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Jan. 5, 2011 - Rush Limbaugh Program
35:01
January 5, 2011, Wednesday, Hour #3
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Time Text
Yeah, the Pelosi filibuster is over and Boehner is now delivering his opening remarks.
We'll jip them here in just a second.
Pelosi are pretty classy.
It's the classiest I've ever heard her.
I'm honest to gosh, it was.
I'm still a little shocked by it.
It won't last longer than it took her to make the speech, but for what it was, it was pretty collegial.
Let's listen to a little bit of Speaker Boehner as he just now begins to speak.
Thank you for being here, gentlemen.
I appreciate it.
I'm honored and humbled to represent a great, hardworking community in Congress.
The people of Ohio's 8th Congressional District continue to afford me the privilege to serve for which I am deeply grateful.
We gather here today at a time of great challenges.
Nearly one in ten of our neighbors is out of work.
Health care costs are still rising for American families.
Our spending has caught up with us, and our debt soon will eclipse the entire size of our national economy.
Hard work and tough decisions will be required of the 112th Congress.
No longer can we fall short.
No longer can we kick the can down the road.
The people voted to end business as usual, and today we begin to carry out their instructions.
Oh, the press are going to hate this.
Pelosi was so nice, and here's Boehner being partisan in the first syllable.
Oh, it's also historic here today, first.
I'll tell you why in just a second, but we've got a really well, we've got a person of color.
The first person of color is Speaker.
In the Catholic faith, we enter into a season of service by having ashes marked on our head.
The ashes remind us that life in all of its forms is very fragile, our time on this earth fleeting.
But as the ashes are delivered, we hear those humbling words: Remember, you are dust, and to dust you shall return.
The American people have humbled us.
They have refreshed our memories to just how temporary the privilege of serving is.
They remind us that everything here is on loan from them.
That includes this gavel, which I accept cheerfully and gratefully, knowing that I am but its caretaker.
After all, this is the people's house.
John Boehner, opening remarks as speaker for just a little while here.
This is their Congress.
It's about them, not about us.
What they want is a government that's honest, accountable, and responsive to their needs.
You can't do it.
A government that respects individual liberty, honors our heritage, and bows before the public that it serves.
Let's start with the rules package that the House will consider today.
If passed, it will change how this institution operates with an emphasis on real transparency, greater accountability, and a renewed focus on our Constitution.
Our aim will be to give the government back to the American people.
In seeking this goal, we will part with some of the rituals that have come to characterize this institution under majorities, both Republican and Democrat alike.
We will dispense with the conventional wisdom that bigger bills are always better.
That fast legislating is good legislating.
Allowing amendments and open debate makes the legislative process less efficient than our forefathers had intended.
These misconceptions have been the basis for the rituals of a modern Washington.
They, in my opinion, have not been served well to the American people.
Today, mindful of the lessons of the past, we open a new chapter.
Legislators and the public will have three days to read a bill before it comes to a vote.
Legislation will be more focused, properly scrutinized, and constitutionally sound.
Committees, once bloated, will be smaller with a renewed mission, including oversight.
Old rules that have made it easy to increase spending will be replaced by new reforms that make it easier to cut spending.
And we will start by cutting Congress's own budget.
By the way, Boehner, earlier, he just said that the Democrats have been turned back into dust.
In case you didn't get the dust-to-dust reference, the Democrats are now dust.
That's what happened in November.
But above all else, we will welcome the battle of ideas, encourage it, engage it openly, honestly, and respectfully.
As the chamber closest to the people, the House works best when it is allowed to work its will.
And I ask members of this body to join me in recognizing this common truth.
And to my colleagues in the majority, my message is this.
We will honor our pledge to America, built on a process of listening to the American people.
We will stand firm on our constitutional principles that built our party and built the great nation.
We will do these things, however, in a manner that restores and respects the time-honored right of the minority to an honest debate, a fair and open process.
And to my friends in the minority, I offer a commitment.
Openness.
Once a tradition of this institution, but increasingly scarce in recent decades, will be the new standard.
There were no open rules in the House in the last Congress.
In this one, there will be many.
And with restored openness, however, come a restored responsibility.
