Rushlin Baugh and the Excellence in Broadcasting Network moving on in the fastest three hours, the fastest week of media, and it's already Friday.
Live from the Southern Command in sunny South Florida, it's open live Friday.
Back we are at 800-282-2882, and we'll get to your phone calls quick in this hour.
I fully intended to get to your calls in the previous hour, but something went wrong.
I just kept making more and more sense.
So I was on a roll.
I just kept on.
Sometimes it happens that way.
I did some research here at the top of the hour.
Krauthammer is calculating the $700 billion cost to the government in his figure of $1 trillion in reporting this big stimulus.
He says you have to.
I mean, if that $700 billion is government, money that the government's not getting, then you got to count it as money spent.
Now, that's how Obama looks at it.
But the point is, it's inane.
The tax rates are not changing.
They have been the same.
And nobody said the tax rates cost the government $700 billion last year.
Why all of a sudden this year?
I do not understand how something that's so simple, so logically simple, has been so easily, totally, manifestly distorted.
There are no, look it, you people are probably going nuts hearing me repeat this over and over again.
I apologize.
But with so many smart people not getting this, I somehow feel compelled here to keep drilling home the point that there aren't any tax cuts.
The rate stays the same.
Therefore, the revenue equation changes marginally, if any at all.
But to say that somehow the government this year is going to get charged $700 billion because tax rates stay the same, I really need to have somebody explain that to me.
And I, as you know, I reject the whole way of thinking, the whole premise that any of this costs government.
It's our money.
It all costs us.
Well, he thinks that I know he thinks the Democrats are missing what a great deal it is for them.
From their point of view, he thinks that I know the Democrats, they've got a slam dunk deal and they're missing it.
And it's apparent that they do think there are tax cuts in here.
No, no.
What's apparent is they were so counting on the rich getting soaked.
And that's not going to happen.
And that's the source of their anger.
That's what sent them over the edge.
They really thought it was going to happen.
And Obama not going for the jugular on the rich has just sent them over the edge.
It just has.
That's why all the F-bombs are being tossed out.
That's why all the disrespect.
I mean, there was another one for Obama.
This was just reported by the Hill from that idiot, Jim Moran of Virginia, said, this is a lack of leadership on the part of Obama.
I don't know where the F Obama is on this or anything else.
They're AWOL.
And Moran was talking about Obama's lack of leadership at Gitmo as well as the tax deal, because Gitmo's not closed yet.
The worst thing, if you can say that there is a worse thing, but clearly a bad thing about the deal in the long run, and this is going to be true for every deal for the next two years.
is because Obama has a bully pulpit and the media will be able to take credit for what works in this compromise and blame Republicans for anything that doesn't work.
And believe me, Obama's counting on that.
And that's why he wants to tie all of this to his reelection.
He's going to be able to take credit for what works, blame Republicans for anything that doesn't work, and use that bully pulpit that the media will amplify, and he'll be able to do it with every deal he strikes.
Every deal he makes, he will be able to make that point.
Here, let's go to the audio sunbike to continue.
Here's Peter DeFazio.
And this is last night on MSNBC's The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell.
And they're talking about the House Democrat caught us caucus a tax compromise.
O'Donnell says, we saw Democrat members of the House sign letters saying they absolutely would not ever vote for a bill that didn't have the public option in it for health care.
Over 100 signatures like that.
Every one of them voted for a bill that didn't have it.
But it does.
You see, at the end, it does.
Because they're turning here, what will happen is that private insurance, the private health care insurance industry is being turned into essentially utilities.
And then they'll go out of business and be taken over by the government, and that's how you're going to get the public option.
And it always was that way.
They're going to go to Canadian single payer.
It's going to happen, may take a few years, but it is going to happen.
It just didn't happen with the signature of the president on this bill, and the left got ticked off.
So O'Donnell says these non-binding sentiments that come out of the House are having less of an impact when they land out here with us.
Can you understand why we are doubting what the power is of these things?
I've been here 24 years.
Never has the Democratic caucus taken a position against a Democratic president like we did today, and it was nearly unanimous.
As far as I know, only one person out of the whole caucus voted no before we voted.
The press outside beyond the closed doors in the hallway could hear the chants, you know, from inside saying, just say no, just say no before a vote on my resolution.
