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Dec. 3, 2008 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:20
December 3, 2008, Wednesday, Hour #1
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Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 24-7 podcast.
Thank you, Johnny.
And as much as I enjoy guest hosting the Rush Limbaugh Show, like you, I'd rather be listening to it, hosted by Rush.
And the word is that we will all get that joy tomorrow.
As Rush will be able to be back.
Listen, you know the uh you know the the drill if you're ill.
Have you ever done this?
Have you ever done this?
You really want to get back to work, you're 70% better, you're 80% better, you say, all right, I'm going back to work.
And you do, and it knocks you back for another five days.
Never smart, and Russia's smarter than that, so one more day to endure of the fill-in stable.
So there we are.
Jason did great yesterday.
I'm back today and thrilled, and I'll be even more thrilled tomorrow when word is Rush will return.
Just one of those nasty, you know, upper respiratory bronchial things, man.
That's never fun.
So there we are.
So let's make the best of it and get going.
Uh telephone number, of course, is the same.
1800-282-2882.
Mark Davis at WBAP Dallas Fort Worth.
Thanks for hanging out with us here today on this third day of December.
Here's my plan.
Here's my plan.
We're going to tackle some of the breaking news of the morning.
Georgia Senator Saxby Shambless won in Georgia.
Thank you, God.
Thank you, Georgia.
Thank you, Saxby.
Not even close.
6040 was the uh the general uh slice there over uh Jim Martin.
And that means that the 60-seat filibuster-proof majority in the Senate will remain yet a dream for power-hungry Democrats.
That's a good thing.
I wish that the news were as good in Minnesota.
We'll talk about that here in a second.
In fact, we'll do a lot of the hot-breaking political news because we apparently we have a new uh, you know, pending confirmation.
We have a new commerce secretary.
At last, Bill Richardson gets his reward.
I think Bill Richardson's goal.
You remember the players in the old days?
Is there somebody in baseball who once tried to play every position on the field?
This is Bill Richardson in government.
And I really have mostly great things to say about ambassador slash secretary, slash governor, slash congressman Richardson.
Uh you got to carry the guy's resume around in a wheelbarrow.
He will now be the next commerce secretary, uh, which leads me to ask just a perfect fly-on-the-wall question: who's going to sit between Bill Richardson and Hillary Clinton at the cabinet meetings?
Mm-hmm.
Just delicious tension there.
But perhaps all is forgiven, all is forgotten, because after all, Obama won, and there you go, and everybody's supposed to be good with that in Democrat land, or are they?
So uh we'll we'll have all the the hot breaking political news and everything that you need.
Um couple of things uh other than that today.
I want to, and I think we'll probably do it in the very next segment, start to ask one of those macro questions.
Uh not about any individual little news story or even a big news story of the moment, but one of those just big sweeping questions that I think are good to drag into the talk show universe every once in a while, and that one today is going to be about the Bush legacy.
Uh the exit interviews are underway.
And by that we refer to the opportunities for the president, in some cases Laura, in some cases daughter Barbara, uh, to sit down with uh big TV network uh folks like Charlie Gibson of ABC, who I think really did a pretty good job these last couple of days, both at the White House and up at Camp David on the helicopter, that's always nice.
And um good questions from Charlie, unlike the Sarah Palin interview, some good questions from Charlie.
And so as I'm watching those, and just we all think about this, but it really got me prodded in a concrete direction toward the notion of what the Bush legacy will be.
And one of the things that is so intriguing about it is that I believe the Bush legacy will be so vastly different than the snapshot of this moment would suggest.
A glimpse of today's news suggests a president who whimpers out of office, figurative tail between his legs, uh largely discredited and uh and and a country as Eager to forget him as he is eager to return to private life.
And if that's the snapshot you look at, that's you know, it's pretty well where you are.
I mean, poll numbers do not lie.
Uh but poll numbers also do not tell any truth any larger than the moment at which the poll is taken.
This has been true of other presidencies.
Um, history adds context.
And five or ten years from now, uh, there may be a very, very different take on the Bush presidency.
So let's try to get ahead of that curve.
You may not agree with everything that I'll say about it.
And I want your take on what you think the Bush legacy will be, because obviously that's going to be an enormous part of the content of a lot of news features that you're going to see uh between now and uh and the inauguration.
