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Nov. 4, 2009 - Rush Limbaugh Program
37:22
November 4, 2009, Wednesday, Hour #2
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Time Text
I think I got an idea on how to get Obama to go to Germany.
It's really not complicated at all.
Angela Merkel should call him back and say, hey, President Obama, there's going to be an emergency meeting of the Olympic Organizing Committee to reconsider the choice of Brazil for the next Olympics.
You want to come back...
Greetings, my uh Obama's not a narcissist.
He's not a narcissist.
He watched a documentary about him while the election returns were coming in last night.
That's what Bob Gibbs tells us.
Welcome.
Rush Limbaugh, the EIB network, and the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
He's watching a documentary that folks, I would be embarrassed if somebody put together a documentary about me the way this has been put together about it.
I mean, it is godlike.
But I have a question.
He's the president.
This thing aired live last night, 9 o'clock HBO.
Now you mean to tell me that they didn't send him a screener copy or a preview.
You mean to tell me he had a wait to see this thing?
You mean I I I frankly, folks, can't believe that he hadn't seen it and didn't help in having the whole thing put together.
Because it's it's the most fawning.
If a documentary could get anal poisoning, this one could.
I mean, it just kiss butt, kiss butt, kiss butt all over the place.
And here he's watching it.
He's watching a one-year-old version of himself and events.
I mean, this is like Citizen Kane alone in a 45,000 square foot mansion sitting in front of the 500 square foot fireplace, drinking brandy as his empire's crumbling all around him and thinking he's having a good time.
I mean, it's this just weird.
It's just weird.
He doesn't have time to decide on Afghanistan.
Doesn't have time to go to Berlin, but he did have enough time to campaign for Democrats in various states who lost anyway.
And by the way, he did not go to New York, where the Democrat won.
The one place Obama didn't go is where the Democrat won.
Where did where Obama went?
It was.
Folks, Virginia, Virginia was a landslide.
It was not just the governor's race.
It was all the way down the ticket.
All the major candidates' numbers in Virginia were almost identical to each other.
Uh this was about the lack of coattails.
The lieutenant governor, few points lower since he was an incumbent, but basically McDonald, the lieutenant governor, the attorney general got the same percentage of a vote.
I uh there's no question of it was anti-Obama coattails working its way down the ticket.
Now, I was waiting for this.
Uh what's the day?
Uh Axelrod, uh, who has uh the spoken out.
CBS News.com.
As Barack Obama marks one year since his historic election, one of the architects of his campaign acknowledges the president has not forged the post-partisan atmosphere that he had hoped to achieve.
Senior advisor David Axelrod said the president is not a magician.
You don't, with a wave of a wand make everything different.
He said, while the president has extended a hand of cooperation, summoned the other party made a political decision that isn't in their interest.
There's um a lot of pressure from the right wing of the Republican Party.
It's made it more difficult for moderate Republicans to step forward and join us.
Wait a minute, though.
He was the Messiah.
He was the one we were all waiting for.
The hope, the change, postpartisan, post-racial.
Now it's even post-accomplishment because there isn't any of that either.
Uh so now it's it's it's my fault.
It's right wing Republicans.
And meanwhile, you know, I've talked to Mitch McConnell, I've talked to John Boehner.
They can't get a meeting with the president.
He's not talking to Republicans.
I guess that's my fault.
And remember when when Boehner did go up there with the uh congressional leadership back in uh February, Obama's, you know, you gotta stop listening to Rush Limbaugh.
That's not how things get done in this town.
Defense Secretary can't get a meeting.
That's true.
His defense secretary can't get a meeting.
McCrystall can't get a meeting.
He's watching documentary about himself.
He's not a narcissist.
Snerdley has a good question.
I I think I have an answer for it.
Barbara from Westchester County called in up just outraged about property taxes.
I got my property tax bill yesterday.
Did you guys get yours?
Now you don't have the uh percentage-wise?
Staff member is saying that they may be paying a higher percentage than do I. Yeah, you're in New Jersey.
Well, we'll compare, we'll compare percentage.
But anyway, in my case, I write the check for the property taxes.
The question certainly is, how come people get so upset about their property taxes but not their overall tax burden?
