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Feb. 9, 2010 - Rush Limbaugh Program
37:39
February 9, 2010, Tuesday, Hour #2
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And greetings to you music lovers, thrill-seekers, conversationalists, fun lovers, liberals, Democrats, rich Republicans, right-minded conservatives, and those who aspire to both.
Here on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network, Rush Limbaugh behind the golden...
What?
No, no, no.
I said, I said, I have finally met Miss Wright.
What I didn't know was that her first name was Always.
And now back to the program.
Rush Limbaugh, the EIB network, the telephone number, 800-282-2882.
If you want to be on the program, if you don't have the guts to call and just want to send in a cowardly email, it's lrushbow at EIBnet.com.
Yes, here it is from thehill.com.
Democrats in Congress are holding Ram Emmanuel accountable for his part in the collapse of health care reform.
Senior lawmaker didn't want to be named here, of course.
I think Rah ran the play as boss called.
Once Obama called a play, Rahm did everything he could to pass it, scorched earth and all that.
Added Emmanuel didn't seek a broader base of Senate Republicans.
I think he did miscalculate the Senate.
He did what he thought he had to win.
At least these guys understand that Emmanuel is Obama.
And if you're going to sit out there and get mad at Ron Emmanuel, all fine and dandy, but who hired him?
Knowing full well who he is and what he does.
He's in there for a reason.
The story actually says here, no Democrat is calling for Emmanuel's resignation, even privately.
And they acknowledged his hard work and straightforward approach and a very tough job.
See, the translation, these people do not want a dead horsehead in their bed tomorrow morning, 18 inches of snow or not.
Speaking of which, speaking of which, ladies and gentlemen, I asked at the beginning of the program, if Obama can make the sea levels fall, why can't he get the snow off the streets?
Well, here's the answer, but at least he could try to fix this.
As many, who is this?
This is a radio station in our nation's capital.
As the region braces for another major storm, one local government is having trouble keeping their plows on the roads.
As many as 60 of the district's snowplows are not working.
Bad news for thousands of residents still waiting for their streets to be cleared, but good news for the United States, which means that the people who can't get their streets cleared are the people who can't get to work in the federal government.
25% of Washington's snowplows are out of commission.
25%.
I'm trying to remember, and I mean this, I'm being serious, I'm trying to remember the last time we had a story about any government agency anywhere that's working that comes in on budget whose work is done efficiently.
Do you think a private sector company engaged in business to make a profit would sit there with 25% of its snowplows out of commission, knowing full well that 20 inches of snow is on the way?
No way.
There is literally no way this would happen.
And if they did, they'd be history.
Anyway, this lawmaker who won't speak by name said that Rah Emmanuel misjudged the Senate by focusing on only a few Republicans, Olympia Snow and Susan Collins.
He said, in the Senate, you have to anchor in the middle and build out.
They just wanted to win.
Their plan was to keep all the Democrats together and work like hell to get Snow and Collins, but it didn't work.
Here's a fascinating blog, Andrew Malcolm from the LA Times top of the ticket blog.
President Obama, Day 386.
What's happened to him?
A favorite story about Chicago politics involves Roman Puczinsky, who served six long terms of political apprenticeship in the Washington minor leagues of the U.S. House of Representatives.
That's interesting.
The House of Representatives is minor leagues to the Chicago.
Don't you love that?
The House of Representatives, minor leagues of the House of Representatives, before the windy city's vaunted Democrat political machine allowed him to step up and serve on a city council.
Late Puchinsky served for 18 years as a loyal operative assigned to the 41st ward, 41st out of 50.
The late Puchinsky then served for 18.
Oh, sorry.
It's always useful for Chicago Pauls to have White House connections if, say, they'd like to dispatch somebody famous to fly off to Copenhagen to lobby the International Olympic Committee for their city's 2016 summer film.
But the Chicago Daily Machine, which is actually a ruthless coalition of urban Democrat factions united by the steel reinforcing rods of self-interest, didn't much care about this Barack Obama fellow before as long as he was quiet, obedient, and headed on a track out of town.
