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Jan. 28, 2009 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:20
January 28, 2009, Wednesday, Hour #2
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Ha.
Greetings to you, music lovers, thrill seekers, and conversationalists all across the fruited plane.
This, the award-winning, thrill-packed, ever exciting and increasingly popular.
Growing by leaps and bounds.
Rush Limbaugh program.
Coming to you from the distinguished and prestigious Limboy Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
Telephone number 800 282-2882 if you want to be on the program.
So I was in Mr. Snerdley's office at the top of the hour.
It's always fun.
It's always interesting going in there because Snurdley will say something.
Uh that that's a brainstarter.
And he said, you know, this this stimulus bill, this is like you said, there's nothing stimulus.
It's it's just a budget bill that's 30% larger than any budget bill we've ever had.
It's just incredible.
He said, this is a reporter's dream to go through this and point out all this stuff that's in it, but nobody's doing that.
And I just I just I hand a sigh.
And I looked at him and I said, Don't you get it yet?
They don't care what's in it.
It's his with a capital H. It's Obama's, and all that matters is that it passes.
You see, ladies and gentlemen, we are in a paradigm in which everything rotten in this country, everything is responsible for George W. Bush, or Bush is responsible for it.
And this is change.
This is the change.
This is the new.
And so it's good, and so it doesn't matter what's in it, it's Obama's and it's got to pass.
They're not they're not gonna break this stuff down.
He's too big to fail.
Snurdley, I'm I'm stunned that you still have this lingering expectation that the media will perform its constitutional task.
Why do you think why do you still think that?
There is no way they're going to perform their constitutional task here.
It is up to me to hijack the Obama honeymoon, and I've done it.
We have hijacked Obama's honeymoon.
Do you realize, folks, supposed to get a hundred days of a free pass?
How are we hijacking it?
Well, if you missed Obama's uh little appearance today in the White House with big corporate CEOs who I thought were the enemy, by the way.
I thought big this and big that.
I thought they were the dirty rotten scoundrels that had caused all this.
But there's Obama meeting with them.
And I watched it.
And Obama sounded like Ronald Reagan.
It was pure perception.
He's using conservative language to sell his socialist leftist agenda.
And remember, it's not what he says, it's how he says it.
So I remembered earlier this month, he said something the exact opposite.
Twenty days ago, Barack Obama was speaking at some university talking about the necessity to get this going quick, and he said that only government can get this done.
So here's what we're gonna do.
We're gonna play Obama from January 8th, and right behind it, we're gonna play Obama from this morning.
Bam bam, side by side, back to back, just to illustrate the different Obamas there are.
And I maintain to you today that the reason Obama went out there and sounded Reagan-esque.
And by the way, it sort of irritated me a little bit because we don't have a Republican who'll do it.
We don't have a conservative in the media who go out and sound Reagan-esque.
Our conservative media people are suggesting the era of Reagan is over.
And yet here is President Obama using Reagan-esque language today to try to move his proposal forward.
While being surrounded by a bunch of big business CEOs.
Here are the two sound bites.
Only government can provide the short-term boost necessary to lift us from a recession this deep and severe.
Only government can break the cycle that are crippling our economy.
That's why we need to act boldly and act now to reverse these cycles.
That's why we need to restart the flow of credit and restore the rules of the road that will ensure a crisis like this never happens again.
All we can do, those of us here in Washington, is to help create a favorable climate in which workers can prosper.
Businesses can thrive, and our economy can grow.
Is that it?
I thought there was more to uh one A than that.
Do we have a computer problem up there?
Okay.
Um, anyway, that's that's the that's the nub of it.
So you heard Obama say 20 days ago, only government can do this.
Only government can provide the boost necessary to lift us from a recession this deep and severe.
And then today he says in the end, the answer to our economic troubles rests less in my hands or in the hands of our legislators than it does with America's workers and the businesses they employ.
He went on to say that they're the ones whose efforts and ideas will determine our economic destiny just as they always have.
So he's saying what I've always said you're the ones who make the country work.
His jobs to get out of the way.
