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Dec. 10, 2008 - Rush Limbaugh Program
34:14
December 10, 2008, Wednesday, Hour #1
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Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 24-7 podcast.
Breathe easy.
Breathe easy, my friends.
Relax out there.
Calm down.
The scandal in the blagosphere involving the Illinois governor, Ron Blagojevich, it does not affect President-select Obama.
I know this for a fact, and I will share with you how I know this for a fact.
In mere moments, but fear not.
Breathe easy.
Your president-elect is not corrupt.
Your president-elect is as innocent and clean and pure as the wind-driven snow.
It's a sitcom.
We are in the midst of a sitcom.
God is writing a sitcom, ladies and gentlemen.
And everybody's a winner.
Great to have you with us.
Here's the phone number if you want to be on the program today, 800282-2882.
And the email address is lrushball at EIBnet.com.
The Blagojevich scandal, ladies and gentlemen, does not, it cannot affect President-elect Obama.
I mean, all this hardwired Chicago corruption, Illinois corruption, it cannot possibly affect President-elect Obama.
It can't affect Rahm Emanuel.
It can't affect Dick Durbin.
Now, how do I know this?
Why am I so sure?
Why am I doubtless?
That's right, exactly.
The media would have told us about this.
Obama has been vetted like every other presidential candidate in this country has been vetted fully by the legends of the old media.
When the Rezco scandal broke, they had to vet Obama.
When the Jeremiah Wright scandal broke, they had to vet Obama.
And when the name of Bill Ayers surfaced, they had to go out there and vet Obama.
Ditt, ditt, ditto.
When ex-President Clinton called President-elect Obama a Chicago street thug, said he had the instincts of a Chicago street thug.
I'm sure the media, that was, President Clinton says that, the media went in there and did a thorough investigation, did a media anal exam of Barack Obama.
I'm sure the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, AP, Reuters, Broder, Brokaw, even Larry King, if there were something like this in Obama's background, they would have told us during the campaign.
And we didn't learn anything like this during the campaign.
So this is a huge relief.
The corruption bug in Illinois bites only governors when they become governors.
And now I see what Obama meant when he said hope.
He meant he hoped he's not involved in this.
He said he hoped the old media had vetted him enough.
You know, this is, this is, I mean, this is why I am totally comfortable, ladies and gentlemen, with the fact that Obama is.
In fact, there are some contradictions to this, but the media, the media wouldn't, I mean, they vet everybody and they dig deep and they find out everybody's flaws, people that want this kind of power.
And don't you understand what I'm saying here?
If they had found anything like this involving Blagojevich that touched Obama, well, they would have told us.
And they didn't.
In fact, the New York Times today headline of the story may as well be thank God for Barack Obama.
Obama's intervention for ethics bill indirectly led to case against governor.
The New York Times is telling us that if it weren't for Obama, we wouldn't have caught Blagojevich.
In a sequence of events that neatly captures the contradictions of Obama's rise through Illinois politics, a phone call he made three months ago to urge passage of a state ethics bill indirectly contributed to the downfall of a fellow Democrat he twice supported, Governor Blugovoyevich.
Thank God for Barack Obama.
Not only did the media vet him, the media is now telling us that if it weren't for Obama, who is as clean and pure as the wind-driven snow, I mean, he's in the middle of all these guys, untouched by any of them.
He's a messiah.
If he hadn't come up with this ethics bill, why we might not have ever learned the truth about Blago.
Oh, wait, what's this?
Hang on, just was just handed a story here from A.P. Obama.
Is it dated?
It's dated today.
I don't believe this.
Headline, questionable associations of Obama.
What?
By the AP, in his life and career in Illinois, Barack Obama has crossed paths with some notable figures who have drawn scorn and scrutiny.
Among them, Governor Blagojevich, and in four pages or four paragraphs, Tony Rezco.
Who's Tony Rezco?
They never told us about Rezco before the election.
Resco raised money for the campaigns of Obama and Blago.
Awaiting sentencing after being, whoa, Obama knew this guy?
Jeremiah Wright.
