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July 22, 2008 - Rush Limbaugh Program
37:25
July 22, 2008, Tuesday, Hour #3
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Ha are you?
Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen.
I am Rush Limbaugh.
I am America's anchor man, America's truth detector, and a doctor of democracy.
Here on the Excellence and Broadcasting Network, the fastest three hours in the media.
Surpassing all audience expectations on a daily basis.
Great to have you here.
Phone number 800-282-2882.
Email address El Rushbo at EIB net.com, another network coming under fire here for all Obama coverage all the time is the National Barack Channel.
A mildly exasperated National Barack news team.
Yesterday dismissed complaints about overcovering Barack Obama's Middle East trip as a lot of hot air.
Steve Capus, the president of NBC News said we get criticized for not covering enough hard news.
Look how many stories are being covered on the Obama trip.
Israel, the Middle East, the war.
That's the point, Mr. Campus.
You were supposed to be covering that place all along, but you haven't been until Barry takes his little summer camp trip over there.
Pimping Bush's ride.
And you're adding insult to injury but make it look like Obama is coming up with brand new policy ideas that everybody has articulated long before he thought of them.
You're crediting him with coming up the ideas and moving things along over there when the president has moved things along and the military has moved things along.
It's a disgrace what you are doing.
It is an utter disgrace.
It's journalistic malpractice.
And it's the same thing over to Columbia brought a Barack Channel.
The American Barack Channel, a National Barack Channel, a Columbia Barack Channel.
They're all doing it.
They're all in the tank.
The tank is full.
And there's a I mentioned this ladies and gentlemen at the top of the program.
There is a there's a new narrative, a new template out there.
And isn't it just coincidental how this comes up?
The new template is voters don't care about surge.
David Schuster of the National Barack Channel on their piddling little cable outlet last night or yesterday, whenever said Americans don't care about the surge.
They want the war to be over.
Yeah, they do want the war to be over.
They want the war to be won.
The American people do not dislike the military.
The American people do not want us to lose the war.
The surge is instrumental in victory.
And I'll try to establish the narrative that the American voter doesn't care about surge.
I frankly, you know what?
I don't think they're focused on the war as much at all.
I think it's gasoline price after gasoline price after gasoline price after the housing crisis.
I think it's domestic things and the economy that has them absorbed and con and then concerned.
This Iraq business is not on their minds as it once was.
But this whole notion that they don't care about the surge because Americans want the war to be over.
The geniuses that are trying to promote this.
That's the purpose of the surge.
The ultimate outcome of the surge is to produce victory, which is how you define the war ending.
What is always fascinating about this kind of argument to me is the complete lack of appreciation for the devastation that would fill the void if we got out of there as Obama wanted us to do.
If that had happened, if we had pulled out of there, what would the American people say then?
If little Barack had actually gotten his way, he's been in the Senate 143 days.
He hasn't contributed one damn thing.
To this victory, he has tried to secure def.
I take it back.
He has contributed one thing.
He Took off his American flag lapel pen.
Aside from that, Barack Obama has not done one thing but try to secure defeat.
Now he's over there rewriting history, claiming this whole victory was his idea, and it comes because of a convergence of political events, not because of the U.S. military, and certainly not to do with the American government.
This is the kind of thinking, folks, that will inevitably lead to the defeat of this country.
Fine, don't fight them.
People want government benefits, no matter what, give it to them.
It's the only way to win.
The only way to win elections.
Create a bunch of dependent people, give them what they want.
If they don't like war, then don't fight a war.
Even if U.S. national security interests are at stake, don't do it.
The American people don't like war.
Who the hell does so if you're gonna run around and say that the voters aren't even focused on a war and the surge, they don't care about the surge, then you're also saying the voters are dumb.
It's not worth trying to persuade them, don't bother explaining anything to them.
Just try to figure out a way to accommodate them.
Treat them as stupid and respond to them accordingly.
Hell, some of you know, some of our pseudo-conservatives have even taken up this whole way of thinking.
You can read about it in the New York Times every now and then.
And we continue now with the American Barack Channel and the program Barack Nightline, the correspondent Terry Moran said to Obama, if we had followed your advice to withdraw in the face of this horrific violence, what do you think Iraq would have looked like?
Nobody has a crystal ball.