We've been doing, since George Bush came to office, supply-side, trickle-down economics, and President Obama just doubled down on that.
Whoa.
This is what we're up against.
Not only are they wrong, they're just plain stupid.
They're just plain stupid.
The last two years have been George Bush supply-side economics.
The last two years have been a dream for these people.
National health care, trillions and trillions of dollars of deficit spending.
And they think that they're saddled with George Bush supply-side trickle-down economics.
I knew these people were angry.
I really didn't think they were this dumb.
Barney Frank last night, MSNBC, question.
What do you know about the nature of the seeming rancor between the White House and the House?
It's fairly strong, and I wish it hadn't been there, but I have to say that I blame the president for it.
It's one thing to have a difference of opinion.
And I was saying, look, I disagree with him, but let's not demonize each other.
Well, this continues.
Is Barney upset now that the White House is demonizing them?
Has Obama said F you to them?
I mean, not to stick up for Obama here.
So Obama's demonizing them in the House.
These Democrats are talking about their own president.
Here is, this is Lloyd Doggett, Democrat Texas.
After a meeting of the Democrat caucus, he went out and had a little press conference and said this.
We listened carefully to what the vice president had to say about it.
He was very articulate and presented it in a very reasonable way, but we've evaluated it and said if it's take it or leave it, we'll leave it.
Ha!
Biden articulate.
That'd be a first.
Biden articulate.
Doggett got a question this morning from Chris Danzing at MessNBC.
He said, the president's argument is that this is the alternative to what you're talking about is for everybody, including those people not making a lot of money in your district, waking up on January 1st with a big tax increase.
Are you prepared for that to happen if that's what it takes?
I'm prepared to work until January 1st to see that we get middle-class tax relief without a bonanza to the billionaires that won't create a single- And if it doesn't happen?
We have plenty of time in January to address this problem without having any adverse effect.
I understand the false sense of urgency that's been built here to justify this deal and all the claims that have been made.
And Anthony Weiner, oh, yeah.
Yeah, last night he showed up on CNN, the Situation Room, and the analyst Gloria Borger, if it comes back to the table and the Republicans say we're not going to vote for anything that doesn't include these tax cuts for the wealthy, which, by the way, are $95 billion in this whole cut package, will you walk away from it?
It's funny how everything is couched in, well, the Republicans won't go along if, dot, dot, dot.
Well, you know what?
There are other people in Congress.
We control the House, the Senate, and the presidency right now.
We should be driving a very hard, forceful bargain and trying to rally the American people to our side.
Well, go for it.
You're not going to succeed at that.
You guys just had the American people throw you overboard.
But he is right about one thing.
Right now, they do have all the power, and they don't have to do a single bit of compromising if the deadline is December 31st.
This is why I'm saying, why are we dealing with them now?
Wait till the cavalry gets there.
Wait till we run the show.
Doesn't that also make sense?
Especially when you look at how little we're getting out of all this.
Open line Friday and back to the phones or to the phones since we haven't been there yet.
Sarasota, Florida.
Rob, you're next.
Hello, sir.
Hello, Rush.
Hi.
Oh, hi.
Rush, it's an absolute honor to speak with you.
And this has been driving me crazy all week.
I have two quick points.
The Libs say extending the current tax rates, the Bush tax rates, would add to the deficit and debt.
Well, the payroll tax is essentially Social Security and Medicare taxes.
And they're already broke.
So a 2% reduction of payroll taxes into Social Security would just make the problem worse and add to the shortfall.
Point number two, the Libs also say paying unemployment benefits is the best thing we can do to stimulate the economy.
We've heard Nancy Pelosi, excuse me, all the Libs talking about how much of a stimulus it is to pay unemployment benefits.
Better than windmill farms and better than the Chevy Volk.
So if that's true, why not use unspent stimulus money to pay for the unemployment?
And they need to be nailed on this.
And that's what I have to say.
Well, We have asked that question prior to today.
We've actually given the answer to it, too.
The reason they don't want unemployment benefits paid out of stimulus is because that stimulus is a slush fund for their re-election in 2012.
That stimulus was all about election campaigns in 2010 and 2012.
It's not about nothing.