Let's see, four paragraphs on Blagovich.
Three paragraphs on Resco, one, two, three, five paragraphs on Jeremiah Wright, A.P. Obama.
Wright was Obama's minister for 20 years.
He helped Obama embrace Christianity.
He performed Obama's marriage.
He baptized Obama and his two daughters.
Wright was known for thundering God bleep America in clips that dominated capable cable TV.
Gee, folks, I may be wrong about this.
I had put my trust in the media to have vetted Obama.
We're getting in now after he's been elected.
Oh, there's four more paragraphs on Ayers.
Bill Ayers.
Who is Bill Ayers?
Bill Ayers is a university professor.
He's a member of Chicago's intellectual establishment.
40 years ago, he was a member of the Weather Underground, a radical group that blew up the Pentagon and the U.S. capital.
Obama knows this guy?
Blew up the Capitol and the Pentagon?
And this preacher saying, God bleep America?
And that we deserve what we got on 9-11.
Did you know any of this?
Let's see.
Ayers was a fugitive for years with his wife, Bernadine Dorn, who is a good friend of Obama's wife.
First Lady knew these two bombers?
I cannot.
Do you realize what's just happened to my credibility?
I just opened this program by saying there's no way Obama could be tainted by any of this.
And now here comes AP telling me he knows all these guys intimately.
Emile Jones, the president of the Illinois Senate, amounts to Obama's political godfather was an important part of his long shot victory for the Senate in 2004.
He helped Obama meet the right people.
Whoa.
Oh, oh, no, Rashid Khalidi Obama knows a militant Islamist Khalidi is a scholar and an author on Middle Eastern affairs who has criticized Israeli policies and was part of a Palestinian advisory panel to peace talks in the early 90s.
He's a friend of Obama.
He is a noted Jew hater.
Oh my God.
Who's this?
Michael Fleger.
Roman Catholic priest, firebrand, protested gun shops and Jerry Springer.
Obama called this guy a spiritual.
He had two spiritual advisors.
He had this Fleger guy, and who was it?
Jeremiah Wright.
Damn, I had no idea.
The AP just came out with this, folks.
Yes, my friends, it's that time.
We welcome back to the bump rotation because it's Christmas time.
Mannheim Steamroller.
Some of my all-time favorite Christmas music.
Great to have you with us.
There's a name on this questionable associations story of Barack Obama.
Is this not hilarious?
Folks, this gets even better.
The sitcom just continues.
Written by God.
There's a name left off of this questionable associations of Barack Obama, and his name is Richard Daly.
Now, Richard Daly somehow is magically escaping any discussion about anything that happened here.
And anybody who knows Chicago politics knows that it all runs through Mayor Daly.
And Mayor Daly and Blagojevich were not close.
They were not good buddies.
They have had their contrethons over the years.
In fact, I actually think that one of the reasons that Barack Obama's president is that Richard Daly wanted him out of Illinois.
Because Richard Daly didn't want him staying there running for governor.
Richard Daly didn't want to have to do battle with a Messiah as governor of Illinois.
So they arranged him to run for president.
Lo and behold, he stuns everybody and wins.
There's a lot to this that's going on.
Now, let's go to the audio tape because the media is doing their best to cover the tracks on Obama here, but it's getting tough to do.
He's in the middle of all of this.
I mean, this is the cesspool that gave birth to Obama.
Here is Obama late yesterday afternoon in Chicago.
An unidentified reporter said, did you have any contact with or were you aware at all of what was happening with your Senate seat?
I had no contact with the governor or his office.
And so I was not aware of what was happening.
And as I said, it's a sad day for Illinois.
But beyond that, I don't think it's appropriate to comment.
Where's your anger, buddy?
You're Mr. Ethics.
You ought to be livid about this.
Of course, he's not livid because anybody in the Chicago political machine knows what the hell goes on there.
Snerdley said, how long have the Daly's owned Chicago?
I said, probably since the fire, which they probably started.
Joking, joking.
So, did you catch your Obama?
I had no contact with the governor or his office, so we were.
I was not aware of.