And I've always believed that people are not aware, as aware of income taxes that are withheld because they never see it anyway.
They might look at the gross on a pay stub or the automatic deposit slip, but they see the net.
Uh I don't know how many people property tax is part of the mortgage payment.
Uh but that you're still banked the payment.
You're still paying it.
You still write the check.
So you know how much it is.
And that plus, in it you add to it now the plummeting value of most people's homes and the rising property taxes.
And you realize we've been lied to all this time.
This is not about assessing the value of our homes.
That's not how they're just taxing what they think we'll pay.
What we'll put up with.
Because if it was really about accurate assessments, our taxes would be going down.
But they're not.
So there's a whole uh whole lot of reasons, Snertley, why this is uh irritating to people.
From the associated press, a dejected associated press, the headline dejection fills a main ballroom after marriage vote.
Uh Cecilia Burnett and Anne Swanson had already set their wedding dates when they joined about 1,000 other gay marriage supporters for an election night party in a holiday-in ballroom.
They hope to celebrate the vote that would make it possible.
Instead, they went home at midnight, dejected and near tears after a failed bid to make Maine the first state to approve same-sex marriage in the ballot box.
Now you know what are there, six or seven states where same-sex marriage is legal, but it's never been passed by a vote of the people's.
Uh by governors, legislatures, supreme courts, and in the various states.
But I mean, here you go.
If you read the whole story, you've got you've got chicken of the news, you have distortion of the issue, and a conservative trend all here in one story.
I'm not gonna read it all to you, but it's just it's it's um it's predictable.
Let's do some audio sound bites.
Uh we'll start here at the top.
What we're gonna do here, we're gonna give you um uh you know that's where Obama did not want the poll results.
I I wonder if anybody's even told him what the returns are.
Does Obama know how the election?
I mean, if he's gonna sit there and watch a one-year-old version of his life and his campaign, have they dared wake him up and say, by the way, we got our clocks cleaned in Virginia.
And we got our clocks clean in New.
Does he even know yet?
Does anybody have the guts to tell him?
Does he care?
Does he care?
Now, an excellent question posed by Ill Snerdbow.
He is such a narcissist, it is does he care?
In his I guarantee you in his mind it's not about him.
Yeah, nothing bad could ever be about him.
No.
So uh I'm sure they've told him.
And I'm I'm sure he's he's figured out who he's gonna blame for it, in addition to me and Palin.
Uh he'll he'll dump on uh on Corzine.
What did I heard last night?
I didn't hear somebody sent me.
I don't watch MSNBC, but somebody was.
And some, I don't know who it was, some Analyst on MSNBC last night talking about the narrowness of Michael Bloomberg's victory.
What did he spent?
200 million dollars or something?
What did he spend on his race?
Not maybe not 200.
Corzine spent 30 million, I think, of his own money.
35 $35,000 a second?
A second of what?
A minute of what?
For how for how long a period of time?
35,000.
So $35,000 a minute for six months?
Or two.
Oh, whatever.
It's a lot of money spent.
Corzine spent 30.
Corzine shellect.
Uh Bloomberg a narrow victor, and this wizard of smart on MSNBC said what we take away from this is that voters are really mad at rich guys.
Oh, it had nothing to do with party affiliation.
Had nothing to do with politics.
Voters, voters are just mad at rich guys at Wall Street types.
Oh, uh Corzine lost because he's a Wall Street guy.
People just found out he got all his money at Goldman Sachs.
I mean, that's you can't you can't make it up.
You just you you couldn't make it up if you if you wanted to.
Okay, just a couple sound bites.
Here is me making a prediction about Virginia yesterday.
Whatever the vote totals in Virginia, the state controlled media will report that the turnout was not as big as expected.
That the vote for the Republicans and against the Democrats was not as big as expected.
And besides, everybody knew that the Republicans would win.
It's no surprise.
The White House even knew it.
Why the White House threw this guy Creed Deeds under the bus a couple of weeks ago?
The White House knew he ran a lousy campaign.
CNN, Jeffrey Tubin.
The question is are Virginia voters, were they more excited by Barack Obama or Craig Deeds?
That's a pretty easy question and a pretty easy answer.
