All Episodes
Previous Next
Jan. 14, 2011 - Rush Limbaugh Program
34:21
January 14, 2011, Friday, Hour #1
| Copy link to current segment

Time Text
Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 24-7 podcast.
It is Friday and everybody knows what that means.
Live from the Southern Command in sunny South Florida, it's Open Line Friday.
Greetings, my friends, and welcome.
Great to have you here.
Another three hours of broadcast excellence hosted by me, El Rushbo.
The all-knowing, all-caring, all-sensing, all-feeling, all-concerned, all-everything maha-rushy.
Here at the distinguished and prestigious Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
We don't say things on this program hoping the left will like us.
We don't say things on this program hoping to show that we are not like somebody else.
We don't say things on this program to gain favor with people who we might consider the opposition, but we would like to be liked by them.
It doesn't happen.
Happy to have you along.
Here are the rules for Open Line Friday.
Monday through Thursday, you have to talk about things I care about or you get the boot or you don't get on.
Well, more than likely, you don't get on.
We don't boot people here, at least not in a way that anybody would ever recognize it.
But on Friday, you can talk about whatever you want.
I don't have to care about it.
I don't have to be interested in it.
I don't have to give a peep about it.
You can ask questions.
You can make comments.
You can bring up things.
The last thing we want to hear on a call on Open Line Friday is I look Rush.
I don't mean to change the topic.
We don't do topics.
Even Monday through Thursday, we don't do topics.
We do issues.
We do whatever's hot.
We do the events that we actually Monday through Thursday, we do whatever I care about because that's all that's really important anyway.
So here's the telephone number, 800-282-2882, and the email address, lrushbo at EIBnet.com.
One thing on the PEP rally, disguised as a memorial, on Wednesday night.
I happened to, as I have been told, I happened to anger a lot of people yesterday by saying that the president delayed the memorial for waiting for the polling data to come in and the t-shirts to get printed.
Well, guess what?
I was right on both counts.
The polling data shows, as you know, that the American people do not associate conservative rhetoric with what happened out in Arizona.
In fact, there's a Quinnipiac poll out that shows a majority of America don't think that, but that the vast 53, 54% of Americans think that the worst of the political rhetoric comes from the left.
Comes from Democrats.
The second thing was they had a way to get the t-shirts printed.
And that's true.
Not only that, they had to wait to get a new logo for the t-shirts.
It was a pep rally.
I have pictures here of chairs with the t-shirts on them prior to opening the doors to the rally.
And the logo for the phrase was together we thrive.
Remember that?
That's what was on the t-shirts.
Together we thrive.
And here's pictures of the, well, I'm not going to waste time here zooming in on the Ditto Cam.
I'm not a TV producer.
It's a radio program, but trust me, I got pictures here of the chairs with Together We Thrive and so forth.
It turns out that Together We Thrive comes from the Organizing for America website, which is Obama's website.
It was written by John Berry, B-E-R-R-Y IV, John Berry's blog, Together We Thrive, February 11th, 2008.
So they reheated.
They reheated an old idea.
The whole point of this was a pep rally or a political rally for Obama.
And you know, you go back and you look at the speech again, and he says all these wonderful things followed by but we shouldn't blame but and I think we have a great thing at but so forth.
So he didn't tie himself to anything.
For too long, Americans have been set one against the other.
It is a side effect of a free market.
This is from the BarackObama.com page, John Berry.
This is the Organizing for America website on February 11, 2008.
Coming up on three years ago, three years ago, they revived.
For too long, Americans have been set one against the other.
It is a side effect of a free market society.
How can profits be maximized?
How can I get the work done for the lowest possible costs?
This continually sets one group against the other, especially in the blue-collar sectors of America.
It has become a part of the American business model, whether it was indentured servants, slaves picking cotton, sharecroppers, the industrious people that built the railroads, or today's migrant workers.
As long as we remain divided, fighting for the scraps that America has to offer, it will be one group against the other.
Well, I said that's on Organizing for America.
This is from an Obama website during the campaign of 2008.
Fighting for the scraps that America has to offer.
This is Obama endorsed.
For too long, Americans have been set one against the other.
It is a side effect of a free market society.
And this was the pep rally theme for this brilliant oratory and really smart and articulate nothingness of a speech.
No, I really, you know, my problem is I live in Liberalville.
I'm not a stylistic guy.
I'm a substance person.
You know, we talk about what is smart on this program a lot.
Obama's naturally assumed to be smart.
Name one smart thing he's done.
Outside of political craftiness and scheming, name one smart policy that Obama has given us to help revive a sour economy.
We're now headed, folks, to $100 a barrel oil, and this regime doesn't want anybody knowing about it.
It is about to rip the UK apart.
It is what consumers are about to riot over there.