It's about nothing else.
And they want more spending.
There's I mean, they're not on the page that says we've got to reduce spending or even pay for the spending that we engage in.
They just want more.
I mean, that's half of the reason why they're proposing this unemployment extension.
They just want to spend more money.
That's how they're buying votes.
That's how they expand the base of their party in their thinking.
Pure and simple.
They don't care about their country.
They don't care about any of these things.
They don't care about the unemployed.
If they cared about the unemployed, they'd be doing everything differently than what they're doing.
They are perpetuating unemployment.
They are extending unemployment, not just unemployment benefits.
They are robbing people of their dignity.
They are doing deleterious things for everybody that lives in this country in the name of compassion and in the name of expanding their base and their importance and their power.
Pure and simple.
Joe in Jefferson City, Missouri.
Hi.
Thank you, Rush, for giving voice to the common person.
And I've got a small point of order.
If we adopt the verbiage of the left, it's going to be hard to win an argument.
My point is we don't really tax the rich.
We tax productivity in this country.
The rich people, people think about guys like Warren Buffett.
He collects a salary of $100,000, but most of his money comes from dividends, which is taxed at a single digit to a 10% rate.
That's right.
And then we have our good friends, the Kennedys, and their money is tied up into tax-free accounts or anyway.
Well, they're clipping coupons on municipal bonds.
They've got a lot of tax-free things there.
Plus, they've got trust after trust after trust that was set up by old Joe after he made a mint selling short in the stock market.
Okay.
Getting back to my point is what we do is we tax productivity, and the more productive you are, the more the government takes.
Our system is actually evil and is immoral because the harder you work, the more the government takes.
But if you want to sit home and watch TV, the government will pay you to be non-productive.
That's mostly true.
Well, it's exactly true.
It's mostly true.
The other thing I want to help out, people understand why lowering taxes increases economic activity.
Now, it's been proven that when a dollar is in a community, it generally changes hands seven times before it leaves that community.
So if a dollar is in the community, it's going to travel around seven times.
And each time that dollar changes hands, the government gets a cut of that money.
But if you raise taxes, that's like turning on a giant vacuum sweeper, sucking all the spare money out of the community, so that inhibits the economic activity, and the overall revenues go down to the government.
Yeah, I never thought of it quite like the giant vacuum cleaner, but you got a point there.
Well, Rush, see, you're at the top.
I'm at the bottom.
I'm just giving you a different perspective.
Well, I appreciate that.
I really do.
I'll go back to the drawing board on this and make sure that I understand it.
Okay.
That's Open Line Friday, False Church, Virginia.
Ellen, welcome to the program, madam.
Nice to have you here.
Oh, thank you so much for taking my call, Rush.
Maybe you addressed this in the past couple of days, but can you help me understand why John Boehner and Eric Cantor are supporting Hal Roger's appointment as chairman of the Appropriations Committee?
Yeah, I think I can.
You want to know why?
Yes, I do, please.
Well, it's about seniority, number, well, if it's even number one, but seniority is part of it.
Also, having people who you know and can trust to do your bidding are going to be there.
That's why you put Fred Upton over at Energy.
I mean, the substance.
Congressman Rogers is known as the Prince of Pork.
Yep.
And we sent a resounding message this past November.
I wrote emails to Boehner and Canter yesterday to say this is not what we voted for.
And it's infuriating.
We are finally going to be in charge once again, and I don't want them to blow it.
It makes us look like hypocrites.
No, it doesn't make you look like hypocrites.
Well, as Republicans, it makes us look like hypocrites.
Oh, you mean in the eyes of, well, yeah, yeah, okay.
But you're really not.
You didn't vote for this.
That's what you're angry about.
Yes, I am.
You didn't vote for the king of pork or earmarks to be in charge of appropriations.
Now, the way they're handling this is we've talked to Hal, and we made sure Hal understands here.
My point is, if you have to talk to somebody long after they've been an adult to get their mind right about what happened in the election, it's like if you've got to go talk to Fred Upton and explain, Fred, you know, that light bulb band that you led, that really is not what we're about here.
We're about free markets, and we don't think the government ought to be interceding.
And Fred says he gets it now.
Well, the fact that you have to explain it to Fred argues against putting Fred on the committee in the first place.
