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Dec. 16, 2009 - Rush Limbaugh Program
37:33
December 16, 2009, Wednesday, Hour #2
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Time Text
Yeah, this is hilarious.
You're gonna love this, folks.
Welcome back, Rush Limbaugh, the EIB network and the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
MSNBC is fit to be tied right now.
Andrea Mitchell, NBC News, Washington, is interviewing the chairman of the Republican National Committee, Michael Steele.
And she's mad.
And the graphic on the screen says GOP shuts down debate on Senate health care bill.
GOP delays debate.
It's the Republicans' fault.
Here's what it's about.
Senator Tom Coburn has demanded a reading of an amendment, a 787 or 767-page amendment to the health care bill was written by Bernie Sanders.
Bernie Sanders, the uh loan admitted socialist in the U.S. Senate from Vermont, and his amendment would make health care single payer.
Right off the bat.
It's a single-payer amendment for health care.
And Coburn said, I admire Senator Sanders for his willingness to fight for publicly what many advocate only privately.
A single-payer system funded and controlled by bureaucrats and politicians in Washington.
Every American should listen to the reading of this amendment, pay careful attention to its vote tally.
The clerk in the Senate is reading Bernie Sanders' 767-page amendment right now.
So that's the delay.
And they're all ticked off about it.
GOP uses Senate procedure to slow down health bill.
And Ryan Mitchell.
Oh, they are fit to be tied.
They're brother.
Steele, what are you guys doing?
How can you stand in the way of our young new president here and his effort to reform health care for every American?
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
It's just great.
Welcome back, folks.
Rush Limbaugh, the EIB Network, Limbaugh Institute, Advanced Conservative Studies.
Telephone number 800-282-2882 if you want to be on the program.
Email address L Rushbaugh at EIM.com in news from Copenhagen.
State, New York State, Environmental Conservation Commissioner Peter Granis.
Swiped back at former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin and other deniers of man-made climate change during remarks at this week's International Climate Conference in Copenhagen.
Gannis told his audience on Monday last week, Sarah Palin put a new posting on her Facebook page challenging the severity of climate change and telling Obama to boycott Copenhagen.
All she has to do is type a couple sentences on Facebook, and the worldwide left goes baddie.
They're even ripping her from Copenhagen.
Now back to the health care bill.
Nobody is talking much about what's going on in the Senate, how it ref uh affect people in the House.
Let's say that this bill in the Senate does pass with no public option, with no Medicare expansion, and uh uh no importation, reimportation of drugs at cheaper prices.
You go over to the Senate, and I know Pelosi has said she'll sign anything, but there still has to be a conference, and the and the and the the people in the House, they don't want any part of anything that has no public option in it.
They want full-fledged public option.
They want single payer El Quicko.
We have a uh we have a quote from Anthony Wiener, and we mentioned this yesterday in New York Times.
The problem that a lot of us face is that we we feel like all the compromises have been going in one direction.
And he cited three examples.
The tougher anti-abortion language added to the House bill, the Senate's proposed tax on high-priced insurance policies, which the White House has endorsed, and the most recent decision to eliminate the public option.
Wiener noted that the dozens of House Democrats had signed letters taking the opposing position on those provisions, and that the House bill approved by its bill by a narrow vote of 220 to 215.
You don't have 30 votes to deal with here, Wiener said.
So there are a lot of people who have staked out pretty hard positions that they're gonna have to go back on.
Now I've been careful not to draw lines in the sand.
I think this is gonna be very difficult collection of compromises to get people to swallow.
And that is the big deal.
Everybody's focusing on the Senate right now because if if they can get something out of the Senate before Christmas, then both houses will have signed something, and then the PR machine can get into gear.
Obama got a bill.
Obama did it.
Obama pulled it off.
The Democrats pulled it off.
Real meaningful health care reform.
Blah, blah, blah, blah.
But then they have to take this Turkey over to the House where there are many more leftist radicals than there are in the Senate who are not going to sit still just to give Obama a victory.
See, these people look at this as personal to them.
These are hardcore leftist radicals.
They want a bigger government.
They want freedom taken away from people of private sector.
They want corporations punished.
They want the government in charge of every aspect of people's lives.
Health care is how you get there.
But if there's no public option, and if there's no expansion of Medicare, and if uh whatever they do with Ben Nelson on abortion, you throw in the reimportation of drugs, can you imagine that conference committee?
