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Nov. 13, 2008 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:34
November 13, 2008, Thursday, Hour #2
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Time Text
No pressure.
Well, thanks, Johnny.
Truly, genuinely thank you to Johnny and to Rush, who takes a day off today, and I'm very glad to be here.
Mark Davis out of WBAP, Dallas, Fort Worth, the community that will welcome George W. Bush home in just a few short weeks.
And I touched on this last hour, and I think there are only going to be more moments like this when he was up at the Intrepid on Veterans Day, when he spoke to the United Nations, that cauldron of America hating tin horn tyrants for the last time today.
And I really just have to tell you, he looked so tired and quite frankly, so old.
Eight years of the presidency will wear anyone down.
Have you seen the before and after shots of Bill Clinton, who actually stayed quite spry, in a manner of speaking, the eight years, I mean, Reagan started out as a fairly advanced in age.
Carter, oh, four years of Carter.
That was, I mean, Carter started to look bad in 1977.
I mean, it was, it was, of course, screwing up the country.
It takes a lot of energy.
And if you, yes, I've seen the email.
Don't send it to me 500 times.
Here's Carter before and after.
Here's Bush before and after.
And then there's Barack Obama and Red Fox.
Ha It actually is pretty funny, the first 27 times.
But as we take a look at these waning days of the Bush administration, there are going to be so many lasts.
And I don't want to make a prediction here.
The president goes out with poll numbers that are almost in negative single integers.
It is one of this administration goes out with a whimper almost without parallel.
It is richly undeserved.
And I've said a million times, history will smile more brightly on this administration as time goes by.
There will be, oh, probably not from the Chris Matthews and Michael Moores or anything of this world, but get ready for a little burst of nostalgia.
I mean, I've said self-professed that there, oh, I've had all kinds of issues with this administration on the exploding growth of government, their weakness on the borders, the ridiculousness of campaign of McCain Feingold, all manner of things like that.
The Dubai ports.
I mean, Harriet Myers, please.
Just all kinds of things.
But there's one thing that just wipes out all of that.
It doesn't wipe it out.
It outweighs all of that.
The war that he has seen fit to fight has kept my family safe.
So he will spend these last 10 weeks, and there will be other lasts for this president.
And when you really write this story, it's an epic drama.
Do you remember, I'm really going off on a rant here.
I'm sorry, but I'm having a good time, and I hope you are too.
Do you remember 2000?
2000 at last, the opportunity to be rid of the stench of the Clintons.
But, you know, the choice there was that even though he had to leave after eight years, what was, you know, what were we being pawned off?
What was being pawned off on us?
His vice president.
So it's Al Gore.
And just can I write enough books that say thank God he lost.
I mean, I'm glad Kerry lost.
Well, in the post-9-11 era, you bet I am.
I'm glad Mondale lost.
I'm glad Dukakis lost.
I'm glad for all those things, please.
But Al Gore, listen, there are liberals.
And for example, Joe Biden.
I'm setting something up here.
Joe Biden's too liberal for me, but I think Joe Biden is a good guy, and I don't think he's a nutbag.
And Joe Biden's one of those Democrats that actually doesn't make my teeth itch so much.
I mean, compared to Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi and all this.
And there are others of that type that I can name.
Al Gore is not, it's not just liberalism with Al Gore.
I can take that, please.
But take the global warming cult leader status, the intellectual recklessness of his position on climate crisis.
There is no crisis.
The planet is not in peril.
We all want to take better care of the planet.
That's fine.
We share that.
But he's just a nut on that.
But he's also, listen, he has a lot of company there.
He has a ton of company in that.
So what is it with Gore?
Additionally, with Al Gore, I just, and listen, I'm not going to diagnose and I'm like, you know, there's something the matter with him.
He has turned down the opportunity to be some climate czar or something like that.
That's so beneath him.
He is this citizen of the world and above it all.
I have to tell you, he makes Barack Obama look positively humble.
I mean, so just thank God Al Gore never got to be the leader of the free world.
But I'll take you back to 2000.
I'm sitting in Philadelphia at the Republican convention, and it is the night before the Bush acceptance speech.
It is the Cheney acceptance speech.
I came close to saying something on my local show this morning.
I'm going to put it to the test right now.
