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Aug. 4, 2009 - Rush Limbaugh Program
35:34
August 4, 2009, Tuesday, Hour #2
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And greetings, welcome back, Rush Limboa and the excellence in broadcasting that we're coming to you from the prestigious and distinguished Limbo Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
I just watching television.
I saw Bill Clinton get off the plane over North Korea.
Where he was going to go meet with uh Kim Jong-il to get two female journalists released, one of whom works for Al Gore.
And I got to thinking two things.
I remember when Jimmy Carter went over to North Korea on his own during the Clinton administration and came out of there saying, I just finished talking to the little potbelly dictator, and he promised me no nukes.
And he sort of cut Clinton's knees out from one.
I wonder what kind of side deals are being made here.
Now, where is Hillary?
This the real Secretary State is in Kenya.
Why go to Kenya unless you've been ordered to go over there and kiss Obama's grandfather's grave?
Is North Korea too important to send a girl?
We welcome to our program, Dr. Arthur Laffer, ladies and gentlemen, who has uh prepared a research paper on the Obama health care plan.
I've I've I've uh admired your work, Dr. Laffer, ever since I first heard of you back in the late 70s, early 80s.
It's great to have you here.
Well, thank you very much, Rush.
It's a pleasure.
By the way, I want to share something with you.
You may not know this, but you are partially responsible for Obama becoming a community organizer from Chapter 7, page 54 of his book Dreams of My Father.
There wasn't much detail to the idea of community organizer.
I didn't know anybody making a living that way.
When classmates in college asked me just what it was that a community organizer did, I couldn't answer him directly.
Instead, I'd pronounce on the need for change.
Change in the White House, where Reagan and his minions were carrying on their dirty deeds.
You were a minion doing dirty deeds to minion minion, oh my gosh.
I I don't know if you remember Rush, but I was on your show in studio in Sacramento, California many, many years ago.
Oh, that's right.
That's that I you you know, you're exactly right.
You impress me enormously then as well as today.
Well, I thank you very much for that.
It's mutual then.
I have a summary here of your findings.
Uh let me just run through a couple bullet points and then you can take it and expand on this.
Uh the current proposals being discussed in Washington, House and Senate would raise the total federal government expenditures by 5.6% more than otherwise, adding 285.6 billion dollars to the deficit in 2019 would increase national health care expenditures by an additional eight point nine percent.
After all this, it would still leave thirty million Americans uninsured.
Uh fill in blanks here for us.
Well, you know, it's a it's a fairly straightforward one, and without going through the specific numbers, although I'd be more than happy to do that.
You know, whenever you separate people from their purchases they make, if you walked into a store and weren't told what anything would cost, and you could pick out whatever you wanted free, you know you're gonna be squandorous, you're gonna buy things that are way too expensive that you don't want.
I mean, one of the ways you control costs is making people responsible for their own money for their own expenditures, and that is exactly what this program does not do.
It it makes the separation between the patient and the doctor in health services further and further removed and takes away all control of cost.
And frankly, i if if I PJ O'Rourke put it, he said, if you think health care is expensive now, just wait till you see how much it costs when it's free.
And that's exactly what we're doing here.
Well, you know, you're you're uh you're an economist, accomplished economist, and you uh obviously did a lot of research here.
Uh one of my bugaboos is in a in a political sense that when somebody like an Obama or any Democrat proposes something massive like this, the premise, which is we have to have health care reform is automatically accepted, and we start analyzing the numbers, and we say, Well, that's too much here, it's too much there.
Do you do you get into the motivation for people who are behind this uh this monster?
Did that interest you at all why the Well, it interests me, but it's not in this paper.
I mean, that's not our purpose.
As you say, I'm an economist, I worry about the costs of the program, which are going to be a lot more than anyone else suggests.
I'm worried about the access and the availability of the services of the health care, and I'm worried about the quality of it.
I mean, that's what economists really worry about in this program.
It's it's a real problem.
Well, your first point about separating people from the cost of things is right on the money.
It's uh, you know, uh it it started fifty years ago with Medicaid and Medicare and it's just expanded and now people consider it a right uh that their employer has to provide for them.