He was a lousy candidate.
He didn't have a message.
He distanced himself from the Democratic Party, and he lost big.
I don't draw a lot of conclusions from that.
You know these people ought to just listen to me and say something different from what I predict just to not make me right.
Because they hate it when I'm right.
Okay, here's Tavis Smiley.
He was on Larry King Alive last night.
Virginia is very close to D.C., but in terms of voting patterns, Virginia could not be any different than D.C. What Barack Obama did in Virginia last year was out of the ordinary, terribly extraordinary, and we celebrated that last year.
But tonight just says that we've returned to business as usual.
I don't think anybody in the country expected that this race was going to be any different, that is for governor in the state of Virginia.
Did I do I know these people or do I know these people?
Everybody knew he was going to lose.
It was not unexpected.
Lousy candidate.
Now, Rush prediction comes true in New Jersey.
First, what I said yesterday.
The damage control spin will be that the president was heroic in his efforts to save a hopeless candidate.
Corzine was surrounded by corruption.
He destroyed New Jersey's economy.
He was enormously unpopular.
But the president decided to make a courageous stand and to try to save him.
And despite Corzine losing, look how close the election became.
But for Obama and his team, New Jersey would have been a wipeout, not a nail bitter.
So uh New Jersey's actually an Obama win, even should Corzine lose.
Here is Howard Feynman on MSNBC's election coverage.
The White House thought accurately that Corzine was a very weak candidate, no people skills, didn't follow through on tax cuts, has the Goldman Sachs tie the Wall Street tie, all of what Chris Matthews was just talking about.
They did, however, suck it up and stick with him.
They did what they could.
It wasn't enough.
They were trying to nudge Corzine out.
knew he was a weak candidate.
Can't we do these two again?
Folks...
...
There are those days and moments where even I think I'm great.
Very often, but today is it's just it's one of those days where I join you and agree with you.
And this is this has been a kick butt show.
Play, play play four and five back to back.
This is uncanny.
The damage control spin will be that the president was heroic in his efforts to save a hopeless candidate.
Corzine was surrounded by corruption.
He destroyed New Jersey's economy.
He was enormously unpopular.
But the president decided to make a courageous stand and to try to save him.
And despite Corzine losing, look how close the election Became.
But for Obama and his team, New Jersey would have been a wipeout, not a nail bitter.
So uh New Jersey's actually an Obama win, even should Corzine lose.
The White House thought accurately that Corzine was a very weak candidate, no people skills, didn't follow through on tax cuts, has the Goldman Sachs tie the Wall Street tie, all of what Chris Matthews was just talking about.
They did, however, suck it up and stick with him.
They did what they could.
It wasn't enough.
They were trying to nudge Corzine out.
They knew he was a weak candidate.
You know these guys.
I th Howard Cavis smiling.
I thought Virginia was realignment.
After this big sweep a year ago, they were all talking about how Virginia was a realignment.
And by the way, lest we forget the Washington Post lost the election yesterday, too.
They backed every loser for statewide office.
They backed many of the losers for delegates in the state.
So the question is, what clout does the Washington Post really have anymore?
Because here's the media, and you'll hear it in a minute.
Limbaugh Palin, rebuffed, limbo palin, responsible for the loss of Doug Hoffman, New York 23.
Limbaugh Palin, Limbaugh Palin, how about the Washington Post?
The Washington Post tried to destroy McDonald the way they destroyed George Allen.
You still can't find the word macaca in a dictionary anywhere.
You can't ignore that the Washington Post did everything they could for Cree Deeds.
By the way, who were Tuben, pronounced the name Craig Deeds.
It's uh Cree Deeds.
Anyway, I gotta take a break here.
We'll be back.
Don't go away.
Sit tight.
My friends, do not ever doubt me.
I expressed incredulity moments ago when I heard that Obama did not watch election returns last night because he was watching himself.
An HBO documentary on his campaign and election.
And I said to him, I said, this doesn't make any sense.
He's president.
He'd have to wait for this thing to air live and get a screener copy of it.
I said, the hell with that.
He probably had a had a role in in approving the damn thing.
Talking points memo, Lib blog.
November 1st, 617 p.m.