How he acquired a reform label coming out of that one-party place is anyone's guess.
But now that the sun has risen on the 386th day of the Obama White House, many political observers are coming to see that the ex-state senator from the south side is running his federal administration in Washington much the way they run things in Chicago.
A small clack of clout-laden people from the same school who learned their political trade back in the nation's number three city, named for an Indian word for a smelly wild onion.
Did you know that?
Learn something every day.
Chicago named for it.
Is Chicago the Indian word or is it a derivative?
H.R. claims to know this.
Okay, you knew it, you knew it, but you don't know what the exact word was.
It means you don't know it.
So named for an Indian word for a smelly wild onion.
Stylist tough, focused, immune to any distractions but cosmetic niceties.
Anyway, the bloom's off the rose here or peeling the smelly onion.
This is, and they're asking, it's a year later, where did the hopes for Obama go?
Obama go.
The people who understand what Obama is and who he is and where he came from are freaking asking, why in the hell is he so ineffective?
There hasn't been a worst practitioner of Chicago politics ever.
They genuinely get what they want.
And his agenda to big items, while a bunch of stuff behind the scenes actually is getting rammed down our throats, we don't know it.
Big items are bombing out.
Back to the audio soundbites before we go to the break.
We are number nine here.
We're going to go back to April 25th of 2005.
And the reason I play this, we've played this once before, but I want to play it again because this is all related to Obama's poll numbers dropping, the media's refusal to report them.
Nobody, there's not anywhere near a majority anywhere in this country for any of his major proposals.
So we go back to April 25th, 2005, five years ago almost, at the National Press Club, Senator Obama speaking about social security reform in a Q ⁇ A got this question.
Someone in the audience would like to know what should the American people do to stop the privatization of Social Security.
The president has been on his 60-day tour, and everywhere he goes, the numbers just get worse.
The American people have essentially voted on this proposal.
If they let go of their egos, I've been on the other side of this where, particularly with my wife, where I've gotten in an argument and then at some point in the argument it dawns on me, you know what, I'm wrong on this one.
And it's irritating.
It's frustrating.
You don't want to admit it.
And so to the extent that we can provide the president with a graceful mechanism to say we're sorry, dear, then I think that'd be helpful.
All right, so here he is making fun of Bush.
Hey, the American people voted on your Social Security privatization.
They don't want it.
Same thing here with healthcare.
They have voted numerous times.
I mean, in more ways than the American people ever voted on Bush's privatization.
Obama's lost three state houses, well, two state houses and the Kennedy seat.
Now, that's a pretty damning indictment, ladies and gentlemen.
But Michelle Mybel Obama, who got her obesity bill today, or presidential directive, came to his defense at Good Morning America today.
Robin Roberts interviewed her.
People were full of hope.
How do you feel when people make light of something that was very important to the campaign, had every intent, still do, to bring hope and change and make it a better world for people?
People are frustrated, right?
But one of the things that Barack Obama said and continues to say is change ain't easy.
And it doesn't happen overnight.
And it certainly doesn't happen in a year.
My husband has done a phenomenal job staying on course, looking his critics in the eye, coming up with clear solutions, and again, staying the course.
That's what leadership is.
But people have a right to criticize the President of the United States.
See, the difference here, there is no leadership.
Leaders have solutions.
He's got no solutions.
He's his agitator.
He's offering solutions zip zero nada.
But don't you love the question, Robin Roberts.
So many people are making light of something that was so very important and had every intent still due to bring hope and change and make it a better world.
The world is disintegrating.
I mean, we've got the Iranians promising some big bang this week.
We've got the Russians saying that our missile shields aimed at them.
We've got the CHICOM suggesting that they sell some of our bonds to send us a big message.
Who's making fun of it?
If you make light of something that was very important to the campaign, hope and change.
Who's making fun of hope and change?
Could they mean me?
You think she might mean me when I ask, well, how's that hope and change working for you?
Oh, you think Robin Roberts is worried about me making fun of it.
Yeah, that really irritates.
We discussed yesterday.
You're not supposed to make fun of Democrats, the liberals.