So these are, look at Boehner's buddies.
I pointed out earlier in the program, Democrats have not changed their leadership, and neither have we.
So you could arguably say that on the surface, nothing appears to change.
Dennis Columbus, nice to have you on the EIB network.
Hello.
Hey, Rush, how are you doing?
You know, for five generations, my family has complained about taxes.
I've heard my great-grandfather talk about them.
And for me, my employment history has covered five variations of the Congress and or the presidency, starting with Reagan.
So I don't care who's in office.
One way or another, they're digging deeper into my pocket.
And if you start with Reagan, while he didn't raise taxes, what he did do was eliminate the credit card and car payment interest deductions, thereby influxing more money into the government coffers.
You know what happened to Bush 41.
He said no new taxes and he got slaughtered.
Clinton one time cut taxes.
It's either in 03 or 07, I forget, but he cut taxes for the bond market.
And it just keeps going.
I don't know where it ends.
Last year alone, I paid almost $20,000 in federal income tax.
I mean, I'm speaking.
I think more and more people are starting to be educated as you are on this, and that's why the election results last November, what they were, it's going to take time.
You may not have seen this, folks, in a roll call yesterday.
They have a story here basically saying that the Democrat caucus that's voting on the tax bill does not include those who were defeated in the election or those who are retiring.
The only Democrats allowed to vote are the most leftist among them, and they're the ones calling the shots.
Well, maybe no big deal to you, but I think it's fascinating.
Pelosi saying to the guys that lost and to the retirement, you get out of here.
You're not part of us anymore.
You shamed us.
You lost or you're quitting.
And by definition, that leaves the far-leftist fringe are the ones voting on this, and they are the ones shouting all the F-bombs at their president, Imam Obama.
And they're the ones, by the way, from whom we have sound bites.
The most ridiculous, stupid, dangerous soundbites of people we've heard in a long time.
These people are genuinely nuts.
Now, I want to go back and make a point here about the $700 billion Krauthammer and a number of people using, particularly the Democrats, saying that the current tax rates, keeping them the same, income tax rates, will cost the government $700 billion in two years.
How can that be?
It doesn't seem possible.
That would mean these tax rates have been there for 10 years.
It would mean these tax rates have cost the government that much every two years.
That would mean that the government has lost $3.5 trillion over the last 10 years because of the Bush tax cuts.
Now, does anybody really believe this?
This is a made-up number.
$3.5 trillion?
It has to be the number if in two years $700 billion will be not going to the government.
Boohoo.
So this is a patently made-up number.
And it's very close to Obama's favorite number of $900 billion.
And he's the one that made it up.
And a bunch of other Democrats start going along with it.
But even that, even if the $3.5 trillion is true, I simply reject this way of thinking that letting people keep more of their money costs the government.
The government ought to work with what it gets after fair, proper taxation of the people.
The notion that government has to come first and then the rest of us deal with what's left over when we are the producers.
Sorry, that offends my sensibilities.
And it offends my tax bracket.
It offends my back pocket, my wallet, and my checkbook all in one.
But that's where we are.
So two years, the same taxes, they cost the government $700 billion.
My heart bleeds.
And that's just, by the way, that's just the top rate, folks.
We're just talking about the 36% rate.
We're not talking about all taxes.
They're trying to tell us that keeping a 36% bracket at 36% is going to cost $700 billion over two years.
And that's if a 36% rate went back up to 36.9, then the figure would be zero.
Wouldn't cost the government anything, which also is absurd.
So that 36% rate for 10 years has cost the government.
It's even more ridiculous.
$3.5 trillion.
Who's next?
Vicki in Biloxi, Mississippi.
Nice to have you on Open Line Friday.
Hi.
Hi, Russ.
How are you today?
Very well.
Thank you.
Well, I was listening to your program yesterday while I was on my lunch break, and I was listening to the part about the kids who are over in England protesting because they have to pay higher tuition for their college education.
That's right.
Let me tell you, I have two daughters who are both in college, freshmen, one is a sophomore.
Both of them are working two and three part-time jobs to help pay their tuition.
And they get very little financial assistance.
Both are on scholarships.
But as you all know, scholarships do not pay everything.