Twenty days ago, Barack Obama says you are a f a non factor.
You have nothing to do, only government can do it.
This, I believe, indicates that he thinks he's in some trouble, not in getting a bill, but in getting Republican support for it.
He desperately wants cover on this.
He desperately wants Republicans to vote for this so that uh when it bombs out, Republicans have no electoral advantage or re-election advantage, because he doesn't want them to be able to go out and say they opposed it, that they knew it wouldn't work.
He doesn't he doesn't deserve that cover.
He's not giving the Republicans anything.
He's rejected the notion of tax cuts.
He's rejected any of their ideas, and he's lauded it over them by saying, Well, I'm gonna trump you on that, uh, Congressman Cantor.
Uh I won.
I'm gonna trump you on tax cuts.
I don't believe that's the way to go.
He's throwing some, you know, little tidbit tax cuts in there that are not stimulative uh in such, just to be able to say so.
But let's not forget.
Here's another thing.
How did Barack Obama end up winning the election?
He ran on what, ladies and gentlemen?
He ran on tax cuts.
Ninety-five percent of the American people were going to receive tax cuts.
We know just as it has been the case for every other Democrat, when when it comes down to the nutcrack in time, when it comes down to getting over the hump and winning, you go conservative, you go Reagan-esque.
You talk about tax cuts for 95% of the American people.
Today you talk about how you, the people are the ones that make this work, we're gonna get out of your way.
You've always determined the state of this economy, and you will in my new plan, which is I'm sorry, folks, it's a lie.
Barack Obama is lying.
Because I happen to believe that what he said 20 days ago is the what's operative because it matches identically the plan that they're trying to get through the House today and later on through the Senate.
Now, as for this, I'm I want to say one more thing about this uh Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee petition, this online petition.
I'll tell you what they're gonna do.
I don't maybe announce some numbers.
When this is all over, when they decide to pull the plug on this, they're gonna say something very simple.
That there is a consensus to silence Rush Limbaugh.
Our petition drive was far, we never anticipated bigger than we ever thought it was gonna be.
And there is a consensus to shut Rush Limbaugh.
This is now this whole thing was put in play with Obama mentioning me last Friday at the Congressional Leaders meeting he had at the White House.
You know, marginalize me, and by by virtue of that, all of you, uh, as the fringe kooks out here, uh, and uh and co-op the Republicans into uh, you know, being moderate, uh, maybe even liberal a little bit, and going along with the historic nature of the first black president for that reason alone, he can't be denied.
It's his plan, it's change.
Only his plan can get it done.
Uh and we're i i it it relies quite a butt, quite a lot on the ignorance of average Americans.
He relies on the ignorance, and I'm not saying stupidity, the ignorance of average Americans who do not understand what's in the plan.
Uh and even when you tell them you I I see I think a lot of people are focusing on the individual uh items.
Well, six hundred and fifty bucks for coupons to convert your your analog TV to digital, twenty-one million dollars to reside them all, uh 4.19 billion dollars for acorn for uh neighborhood uh stabilization efforts.
Uh and so the the the objective here, people want to pick out these individual things and say, look at this.
Well, how does this create jobs?
That's not stimulus.
And I think, you know, narrow casting this or looking at it in niche ways is interesting.
It might be persuasive to some, but it undersells what this is really all about.
What this is really all about is simply advancing an agenda of enlarging government and entrenching the Democrat Party in power in perpetuity.
That's all this is.
And the individual ingredients are the mechanism that they accomplish this.
Now, Snerdley has just sent me a note.
Everybody doesn't know the details of what the petition is and who the DCCC is.
Okay.
Fair point.
Uh the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee, Republicans have one too, and there are organizations in the Senate.
For example, Chuck Schumer ran the Democrat senatorial campaign committee, and that when he was running was when they uncovered the uh the private credit data of Michael Steele and went public with it.
Uh the the the Tony Quello used to run it in the House way back when Eric von Holland runs it now for the Democrats.