Uh, if we did, then you'd just hire the guy with a crystal ball.
If you had to do it over again, knowing what you know now.
Would you support the surge?
No, because uh keep in mind that that You wouldn't.
Well, these kinds of hypotheticals are very difficult.
Uh you know, hindsight is 2020.
But I think that what I am absolutely convinced of is that uh at that time we had to change the political debate.
Because the view of the Bush administration at that time was one that I just disagreed with.
Do you understand what he just said?
In the first place, he said we can't look back after he just got through this whole press conference looking back and saying that his plan would have worked, except for X, Y, and Z. Now he's asked by the American Barack Channel on Barack Nightline, knowing what he knows now, would he support the surge?
No.
No.
No, these hypotheticals are very difficult.
But we had to change the political debate because the view of the Bush administration at time was one I disagreed with.
So the surge and its success is irrelevant.
He needed something to disagree with Bush about.
And he needed that in order to get the Democrat Party nomination.
He needed that to get contributions.
So it's not about American military success, as I have been pointing out time and time again.
It is not about that at all.
It is about power with these people.
It is about doing and devastating whatever lies in front of them in order to get that power, and he has just admitted it.
And of course, the sycophantic slavish disciples in the drive-by media swoon.
They think this is brilliance and honesty.
However, must be fair, there is one renegade in the drive-by today.
His name is Dan Balls, B A L Z. And Dan Balls is writing in today's Washington Post.
Headline of the story, Obama makes war gains.
Subhead, Mullechy's embrace of withdrawal timeline confounds McCain.
But then the balls in the story makes three points.
Number one, Obama has certainly not won the argument over Iraq policy.
Far from it.
His proposal to withdraw troops over a 16-month period still faces serious questions, including some from the commanders Who might be asked to implement this if he's elected?
But the curious turn of events made for an unexpected opening act for Obama's week-long tour, his college visitation tour, a little summer camp to these seven countries.
Whether Obama can count on Nouri Al Maliki in the days ahead's another matter.
The Iraqi government does not speak with one voice on this matter.
It's not yet clear how current negotiations with the administration will conclude.
And number three, beyond that, Obama's opposition to the troop surge that has helped quell violence and U.S. casualties leaves plenty of room for further questions about his judgment at that moment.
Shazam.
Shazam, Dan Ball's the Washington Post.
We have one fallout.
We have one renegade.
We have one traitor.
We have a Judas.
We have a Judas, my friends, among the disciples.
Obama's opposition to the troop surge leaves plenty of room for further questions about his judgment at that moment.
But as political theater, Mr. Balls writes, the events of the past few days have played unfailingly in the Democrats' favor.
Political theater.
Amen, bro.
And what makes it theater?
There's an audience.
Who's the audience?
The drive-bys.
The disciples.
Two hundred of them following this guy around, their tongues dragging along the concrete and the floors.
They're the audience.
They're writing the reviews.
They are the critics.
They so desperately want to be loved by the Messiah.
And so they have thrown their professionalism down the toilet and flushed.
They have thrown their integrity in a sewer.
They've thrown their independence, their objectivity, their fairness, their judgment, whatever, out the window.
In order to be close to the Messiah.
In order to get a Democrat in the White House.
We'll be back.
I gotta check and see how that montage is coming.
We put together a montage of Obama's press conference today of all the stutters.
Forty-six seconds long.
Then Cookie said, If I did the whole speech, if I did a whole press conference, it'd be three minutes.
I said, do it.
He said, You gotta be kidding.
Oh my God, you gotta be kidding me.
I said, No, do it.
He's been working on it for two hours.
She might be going stir crazy.
I would be having to listen to that thing over and over and over and plus pick out all the stutters.
I'll check on the progress during this windfall profit timeout.
Stay with us.
Okay, back to the phones.
Up next, by when we get the uh soundbites, uh we've we've got uh we got some sound bites here from the drive-by is commenting on the uh the Obama summer camp tour, and not all of them favorable, David Rodham Gurgen, Gloria Borger, and Raya Mitchell.
National Barack channel.
But we'll get to that as soon as we get some phone calls here.
It's been a while, people have been patiently waiting.
We go to Detroit, and it's a Jesse.
Hello, sir.