But Dr. Laffer, your research is going to add to uh what people have already learned on their own by reading what's in the House bill, uh, and they're they're outraged by it.
Um do you think that your research paper has an opportunity to stop this?
Well, I I hope it it provides the information in the uh fodder basically to really make it a lot better if not stopping it.
I mean I'd love to see it stopped.
I you know, our health care system has things that can improve it a lot, but it's not broken.
It provides great health care for many people.
And frankly, I I think this type of reform and especially in the direction I think these people are going for having a single payer, I think it's it's really the wrong direction for America to go.
I think it'll really add costs and uh provide a lower quality product.
Now you have in your paper a lot of solutions uh that uh make health care more available, make it better without destroying what's already good in the system.
What are some of those?
Well, you know, uh some of the obvious ones that I think are really big.
I mean, I think health care providers who aren't doctors allowing them to do things they're competent to do uh and not prohibiting them from doing it, the nurses and other health care technicians, shots and other things and prescribing low-level medicines and that type of stuff.
I think tort reform is another one, Rush that really is a huge increase in cost.
I mean, the the insurance costs the doctor has just for practicing medicine and how that feeds through in expenses, uh it it's amazing.
Uh all of these things, there are lots of things we can do to make our system better.
HSA's health savings accounts.
Yes, HSA is another good example.
There you go.
From both both houses, uh the House and the Senate, the HSAs are going to be gone precisely because they do give power and control to the patient.
Sure, and it gives you the cow power of your own money.
It's it's money that you put in there.
I mean, you know, individual ownership of insurance policies, that's an obvious one.
I mean, the HSAs, as you say, are clear.
Uh you know, interstate purchasing of insurance, that that's another one that can easily be done.
There are lots of other ones that are in there that really will make the the system a lot better.
But making it the post office of the Department of Motor Vehicles, or making uh doctors, employees of government really doesn't make it better, honest.
Let me move to the general economy if I can for just a second.
We saw the uh news yesterday tax receipts, uh corporate and personal uh near record lows since uh the nineteen thirties.
Surprise, surprise.
Well, does it does it uh the personal question?
Uh the author of the Laffer Curve, the the the principle that uh to a certain point lowering marginal tax rates stimulates economic activity and generates more revenue to the Treasury has been proven twice, Kennedy and Reagan.
It has been and well, Bush, Bush uh Bush 43, it has been proven three times.
Does it frustrate you personally that something you know works that has been demonstrated to work to the world?
Yes, constantly attacked and tried to be overthrown.
Yeah, but it's it's silly because I mean everyone knows that you can overcharge for something and collect less money, and everyone knows you can undercharge for it and collect less money.
You know, there's a pricing mechanism there, and taxes are no different.
And you just let's take the health care one here at Rush.
You know, the president wanted to put a five point four percent surcharge on millionaires thinking he'd collect more money.
That's about the dumbest idea I've ever heard.
If you raise taxes on those people, you're gonna get a lot less people, and they're gonna figure ways around it, and you're gonna collect a lot less money.
Dr. Laffer, this gets to a uh the a question that the the point that really, really bugs me.
You just said it's stupid.
Anybody with any economic literacy has to conclude by now, and many knew before it was implemented that the whole stimulus theory was bound to fail.
It had no chance.
It's never worked.
Whenever you get something for nothing check, because you're probably I'm back to motivation.
I'm back and this may be an area you might not want to get into, but I'm gonna chance to question it.
Sure, go ahead.
I don't believe they're stupid.
I think it's being done purposely for a reason.
Nobody is this stupid, not with the history of the world and the history of this country within twenty years as a guide.
There's a blueprint how to get an economy going again.
It's called Get Out of the Way of the American People and Incentivize Them.
This is the exact opposite.
We're losing five to six hundred thousand jobs every month.
Consumer spending was up uh point four percent, but incomes are down one point three percent.
Nothing is working.
There is no rescue.
There is no recovery.
And they're talking about doubling down on this.
And I, for one, as someone who understands how wrong this is and dangerous, don't understand why it is being continued.
Well, I'm not really sure, but if you've ever been at a university with fellow professors, I mean, they may be able to manipulate a Feynman diagram or invert a matrix over a Bonock space, but they don't know how to pay their lunch bill and they can't tie their shoes.