And the purpose, the purpose of the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee, same thing with the Republican version, is to find candidates in off-years and get them to run for open seats, and then to get uh your your your sitting members re-elected, your incumbents re-elected.
It's all about re-electing Democrats.
And the Republicans have one too.
I don't know who's running the uh the RCCC right now, but the Democrats are doing it.
So they've put up a petition.
This is right out of the Rom Emanuel playbook.
This is right out of, and by the way, do you know that Rom has a conference call every morning?
Now he's the chief of staff to Obama.
You know who's on the conference call?
James Carville works at CNN, the forehead Paul Bagala works at CNN, and George Stephanopoulos, who has his own show at ABC.
Yes, absolutely true.
There is a conference call every morning between Rahm Emanuel and these three guys who uh work together in the Clinton days.
That they're all former Clinton Knights from the Clinton War Room.
And uh this is uh this this is a conference call that takes place every morning, and sometimes multiple times during the day.
Kid you not.
Now this they have an online petition at the DCCC website that has a 19-second clip of me saying, I hope Obama fails.
It's taken totally out of context, and it's presented, tell Rush Limbaugh what you think.
Here's a message, and hit the submit button, and we will send it to Rush.
So it's it's a it's a flood my inbox uh kind of kind of campaign.
Uh and on my website last night, we uh we linked to their homepage where you can send the DSC or DCC a message yourself.
So we did our reverse petition last night at Rush Limbaugh Doug.
I'm still up there.
So if you go to RushLimbaugh.com, the reverse petition sends them a message from you.
And it's been going gangbusters all night.
So we we've just been having fun with it.
My spam filter is taking care of all their emails to me.
I haven't seen one of them.
Uh and so my it's it's funny, but at the same time, folks, this is an organization that serves to advance elected Democrats, again, targeting the free speech and lying about the free speech of a private individual citizen, which of course I am, even though I have hijacked the Obama honeymoon, and they're not happy about it.
So what they're gonna do at the end of whatever their plan is, however long it takes, they're gonna say their response to their petition was overwhelming.
More people think I should be shut up than they could possibly opinion now that they've collected that uh that I need to be silenced.
This is uh that's exactly what they're gonna do.
And they there's no counter on their website, so you don't really know how many it is.
We'll just have to trust, at least there wasn't one last night.
We're just gonna have to trust what they say.
Now you have uh Soundbite number uh one A ready to go in its entirety.
Okay, so I want to do 19 and 1A.
We want to do Obama twenty days ago, Obama this morning, back to back, straight into the commercial break.
Here we go.
Only government can provide the short-term boost necessary to lift us from a recession this deep and severe.
Only government can break the cycle that are crippling our economy.
That's why we need to act boldly and act now to reverse these cycles.
That's why we need to restart the flow of credit and restore the rules of the road that will ensure a crisis like this never happens again.
In the end, the answer to our economic troubles rests less in my hands or in the hands of our legislators than it does with America's workers and the businesses that employ them.
They are the ones whose efforts and ideas will determine our economic destiny.
Just as they always have.
For in the end it's businesses, large and small, that generate the jobs, provide the salaries, and serve as the foundation on which the American people's lives and dreams depend.
All we can do, those of us here in Washington, is to help create a favorable climate in which workers can prosper.
Businesses can thrive, and our economy can grow.
And I also, my memory, ladies and gentlemen dancing uh quite uh rapidly here.
Sturdley helped me out on the didn't Obama say at some point that he would not sign a stimulus bill had a whole lot of pork in it.
He said he's gonna line by line there he will not sign a stimulus bill that has pork in it.
And eighty percent of this bill is pork.
We're gonna be talking with Eric Cantor at uh one third.
Well, after the after the break, coming up here at the uh bottom of the hour, Eric Cantor, uh Republican from Virginia, he is at this moment being grilled by Andrea Mitchell at MSNBC, demanding, she's practically demanding that he denounce me.
She keeps in, do you agree what are you saying here?
Do you agree what he's saying there?
And I, you know, I've you know, you sit here and you watch this stuff, you know.
I want to say to Andrew Mitchell, Andrew, do you know what's in this?