No, no, no, because they're too serious.
Their work is too important.
You're not supposed to make fun.
So then Robert Roberts said, well, the peaks and valleys of this year, successes, some shortcomings, and the rhetoric of the last few months, is there ever a time you look to your husband and say, we got to fix this?
It's a constant struggle.
You know, the coarsening of Washington and politics has always been here.
We had hoped that more progress would have been made.
But as I say, you just keep holding the hand out.
You know, you never give up on the possibility.
Stop the tape a minute.
You hold a hand out with the middle finger extended is what's happening here.
Yeah, the hand's being held out, but there's a middle finger extended.
Resume more civility.
You never walk away from that, right?
You keep your hand held out.
You keep that smile on your face.
You stay open to the possibility of partnership.
And one day, there'll be another hand out there to accept yours.
That is the beauty of Barack Obama.
His hand stays out positive and focused.
It's a gift.
With the middle finger extended.
So what is she suggesting here?
People keep their handouts.
He's extending these hands out there and he's waiting for somebody to take the handouts.
Disguised lingo.
You have to be in the welfare state to understand a code lingo here, folks.
It means that Gravy Train's going to keep on coming.
Don't sweat it.
All right, here's the Indian word for Chicago that means smelly onion.
It is S-H-I-K-A-K-O, Chicako.
Chicaco.
And from that, they got Chicago.
Or it could be Chicago.
I'm not sure.
But regardless, that's the word.
Furnished to be my none other than H-R.
It does sound similar to Macau, which drove George Allen out of the race.
So you have here Chicago, Chicago, very close to Macau.
All right.
From a very uneasy Washington Post, uneasy that it might not pass.
You know, one of the things that's been delayed by the snowstorm is the jobs bill, people getting together in Congress on the jobs bill.
And here's the story: as the Senate this week considers a jobs bill to reduce unemployment, lawmakers will have to decide whether to continue an unprecedented change in how the country treats people who are out of work, which was quietly approved last year.
Through a series of laws, including the Porculus Bill, people in states with high rates of unemployment are eligible to get jobless benefits for up to 99 weeks.
An all-time high.
It's almost two years.
But Congress did this in a piecemeal fashion.
It must now pass legislation to keep benefits going for an estimated 1 million people who would otherwise become ineligible at the end of the month.
The Senate approved a measure that extended benefits from 79 to 99 weeks in a unanimous vote last year, but Republicans have not yet said whether they will continue to support these benefits, particularly if they are included in a larger jobs package.
Make no mistake, folks.
I'm telling you right now, this is where the billions for the next jobs bill are going to go.
Extending and make it official 99 weeks of unemployment compensation.
That's where the vast majority of this jobs bill money is going to go.
Now, you look dubious in there.
You look, why not?
What?
Exactly right?
Exactly right.
Europe in two years.
What?
In one year?
In one year, what better way to make more people dependent on government and thereby ostensibly theoretically make more Democrat voters than to extend unemployment benefits for nearly two years?
And what better way to ensure that people are not looking for work, therefore not pressuring the job market for jobs to be expanded created?
Telling you, folks, every time we hear something about what's going on, we look at it, have to conclude that it is done on purpose.
Back to the phones to Cranberry Township, Pennsylvania.
John, welcome to the EIB Network, sir.
Hello.
Good afternoon, Rush.
I never had a chance to meet you, but it's a privilege to speak with you.
Thank you very much, sir.
In our area here, we have quite a few people, I, myself included.
It would be nice if you could be of assistance, Rush, but I'm out of work with master's and PhD degrees.
And it's not that you're electing to be, and it's not definitely that you're sitting back waiting on a handout of any kind.
It's just that a lot of the companies in our particular area who are doing some hiring are reaching out more to our overseas brothers and sisters, if you will, than to people within our own communities.
Why?
I don't know.
That's a solvent I haven't been able to come up with.
Maybe the labor factor is cheaper.
You know, there could be many reasons why.
However, in my situation, I've been going out and obtaining opportunities to teach in academia.
Getting full-time in that particular region is kind of tough, though.