However, back on November 23rd, Chicago, Illinois, Fox News, political reporter Jack Connody is talking with Obama's senior advisor, David Axelrod.
Connody says, has Obama expressed a preference?
However, who might replace him in the Senate?
I know he's talked to the governor, and there are a whole range of names, many of which have surfaced.
And I think he has a fondness for a lot of them.
All right.
Now, ladies and gentlemen, they put out a statement yesterday from the Obama campaign, basically saying that Axelrod was wrong, that Axelrod misspoke, that Obama had not talked to the governor, but they have a problem with that now.
Because on November 5th, KHQA, CBS-TV in Illinois, I think it's Quincy, the reporter at Carol Sowers, she reported the day after the election, November 5th, quote, now that Barack Obama will be moving to the White House, his seat in the U.S. Senate representing Illinois will have to be filled.
That's one of Obama's first priorities today.
He is meeting with Governor Rod Blugojevich this afternoon, November 5th in Chicago, to discuss it.
Now, this is two separate sources.
One of them, Barack's own spokesman or campaign guru, David Axelrod.
Oh, yeah.
On November 23rd.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
He's talked to the governor.
Oh, wide variety, wide range of names.
Take over that seat.
They say, no, no, no, Axelrod's wrong.
Does this reporter just make this up?
I never heard of Carol Sowers, but she just make it up that Obama was going to talk to Blago the day after the election.
She had to be told by somebody that the meeting was scheduled.
Of course, the website reporting this could be a hoax.
We have to cover all bases.
I mean, there's so many rumors on the internet these days that you can't tell what's what.
Maybe the meeting was scheduled and canceled.
Who knows?
In the complaint that the Chicago U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald read yesterday and released to the public, there was a lot of interest in candidate number five because candidate number five, yes, yes, we're going to get to the auto bailout.
And this really steams me, by the way.
This is, well, you know, I'm getting so sick and tired.
Here we had, here we had the auto execs, the white-collar guys, they got to get fired.
Pelosi and everybody else saying they don't know how to run their business.
Obama's even saying the same thing.
We're going to get a car czar in there.
We're going to have somebody who knows how to run the auto business because these guys don't.
If they want their money, blah, blah, blah, blah, you had the guts to fly in here.
How come nobody's telling us how Gettelfinger got to Washington?
Did Gettelfinger fly in on a jet or did he drive in in a General Motors car?
How come we never hear about any of the excesses of the union?
Well, we don't hear about that because that's who the bailout's actually for.
This is a travesty what is happening here.
It is a pure 100% travesty.
And there is so much anger for this bailout out there.
If the Republicans do not stand up to this, I don't care how much Obama screws up.
Nobody's going to have the guts to vote for Republicans anymore.
And a lot of Republicans think, but Rush, how do we oppose President Bush?
And he's doing this.
President Bush is signing off of him.
Take a stand.
You're going to be dealing with an incoming Democrat administration that you're going to have to be taking stands against all the time.
Take a stand on this.
Anyway, Senate candidate number five in the complaint was the one who was offering apparently Blagojevich some loot in exchange for being selected.
And ABC Brian Ross says that Senate candidate number five is the son of the Reverend Zach.
That would be Jesse Zax Jr.
He's the anonymous Senate candidate number five whose emissaries Blagojevich reportedly claimed offered up to a million dollars to name him to the U.S. Senate.
According to the FBI affidavit, Blagojevich stated he might be able to cut a deal with Senate candidate five that provided Blagojevich with something tangible up front.
Jackson Jr. said, I don't know when he was asked if he's candidate number five, but he said he was told, quote, I am not a target of this investigation.
Let me tell you something.
Jesse Jackson Jr. has a regularly scheduled appearance on our affiliate in Chicago, the Big 89 WLS, and he canceled it yesterday.
These guys in Chicago, I mean, the cockroaches are scrambling.
Imagine Patrick Fitzgerald is a giant can of raid, and the Democrats are all scrambling like cockroaches because they don't want to be caught up in this, and nobody knows where it's going.