They're having huge, and OPEC guys are saying the price of oil in this country right now, I checked it for the program, 91 bucks.
The OPEC guys is $100 a barrel.
That's normal.
Get used to it.
We're not going to do one thing to bring it down.
We want it up as high as we can.
Obama has said gasoline, four or five bucks.
I don't have a problem with it.
I just had a problem how fast it got there.
Anything that impedes on the mobility and the freedom of the American people, fine and dandy with Obama.
What's smart about this?
I've never understood this notion.
He's a smart guy.
He sounds smart.
He speaks smart.
He articulates well.
And he really lifts that nose and head in the air above the camera lens and has the ability to look down or make it appear as though he's looking down on all of us.
But the substance of what he says.
Anyway, it's just one of these things.
We have to accept he's a smart guy.
We've never seen any record of it.
We haven't seen any transcripts.
We just accept it.
So this guy, John Barry IV, what I see in Obama is a chance for a revolution, a chance for every group to participate and be heard, a chance to live the American dream that has been denied to so many.
Together, we can and will change the world and return America to the shining beacon of hope and prosperity that we were and that we can be again.
Only when we work together do we accomplish feats that rival any ever accomplished in the history of mankind.
Only when we work together.
Diversity is our strength.
That is what this campaign brings us a promise of.
For many, this is a scary prospect and thought, getting to know someone different from myself.
We all want the same basic things.
For example, a safe place to live, health, a quality education for our children.
In a previous career, I was a global leader of diversity for a global Fortune 500 corporation.
I have studied the effects of diverse groups working together, and the results cannot be denied.
Together, we thrive.
February 2008, organizing for America.
So, don't doubt me.
The PEP rally, complete with medicine man.
We all know what the purpose of that was, too.
Got to have some religion in there, but let's not go too far.
That was brilliant, too, of Obama, don't you think?
So we have delaying for the polls and waiting for the t-shirts to get printed with the new logos.
Howard Feynman, this is last night on MSNBC's countdown at a fill-in host.
And they talked to the Huffing and Puffington Post senior political editor Howard Feynman about Obama's Tucson speech and favorable conservative reaction to it.
The guest host said that, Feynman, how has the favorable response from the right change politics going forward?
It's not going to be any wholesale change.
But I do think, and you can tell that from what some of the other people on the right have been saying, not just Rush Limbaugh and others.
They grant that the president gave a nice speech, but then they say it's going to be business as usual come tomorrow.
So the fill-in host says, well, what does it mean that Republican presidents seem to have their moments of national unity in response to some type of external event, the shuttle 9-11, while it seems like Democrats Bill Clinton and Obama have both had theirs in response to domestic political violence.
What interests me now is the difference between Oklahoma City and Tucson.
I started out last weekend thinking that they were very much related, but I think in the end it's different because in Oklahoma City, that was an attack on a federal office building.
It was clear that the bomber had sort of political in the broad sense motivation for what he was doing.
It was sort of anti-governmentalism taken to a violent extreme.
And I think in the way had a lot to do with politics with Bill Clinton and the politics of the 90s.
I think this is different because I think there's no evidence so far that Jared Loftner had anything political on his mind whatsoever.
Damn it.
So they had their chance.
They were really hoping.
They were praying.
Well, they were really, really hoping.
And they were rubbing their hands saying, oh, gosh, this is it.
This is it.
This is Obama's Oklahoma.
This is it.
Damn it.
It's just nothing but a lunatic insane ass item who happens to like us.
How can we paper this over?
Okay, we'll blame it on rock music.
Yeah, conservatives like that.
We'll blame it on some group quote drowning pool.
Yeah, yeah.
We'll send the sheriff out there.
He'll run cover for us.
Damn it.
We're hoping Oklahoma City.
We didn't get Oklahoma City.
It's not the same thing.
Damn it.
Another attempt blown up in smoke.
Speech or not, it didn't work.
I, El Rushbaugh, welcome you to Open Line Friday.
Don't go away.
I was going to name my first child Krauthammer, even if it was a girl.
But no more.
We're back, Rush Limbaugh, Open Line Friday.
Great to have you here.
Joe Arpaio, the sheriff of Maricopa County, was on Hannity last night during a discussion of Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik.
Handed he said he mentioned Rush Limbaugh by name.
He did it in the opening hours, repeatedly talk radio Rush Limbaugh.
I wanted to get your reaction, Sheriff Arpaio.
I'm a little discouraged at his comments.
He is running the investigation.
I was a high federal law enforcement official.
We have to be very careful what you say, not to give ammunition to the person being arrested, and will go through the criminal justice system.
I am concerned about his remarks.
I hate to say this, but I don't think it was correct to blame everybody on these murders.
That's not fair.
It's not true.
And I take issue with that.