Hello, are you doing Rush?
Fine, thank you much.
I'm glad you took my call.
Um, I'm sitting up here, my head about to blow off my shoulder.
Uh, listen to Barack Obama saying uh knowing what he know about the surge, no woody know, uh supported knowing what he knows, and he said no.
No, the surge was meant for no more than that purpose to save lives.
Uh soldiers, how many soldiers, thousands of uh Iraqi life has been saved, thousands of probably soldier life have been saved.
And he said he didn't he didn't he wouldn't support it.
Of course not.
And so that you know, what did that mean?
Do he care about the Iraqis?
Do he care about the soldiers?
Well, he cares that they're unemployed Iraqis.
He said that in a previous soundbite.
Had too many unemployed Iraqis, but you're right.
Up till now, the Democrats would have been perfectly fine with Sabam Saddam still in power with his rape rooms and torture and all that.
We had no reason to go in there.
They never cared about the Iraqi people.
Now all of a sudden cares about the unemployed Iraqi men and women.
But you're you're right on the money.
Saving one this guy, he he needed a political issue.
He needed something to disagree with the Bush administration about for his campaign for his fundraising, and he just admitted it.
Right.
And you know, not care about the surge because I'm a I'm a black uh man from Detroit and I'm a Marine.
I served in Vietnam in 65 to 66, and this is for my brothers that's serving now.
You know, he doesn't he doesn't care anything about it.
If he did, you know, he would have said he would have said he would support the surge, you know what I'm saying?
Because it's going to save countless lives.
And that's what I'm so angry now.
Now you have a right to be angry.
And so thanks for taking and then also uh the guy uh on uh MS MBC, uh Jeff Row, the one that said the surge didn't matter, it matters to me.
Uh that's excellent.
It of course it it it's successful, and the purpose was to uh achieve victory and save lives.
You are absolutely right.
And thanks for taking my call, right?
My pleasure, Jesse.
Thank you very much for uh calling.
One thing you've got to remember about the most merciful Lord Obama, he's not a thinker, folks.
He is not a thinker.
He has learned what he knows.
He has been indoctrinated, all these Ivy League schools and classrooms.
That's why he has the view of Middle America that he does, and that's why he has the view of the U.S. military that he does.
In fact, that's why he has the view of America.
I mean, you will find a concentrated anti-American bias, particularly in the Ivy League, but on many college campi.
So that's what he's learned.
He's been taught.
He's not a thinker.
And you can see he's not a thinker when the teleprompter is away.
When the teleprompter's not there and not on, guy has trouble.
They joke about McCain with the prompter, it's the other way around with um with uh Barack Obama.
All right, here's David Rodham Gurgan.
This is on uh CNN last night.
Anderson Cooper 360.
Question, what do you make of these moves by the Maliki government saying it wants American combat troops out of Iraq by 2010.
But Barack Obama made the first mistake of his trip in releasing a statement in which he uh said exactly what Maliki had said in those conversations.
We have a long tradition in this country that we only have one president at a time.
He's the commander chief and the negotiator in chief.
I cannot remember a campaign in which our rival seeking the presidency has been in a position of negotiating a war that's underway with another party outside the country.
I think he leaves himself open to the charge tonight that he's meddling, that this is not his role, that he is can be the critic, but he's not the negotiator.
We have a president who does that.
So, and I think the underlying facts support him, but I think it would be a real mistake, and I think it was a mistake, um, to get into these conversations and not let it be used politically.
He's right on the money about that.
Right on the money, but after this has been said, okay, so it's said on CNN uh last night, and that'll be the end of it, as far as the drive-by's.
There will be no such sim there won't be any any amplification of this.
David Rodham Gergen has gone out there and he's he's got it said, so they were drive by say, eh, we had somebody point this out.
But that's not the action line.
Uh the continuing trip to the Obama's taking that's the action line.
Uh Gloria Borger Borger was up next, and uh he was she was asked by uh Anderson Cooper, do you you think this is the first mistake Obama's made?
I do agree with David about walking the fine line between being this candidate and being presumptuous, and I think that he may just have crossed that because you know it it is a tradition.
You don't talk about these private conversations, and it's not up to Barack Obama right now uh to negotiate troop withdrawals.