All righty, so let's get into a couple of things from today's news, and again, 1-800-282-2882, we're going to do that.
And the other thing that I'll do probably no earlier than the middle of the next hour.
As you know, uh when Jason fills in uh for Rush, I assume he turns around and then does his own afternoon show up in Minneapolis.
Uh my gig is to do my own show here on BAP in Dallas Fort Worth, and then do the Rush Limbaugh show.
And you half the show today, half my local show today was something I will bring to you.
And it seems like every time I get to fill in for Rush, there's some some little nugget from here in Texas that I simply am able to toss out for you because it has universal appeal, just some little thing.
And in this case, it it it combines what is and is not a free speech issue, what is and is not acceptable public behavior, what is and is not uh a comment that should get you suspended.
Do I have your talk show ears perked up?
Well, the National Hockey League has suspended a member of our own Dallas Stars for something he said in Calgary yesterday.
Maybe you've heard it.
If you want to get ahead of me, blog it if you wish, I will lay it all out for you and play the incendiary, or is it so incendiary audio next hour?
Let's just say it's next hour.
Okay, and we'll see what, see what you think about that.
Because any opportunity you know you remember John Rocker, I mean, for crying out loud.
Uh and the Dixie Chicks.
I mean, the Dixie Chicks controversy wasn't about music, the John Rocker controversy wasn't about baseball.
It was about what do you say in public and get away with it.
And this is um to get ourselves back into today's news, this is just a day for that.
Because are you um are you aware of of uh a couple of things?
Let me give you these.
Let's let's build insignificance.
Because we have a an Ed Rendell, governor of uh Pennsylvania, and we have a Harry Reed.
So if part of our theme today is stuff people say in public that gets them in trouble, we'll save the Sean Avery one, that's the Dallas Stars player.
Save that one for for next hour.
But when uh uh two key Democrats, or and even if it were Republicans, I'd be talking about it too.
You know, our side says embarrassing things too sometimes.
Um which one first?
Let's go to the simpler one first, because this one really just gets filed under the wow, if a Republican had said this.
You know, if if Mitch McConnell, you know, were running the Senate, uh, or if Newt were still uh uh majority leader in the House and had thrown down something like this that Harry Reid mentioned yesterday.
It seems like we do this all the time.
But it's true.
It's it's an absurd double standard.
So see what you think of this.
The occasion, yesterday morning in Washington, the opening of the Capitol Visitors Center.
Uh if you go visit the U.S. Capitol, which every American should do, it's a wonderful thing made a little more pleasant by the opening of a brand spanking new Capitol Visitors Center.
Harry Reed, of course, is there as well he should be.
And um, here's the quote.
Harry Reed referring to the fact that the new Capitol Visitor Center has air conditioning.
Keeping in mind that Washington, especially in the summertime, can be real hot and real humid.
The Harry Reed quote.
My staff tells me not to say this, but I'm going to say it anyway.
In the summer, because of the heat and high humidity, you could literally smell the tourists coming into the Capitol.
It may be descriptive, but it's true.
For those of you who may have driven your cars off the road.
Now listen, there's there's mild shock and major shock, and please, the there are big things and little things, and this is a little thing.
But I will but I will tell you seriously.
Let a Republican say this.
And engraved invitations to the crucifixion are in the mail.
The quote from Harry Reid once again in the summer, because of the heat and high humidity, you could literally smell the tourists coming into the Capitol.
Harry Reed.
Amount of attention paid to this, pretty well zero.
And you know what?
Honestly, that's that's about the that's about the attention that deserves to be paid to it.
Why am I paying attention to it?
To tell you that Harry Reid will get the free pass, and Lord knows no Republican would have.
All right.
Here's one that's a little meatier.
This involves Ed Rendell, and one of my favorite situations.
I mean, whether it's somebody I admire or somebody not, somebody who shares my politics or somebody who doesn't.
Uh the golden situation of I didn't know the mic was open.
Isn't that just uh a playground we can all enjoy?
Whether it's Jesse Jackson uh making uh the that that golden castration reference back ah, I'm wistful about those days in the campaign back when we thought we had a chance.
But here's an open mic moment for uh Ed Rendell.
