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March 9, 2010 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:39
March 9, 2010, Tuesday, Hour #3
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Time Text
What did you have a hernia saying 30?
Senator Lagana hernia up there when he said 30.
The engineer gives me a cue when it says it 30 because they think I can't read the clock and it sounded like you had a hernia when you said 30.
Okay, greetings, my friends, and welcome back.
Rush Limbaugh here, the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
A telephone number, if you want to be on the program, is 800-282-2882, the email address, lrushbaugh at eibnet.com.
Great to have you here.
And I promise we're going to get to your phone calls earlier than usual in this hour because what?
What, Snurdy?
What?
What does that mean?
What?
I know I've gone, well, I've gone three hours.
I've done a phone call.
We have people on hold for two.
That's why.
We got to get them on.
They've been on hold for two hours at least here.
So we're going to get that done.
Dennis Kucinich, last night on PMS NBC, confirms his no vote on Obamacare.
I voted against the first version of the bill in the House.
I told the president twice in two different meetings that I couldn't support the bill if it didn't have a robust public option and if they didn't have something that was going to protect consumers from these rapid premium increases.
And you know what?
The White House counts me as wavering.
To hear the president, you think that he was for single pay or at least a public option, but he's not.
This bill represents a giveaway to the insurance industry, $70 billion a year and no guarantees of any control over premiums, forcing people to buy private insurance, five consecutive years of double-digit premium increases.
I'm sorry.
I just don't see that this bill is a solution.
And Lawrence O'Donnell is the host here, doesn't like what he's hearing here.
He said, so do we just get a no there, Kucinich?
You're going to vote against the Senate bill, the first stage of this process in the House?
If that sounded like a no, you're correct.
Okay.
Will you be comfortable if it turns out you are, in effect, the single vote that defeats health care reform?
Every vote counts.
I'm one of foreigners.
We don't even hear about it.
That's how they're approaching.
You really want to be a guy that kills Obamacare.
I asked that if Scott Brown.
It's a badge of honor with these guys.
Now, we talked yesterday, ladies and gentlemen, about the largest health insurance company, if you will, in the country is the United States government.
And the single most powerful insurance company executive is Barack Obama.
He runs the S-CHIP program.
He runs Medicare.
He runs Medicaid and the VA.
And we went through the progression yesterday.
Nobody gets everything they want in those programs.
Just because the governments get behind it, you don't get everything they want.
And they constantly complain.
And they deny coverage.
The number one insurance company that denies claims in this country is Medicare.
Medicare denies far more claims than any private insurance company does.
And yet here's Obama with all these great reforms that are just going to compound the problems that we already have in government-run insurance.
And we've got now this, I want to ask you if you would put up with this in the private sector.
Essentially, if Obama's bill passes, we get the pay go.
We pay now.
The taxes and all the other fees and everything will happen immediately upon signage of the bill.
But the so-called benefits don't kick in for four years.
And this is so that they could get a 10-year score from the CBO of something under a trillion dollars.
Now, let me ask you a question.
Can you imagine what Obama would say If say Blue Cross Blue Shield was out there selling policies that you had to pay for every month for four years, but you didn't get any insurance for four years.
You had to pay into it, but you couldn't file a claim for anything no matter what happened for four years, because that's what they're proposing.
This is Obama's pay go.
It's a stunt and it's a nightmare.
And you have to, if you hate your insurance company, you've got to understand that the biggest and the worst is the United States government, Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP VA.
And Barack Obama runs it.
I mentioned before the Rove interview, what's this from?
The New York Daily News, already challenged on the right by J.D. Hayworth.
John McCain's about the...
Oh, have you heard...
Speaking, hang on a minute.
I got to find a sound bite here.
It's getting not pathetic.
It's get grab number 27.
You know, J.D. Hayworth running against McCain out there in Arizona.
And Charlie Crist, the current Florida governor, is the tight fight here that he's losing in the primary to Marco Rubio.
So last night, Governor Christ was on McGretta Van Sustran.
She said, sort of a punchback, which occurred previously, is that you've said about your opponent, Mr. Rubio, that he's the greatest fraud perpetrated.
So it sounds like you've had a couple of punches back as well.
What do you say to that?