Uh it's up to Barack Obama to be on a fact-finding mission, which is indeed what he has said he was not.
Yeah, well, this is not the first mistake, and it's by no means the only mistake.
He's he's piling up all kinds of mistakes here.
He is saying really stupid things in these press conferences.
It's not just that he is revealing the private conversations he had with Nuriel Maliki.
It's not just that he's conducting negotiations and pretending to be president when he's not.
It's his arrogance that leads into that.
But he's just playing wrong on so many things.
You don't think it's a mistake, for example, in the face of of unquestionable success of the surge.
To deny it?
Would you, knowing what you know now, would you support it?
Yeah, I think I would have.
That was mistaken.
You think that's smart?
Hey, Mike, grab the 46-second montage.
I just heard from Cookie.
She just told me that the full-length montage of all the stutters and the uhs and the ands and so forth in Obama's 40-minute press conference runs eight minutes.
It runs eight minutes and it's going to be done in nine minutes.
It means that we're not going to have time to play at all today.
Eight minutes of now, but we we've got the we got a 46-second version of this.
None of these have been repeated.
And I've noticed this throughout the campaign when there's no teleprompter.
This this guy's an ed Koch.
And today it just was over the top in this press conference.
Just over and I'm watching this.
Everybody talking about a great orator, what a great communicator, how confident this guy.
Anything but that.
This guy was so unsure of himself today.
It was, it was just he doesn't know what he's talking about, as the sound bites that we've aired so far indicate.
Imagine eight minutes of this.
Uh uh are uh uh uh uh um that that's a bunch.
Um so let me tick these off.
Um so the issue is not a perception that uh put it this way.
Um we're trying to bipartisan group here and and uh uh and uh uh uh uh um uh uh uh you know who the bipartisan group is that he's talking about?
He's got Senator Jack Reed from uh where's Reed from Rhode Island and Chuck Hagel from Nebraska.
I know, where's the Republican in this group?
What what what what is bipartisan about this group?
And I saw him sitting there, they were sitting back there, just I mean, they were looking up at the Messiah with like they were in prayer as he was bumbling through this press conference, and they didn't say a word.
Not that I wanted them to, don't misunderstand.
I just what a traveling circus.
All right, there we go.
Uh two more bites here for you, folks.
Andrea Mitchell.
National Barack Channel.
This is last night on their little twiddling cable outlet talking about uh Obama and his summer trip to Afghanistan and Iraq.
Let me just say something about the message management.
He didn't have reporters with him, he didn't have a press pool, he didn't do a press conference while he was on the ground in either Afghanistan or Iraq.
What you're seeing is not reporters brought in, you're seeing selected pictures taken by the military, questions by the military, and what some would call fake interviews, because they're not interviews from a journalist.
So there's a real press issue here.
Uh politically, it's smart as can be, but we have not seen a presidential candidate do this in my recollection ever before.
Yeah, so where's the criticism?
Just say it, it flops and flies away.
By the way, but isn't this also interesting?
He's meeting with the troops.
He's meeting with the generals, and of course, the you know, the Pentagon, the military's out there, their stage managing this, they always do this.
No matter who's on the trip, but it's fake interviews because the trips, the questions from the journalists are not being asked.
Questions asked by the troops, they're irrelevant because they're not journalists asking them.
These are fake interviews.
So, in essence, Andrea Mitchell, National Barack Channel, is out there accusing Barack of propagandizing this by not allowing the media anywhere.
Hey, look.
Andrea, if he didn't want you, he didn't want you.
Well, I don't know, military journalists are phony journalists because they work you have to understand a liberal mindset, snertly.
Military journalists are phony journalists because they're with the military.
The military is nothing but a propaganda arm of the Bush administration.
You can't trust what the military tells you.
That's a liberals.
They hate the military.
Hate it.
They just don't trust it.
It's not one of their most favorite institutions.
Andrea Mitchell, National Barack Channel, was asked the following question by the host.
Chris Matthews.
The administration of George Bush, and now the campaign of McCain has fairly or not made their case that they're the politicians looking out for the troops.
They are the troops politicians.
They have suggested as soldiers, men and women, both in all ranks.
All the outfits support the Republican policy in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Does the picture of Obama having a good time among the smiling faces of service people undercut that political statement?