Dick Cheney, let's do it together.
Very seriously.
Dick Cheney.
Best vice president of my lifetime.
Finest vice president of my lifetime.
I'm going to put down a test here in a second.
But do you remember the Cheney chant?
Not really a chant because it's Dick Cheney.
It's like, raise the roof.
I'm Dick Cheney.
No, it was help is on the way.
After eight years of the Clinton stench, help, my words, not his, help is on the way.
A better day is coming.
A better time is coming.
A better tone in Washington.
And it happened.
And the inauguration in 01, I just can't say enough about it.
We did joint, since I was in Texas and the inaugurations in Washington, we did joint coverage heard on Russia's Washington affiliate, WMAL.
And of course, here at BAP in Dallas-Fort Worth, and I'm sitting there on the scaffolding, just freezing everything I have off watching as this Texan, a man I know, takes the oath of office as the 43rd president of the United States.
It was just a singular moment in my life.
And then you get 9-11.
Everything changes.
But one thing doesn't.
My gratitude at who the president is.
And of course, the national unity that Democrats like to blame President Bush for destroying, huh?
Excuse me?
He didn't change.
The America of 9-11, the America of September 2001 and October, November, December, January, 02, I'm stretching it now, February.
By March, it was over.
And you know why it was over?
President Bush didn't do anything.
He didn't change.
He said, guess what?
Going to fight a war.
Six months later, there were two kinds of people.
The people with the guts and the spine to stick with it and the people who didn't have the guts and the spine to stick with it.
Also known as the Democratic Party of the United States.
So they went back to their natural nesting ground of Bush loathing and politicizing national security.
And that is what took all this wonderful unity and dashed it against the rocks.
And the years since have involved the war and really little else.
I know other things have happened.
We've had immigration battles.
We've had, you know, all kinds of other things.
But the path of this presidency and the story of this presidency is inextricably linked to the war.
And that means it went into the toilet bowl in, let's say, 2006 when the war was not going well.
And then the surge.
And now it's better.
And we are winning.
We are winning.
There's so much more to do.
John McCain would have done it.
I don't know that Barack Obama will.
I pray for some epiphany of wisdom.
But the bullhorn, the bullhorn.
We're going to go after the people.
The people who knock these buildings down are going to hear from us.
I'm sorry.
Sorry.
I have a tough time telling that story.
Doggone it, man.
And it's not a squandered opportunity.
He has chosen to fight the war.
And may God bless him eternally for it.
It is we who have failed him.
It is America that got war-wear.
We're fat and lazy.
And whah, it's hard.
This fighting terror is hard.
Lest I remind you that al-Qaeda and the people in the coffee shops of Kabul, they're okay fighting us for the next seven centuries.
No problem.
Oh, by the way, we're going to be fighting America and trying to kill Jews for about the next 700 years.
You good?
Yo, sign me up.
You bet.
I'm good.
America, four years.
I'm out.
Whah, it's hard.
We have been the problem.
This war-weary, historically illiterate nation of ours.
So as this presidency winds down, and so thank God is this story, I'm just filled with nostalgia is not the right word.
It's like a platform.
It's not a tragedy.
I want to call it a tragedy because we're winning the war.
History will smile on this administration.
President has done a whole lot of good things.
Thank you for the tax cuts that kept our economy strong for a real long time post-9-11.
But what a story.
Is there really any story?
No two presidencies are the same, but started out with such hope, endured such tragedy, energized a nation with the kind, and I will tell you this, a word comes to mind, and that word is visionary.
What is a visionary?
It's someone who simply sees something that not everybody sees.
You're not a visionary if 90%, if everybody agrees with you, then you're just, you know, you got a good idea and everybody agrees with you.
Good for you.
If you're ahead of the pack and people are slow to warm to what your idea is, but ultimately recognize that you are right, that is a visionary.
George W. Bush, visionary in terms of the moral necessity and the practical necessity, because we'd like to not die of fighting terrorists where they live so they don't come where we live.
So eight years, two elections, and a seemingly a century of American history that has passed beneath our feet during this period.
What a remarkable, remarkable time.
And the pages turn.
The Obama era begins.
How long does it last?
What does it present us with?