So, I mean, it's it's all it's not a bed of roses out there for these people.
And I was I was thinking here, uh, ladies and gentlemen at the uh at the top of the hour, and then this goes goes back to my admonition to everybody, to simply try to understand liberalism, and you'll be you'll find yourself so much more easily able to understand what they're doing.
Liberalism is something that cannot exist in the sunlight.
It cannot exist.
It's like Dracula.
It's got to hang around in a coffin all day, comes out only at night when nobody can see what's going on.
Imagine this.
What is it been said?
Well, what's been said that our health care system really needs?
The two things, right?
That's right, Mr. Lumbaugh, we must enthore the unenthorned.
If if if if if the immoral so many Americans have no third, and we go do it real fast.
And the second thing is we've got to contain costs.
Okay.
Those are the two beefs that people have insurance and cost.
And then cost is part of access.
Had the powers that be here, had Obama and the boys come up with an honest plan.
Where would they be today if they had come up with a plan that simply said, okay, here's how we're going to insure the uninsured.
It's a priority, and here's how we're going to roll back prices in the private sector.
I get to ask myself, has there ever been a time where the federal government interceded in the private sector and succeeded in lowering prices?
Senator McCain and the boys, the Commerce Committee have always convened uh meetings to target the cost of cable television.
They've bad-mouthed the cable TV operators.
They're just a bunch of greedy SOBs.
So they have new legislation to reduce cable costs, and they never get reduced.
Cable costs never become smaller.
They always expand, they always get larger.
The one thing the federal government can do to lower prices in health care or anything else is get the hell out of the private sector.
The reason prices are so high in health care is because the federal government is involved.
It's not a free market anymore, and it hasn't been in a long time.
But if they had tried an honest proposal, they'd probably have gotten it by now.
Because people do want those two things.
They want people insured and they want access and they want lower prices.
Prices are out of control.
And they come up, but they can't be honest is the point.
They can't be.
They have to use this issue as a means of achieving something else, which is the expansion of government, but total control over people's lives.
And again, it's an illustration of just how dishonest liberals are.
This is not about lowering the cost of anything, despite what they say.
It is not about providing additional access to greater care.
You read the bill, there's no way any of that can happen.
No way prices are going to come down, no way the deficit's going to be reduced, no way care will be expanded or made better.
And yet they have to go out and lie about that while pushing something that's nowhere near what they're talking about wanting to achieve.
They can't.
They cannot be honest.
It would kill them politically.
It would be the end of them if they were.
Look at how the uh the global warming hoax has illustrated who they really are.
And there's no difference in the way they're trying to go about the uh uh establishing whatever it is they want on uh government controlled uh uh lifestyles on climate change and health care.
It's the same thing.
Liberalism is what it is, leftism is what it is, Marxism, communism, all those that fascism, it is what it is.
And no nice set of words is gonna change it.
No PR spin's gonna change who those people are and what that is.
It's very similar.
Here's Howard Dean.
Last night, I take it back.
I get back.
That's this morning.
Well, he's out there everywhere.
Dean was on Vermont Public Radio.
He's on MSNBC last night, he's on ABC's Good Morning America Today.
See, I happen to think that what's going on here is a little payback.
You may have forgotten, but of course, it is my job never to forget.
And after Obama won election, one of the first things he did was to get Howard Dean and everybody as part of Howard Dean's staff out of the DNC.
He didn't want Dean anywhere nearby.
And these these two guys are not friends, and Dean particularly has a huge animus for Rahm Emanuel.
So here's Dean all of a sudden when the public options go tossed out, and the Medicare expansion is tossed out.
Here comes Howard Dean all over the media, sounding like the Republicans ought to be sounding, saying the things Republicans ought to be saying to kill this bill.
And in this this next comment, this bite is designed to enrage the left-wing kook fringe base at Obama.
It's a question from Stephanopoulos.
You call this the collapse of health care reform.
The president's poll numbers at New Lowe's.
A lot of leading Democrats believe if this bill goes down, it'll cripple the Obama presidency.
Are you prepared to do that?
We've gotten to the stage, George, and you know this better than than most in Washington where passing any bill is a victory, and that's the problem.
Decisions are being made about the long-term future of this country for short-term political reasons, and that's never a good sign.