They only pay a certain amount of money because they're not full-ride scholarships.
My husband and I are the epitome of the working class poor.
But we're Republicans.
We're staunch Republicans.
And it just pisses me off to no end that these kids over there are protesting.
And here my kids are out working two or three part-time jobs just to put themselves through college.
And, you know, I don't feel bad that they have to do that because they want a college education.
They know that it's important that they have that.
And they're willing to do what it takes to get their education.
And it just infuriates me.
Well, me too.
And the thing is, you know, like I said, we're working class poor.
My husband is a disabled American veteran.
You know, I have a part-time job.
And, you know, we have a lot of- You have a part-time dog?
Pardon?
You have a part-time dog?
No, job.
I have a part-time job.
Job?
Job.
Yeah.
I have a part-time job.
And, you know, we're just barely making it.
And it just, it infuriates me to no end.
You know, I have one daughter who's trying to save up to buy a laptop for college.
You know, there's tuition.
Let me warn you of something because all that's coming here.
All of that is headed our way.
A couple weeks ago when I saw the first protests, as you know, if you were here, it ruined the day.
I was so ticked off.
I was so cynical and sarcastic all day.
I was calling them names.
You know, these freeloader rock and roller mefem types.
Let them pay for it themselves.
I got so fed up with the notion that somebody ought to be paying for everybody else.
Whatever these kids want, somebody else ought to be paying for it.
But that's what their system has taught them.
Hello, socialism.
And now they happen to be unfortunate enough to be alive at a point where the system's bankrupt.
By the accident of their birth, these kids are learning reality.
But they've grown up hearing about how all their colleges paid for, and it's part of their life as written.
And this is what it means.
And all of a sudden, they got to pay for it.
Something happened yesterday that has a lot of people really upset.
And that is Prince Charles and Camilla were on the way to the theater and they're in their Rolls-Royce limo.
And somehow that Rolls-Royce limo ended up in the middle of all this, and paint was thrown at it, and somebody, Prince Charles or somebody, rolled down a window to wave at these kids, and somebody jabbed a piece of wood in there and started poking Prince, Camilla Parker Bowles, in the ribs.
And the driver of the Prince's Rolls-Royce happens to be a cop, and he sped off, somehow found a way out of the crowd and sped off.
The cops were this close to pulling out their guns and starting shooting people.
Now, this is a monumental security breach.
This is the heir to the throne.
Now, I know it's just symbolic, but still, the security around these people is supposed to be impenetrable.
And they end up in the middle of this, and somehow a window gets rolled halfway down, and some malcontent kid starts poking Camilla Parker Bowles in there.
Now, they were on their way to the theater, some royal thing, and they showed up, and they were composed but shaken, it was said.
Now, I want to warn you people, the Republicans are going to take control of the House.
I want you to be prepared for similar type angry protests, which will largely be orchestrated but made to look spontaneous.
This will be part and parcel of the left's attempt to dissuade anybody from ever voting Republican again, because there's going to be, let me put it this way, I'm not going to actually predict it, but I'm just going to tell you I will not be surprised if these kinds of violent protests and it'll all be about economic things.
Remember, this election is about cutting spending.
We don't have money to keep giving away to people.
Obama's going to keep trying.
At some point, there will be legislation to cut spending here, cut spending there, and some of it is going to affect kids in their education, and they're going to go hog crazy like out in Santa Cruz, Santa Barbara, all over Berkeley, San Francisco, L.A., it's going to happen.
It's going to happen in New York City.
And it has the potential to be really bad, and it's going to occur under the same auspices, and that is these kids are entitled, and here come the Republicans taking it all away now and giving it to their rich friends.
Remember, the theory here is these guys on the floor of the Senate and the House last night, like Bernie Sanders, were saying that the rich are waging a war against the poor, that the rich are guaranteeing that your kids and grandkids are going to be poor, that they won't have any money because the rich are taking it.
Okay, so the media will amplify that.
They'll say, Bernie Sanders is saying, a local Democrat today said, blah, blah, kids will hear it.
They'll then see their budget cuts on their precious little items, and then they'll associate this with the Republicans.
Prince Charles had to shove Camilla Parker balls down on the floor.
It got so bad in there.
They broke a passenger window in an armored Rolls-Royce.