I could play it for you, but it would essentially sound like this.
And it would just be unfathomable.
So unfathomable.
So let me just give you the quote.
He was speaking about uh President elect Obama's pick for Homeland Security Chief, Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano.
Now, Homeland Security Secretary, demanding job.
Any cabinet post, demanding job, right?
So here's Ed Rendell weighing in, just to someone standing there, I guess, didn't know that the mic was being picked up, and his quote is.
Janet's perfect for that job.
Because for that job, you have to have no life.
Janet has no family.
Perfect.
She can devote literally 1920 hours a day to it.
Ha.
Okay, Ed.
Now in Ed Rendell quote here, we have not so much a you know, what would a Republican have gotten away with, blah, blah, blah, but Campbell Brown's reaction.
Uh Campbell Brown has that cutting through the bull segment on her uh show.
And uh she chastised Rendell for this remark, suggesting that it would never be made toward toward a man and unfairly focuses on the work family balance uh that women face.
Quote from Campbell Brown.
I don't mean to rake you over the coals.
I know what you meant to say, but your comments do perpetuate stereotypes that put us in boxes, both mothers and single women.
What?
I mean, let's really pause here for a minute.
If I I it wouldn't surprise me in the least to have someone make the exact same observation about a single childless man.
If someone off the I mean, nobody's ever gonna say something like this in public because you just don't want to come across sounding like uh that guy's got no life, or that lady uh, you know, she got a lot of time on her hands.
That's just an untoward thing to say.
But if someone were caught off mic referring to a male appointee, saying, Boy, uh Tom's great for that job, I gotta tell you, he has no family.
Perfect.
He can devote literally 19, 20 hours a day to it.
My eyebrow wouldn't go up at all.
Not in any different way compared to saying it about Janet Napolitano.
Campbell Brown's queen of the agenda here.
She just wanted to put a shiv in Ed Rendell's ribs uh about uh perpetuating stereotypes about uh working and uh and single mothers, people with families, people without families, and and if she did it, then I'll give her credit for it.
But I want to say that Campbell Brown did not spend a lot of time getting people to get off Sarah Palin's back when they said that she was ill-equipped for the vice presidency because she had a family.
So pretty selective ire there on Campbell Brown's part.
And uh yeah, I guess that's me going to bat a little bit for Ed Rendell.
Uh watch the open mic there, Ed.
As anyone sh if you got it clipped to your lapel, presume it's on and presume the world is listening.
Uh but that having been said, for Campbell Brown to go after him uh for sexism.
Just that that's that's absurd.
It's just patently absurd.
All right.
Chronicling all uh speaking of absurd, Minnesota, uh the Minnesota race, Al Franken, Norm Coleman, I'll give you the latest from that next.
The uh Frankencamp claims the margin there is down to 50, and this'll knock you out of your chair.
New ballots have been found in Minnesota.
Imagine my surprise.
Mark Davis in for Rush today.
He really should be back tomorrow.
1-800-282-2882 details on the Minnesota story, and of course your calls coming next on the EIB network.
Makes me want to put on a leather wristband, spike up my hair, and pump my fists.
Okay, not really.
Little Billy Idle here on the Rush Limbaugh Show.
I'm Mark Davis filling in for Rush.
He really ought to be back tomorrow.
We're just teasing you.
No, I'm kidding.
It's it's the the usual sickness thing.
You think you can make it, you don't, and uh let's err on the side of caution, and he really should be back tomorrow.
But we're together today, and I'm thrilled, and let me tell you what I was gonna tell you about, and then we'll start to do some calls here.
Saxby Chandless wins in Georgia in the bag for the Republican Party.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
No more 60 vote uh the 60-seat uh filibuster proof majority in the Senate.
Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope.
But, you know, w with the Rhino phenomenon and in when there is there used to be such a person as Lincoln Chafey in Rhode Island, there is still such a human being as Chuck Hagel in Nebraska for some ungodly reason Republicans continue to show some degree of favor to these people.
Um I'm not real comfortable with 59.
Uh that's why that and there is one other thing.
I don't like psychopaths in high office.
This has nothing to do with Al Franken's politics.
Nothing.
Truly.
And I'll make that clear by telling you that I mean, listen, uh when Senator Obama chose Joe Biden.