And people are starting to ask today the question I asked yesterday, why the hell stop the investigation?
If you've got this massive corruption going on, unheard of before, why stop it?
Lots of people are, and of course, the rule of thumb answers, well, we couldn't let this guy appoint somebody to the Senate.
Why are we tainted?
We had to stop that.
Yeah, right.
By the way, Dingy Harry said, I don't care who he appoints.
If he appoints anybody, we're not going to confirm him.
It ain't going to happen.
Supreme Court might have something to say about that.
Good morning, America, today.
Stephanopoulos and Diane Sawyer had this exchange about how well Obama speaks, like I said yesterday.
He switched pronouns in the middle.
Let's listen again.
I had no contact with the governor or his office, and so I was not aware of what was happening.
That telling move from we to I was interesting by the president-elect Obama.
I think that's because he can't be sure that no one connected to him in any way spoke with Blagojevich or emissaries of Blagojevich.
The reason they can't talk about it, they say right now, is because this is an ongoing criminal investigation, and they want to make sure that they have their story straight before they go out and say anything more publicly.
They're marveling at how quick Obama catches himself once he got one foot in the sinkhole.
It's Clinton all over again.
This is proof of the assertion that I and I alone made yesterday trying to help everybody understand Obama.
It's not what he says, folks.
If you attack him and parse him on what he says, you're going to go nowhere.
His supporters support him because of how he says what he says.
And welcome back, Rushlin Blaugh.
Mannheim's steamroller is back in the Christmas bump rotation.
Love this tune.
This is called Patapan.
Listen to just a bit of it here.
You know what we need in this country?
We do not need, we do not need a car czar.
We need a union czar.
Why do we have to have a car czar?
Why do we have to have somebody from the government, I'm here to help you, run the auto business?
I'll tell you why.
It's to protect the unions and to get all these green.
By the way, a little question here.
A little question.
Somehow, the future, the future of the U.S. auto business, according to all these wizards of Smart in Washington, is what?
The electric car, right?
The electric car is the sales of electric cars in Europe, and they're a bunch of wusses in Europe.
I mean, Europe would sign on to any of these newfangled, stupid moves to protect the climate, right?
Sales of electric cars are plummeting like 156 this year.
156.
So they're going to have to force us into these things.
But there's a problem, I think, ladies and gentlemen, because electric cars need what?
No electricity.
And even if you have a battery in there, you still have to recharge the car.
What do you plug it in?
I mean, that's where we're headed here.
You plug it in.
Right.
Well, where do we get our electricity?
Little pop quiz.
You know what percentage of our electricity comes from?
Coal.
Try.
Oh, try well over half.
Try well over half of our electricity comes from coal, which Obama says we need to get rid of.
And his cap and trade program will put the coal industry out of business.
No new coal plants.
So, where are we going to get the electricity to drive around these little putt-putts?
You think Plexico Burris is going to drive around an electric car?
Hmm?
You got another thing coming if you think Plexico Burris is going to go buy an electric car.
How do you outrun the cops in an electric car after you've shot yourself in the thigh at a nightclub at one o'clock in the morning on your way to the hospital?
A question.
The Reverend Jackson, Senate candidate number five, Elliot Spitzer, client number nine.
Which would you rather be, Senate candidate number five or client number nine?
It's the EIB network.
And they're Rush Limbaugh going back to our archives, the grooveyard of forgotten favorites.
So what would you rather be?
Who would you rather be?
Senate candidate number five or love client number nine?
You choose your Democrat scandal to put yourself in.
Which would you rather be?
Unbelievable.
The Associated Press is piling on Obama today.
After the first story, questionable associations of Obama, they actually ran a story saying that he knows Blagojevich, he knows Tony Rizco, he knows Jeremiah Wright.
He knows Bill Ayers.
He knows Emile Jones.
He knows Rashid Khaledi and he knows Michael Flager.
These people at AP, they're shameless telling us all these things now.
And then there's this from Liz Sidotti.
President-elect Obama hasn't even stepped into office, and already a scandal, not of his own making, is threatening to dog him.
