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Oct. 12, 2010 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:40
October 12, 2010, Tuesday, Hour #3
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As many of you people who have listened to this program for any length of time at all know, I am fascinated by how people think.
That is something that interests me more than a lot of other things about people, how they think.
I'm always fascinated with what I learn.
well Some people don't think.
Some people are, well, I mean studiously thinking, but he thinks it would be brain activity, but some people just reactionary or their parrots or their parasites or what have you.
But as I look for reasons, and I'm I'm I'm interested in reasons why there is a cultural divide.
I'm interested in reasons why there's a political divide.
I mean, I know who liberals are, but it doesn't compute with me.
I could never be one.
Therefore, I love to know how they think or how they feel.
What is it that makes them?
And in the process of doing this, it has been a worthwhile exercise on my part because that is why I am able to tell you in advance who they are and what they're going to do.
Because this has led to a lifelong of study, lifelong study of these people.
And liberals are capable of being typecast.
There's not a whole lot of individuality within the sphere of liberalism, because they are guided by and governed by their political beliefs.
Now I have an opportunity to engage in such an exercise this very day.
There is a column in the Washington Post by a woman by the name of Anne Applebaum.
Now I think I might have referenced things in past columns she's written.
I don't remember, but the name rings a bell.
But beyond that, I don't know who she is.
She's just a columnist.
And the title of her column is The Rise of the Ordinary Elite.
Now you and I have been discussing elites for quite a while on this program, the Inside the Beltway ruling class elites.
This piece that she has written affords us an opportunity to find out how the elites think about elitism.
And it's much different than the way you and I think about it.
Strikingly so.
Let me demonstrate.
Here's how she begins the piece.
In 1958, an English sociologist and labor party politician named Michael Young imagined a future in which the British establishment dissolved itself, abolished all forms of hereditary power, i.e.
inheritance and so forth, and created instead a meritocracy, which is a word that Michael Young invented.
The word meritocracy, I guess, is attributable to this guy in 1958, English sociologist Labor Party politician Michael Young.
So he imagined a future, the British establishment dissolved itself, abolished all forms of hereditary power, in other words, no Kennedys, and created instead a meritocracy based on IQ.
In Young's fable, the academically talented from the working class happily join the ruling class.
Now stick with me.
Stick with me on this.
You're not already.
If you think you know where this is going, you don't.
Thank you.
So you believed that the or imagined or hoped for, it's a fable.
A meritocracy based on IQ.
The academically talented from the working class would happily join the elite, the ruling class.
But the less talented resent their own working class IQ people even more than they represented the old dukes and duchesses.
By 2034, this resentment leads to a violent populist revolution that sweeps the meritocracy away.
Now Rimmer is a sociologist, and he's theorizing what would happen if certain dominoes fell in His theory.
He wasn't wishing for this as he's just a thinker.
We might have been wishing for it, I don't know, but whether or not he was, I'm not judging him.
That's not the point here.
Don't get caught up.
He's not the focus here.
But his he dreamed of one day we're having no longer are you somebody because of who your parents were.
You're somebody because of what you are.
But within the cohort of the working class, you take the high achievers out of it, the high IQ, and you put them in the ruling class, the remainder of the cohort working class so resents them, more than they represented the inheritors of wealth, that they revolt against all ruling class people and wipe them out, and the meritocracy goes away.
Meaning meritocracy alone will not sustain a culture or a population.
Ms. Applebaum says to some, this story has always seemed like a warning to America.
In 1972, the American sociologist Daniel Bell cited this and predicted with amazing prescience the rise of an anti-elite education populism.
Bell got one thing wrong, however.
He thought the coming attack on universities would take the form of enforced quotas and lowered standards.
In fact, American universities staved off that particular populist wave in the 70s by expanding their admissions to include women and minorities while keeping standards high.
But see, they didn't keep standards high.
This is the dirty little secret.
So in order to stave off this popular revolt against the elites, they let in members of the working class.
Women and minorities, while keeping standards high.
But they didn't keep standards high.
They had the lower standards to get these people in there.
There was, it was not a meritocracy.
But even that is not the point here.
Ms. Applebaum writes the result of that expansion, meaning all those high IQ minorities and women getting into universities.