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs says Obama has already seen by the people.
Produced and directed by Alicia Sams and Amy Rice and backed by actor Edward Norton.
Gibbs told the Talking Points Memo D.C. that Obama's review was thumbs up.
Now this is November 4th.
Last night was November 3rd.
Gibbs that Obama was watching himself last night, but we know that he's already seen the damn thing.
Oh, of course he wasn't watching return.
You don't care about that.
He watched a rerun about himself.
If that's what happened.
If he actually did, he watched a rerun to see if the uh version that aired live was the same one that they had sent him.
Uh and can you imagine probably watching the rerun?
Boy, boy, do I look good.
Do I look just imagine?
But do we buy any of this?
He was watching himself.
Why would Gibb uh even if if he was doing it, do you realize why why announce it's election night?
You're president of the United States.
You would put it all on the line.
The signs in New Jersey have your name above Corzines.
You flew in there.
And you don't care?
You're not interested.
You are watching yourself.
It gets even better here.
From the Politico, Nancy Pelosi, to reporters, during a Wendy uh Wednesday morning photo op today.
From our perspective, we won last night.
We had one race that we were engaged in.
It was in Northern New York.
It was a race a Republican has held since uh civil war.
We won that seat.
So from our standpoint, no.
Uh a candidate was victorious who supports health care reform.
His remark last night said that uh this is a victory for health care reform, other initiatives for the American people.
So from our standpoint, we picked up votes last night.
But yeah, Nancy, you might have lost all the blue dogs.
Well, I I guarantee you a lot of Democrats are here in footsteps today because of what happened in Virginia, particularly Virginia.
But no, but New Jersey as well.
These blue dogs.
I heard, I heard Carl Rove.
People are picking up on this now.
Carl Rove last night said Pelosi wouldn't mind the blue dogs Losing.
Folks, this is uh this is a salient, salient point.
Pelosi doesn't like the blue dogs being in the caucus because they're not radical enough for it or not really dependable.
She has to work too hard keeping them in line.
She would love to get their votes on health care and send them home and be trounced.
So she didn't have to deal with it.
Think of it as thinning the herd.
That's that's that's exactly what she would uh what she would love to do.
So from her standpoint, it was a big win last night.
But uh Andrew Malcolm at uh the uh blog at the Los Angeles Times, well aware of the approaching bad news wave.
Obama hold up on the White House Tuesday night where aides claimed he didn't pay attention to the returns, right?
And the Cubs still have a chance of pulling out a World Series win this week.
The president of the United States did five events for Corzine, talking of him as a partner in the Senate and in the White House, and both Obama and the candidates praised his economic stimulus package and his health care reforms.
I'm telling you all this because I'm gonna go back to the audio sound bites, and I want you to listen to the Democrats make my prediction come through and throw Corzine overboard and then back up and run over him.
They're not content to throw him overboard, they back up and run over him and then speed off.
And it's it's it's uh it's gonna be Bob Beckle and Joe Trippie.
Oh ho ho, wait till you hear this, folks.
Don't go away.
And we are back.
El Rushbow having more fun than a human being should be allowed to have.
All right, we're gonna go to my prediction coming true about media spin in New Jersey.
We'll follow it back to back by Joe Trippie on a Fox News channel last night and uh Bob Beckle on the Fox News channel last night.
Uh here goes.
The damage control spin will be that the president was heroic in his efforts to save a hopeless candidate.
Corzine was surrounded by corruption.
He destroyed New Jersey's economy.
He was enormously unpopular.
But the president decided to make a courageous stand and to try to save him.
And despite Corzine losing, look how close the election became.
But for Obama and his team, New Jersey would have been a wipeout, not a nail biter.
So uh New Jersey's actually an Obama win, even should Corzine lose.
I don't think so.
I think Corzine's with the the approval ratings he had, most consultants or pundits would say those numbers are terminal.
If Christy's been a stronger candidate, he should have really really done some damage here.
He's barely going to win this thing.
I mean, it would be a hundred thousand votes, maybe he's held that margin throughout the night.
And we'll see how that holds up.
But I really think that this is about throwing out the ins with the outs.
Are you kidding me?
The second coming wouldn't have saved Corzine.