Yeah, but hey, look, how much work are you getting there part-time teaching in academia?
Not much.
Maybe one, two classes at the most.
A week, a day, a what?
How much?
A week.
And what are you teaching?
I teach in the business curriculum.
I teach training and development.
Oh, man.
Now, you have a master's or PhD in one of those two?
I have an MBA, yeah.
Oh, man.
You know what?
I'm going to be selfish here.
You don't know what a godsend this is for your students.
Even if it's just one or two classes a week, I mean, you realize the perspective they're getting from you.
Oh, yes.
I definitely do, Rush.
I realize what they're getting.
But on the same token, it would be nice if you could be able to extend that to touch their lives in the future full-time.
No, I understand.
I understand, understand.
So are you, where is Crownberry Township?
What's it near in Pennsylvania?
Pittsburgh.
Near Pittsburgh.
And so are you talking about colleges and universities are hiring people from out of the country to do their work?
No, I'm talking about people who want to do something.
A lot of people will take teaching jobs part-time.
But conversely, what they're doing is looking for full-time work in corporate America.
And a lot of our facilities here, there's a lot of quota systems, you know.
And unfortunately, that's a cross to carry.
But what are you going to do?
I mean, you can't stop an asteroid on a dime, you know?
So unfortunately, that's what you're caught up in.
So what do you want to do?
Well, I have a very good operations management background, Rush.
I would like to be somebody who's guiding and leading companies to meet the strategies that they're coming out with and helping to achieve their goals to continue their life cycles in the market.
And that's ultimately what I would like to do and also continue teaching.
You know, more or less, a lot of, like I said, a lot of my friends who were working full-time, some of them have lost their jobs as well, is to be working full-time.
Why don't you do this?
Why don't you do this?
You got to start small, and this is probably as productive an idea as anything.
Find one company somewhere and offer yourself as a consultant.
I guarantee you that everybody in this recession is looking for ways out of it.
Sure.
If you can find a way for Company X as a consultant, you know, negotiate a consulting fee with them, be an invent contractor, don't go on staff.
Just get one company that you are consulting, consult them on positive ways to ramp up, to grow, to get out of the problems they're in, and then you keep doing your teaching thing at the same time.
Then you can write your ticket.
Yeah, I'm sure.
You know, we're in a small market here, Rush.
I mean, I realize that a lot of a lot, like I said, I am myself.
Well, wait a minute.
How close to Pittsburgh?
Pittsburgh's not that small.
No, well, it's smaller than what you thought.
We lost a lot of population here.
And when those demographics have changed over the last several years, a lot of companies went with it.
Yeah, but you've still got – I'm not talking about major corporations only.
Sure.
You've still got any number of businesses, small, medium, large, or whatever.
I guarantee you, most of them.
Frankly, I have been amazed over the last 10 years at the number of companies who go outside to find advice and consulting.
McKinsey is huge.
I mean, I've been stunned that, and I used to work for the Kansas City Royals.
They looked outside for a certain kind of marketing and business advice all the time.
And you've got people on staff.
Why are you adding to your expenses by going outside?
And you already got people here, but they're doing it.
And I know I'm making it sound easy, but it's your business.
You know how to pitch them.
And you've got some experience here and you can identify the ones that are in trouble.
I go for it.
Get one of those in your tank that you're helping and you can write your ticket.
Well, Obama finally made his way to the press room, ladies and gentlemen, making his pitch to the White House Press Corps for a bipartisan support of the Republicans health care, bipartisan commission on debt reduction.
You know, even Alan Greenspan of all people, on Meet the Press Sunday and Henry Paulson, they both said tax increase is the worst thing we could do right now.
And Greenspan said, when I heard that the Senate placed Social Security off any austerity budget cutting programs, I know we're not serious.
We're not serious about cutting anything.
And you've all heard the news now that Social Security is officially paying out more than it takes in because the recession has caused people to retire.
Folks, I can't imagine how bad this could get.
I really, in fact, I want to save the discussion of that for another day because I want to stay focused on something positive here right now.