I don't need to go all fairness doctrine on you or anything, but if I may be permitted, and while we're making lists of things that we are thanking God for, unapologetically, thank God for the Limbaugh Show and this little show of mine that I do in Texas and my occasional opportunity to pop by here and talk to you and the tons of people, mostly conservative.
Yeah.
Talk radio doesn't need balance.
Talk radio is balance.
And some of the folks who do this for a living are liberal.
Bill Press, Alan Combs.
God love you.
You're doing hard work.
You're doing it well.
What a magnificent sound of free speech.
What a joy it is to chronicle these things that pass before us.
And so there's some of that.
Now, how about if I shut up and take some calls on the Rush Limbaugh Show?
Let's take this break, come back.
We're going to take some calls immediately.
Some bailout calls, some Sarah Palin calls.
We can talk about what she needs to do or doesn't need to do to get better street cred for 2012.
And maybe we'll put that chainy best vice president of my lifetime thing to the test.
I think I'm, you know, that just burst into my head.
I'll think about it during the break and get back to you afterward.
1-800-282-2882.
1-800-282-2882, The Rush Limbaugh Show.
I'm Mark Davis filling in, and we will be here right now.
Little Aerosmith, not a bad, what, 33-year-old record there walk this way from Toys in the Attic.
Wow.
We're all a lot older than we think we are.
Now, this is kind of funny.
We talked about playing Rush as the bumper music on the Rush Limbaugh Show and just the inherent comedy of that.
I thought the boys, I thought Kit and Mike and everybody, the people in my intercom ear here in Texas, as I enjoy the gift of filling in on the Limbaugh Show, thought they might have been pulling the substitute host's chain a little bit with this next call, but no, because there it is in Fairfield County, Ohio, about 300 people, Rushville, Ohio, best town name in America.
Cheryl, you are there, and it's a pleasure to have you.
How you doing, ma'am?
Thank you so much.
First, I wanted to comment: please pass on thanks to President Bush from most of my family, too, for keeping us safe.
Promise you I will.
Okay.
On Sarah Palin, I would be thrilled to see her be a senator, but I would also be thrilled to see her come back in 2012 and run as a president candidate.
Well, there's some who say that's the sort of first one, then the other.
Let's let her have that Ted Stevens seat, get some Senate mileage on her, and then get some Washington street cred, and then hit it right there in 2012 and duke it out with probably a very crowded pack of Republicans.
I'd be thrilled to see that.
Can I ask a question, though, Cheryl?
Because while that's a scenario that I've talked about, and it sounds good to me and sounds good to you, none other than Camille Paglia, who is a very intellectual, elite liberal on most things, but certainly on abortion, she has written one of the most complimentary things about Sarah Palin, saying that people like Sarah Palin, specifically because she is pro-life, are part of the future of feminism.
And that with their views, so that feminism is not just defined by people who worship at the altar of available abortion, there needs to be diversity in feminism, and she is it.
And Camille Paglia has nothing but good things to say about Sarah Palin.
There's one other thing she says.
She says, to those of us who are hoping and even requiring some U.S. Senate mileage on her, forget that.
She doesn't need to go to Washington and have the soul sucked out of her by that noxious environment.
Let her stay in Alaska or do anything she wants that keeps her life closer to the normal American, that proximity that made her so charming to all of us, that going to the Senate might, in a way, is my word, not hers, make her a step more ordinary.
She doesn't need to go to the Senate, and there's a part of that that kind of resonates with me, and I want to check with you.
Yeah, my most liked thing about her is that she's not polluted by the politics.
She doesn't follow everybody else's lead, and that's why I would love to see her and a lot more people that are like her and like us running our country.
Me too.
Cheryl, thank you very, very much.
I will suggest to you that right now, sitting here, right now, my favorite thing would still be, with due respect to Camille, let's get her in the Senate.
Because here's the thing, I have enough faith in her.
I have enough confidence in her that she could walk the halls of the United States Senate and she would change the Senate more than the Senate would change her.
And while it may be satisfying for those of us who love her to say, hey, stay there in Juno, girl, stay true to Alaska and stay different and maverick-y and all that good stuff.
The fact of the matter is that if you are going to be going up against, you know, Mitt Romney, Bobby Jindal, Charlie Christmas, now these are other governors, but they're governors of states that actually have some people in them.