It's the reason that I predicted Christie was going to win yesterday.
Yes, could you say it's a good night for the Republicans?
Yes, but it's not going to change things.
Obama's 51% favorable.
Obama doesn't have much to worry about.
The second coming.
That means Jesus Christ.
Not even Jesus Christ could have saved Corzine.
Yeah, he's saying Corzine, right.
I mean, they're really dissing the guy now.
They're throwing it.
But but not even Jesus Christ could save Corzine.
Beckle, do you know how nuts you are?
How in the world do you compare one visit from Jesus Christ with five visits from Obama?
He had five visits from the Messiah.
From the one.
And you're bringing Jesus Christ into this?
Jesus Christ doesn't stand a chance.
With one visit, Obama had five in there, Beckle.
Folks, I've I'm having more fun today than I've had in this stuff in a long time.
Get this.
Wall Street Journal.
Desperation grabs for revenue.
Nothing new in politics, but California once again leading the way in creative financing to help close.
To help close yet another gaping budget deficit, now estimated to be seven billion dollars this year, reach as high as twenty billion next year.
Sacramento lawmakers have authorized a 10% increase in the amount of taxes withheld from worker paychecks starting November 1 and through 2010.
The extra withholding tax will reduce California's take-home pay by about 1.7 billion for the year.
But the lawmakers say it's not a tax increase.
They're calling it a compulsory interest-free loan from taxpayers.
A 10% increase in withholding.
It's an income tax increase, and they're calling it a loan.
Sacramento demanding loans from taxpayers.
I just uh they're gonna they're gonna destroy the state.
They're gonna take 1.7 billion dollars out of an economy that's already in trouble.
Here's uh Denise in Austin, Texas, as we go back to the phones.
Thanks for waiting, Denise.
Nice to have you with us.
Oh, thanks, Fosh.
It's an honor and just a thrill to talk to you.
Thank you.
I first I just want to say I love your comments on the Berlin Wall.
If they weren't so true, it'd be funny.
But what I wanted to say, this the race in New York was so reminiscent of letting the liberal press pick our candidate for president last year.
Yeah, I know.
It's it's pretty much like that.
Letting the liberal media and the Democrats pick our candidate.
Yeah, I mean if we had any other candidate, any any governor or that mayor, I think we go to one.
It's just a frustrating.
But see, that is the the dirty little secret of New York 23 is is how the smart thinkers in the Republican Party totally blew this.
They picked the wrong candidate that stood by the wrong candidate, sent the wrong candidate 900 grand, the wrong candidate gets starts gets to shellacted and pulls out, they praise her, oh, we love Didi, and she endorses the Democrat.
Had there been a primary up there, and that's a special election, but had there been a primary up there, uh n none of this none of this would have happened.
And don't forget now, Hoffman got a larger percentage of the vote up there than any conservative on the in New York than uh any conservative or any pr any candidate has in the conservative line.
And I'm not talking about total numbers of votes, I'm talking about percentage.
He got even a higher percentage than James Buckley got when he won a Senate seat uh running on the uh conservative line.
Richard in uh Mary, Pennsylvania.
Hi.
Yes, sir.
A pleasure.
Thank you.
Um what I'm worried about is the split.
Sorry, Virginia uh McDonald won by I think twenty percent, they said eighteen percent, but who's counting?
All right, yeah.
Uh but the other races were like three to five percent.
What I'm worried about is this this so close split.
How are the conservatives, not the Republican not the city of the Captain City?
Well, wait, wait.
What what what wait what race is you talking about three to five percent?
Uh well, of course I in New Jersey.
That was five percent.
That's five percent in That's what I'm saying.
And then Hoffman, he what what he lose by uh six or seven.
He lost he lost by five, but that's because five percent went to a candidate that wasn't even a winter.
I understand, but I'm saying is uh we're on this divide.
We're we're we're so split, sir.
How do we how do we turn it in?
Who is this who is this we?
Who are you talking about when we say we're I'm talking about conservatives, not Republicans, conservatives.
How do we turn it, you know, to we're so close.
How do we turn it to our you're the one that can answer this, sir?
You want to know how we can get bigger majorities?
That's right.