White comedian Paul Shanklin has Sheriff, well, not Sheriff Clarence Dupnick, and I'm not a sheriff.
And we're back, Rush Limbaugh on Open Line Friday.
Some House Democrats, this is from theHill.com, some House Democrats blamed their defeat in November's midterm elections partly on Nancy Pelosi's decision to force a vote on a climate change bill.
Really?
Do you remember that?
House Democrats blamed their defeat in November's midterms on Pelosi's decision to force a vote on a climate change bill.
A new study suggests that climate change has claimed bigger political victims in the past than Pelosi and the Democrats, much bigger.
The study published in the journal Science, get this now, suggests that climate change contributed to the rise and fall of the Roman Empire.
Climate change seems a factor in the rise and fall of the Roman Empire, according to a study of ancient tree growth that urges greater awareness of the risks of global warming in the world.
I don't know.
The rise and fall of the Roman Empire because of global warming.
And these people think they are the smart ones.
They are smarter than everybody else.
I thought it was cultural liberalism, societal debasement, tyranny.
But now we know that it was mostly global warming.
Wait till they figure out to try to find a way to tie global warming to the Tucson murders.
I mean, it gets very hot in Tucson, even though it wasn't very hot when this happened.
It does get very hot there.
I've been to Tucson.
Their Rush to Excellence Tour way, way back in the late 80s went out to Tucson.
75%, the Ras Mussin Reports poll, 75% want the health care law changed.
How good are Obama's speeches?
How much do they really matter?
Obama gave hundreds of speeches advocating Obamacare, but that didn't change a damn thing.
The country class still hates it.
Voters overwhelmingly want to see last year's health care law changed.
There is substantial disagreement about how best to do it.
The latest Ras Musson Reports National Telephone Survey found that 75% of likely voters want to change the law.
Only 18% want it left alone.
Those figures include 20% who want the law repealed and nothing done to replace it.
28% want it repealed and have its most popular provisions put into new law.
27% say leave the law in place, but get rid of the unpopular provisions.
It is worth noting that a majority, 55%, take one of the middle ground approaches, replace it or leave it and improve.
The bottom line is here.
Obama grips this wonderfully, wonderfully, the best speech of his presidency.
Advocating what, by the way, in Tucson.
What did he advocate?
If you can tell me, we'll work on it together.
But I do know he gave hundreds of speeches advocating Obamacare, and the American people don't want it.
And he really, this most brilliant oratorical president, really, really tried to sell health care.
He's the most well-spoken president ever, and people still don't want it.
We are back.
It's Open Line Friday.
Rush Limbaugh and the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
You know, now would be a time for President Obama to give a speech on inflation so he can stop that dead in its tracks.
We already had the president go out to Tucson and stop dead in its tracks the actions of insane lunatics.
We had the president grive hundreds of speeches on health care, and the American people still don't want it.
And so don't be surprised that absent a speech by Obama on the subject, inflation will be one of the top stories by the year end.
But if the president can ask the country to stop inflation, I was going to say whip, but that is a dangerous word.
Whip is an angry word.
It has historical notations that we don't want to dredge up.
So if he can beat, well, that's problematic now and dead in his tracks.
I said, see, I'm trying to be civil here, as requested by the left.
Anyway, if the president can ask the country to stop inflation, stop inflation now, sin.
S-I-N, stop inflation now.
Yeah, Gerald Ford was whip inflation now.
He even had buttons on there, whip inflation now, win buttons.
Now we have sin buttons.
Now we won't have to worry.
No, they didn't work.
They didn't work.
But Obama has unique powers, oratorical skills, a gift, as he said to Harry Reid.
And folks, in the UK, you know, oil is at $90 around the world right now.
And Mohammed Ali Khatibi said by phone from Tehran, it's not a big deal.
It's not an extraordinary situation.
Kuwait's oil minister said Wednesday he considered oil at $80 to $100 a barrel to be a fair price.
And he didn't expect OPEC to increase output.
All the front pages of the papers in the UK all this week have been about the rising near-record gasoline prices.
The American state-controlled media is suppressing the story.
Their marching orders are to continue to focus on Sarah Palin.
And so the state-controlled media in this country, with marching orders from the White House, is focusing on Palin, civility, the dangers of the right wing, and the brilliance of Obama's speech in dealing with the right wing.
In the meantime, nobody wants the health care bill.
75% want it repealed.
The Republicans start dealing with that next week.
Gasoline prices are rising.
Reuters story, rising gasoline prices beat down U.S. consumer sentiment in early January, overshadowing an improved job outlook and passage of temporary federal tax breaks.
A survey released on Friday showed a year-end surge in gasoline prices ratcheted up consumer inflation expectations to their highest in more than two years, according to the latest data from Thomson Reuters and the University of Michigan.
