat Leahy, chairman of the committee, has opposed parts of the statute that we think are essential in terms of going forward, including specifically this retroactive liability provision.
I don't like to question people's motives.
I assume he's got reasons why he believes the way he does, but the fact is it's their inability to resolve that issue that's delayed passage on this legislation.
I think there are people out there, frankly, Rush, that don't like what we've done, that are opposed to the bold action and tough decisions the president's made since 9-11.
I think there were a lot of people who were panicky in the aftermath of 9-11, but now that we've demonstrated our ability to defend the country for the last six and a half years, they want to act as though there's no threat and we don't need to take these important measures.
But the fact of the matter is the threat's still there.
It still exists.
I look at it every day in our intelligence brief.
We need to perpetuate and protect our capabilities here as well as in terms of our ability to interrogate prisoners.
You may not be able to answer this, but if you feel confident that two weeks can take care of this retroactivity in protecting, I think there are 40 civil lawsuits that have been filed against the phone companies.
What do the opponents of this want in exchange for going along with us?
Well, I think the fact of the matter is at this point they don't have the votes.
That is, I don't think they can prevail.
I think there are a number of Democrats, for example, who've indicated they will vote with us on the key issue on this legislation in the Senate.
But to date, it's been hung up through various parliamentary maneuvers.
But I think eventually we will get the legislation.
I do think the votes are there.
But they want more time to let the opponents sort of air their grievances and probably vote on some more amendments before we go to final passage.
Is there any surprise on your part, feel any surprise, that this issue has not specifically, this issue that we're talking about today, has not been discussed front and center in the presidential campaigns?
Well, I think I can't speak, obviously, for the Democrats.
I don't know where they are on these issues.
I think generally they have not been as supportive of the kind of robust strategies of the Republicans.
I know most of the Republican candidates have, in fact, been solidly supportive of what we've been doing in the global war on terror.
And I think there's probably less enthusiasm, if I can put it in those terms, on the Democratic side for some of those same measures.
All right, moving on because our time is dwindling.
A New York Times story today, headline, White House shows signs of rethinking cut in troops.
The pull quote here, Mr. Bush has made no decisions on troop reductions to follow those he announced last September.
In his address to Congress, Mr. Bush spoke of those reductions, but not of any future ones.
What is the story?
I don't think there's a story here.
It seems like he's delivered on the reductions he spoke of.
He hadn't indicated any others as he's waiting on another assessment from General Petraeus.
So what are they trying to stir up here?
Well, it sounds to me like they're trying to stir something up.
I would agree with you, Rush.
Fact is, the President said last fall that we would pull out a brigade about the end of the year, that we'd have another review in March when General Petraeus could come back and give us his recommendations going forward.
And in the meantime, that we would go back to the pre-surge level.
We had 15 brigades in Iraq when we started the surge.
We added five brigades there now in the process of coming out.
And we'll get back to pre-surge levels by this summer.
But we've not made a decision to go below that.
That'll depend very much on circumstances on the ground.
The last thing we would want to do at this stage is having made the enormous progress that's been made over the last year with a dramatic drop in casualties and number of incidents, number of attacks by insurgents and so forth, and with all of the bad guys that we've rounded up and killed, you'd hate to see that reversed by going too fast or taking out troops too soon.
But we are keeping the commitment that was made previously.
And as the President said, he'll listen very carefully to his commanders on the ground, and specifically General Petraeus, in terms of what he thinks he needs to complete the mission.
I find it fascinating.
I predicted this.
I find it fascinating that this issue is not even a part of the presidential campaign, particularly on the Democrat side, precisely because of what you just said.
The news is robust and positive, and it serves them no purpose.
But they're still working behind the scenes with the FISA thing and other things to eventually weaken the country.
One more quick question topic before we go, and that's the economic stimulus.
I saw a poll, it might be Rasmussen, I'm not sure.
Only 42% of the American people are really cool to this.
There's a greater number combined not cool or not all as happy about it, thinking it isn't going to matter that much.
We've got a Fed rate cut of a half point that was just announced today.
So what is your overall feeling on the economy and where it's headed?
Well, I think we're experiencing a bit of a slowdown.
We don't believe we're going to have a recession, though.
A recession would be two negative quarters back-to-back.
And I think the action that the Fed's taken has been very positive.
We think the stimulus package will have a positive effect.