You will not have the right to willfully disrupt the proceedings of the people's House.
But you will always have the right to a robust debate in an open process that allows you to represent your constituents, to make your case, offer alternatives, and be heard.
You're just going to lose, but if you go ahead and go ahead and offer all you want, but you're not going to get anywhere with it.
That's our hope.
In time, I believe this framework will allow the House to be a place where the people's will is done.
It will also, I hope, rebuild trust amongst us and the people we serve, and in so doing, provide a guidepost for those who follow us in the service of our nation.
To our new members, Democrat and Republican alike, as you take the oath today, I know that you do so mindful of this shared goal and know that your constituents have placed much trust in you.
You're nothing in the world.
Speaker, I feel part of my job is to help each of you do your job well, regardless of your political party.
And my hope is that every new member, and indeed every member, will be comfortable with approaching me with regard to matters of the House.
We will not always get it right, and we will not always agree on what is right.
There's a great deal of scar tissue that's been built up on both sides of the aisle.
We can't ignore that, nor should we.
My belief has always been that we can disagree without being disagreeable.
That's why it's critical that this institution operate in a manner that permits a free exchange of ideas and resolves our honest differences through a fair debate and vote.
Hey, look at those Democrats.
Look at sometimes very different ideas about how to go achieving the common good.
It is why we serve.
If it looks good.
Let us now move forward, humble in our demeanor, steady in our principles, dedicated to proving worthy of the trust and confidence that has been placed in each of us.
Sorry, folks.
If we brace ourselves to do our duty and do what we say we're going to do, I don't think there's together anything that we can't accomplish again on behalf of the people we serve.
All right, that's it.
That's John Boehner.
He's addressing his constituents and the members of the House.
That scar tissue reverence, obviously a dig at Ms. Pelosi, they shot a picture of Stanny Hoyer and James Clyburn while Boehner was talking about all this.
We're going to get along here.
We're going to be agreeable.
They were shooting this guy daggers.
I know the Democrats are sitting there thinking, what the hell happened to us?
This is not the way it's supposed to be.
At any rate, a lot of ceremony today will probably last a few minutes longer before it retreats into what the normal day-to-day is.
But at least it is the peaceful transference, transferral of power.
And it went off without a hitch today, which again is somewhat disappointing.
I was really hoping that Pelosi would have to be dragged out of there refusing to give up the gavel, but it didn't happen.
Also happy to report, ladies and gentlemen, so far no gunplay in the House of Representatives during the swearing in of John Boehner as the new Speaker of the House.
Now we can finally say it, former Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.
And there is no denying Pelosi's place in history as secure.
Undoubtedly be remembered as the most unpopular speaker of the House in our nation's history.
By the way, while we were away at our obscene profit timeout, the fetishist speaker, John Boehner, just made all of the new members of Congress swear to uphold the Constitution.
There will be outrage later today and tonight on this about MSNBC about this.
I mean, 435 new fetishists.
I mean, it happened within what, how long?
10 seconds for all of them say, I do.
And for him to say, congratulations.
Back to the audio soundbites.
We got a lot piling up.
Soundbites I didn't get to yesterday.
As you know, I'm very uncomfortable playing soundbites that mention me, and half of them every day do.
And this is yesterday on MSNBC, Jen Sing and Company.
She spoke with ReadReport.com editor Joy Ann Reed.
Anybody, And last time I said I had no idea who somebody was, they got really outraged about it.
Started insulting me as being uninformed.
I don't know who, well, I don't know what Reed Report is, and I don't know who Joy Ann Reed is.
I'm not saying she's nobody.
I just don't know.
I mean, people on TV end up getting guests come out of nowhere.
Anyway, this Joy Ann Reed was asked about Sarah Palin and whether or not she could win the general election for president.
And the guest here, Joy Ann Reed of the ReedReport.com, started laughing.
And Chris Jansen said, wait a minute, you're laughing, Joy Ann.
You're not buying this?
Oh, please.
I mean, I think most serious people understand that Sarah Palin, she's not going to be president.
I'm sorry to all of her Facebook fans, but she's not presidential in any way.
Most polls show even Republicans believe that.