It's an appearance game.
Part of it is what you bring to the table, and the other part is what people think about you, you know, extraneously.
And if she can say, you know what, I've been out here doing national politics, it's no more, no more.
It put Tina Faye out of a job, not because she wouldn't look like her anymore, but she couldn't make fun of her anymore.
It would no longer be her only foreign policy experience would not be that I could see Russia from my house, which was very funny.
The best satire always goes to some level of truth.
And she was not a teeming lexicon of foreign policy experience.
So you know what?
Let's get her some.
Let's get her some experience in the things that people said she lacked experience in.
Let's get her at the forefront of the national leadership of a revitalized Republican Party.
Let's do that.
Let's really do that.
Because short of that, I don't know if she's going to be able to keep up.
I don't mean intellectually.
I just mean in the horse race that's going to feature a bunch of people with some really strong resumes.
And I want her resume to be as strong.
I know her heart already is.
I know her mind already is.
But I want, I'm just tired of talking about experience.
This year has set the, oh, experience.
What is that anymore?
The very presidency of Barack Obama proves that experience, as we've known it, just doesn't exactly mean what it used to.
And that's okay.
Listen, I'm the guy who told you that Sarah Palin didn't have to be a governor for 10 years or a senator for 14.
America's decided that a two-year senator, hey, good, we're fine with that.
No problem.
I'm a four-year senator.
You know, and that's it.
And it's fine.
That's fine.
Because I'll tell you, many of the some of the folks that I've thought about for president don't have any experience at all.
If there is any one human being who I may have been more jazzed about in running for president than anybody ever, it's probably Steve Forbes.
Steve available in 2012?
How old is he?
His last birthday.
Anyway, all right.
Listen, some 2012 talk.
We're going to go into Indiana.
We've got a guy in Detroit who wants to talk about GM.
Tony, that's you.
Your vigil is almost at an end.
And a number of other things going on on a topic-heavy Thursday, November 13th.
It's a pleasure to be with all of you.
I'm Mark Davis, filling in for Rush Limbaugh on the EIB Network.
Give us a buzz at 1-800-282-2882, and we'll explore some other topical matter with you in just a moment.
Stick around.
It is a Thursday.
I'm Mark Davis in for Rush.
More of your calls are next.
Makes me want to reach for a glow stick and rave like a Republican.
Hi, everybody.
Mark Davis in for Rush today.
I have explored this premise during the commercial break, and there's some comedy here.
I mean, well, okay.
Dick Cheney.
So here's the headline.
Here's the headline.
As always, let me go back to the beginning and take you with me in my tortured journey.
Joe Biden meets with Dick Cheney today.
And wouldn't you love to be a fly on the wall there up at Observatory Circle, the vice president's residence, which is vice president's residence.
That trips off the tongue.
The VP's house.
Because you will recall that Joe Biden at one point, maybe many points, referred to Dick Cheney as the most dangerous vice president in American history.
Thanks, Joe.
Appreciate that measured, calm observation.
And it got me to thinking, you know, all other things being equal.
And it's funny, favorite president of our lives.
I mean, anybody of any age, really, you know, hello, Reagan, and everybody lines up after that.
Although I will tell you, again, and I don't mean to belabor this, this has been an ideologically tough presidency for me.
But with everything Reagan did, and as much as I love Reagan, I didn't need Reagan to keep my family safe from terrorists from 1981, 89.
I've needed President Bush to do that, and he has.
So I think my eternal gratitude is on the record.
So, but favorite president, you know, a lot of eight-year folks.
I'm 51.
How many presidents?
I mean, Eisenhower was president when I was born.
Don't have a lot of memories of Ike.
But here's the deal.
I would look it through this.
Dick Cheney, best vice president of my lifetime.
I'm absolutely going to stand by that.
And it's easy to stand by that when you take a look at the relatively meager competition.
Not to be disrespectful, but let's start counting backwards.
Before Dick Cheney, Vice President Al Gore.
I don't think I need to go into any more detail there.
Prior to that, Dan Quayle, God bless Dan Quayle, deserved more credit than he ever got.
A fine vice president.
But again, we're talking like best ever and best in my lifetime.
Prior to that, George H.W. Bush, a fine vice president under Reagan, clearly he would be number two.