It's obviously we're talking here only about 1% of GDP that's directly affected by it.
But the President believes that getting a stimulus package through on a short-term sort of one-shot basis will be helpful in terms of consumer spending.
So our hope is that we can get through this rough patch and continue and resume the growth of 3 to 4 percent in the future that we've enjoyed in the past.
We've had now over, what, 52 months of uninterrupted job expansion in the economy.
It's an all-time record in terms of longevity.
We're hopeful we can keep that up, but I don't see any reason we can't.
What would you say to people listening who are alarmed at the housing crisis, subprime crisis, the people in their homes who see their equity or the value of their home plummeting?
You've been around in politics a long time.
You've been through economic cycles, member of Congress, various administrations.
What would you say to people who are feeling a little bit uneasy about the value of their home?
How long is it going to be before this rebounds?
Well, we clearly have to work our way through the way through the current glut, if you will, in the housing market.
We've got a large inventory of unsold homes out there, and that's affecting the price.
And that can have consequences for everybody.
But the economy, I think the economy is very resilient, and we'll work our way through this.
Obviously, you know, you want to do everything you can to help those folks who are most adversely affected by it, but you can't repeal the laws of economics.
We've got to get through this patch.
The president's got work being done by Hank Paulson over Treasury and Alfonso Jackson at HUD to try to provide support and opportunities for refinancing for some of those folks who are most directly affected by this.
But you also need to be careful here to make sure the government doesn't do something that makes the situation worse instead of better.
Which it can easily do.
All right, Mr. Cheney.
This wouldn't be the first time.
I can remember Rush back in the 80s when I was in Congress.
We had another housing crisis, and the home builders got upset, and they started mailing 2x4s into us.
I ended up with my office chock-a-block full of 2x4s with stamps on them from all over Wyoming, my home state.
And when we came through it, this is what people need to realize.
We always come through these things, we end up stronger in the yet.
Well, look, I appreciate your time.
It's always nice to talk to you, and appreciate the update on the FISA situation because it's really off the radar with the presidential campaign going on.
So thanks so much for that and your time again.
No, this vital issue, Rush, and I love your show.
It's a pleasure to talk to you again.
Thank you.
Vice President Dick Cheney.
And we'll be right back after this.
All right, people have been patiently waiting on the phones.
So we go back to Gene now in Manhattan, Kansas.
Nice to have you, sir.
Welcome to the big program.
Hello.
Yeah, I had to get my phone off the earphones so I could hear better.
Yes, about the fellow who called in a while ago about jumping your case because you weren't picking out his nominee.
If anybody listens to you enough and they understand you, it's only obvious that when you're telling us about John McCain and who we don't want, and you think like I do, I mean, I'm pretty sure I know who you'd like, and it's pretty much who I would like.
But if you really know who you are and understand you, it's, well, I just don't understand how he's doing that.
Yeah, the options.
Yeah, I know.
The options have kind of dwindled now.
So that if one speaks against one candidate pretty much are not, and you don't speak against the other one, it may be pretty obvious.
But I think what the guy meant, and I'm getting a lot of people, is, why don't you start telling us why you like somebody and what it is you like about them rather than just focusing on what you don't like about Senator McCain.
And that's a fair point.
I've made the assumption that people know those things.
I'm working on the assumption here that none of these candidates from the get-go, from the top, when they were all in there, none of them lit anybody's fire.
And you know I'm right about this.
Otherwise, Fred Thompson flirting with getting in would not have caused the firestorm that it did before he got in.
I mean, you can go back and look at any number of events in this thing and you can start lamenting.
I was in Detroit back in May for a rush to excellence tour and also a meeting with some people at General Motors.
And I had a couple of these Rush to Excellence things in the first half of the year.
And I'd go out on stage and did a little routine on the Republican presidential candidate nominees.
And I'd get to Fred Thompson.
A place erupted in applause.
This is before he had made it official that people he was rumored to be doing.
And the sole reason for that was that everybody was dissatisfied with one or two or more things about all the other candidates.
And so when you boil all this down, what you're left with is that not one of these people has been somebody that a majority of Republicans or conservatives are all fired up about.
And so, folks, it is risky to start saying definitively about any candidate.
And I want to tell you, this is what I like about it.
This is good and this is good.
And then the next day goes out and promises $20 billion a year to the auto industry from the federal government.
You just don't do that when you're not sure of what you're talking about.