I have to tell you that the military feels very uncomfortable about being used in any way as uh helping one side or the other in a political campaign.
This is something that is against their rules.
It's against the law, and they don't want to be, you know, part of this, but they have no choice because congressional delegations are carried by the military.
So they're trying to play it down the middle.
It's very hard for them uh to be put on the spot this way.
I do think that Obama has some vulnerability when you really drill down on these issues because the surge.
Clearly the surge has worked.
And not only in terms of security, there is some level of political reconciliation.
The Sunnis rejoined the government on Saturday.
Uh we saw 1,700 police recruits only yesterday being sworn in, the first and largest, or the largest, I should say, graduating class.
So there are some positive things happening on the ground that you have to attribute to the surge.
Whoa!
Mama.
All right, that's all well and good.
Credit where credit is is deserved if she gets credit.
How isn't the question rather obvious?
It's been working for a long time.
Surge has been showing a lot of success for a long time.
We're only now hearing about it.
We're only now hearing about it because Barry had to go tour some college campuses to see if the administrators would let him in.
Be part of the gang.
So all of a sudden we get some accurate reporting out of Iraq because Obama's there.
Very little accurate reporting, but you gotta give Andrea Mitchell, National Barack Channel, all the credit in the world here.
She saw it.
She saw it.
It's just kind of frustrating because it gives you the idea what could have been reported all along, if there was any kind of honesty in the American media.
About it.
We'll be back in just a moment.
Stay with us, my friends.
Yeah, no, no, no.
We're just Away, we're back.
Rush Limbaugh here, having more fun than a uh human being should be allowed to have.
Uh, Washington, D.C. Norman, you're next.
Great to have you here on the EIB network.
Hello.
I am so sick and tired about the way this media is disrespecting presidential nominee John McCain.
Rush, do you believe this media would be this one-sided if the table were turned?
If this were John Kerry, a guy who's been in the Senate since Vietnam going up against the new black politician that wasn't well known but was a conservative through and through.
I'm a lot older than you, Rush.
I've I I've been following politics for a long time, and I've watched the Democrat leadership in the House of Representatives go from O'Neill to right to Gephardt to Plosi, and I've watched the Democrat leadership over in the United States, Seneca from Bird from Mitchell to Dash would have read.
These liberals come and go, Rush, but I really worry about what these media Hollywood Empire are in this country into the body great grandchildren will be born into.
But John McCain is the man half the voters in this country are praying will be their next president.
And this media, I believe a media that is iron fistedly controlled by ruthless people who think ideologically like Bill Clinton and George Sorce.
This Media is belittling him by ignoring him.
Rush, if this media were reporting the same truth that you report about these liberal Democrats, the American people wouldn't be turning over our country to them.
Logically, it's isn't our problem the media, and not the liberals who were reliant on the case.
This guy cannot report the truth of who they are.
Hey, Norman, thanks.
Thanks for the um.
Thanks to call Norman.
It is great to hear from your voice today.
We think he called yesterday, taking a totally opposite point of view.
Anyway, here is the Nikki in Pittsburgh.
Nikki, welcome to the EIB network.
Hello.
Thank you, Rush.
A few weeks ago you referenced a song in the movie Camelot in relationship to Hillary Clinton, how to handle a woman.
Right.
Well, in that same movie, Guinevere points out to Lancelot that he lacks humility, humility.
Uh she even says it in French though, so he understands it.
I think Obama lacks humility.
And I think you're right that the Americans are going to turn against him for that reason, too.
Yeah, you know, I got it's interesting.
Uh that's a it's uh uh curious and interesting way to look at he lacks humility because that that is almost required if uh if one is arrogant, as arrogant as Obama is.
And I got a you know, I got an email note, Nikki from uh somebody just read it during the break, saying that I should stop calling Obama names, that it is beneath me and it's not productive.
I should stop calling him a jerk and that kind of thing.
And I just maybe that's true.
I just I got so mad listening to this stuff today.
It's infuriating.
It is unconscionable, and it is infuriating, and you've nailed it.
He just he has no humility whatsoever.
I so I'm gonna stop calling him names, and I'm just gonna call him a con artist.
He is a con artist.
He is conning everybody.
And he's getting away with it because so many people want to be conned.