Moving backward from there, Walter Mondale, Nelson Rockefeller there for about 20 minutes.
Gerald Ford.
Now, I am very proud, very proud.
And I will always love Gerald Ford.
And he was the first president I voted for.
I was 18 in 1976.
So he'll always have a special place in my heart.
But Gerald Ford was only vice president, you know, for a week and a half because his predecessor, Spiro Agnew, was a crook.
So again, it's kind of a fetid pool of vice presidential talent.
Then you go earlier with Matt and I, you know what?
You know who you get to before Spiro Agnew?
Hubert Humphrey.
The last Democrat vice president.
Oh, boy.
How do you want to finish this sentence?
The last Democrat vice president before the Democratic Party, the Democratic Party offered up who could even remotely claim to be as patriotic as Republican counterparts, before the Democratic Party turned into a cesspool of not America hating, although that is something, you know what I'm talking about.
It's before the Democratic Party snapped a twig and went nuts.
There, that's what I'm saying.
He was the last sane Democrat vice president.
And I mean that very colloquially.
Walter Mondale had already started, already started to get into this of the absurdity of the income, the wealth redistribution, the, you know, and under Jimmy Carter, of course, it was Vice President Walter Mondale who helped oversee just the evisceration of our military and pandering to terrorists.
Of course, Republican presidents had pandered to terrorists too.
But Hubert Humphrey, I want to actually give some props to because that was back when, and obviously, you know, Kennedy with him and LBJ in some ways, when Democrats could actually stake a claim to sort of having some middle American values.
You know, and, oh, I can hear you.
I can hear you.
Hey, Mark, didn't Barack Obama have Middle American values?
After all, he won.
Not so much, buddy.
He won, all right.
But he won despite radical leftist views and a circle of associations that should send people running for cover, metaphorically.
So how did he win?
It wasn't by appealing to basic mainstream American values.
Everybody just hated the GOP brand.
They're sick of Bush, sick of the war, economy tank.
Oh, here's a Democrat, more government?
I probably need some more government.
So, okay.
That's how you win.
This election's not some affirmation of Democrat values.
Please.
Anyway, before Humphrey was Johnson, and then before that, the vice president when I was born was Nixon.
You know, who says vice president, pre-Watergate, Nixon, pretty good guy, especially in foreign policy and various other things.
Hmm.
So best vice president.
If you're older than me, then you wind up going to Albin Barkley, Harry Truman, Henry Wallace, John Mance Garner, Charles Curtis, et cetera, et cetera, all the way back to Calvin Coolidge and more.
The vice presidency.
Hmm.
Hmm.
I believe it is safe to say.
We need to find out who the running mate is for the Republicans in the victorious 2012 ticket.
But for the time being, Dick Cheney will stand with very little competition, very little, among the truly magnificent vice presidents of our time.
The measure of that being resolve, love of country, support of our military, the backing of our troops in the most important war we have ever fought, and the resiliency to withstand hatred, the likes of which no vice president has ever seen.
And I talk to Lynn Cheney every once in a while.
I don't mean like over coffee.
She writes books about every four months and she does radio tours.
Hi, Lynn, how you doing?
And just what a magnificent woman.
And I always say to her, after we're finished talking about whatever really magnificent children's book that she has written or something, please relate to your husband.
I don't ever speak for everybody.
I'm not speaking for everybody now.
I know.
Some of you are listening right now.
You think I'm nuts.
But for those who are along with me on this, I always tell Lynn Cheney, please relate to your husband our unending gratitude for his resolve and his strength and his service to this country in one of our toughest chapters in its history.
And one, I think I said that the first time I said that.
It's become kind of routine now.
But she was almost taken off guard, almost taken aback.
Maybe not a lot of radio guys say that to her.
I don't know.
Even conservatives.
Cheney is, I don't know.
He's been such a punching bag.
You know, and I believe that there are conservatives who even hesitate to share love for Dick Cheney and express proper gratitude because it's just so uncool.
You know what?
I'll take safe over cool.
I'll take patriotic over cool.
I'll take commitment to causes that mean something over cool.
I'll take limited government over cool.
I will take low taxes over cool.
I will take winning the war on terror over cool.