So it's been, I'm not going to, you know, these guys come and go.
I am forever.
Presidential candidates come and go.
I am forever.
Presidents come and go.
I am forever.
Clinton's gone.
I'm still here, right?
George H.W. Bush is gone.
I'm still here, right?
Fine.
Richard in Vancouver, Washington.
Hello, sir.
Hello, sir.
Thank you for taking my call.
Yes.
I just wanted to mention that I'm a recent convert to your program.
I found you in June and listened to you daily ever since.
And I find you very informative.
And in fact, I even find that I start quoting you when I'm visiting with others when politics come up.
So I just wanted to thank you for giving me that information.
Thank you.
Thank you, Thing.
I'm sure you urge me to hang in there against all these assaults and attacks.
You have my support.
I appreciate that.
The first encouraging phone call today that I've got.
Not that you others out there who have not called are not feeling this sense of encouragement.
I can handle it either way because I know myself.
I know who I am.
I like myself.
Love myself.
Like hearing myself speak because I like hearing people who are right.
And I know I'm right.
And you know I'm right.
And if you're going to talk me out of it, feel free.
But I am rock solid.
That's why I say I'm here forever.
These other people come and go.
But I appreciate that, Richard.
I'm only teasing.
I haven't had people rip me today.
They've just been a little disappointed, have threatened to abandon me, and have, which has happened many numerous times, and claim that I disappointed them for what.
Because I could have done more.
I could have done more than Romney could have done.
I could have done more than Fred Thompson did for himself.
All right, we're going to repeat the show open where I vow to fight on the first hour of the program.
We're going to repeat it when we come back.
And now, from EIB election headquarters, Rush Limbaugh is about to make an important statement.
Ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, thank you.
Thank you very much for coming.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, no, no, no, no, thank you.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, to all of those gathered here, my loyal staff, my enthusiastic supporters, those of you who spread the word, every neighborhood, every precinct, thank you.
Thank you so much for all of your tireless hard work.
We all work tirelessly, even I.
I personally traveled from my home to my studio and back.
And I traveled from my Florida studio to my New York studio.
But alas, we did not win.
Now I know that there are reports of campaign irregularities.
But I want to point out to all of you, this is no time to quit.
This is no time to feel down.
This is no time to feel defeated.
Thank you.
Thank you.
The same media, the same media that could not call New Hampshire right, still.
Ladies and gentlemen, please.
The same media that couldn't call New Hampshire right still shamelessly in the prediction game predicting my demise and your demise.
Well, I say, bomb.
The same media that's losing circulation and readers and viewers and respect is predicting my demise.
Thank you.
We did not win, but we did not, and we have not lost.
I know of all these reports of campaign irregularities.
It has been revealed and documented, ladies and gentlemen.
My name was left off the ballots in Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties, Broward counties.
My name was not to be found on the ballots in Orlando, in Jacksonville, in Tampa, St. Pete.
No, Elections are what they are, and one thing we know is there will always be another.
This election might have been stolen from us, ladies and gentlemen.
Let me assure you, we will not.
I repeat, we will not.
We will not pull an Al Gore and sue anybody.
We will not look at hanging chads.
No lawyers, no lawsuits.
thank you thank you thank you thank you i love you too My friends, my friends, there's reason for optimism.
There's reason for hope.
By the way, change is a stupid slogan, and so is hope.
But I know some of you want hope.
Be of good cheer from the shadows of this setback.
Let me offer this uplifting thought.
In Florida, half the liberals voted for Mrs. Clinton.
One-third of the Republicans voted for Senator McCain.
Our friends in the media predicting my demise.
Talk about how conservatism is dead.
Let me ask a simple question, ladies and gentlemen.
Why is it that all of the Republican candidates claim to now carry the mantle of Ronald Reagan?
Senator McCain, the most recent McCain claims conservative metal, said McCain, it shows one thing.
I'm the conservative leader.
Who can unite your party?
How can I be said to have lost, ladies and gentlemen, when what I stand for is rock-rib conservatism in each one of these candidates.
Each one of them flawed, by the way, which has caused many conservatives to be wandering aimlessly in the electoral woods.
How can it be said that I have lost or that conservatism is lost when all of our Republican candidates claim to be conservative and to carry the conservative mantle?
In fact, it looks to me like Fred Barnes' candidate, Rudy Giuliani, has now dropped out.