He had a Republican Party of Florida credit card that he charged $130 haircut, or maybe it was a backwax.
We're not really sure what all he got at that place.
Wait, stop.
Wait, a backwax?
Wait a second.
I know, but I mean, was there a suggestion that it was for a backwax?
Are you being flipped?
I don't know what it was.
Initially, we were told it was a haircut.
I don't know.
You spend $130 for maybe a haircut and maybe other things.
I don't know what you do at a salon when you're a guy.
I get my haircut for $11 from a guy named Carl the Barber in St. Petersburg, Florida, where I grew up.
And, you know, to me, that's real fiscal conservatism.
We got the John Edwards technique being applied here.
Real fiscal conservatism is $11 for a haircut.
So Marco Rubio, he's not qualified, folks, because he might get backwaxes.
He's not qualified.
You need to know this.
So anyway, back now to McCain.
Already challenged on the right by J.D. Hayworth.
John McCain's about to get hit from the left today on health care with a barrage of robocalls.
The Democrat-linked Americans United for Change firing off about 250,000 calls starting today in Arizona, basically calling McCain a rich guy hypocrite.
Arizona Senator John McCain, happy to let the government pay for his health care, but last December, John McCain voted against requiring ordinary Americans be eligible to buy the same health insurance as members of Congress.
Senator McCain may have seven houses and fly around a private jet, but when it comes to his health care, he should be no better than the rest of us.
Now, I see, my friends, we were talking about this with Carl Rove just a moment ago, bipartisanship.
I thought the Democrats love McCain.
I thought these people making these robocalls love McCain.
He would cross the aisle and work with him and so forth.
How can this happen?
How can this happen?
These guys are all politicians.
You and I are not politicians, and they are.
And it's just, we try to understand them through our lens, but we're not politicians.
I'm sure you heard Carl say how impressed he was with Ted Kennedy.
Now, how can that be?
You and I look at Ted Kennedy as a buffoon, a dangerous buffoon who's out destroying very important, valuable people on our side, personally, character-wise, career-wise, out destroying them.
But people get to Washington to see Ted Kennedy's an icon.
How can that be?
He's a very successful Democrat.
Because he's in the game.
He's in the game.
And it's kind of like, not the best analogy here, but kind of like if you play professional baseball back during the Nolan Ryan era, Nolan Ryan never spoke to an opposing player in his career.
Very seldom.
He spoke.
Those guys were the absolute edibles.
all respected him.
Now, he was trying to beat him.
He wasn't trying to destroy their character or any of that kind of stuff.
He was trying to beat them.
But they still had this.
So these guys are all in the game together.
You and I look at Ted Kennedy as an absolute buffoon.
We look at Obama as an absolute disaster.
And other people, well, no, he's elected president.
He's in the game.
He's a politician.
Well, we deal with him the way we deal with politicians.
We deal with ourselves and everybody else as politicians.
So it's not that the two parties are the same and so forth.
It's that it is a business.
Politics, like everything else, is a business.
And it's a game.
And the people that are on stage in the game, and if they're prominent in the game, regardless of what party, there's, I guess, a lot of respect bestowed upon them.
Whereas you and I are not in the game.
You know, we're the peasants with the pitchforks.
And we see these people play in the game.
You know, we're the country's the monopoly board, and we're to pieces.
And they're rolling the dice and moving us all around here.
So some of us end up in jail, some of us, you know, buy worthless railroads.
Some of us end up Park Place.
Some of us end up St. James Place.
And others of us end up Vintler Avenue.
And then we move around and so forth, but they're still the guys with the dice.
And we very seldom pass go.
And if we do, we go to jail, tax jail, or whatever jail it is.
I mean, so it's a eye-opening thing in a way to try to understand this because when you hear people say, oh, Ted Kennedy, amazing amount of respect.
I don't respect Ted Kennedy for anything.
Anyway, folks, we have to take a break here, and I promise we're going to come back.
We'll get into your phone calls and stuff.
So sit tight.
And we do have a pretty interesting audio soundbite roster left as well.
And we have actual on-the-ground proof, ladies and gentlemen, that the climate policy is a job loser.
California is likely to see modest job losses in the near term from its aggressive climate change policy due to higher energy costs and other factors, according to California's independent legislative analyst's office.