There are some good things in this bill.
The problem is we're now committed to a solution using the private insurance companies, and you will be forced to buy insurance.
If you don't, you'll pay a fine.
And 27% of the money that you put in will not go to your health care.
It'll go to CEOs and make 20 million dollars a year.
This is a bigger bailout for the insurance industry than AIG.
And not one person, excuse me, a very small number of people are going to get any insurance at all until 2014, if the bill works.
This is the kind of stuff, throw the AIG stuff out.
This is the kind of stuff the Republicans ought to be saying.
Yeah, I'll hear it, play it one more time, but I want to analyze it first.
We've gotten to this stage, George.
You know, this better than most in Washington, passing any bill is a victory, and that's the problem.
That is a stab, not in the back, but in the front of President Obama.
That is itu brute.
That is right in the heart and twisting it.
He is saying, Obama, you're irresponsible.
You just want something because you want to be able to say you got it done.
Oh, that's typical Washington.
Obama ran as untypical Washington.
Howard Dean has just called him your average run-of-the-mill political hack who doesn't care about anything other than his own narcissistic self and getting a monument for what he's supposedly accomplished.
That's how you read the first sentence.
Decisions are being made about the long-term future of the country for short-term political reasons.
What that means is Barack Obama wants something out of the Senate so that he can go to the State of the Union speech in January and huff and puff, put his chest out, say, look what I did.
No presidents since FDR has been able to do this, but I did it.
And Dean is calling him on it here.
He says that's never a good sign.
He said there's some good things in the bill.
The problem is we're committed to a solution using the private insurance companies now, and you'll be forced to buy insurance.
If you don't, you pay a fine.
Twenty-seven percent of the money you put in will not go to your health care.
Republic, this is exactly right.
He is exactly right.
That's it, and what what bugs him about this?
He wouldn't care if everybody was forced to buy insurance from a government insurance company.
He would love that.
But now that the public options gone, and what is the public option gone mean?
It means all of this talk that we have to come up with a government option to provide competition against those evil private insurance companies because they're ripping people off and they're causing people to die.
So now the competition, The whole nuts and bolts of of so many Obama speeches selling the public option, competition against the evil insurance companies.
What's it become?
Howard Dean's telling his charges this bill is so bad, you're still going to be forced to buy insurance, but you're going to be lining the pockets of greedy insurance company CEOs who make 20 million folks.
This soundbite, I'll guarantee you, Rahm Emanuel is up there throwing knives at his television while he watches this.
He's got a knife.
He may off may even chop off another finger.
It may this may disorient him so he won't put back that ballerina costume on that he uh he has in the closet from his days as a young child.
I mean, this.
And then to say to tap it off, top it off by saying this is a bigger bailout than what AIG got.
Bigger bailout for the insurance companies than what AIG got.
This is a call to arms to every fringe kook lunatic wacko lurking on the left wing fringe websites out there to stop this and see to it that doesn't pass.
Now here it is again in Howard Dean's own words.
We've gotten to the stage, George, and you know this better than than most in Washington where passing any bill is a victory, and that's the problem.
Decisions are being made about the long-term future of this country for short-term political reasons, and that's never a good sign.
There are some good things in this bill.
The problem is we are now committed to a solution uh using the private insurance companies, and you will be forced to buy insurance.
If you don't, you'll pay a fine.
And 27% of the money that you put in will not go to your health care.
It'll go to CEOs, make 20 million dollars a year.
This is a bigger bailout for the insurance industry than AIG.
And not one person, excuse me, a very small number of people are gonna get any insurance at all until 2014 if the bill works.
And what he's saying there is look, folks, you're gonna be paying higher taxes and fines and so forth, but you're not gonna get any health care benefits until 2014 because they don't start until then.
And that's to protect Obama's reelection.
We'll be back.
Stay with us.
All right, here's an update.
Senator Jim Dement has joined Tom Colburn's effort to read the entire 767-page Bernie Sanders amendment to the health bill.
And furthermore, Dement has uh vowed to have the entire health care bill read on the floor whenever it comes out.
Do you realize the whole bill is not been put together yet?
They're still waiting on CBO scoring and all these changes in there for Lieberman and uh and uh Ben Nelson.
Now, this helps Jim Dement joining uh they have to keep somebody on the floor while the clerk is reading it, otherwise the Democrats can shut it down.