But she's become sort of like Rush Limbaugh.
She's a pure entertainer.
She thrives on attention.
And you have to pay her homage in order to move to the next step in Republican leadership.
You just have to do it.
You can't say Rush Limbaugh is wrong, and you can't say Sarah Palin is not electable.
These are cardinal rules.
The things you learn listening to people you don't know.
And then later, Roseanne Barr was on Good Morning America.
That was this morning.
Robin Roberts spoke to her.
Apparently, Roseanne Barr hasn't, is it back to calling herself Roseanne Barr?
I thought she just called herself Roseanne.
Well, it doesn't matter.
Robin Roberts says she has a brand new book, Roseanne Archie, Dispatches from the Nut Farm.
In it, she shares her hilarious thoughts and politics to aging.
Clever little cover there.
What were you thinking?
I thought, well, get them all.
I was thinking Rush Limbaugh kind of.
Left wing, Rush Limbaugh kind of thing.
Oh, I'm flattered.
Roseanne modeling her future career after me.
In truth, how many people have been doing that for who knows how many years?
Probably and continue to do so.
Let's see, Maude Behar.
We did the, that's why they did those.
Grab a phone call.
Well, now, because I got the things all out of order here in the Soundbite Rush, so I'll get them back in order because we're back now to the fetish soundbites that we played earlier.
Paula in Heartland, Wisconsin.
I'm glad you waited.
Welcome to the Rush Limbaugh program.
Rush, so cool to talk to you.
Anyway, I'm going to get right to my point like I was instructed.
Rush, I had a thought doing some reading this morning.
I understand that Harry Reid and some Democratic senators are going to try to push through some filibuster changes in the filibuster rules.
And as I got thinking about it, I said, man, I hope I can get Rush today because I need his input on this.
And I'm thinking, well, the House is now Republican, so it's really not going to matter as far as legislation goes.
But I'm thinking the Senate does all the judicial and federal nominations, approves them.
And I'm thinking that since Obama's agenda is really going nowhere legislatively, that the Democrats are looking at this as a way to load the courts with as radical judges as they can to try to keep their agenda moving forward.
Well, no.
You know, you are incredibly shrewd, and I mean this.
You are incredibly shrewd.
I just want to bring one small correction.
Their desire to get rid of the filibuster in the Senate goes beyond judicial nominations.
They really want to get it.
They've lost.
The filibuster is now an obstacle.
So, of course, it's outdated.
It's outmoded.
It's a fetish.
And we have to get rid of it.
We've got to get rid of this requirement that says they have to have 60 votes to get anything done.
That's just antiquated.
It held them back.
So they're serious about it in terms of legislation.
But the way this breaks down legally is quite fascinating.
And a lot of people are calling Republicans hypocrites for opposing the change in filibuster rule.
And the reason it's a fallacious reason, or the reason Republicans are being called hypocrites, is because the Republicans objected to the filibustering of judicial nominees.
And all of a sudden, the Democrats want to get rid of the filibuster, and the Republicans are opposing that.
And everybody says, oh, you Republicans are being hypocrites.
Why you wanted to stop the Democrats using a filibuster on judicial nominees?
There's a constitutional reason.
Judicial nominees cover both branches.
You have the president who makes the nominations and the senate who confirms.
And so the filibustering of judicial nominees is something that affects the executive branch.
And that, to my layman's mind, after consultation with several legal scholars, is unconstitutional.
The Senate can't pass legislation limiting the things the executive branch can do.
That's why there's a separation of powers in the first place.
So it is, in my mind, and there are a lot of people on our side, by the way, who are calling the Republicans hypocrites, and I think they're wrong.
And I say this with a modicum of respect.
I don't think the two are the same thing.
The Senate can make whatever rules it wants for itself, Paula.
If Reed wants to try to overturn the filibuster rule and get rid of 60 votes in the Senate, let him try.
If he can get the votes for it, then they got a new rule, and that's how they operate.
Fine and dandy.
It's up to them to make their rules.
The president can't tell them what they have to do, and the courts can't tell them what they have to do.
But the Senate cannot in any way restrict what the executive does.