That expansion is now with us.
Barack Obama, brought up by a single mother, graduate of Columbia and Harvard Law is president.
Muchell Obama, daughter of a black municipal employee, graduate of Princeton and Harvard Law is first lady.
They brought with them to Washington dozens more people, also from modest backgrounds, mostly not with inherited wealth, who have entered high government office thanks in part to their education.
Not that Washington wasn't staffed with such people already.
Think of Clarence Thomas.
Son of a domestic servant and a farm worker, graduate of Yale Law School and Supreme Court Justice.
So, let me stop and interpret this.
In her estimation, this original theory of the sociologist in England, Michael Young, has happened.
We now have an elite based on IQ.
Not inheritance or anything hereditary.
We've got it.
This has happened.
And they are represented by Obama and Michelle and everybody they've brought into town with them.
Now, my question do you and I consider the Obamas part of a meritocracy?
Do we consider them elites to have come from one of us?
We don't, do we?
They have nothing in common with us.
Meritocracy?
Um keeping standards high.
Where are all the articles Obama wrote while president of law review at Harvard?
Where are all the transcripts?
Where's the evidence of all the high standards?
But even that doesn't get to where I want to go here.
Ms. Applebaum is ignoring something here that the English sociologists never conceived.
Affirmative action.
That's why The standards were not kept high.
Even Michelle, my Belle Obama admitted she would have never gotten into Princeton or Harvard without it.
And affirmative action was a lowering of standards.
This is why people really didn't want to be considered affirmative action, babies, because it was a stigma.
You didn't get there on merit if affirmative action got you there.
You got there because the way was paved for you.
You see, you and I would argue that the way has been paved for Obama.
Whereas the way has not been paved for me.
I struck out on my own.
I mean, there's nobody in my family who could have pulled one string.
Maybe if I'd stayed in law, they could have.
But people in it, we were talking about this on this show just the other day, about how you and I, when I read Cod Villa's piece, The Work of the Ruling Class, the Working Class versus the Ruling, we are a meritocracy.
You and I believe that you get where you go based on performance.
You do your job better than anybody else, you'll be rewarded for it eventually with another job and another job, and eventually it all pays off.
We don't want to get where we get because of buzz.
You know, I there's a there's a radio figure.
I'm not going to mention any names here.
Nobody ever listened to this radio figure, but everybody thought he had all this power because five or six people in Washington did.
But nobody else did.
But he yet he was thought to be among the most prominent.
But in terms of meritocracy, no, it never happened.
And I always said, I don't want to be a number one because of buzz.
I don't want to be perceived number one because somebody in the media says I am.
I want to be because it can be proven that I'm number one with the way we measure it, i.e., ratings and revenue.
Well, the way Obama apparently has number one, he can't show us a proof.
The meritocracy, he will not show us the proof.
You and I believe that somewhere along the way, Obama had the way paved for him, that he had a professor or two somewhere to turn to C into an A. Uh that there was some guilt over the plight Obama had had, that we got out of the way, he's a victim, and so we're gonna make it good.
United States been sort of unkind to people like Obama, and we're gonna.
Whereas you and I don't think a whole culture has stepped aside to pave the way for us.
So I find this fascinating that Ann Ampelbaum looks at the Obamas and the czars that he's brought with him, and his cabinet, who have no experience earning a nickel.
There's not one of them that's not a payroll.
There's not one of them that has made a payroll.
There's not one of them who's had a job in his business advisors, not one of them has ever worked in the private sector.
And she writes a piece here that meritocracy, born of their IQ, has brought them to the highest levels you can achieve in American politics.
Whereas you and I, and therefore, they're elites because of their achievements.
They're not elites because of uh inheritance or because of the way beam.
I would see, I submit.
You go to Harvard, you go to Yale, you go to Carnell or Cornell or Princeton, all these Ivy League schools, that's the that's the minor leagues.
That's double A, triple A. That's where you're trained to be in government.
That's where you're trained.
How to dress, how to speak, kind of shoes to wear if you work at the State Department, you're trained.
That's where you're trained to navigate.
The um ladder of success.
And if you don't get into those schools, you have to do it on your own some other way.
In other words, the fact that you went to Yale says more about you than what you say about yourself.