And what you see here are these types of mistakes are classic professorial mistakes, lawyer mistakes.
They think that if you change a law, Rush, all of a sudden things are working in that direction.
It's not true.
And and they have no idea of the real world.
They've never made a bad trade.
They've never suffered the humility of their own ideas being wrong.
Because in their classroom, their ideas are always right.
And that's the trouble with this administration.
They they really don't have a clue.
Well, you're being generous.
I I I am.
I like I like the people very much.
I know a number of them very well.
They're good friends.
All right.
Does Lauren Summers have a clue?
Uh I don't think he has a clue.
He may be the one that you're right on, by the way.
The other ones, Jared Bernstein, I know him very well.
He's a great guy, an honest man.
I think he's wrong, but he's a great guy.
Christina's Roomer.
She's terrific.
Her research before has been great.
Yeah, see, Christina Roomer is an acolyte of you.
Yeah, but she's great on that stuff.
I would and she's just sitting there now in a position where she has to mouth the the the party line, which is very sad.
I watched Austin Goolsby defend Obama's firing of the chairman of the board of GM.
Hello?
That's not what a president of the United States is supposed to do, Rush, but that's what they were doing.
And and the economist was justifying, well, we're a big shareholder now, and we?
Oh my goodness.
It's crazy, isn't it?
It is well, it's crazy and dangerous because you know, when you start attaching motive to this, um I I grant that you that they're professorial and academically stupid, uh ignorant.
But something about this is so bad and so wrong.
And there you when you look at something that this bad, there there are people going to benefit from it.
And when you look at who, then you say, okay, how?
And but who benefits from this?
I see, I don't see the who benefits from these types of classic mistakes unless you're just a power hungry dictator.
Well I mean, would Kim Jong il do this?
I mean, seriously.
He has done it.
His people are eating dogs, they're starving to death.
They're doing it in Venezuela.
It's the history of the world.
Well, Chavez is a pretty bad guy.
I there are not many worse than Chavez.
The history of the world is this.
That's why they guess the United States is such an exception.
And if you have a guy who, for whatever reason, has a chip on his shoulder about how the uh immoral and unjust this country was.
I tell you what I think, put in economic terms.
I think that the objective of Barack Obama is via redistribution to return the nation's wealth to its quote unquote rightful owners.
But you know, he's destroying it for the poor, for the minorities, for the disenfranchised.
Yeah, but he's no one no one's doing better with nine and a half, ten percent unemployment rate.
And the participation rates, the average hours, the average wages, the quality of jobs, it's declining like uh like a submarine thing.
Well, let me pause positive theory.
If your number one signature issue is health care, and you want it because with it you'll be able to regulate every aspect of every American's life.
That's true.
What better event could you have than massive unemployment with people losing their health insurance, clamoring for more, clamoring for their help because they're scared to death they're gonna get sick.
Uh I I think there's uh a lot of fraud and deceit that accompanies the uh professorial stupidity.
Well, there is a lot of that.
It it's hubris, I mean, is what it really is, and their inability to admit they're wrong because frankly, they don't have to bear the consequences of their own hubris and their own mistakes.
That that's the problem.
That's a good point.
Dr. Laffer, this is uh great talk to you again.
Oh, Rush, it's wonderful talking with you.
You're doing a great job.
Thank you very much.
You bet have a one you're gonna present this paper at two o'clock this afternoon, right?
I I sure am.
All right.
Well, we'll have uh where where are you doing that?
In New York?
I am in New York, yes.
Okay, good.
Well, good luck and thanks very much for your time.
Thank you very much, Rush.
Dr. Arthur Laffer, and we will be right back.
Stay with us.
And we're back, Rush Limbaugh, the cutting edge of societal evolution.
Telephone number if you want to join us, 800-282-2882.
And the email address L Rushbaugh at EIB net dot com.
You remember back Bill Clinton said that during the campaign, Bill Clinton said that Obama had the instincts of a Chicago thug.
Well, today Daryl Issa has issued a statement.
It reads in part, this a House Oversight Committee.