This is the same kind of people that are throwing F-bombs at the president of the Democrat caucus.
So I'm not trying to scare anybody, but this is a leftist tactic.
Violent protests and so forth.
And when the Republican majority sets in, I mean, you saw how it was with Bush and the Iraq War and Code Pink and these people infiltrating congressional hearings and so forth.
It's going to get, it's going to be just as bad, if not worse.
And especially if some of the spending affects our precious children and their precious education that they expect everybody else to pay for.
You wait.
I read something today.
Rich Lowry had a piece at National Review and a statistic in there that I didn't know.
What percentage of the American workforce do you think has graduated college?
We hear about education all the time.
We hear about how necessary a college degree is.
We hear about all the people that go to college.
It's all graduations every May.
Every fall, we got the fall class graduating, people going to work, other than now during the recession.
But the impression is a lot of people in the workforce have college degrees.
What do you think the actual percentage is?
What would you guess, Dawn?
Well, I'll guess.
It's 30%.
30% of the American workforce has a college degree, according to Richard Lowry.
30% of those working have a college degree, meaning 70% of the workforce does not have a college degree.
If you attach to this the old adage that you don't make any money in this country unless you're educated, unless you have a college degree, that obviously isn't true.
There's have to be a lot of people in that 70% that are doing quite well that don't have a college degree.
And you might say even now that during the recession, a lot of people with college degrees don't have anything.
Can't find a gig right now because of the employment situation.
Anyways, you hang tough out there, folks.
We'll be right back.
Leave it to Harry Reid to think about trying to change the tax deal that Senate leaders cut with Obama earlier this week.
Now, this is the stuff that the folks at Heritage Foundation live for.
They have been picking this thing apart, seeing somebody try to take a deal, bend it as far away from the conservative principles as possible, and try to substantiate it until he or she is busted for the absolute insanity of the idea.
And that's, wait till you hear a list of the pork in this bill.
And you can always count on the researchers at Heritage to blow the whistle on stuff like this because they got their eyes trained for such things.
This is what they live and breathe for.
It's just one of the many benefits members of a Heritage Foundation get when you join, the comfort and satisfaction to know that somebody is there studying to provide you details that you'll only find elsewhere here on this program.
And sometimes they beat us.
We steal from, well, I don't steal.
I'm a member.
I use their stuff.
Make yourself a member at Heritage.
You go online to askheritage.org and join for any membership fee you want.
You start at 25 bucks a year.
It's a great Christmas gift to give yourself or anybody else.
And you'll be in good company, more than 700,000 of us out there.
AskHeritage.org is the address.
You want to hear some of the stuff?
I mean, first off, there is tax credit for biodiesel, a tax credit for ethanol extensions, tax credit for energy-efficient homes and appliances, and credits, tax credits for training mine rescue teams.
It would allow millions of dollars worth of expensing for film and production companies doing work in the United States, because a lot of them are going to Canada now with the expenses.
It would allow millions of dollars for the rum trade in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.
It would provide incentives for investment in the District of Columbia.
It would provide other benefits for the battered Gulf Coast.
Now, the ethanol subsidy, the 45 cent per gallon ethanol subsidy alone extended through 2011, was estimated to cost about $5 billion.
In all, the package would cost about $855 billion, according to a preliminary congressional estimate.
That does include the $700 million it will cost the government to extend the tax.
Still, folks, everybody thinks this is a bill to extend the current tax rates and beat the deadline of their expiration, which is January 31st.
And here at the end here, Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell has said he expects most Republicans in the Senate to support the bill.
Prominent House Republicans back it too, though some conservatives have balked over the sheer size of the package and particularly over the unemployment aid, which is about, well, it's either 56 or 65 billion.
I'm confused, but this has long ago ceased being a tax bill.
It's a last-minute giant magnet for the dreams of the going-away Democrat majority in the House.
That's what this is.
Pork earmarks, the stuff that was rejected in November.
Bernie Sanders is filibustering the tax deal.
As we speak, he's sitting there.
He launched his filibustering.
He's actually filibustering.
He's been talking since 10.30 this morning, 10.25, something like that.
And I don't know how long he's going to go, but imagine Obama has actually done some unity here, me and Bernie Sanders.