So using the filibuster to get in the way of judicial nominations, that is what's, if any, hypocritical.
That is what's unconstitutional.
And the Republicans were totally right to oppose that because that impacts the, as I say, the president.
He has a role in the selection of nominees because he selects them.
They go through the confirmation process.
But if Reed wants to get rid of the filibuster, it's not automatically covering judicial nominees when he does it.
They're two separate things.
Well, I understand that.
And I just see it as another power play by Reed and company to try to just nullify the election results.
We see that in the United States November.
Of course it is.
He wants to throw it out the window.
If this was so important to him, why didn't he do it two years ago?
The fact is they don't.
Because he had 60 votes two years ago until he lost Scott Brown.
Exactly.
Exactly my point, Rasha.
Exactly my point.
I just look at it as so indifferent.
You know, no, but you're right, but it's not the first time they've done things.
I can't remember off the top of my head, but Democrats lose power.
All of a sudden, certain customs and laws and rules are all of a sudden outdated.
I mean, look, as far as they're concerned, the whole Constitution's kaput now.
The whole Constitution is a...
I mean, E.J. Dionne Jr. in the Washington Post recently had a piece saying, essentially, that the Constitution, nothing's sacred about it, it's just...
It was just a political document, and it was put together by virtue of political compromise.
And therefore, the people who don't agree with some of the political compromises of the day when the Constitution was ratified don't have to support it.
I mean, that's the new liberal thinking.
It's not the law of the land.
It is not everything it is.
It's no more than a piece of legislation from 250 years ago.
And if you don't like it, you don't like it.
You have to abide by it.
That's their new thinking.
They're the sorest losers, and this is why I've always said there's no common ground here.
The only thing for us to do is keep winning.
The only thing to do is to keep beating them.
They have no interest in working with us.
They have no interest in common ground or bipartisan or anything.
They are pure, unadulterated, Stalinist, tyranny type people.
All they want to do is rule, not govern, and they have to be defeated every election.
One little history lesson, ladies and gentlemen.
The reason that we have the 60-vote rule in the Senate today for cloture, meaning 60 votes to stop debate and move to voting on the bill, essentially 60 votes to pass the bill.
The only reason we have that, the so-called filibuster, is because the Democrats changed the rules in 1975 when they had a big Senate majority after Watergate.
And they were trying to make sure that they couldn't be stopped.
Had to have 60-vote rule.
That's when it started.
Watergate 1975.
The change was initiated by Walter F. Mundo, who was soon to become a vice president for Jim McCarter, who then would then get shellacked in 1984, the second term of Ronaldus Magnus.
But that's when this whole 60-vote business in the old days, my old days, in the 60s, if you were going to filibuster, you damn well had to stand up and filibuster.
You had to stand up, start talking, and not stop.
And they changed the rules.
Filibuster can mean, you need 60 votes.
60 votes to stop debate.
60 votes to stop somebody from speaking who's really not speaking.
And that happened in 1975.
So again, the Senate, as well as the House, can change their.
There's new rules in the House as of day.
Boehner was announcing them.
They got a rules committee.
The Republicans run it.
They can set the rules.
And the Democrats have no choice because they don't have the votes to beat them.
So it's the way it's set up.
And the Democrats run the Senate still, and they can set the rules they want.
Now they want to get rid of 60 because they're nowhere near 60, and there aren't enough Olympia Snows and Susan Collins in there to get them to 60, even if all Democrats hold.
So of course, 60, it's not fair.
The Democrats can't, they're running the Senate, but they can't get anything done because this stupid 60-vote requirement that we put in ourselves back in 1975, but now they want to get rid of it since they can't get there.
It is what it is.
And we'll see if I mean they're going to need even Republican votes for that to get that passed.
And we'll see.
Here's some sound bites.
This is Pelosi.
Before she got gracious, at the end, she's enhancing the gavel to Boehner.
She was politicking to the end.
We have made the largest ever commitment to making college more affordable, enacted Wall Street reform with the greatest consumer protections in history, and passed a strong patients' bill of rights.
It means that children with pre-existing conditions can get care.
Young people can stay on their parents' policy until they're 26.