The first thing I said was, you know what?
He might have grabbed right there, one of the least annoying Democrats of the last few years.
I mean, compared to Charles Schumer, compared to, you know, Dick Durbin, compared to Barbara Boxer.
I mean, Joe Biden, uh I can actually hear his voice for three minutes uh, you know, without growing violent.
It's uh that there are plenty of Democrats where the worst thing I would ever say about him is I think they're mistaken.
They're really, really are.
You know, I watch Claire McCaskill.
Seems like a lovely woman.
I you know, th that this is not born of politics at all.
This is born of my amateur diagnosis.
I've been around this man.
And Al Franken is psychologically unhinged.
I I really want to back this up.
I just on the limbo show.
I really want to back this up.
There's a um a talker's magazine, kind of the industry Bible, as it were.
Michael Harrison does a great job throwing together this wonderful publication, and they have an annual thing and they have a freedom of speech award, and it goes to some talk show host who's done something noteworthy.
And uh in one year, and and listen, you can only give it to you know, Rush and Sean and various other people a certain number of times, then you gotta start spreading it around.
And the Air America thing had come about.
This is maybe four years ago.
I don't know.
And and Al Franken had surprised many of us by actually taking a job and showing up for it.
A lot of people said, yeah, Hollywood boy.
When you actually realize that a talk show is work, you won't uh you won't be there for long.
And he actually stuck it out.
And I don't know if it was for that reason or that was just noteworthy and whatever.
So Al Franken gets the freedom of speech award from uh from Talker's Magazine at their new media seminar.
And and and it was intrigu.
Al, as I said, I've been around Al a number of times.
He is capable of funny.
Back in his writing days on SNL, he was capable of very funny.
But as I've said about Janine Garofalo and others, hate will suck the funny right out of your head.
Also in progress about Bill Maher.
I mean, uh a brilliant guy in a lot of ways, and a funny guy, truly at times.
But hate, religion uh a political bigotry, which this really is political bigotry, hating someone just because they're a conservative, uh, will suck the funny right out of your head.
So Al gets this freedom of speech award from this big gaggle of of talk radio people, and all the syndicators and big people and big names and uh, you know, even you know, run of the mill local folk like me.
We're standing in the room, we're up in New York, and Al goes off.
You would think maybe for this, uh some level of graciousness.
An occasional barb at maybe Limbaugh or O'Reilly or something like that.
That's fine.
It's Al Franken.
It's okay.
It's your five minutes.
Except it wasn't five minutes, and it was a nightmare.
Michael Harrison had to get a metaphoric hook and drag Al off the stage because of the endless ferocity and meanness and cruelty he showed to the people of his profession gathered in the room.
The guy is a nutbag before you even get to his politics.
Well, that took a minute to tell, so I'll tell you what the latest is in the Minnesota vote totals in just a moment.
Right here on the Rush Limbaugh Show, Mark Davis filling in.
Stick around, we'll get to that next.
It is the Rush Limbaugh Show on the EIB network on this Wednesday, December 3rd.
I'm Mark Davis, WBAP Dallas Fort Worth filling in for Rush, and he really show we I know we've strung you along like this for a good 48 hours.
He thought, and those around him thought he really could have made it back Tuesday.
Really could have sort of made it back today, but playing it safe is always smart in this regard, so the word say is that he should be back tomorrow, and I join you in hoping for that return tomorrow.
Meanwhile, here we are together.
Uh Mark Davis, 1-800-282-2882 filling in for rush, and here's the uh the actual news story that got waylaid by my um fond remembrance there of a day spent in the company of Al Franken.
Uh here is the story.
Reed Wilson has it at the Hill.com.
Minnesota Democrat Al Franken's lead attorney said yesterday that his count shows the com his count shows the comedian trailing Senator Norm Coleman.
Oh, big props to Reed Wilson for for for that opening paragraph.
The comedian trails Senator Norm Coleman by just 50 votes with more than 200,000 left to be counted.
Ugh, be afraid, be very afraid.
Attorney Mark Elias held his press conference in Washington just hours after elections officials found nearly 200 ballots that had not been counted on election night.
Oh joy, they continue to find ballots.
Isn't that something?
So far, the Franken campaign claims to have picked up 165 votes in this hotly contested recount.