The budget watchdog was responding to a request by Republican State Senator Dave Cogdall to study the effects of California's 2006 climate change law, which mandates changes to cut greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.
California's environmental vanguard approach being hotly debated in the state ahead of a November race, gubernatorial.
And in the midst of an economic downturn that has pushed unemployment to recent records, many other states, the federal government, are watching closely.
The aggregate net jobs impact will be negative.
Going green, Obama's signature energy policy, loses jobs, raises prices, and will cause even more unemployment, ladies and gentlemen.
We ought to do it, though, to save the planet.
Nancy Pelosi delivered a speech this morning at the 2010 legislative conference for the National Association of Counties.
Among other things, Nancy Pelosi said, we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of controversy.
May I repeat that?
Nancy Pelosi, in his speech this morning at the 2010 Legislative Conference of the National Association of Counties, said, quote, we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it away from the fog of controversy.
Yep, we got to pass it so many will then know what's in it.
You've heard about the controversies within the bill, the process about the bill, one or the other, but I don't know if you've heard that it's legislation for the future, not just about health care for America, but about a healthier America, where preventive care is not something you have to pay a deductible for, or out of pocket.
Prevention, prevention, prevention.
It's about diet, not diabetes.
It's Nancy Pelosi.
I'm just telling you what she said.
We ought to pass the bill so that's how we find out what's in it.
Away from the fog of controversy.
All right, to the phones.
We're going to go to Florence, Kentucky.
Debbie, thank you for waiting.
You're next on the Rush Limbaugh program.
Hi.
Hi, Rush.
You're worth the wait.
Thank you very much.
Yes, I just wanted to make a comment and ask your opinion on Steve Pack's flip-flop on the health care bill.
It didn't happen yet, but don't be surprised.
Well, do you think that Rahm Emanuel might have paid him a naked visit this week?
No, I think what's actually going on is stimulus money is being passed out.
Yeah.
And threats are being made.
Exactly.
Exactly.
This administration is an embarrassment.
It is.
Nobody, you know, what is patently obvious now, ladies and gentlemen, is they don't have the votes.
They do not have the votes.
And a lot of people, the Heritage Foundation today, in their morning call, is saying there still isn't a piece of legislation.
Stupak is saying that there is not a bill.
Now, there is a bill.
There is a bill.
It's the Senate bill.
Now, nothing can be added to it right now, but they are adding things nevertheless.
But it's a fascinating thing.
All kinds of people are analyzing what they think of the vote counts, but nobody knows for sure.
And the Stupak 12 is a big number.
Right now, the best count is by some guy named Jay Cost or Cost.
I'm not sure how he pronounces his name.
Is it Real Clear Politics?
And he's got him right at one vote shy.
I think it's, no, let me retract that.
Let me retract that.
I'm not sure if he's going to one vote shy or one vote shy with Stupak.
But the point is, they don't have the votes yet.
It's patently obvious.
And a lot of people think that they're not going to get the votes because they don't even have a bill.
The members of the House are still being told that the things they want are going to be in there.
They're being double-crossed.
And I mean, they're really being double-crossed.
And it should be obvious to them that the president doesn't care what happens to them.
He really doesn't.
I don't think Obama cares if he loses the presidency in 2012.
I think he's already alluded to the fact he'd rather be a great one-termer than a mediocre two-termer.
Well, a great one-termer in his lingo means he's so despised that he gets beaten.
And he's so despised, he gets beaten because everybody hates what he did.
But that, in his view, is a great first term.
And that's what we face.
Tim, Buffalo, New York.
You're next on the EIB network.
Hi.
Hello, Trush.
Hi.
Your instincts on Eric Massa are absolutely correct.
He's a real kook.
He's pretty clueless, too.
He's been pushing for a pork barrel highway project through his district, and he says that he would get funding for it if it killed him.
Then at a recent public meeting, he said that he would die before he signed any legislation that promoted free trade, which is really funny because the pork barrel project that he's been supporting is a NAFTA Super Highway.
Well, it's patently obvious whether he's telling the truth about what happened on the shower stall with no curtain in the house gym with Rom Emanuel.
The fact that he would tell a story, use the terminology.