It looks like David Brooks' candidate, Mike Huckabee, has no traction.
He hasn't won anything since Iowa, and he needs to get out.
Tom Broca's candidate, Hillary Clinton, she's in deep trouble going into Super Tuesday.
The race card didn't work, needs the firewall of a Latino vote.
But Tom Brokaw's candidate is floundering.
Tim Russert's candidate, Barack Obama, seems to be doing better than expected.
Good for you, Tim.
I'm proud of you.
Olbermann's candidate, Kucinich, is now gone.
He's back in Ohio.
Trying to keep his seat against a primary challenger.
Mort Kondracki's candidate, Ron Paul, gets weirder by the minute.
Thank you.
And I want to stress once again, ladies and gentlemen, I want to thank you for your support, and I want to assure you that I cannot and I will not leave the golden EIB microphone.
I will not retire.
I will not concede.
I will not drift away.
I will not fade away until every American agrees with me, as I have always said.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Here is the bottom line, ladies and gentlemen.
I think this is it.
There is a lot of anxiety among a lot of conservatives about Senator McCain.
It's simply indisputable.
But there was no figure in our roster of candidates who rose up to challenge him or galvanize conservative support.
All the candidates on our side, for various reasons, are uninspiring or worse.
And so, just as I predicted, the base has fractured.
Some going here, some going there.
Senator McCain's been able to cobble together enough votes to win in a few states.
Fine, he deserves credit for that.
But to pretend that Senator McCain is the choice of conservatives when exit poll data from every primary state show just the opposite.
He is not the choice of conservatives as opposed to the choice of the Republican establishment.
And that distinction is key.
The Republican establishment, which has long sought to rid the party of conservative influence since Reagan is feeling a victory today, as well as our friends in the media.
But both are just far-fetched and wrong.
Thank you.
Thank you very much for your steadfast support, and I trust it shall continue because I shall.
I see what's happening, and we have to reverse it.
And some people think elections are a game.
They think it's like who's up or who's down.
I don't want to fall backwards either.
You think this will help me with a women's vote?
Well, it's a good thing you didn't see that.
I just turned on my microphone, and if you had seen that, I could have gotten a union citation.
Not allowed to do that here in the New York studios.
I turned it right back off before you even saw it.
And since you didn't see it, it didn't happen.
You can't write me up.
All right, we're back.
People have been patiently waiting.
So go back to the phones to Peggy in Houston.
Hi, Peggy.
Thank you very much for your patience.
Thank you.
It's an honor to talk to you.
I just wanted to bring up the fact that we're leaving out one component, and that is the McCain Democrats.
They're going to cross over.
You can't tell me that they won Hillary, all of them, and you can't tell me that all of them won Obama.
And they'll have just what they need, a liberal Republican with a strong sense of military.
All right.
So you think McCain could win pretty handily, then?
Yes.
If he gets the nomination, I'm hoping for Romney.
Oh, I was going to ask if you are in favor of that.
No, I'm not.
All right, why not?
What would be wrong with McCain getting a bunch of Democrats and winning by a big margin and beating Hillary?
What would be wrong with that?
Isn't that what we want to do?
We want to attract Democrats and independents and moderates.
I thought that's why McCain was loved.
Why wouldn't that be a good deal?
Because that's just like having Hillary or Obama.
They're both extremely liberal, except in the military sense.
It would be health care.
He spends a lot of money.
Look at all of the background laws that he had with the education, the Kennedy factor.
Yeah, there was Reagan-Kennedy.
There's Reagan Lieberman.
There is, well, McCain.
He's trying to pass himself off as river.
You would never have Reagan Kennedy.
You would never have Reagan find gold.
No, you would never have that.
He believes in big government.
I think what I hear you saying, Peggy, and you are very shrewd, if I'm right, what I hear you saying is that McCain would attract liberal Democrats who don't like Hillary, but he would attract them as Democrats and as liberals.
And this would thus water down, maybe dilute to a great extent, the identity of the Republican Party.
It could if we let it, but I think that we're strong enough that we won't allow that to happen.
Well, wait a minute.
Wait, how can we stop it if he gets a nomination?
And if you're right, if he's going to attract a bunch of liberal Democrats who don't like Hillary, who like the social, you know, the socialist stuff, but they want somebody who can handle national security, if McCain successfully attracts a bunch of liberal Democrats to the Republican Party as liberal Democrats, what can we do?