So there need to be some other senators in there to make sure that uh along with Dement and Coburn, uh that uh that this thing gets read in its entirety, and that they're thinking and doing the same thing, vowing to do the same thing when the entire bill comes out, and because delay is a key element here in screwing up the strategy.
Strategy on the Democrat side is to have the final vote on Christmas Day or the day after.
And that's that's cutting it real close.
You're required to have thirty hours of debate before every cloture vote.
And if they can delay this by a 30-hour cycle or something, it might take 34 hours to read the whole page, the whole bill, it's two thousand pages.
Uh, so they could really gum up the works of Obama being able to say the Senate passed his bill prior to Christmas.
To the phones we go to Jim in Orlando.
Great to have you on the program, sir.
Hello.
Hey Rush, how are you doing?
Ditto's and uh great show on Shatner uh last week.
Thank you, sir, very much.
Listen, uh this I know this is anecdotal, but um I I got a little story about prescriptions that just underscores the crap that's going on in DC.
I suffer from both gout and psoriasis.
I'm over sixty.
Uh I need medications for this.
Uh the last time I got my psoriasis medication was four years ago.
I got a prescription last week because I have a flare up, and I went to fill it yesterday, and four years ago cost me $90 for a little two-ounce tube of SAB.
That prescription today was a hundred and eighty-five dollars, and I had to pass it up because I couldn't afford it.
I don't have medical insurance, and I've been unemployed for 18 months now, so I had to pass that up.
My God prescription, which I can't pass up, cost me five dollars uphill, and there are no substitutes for either one of these, no generics.
So I don't have a choice in the matter, and uh that's three hundred dollars a month for like out medication.
And um it just galls the heck out of me, pardon my French.
Uh that these characters in DC don't know what the meaning of the concept of for the good of the group is.
They give a lot of lip service to it, but they are so far up the rear ends of vested interests and moneymakers and lobbyists that they haven't got a clue what they were hired to do in the first place.
People like you and me and every other citizen in this country put them in a position to where they're supposed to make decisions and vote on policies that are in the best interest of the group.
Meaning, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
You are missing something crucial.
They do know the meaning of the concept for the good of the group.
The group happens to be them.
Well, that's not the group that they were voted to serve.
And well, you don't need to look it, you don't need to go to the uh concept that the uh insurance companies are in bed with the Democrats to get mad at this bill.
You get any other aspect of this bill, and you would have to conclude the last people, the last group that Democrats are trying to please or satisfy or even do something good for is their own voters.
And why don't those people wake up and smell the roses or the coffee or whatever?
Because don't doubt me, those people hate conservatives and Republicans more than they will ever get mad at Democrats.
The Democrats play on that constantly.
And a little manheim steamroller in our uh in our rotation bump.
Great to have you here.
Here's a little observation I have for you.
The uh uh Republicans now, Tom Coburn and Jim Dement are reading the Bernie Sandman Sanders amendment, all 767 pages of it.
Well, they're having it read by the Senate clerk, which delays debate on the health care bill, which is a good thing.
And this is the first time the Republicans have done something that obstructs any of this, which is something we've been urging them to do, hoping they would do it.
Now, the Bernie Sanders amendment, if you look at it, it's it's it's upfront and honest about what they want.
Single payer government's gonna pay for everybody's health insurance.
And my my guess is that the people who support the Obama plan think that the Sanders amendment is what they're actually gonna get.
And they're not gonna get that.
That's why Bernie has offered the amendment and it's now being read.
Now remember, in the in recent weeks, Democrat strategists from the White House on down have been warning Democrats in the House and Senate, the reason you lost the House in 1994 is because you didn't pass health care.
If you had passed health care, Hillary care, 1994, you would not have lost the House.
And the Republicans would not have won it.
So it looks to me like you could you could almost analyze this and say, if the Democrats are right about that, which of course they're not, you can almost look at this and say that the Republicans must be willing to commit political suicide over this.
Since they're now obviously being obstructionist.
Either they are suicidal or they don't believe that health care reform is as popular as the media claims it to be.
Remember, the media kept telling us that the Democrats lost in 94 because they didn't ram through Hillary care.
But of course, the Republicans bragged about it.
The Republicans bragged about killing health care, and they won a landslide.
So again, the effort here to get this passed and to get Republicans to shut up worked for a while.