That number, Elias said, includes all ballots challenged by both campaigns, assuming any calls made by neutral election judges on the scene are accurate.
Coleman's campaign has challenged approximately 300 more ballots than Franken's, leaving those votes off the official tally posted on the Minnesota Secretary of State website.
For those of you who actually care what the official count is right now, that is Coleman up by 340.
The official Minnesota Secretary of State website shows Norm Coleman leading by 340 votes.
The two campaigns together have challenged nearly 6,000.
So th this this will all come to an end at some point.
We'll see how.
We will see how.
One quick tidbit in transition news.
I believe a president-elect is judged by those he brings into the fold.
So joining the White House staff in the Obama administration will be Cecilia Munoz.
She currently serves as senior vice president for the Office of Research, Advocacy and Legislation at the National Council of La Raza.
The National Council of La Raza makes LULAC look reasonable.
These folks are amnesty fetishists.
Cecilia Munoz in her post advocated for federal legislation to give the estimated 12 million.
It's from CNS News.
Penny Star has the byline.
And I guess the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants.
Yeah, that's estimated by people who lowball that figure to give them a path to citizenship.
And she has been tapped for the job of director of intergovernmental affairs.
And again, it's funny.
I just offer this not to raise an eyebrow.
I mean, hello.
It's a fan of amnesty in the Obama administration.
Whoa, that's shocking.
This is what you get.
I love the emails that I sometimes get.
Mark, I'm concerned that Janet Napolitano will not be strong enough on our borders.
really, really.
Well, if enough Americans had been concerned about that, they would not have voted for Senator Obama.
Of course no homeland security chief under President Obama is going to be ardent enough about protecting our borders.
It's only in the last uh 18 months that President Bush's homeland security chief has been ardent enough about our borders.
And I like Mike Chertoff, I really do.
But uh two two, three years ago I was talking to Mike Chertoff, and it was like, dude, can can you s can you I don't think I actually called him dude, but you know, tells the story.
Uh could you maybe beef things up along the southern border?
I mean, I'm I'm all about the stopping Al Qaeda from setting up a cell in Dayton, Ohio.
All about that.
But we have wave upon wave of uh of illegal immigrants coming across the southern border, and that's definitely an economic issue, but also a homeland security issue, and he really kind of blew me off.
Uh then um at one point I think the quote was we can't be worried about the economic immigrants.
Well, we can't be worried, but it was a de-emphasis on what he called the economic immigrants as opposed to the terrorist immigrants, and silly me, I got greedy, I wanted him to be concerned about both.
I told him so.
Uh then, uh this was probably oh late 05 or something like that.
Then I'm sure you noticed uh around late 06, early let's make it 07, early 07.
Did you notice that ice buses were really starting to pull up to a whole lot of meat packing plants in the Midwest and actually rolling out with seats full of actual illegal immigrants?
And the next time I talked to Mike Chertoff, oh, I nearly hugged him through the phone.
I said, sir, rather than dude, which is less appropriate.
I said, sir, that this is great.
This is all we've ever wanted.
Those of us who are serious about our immigration laws.
Uh is this just to give us a smile on our faces as you guys, you know, take your last 18 months uh before hitting the exits?
And he said, no, it's cause a constant evaluation of what priorities to make.
And listen, I said, look, I'm not gonna blister you anymore for not doing this in 04, 05 or whatever.
Uh if if you've uh if you folks have had an epiphany that maybe we need to actually find and deport illegal immigrants better late than never.
You know, uh good for you.
And with that, let's do this.
The Bush Legacy.
I think we're up on most of the the big headlines of the day.
There are more, and I'll sprinkle them through out and keep an eye on things for you as the show progresses.
But I really wanted to spend some time today uh talking with you about those things and also about the Bush legacy.
Let me give you sixty seconds on it, because trust me, I'll give you more, uh, and then get some calls going on this.
There is one word that I think would get almost no disagreement.
Well, except from people who think he's just Satan.
Here's what I and those people exist, and many of them make movies, by the way.
Uh and that adjective is mixed.
It will truly be a mixed legacy.
It is mixed for me, and I know I come across as a huge fan and a major supporter, and I am.
Here's the deal.
Um the issues.