Do you know this is not a stimulus bill?
But then I would be falling into the snerdly behavior.
She doesn't care what's in it.
They don't care what's in it, except to the extent that they love that it's going to grow the Democrat Party and low uh grow uh grow government.
Let me grab some phone calls.
People have been patiently waiting.
Paul in Westerville, Ohio.
Thank you for calling, sir.
Nice to have you here.
Hi, Rush.
Uh, greetings from uh snowy central Ohio, uh, John, your friend John Kasich Country.
Thank you, sir very much from 79 degrees and sunny South Florida.
Um I have a proposal for you uh to uh make a little tweaking on your 5446 proposal with Obama.
Yes, sir.
Um you had proposed a major change in the capital gains rates, and I would generally agree with you, but because many, many people have carry have capital capital gain carry forward losses that will last them a lifetime.
You might want to consider adjusting that and and and changing it to a proposal where all IRA distributions from all types of IRAs become non-taxable.
Because your capital gain one, while in theory is great, on a practical basis, isn't gonna have much effect, unfortunately.
And you're saying this because there have been the market's been wiped out that it's gonna take years for people's uh portfolios to rebound to a to a positive or plus side, so they're not gonna be having any capital gains in the long term.
Exactly.
I I don't know if I have enough years left to live to utilize my capital loss capital.
Well, but here's why I'm thinking about it.
You're thinking about people now.
Correct.
What's happened is a tremendous number of people have gotten out of the market.
Now, at some point they're gonna get back in.
There are a lot of people think that we are near the bottom.
They're hoping so.
But even those people who have gotten out likely have incurred capital losses.
Right, but forget them for just a second.
We're gonna we're gonna we're gonna handle those people, also may have lost their jobs.
We're that there's m there are many aspects to this.
But the if if people get into the market, if people go back into the market and buy new at these level You think it won't spur people getting back in?
Do you think a two or three hundred point a day increase in the Dow Jones industrial average will not indicate some degree of confidence elsewhere in the economy?
I know the market's not always a leading indicator of economic activity, good or bad, but but this is designed to get people back in it rather than getting out of it.
I understand what you're saying.
It's excellent, it's an excellent point.
But again, well, I got to take a break.
We're coming up on the on the on the bottom of the hour break, and I want to remind you again, if Andrea Mitchell lets him go, uh we will be talking to Eric Cantor, uh Congressman from Virginia after the break.
Sit tight.
And we're back.
Rush Limboy here on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Back to your phone calls in just a moment.
800-282-2882 if you'd like to join us.
And we'd now like to provide a little safe haven for Eric Cantor, Congressman from Virginia, who just finished twenty or so minutes with Andrea Mitchell at MSNBC.
Uh, Congressman, great to have you here on the EIB network for the first time.
Rush, it is great to be on with you.
Um I I I was able to read some of the closed captioning, Congressman, when you're on with Andrea Mitchell, and it's you know, it's it's got to be a little frustrating, but you know, you guys are you guys are doing great.
You're you're hanging really, really tight and tough up there against this, because it's a it's a pork bill that Obama said would not be a pork bill.
He promised that there would be no pork in this, that we're gonna do new ways.
And here, I don't know, it could be Andrea Mitchell, it it could be anybody in the drive-by media, just basically treating you as a suspect, accusing you of opposing this m this marvelous miraculous pack just because it's his.
I don't think she has the slightest idea what's in it after you told her.
Well, and that's the frustrating part, Russ, but we're not giving up, and thank goodness you're there to try and help get the message out about what this bill is and isn't.
This is a this is a spending bill.
This is not a stimulus bill.
And you know, the message to the President that I delivered on several occasions has been this.
You were elected by the people of this country because they had hope that you would actually change the way that our Federal Government works so that it could start working for the people again.
And first order of business should be to cut the waste and pork barrel spending in Washington.
This bill is so chock full of government expansion.
Um they can you it's hard to even find the stimulus programs in here.
Even the Congressional Budget Office, uh controlled by the Democrats now says it is not a stimulative bill.