He's the spawn of Satan.
So this guy clearly, you know, a knife and fork short of a full play setting, an order of fries short of a happy meal.
The elevator doesn't go to the top.
Not a whole lot of dogs under the front porch.
Whatever you want to say.
This guy's not all together.
He's not all there.
It's patently obvious.
No, he's not.
He's about in the same boat with Senator Schumer.
Well, Schumer's at least sophisticated about the way he goes about things.
He may be just as outrageous.
That he is.
On the same project, Schumer jumped all over federal regulatory agencies for doing their jobs.
And then when that allowed the state to blunder ahead with the project and cause a massive landslide, he demanded an investigation to find out why the state screwed up.
Well, look, the stories that we're going to hear about Democrats and their hypocrisy and all that are legion.
All we have to know is that they're bad.
They don't deserve victory.
We need to defeat them.
I don't mean in their districts, although it would be nice.
I'm talking about defeating them in Washington, in the Senate, and in the House.
I was mentioning the Heritage Foundation a moment ago.
And we're talking about the word failure all over the Obama administration.
But there is an area of U.S. foreign policy that Obama is really, really botching, and he doesn't care or doesn't appear to be.
And that is Iran.
Now, failure is a one-word description that comes to mind when you look at Obama's effort to curb Iran's hostile actions, nuclear buildup, and what have you.
Has anybody kept track of the number of countries joining our efforts in generating a fourth round of U.N. sanctions?
Have you been keeping track?
Have you been keeping track just how successful the first three rounds of sanctions have worked?
I mean, they haven't.
Every time there's news of Iran's nuclear weapon developments or more evidence of state-sponsored terrorism from Iran, we get an idle threat that we are thinking about taking tough measures.
But what really happens?
It may be time for some new thinking on this.
And the Heritage Foundation is, they're new thinkers.
Unique, original.
600,000 members now at Heritage, thanks largely to this program.
Concerns for our national security don't just pass by our friends at Heritage Foundation.
They give it thought.
They put forth good ideas.
They've got all kinds of departments, divisions, chairs, endowments.
They've got people chronicling health care, informing people about the latest approach Obama's taking, but they also watch foreign policy as well.
And it's a whole different bunch of people that do that.
If you look online today at AskHeritage.org at the 10 action steps that Heritage readily encourages or encourages and ask yourself if this doesn't make more sense than what Hillary Clinton's asking our neighbors in Latin America to consider this week.
This administration is a disaster from front to back, top to bottom, side to side.
We are a great nation at risk in a dangerous world.
And we are being led by a young man child who is the most unqualified, inexperienced guy in whatever room he walks into, be it the situation room or the Oval Office or the Cabinet Room.
Did you see, by the way, that they put out a picture of Jay-Z, the well-known rapper, sitting in the president's chair in a situation room?
Now that nobody gets in the situation room, least of all rappers sitting there pretending to be running some foreign policy operation.
But they put the picture out there.
Back we are, Rush Limbaugh here on the cutting edge of societal evolution.
Ladies and gentlemen, I've always said to all of you that the sports media in America is as liberal, leftist, closed-minded as is the news media.
So I am going to be interesting to see their reaction to this story.
It's from ESPNOutdoors.com.
The Obama administration will accept no more public input for a federal strategy that could prohibit U.S. citizens from fishing in the nation's oceans, coastal areas, Great Lakes, and even inland waters.
This announcement comes at the time when the situation supposedly still is fluid and the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force still hasn't issued its final report on zoning issues of these waters.
Robert Montgomery is the author here and he says, that's a disappointment, but not really a surprise for fishing industry insiders who have negotiated for months with officials at the Council on Environmental Quality and bureaucrats on the task force.
These angling advocates have come to suspect that public input into the process was a charade from the beginning.
So fishing is on the verge of becoming a privilege controlled by Barack Obama.
Fishing.
Now, I have one experience as a fisherman.
I went up there, where was it?
It's Vancouver, British Columbia.
Went up there with Paul Westfall, who's in the coach of the Sacramento Kings, Howard Slusher, who was then, may still be at Nike, and the Hutch, Ken Hutchison, the Reverend Dr. Ken Hutchison, where I met the Hutch.