Do I wish that President Bush would have shrunk the government instead of expanding it?
Of course.
Do I wish that his administration would have been more serious about our borders for its entire eight years?
Of course.
Did I think that uh Harriet Myers was a goofy pick and that the Dubai Ports deal was bad?
Yes.
There are a number of things that have happened during this presidency that have given me the occasion to criticize this presidency.
And yet there's this one thing.
There's this one thing.
President Bush has kept my family safe for seven years.
He's kept your family safe too.
The only difference between us is I realize it and you may not.
In this audience, I'm guessing most of you do.
If you don't, call me and we can discuss it.
1-800-282-2882.
But the fact of the matter is That any political I don't want to call it nitpicking because like the borders and the size of government are big things, but any polit any political criticism that I might have of this president will forever be dwarfed by the gratitude that I will feel for him and the fact that I will thank God for every day of his presidency for his selection of Dick Cheney as,
and we talked about this a couple of weeks ago, a couple of months ago when I filled in, the finest vice president this nation has had in my lifetime.
And um I I there is no end to my gratitude.
I will have there will there will be Democrat presidents I will disagree with mightily.
Here comes one.
There'll be future Republican presidents that won't be as conservative as I want them to be.
Uh this is one of them that's just coming to an end.
But I can make all those points all day long about ways in which the Bush administration has not been as conservative as my conservative heart would have liked.
But against slings and arrows that brought his popularity level down to nearly single digits, against the most brutal attacks from Democrats and the media that any president has ever faced, his resolve has remained.
And his visionary goal of bringing democracy to Iraq.
Remember, this goal is nothing less than the wholesale reform of the murderous lunatic wing of the Islamic faith, a sizable wing, especially in that part of the world.
That vision has kept my family safe.
And my wife and my two children are safer, and so am I, because of him.
For that, my gratitude knows no end.
I believe that others will join me with some measure of that gratitude, maybe not as perhaps not as effusively as I've put it, as uh after time passes.
And after it's pretty clear that we won in Iraq, and I hope that stays stable and secure, and we hand that over to the Iraqis, and it'll be a shining example of how even in the Islamic world, you can have self-determination and democracy.
And if that works, I hope the dominoes start to fall, and other Islamic nations look at this and go, whoa, uh give me some of that.
So actual elections that mean something, freedom, self-determination.
You're still gonna be Muslim nations.
We're not trying to, you know, turn y'all into Methodists from Indiana to pick a state and a religion.
Uh but I I believe that the years will smile on this presidency far more than current evaluations of the moment will do.
All right.
So that's me.
Uh let's pause and come back and talk to you.
We'll be all over the country, of course, and it is the Rush Limbaugh Show.
1800-282-2882.
I'm Mark Davis filling in today.
Russia will be back tomorrow, but I know this.
We'll all be back right after these.
It is the Wednesday Rush Limbaugh Show.
Word is the Thursday Rush Limbaugh Show will actually be hosted by Rush Limbaugh, but that will depend on the sort of the remaining fifteen to twenty percent of his recovery from just a nasty bronchial thing.
And uh so I'm Mark Davis filling in in Texas.
Let's go to your calls.
1-800-282-2882.
Let's kick things off along the coast in the beautiful historic town of Savannah, Georgia.
Eric, Mark Davis, you're on the Rush Limbaugh show.
Hello.
Hello, Mark.
Uh mega U.S. Army Ditto's from Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, Georgia.
Thank you, sir.
Hey, uh, talking about the Bush legacy, uh, you know, I've had I've heard a lot of people around me talk about, you know, Bush has destroyed the economy, and it was he was handed a uh a good economy by the Clinton administration.
He destroyed it, and I like to remind them that, you know, he inherited a minor recession.
And we had what, six or seven years of economic growth.
And everything was doing pretty well until the Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, and now we're seeing the economic results of that.
We are, and everybody comes at this differently.
I'll I'll tell you where I do.
I don't believe that government ever has as much to do with the economy as as a president or a Congress thinks.
Only in singular moments where someone does something so stunning like the Reagan revision of our entire tax code, uh that is that created a boom that was so strong that not even Bill Clinton's tax increases could kill it.
That aside, generally an economy's gonna do what it's going to do.