Twelve cents out of every dollar could be maybe argued that it is worth some stimulative effect.
That is a far cry from doing things the right way and delivering results.
Congressman, did you happen to have a chance this morning to hear President Obama's remarks in the White House after the two CEOs from IBM and Honeywell spoke?
No, I didn't.
I'd like for you to hear what he said.
But before that, I want to play you two sound bites, because I know you've been swamped.
I want to l I want you to hear President Obama from January eighth.
He was at uh George Mason University.
This was the occasion where he said only government can get this economy moving.
Uh only government can provide the short term boost.
The second sound bite, and these are short, they're uh twenty-eight and thirty-eight seconds each.
The second soundbite from today, he sounds positively Reagan-esque.
Here is Obama Cut 19.
Mike, this is from uh January eighth of this year.
Only government can provide the short-term boost necessary to lift us from a recession this deep and severe.
Only government can break the cycle that are crippling our economy.
That's why we need to act boldly and act now.
Okay, stop the tape.
Now let's move on.
This was this morning.
It's a it's Reagan, Congressman, that this is 180 degrees different in the end.
The answer to our economic troubles rests less in my hands or in the hands of our legislators than it does with America's workers and the businesses that employ them.
They are the ones whose efforts and ideas will determine our economic destiny, just as they always have.
For in the end it's businesses, large and small, that generate the jobs, provide the salaries, and serve as the foundation on which the American people's lives and dreams depend.
All we can do, those of us here in Washington, is to help create a favorable climate in which workers can prosper.
Businesses can thrive, and our economy can grow.
Okay.
Two totally contrasting views.
When you go up to the White House and talk to him, which which president.
I know it's it's tough.
You guys have your your strategy here is is to uh you know blame the House bill on Pelosi and so forth, which is great.
But how how do you how do how do you know which president you're dealing with?
Well, this is a good question, Rush.
And to tell you the truth, you know, he came up to Capitol Hill yesterday and spoke to House Republicans, and he said he has no pride of authorship in this bill.
Uh and he wants to continue to work with us.
In fact, three weeks ago, before he was even sworn into office, he reached out and says, Bring me your ideas.
Well, last Friday, when we went to the White House, and bipartisan, uh bicameral leadership.
So it was Pelosi, it was Hoyer, it was Boehner and I, uh Reed and McConnell uh and others.
And we presented uh to the President our House Republican plan.
Uh and that plan is focused very much on the premise that he was trying to relate in the latest clip that it really is the men and women in a small business of this country that provide the jobs and the salaries, and all we can do here in Washington is to create an environment where you provide economic incentives for people to put their money to risk and create jobs.
I couldn't have said it better.
The problem is when we got into the discussion of the kind of tax relief that really will produce that kind of stimulus and incentive, he says we have a philosophical difference.
His opinion is that we ought to go the route of his make work pay program.
Well, you know what his make work pay program is.
It is to provide refunds to people who don't even pay income taxes.
Yeah.
Now the Americ the American people know that is unfair, and it doesn't do anything to provide incentives for people to get get back to work and create jobs.
It was actually reported that uh in that meeting he said to you after you and you were the one that specifically uh presented the tax cut proposals, and that he smiled and said, Well, I'm gonna trump you on that.
I won.
Uh and we're not gonna do that.
Uh how that makes you feel.
I mean, you you you go up there under the auspices and he's willing to listen to your ideas, which I guess he did.
I mean, he followed through.
Well, you know, Rush, he is uh he's the president, so you know, he can say that.
Uh but all I countered with and said, look, you know, again, you set the standard.
You're the one that said you want this to be a real stimulus bill.
Let's get down to business.
Let's throw out all the pork barrel stuff uh and really make this work.
So he came back up to the Hill uh after we were at the White House and again was here yesterday.
Um I'm hopeful, I'm hopeful at some point, Rush, uh, that we can get there.
Uh again, it is uh, you know, Speaker Pelosi has has really not uh embraced what it is that we are for.
She claims she has.