The old whole this this absurdity that the only reason the Democrats lost the House is because they failed to ram through health care.
The fact that they tried and got so close is one of the many reasons they lost in a landslide in 1994.
So uh the Republicans finally standing up and doing some obstruction here in the form of reading Bernie Sanders' amendment and Dement's vow to read the whole health care bill, all two thousand plus pages of it, is a fascinating concept, and maybe the Republicans are figuring out now that uh they've been sold a bill of goods and everybody's being sold a bill of goods, about the Democrats must pass this in order to uh to avoid being defeated.
In fact, look at it this way.
We know Pelosi's willing to lose 30 or 40 seats in the House.
She's willing to thin the herd.
She doesn't like the so-called moderate blue dogs being there.
And how's she gonna lose them?
By having them vote for this.
So she's tantamount admitting that voting for this is political suicide for Democrats.
So once again, another lie.
The Democrats did not lose Congress in 94 because they failed to get health care.
They they lost in part because they tried for it.
It's uh it it this stands to reason, and dingy Harry too.
There are some senators they wouldn't mind losing over there, and the way to get these people defeated is to have them vote for this.
History may be repeating itself here, 2010 to 1994.
By the way, that last call was from Orlando, which happens to be where Tiger Woods lives.
And get this.
This story ran today, the Orlando Sentinel.
Gordon Morgan tried on a Tiger Woods shirt at Edwin Watts Golf.
He ended up putting it back on the shelf.
He said we're banned from buying any tiger stuff because of our wives.
Wives will not let them buy Tiger Woods shirts made by Nike.
Now, this is one little anecdote uh in a in a newspaper story, but it does point up what the the you know that's the greatest source of tiger's income is these endorsement deals.
And if if Phil Knight's standing up, Phil Knight of Nike said, Hey, this is nothing.
And it's gonna be a blip.
When this is all over, it's gonna be a blip of a memory.
Nobody's gonna remember this.
Stands to be seen.
Back to the audio sound bites.
Here's Andrea Mitchell uh grilling the chairman of the Republican National Committee, Michael Steele, and she is fit to be tied over the delaying tactics of reading the Bernie Sanders amendment on the floor of the Senate.
Mr. Chairman, let's face the fact that Bernie Sanders' amendment, the single payer amendment, isn't even a talking point anymore for Democrats.
It's an amendment that's gonna be voted down just as likely as Republican amendments are voted down.
So why take the time to read more than 700 pages of an amendment that's not even germane to where this bill is going?
Now, I want uh aside aside from her question, why are you doing this?
Why are you delaying debate on something our brand new and lovable president wants?
Why are you doing it?
Why are you doing it?
The thing that that sticks out at me here in with this, she's admitting that single payer, which is what Bernie Sanders amendment is, and it's crystal clear.
It's the most honest thing the Democrats have put forth in this whole health care bill, from the bill to all the amendments, Bernie Sanders is it, and it's unabashedly honest.
We want single payer, we want the government in charge of every aspect of health care.
And Andrea Mitchell says that's not germane.
Everybody knows this is going nowhere.
This is not gonna happen.
Well, you people on the left who probably think the Sanders Amendment is what the entire health care bill is.
How many Obama voters do you think?
And it has to be those that still support the plan.
How many Obama voters do you think really believe that what they're gonna end up getting here is the government paying every health care expense they have?
It's not gonna cost them anything.
A couple of rich people who are going to pay higher taxes are gonna pay for it.
And Andrea Mitchell has just sent the signal to the kook fringe leftists.
This isn't about single payer.
It can't get passed.
The government running every aspect, we still can't get it done.
I don't know if she's aware that she sent that signal because I'm convinced that a number of Democrats still support this, believe that the Sanders amendment is exactly what the entire health care bill is.
Here's Michael Steele's answer.
It is germane.
It's germane to the debate.
It you know, is that as Germaine is taught reform, which is not a part of this is as well.
It's as germane as HSAs, which have been gutted uh in this bill, as germane as the tax provisions and on small business in this bill.
But none of that has been discussed in any great length.
Largely the members don't know what's in these bills.
Harry Reid has kept this thing in his cloak closet from the very beginning.
We still don't know what it's gonna cost.
And so, yeah, let's slow this thing down and try to get in front of it instead of being steamrolled over by it and the leadership's uh approach to try to get something done.