I understand that a president and a Congress will uh bathe in uh in praise when the economy's going well, and they'll be pillowied when the economy tanks.
But these things tend to happen almost irrespective of what presidents do.
That said, the Bush tax cuts, I believe, without doubt, kept this economy strong for five years post-9-11, which is the most remarkable part of his of his economic legacy.
Was it was it bound, were some things bound to cave in?
Absolutely.
Housing, boom, then bust.com, boom, then bust.
Credit, boom, then bust.
Auto industry, boom, then bust.
There's there's no way to avoid these things.
And the bouncing ball of oil prices, please.
So um I yeah, that's uh people are always eager, and I'll even uh restrain them from this from saying, hey, the the economy was great during thus and such a president.
Okay, maybe so.
Was it necessarily because of what he did?
Or the economy tanked during thus and such a president.
Okay, but was it really because of what he did?
Exactly.
I I couldn't, you know, you put it much better than I could, but you know, it it's startling to me if you if you uh the uh the coincidence of the Democrat takeover of Congress in two thousand six and what's h happened since then.
Well, contrast that with with the the preceding years.
I mean, i it's it's cut and dry to me, and and so many people like to, you know, uh have a knee-jerk reaction of blaming Bush for everything in the economy.
And like you put it, there's there's other uh outside influences that affect our economy.
There are, and I guess that was my long-winded way, imagine that, of saying that I might not be boarding the train of saying that all this uh all this um uh torturous uh uh malays of now, to borrow a Jimmy Carter word, is because of the O six Democrat Congress.
I I just don't know.
I mean, there's so much of this that that would I I absolutely believe would have happened anyway.
Um I would love to tell you that if the Republicans had held sway in Congress in 2006 that uh that we would never have gotten four dollar gas, and then the stock market wouldn't have plunged seven uh thousand points and you know I would have loved but I can't I can't intellectually honestly say that.
Now, if Democrats, you know, keep everything for ten years and and the economy stays in the toilet, well, you know, then uh that you got a little more meat on which uh on which uh to make that argument.
Eric, thank you, my best everybody in Savannah, especially their large and proud military community.
All righty.
Um take a call now or have room after.
I choose after.
On the Rush Limbaugh show, 1-800-282-2882, room for an actual call when we come back.
It is the Rush Limbaugh Show for a Wednesday.
I'm Mark Davis filling in to the phones to the phones in the beautiful state of Utah.
We're in Salt Lake City.
Levi, hi, Mark Davison.
Welcome to the Rush Limbaugh.
How's it going?
Good going.
Spectacular.
All right.
I you know, I just want to say I think Bush will be known as the godfather of fighting terrorism.
He has his policies will be looked on to go, you know, in the future.
And I hope it ends now, but I d I think it's doubtful.
And I hope Obama realizes that he can't go past it, you know, can't change his policies, but it more and more look like it.
It looks like it.
In the future, we'll realize that Bush was on to something.
Yeah, I mean, I I I don't use the word visionary lightly.
But how many people, even after 9-11, had a thought in their head that said, let us go to war to plant democracy where there is tyranny and terror because freedom is a beacon that can shine light into people's hearts and make them want what we have.
Not to make them like America.
I always just drives me nuts when people say you can't take these societies and make them like America.
I'm not trying to turn Tehran into Tennessee.
I'm not.
But we can show people what they have a God-given right to, and uh and it's theirs to take if they want it.
I think the Iraqis are gonna want it.
Oh, uh exactly.
And it it just blows me away that you get this new uh Congress and president thinking that if we leave them alone and just you know stay in our own little corner that they're not gonna attack us.
It is known that they want to harm Americans.
And it just blows me away.
It blows me away.
I you know, I I feel okay right now, but in the coming years, I I don't know what to feel.
Well, uh let's ride through it together, sir, and thank you.
Appreciate your call in my best everybody in Utah.
Uh speaking of Ahmadinejad, there's a report out, uh a coalition of top uh think tanks, th that warning new President Barack Obama of a nuclear Iran, a warning that takes on a certain urgency, I would suggest, because he is president.
And just to show you, I'm not throwing that out as a barb, I'll justify that uh when we begin our next hour together.
Here on the Rush Limbaugh Show.
Mark Davis filling in.
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