Uh you know, she talks about the sacrifices that that her caucus has made to include the net operating loss provisions.
And you know what that is.
Those are the ability for businesses to take advantage of the losses they have now and apply them against the gains and the income taxes they paid before.
Which she has incurred, by the way, with her investment in T-Bone Pickens natural gas plan.
Well, there you go.
She should be excited about this.
Right.
Well, she she claims that was a very heavy lift and that the you know the Democrats don't like that.
And uh that that perhaps we should be satisfied with that.
My contention back uh, you know, to any of that kind of discussion is look, we shouldn't just be satisfied uh with a partial attempt to sustain jobs.
We ought to be doing everything we can, focused like a laser in uh on preserving the jobs that are out there and providing an environment to create new jobs.
We're speaking with Congressman Eric Cantor from Virginia.
Two more things before we let you go.
I you you you mentioned pork.
I want to play you another President Obama soundbite.
He's President elect at this time.
This is December 7th.
He was on uh Meet the Depressed with uh with Tom Brokaw, and he was being asked about the stimulus package, and he wanted to know how Brokaw wanted to know how much it was going to cost and who was going to pay for it.
When I met with the governors, all of them have projects that are shovel ready.
And now we're gonna have to prioritize it and do it, uh not in the old traditional uh politics first way.
What we need to do is uh examine what are the projects where we're gonna get the most bang for the buck, how are we going to make sure taxpayers are protected?
Uh you know, the the days of just pork coming out of Congress as a strategy, uh, those days are over.
Apparently not, because this is a pork bill.
You can call this the porculus.
Right.
Let me tell you something.
It is porculous.
That's a great that's a great description.
But let's let's call it how it is.
Even the Congressional Budget Office says less than a quarter of the money that they've allocated towards these type of project even gets out the door prior to the beginning of 2011.
Uh and you know, and let's also look at sort of what they're talking about of giving states money.
Listen, we need to impose reform all over the place at all levels of government.
If you just sit here and have the federal taxpayers again borrow the money, twenty seven hundred dollars for every man, woman, and child, to then go and give to the states, and there's no reform there, how do we end up growing GDP?
How do we end up getting We don't?
Exactly.
We we don't see that's the whole point.
You know, uh i it's it's great news.
It is fascinating to learn all of these pork projects that are in this bill, and only twelve percent if that actually goes to stimulus.
But that that masks what this really is.
This is a bill to grow government.
This is a bill to grow the power of the Democrat Party.
This is the New Deal too.
This is this is designed to uh uh uh create uh another fifty years of Democrat rule in perpetuity.
This is not gonna grow the it's not gonna create any jobs.
Congressman, he doesn't need in the House.
Correct me if I'm wrong, every Republican could oppose this, and he it would still pass, correct?
That is absolutely right.
All right, so why here's my question, final question.
If this bill is so magical, if this bill is going to accomplish everything in terms of stimulus and bring back prosperity and full employment, why doesn't he want it to be only a Democrat vote?
He could ruin the Republican Party forever.
If this bill actually works as he says, and none of you vote for it, he can come back when it's in full-fledged success mode and say these guys opposed it, they didn't want this day.
It could destroy you guys.
But yet he wants your cover on this.
Absolutely.
And you know, it's the same and this as went on in prior bills when Speaker Pelosi wanted us to take responsibility along with them.
And you know what?
House Republicans are not going to do that given the nature of this bill.
And that's our message to the President as well.
If you want us to shoulder the burden of the product that comes out of Congress, it ought to be the right product, it ought to be a stimulative bill, it ought to create incentives for investment.
It ought not be just more borrowing spending on the part of the government.
Congressman Cantor, thank you very much.
I've enjoyed talking to you.
And uh, you know, keep fighting these people in the media.
They are every bit as much your enemy as Pelosi is.
Well well, listen, uh Rush, we've got uh so much work to be done.
We I thank you very much for what you're doing.
We've got uh and a tremendous amount of pork list that we can back up this description of porculus uh that I think your readers would really your listeners would really like to read.