And Slusher had won this trip bidding at an auction for some fundraiser somewhere.
And I, well, it's not the first time.
I'd been fishing when I was a kid over in Illinois, and we caught something like 20,000 bluegill or carp or something, whatever.
Bluegill, I mean, it stunk up my hands for, I can't tell how many ways I want to know part of it.
Just not a big, I love the water, but not being out on it.
So, anyway, go up there.
We have these tour guides, and they take us out on these little boats, and a couple of us, well, I caught a salmon, but a damn sea lion waited until I'd almost roped it all in and then came and just gobbled it up off the hook.
In fact, there's a story, I had the story yesterday.
They're treating somewhere up in Oregon sea lions as criminals because they do this.
They're predators of salmon, and the salmon are protected.
This is one for PETA, because who do you side with here?
The salmon are wiping out, are getting wiped out by the sea lions.
And the story is hilarious.
that treats the sea lions as a bunch of Al Capones.
They don't go as far as Mirandais, but they're talking about punishing them and cordoning them off and doing...
It's hilarious.
Anyways, I'm not a big angler as it is, but I know a lot of people who are.
I know a lot of people, former professional athletes, who go into shock after hearing they can't go fishing anymore because of Obama.
I wonder what the sports media is going to say about this.
Jim Hoft at the gateway pundit Obama's latest assault on freedom.
New regulations will ban sport fishing.
He wants to ban sport fishing.
And there's 600, I think it's Barack Obama has a message for America's 60 million anglers.
We don't need you.
So I wonder what all these Namby-Pamby little sports writers are going to think about this.
Because they're going to be conflicted.
They're going to be conflicted because animals are animals and they shouldn't be savaged by us.
And Obama is a great young man-child president and so forth.
If I had to make a prediction, I'd say the sports writer community will come out against fishing.
And this is long overdue.
It's inhumane.
It's Obama's right.
I hope I'm wrong, but I seldom am.
Mary in Tampa, welcome to the EIB Network.
Great to have you here.
Thank you, Rush.
It's a pleasure speaking with you.
Thanks very much.
Obama's health care is, I mean, they make issues about comparing it to auto claims.
Well, I'm an adjuster, and I deal with non-standard, meaning people that can't get insurance.
What they do is they come down.
Let's take an example, New Yorkers.
They come down here, they buy the basic minimum required for the state.
Well, they live in New York.
So what happens if they get an accident there?
We as the insurance company have to up our limits because we're required by the state.
So if they get rid of this state to state and let us just buy insurance, it would be the same as health insurance.
Get rid of this torque garbage.
Oh, yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about.
I mean, it's like we pay the minimum down here in New York, the premium to hire.
Of course, they're going to come down here and pay for that, and then they live there and have accidents.
And then they, you know, wait just a second here.
I'm confused by one thing you said.
You're talking about people who buy insurance, but you deal with people who can't.
Oh, no, no.
We deal with people who have like tons and tons of traffic incidents and things for that nature.
So we charge them more money, which means non-standard.
Ah, yes.
Okay.
Well, that's generally how it works.
And, you know, if you want more health coverage, it generally is going to cost you a little bit more money.
What I'm saying is, though, most insurance companies have these issues where people, let's say from New York, come down here, buy their insurance, live in New York, and then they have accidents in New York.
We being down here, we're not required to carry BI, but New York is bodily injury coverage.
So we as the insurance, they're not paying the premium for that coverage, but because New York mandates it, we have to give it to them, which is $25,000.
So, I mean, there's premiums.
Wait a second.
I'm still kind of confused here, and it's because of my hearing limitation, my cocoa input.
Are you basically, Mary?
Are you basically saying that New Yorkers are a bunch of cheapskate type wads that are trying to game the system?
They come down here, buy cheap auto insurance from you, go to New York where they have none, and then your company has to pay when they screw up and have a wreck.
You betcha.
Okay, I heard her correctly.
I thought so, but I just wanted to double check.
Yes.
So what you're telling me is that the consumer is not some little angel running around getting screwed and shafted by the insurance company.
There are a lot of consumers out there trying to screw and shaft the insurance company.
Is that what you're saying?
And exactly.
And then paying the higher premiums because we're dealing with folks.
Now, wait a minute.