I'm going to go back to this guy, John, in Cranberry Township, and consultancy.
I have mixed emotions about it.
Now, I, ladies and gentlemen, am in broadcasting.
And let me for a moment focus on television for a minute, local television.
Recently, one of the most important figures in local television news passed away.
His name was Frank Maggot, and he was from Iowa.
Frank Maggot was a giant consultancy firm that advised local TV stations on how to do the local 5'6 at 11 o'clock news.
And Frank Maggot associates would be brought in by all of these local TV stations to meet with the talent, to study them, and to make suggestions on how they wear their hair and how they speak and how they read the teleprompter and what color clothes to wear.
I mean, it was, to me, as a broadcast, I always thought it was insulting.
And I'm telling you that most people, and I may be speaking out of school here, and this is not to insult Frank Maggot or his company.
Please don't misunderstand here.
If you're with the Frank Maggot company, but I know most people, when they were told by management that the Maggot people were coming into town, it was hunkered down because you always thought, man, I'm going to get fired.
Is some consultant going to say, I don't have it?
Somebody who's not in the market, somebody's just perusing data, ratings data, is somebody going to say, and I get candor, I get moved to some graveyard news shift or whatever.
And I've known my fair share of people in local news.
And when the MAGGID people were coming, it was head for the bunkers.
And frankly, I always wondered why in the world this is.
I thought the people who owned and operated TV stations were the experts.
Somehow this MAGID guy set himself up as knowing more than any of them.
He convinced them.
And how he did it, I mean, I don't know for a fact, but I'm sure that he had a couple of stations he consulted and bam, their local news rating shot through the roof.
And since everybody in entertainment, news, whatever, is copycat, they had to have him.
So John, in Cranberry Township, Pennsylvania, all you need is one.
All you need is one consultancy that gets on the map.
And John, you know where you ought to go?
There's a company out there, John, that has no idea what to do.
They have never encountered the kind of problems they're having.
A company's called Toyota.
They have the U.S. federal government lined up against them because the federal government owns their competitors, GM and Chrysler.
They just today had to add Lexus.
They own Lexus.
They just today had to add Lexus hybrids to the recall list.
Lexus is their huge top-of-the-line brand.
They are recalling hundreds of thousands of Priuses.
And then you have the other Toyotas that have the braking problem.
Not the Prius.
The hybrids have the braking problem.
The other Toyotas have the accelerator problem.
These are all software glitches and massive, massive recalls.
The Toyota CEO is all over the place personally apologizing, which is what in the Japanese culture happens.
But after, and this is a company, the reason, this company has a chance because people have voted with their pocketbooks.
They love these cars.
And I think they'll be very accepting of this.
This is, but it's still a challenge for them.
Now, John, you're probably hearing me say, Toyota?
I mean, you got, you're talking to multinational corporations.
How in the world do I get?
I don't know.
But you're the consultant.
You've got the MBA.
You're the guy that might have an idea for them.
You just got to be careful who you give the idea to doesn't steal it if it's a good one.
But Toyota is one example.
Let me share with you this story from Reuters.
The outlook of small business owners remained bleak at the start of the new year, according to a survey released on Tuesday by the National Federation of Independent Business.
Small business owners entered 2010 the same way they left 09, depressed.
The group said, noting its Small Business Optimism Index reading for January, still below the 90 mark, which is the dividing line between positive and negative outlooks.
But the group also said that seven of the index's 10 components rose, indicating conditions could soon improve.
Swelling inventories have largely contributed to the recent growth in U.S. gross domestic product, but small business owners said they continue to liquidate inventories, and with weak sales trends, they have little incentive to replenish their stocks.
Now, for whatever reason, human nature being whatever it is, it is now, I don't know, universally accepted, but with times as tough as they are, these people are looking for any idea to get themselves out of this mess.
And they realize, John, that their biggest obstacle is what they don't know yet.
And that is what of Obama's agenda is going to pass.
You put together a plan to help them deal with whatever it is on a contingency basis.
You got an MBA.
How to operate if healthcare happens?
How to operate if the tax increases happen?
Whether to operate.