So if they want to go on on the web, you can find it.
It is astounding.
All right.
I we'll we'll direct them to it.
Thanks again, and uh we'll chat soon.
Thank you, Russ.
You bet.
Congressman Eric Cantor, Virginia.
We'll be right back.
Another teachable moment here on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Two stories.
First from the Associated Press.
Date line, Beverly Hills, California.
As the economy weakens, the wealthy and the businesses that cater to them say it's more common, even chic to scale back extravagant spending and play down effluence.
Retailing experts call it luxury shame.
Stealth wealth.
From Rodeo Drive to Fifth Avenue, that means one thing.
Hide the labels.
In fact, if you go into a Tiffany store on Rodeo Drive, you can ask for a plain white sack or a white box, Rather than the identifiable Tiffany blue box or sack, so that you can walk out and not appear conspicuous in your consumption.
In the New York Post.
Now keep in mind that the Attorney General there, Andrew Cuomo, is conducting an investigation into bonuses paid to executives during the bailout here on Wall Street.
As it, and by the way, I mean, when you're losing gazillions of bucks and you pass out four billion dollars worth of bonuses, it's a problem.
It is, it's it's you know.
Why pay people who are failing?
You know, but but regardless, they're investigating all of these high salaries.
They're investigating these jets, they're investigating these refurbished executive sweets.
The New York Attorney General is gonna bring these executives to their knees, and then this story pops up on the New York Post.
New York State will lose a whopping one billion dollars in tax revenue this year because cash bonuses to Wall Street employees plummeted 44% in 2008, according to a new bombshell report.
So we've already got a budget mess in New York State.
Income taxes and others are going up, but the bonuses paid to Wall Street executives are gonna cause a bombshell reduction of one billion dollars to the New York State Treasury.
In an analysis released this morning by State Controller Thomas DeNapoli, he estimates that the securities industry paid its New York City employees $18.4 billion in bonuses last year compared to $33 billion in 2007.
A drop in bonuses it'll also cost the city 275 million, as well as the state one billion.
The securities industry has already lost tens of thousands of jobs.
The industry is still continuing to write off toxic assets at Denapoli.
Oh, whoa is usually.
So what do we have?
Two stories here.
The rich, and this is the second or third time we've seen this.
The rich are cutting back.
The rich are not spending.
And when the rich don't spend, it trickles down everywhere.
I guess that means when the rich do spend, it also trickles down.
And now the rich are not even getting paid in New York, and it's going to result in a one billion dollar loss.
And yet government is the only entity that can fix our problems.
Now this I want to go back to this story from the AP, the wealthy turn stealthy as economy weakens.
Luxury shame, stealth wealth.
The objective here is to there's a quote in here from a guy, a well wealthy guy and his wife Shoppers.
A lot of us are downsizing, not only because we have to, but because we think it's the right thing to do.
May I take that comment as a teachable moment?
Why?
What makes downsizing the right thing to do?
He makes it sound here like there's some sort of morality play going on in downsizing, like getting rid of the Mercedes and going out and buying a hybrid.
Or maybe getting rid of the light bulbs at work and going out and getting those stupid curly cute cheese puff light bulbs.
If it's the right thing to do now, why was it the right thing to do one, three, seven, whatever years ago?
If cutting back, if downsizing is the right thing to do now, why is it always the right thing to do?
Is it because unemployment seven or eight percent instead of three or four percent?
Is this guy afraid of hurting the feelings of out-of-work Americans of causing resentment of his wealth?
Does albody somebody unemployed, and there's always somebody who's got less than you do?
There's always somebody who has more.
The real emotion that's working here is fear.
People like this rich guy quoted here, they flaunt it.
They're afraid people like Obama and the government are gonna come take it, and so they want to portray themselves as not rich, so they won't be targets, they don't want anybody criticizing them, and in the process, they they too are participating in slowing down the economy.
All right, the fastest three hours in media, where has the first two gone?
They're they're they're finished, but we've got one more to go, ladies and gentlemen.
Some very important program announcements coming up when we get back.
So sit tight.
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