I want to know how we can get an instead of three, five percent, how do we get ten, twenty percent besides uh Virginia, McDonald won't be a little bit more than a little bit.
Wait a second.
I uh trying to be patient here.
Let's look at both of these states.
You you you're you're don't tell me you're unhappy with 18% in Virginia.
No, no, I'm not happy I'm not unhappy with Virginia, but I'm saying with uh Hoffman.
Now let's go to New Jersey then.
New Jersey is so blue, it's almost black.
It's a Navy blue state.
I mean, it is deep Democrat for a Republican to win by one vote in that state, is says something.
The last Republican that did was Christie Whitman, I believe.
Uh and maybe there's something of the name Christie that people vote for in uh in New Jersey.
Maybe every Republican is high in the name Christie somewhere in there.
First or last name.
But this this was this the corruption in this state is such that the most popular jewelry item among elected Democrats this year has been a set of handcuffs.
And even at that, Democrats usually still win.
To have a 5% win in New Jersey is nothing to sneeze at.
We're just starting.
We just had a uh a the the big big Obama victories in these states a year ago, and they were talking about realignment.
This is this is a I think there's two things going on here.
Richard, one thing, Obama's been stopped.
There is no question this is an anti-Obama vote.
And largely when you see the exit poll say that it's the economy, there can be no other no other person that's associated with the economy than Obama.
They're not voting against Bush because he's not around.
The whole business of expanding majorities has to be Republican Party's got to finally decide is it gonna be conservative or is it gonna go moderate like David Brooks type?
And if it goes that way, it's gonna lose, and we're likely to be talking about majorities, winning majorities.
The uh the the conservative movement here is on an ascendancy, uh, and it's it's got a fresh opportunity here, and this was a great start yesterday to have these two margins of victory, and 18% is huge in Virginia, and it was all the way down the ticket, Bob, all the way down the ballot for the statewide offices.
So there's a lot to build on here.
And both these candidates, Bob, you know, I've had people say the email, well, you know, Russia, I'm listening to the media uh talking about uh uh McDonnell and uh Virginia saying this is a candidate uh Republicans need to nominate uh moderate uh candidate, uh moderate now somewhat conservative, yeah, but you're not not a not a right winger.
You you need to a Republican need a this kind of candidate you need.
What people don't want to admit here is that both uh Christie and McDonnell in the last weeks of the campaign went pedal to the metal conservative, particularly McDonald, when he saw the margin that he had.
Uh had had Hoffman been in this race from the get-go as a conservative with no turncoat, no liberal Republican on the ticket in New York 23, still on the ballot in two places, Bob.
She gets five percent of the vote yesterday.
That's just a mismanaged uh uh campaign election from the get-go by by the the smart thinkers in the uh in the Republican Party.
And that's every reason to feel optimistic about this.
We'll be back just a second.
By the way, folks, one more thing about New York 23.
When this all started, look at where Doug Hoffman was.
He was down there in last place.
Nobody had ever heard of him.
He's at 20%.
And despite all the incompetence and despite the party being against it, remember the Republican Party ran ads against Hoffman.
Remember this, and he still climbed with 45% of the vote, he still ended up there.
Now, I'm telling the percentage of the vote that Hoffman got has put the fear of 2010 in the in the mind of every blue dog and in a lot of rhinos.
This guy almost pulled it out with his own party running ads against him and in and uh endorsing a liberal Republican and then praising her when she leaves and then she endorses the Democrat.
And all this is done in 30 days.
You need to keep all this stuff in perspective about New York 23, and again, not buy into the media template on this at all.
Um, I want you to listen to Dingy Harry in Washington yesterday in Capitol Hill, had a press conference.
Reporters said, You think you can pass health care reform this year?
First of all, we're not going to be bound by any timelines.
We need to do the best job we can for the American people.
We want quality legislation, and we're gonna do that.
We're gonna do this legislation as expeditiously as we can, or we're gonna do it as fairly as we can also.
Uh now, wait, wait a second.
Wait a second.
What was this big press conference about last week announcing this thing?
Done, sent over to the CBO to have it scored?
Pelosi gonna have a vote Friday.
And now he can't commit to it being done this year.