There are a lot of people in this country want to believe that a guy can come along, snap his fingers and give him health care.
That a guy can come along and make all of our enemies love us.
They want to be conned and to believe in this.
It's not that it has to be true.
They just want to believe that it's true.
So we got a con man.
We have a con man operating here.
That's and that's not calling him a name.
Uh Beverly in uh qu was it, Quentin, Texas.
Yes, Beverly, I'm glad you called.
Welcome to the EIB network.
Hello, Mr. Limbaugh.
East Texas greetings to you.
As a mother of a son who's on his eighth time overseas, I want to tell you how much you encourage us because day by day we see the discouragement that the mainstream media offers.
And listening to you uh and accompanied by my prayers for my son, give me courage.
He left his wife and his new baby daughter, which they named Liberty.
And our son tells us that each time he goes to war, he always knows that he's fighting for the country's liberty.
So their reasons for naming her liberty was that when he goes now, he can say, I'm fighting for my country's liberty and I'm fighting for liberty.
So thank you, sir, for all you do for us military family.
Yeah, the the thanks are owed to you and to your son, and and it's a it's a it's a debt the American people could never be able to repay.
I just have so much empathy.
I can't imagine what it's like.
Your son's been instrumental in the success of the military operations there, and we've got a presidential candidate, a Democrat, who cannot bring himself to credit the people who deserve it.
Yes, sir.
He demeans and disrespects the military, as does the mainstream media.
I didn't think anyone could be worse than John Kerry and Bill Clinton the night that John Kerry reported for duty.
My husband, who is a two-tour Vietnam helicopter pilot and career officer, he crashed and broke his back in Vietnam.
But when he heard Kerry say reporting for duty, I thought he was gonna have a heart attack in the living room.
But but now watching the de the progression and the degrading of the military, as if we're numbskulls.
My son graduated, our son graduated from the military academy.
It took it took an amazing amount of uh intellect and stamina to graduate from that fine academy.
And watching this, it just discourages me so much that that um the mainstream media is feeding Kool-Aid to so many people.
But when we listen to you, we are reminded why he's thank you.
Thanks Beverly very much.
Appreciate that.
All right.
All right, we have the montage.
Now cookie cut it down to seven and a half minutes.
Not eight minutes just too long.
Seven and a half minutes.
I want to hear this myself.
I want you what this is.
Not one repetition of one stutter from Barack's press conference in Amon Jordan this morning.
It started about ten o'clock.
I watched it, my friends.
And I was struck by all of these that I would just you know the context here.
Such a great orator, such a great communicator.
Guys, this is a just penetrate you with his oratory language.
Now, listen to this.
I also want to thank the this.
So Seven and a half minutes of this.
You know, is of their work.
I called, and I'm with, as that, and we have to do this.
As well as, right now, and identify if you want to, that's a bunch.
So let me tick these off.
It is true that what in Iraq are seen as...
And so, and if I was, if I were in his shoes, and so a, from someplace else, the, and to see the Okay, folks, we got a lot more to I don't have time to squeeze it all in here.
We're gonna let it keep running.
We gotta go to uh the profit center timeout.
We're gonna let it keep running.
It'll still be playing when we get back.
Uh factor on that.
Uh the uh uh uh uh you know d what is that say about my domestic policy?
Uh obvious uh uh uh comrade uh operation.
Uh uh uh uh and uh uh uh uh uh uh cutting through the uh uh uh conflict.
Yes, I'm sorry.
Uh uh I uh uh uh uh uh I'm I'm uh well uh uh uh uh personnel.
Uh uh uh potential sh uh uh uh uh avoided.
Um in terms of uh look, there are all kinds of things that I learned.
So let me tick these off.
Let me put it this way.
And a lot of what
drives, it appears, motivations and sensible arrangement.
Some of the, and so.
The Obama montage of stutters from the press conference today is still rolling, folks.
The, you know, and the way, for example.
We have not stopped it.
And because it, and on the other hand, I think that, you know,
Uh l let me uh uh uh uh uh uh uh um would would uh uh um uh uh uh I think that uh uh uh I uh uh uh with its it's not gonna end uh in time for it's still gonna go.
It's it's still still going.
It's gonna be going another two minutes.
See you tomorrow, folks.
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