Following reports that White House Chief of Staff, Rom Emanuel, has been orchestrating an effort to intimidate members of Congress and governors who raise legitimate concerns regarding the effectiveness of the stimulus bill.
House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform ranking member Daryl Issa, Republican California, sent a letter to Rom Emanuel saying, while this type of scare tactic may work in Chicago, it will not work to intimidate me or other members of the United States Congress.
I and others have dared to bring these facts to the attention of President Obama, Congress and the American people, Issa wrote.
You've unfortunately reacted by once again resorting to the playbook of the Chicago political machine.
And he says this isn't Chicago, and it isn't going to play here.
Rom's kneecapping people, he's strong arming people, he's twisting arms and so forth, forcing things down people's throat that nobody wants.
It's the Chicago way.
I want to go to the top of the audio soundbites here, Mike, because I mentioned that these town halls are just bubbling over.
There is something really at work out there that the administration doesn't realize, and their cronies in the media do not realize.
Last Saturday in Minneapolis, North Point Health and Wellness Center, Representative Keith Ellison held a town call.
He's a Democrat on health care reform.
And during the forum, a guy said this.
The problem here is when you expect the government to give you insurance or keep you well and tell you what you can and cannot, tell you when and when you have to exercise, you've given away your personal rights.
You've given away your personal responsibility and wellness.
Wellness is an individual right, and you must take responsibility for it.
The government does not grant you rights to life, liberty, or wellness.
These are God-given rights, and to keep them, you've got to take them to yourself.
Yay!
The crowd went nuts here.
And of course, uh, the Democrat line now is well, of course, it's insurance people.
Uh insurance companies are stoking these people up and giving them facts and figures.
Here's uh another extra great question.
Great question, but Ellison doesn't answer it.
Are you willing to put your family on this government system which is different from the one you currently use?
If you are not willing to put your family on the system, why should the rest of us?
All right, next point.
Well, answer the question.
He didn't answer the question.
Answer the question.
Let me tell folks, let me warn you.
I asking the question is enough.
How can you trust their answer anyway if they do answer it?
Obama said that he would put himself and his family in the public plan.
He's not going to he won't be permitted to.
The public plan will not provide for Obama the way he is provided for now as president.
And he's not going to put his family in this plan.
Trust me on this.
Nor are members of Congress going to give up what they have and join whatever this public option ends up being.
Here, this woman in this bite is great.
She says she'd rather go bankrupt than not be able to treat her father's leukemia.
My dad has been diagnosed with an acute leukemia.
He's got a 15% chance of survival.
We spent a month and a half inpatient at Mayo, and we might lose the family farm.
But I'm here to tell you that the chemo drug that he is on now that may save his life is illegal in Norway.
It is not available in Great Britain because it is expensive.
And you know what?
The worst thing that can happen to you when you have a health crisis is not bankruptcy.
It's death.
And I would rather that we lose the family farm and keep my dad alive.
Yeah.
Right on, right on, right on, right on.
And then Keith Ellison.
End of life health care costs result from the guilt trap.
This is uh at his town hall meeting, and here's his discussion on it.
We ought to all have a conversation with our loved ones, not about money, but about enemy.
So what the bill says, what it calls for is that you have a conversation with your provider and encouraged to have a conversation with your family about things like living well, do not resuscitate, things like that.
Now look, it happens to be true that a lot of expense is in life here.
So some of that expense is associated with the fact that the family is in a guilt trap, so they don't know they want to do everything they can to say dad or mom.
End of health care costs result from a guilt trap.
This is uh really amazing.
Obama is gonna cut costs by removing the guilt trap.
Family members feel.
You won't have to treat your dying parents out of guilt anymore.
They'll just take the pain pill.
I kind of sprung that on.
You want to hear that again.
She went pretty quick out there.
This is um this is our look into the future.
Title of our little skit here is Martha.
White comedian Paul Shanklin.
Ladies and gentlemen.
Okay, there's an update from state-controlled media.
The Obama administration has decided to withhold data on the Cash for Clunkers program.
Wonder why they are withholding data from the Cash for Clunkers program.
The limited information released so far shows that most buyers are not picking Ford Chrysler or General Motors cars.