I will take Dick Cheney's value system over whatever the momentary definition of cool is any day of the week.
1-800-282-2882.
1-800-282-2882.
Here's a guy who's been waiting a little bit.
I much appreciate it.
And we are in South Bend, Indiana.
William Mark Davis, you're on the Rush Limbaugh Show.
It is a pleasure to have you.
Hi.
Oh, thanks, Mark, for taking my call.
You bet.
My comment is that I think that the future of America and conservatism now lies with Republican governors and red state governments.
In fact, I think that coalition is as powerful, if not more powerful, perhaps than even the Republican Party.
So if conservatives rally their lives, their businesses and families around that coalition and that powerhouse territory, then all of the values you just mentioned that you would prefer over cool, they don't have to wait until 2012 or 2016.
They're there now waiting to have policies implemented and proposed and put into place right here, right now.
You're completely right.
You're completely right.
We will have to wait a while, heaven knows how long, before Republicans run the House or Senate again.
Maybe not that long.
I mean, it could be, you know, 2010.
I don't know.
But while we're waiting for that, while we're in that lonely vigil, my state of Texas, Russia's state of Florida, and various other places have strong, energetic, clear-eyed conservative governors, Bobby Jindal in Louisiana, Sarah Palin in Alaska, who are every day showing how conservative values can make government work better, make life better for constituents.
And those are lessons that people should be paying close attention to, apart from the lessons that someone might learn from watching members of Congress under the Capitol Dome.
You're absolutely right.
That's right.
I mean, I think there's an absolute powerhouse right there right now, waiting to be tapped and energized.
Talk about businesses.
You can attract businesses there that would become successful because of low taxation, because the regulators are off their back there.
Talk about churches.
People of faith can go to the Red States and not feel like they're constantly being infringed upon by the lunacy liberal policies that are going to be rolled out in all the blue states, but they really wouldn't have so much power when they try to get to the red states because the power structure is already in play there to protect red state people and red state values.
You bet.
I think it could not.
Senator Tower should shift there and really make it bulk and a lot of it will.
Obviously, we're in total harmony.
A lot of it will depend on the force of the personalities.
It does ultimately depend on the person.
There have been governors who have run.
I thought Mitt Romney was just a genius in so many ways.
And yet when he was delivering his speech in St. Paul, I was really just kind of underwhelmed.
And I actually ultimately became a Romney guy.
Rudy crashed and burned with that ridiculous Florida strategy.
You know, Huckabee was too much of a goofy populist.
God love him.
I really appreciated him for a lot of reasons, but that just wasn't flying with me.
So I sort of became a Romney guy.
And when it was ultimately going to be McCain, and then we had McCain and Sarah Palin and da-da-da-da-da.
And there was Mitt up doing his speech.
I thought, you know, this is good.
This is lovely.
He's a smart man.
And people who had criticized him had said he was almost too, it was almost too smooth.
It was almost not robotic or anything like that.
I guess my point being, Romney is the complete package.
And for some reason, he will be assessed in 2008 as not having been that great a campaigner.
If there is a great campaigner in Congress, if Eric Cantor, Virginia, a Republican, if anyone of a number of, I'd vote for Jeb Hensling out of the 5th District of Texas for president tomorrow.
It's going to depend on what the package is that somebody brings forward in their vision and their talents on the trail.
But I think your ultimate conclusion is a great one.
The Republican governors are providing examples every day.
You don't have to wait till the next congressional act to see what they can do.
Appreciate it.
William, my best to everybody in Indiana.
All righty, boy, got to go back in a second.
1-800-282-2882, Mark Davison for Rush on the EIB network.
Now we're talking little Texas bumper music, some fab thunderbirds, and tough enough on your Rush Limbaugh show.
Rush is out today.
I'm Mark Davis of WBAP Dallas Fort Worth filling in and loving life in the process.
Let's see what some others of you have to say.
A little Sarah Palin talk, a little bailout talk, future 2012.
We're a funny country, okay?
Here's evidence of what's everybody's complaint.
Everybody's complaint.
Our campaigns are too long.
We should do like what Canada just do.
They have an election and they just pigeonhole, shoehorn everything into three months, three months, boom, you're done.
Yeah, that's what we ought to do.
Well, guess what?
No.