The fact that you went to Harvard says more about Harvard or more about you than what you've actually done.
Just the fact that you got in.
No matter what you did there.
Not always, you can have a Harvard MBA, and they still think you're an idiot, as in George W. Bush.
But even so.
Angelo Codvilla's article, which has now been turned into a book, ruling class versus country class, we now have a piece in the Washington Post which posits that Obama is us.
And that Muchell Obama is us.
And that Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan are us.
Because their IQ enable them to achieve rank status in the elite.
But on the other hand, you know, I've achieved rank status and what I do.
I could never be, I would never ever be accepted.
Sarah Palin, meritocracy.
I mean, she started from nothing, PTA, going to local school districts, wins elections, becomes governor, vice presidential nominee.
Never once would she be accepted into the elite that Obamas are members of and everybody else in the Washington ruling class.
I just not much more than that.
I just I just find it fascinating to look how other people think.
All this discussion of the elites, the ruling class, and the working class, and I read a piece today from Anne Applebaum about whom I know very little.
So I'm not being critical.
Don't misunderstand here.
This all just fascinates me.
Helps me to understand who I'm dealing with.
Helps me to understand what I'm up against when I'm trying to communicate to other people about who they are.
Helps me to understand how they think of themselves.
Okay, so they're not elites.
They've somehow succeeded in becoming elites by virtue of merit.
Yet they won't even prove the merit to us.
They ignore affirmative action.
They ignore the fact that the way was paved.
For Sonia Sotomy, or for Elena Kagan for Mucello Barcelona, no show job at a Chicago hospital for 300 grand a year after her husband gets elected to the Illinois Senate.
All fine and dandy, but you know, that's that's the kind of stuff that hereditary connections get you.
Not merit.
She didn't get the jobs because she's better at it than anybody else.
She got it because her husband has influence.
It's closer to getting it because you inherited it than you achieved it.
So they're the elite.
They've cracked it, and so this guy's theory from 1958 has now been proven.
It's happened here.
Now, if we if we carry this out, and I there's much more to this, I'm still only halfway through a piece here, and I've got to take a break, but if we follow this through, the ascension to the ranks of the elite by the Obamas is going to so tick off.
Everybody else in their working class circle that there's going to be a total overthrow of the elites.
Well, that part may actually be true.
What is happening here?
It's Washington versus the rest of us.
That's kind of what's shaking out here.
The sociologists said this wouldn't happen here until about 2034.
It's 2010 or 24, 20 years ahead of schedule, if it happens.
There's much more here.
But I gotta take a break.
We'll do that.
We'll come back right after this.
Don't go away.
Now, if you go to Wikipedia and you look up Anne Applebaum, here's what you'll find.
Keep in mind this is Wikipedia.
Anne Applebaum's parents are Harvey M. Applebaum, a Covington and Burlington partner, and Elizabeth Applebaum of the Corcoran Gallery of Art.
She graduated from the Sidwell Friends Schruel.
She earned a B.A. at Yale as a Marshall Scholar at the London School of Economics.
She earned a master's degree in international studies, and she studied at St. Anthony's College in Oxford.
So she pretty educated herself.
High IQ elite.
Now, this piece was originally written in Ceylon, and it was about Christine O'Donnell.
And here's another passage from her column.
At one level, the use of elite to describe it to merit or merit merit simply means that the words lost its meaning.
As Jacob Weissberg points out, when Sarah Palin, Christine O'Donnell, or Justice Thomas's wife fling the word elitist at opponents, it often means nothing more than a person whose politics I don't like, or even a person who is snobby.
Ms. Applebaum, let me say the way we think.
You all are not elites simply because you went the Ivy League and have a uh an impressive array of universities you've attended.
It's how you view the world.
And it's how you view the American people.
It's how you view what makes the country great.
I mean, if you don't believe in American exceptionalism, how in the world can you believe in a meritocracy?
But you don't.
Most of the elites today think American exceptionalism it's pedantic.
I mean, that's for the serfs.
That's that's for the dumb trodden.
That's the carrot dangling at the at the end of the tunnel.
Maritime, American exceptionally, tell them they can be something too.
We know that's a bunch of BS.
That is how elites think.
But the concept of American exceptionalism is very real.