And then there's an ABC story by Jonathan Carl.
Senior congressional Democrats say reform before the end of the year is highly unlikely.
Senior Congressional Democrats told ABC News yesterday, it's highly unlikely that a health care reform bill will be completed this year, just a week after President Obama declared he was absolutely confident he'll be able to sign one by then.
Getting this done by the end of the year, that's a no-go, a senior Democrat leadership aide told ABC News, and two other key congressional Democrats also told ABC News the same thing.
Now this may come as an unwelcome surprise for the White House, where officials from the President on Done have repeatedly said health care bill will be signed into law by the end of the year.
Pelosi, October 27th, at a fundraiser for the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee.
I am absolutely confident we're going to get health care done by the end of this year.
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
But after Reed made his comments, other spokesmen out there saying, we're not going to be finished this year.
The delay is causing some frustration among Reed's fellow Democrats.
But Reed said of his colleagues they want us to do this the right way, not the fast way.
Well, now something doesn't jive here, folks, because last I heard about this, there was gonna be this giant vote Friday in the House.
Harry Reed was getting his bill back next week from the CBO, and that it was a pretty done deal.
And you know, I'm I'm wondering if all of this is not just a giant big bluff that's been called.
To try to make people think something was a fate accompli next week when it's not.
Now, all this talk about not getting it done before the end of the year, I wonder if what the purpose of that is is sort of tame the crowd that's going to show up tomorrow in Washington.
I wonder if they're putting this folks don't I don't believe anything you hear coming out of this.
There's just there we're dealing with Democrats, we're dealing with people that do not care what you think, but they don't want to stare you in the face when they hear you tell them that you don't want what they're doing.
But to all of a sudden have this news out that they're not gonna get this done by the end of the year.
Obama has said, by the way, if it doesn't get done by the end of the year, it doesn't get done.
And that's how that's that's how precious the timeline on this is now.
Dingy Harry not committing to it.
And here's something else.
Dingy Harry sent his bill, his health care bill, over to the CBO to have it scored.
Everybody's been commenting about the contents of the bill and the cost, so the Republicans haven't seen it.
So the Republicans sent him a letter.
Could you please release the text of the bill to us?
And Dingy Harry wrote back and said uh bill does not exist.
It hasn't been written yet.
Apart from my decision to include a public option from which states may opt out, no final decisions have been made, and none can be made till we get more information about how CBO would score different combinations.
So uh no final this is all in quotes from Harry Reed's response letter.
No final decisions have been made.
There is no bill to release publicly.
It does not exist.
Harry, there is no bill in the Senate.
Just the Baucus bill was not a bill.
It was a draft.
And it had phony numbers in it.
It got scored by the CBO a certain way, didn't have the public option.
That's how Olympia Snow was brought on board.
Dingy Harry getting heat from the left saw going to have a public option with a state opt-out.
I mean, I I think we're being hosed.
I don't think they're anywhere near where they want to be on this, but they want us to think it's imminent.
Regardless.
Um the this this rally in Washington tomorrow, you know, Levin's gonna be there and John Voigt and people from all over the country are showing up at this thing.
And I I uh I just wonder if this, all this news here isn't designed to uh make people relax and think they don't have to go.
Don't fall for it, folks.
Uh Something about this.
I'm really not comfortable saying they're bluffing, because when you say they're bluffing, you allow yourself to be convinced that they're not close.
But I know how desperate they are to get this.
And I know that they will do whatever they can to get this.
I also know that the no votes on this will be influenced by people in person in Washington saying, you know, shake your your finger and say, no, you don't.
We don't want this.
Now Dinji Harry won't commit to it.
The end of the year.
White House is upset.
Concerned.
What is going on?
Anyone got any ideas?
Maureen Dowd.
I don't yeah, I she has a column about me today in the New York Times.
I don't know, either Michael Douglas broke up with her again, or they raised taxes on bourbon.
That's the only thing I can explain to me why she's so snarky to me today.
Nevertheless, look, folks, we've got uh fastest three hours of media going on.
Two of them are in a can, and uh only one more to go.
We'll take a brief a brief break here at the top of the hour.
Lots more still to do, plus your phone calls coming right back right after this.
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