That's exactly uh exactly right.
Slow it down.
Um that's and you know that's a good point to make that uh read Dick Durbin said the other day he hasn't even seen the bill.
And he's on he's on Dingy Harry's leadership team.
Next soundbite, we're not gonna this runs five minutes, we're gonna play the whole thing, but this is a portion of the clerk reading Bernie Sanders' amendment on the floor of the Senate.
In general, for purposes of this title, a comprehensive health service organization in this section referred to as a CHSO or a public or is a public or private organization which, in return for a capitated payment amount, undertakes to furnish arrange for the provision of or provide payment with respect to one, a full range of health services as identified by the board, including at least hospital services and physician services.
If you're just joining us, uh what you're listening to is an amendment written by Bernie Sanders, avowed socialist from Vermont, U.S. Senate, 767 pages to the entire health care bill.
Uh it's it this bill, this amendment is an amendment which would uh make sure that the government becomes the single payer and provider of all health care in America.
And Tom uh Tom Coburn of Oklahoma said, Well, we're going to read the whole thing.
I want people to hear it.
I want people to read and hear this as a clerk reads it.
So that's what you're listening to.
You're listening to a piece of legislation, an amendment to the health care bill offered here by Bernie Sanders.
Area coverage in the case of urgently needed services to an identified population which is living in or near a specified service area and which enrolls voluntarily in the organization.
B enrollment.
One, in general, all eligible persons living in or near the specified service area of a CHSO are eligible to enroll in the organization, except that the number of enrollees may be limited to avoid overtaxing the resources of the organization.
Two, minimum enrollment period.
Subject to paragraph three, the minimum period of enrollment with a CHSO shall be twelve months unless the enrolled individual becomes eligible to an enroll with the organization.
Three, withdrawal for a cause.
Each CHSO shall permit an enrolled individual to disenroll from the organization for any cause for cause at any time.
C. Requirements for CHSOs.
One, accessible services.
Each CHSO to the maximum extent feasible shall make all services readily and promptly accessible to enrollees who live.
She needs reverb.
And if this this if there was reverb added to this, then um it might be a little bit more compelling.
Let's keep listening.
I I'm still waiting for one word of substance about what the hell this amendment is about.
Two, continuity of care.
Each CHSO shall furnish services in such manner as to provide continuity of care, and when services are furnished by different providers, shall provide ready referral of patients to such services and at such times as may be medically appropriate.
Three, board of directors.
In the case of a CHSO that is a private organization, a consumer representation.
At least one third of the members of the CHSO's Board of Directors must be consumer members with no direct or indirect personal or five family financial relationship to the organization.
B. Provider representation.
The CHSO's Board of the United States.
Again, ladies and gentlemen, you're listening to the clerk of the Senate read parts of a 767-page amendment to the health care bill offered by Bernie Sanders urging a single payer health system in America.
We need a translator.
I feel like I'm listening to Kim Jong-il.
...associated with the organization, will promulgate medical standards, oversee the professional aspects of the delivery of care, perform the functions of a pharmacy and drug therapeutics committee, and monitor and review the quality of all health services, including drugs, education, and preventive services.
Six premiums.
Premiums or other charges by a CHSO for any services not paid for under this title must be reasonable.
Each CHSO must A, comply with the requirements of Section 1876-1A of the Social Security Act Relating to prohibiting physician incentive plans that provide specific inducements to reduce or limit medically necessary services and B make available to its membership utilization information and data require regarding financial performance, including bonus or incentive payment arrangements to practitioners.
A. Provision of services to enrollees at institutions operating under global budgets.
All right.
The organization is I think I think you get the idea.
Um it's it's a brilliant stroke to read this thing.
Not to be obstructionist, but to illustrate what the hell this is and what it's not, and how nobody is going to be able to understand this without hiring a law firm.
Anyway, quick time out.
We'll be back and continue more of your phone calls right around a corner.
Your guiding light, Rush Limboy, and the excellence in broadcasting network as usual, talent on loan from God.
All right, to the uh to the phones to South Windsor, Connecticut.
Hey, George, I'm glad you waited.
Welcome to the program.
Yeah, Rush.
You know, I've been listening to you for some time, and and I'm I'm thinking I got you wrong, but I've been listening to you talk about big pharma, and it seems as though you're you're kind of coming down very negative.