It's what's made this the greatest country on the face of the earth.
The fact that it is smirked at people who are elites.
The fact that the people who make the country work are smirked at and looked down on.
That's how we define elites, not where they went to school.
Not what they've achieved or not, it's their worldview.
And the fact that they have a superiority complex are better than everybody else.
Obama, Obama mentions affirmative action 14 times in his second autobiography, second autobiography, Audacity of Hope.
But he never, in 14 times of usage, he never uses it when talking about himself.
Like we said, fish don't know they're wet either.
They don't know that they live in water.
Obama doesn't.
If he had never been the editor of Harvard Law Review, we'd have never known who he was because he's never got a book contract.
Wait a minute.
I just remembered about Crystal Ball.
I didn't know I teased that.
Let me get to this audio sound by number 21.
This is um yesterday on Leaning Forward, it won't hurt much.
MSNBC Dylan Rathigan show.
He interviewed Virginia Democrat congressional nominee Crystal Ball.
That's with a K. During a discussion about an alleged double standard in politics regarding racy photos of male versus female candidates.
Radigan says, uh, Crystal, can you explain a double standard?
I saw a picture of this woman.
And at first, just to because this is about racy photos, she but there are apparently racy photos of her out there, and she's complaining about it.
Just so you'll know, I mean, I happen to see this woman on on TV 45 minutes ago, and then I know this we have the soundbite here on the roster, and I thought I was looking at Demi Moore at first.
That's what she looks like.
So now the question, Crystal, can you explain the double standard as you see it?
For years, women have been delegitimized and denigrated by being portrayed as horse.
And I can't believe that I'm on your show saying that word, but I think that's true.
The new twist is that now that we have Facebook, now that so many of us live so much of our lives online, and so much of it is recorded digitally, and what does that mean?
I think I'm sort of the first person who's had to face this particular thing, but I certainly don't think I'm the last.
So part of the reason that I believe this story has gotten so much traction is simply because we have to ask ourselves as a society, as people of my generation, both young men and young women, come of age and decide to run for office.
How are we going to handle this particular issue?
I I I should not admit this.
But um let me find the appropriate thing in the soundbite to react to.
Um I think I'm the first sort of person who's had to face this particular thing.
Crystal, I'm sorry, I don't know what you've had to face.
I don't know what news outlet has reported on whatever you've had to face, but I, El Rushboat, don't know what it is.
Do you know, Sturdley?
Have you heard?
I don't know what it is.
I uh see I I well, of course racy pictures, no, I understand this too.
I I was one of the ones who first sounded the warning bell about all these young people who want to vomit every bit of Information about themselves on my space, my butt, Facebook, all these places out there, they're totally willing to give up their anonymity.
Everybody wants 15 minutes of fame will do anything to get on TV.
And I said, this is gonna lead to nothing good.
Nothing good's gonna come out of this.
Because at some point these people are going to regret that everybody knows everything about them.
How many of us could run for office and withstand an average media exam of our life?
I mean, how many of us would want whatever we've done in our lives plastered all over television by a political opponent?
So apparently something she did, or something published about her that she thinks is negative, has happened because she's running for office, First District Virginia, and apparently it relates to Facebook or whatever.
There's racy pictures of her out there somewhere, and now somebody's called her a whore.
I I I don't know if somebody called her a whore.
I know somebody called Meg Whitman a whore and is not apologizing for it.
And I also know that when Scott Brown run ran for the Senate in Massachusetts, weren't there all kinds of beef cake pictures of him all over the place?
I mean, it's not just not just named at women.
Oh didn't he pose for some well, yeah, but but did he pose for some magazine?
He posed for Cosmo.
That's what he posed for Cosmo.
And so it's not it's not it's not just women.
Like I'm being told that there was a photo of I can't tell you what I never mind.
I I've been told what she did, but I I don't dare say it.
Well, that's what I can't tell you.
I've just I've just learning here through a flash note what there's a photo of her doing.
Yeah.
Well um, it's years ago, six years ago, the picture's six years old.
I she sounds kind of, I don't know how old she is now.
But see, she's 30, okay.
So this is when she's 24.
And the point is, she said, well, this has happened way back in my past.
If Facebook, my butt, my space, whatever.