I mean, the party is going to be watered down and changed forever.
Well, I don't think that they'll change their political affiliation.
I just think that they'll come over to vote for him because you have it'll serve as a model for anybody else wanting to win.
The only way to do it will be to go out and get liberal Democrats to vote Republican, not change parties.
The grassroots won't allow the liberal Republicans to take over.
We won't.
It will be a revolution before that occurs.
Yeah, well, that's happened before.
I mean, that's, and the country club blue blood Republicans that you're talking about didn't like it.
But you're right.
You know, as they say, you're very shrewd.
And I also like your optimism.
Well, I have to be optimistic, like what I'm faced with.
Yeah, I know.
That's the truth.
Well, look, Peggy, thank you.
I really appreciate that.
It's my honor.
You bet.
Chuck in San Jose, California.
It's great to have you with us on the EIB network.
Hello.
Hey, make a ditto's rush.
Hey.
Got a longtime listener, veteran, conservative Christian.
And my question for you is, when candidates running for office drop out before Super Tuesday, especially when we had such a diverse field, is this just another example of politics as usual?
I think it's more a function of money.
Which brings me to the second part of my question.
Everybody's criticizing Romney for using personal monies.
And I look at the other candidates.
Giuliani had a lot of money.
He only spent it in one state.
Couldn't he have better positioned himself to go into Super Tuesday with a better spending plan?
Yep.
Well, not just spending plan.
I think one of the lessons for people who followed Rudy who want to duplicate it is you can't ignore all of the first four states.
You might be able to punt Iowa, but you can't punt New Hampshire.
And you can't punt Michigan or South Carolina because you're just going to give everybody whoever, even if nobody wins all four, you're still giving your opposition a big head start.
And they're going to forget about you.
Now, the reason Romney, I want to make this point.
The reason Romney is spending a lot, A, it's his.
So what difference does it make, though?
What business is it of ours?
Why should Romney be subject to McCain's stupid rules?
Well, exactly.
But he has to.
Which is what he said last night when he readdressed the question about shifting chairs on politicians in Washington is just politics as usual.
Right.
Put a guy in a different chair doesn't change anything in Washington.
Now, the point is, McCain is, relatively speaking to Romney, out of money.
It doesn't matter.
He's got a slavish mainstream media that's giving him.
I just saw some project for journalism just did a review of who's getting all kinds of coverage in the drive-bys and lead story.
McCain's way ahead of Romney in the free media that he's getting.
And his is slavish.
You know, Romney gets ripped and criticized in his mainstream media reporting.
Romney has to spend his own money to counter some of this.
You know, I get all a little bent out of shape here when people want to get holier than thou about the money in politics.
And somebody's spending.
You're just buying the election.
What do you, would you rather have somebody spend their own money or go out and raise gazillions and owe everybody else that has donated to them?
You can't tell me you're worried about lobbyists and at the same time not be worried about donors extracting their two censor revenge or whatever.
Frank in Barton or Bartow, North Dakota.
Nice to have you, sir.
Yeah.
Omega, stick down, hit up Diggles, Rush.
I appreciate what you're doing.
And I was just calling in, you remind me of my father.
And in a unique way, you have an ability to always come around.
You're always right.
And I appreciate what you're doing.
And for a while there, I was a little bit concerned about what were the direction.
But with you and the other conservative shows and programs, it really makes it, for me especially, and helps me be optimistic and carrying the conservative banner forward regardless.
And like you said, I think the answer to that is you're going to be here for a long time.
So is this country.
And these people, hopefully we can, the conservative issues and the agenda can stay strong and continue forward.
I think it's important.
Obviously, I feel like my worst concern is I'm voting for my kids, a 10-year-old and a four-year-old.
And I appreciate everything you're giving us.
Well, thank you so much for that.
I appreciate the encouragement.
Fear, I will not cave on principles and beliefs, core values, those kinds of things.
I will not cave on them because I don't know how.
I don't know how to cave on principles and core values when you're talking about the future of the United States of America and what we all want it to be.
Thanks much.
We'll be back and wrap it up in a second.
Well, that's it, folks.
That's it for today.
Just a 21-hour break coming up.
We'll be back tomorrow, smiling, filled with good cheer and optimism.
By the way, it looks like illegal immigrants may get rebate checks in the stimulus program.