Obama isn't accused of anything, but the fact that the Governor Rod Blagojevich, a fellow Democrat, has been charged with trying to sell Obama's Senate seat gives political opponents an opening to criticize him.
A slew of questions remain.
Despite all that, at the very least, the episode amounts to a distraction for Obama.
Just six weeks before he is sworn into orifice while he works to set up his new administration.
It also raises the specter of notorious Chicago politics, an image Obama has tried to distance himself from during his career.
Yeah.
They gave birth to him.
There were signs the continuing investigation could still involve Obama.
More details on the case could be forthcoming.
AP says Obama's not out of the woods yet.
They are clearly piling on our president-elect, ladies and gentlemen.
It's unbecoming of the drive-bys to behave in this manner, but they are certainly doing.
I wonder if Fitzgerald could get all these guys, you know, summon them to a grand jury.
I think he knows how grand jury works.
He convened one for two years to nail the scooter.
Scooter Libby.
These guys need to go to the grand jury and tell their stories.
That could be somewhat fascinating.
Back to the audio sound bites.
This is a drive-by montage on how this whole thing is just a sad, sad distraction.
It's an unwelcome distraction as Obama tries to build a new government.
It's got to be a distraction.
This is solely a distraction.
Certainly a distraction.
Clearly, this story has become a huge distraction.
It is a major distraction.
It's a drag for Barack Obama.
It's obviously a distraction.
Okay, so that's the my word now is it's just a distraction.
And Jeffrey Toobin said, solely a distraction.
They are convinced, ladies and gentlemen, of his not just innocence, but I mean his purity.
He is so pure that even surrounded by scandal, he is unaware that it's taking place and he is incapable of being smeared by it or touched by it.
And they are so sure, which is why I'm so sure, that Obama has nothing to do with this and has no culpability whatsoever, because the dry-bys clearly know him better than I do, and they have vetted him, and they know all these things.
They would have told us if there were any questionable character traits held by Barack Obama.
And listen, Jonathan Alter on MSNBC last night had this to say about Blago.
I would not rule out the possibility that Blagojevich will start trying during his case to try to take down Obama with him and spread a bunch of lies about him.
It's very, very possible.
Whoa, that's quite an assertion from the anointed Jonathan Alder.
He knows that Blagojevich will probably start telling lies about Obama to try to take down Obama with him.
He's going to spread a bunch of lies.
What lies could he possibly tell that anybody would believe because Obama has been vetted?
What could Blagojevich say that anybody is going to believe now?
Especially since Jonathan Alter has warned us and has sort of set the table here to expect Blagojevich to lie.
Well, what could he possibly lie about that anybody would believe, folks?
Corruption, nationalization, and propaganda.
Those are the three words that describe America today.
Corruption, nationalization, and propaganda.
Vladimir Putin is looking at the United States right now and saying, damn it, they're beating me to it.
This is quite a trifecta when you stop and think of this.
Corruption, nationalization, propaganda.
We have come a long way, baby, but that's where this country is.
We're being run by corrupt politicians who, with the help of propagandists in the media, are destroying the private sector.
We're on the way to becoming a socialist country.
We no longer believe that the private sector can do a better job of running businesses than the public sector.
Does it not frighten you a little bit that whenever any private sector business is in trouble, everybody says, let the government run it.
Let the government fix it.
The government can do it better than these frauds and these cheats.
This is incredible, ladies and gentlemen.
We no longer believe in risk.
We no longer believe in reward and the possibility of failure.
And it is failure where life's real lessons are learned.
We're becoming soft out there.
And a lot of people want to stay that way as a country.
So the big three defects, corruption, nationalization, propaganda, they're all related.
They work together quite well.
They reinforce each other.
These are the three legs of the stool of liberalism.
Corruption, nationalization, propaganda.
There are no ethics.
When you have corruption, nationalization, and propaganda, no ethics.
And so nobody can violate any ethics.
They exist to make the individual subservient to the state.
And they are winning for now.
Remember Senator Moynihan?
Senator Moynihan of New York talked about defining deviancy down.