And so, oh, I'm the first this has happened to no, Crystal, you're not.
Crystal, you're not the first person to whom this has happened.
This is the thing.
Every when I always tell you, people think that history began the day they were born.
Everybody's historical perspective begins the day they were born.
So poor Crystal Ball here thinks that this is the first time something's happened like this.
It happened to her.
No, Crystal.
I mean, we had Fanny Fox, we've had Wilbur Mills, we've had oh my gosh, there have been legions of them before you, Crystal.
Yeah, they're still trying to coax me to telling you what the picture is of her doing.
Now, those of you who have seen the picture know why I can't describe it.
You know why I can't describe what she's doing.
I mean, I not on this show.
I w I wouldn't do it.
No, it's not a Monica situation.
Well, well, what wait, wait, wait.
No, I can't.
I can't, with ontological certitude, say that it isn't.
There it the picture was taken at a Christmas party.
Let me see if I can say this without saying it.
Okay.
Christmas party.
Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer, Rudolph the Red nosed reindeer.
So people in costume.
Rudolph the red nose reindeer is there.
Red nose.
And yeah.
Except it's not his nose.
It's now there's certain that's another body part there.
They're looking for the pictures now.
The man was supposed to be Rudolph, but but wasn't.
I can tell by Sturdley's eyes he's found the picture now.
Folks, you'll try you you'll be happy.
You'll be happy that I didn't describe this for you when you eventually see this.
Yeah, think of Pinocchio.
Think of Pinocchio, and think of a well, then you don't have the right picture.
If If she's not, if she's not doing anything, if she just looking at at Rudolph the red-nosed ring, if she's just looking at it, then you don't have the right picture.
There are nine pictures all told.
If you just found one of them, then you haven't found the one that she's.
Okay, now that you know as close as I can get to telling you what this is all about, let's play the soundbite again.
Yesterday she's on Lean Forward, It Won't Hurt Much, MSNBC, Dylan Radigan Show.
She's running for Congress, first District Virginia named Crystal Ball.
And this uh conversations about an alleged double standard in politics regarding racy photos of male versus female candidates.
And she is asked to explain the double standard.
For years, women have been delegitimized and denigrated by being portrayed as force.
And I can't believe that I'm on your show saying that word, but I think that's true.
The new twist is that now that we have Facebook, now that so many of us live so much of our lives online, and so much of it is recorded digitally, and what does that mean?
I think I'm sort of the first person who's had to face this particular thing, but I certainly don't think I'm in the last.
So part of the reason that I believe this story has gotten so much traction is simply because we have to ask ourselves as a society, as people of my generation, both young men and young women, come of age and decide to run for office.
How are we going to handle this particular issue?
I find it fascinating.
She thinks it's the first time it's ever happened.
She's the first person it's happened to.
Well, it proves another theory of mine that people's historical perspective begins with the day they've been born.
Uh look at I, folks, there's no way I can win this.
If I withhold the information, all I'm doing is enticing you to go find it.
If I tell you where to go find it and you see it, you're gonna be mad at me.
There's no way to win here.
Okay.
Okay, you finally saw the one.
Did you what's the website that you saw it at?
Tell me what website uh.
All right, that's where it is.
That's where it is.
All right, this is folks in the audience.
I know this is I'm driving you nuts.
This is unfair, it's totally unfair.
I mean, I'm not doing this on purpose.
I'm I'm not I can't describe the I wouldn't just I mean I could easily describe it.
I'm not going to.
And I can tell you to go look at it yourself, but if you did, you still get mad at me for telling you to do that.
And then some of you are going to hear this on the podcast later listening with your kids.
I'm telling you, this is a no-win.
So you just have to use your if you want to if you want to find out what this is all about, you are on your own, just like I was.
And we'll be back after this.
All right, now uh we are back.
Uh L. Rushbow serving humanity here on the EIB network.
I have to tell you, if you go look at these pictures, there are nine of them in total.
If you find the website, um, know this.
These pictures are fairly innocuous compared to what the kids are putting up there today.
I mean, this really is nothing.
Depending on your generation and age, this is nothing compared to what else is out there.
Because of what a MySpace uh well, all these sites, uh cell phone cameras and so forth.