Six of the top ten vehicles purchased are Honda, Toyota, and Hyundai.
So uh we're not selling American cars.
We're not buying Obama mobiles, and we're not buying from Obama Motors that are withholding data from the Cash for Clunkers program, just like Obama withheld data from the uh the mid-quarter report on the deficit.
Remember that was supposed to come out in August, withholding that data?
And we found out why when we found out how low the tax receipts are and how much gigantic more the deficit is going to be.
So six out of ten vehicles purchased are Honda Toyota and Honda.
Obama Motors trying to subsidize themselves, and they're subsidizing their competitors.
The Asia stimulus plan with Clinton over there in North Korea, and who knows what kind of side deals are being made over there.
Uh Clinton comes back.
Why should by the way, one of these journalists over there works for Al Gore's network?
Why why isn't Al Gore over there trying to secure her release?
But I hope Clinton comes back and you know a week or two, yeah.
I just want to announce uh struck a day with Kim Jong-il.
He's he promised me no more missiles, no more missiles are gonna be launched.
He gave me my game gave him my word.
Uh I gave him his word.
Uh, and and uh everything's cool.
Uh and uh I was on the phone with Hillary all the time.
We negotiated this together.
And then two days later, another missile catch launched.
We can dream out there.
I Ronald in Los Angeles says we go back to the phones.
Hello, sir, great to have you here.
Hi, Russian.
Thanks for taking my call.
You bet.
Let me tell you, I am livid with this Obamacare proposal.
I belong to a union in Los Angeles, California, in the entertainment industry, and there is no way I would consider giving up my benefits to have any kind of government operated involvement health care.
I have a 12-year-old daughter, and my union and the health care plans that they offer is only second to probably Congress.
Now, your union offers the plan, but it's actually from your employer.
What kind what what kind of business are you in?
Well, we're we're independent contractors in the entertainment industry.
Oh, oh.
I ATSE.
Now the picture is coming into focus, as Lee's.
Hey.
So you're an independent conduct, so your union does provide you the insurance.
Yes, they're our conduit for our insurance.
Uh-huh.
Uh-huh.
And uh you d yeah, you the odds are it here what'll happen.
Two things are gonna happen here.
Well, maybe three.
What what what's gonna happen is first, businesses, if this public option ever comes up, are gonna offload their health care to get rid of the cost.
They don't care about anything else, right?
It's they're there, it's breaking their banks.
They'll be happy to offload it to the public option.
Second thing is that unions will probably feel I mean that's what Obama wants.
That's what they've elected him to do.
See, Obama thinks guys like you want the government to run everything because you love the government when guys like Obama are running it.
The third thing that'll happen is if for some reason you are allowed to keep that plan because you're a union and you're exempted and he has special favors for unions.
If that plan changes, if the price changes, if the coverage, if there's a minutest change, it's in the bill.
You are no longer allowed to renew it, and you have to go to public option.
So one way or another, you're going to end up under Obamacare.
Let me tell you this, Rush.
Let me just break in here a minute.
Is that he has attempted to wanting to tax the unions, and then once he got the pushback from the unions, he's laid off of that for health care.
You made me aware of that.
So I don't expect the unions to be impacted.
Because those are the coffers that support his existence.
Well, uh, I know.
But remember now he says in two thousand seven and two thousand three.
He thinks there should be a single payer system.
It may take fifteen or twenty years.
So he may have to make you guys last because he owes you the most.
But his objective is to have everybody covered by the federal government.
Addition additionally, Rush, I am a Vietnam Air vet.
And I have, and I'm over fifty-five, and let me tell you, the veterans administration run health care would be my last resort.
I would not use a government instituted health program when I have choices.
So he's lost two areas here on the West Coast with individuals in my similar state of being, as well as other union and former vets.
Are you not the only union guy that uh feels the way you do in your union?
They all do.
They feel similar to what I do.
They don't want to give up their excellent health care that they get and the providers that provide those because we have choices of where we can go.
Exactly right.
And you know something?
That's that's that that's the case for over fifty percent, sixty percent of the population.
They don't want to change what they've got.
They don't want it.