They're looking for answers out there.
Everybody is.
You've got the MBA.
And the consultancy business, you know, if you travel 30 miles, you're a consultant.
You might come up with what country to move your operations to if A, B, and C of the Obama administration happen.
Should you go to Germany?
Should you go to Mexico?
Should you go to Costa Rica?
Any number of, I mean, the ideas, the options, the suggestions you could make are limitless.
And there are people looking for small business, especially.
You know, small business people comprise the gamut.
A lot of them are just creative.
They just have a passion for a service or a product.
The business side is something they have to learn.
There you go.
I mean, this is this.
You know, I've often said, and I maintain it to this day, that even in a circumstance like this, meaning this deep a recession, most of the limitations that people face are those they place on themselves.
Now, we're in a tight battle because Obama is a huge limitation on everybody right now.
In normal times, I don't mean to harp on John here, but he's the last caller.
He's in Cranberry Township near Pittsburgh.
If anybody, if any of you are unwilling to move, fine, but understand that is a self-limitation.
You're limiting yourself to opportunities available where you happen to be if you're going to work with local people.
So it's to give you an idea of, I'm going to let a big cat out of it, and I don't even, I don't know this to be true.
This is just a wild, wild guess.
You know the people that own these fractional corporate jet deals where you can buy a quarter share or a half share of a private jet with a whole bunch of other people.
And when you need one, you call them up and send a jet to your place within four or six hours to take you where you want to go.
But it's never the same jet.
It's never the same flight crew.
You buy a quarter share in a type of airplane.
So it usually is the type of airplane you bought into like a hawker or what have you.
Now the people, they're going to hate me for doing this.
The people who run these businesses, who started them, you know why they did it?
Keep track of competitors.
Well, who is it that signs up for quarter shares?
Who does not want to buy a whole airplane?
They buy up for a quarter share.
Businesses.
So if you own one of these companies, you can see who's flying to where, if they've cut back on how much they're flying, and if they're increasing their flying, and then where they're flying, you can keep track on what they're doing.
As the owner, you have access to all the flight manifests and records and so forth.
It's a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant thing.
It's entrepreneurism at its best.
You're providing a service for people who don't want to run through the cost of a whole airplane.
And if you want, you can find out trends, business trends before they happen because you're witnessing it.
So there's all kinds of opportunities out there, John.
There's all kinds of opportunities for anybody.
Let your passion be what guides you.
Your passion combined with your expertise.
Even in Obama's America, there is opportunity.
In this case, unlike in normal America, in this case, you're going to have to find it.
Opportunity is probably not going to knock on your door as often as it would in normal economic times.
But remember, there's no such thing as luck.
Luck is where preparation meets opportunity.
Let me stay focused on this small business thing here for just a second.
John, I don't want to embarrass John out there, but he's the most recent call about that, about all this.
And I've got ideas just exploding inside my little cranium here.
John, you teach business school twice a week.
Look at what you have there.
You can combine your own project with education for them.
Have them do a research project on small business companies of, say, 100 employees or fewer or 50 employees or fewer.
Find out where they are and how they're doing.
And bamo, there you've got your call list.
And your students are learning things.
At the same time, you kill two birds with one stone.
And it's free labor, John.
The students are free labor and you're not going to have to cut them in on anything.
Now, for the rest, it's not exploitive.
It's how it happens, Snerdly.
It's not exploitive at all.
And it's exploitative and it's not exploitative.
And if he wants to cut them in, raise the grade from a C to a B.
Now, now, whatever.
Look at, i'm just the idea guy here.
This is not even my business.
I'm just now the rest of you small business, rest of you in this audience, unemployed or with a small business that you're in trouble.
I know you listen to this program every day.
You hear people advertise on this program.
We are sold out.
You hear them advertise it.
Does that not tell you that some businesses are succeeding out there?
And I'm not going to jump into Egoville here and say it's because they're associated with me, although it is.
But they are working.
The point is that even in the midst of all this, there are people who are enjoying success, even in this depressed market.
There's no reason that can't be you.
Now, we just got a new advertiser.