As you know, it's a private industry, and you're pro pro private industry to get things done.
And the industry has gone through an enormous amount of layoffs, whether it's Pfizer or or Bruce Fell Myers or Santa Pie or Merck.
I mean, over the last several years, there's been, you know, huge, huge layoffs, but you don't hear anything about it, and you don't feel there's no sympathy in the mainstream media about it.
And so now this whole reimportation, and if you want, I can try to help you better understand it in a simplistic way if you want to, but I hope that you're not going to be able to do that.
No, no, no, you have misunderstood.
You are not trusting what you know.
Okay.
You know, you just said it.
I'm big, big believer in private sector.
I am a huge believer in American private sector businesses.
They have made the country what it is.
Now you know that.
You've listened to me long enough, you said so.
So you hear me today discussing how the Democrats are all ticked off because the reimportation of drugs amendment by Byron Byron Dorgan failed, and you might have heard some glee in my voice, not glee that the uh the the the I'm I'm happy the Democrats are flummoxed here.
I you know I I'm I'm one of the biggest defenders of big pharma, of big retail, of big oil, of of uh the American private sector capitalism that you'll ever find.
I got nothing against you guys.
You guys have helped make this the greatest health care system in the planet.
Now, I'm not I'm not institutionally uh supportive if if if somebody engages in in uh uh uh unfair practices, I'm gonna call them on that, but I'm not institutionally opposed to it, which is what all the Democrats are.
Right.
And your collar that uh called before from Orlando with Gout, I mean, if he doesn't have an in sh a pharmaceutical plan for his insurance, whatever insurance he has, or if he doesn't, there are plenty of resources within the industry to help him with some of these uh medicines that may be of a certain cost that he's having difficulty paying for.
Yes, I was remiss in in uh in not mentioning the those programs, and uh but he may not know how to access them.
He may not even know they exist, and I was remiss in not missing that.
But no, don't.
You know, I'm I'm not I'm not uh the great the best way to say this is that I am not in the tank for any private sector corporation.
I'm in the tank for capitalism, and I understand that there are going to be people that that that uh break the law and and uh engage in unfair business practice.
It's human nature, it's the way it is, but that does not to me indict the system.
It indicts those individuals.
The Democrat Party wants to put you out of business.
They want to put the private sector insurance business out of business.
They want the they have spent fifty years or more getting average Americans to despise you and other private sector businesses, and I resent the hell out of it.
It's working.
They're doing a good job because there has been a a number of layoffs, which affects a lot of things from research and development for better and newer.
Well, let me tell you something though.
Let me tell you something.
One of the reasons they succeed in this PR message is, and one of the things I'll tell you I am a little bit upset about, why in the world would you guys get in bed with Obama in the first place?
Why would you go ahead and give him a hundred and fifty billion dollars to run ads to support the program?
Where's your guts?
Where's the industry guts to stand up and say this sucks?
This is bad for America.
It may be good for us to keep the government off our hand, but all they're doing is spend spending protection money.
They're they're they're giving Obama 150 billion dollars in exchange for Obama not not targeting them.
Well, what good did it get 'em?
You get in bed with snakes, you're in bed with snakes.
Right, you're right.
You you cover both sides of of the coin, and again, you're the all knowing, all caring Maha Rashi, ninety nine point close to eight percent accuracy now.
That's ninety nine point five, but who's counting?
Thank you.
You bet.
Now, this is this is uh look I I um a lot of things I I get I get ticked off about here.
I see, in my in my perfect world, which is based on common sense, here you have big pharma, and they know full well that they've got an administration that's gonna try to bankrupt them.
Instead of getting in bed with them and buying protection, stand up to them.
I do.
I'm still alive, I'm still here, my business is still thriving.
I don't understand the cowardice.
And don't tell me, well, it's a lot of money's at stake.
Yes, a lot of money is at stake, and you get in bed with the people that institutionally hate you, you're gonna end up losing your money anyway, no matter what deal you make with them.
Just as I said, just as I thought in the politico today, House Democrats, Senate is dithering.
Uh members of the House think they are carrying too big a burden on this.
Pelosi has just told the Hill newspaper that she next year is not going to go first on these controversial votes.
She's not having her House members vote until the Senate acts.
She's not putting up with this anymore.
We'll be back.
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