That's but but see, that doesn't matter to Obama, Ronald.
And it doesn't matter to the Democrats.
They're going to force this on us anyway.
It doesn't matter.
The contempt that they are feeling for the public right now is at an all-time high, because this kind of opposition wasn't in the plan.
This was not dreamed of.
I appreciate the call.
Very enlightening.
Maryland in uh dripping springs, Texas.
Now that's gotta be a place.
It is a fabulous place, Rudd.
Sounds like it.
I mean, for somebody to name a place dripping springs.
Well, that's what drew us here about twelve years ago.
Well, it's gotta be dripping something.
I've got to tell you, it's a pleasure to talk to you.
Thank you.
We listen to you every day.
Appreciate that.
Uh wanted to give you some information about the uh town hall meeting that was held in Austin last Saturday.
Oh, yeah, but Lloyd Doggett, claiming that you guys are an unruly mob and you're sent there by the insurance companies.
Yes, sir.
Well, first of all, my husband and I are senior citizens, and uh, we did attend the meeting as individuals, and we believe that the majority of the people there were as were there as individuals.
We saw all ages, young to seniors.
First of all, it was a terrible location.
They had it in a parking lot in front of a grocery store.
Uh, he was not on a platform, there were no microphones for him to use, or for people who were trying to ask questions.
We feel that this was a grassroots despite what the information that he's now putting out on our local TV.
He said he's never seen anything like this in the fifteen years that he's been in Congress.
Well, this should certainly be a clue to him as to how people are feeling about this health care bill.
We were there to express our dis dissatisfaction with the Obama health care plan and to state that do we do not want the government to run our health care.
Many became angry during the meeting, and it's understandable because uh actually Doggett was unable to answer specific questions about the bill, and it was obvious that the attendees were better informed than he expected them to be about the provisions of the bill.
Better informed than he was.
Better informed than he was, yes, sir.
Well, this is being replicated all over the country.
Uh and there's a the political even has a story today on this.
And in the story, here's what the nut graph, not a nut paragraph is this.
Angry protesters shouted down Democrats at public events from Texas to Pennsylvania over the weekend, leaving the party only one real hope for getting its message out over recess, and that is a backlash.
They are hoping for a public backlash against the protests.
And that isn't in the cart.
They're counting well, nope, they may try to make it happen.
They are hoping some they're hoping for some incident or nutcase that goes berserk, goes wacko, that creates a backlash at these town hall meetings.
They are losing.
They are losing.
They don't have a game changer.
Even the Democrats in safe districts, like Marcy Captor of Toledo, they're afraid to hold town hall meetings.
They do not have a game changer.
There's nothing in the legislation that'll change the game.
There's nothing the president can say that'll change the game.
What they are hoping for is somebody goes wacko at one of these town hall meetings, so they can then point to all of them and say, see, it's an unruly mob.
These people are uh insane, blah, blah, blah.
They're hoping for violence.
They're hoping for something like that.
That's their only hope.
They don't have a game changer.
I gotta take a break.
Don't go away.
It is as I said earlier, uh, ladies and gentlemen, the libs, the Democrats from the White House all the way down to Congress and state capitals, are now dripping with contempt for the public.
A public that's becoming increasingly active about their own futures.
The public who are attending these town hall meetings.
And these Democrats, dripping with contempt do so at their own political peril.
They and their media cronies have no clue what the public is feeling.
They can smear them, they can degrade them, but they still have the power to throw these political hacks out of office, and many of them are going to lose their power as a result.
Let's listen to Dick Turbin.
Yesterday in Washington, unidentified reporter for a website, asked Dick Turban a question.
And during the during the well, during the series of questions, and during the interview, Turbin said this about town hall protests against health care reform.
I hope my colleagues won't uh fall for a sucker punch like this.
These health insurance companies and people like them are trying to load these town meetings for visual impact on television.
They want to show thousands of people screaming socialism and try to overcome public sentiment, which now favors health care reform.
That's almost like you know, flooding the switchboards on Capitol Hill.
It doesn't prove much other than the switchboards have limited capacity.
So we need to have a much more balanced approach that really allows members of Congress to hear both sides of the story rather than to be uh sucker punched or sidetracked by these types of tactics.