We just got a new advertiser.
These people came in to see me three weeks ago and they brought their product.
They're located in Sacramento, in fact.
It's called Sherry's Berries.
They are the biggest chocolate-covered strawberries I have ever seen in my life.
And they are hand-dipped and they come in boxes of 12.
And they're all different patterns, even though they're hand-dipped.
And they come delivered to you cold because you've got a refrigerator.
You don't want the chocolate to melt.
They are huge.
And I don't eat much sugar for a whole bunch of reasons.
I don't have that big a sweet tooth.
But of course, I tasted a couple of these, and they were just delicious.
And they came in hoping I would accept the product.
And I did on the spot because it's ideal for Valentine's Day.
This is something that will melt in their mouths.
Hand-dipped strawberries from Sherry's Berries.
They're just $19.99.
They've sold over 50 million of these things.
They're taking it out national now.
And who did they choose to do it?
Now, if you want to do this from Valentine's Day, and this is a twist, I mean, a lot of people give candy on Valentine's Day, but here's a chocolate-covered strawberry, 12 of them.
That's just, you have to see these.
Do believe them, and you can't do it at a website.
I'll give you here in a minute.
Thursday's the last chance to get these delivered by Valentine's Day.
$19.99, the lowest price that these enormous strawberries have ever been.
And this is an offer exclusively for you, only lasts until Thursday.
So here's what you do.
Call 866-FRUIT02.
866-FRUT02.
For those of you in Rio Linda, 866-378-4802.
Or we have a website, www.rushberries.com.
www.rushberries.com.
Just take a look at them.
You're going to wish you could taste them when you look at them.
But here's another small business joining the roster of successful people here on the EIB network.
So the signs are everywhere, folks.
It's tougher, obviously tougher with what's coming down the pike and what's already come down the pike, but it can be done.
In times like this, it's always the ingenuity and the entrepreneur that finds ways around this stuff.
We're Americans, and we're always going to be Americans despite this administration's attempt to redefine who we are and what we do.
Who's next?
Tony in Edmonds, Washington.
Nice to have you, sir, on the Rush Lindbaugh program.
Hi.
Hi, Rush.
I just want to make the point.
I've been in business.
I'm an architect.
I've been in business for myself since 94.
And after the downturn, I used to have, we peaked at like six employees.
I've had to lay off everybody but myself right now.
Yet if I were to hire people back, the state of Washington will require me to pay into their unemployment pool to the tune of 42 cents an hour till that person has paid $35,000, after which I don't have to contribute to the unemployment pool.
And that goes on for, they penalize you for like two to three years.
I mean, I laid off some guys back in 2002, and I was paying a higher rate for probably two to three years after they were laid off into this pool.
So they're penalizing you for hiring people, in essence.
Right, right.
And so I haven't even looked at the federal unemployment rate.
Frankly, that's been rather low, and it's been a minor payment.
Okay, given that reality, it's a reality you've got to face.
What's it going to take for you to have your business expand and despite all this, hire people back?
Well, one of the thoughts was change the name of the company and re-up with the state and come in as a different entity.
And I haven't talked to my accountant about that, but I'm wondering if there would be restrictions in the ability to do that.
So you're starting fresh, in other words, on the amount of you have to pay in the unemployment fund.
Right, right.
Or I'm really joining forces with a larger firm out at Tacoma.
I'm up north of Seattle a little bit and marketing with them.
So it's looking at different options.
Well, but still, all right, fine.
This is a great example.
Guy hasn't thrown in the towel yet.
Looking for ways around all these stupid statist regulations that are obstacles.
Good luck, sir, and stay in touch.
Let us know how it goes.
Back after this.
Have you seen this?
You may not have seen this yet.
Felony snowball tossing charges have been lodged.
Virginia college students pelted a city snowplow.
An unmarked police car and felony snowball throwing charges have been filed against two Virginia college kids.
The police responded to the scene in a bid to identify the assailants.
Their unmarked vehicle also came under an icy assault.
Felony snowball throwing charges.
My gosh, if we were only this serious about terrorism!
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