Pregnant women and breast and prostate cancer patients can no longer be thrown off their insurance.
Our seniors are paying less for their medical prescriptions.
Taken together, it will save taxpayers $1.3 trillion.
Now, I honestly don't know if she really believes that.
For all I know, she might really believe that.
Not if it's true.
Not one thing she said about health care is true.
But she might believe it.
I know she hasn't read 2,000 pages of it.
You know what she thinks?
Affordable health care for all Americans.
That's what she thinks they passed.
Or that's what she wants you to think they passed.
Speaking of, what is it here?
Prostate cancer patients.
You know, I just got an email from Dick Morris asking me if my prostate's keeping me up at night.
I did.
I think I sent it to the trash folder, but let me see if I deleted it there.
Yeah.
From Dick Morris reports, is your prostate keeping you up at night?
Read on for a simple and 100% natural solution that may help you.
Can you not?
From some guy named Dr. Brownstein, but it's sent to me by Dick Morris.
Okay, here's the moment the cavalry arrived.
This is Pelosi passing the gavel to Boehner.
I now pass this gavel, which is larger than most gavels here, but the gavel of choice of Mr. Speaker Boehner.
I now pass this.
I now pass this gavel and the sacred trust that goes with it to the new speaker.
God bless you, Speaker Boehner.
God bless you, Constitution fetishes.
Man, I tell you, the left in this country, if they're watching this today, has got to be doing circles.
All of these references to things that they despise, God and the Constitution.
The gavel, by the way, is huge.
I saw it when I was watching it.
That is a huge gavel.
It took her two hands to hold a thing.
And it was nowhere near as big as the one she carried to the Hill after passing Obamacare, I guarantee you.
Remember they're walking on the street there with the Congressional Black Caucus hoping for insults and stuff?
That gavel that they had.
I don't think this was as big as that one.
Barbara Lee, who is the chairman of Congressional Black Caucus this morning, after swearing in, the members of the Congressional Black Caucus, Congressional Black Caucus, swore in their members before they were sworn in as members of the House.
And at that swearing in, the chairman of Congressional Black Caucus said, among other things.
The American Dream, as we all know too well, has really turned into a nightmare for many.
Poverty, the foreclosure crisis, health disparities, unemployment, the lack of economic and educational opportunities.
Stop the tape a minute.
I am stunned.
Recue this.
I am stunned to hear a Democrat, an African-American woman, the chairman of the Democrat Congressional Black Caucus, just rip into President Obama the way she is here.
Stunning.
Listen to this again.
The American Dream as we all know too well has really turned into a nightmare for many.
Poverty, the foreclosure crisis, health disparities, unemployment, the lack of economic and educational opportunities, violence and crime all disproportionately impact the African-American, low-income, and communities of color.
Now, during the 111th Congress, the CBC did not miss a beat.
Bread got worse.
And they fought each and every day to address and attack and close these disparities and fought for equity and for justice in every major piece of legislation.
Yeah, meanwhile, as she said, all this has really turned into a nightmare.
But we're on the case.
We here at the CBC, we are on the case.
We didn't miss a beat while it was getting worse under our African-American president, Barack Obama.
She didn't say that, of course, but who's been running the show for the past two years?
Obama.
And the Democrats have been running a show.
This woman has indicted herself, the Congressional Black Caucus, and, of course, Obama.
Wolf Blitzer, last night, CNN, the Situation Room, had on a congressional correspondent, Dana Bash, and they had this exchange about Democrat staffers losing their jobs because of new Republican representatives being sworn in.
I've heard, Dana, and you probably know this better than I do, that, what, 2,000 Democratic staffers have lost their jobs now as a result of the Republican takeover of the House and the increased number of Republicans in the Senate.
2,000 staffers have lost their job.
Is that right?
That number would not surprise me at all.
I mean, it is such a huge shift in power, and shift in power means shift in personnel.
And there's absolutely no question about it that so many House members in particular lost their jobs, and that means that all of their staff lost their jobs.
So, 2,000?
I mean, that's nothing compared to the number of people CNN are going to lose their jobs if things don't change there.