There's another compassionate, responsive, I hear you kind of Democrat.
You people are nothing but a bunch of phony baloney plastic banana good time rock and roller sucker punchers.
You know, you you you dims, you liberals out there, you don't get to tell us what we can do and what we can't do.
You don't get to tell us what we can say and what we cannot say.
You have set the standard.
You elect people to high public office who are often disgusting, who have pathetic backgrounds, and so forth.
You embrace artists who are on the public dole defacing images of Jesus in jars of urine.
You fund street protests and organizers, and we're supposed to play by different rules.
We're supposed to have it look at if you if some friends of Obama want to show up at these things, it's their business.
Nobody's keeping them out.
If some supporters of Obama health care want to show up, these are Democrat town hall meetings for crying out loud.
They're Democrat town hall meetings.
Here's more from Turbin.
A question uh was well, you showed up in MSNBC uh later on, and he was got this question.
There are reports out there that there was a memo sent out actually encouraging people opposed to some of the policies being explored by the administration to carry on this way, to yell at the Democrat lawmakers.
What's your take on that?
And what'll happen over the next few weeks?
The polling shows people a little hesitant from what we're hearing there.
There are health insurance companies that are making more money out of the current system than most companies in America.
They don't want to see it change.
They are very profitable and they don't want to see this reform.
So they are helping to organize these rallies.
They're being supported by a lot of people who are coming out and screaming and trying to shout down any discussion.
But if we're going to get to meaningful health care reform, we have to get beyond the shouting, sit down, read the bill carefully, and do the best we can to get it passed in September.
Health insurance companies are making more money.
They're behind all of this.
We happen to have from Doylestown, Pennsylvania, a guy named Robert.
Robert's the guy who asked Arlen Spector the question that got the most attention at the meeting with uh Kathleen Sibelius.
Robert, great to have you on the program.
Well, thanks, Ross.
What can you tell us about the whole day?
Uh it was an incredible day.
I mean, we showed up, it was a terrible rainy day.
It was hard for individuals to get even get to the protest error, but the town hall meeting.
And um it was through groups like the Thomas Jefferson Club and Kitchen Table Patriots that have set up around Philadelphia that were neighbors who have banded together, and now these groups are seeking searching the other groups out in order to spread information.
I never would have even have known of the town hall meeting if it wasn't for the fact that you know these groups exist and they're trying to get the information out.
So these are grassroots people.
Yeah, it's grassroots people.
I mean, I know the people who have founded these these groups.
And I mean, they're these aren't political operatives.
These are neighbors who are really concerned.
They're not community organizers.
They're not agitators, and they're not being paid by a branch or a grant from the U.S. government, right?
Oh, absolutely not.
I mean, a lot of these things are being funded by the members themselves.
I mean, you know, it's the groups the way that they're getting set up is neighbors are getting together and finding out that they share common interests.
And then once they get together and get a group together, then the groups are trying to seek one another out in order to consolidate their efforts, and and you know, so they don't have to put out a pocket in order to be able to do everything that they need to do in order to get their message out.
So you're oriented around issues, not agitation.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
What was the question you asked Spector?
Well, the question that I asked Spectre was, you know, how can we trust health care re-engineering to a group of people who don't have the the capability or uh at best in the best issue um view time to be able to read their own legislation.
And you know, that's what got him on the whole um uh stint about he has to break the legislation up among all of his staff members.
We played his answer quickly.
We we are no, we played his answer, and we break the pieces of legislation up because we've got to do this fast and booze and hisses erupted.
Well, it's great to meet you, Robert, even if it is on the phone.
I'm glad you called a spell out because Richard Wolfe over at NBC was maligning new people, saying that you had been set up and paid for by uh organized groups and bust in there and uh you really didn't care about it, you're just agitating.
Glad to know that wasn't true.
We knew it anyway.
You notice who the Democrats now hate?
It's the insurance companies.
They're making a profit.
Somehow they're making a profit.
Record profits.
If they're making record profits, Senator Durbin, why don't you study them?
And find out how more businesses and people can make profits.
It's not because they're ripping people off.
It's because they're providing something people need and want.
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