That can't be true because President Obama says that every one of us is clean and pure as the wind-driven snow.
We are innocent.
And it's only people like you who are predatoring against us.
That you are screwing us and shaving us and raising our premiums.
And by God, he's going to stop it.
He's going to raise them higher.
Well, let him pay for it then.
You know, I'm a woman.
I'm a minority.
And, you know, so be it.
If I'm a racist, I'm against the guy.
I'm a racist.
But you know what?
I have to pay for my premium.
Let him have them pay for it.
Well, that explains it all to me.
The fact that you can pay for your premium means that you're not in touch.
You don't know what life is really like as an American.
Well, you know what?
I'm sick and tired of hearing these people whining and complaining about, you know, not having it.
Well, you're not entitled to it.
Nowhere in the Constitution or the Bill of Rights says that you're entitled to have any freaking coverage.
Go out and get it.
Work for it.
Yeah, you know, you, you, uh.
I'm sorry.
No, I don't live.
I'm not.
No, no, no.
No, no, no.
Snurdy, she's not mean-spirited.
She's dealing with New Yorkers.
How the hell can she be mean-spirited?
Yeah.
See?
New York, California, Ohio.
We're going to have all these springbreakers down here.
You know, they can't seem to freaking drive.
I got to pay for their premium.
What do you mean, springbreakers can't drive?
Why can't they freaking drive?
Because they're drunk.
Oh, you know, it's teenagers.
Come on.
Well, that just means, but you have to, if you were selling health insurance, you'd still have to insure them for being drunk and somehow make it your fault.
I know, but you know what, though?
I say, you know, get rid of the lawyers, get rid of the court reform, and watch how people can actually go out and afford to pay for their own coverage.
And it's really, and I get sick of hearing them saying insurance.
It's coverage.
It's not insurance.
It's coverage.
Coverage for something that could happen.
It's something against something happening.
You know, I mean, it's kind of like I get really, I'm just aggravated with the whole thing.
Yeah, I can tell you're aggravated.
Yeah, because I've got to work, you know, eight hours a day, and I've got to go out and pay for my things.
I've got two kids.
I go to school at night.
I mean, I'm working my butt off, but I got to turn around and give it to somebody else who I know are out there staging fraudulent claims and accidents and things like that.
Look, I hate to tell you, if you think the New Yorkers are bad, just wait till the New Jersey people get here.
We'll be back after this.
You know, I am in such hot water now.
People in New Zealand are sending me emails saying, how come you're not coming here?
You've been telling everybody you're moving to New Zealand.
Now you say you're going to Costa Rica.
I did not say I'm going to Costa Rica.
Stupid people in the media who cannot trouble themselves to read my transcripts or listen to this program, listen to out-of-context stuff.
I was asked yesterday, where will I go for health care if Obama's health care passes?
And I said, if doctors here are not permitted to form private practice little clinics with individuals paying a fee and a retainer and for services, then I'll go to Costa Rica to get major medical health care.
Didn't say I would move there.
They're all over these websites.
Limbaugh says he moved to Costa Rica.
Why, what more incentive do we have to pass health care to get Limbaugh to move to Costa Rica?
Now, New Zealand's reading about this, and they're all been out of shape that I'm somehow not coming there.
All because of stupid media.
Costa Rica doesn't.
No, they're no competing for me because Costa Rica doesn't think I'm going to move there, which I wouldn't.
Gosh.
Anyway, get this.
More candy from Washington, ladies and gentlemen.
The federal government, U.S. regulators may dedicate spectrum.
This is broadcast spectrum to free wireless internet service for some Americans to increase affordable broadband service nationwide, according to the FCC.
FCC provided few details about how it would carry out such a plan and who would qualify.
They're going to give away internet service next.
But not to everybody.
Just certain people.
Nobody's going to pay for it, sternly.
Well, your children are grandchildren.
We don't have the money for this.
We don't.
Let's go to MSNBC last night, hardball with Chris Matthews, spoke with Salon.com's news editor Steve Karnaki about the Republican Party.
Matthew said, Look, Republicans are doing very well in polls as the no party.
People unhappy with the economy, unhappy with the direction of the country right now.
Republicans are benefiting in terms of poll numbers.