That's when things got so bad in a certain area that you can't fix them.
You don't even try anymore.
You say that's normal.
And normal behavior.
We can't stop it.
We can't fix it.
We have done just that.
It used to be considered deviant to cheat, lie, and steal.
Not to Charlie Wrangell, and not to anybody in Charlie Wrangell's orbit.
Tell it to Barack Obama.
He worked closely and helped the careers of Tony Rezco and Bill Ayers and Bogoyevich and vice versa.
But it's not considered deviant to cheat, to lie, to steal.
It's now clever.
It's clever to be able to get away with it.
Obama knew these people were corrupt, but they had no impact on him.
He knew.
He had to know.
He came from this cesspool.
He had to know that there was a corrupt place, but it didn't taint him.
I know, I know, he bought his house with a little help from his convicted friend Resco.
A goodbye with a little help from my friend.
But everybody does that.
Everybody has connections.
Nobody.
Do you realize in America, nobody does anything on their own, folks?
This is the lesson you are to learn.
Hard work does not get you where you want to go.
Ambition is not the answer.
Connections.
Getting help, getting sweetheart deals, not even paying wholesale, much less retail, having it given to you.
That's a measure of power.
That's the measure of character.
So of course Obama's untainted, even though a felon arranged the purchase of his home for him at below market prices.
That's brilliant.
That shows he understands how the system works.
You know, it used to be considered deviant to even suggest the federal government should own and operate American businesses.
Today, it isn't just an option to take over an industry in a down business cycle, which is caused by corrupt liberals.
It's the answer.
The answer is to have the government take it over.
The only option, and we're supposed to feel good about this.
Used to be considered deviant behavior to withhold news or knowingly lie and smear people who did not share the politics of the reporter or the media outlet, but tell people like Dan Rather and others who get their own television shows by doing exactly that, smearing people simply on the basis they have a different political ideology than the reporter does.
So the country will now accept almost any behavior without objection.
In fact, I'm not so sure that deviant behavior isn't now the preference.
Quick timeout, back after this.
A couple of Senate Republicans.
Jim DeMint, Tom Coburn, DeMint from South Carolina, Coburn from Oklahoma, standing up against the auto bailout.
Dement first.
The argument that's being made today is that people will not buy a car if a company is in bankruptcy is a bogus argument.
Americans are not stupid.
Yes, they are.
They know that this bailout is only a temporary solution.
They're much less likely to buy an American car with this bailout plan.
Get this, Tom Coburn, Oklahoma.
In 2007, GM sold 9.37 million cars worldwide.
Toyota that same year sold 9.37 million cars worldwide.
GM lost 38.7 billion.
Toyota made $17.7 billion.
Therein lies the problem.
Shazam.
Did you catch that?
They sold an equal number of cars, Toyota and GM, $9.37 million worldwide.
GM lost $38.7 billion.
Toyota made $17.7 billion.
What is one of the problems, ladies and gentlemen, that exists for Blagojevich here in selling Obama's Senate seat?
What's one of the problems?
One of the problems is that Blagojevich is trying, among other things, to get himself a high-paid job, and he wanted to get his wife a high-paid job, right?
And this is called out-of-control corruption, selling the Senate seat.
Well, now, how do you think Michelle Obama, our first lady select, got her six-figure community outreach job at the Chicago University Hospital?
She got it after her husband was elected to the state Senate, where he could hand out earmarks.
Well, I know it's a coincidence here, but still, we need to mention this.
And even before that, he was asking for a job for Michelle.
We have this July article from the New York Times.
Soon after, the faculty saw an opening and made him its best offer yet: tenure upon hiring.
A handsome salary, more than $60,000 he was making in the Senate seat, or a $60,000 or the $60,000 he earned teaching part-time.
A job for Michelle Obama directing the legal clinic.
And the New York Times, I mean, they think this is brilliant maneuvering on his part.
Obama was seeking jobs for his wife, just like Blagojevich was doing in selling a Senate seat.
Barack Obama, wasting no time, has demanded that Rod Blagojevich resign.
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