Campaigns in America should be as long as people wish them to be.
Now, we all talk a good game.
We all say, we're tired of the campaign.
Talk radio listenership skyrocketed during this campaign.
It was like OJ.
Remember he said, I'm sick of OJ.
And the OJ ratings were through the roof every night of OJ coverage.
People lie about what they are tired of.
Here's where I'm going with this.
We're so funny in that we say that our campaigns are too long and we get tired of the analysis, baby, boom, boom.
Has anyone noticed that we're essentially doing 2012 horse race talk?
Oh, my, And it's working.
So just strap in, man, because the names Sarah Palin, Charlie Christ, Bobby Jindahl, Tim Polenti, the very, the Republican governors, like our last gentleman was mentioning.
And there will indeed be some folks in Congress, Mike Pence of Indiana, you know, some folks who might be interested for either the top job or the number two job.
Of course, it's funny.
There's nothing like getting your butt beat to spark some enthusiasm for talk about the next election.
So I think that's part of what's driving.
If McCain wins, there's probably some fatigue.
Like, oh, God, wait, please, we won.
I'm done.
Please, please, please.
As it is, we lose, and then we are just, can 2012 get here fast enough?
Can we get to the calls?
Yes, we can.
And in so doing, we head to Detroit City.
Tony, Mark Davis, thanks for hanging on.
Welcome to the Rush Limbaugh Show.
Hi, Mark.
Thanks for taking my call.
Just a quick observation.
You know, I don't know that on this bailout issue, you know, I'd throw lenders and the automakers into the mix, but I think that you look at what's happening.
Clearly, there's a new political and business dynamic that's going on out there, and it's basically rewarding failure.
It's not rewarding being a good entrepreneur, being profitable, being at the head of your market.
But if you're a failure, the government's ready to bail you out.
I mean, you look at the lenders.
They knew they were writing all these bad loans.
And the lenders that wrote them and the lenders, for that matter, that bought those loans on the secondary market knew they were bad loans.
And then you've got, you know, Secretary Paulson that wants to bail the lenders out.
What was it, six weeks ago, and wants to buy bad loans.
I don't know about you, but when I need to take a loan out, I generally have to pony up some really good collateral and not bad loans to get a loan.
And the automakers are no different.
I mean, we're creating a culture here of failure.
We're rewarding failure and we're not rewarding being a good business or business person.
And I would think that you could even throw the borrowers that took those loans out, and you could throw in Wall Street too, because they jump up and down every time somebody talks about bailing somebody out.
They're the fodder for the platinum parachutes.
When a CEO does a bad job at running a company, all of a sudden, you know, they get the platinum parachute.
Absolutely true.
Tony, some calls are so concise and well-phrased that they require absolutely nothing from me except thank you.
You're totally right.
You've defined with consummate skill the exact mindset that has us, as you say, rewarding failure.
We're not tough enough.
We don't have the spine to experience failure or to let others experience failure.
And God knows no politician is going to step forward and say, look, I got some bad news.
It's going to get worse before it gets better and there's going to be some pain.
But at the other end of the tunnel, there will be a brighter day and a stronger America.
Oh, no.
They know they got to whip out the teat of government, lead us to the trough, and say, I will keep it from getting that bad.
I will protect you from bottoming out.
Tony, love you.
Thanks for listening there on the big WJR.
All righty, let us head into the new president's state of Illinois.
See how these folks are doing.
We are in.
Well, you know what?
I forgot.
Let me scoot.
Well, Bob in Sterling, Illinois now knows that he is next.
Right after this on the Rush Limbaugh show.
All right, now we've gone from playing music from people in my state to playing music by people I actually hang out with.
Ted Nugent, Uncle Ted, boy, go get that book of his Ted White and Blue Nugent Manifesto.
Just fantastic.
I'll tell you what, let's do.
Rather than give somebody like 20 seconds to be concise or even sensible, because heaven knows I'm incapable of that.
Let's go ahead and carry everybody into the uncharted wonderland that is the next hour.
So sit tight.
I've got a couple of other brand new things that we can talk about.
A number of things that have intrigued me in today's news.
And other continuing things from Sarah Palin, National Security, New Obama presidency, et cetera, et cetera.
Mark Davison for Rush.
Stick around.
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