But when you get the reality of the Republican Party, you get sticky business.
Sarah Palin, extreme polarizer.
People think she's nowhere near the weight you have to be to even be thought of as presidential material.
And then you have other people in the party who think she's just dandy.
It seems like there's a difference between how popular they've become because of the unpopularity of the Democrats, and yet they're not ready for prime time.
Steve, what do you think about it?
If I were Steve Kornacki, I'd say, what did you just say?
What do you want me to answer?
But Cornaki thought he got it, and here's his answer.
The Republicans are really in danger here, I think, of falling into a trap.
That's the thing you have to look at with the Republican Party.
The party of Sarah Palin, the party of Rush Limbaugh, can win in 2010.
But that same party can't turn around, I believe, and win in 2012.
And the trap for the Republicans is: if they have a very good November, if they pick up 25, 30 House seats or more, if they pick up five or more Senate seats, they're going to take it as vindication for their strategy for 2009-2010.
And that's going to set him up for real trouble in 2012.
Now, this guy is supposedly some brainiac at salon.com.
I don't know how the Republicans could take victory in 2012 as a vindication of their strategy when there isn't one.
What's happening here is, Mr. Cornacki, is that independents and Democrats are running as far away and as fast as they can from Obama.
And Obama's still going to be there in 2012.
He's still going to be there.
What this guy's trying to say, don't you, Republicans, don't think conservatism is going to win for you because that's not what's going to win for you.
Yeah.
Falling into the tap of winning big by going right.
And then Jesse Ventura.
Now, do you remember when he was governor?
Jesse Ventura to come on this show.
We were buds.
Well, I mean, we're not close friends, but we were buds.
And I ran into Jesse Ventura at a golf tournament.
He was nice as he could be.
Now, Jesse Ventura is on Larry King Live last night, got some sort of television show.
And Larry King said while popping the suspenders, what do you think?
Winning the American Tea Party?
This is just more of a right-wing movement to try to make it look like we're turning socialist or something.
The state of Hawaii has had state-run health care for over 40 years, and it works fantastic there.
In fact, Rush Limbaugh even got treated there and said how great it was before he found out that it was state-run health care.
It was a private hospital.
I have explained.
How many times have I had to explain this?
The libs are all out there trying to say that I went to the socialist health care system and came back praising it.
I paid for every penny of it.
Nobody else in Hawaii paid for it.
It was a private hospital with private doctors and everything else.
Oh, well, just more of the same.
Who's next, nerdly?
Jim in Williamsville, New York.
Great to have you on the program.
Hi.
Rush Pardigas, Lusitania, Cigar Smoke, and Doodles to you from a 15-year veteran list or a first-time caller.
Thank you.
Where are these Pardigas cigars from?
I get them from Toronto.
Ah, good.
Good.
What a Canadian citizen.
Congratulations.
Yeah, congratulations.
Yeah.
Hey, listen, an interesting sidebar to that Eric Massa mess for Democrats.
You know, our besieged governor, David Patterson, will be charged with naming a replacement for Massa.
And I'm wondering if there's any chance, do you think that Patterson acts some revenge on Obama, Emmanuel, Cuomo, the whole Democrat gulag by appointing a Republican, or at the very least, a dino, a Democrat in name only?
Are you sure that Patterson appoints, or is there a special election?
I am reasonably sure that Patterson will be appointing the replacement, assuming that he doesn't resign in the next 60 or 90 days.
Well, let's assume you're right.
So David Patterson will become the Massa who gets to appoint whoever gets to take Massa's place.
So for the first time in his life, Patterson is going to be a Massa.
Interesting.
Interesting.
Would he choose a Republican or a Dino?
A Democrat in name only.
You know, it would be great if he chose Harold Ford or put himself in the seat.
Interesting.
Thanks for the call out there, Jim.
We'll be back.
Washington Post, breaking news.
Eric Massa investigated for groping male staffers, multiple male staffers.
So he won't be interested in this story.
This is some Reuters.
Wine may be good for women's waistlines.
Light to moderate alcohol consumption, especially red wine, is not only good for a woman's heart, it's also good for her waistline, according to a study reported Monday.
I think Maureen Dudd might be happy, but she drinks white wine.
And this says red.
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