Your guiding light, everybody wants to be me, Rush Limbaugh, behind the golden EIB microphone.
Now, the Congressional Black Caucus was sworn in as members of the House like a half hour ago.
But this morning, the Congressional Black Caucus was sworn in to the Congressional Black Caucus.
Now, I would like to know what did they swear to uphold in the Congressional Black Caucus?
What is their fetish?
We know that when they were sworn in a member of the House, they had to swear to uphold, defend, and protect the Constitution, much as they might object to that.
So what did they, I mean, I wasn't privy to it.
I don't know what the oath of office is for the Congressional Black Caucus.
I don't know what their fetish happens to be.
And no, I don't ever recall a CNN sob story on the number of Republican staffers who lost their jobs in 2007 when Pelosi and the Democrats rode in.
By the way, still no reports of gunfire from the House chamber.
So the news continues to be okay.
Cornell West is a professor of what?
Professor.
Well, African-American, Professor pretty much everything.
Used to be at Harvard.
Something happened there.
He's now at Princeton.
And he was on television yesterday afternoon in the interview.
We have two soundbites.
A question, where was this country two years ago when President Obama took office?
And in your estimation, where have we moved to today, Professor?
Two years later, we have missed the opportunity.
Unfortunately, we didn't get the kind of leadership that we should.
The president didn't have enough backbone.
He became too milquetoast.
He would not fight big business, would not fight the big banks.
He actually came too easily to big business and big banks.
And of course, the obstructionism on the right was helping push him to the center.
And now, of course, he's being pushed even more to the center, which means we are in deep trouble.
We are in deep trouble.
Obama has sworn to destroy all of these elements of our economy as he can, Cornell West.
They're just not happy.
It hadn't happened soon enough.
This hadn't, and I don't know what surcame is.
He said here, that's right, it's in the transcript.
It's what he said.
He said he actually surcame too easily to big business of big banks.
Somebody looked that up.
Look, before just do me a favor, look it up in the S-U-R-C-A-M-E.
Look it up in the urban dictionary before we go off on this.
He actually surcame too easily.
I think I think that's what he meant was succumb.
But sir came, maybe that's what he thinks is succumbed.
I don't know.
Past tense of succumbed.
Sir Came.
Well, yeah, that's what it would be.
Sircumb, but that's S-U-C-C-U-M-B.
There is no S-U-C-C-A-M-B.
No, don't ask Mario Cuomo.
Ask Jesse Jackson.
He might know Al Sharpton.
He surcame too easily.
We'll find it.
I mean, they've got to be a look, he's a professor at Princeton.
He used to be at Harvard.
There's got to be definition of it.
Before we, you know, look at, we don't know everything here.
And before we go off too deep on this, somebody look it up in the urban dictionary, whatever dictionary you can find it if it exists out there somewhere.
Sir Caim, S-U-R-C-A-M-E would not fight the banks.
He actually circumcised too easily to big business of big banks.
And so that prompted the interviewer on television.
You sound disappointed in your president.
I'm disappointed, my dear brother, Barack Obama.
I did 65 events for him.
I wanted, in fact, to inaugurate a new era in which working people were at the center.
When you look at his economic team, you saw those coming out of walls tied to corporate America.
What about workers?
Where's the jobs program?
Bill Clinton became a masterful opportunist and triangulated and trying to steal the thunder from Republicans and actually did tremendous.
Will Barack Obama be a Clinton and do damage?
Or will he be an FDR or a Lincoln as he said he would and stand up for working people and poor people?
Hmm.
Time will tell, Cornell.
We'll keep a sharp eye out for you and we'll let you know since you're so depressed about this.
I love this headline in the Washington Post today.
After a losing house, Democrats will try a new strategy, bipartisanship.
By the way, folks, during our obscene profit timeout, we conducted an exhaustive search, and we cannot find the word sir came in any dictionary, not even the urban dictionary.
Obviously, Professor West is breaking new ground here in the English language as well as in all of his other fields.
He got a PhD from Princeton with a doctoral thesis entitled The Ethical Dimensions of Marxist Thought.
So we'll see if we can find somewhere in Marxist literature sircame.
If it's anywhere, it'll be there.
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