By the way, this you want to laugh.
Robert Fibbs, the White House press secretary, just told the White House press corps that the lifting of the deep water drilling moratorium in the Gulf in Alaska was based on policy process that got done faster than expected.
Right, okay, fine.
Just in time for an election.
But here's a dirty little secret.
Somebody call fibbs and say, what about the permit process?
Yeah, you may have lifted the moratorium, but how many permits are you granted for people to start drilling?
You can lift the moratorium and still make sure there's no drilling if you don't give any permits.
You know, people are still asking me about pictures.
I don't...
Um...
It is a challenge.
It is a communications challenge.
I I'm a specialist.
I'm a highly trained broadcast specialist.
I'm still struggling for a way to try to explain this to you without getting myself in trouble.
Um think of think at the photos look like ornaments you would see on Bill Clinton's Christmas tree.
If you try to conjure that image.
Um the Clinton's Christmas tree, the ornaments on Clinton's Christmas tree.
In the Oval Office.
You'll see once you find the pictures.
You know, we talk about life luck, and I always suggest to you you don't want to lose your identity.
Because it's a rotten thing to have to restore it.
Well, here's a story, an example of how difficult it is to get your identity back as student at Weber State University story is a prime example of how difficult it is to get your life back once your identity is stolen.
It's gotten to the point to where he's applying for a new social security number.
You know how hard that is when you already have a social security number and to get a second one?
You know how hard that you know how hard it is just to go in and have your current number confirmed.
Cameron Noble is a newly married 22-year-old student who is studying radiology at Weber State, but according to his social security number, he's a deadbeat dad in his 60s living in California.
He said it feels like it's never ending.
Fifteen years and it's still going.
It started when he was seven years old.
His parents tried to claim him as a dependent on their taxes, only to be told that Noble was too old.
In fact, his social security numbers show that he was older than his parents, and that his name was Jose Zavala.
His parents took care of the problem, or so they thought, and then this guy Noble got a job at the age of 16.
All of a sudden, he started receiving notices that his wages were being garnished for child support.
But it was really this Jose Zavala guy who owed the back child support, and he would continue to haunt Noble for years to give it.
It took 15 years, folks.
And ended up having to get a second social security number.
Now, you don't want to subject yourself to this, and you wouldn't have to if you have life lock.
1-800-440-4833 offer code rush, and you'll save what is money off an already ridiculously low price.
LifeLock offer code rush, 800-440-4833.
Rob in Felton, Delaware, great to have you on the EIB network.
Hello.
It's an honor and a pleasure to speak with you, Russ.
Thank you, sir.
Megadiddoes from the first state of Delaware.
Appreciate that, sir.
Great to have you with us.
I just want to let you know how right you have been and you are that this administration does not care for the hardworking American people.
True story.
I'm in the construction trade.
My beautiful lovely wife is a cafeteria worker in an elementary school.
Mm-hmm.
She was able to put about 70% down on our house.
Times got tough two years ago.
We were late three times on our mortgage payment.
Yeah.
Um we kept saying they refused to take any more after that.
And we called and we asked why, and they said, Well, we have a right to refuse any more payments if you're late three times in one year.
You put 70% down?
Yes, sir.
70% down, and they got you after they told you you're in trouble after you missed three payments?
Yes, sir.
70% down?
Yes, sir.
And so you went to the Obama home modification program to solve the problem, right?
That's correct.
And what happened?
Every program that was out there.
And this past year, um, there were delay processing, delay process processing.
We were denied everything.
Because the dirty dirty little secret is, I'm sad to say I'm out of time, but the dirty little secret is the Obama program was for public announcement only.
You get down and deep into it, and we've had the news stories.
Hardly anybody was aided or assisted by it.
But it sounded wonderful when the drive-by is reported that Obama cared, and all these people in foreclosure were going to be helped.
We'll be back.
No, the Clintons actually had, according to Gary Aldrich snurkly, the Clintons actually had that kind of stuff on their Christmas tree as ornaments, remember?
They actually did.
Gary Aldrich's book, former FBI agent.
Uh, you know, I don't know.
Think Anthony Wiener, folks.
I mean, you can say his name.
Democrat, member Congress.
See you tomorrow.
Look forward to it.
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