So, things the American people come in contact with every day, things that matter to them, the sentiment is not good.
Gasoline prices, food prices are on the rise.
The cost of living is going up.
That means inflation.
The American people are sin.
Healthcare is coming with all the tax increases.
The American people simply are not focused on that which the media and the White House wants them focused, and that's Tucson and Sarah Palin.
Now, energy and food costs do not count in the federal core inflation statistics.
In case you're wondering how inflation reports don't show much inflation, energy and food costs are not considered.
They never have been because they fluctuate too much.
But it's awfully handy to not have to count those things.
Now, the price of oil has about doubled in five years.
And again, it's the big story in the UK.
There are riots in places of the world over gasoline prices.
The American media is protecting this story.
The American media covering it not at all.
Remember, the instructions from the White House are: you keep focusing on Palin.
You keep telling the American people what a dangerous, unqualified boob Sarah Palin is.
David Cameron, Prime Minister of the UK, is set to act over soaring petrol prices.
The London media is pushing him, but silence in the USA.
From express.co.uk, petrol prices may kill the economy and the coalition.
They are severely worried about the economy blowing up because of rising energy prices in the UK.
The same prices that are going up here, you're just not having it reported.
Lots of urgency in the UK.
But here, it's all palin bashing on orders from the White House News Center.
UK fuel prices yesterday nudging their record highs of July 2008.
And Obama wants us talking about this strange harmony, BS.
Just can't we all get along here?
So it's time for a speech here.
It's time for here from the this is a DC gossip blog.
Washington insiders are wondering if the next real economic crisis facing President Obama is when gasoline prices spike to $4 or $5 per gallon.
At today's press briefing, the White House press spokesman rebuffed queries about that possibility, saying, there are many people that would get upset at me if I started to opine on oil and gas prices, so I won't.
Besides, we have our orders from the White House News Center to focus on Sarah Palin and whether or not the president can make sure the American people are once again civil to each other.
We're going to focus on that, and we're going to focus on palin.
We're not going to talk about oil prices.
We're not going to talk about anything to damage the economy because we've sent out word from our news center that there is a robust recovery going on.
But we can't feature any news in the American media that would contradict that.
Now, Michelle Obama has an open letter from the White House blog to parents following the tragedy in Tucson.
I don't know that I don't know if she got the message that her husband attempted in his inimitable, exclusive and brilliant manner on Wednesday night.
Posted by First Lady Muchel Obama, January 13th, 2011.
Dear parents, like so many Americans all across the country, Barack and I were shocked and heartbroken by the horrific act of violence committed in Arizona this past weekend.
Yesterday we had the chance to attend a pep rally memorial service and meet with some of the families of those who lost their lives.
And both of us were deeply moved by their strength and resilience in the face of such unspeakable tragedy.
And we made sure they all got together with Thrive t-shirts.
As parents, an event like this hits home especially hard.
It makes our hearts ache for those who lost loved ones.
It makes us want to hug our own families a little tighter.
And it makes us think about what an event like this says about the world we live in and the world in which our children will grow up.
In the days and weeks ahead, as we struggle with these issues ourselves, many of us will find that our children are struggling with them as well.
The questions my daughters have asked are the same ones that many of your children will have asked, and they don't lend themselves to easy answers.
What are the questions?
Dawn, you have two daughters.
Did I ask you any questions about this?
I'm not saying that children won't ask parents about it, but what were the questions, Michelle?
I mean, the questions your daughters have asked are the same ones.
What are the questions?
They don't lend themselves to easy answers.
What's so hard to answer about this?
Why did this happen?
Because they're crazy people in the world.
That's why it happened.
There are crazy people in the world.
You might want to add there are crazy people in the world who don't yet realize the brilliance of your father.
But they're crazy people in the world.
But they will provide an opportunity, Muchel back to the letter.
They will provide an opportunity for us as parents to teach some valuable lessons about the character of our country, about the values we hold dear, and about finding hope at a time when it seems far away.
What lessons?
Muchel says that the questions that kids ask provide an opportunity for us as parents to teach some valuable lessons.
What lessons would those be?
About the character of our country?
The values we hold dear, about finding hope?
She wants us to believe that families are huddled en masse in the corners of their homes, fearful to even turn on the lights and their children.
Mommy, mommy, mommy, what happened?
What do we do?
I tell me, mommy, mommy, how do we say, mommy?
We've lost hope.
Mommy, mommy, what are the core values of America?
Mommy, mommy, what are we?
Answers are very simple.
There are crazy people in the world that need to be institutionalized.
You might want to throw in that the Republicans made them that way if it makes you feel better, but just throw in that they're some crazy people and need to be institutionalized.
We can teach our children the value of tolerance, the practice of assuming the best rather than the worst about those around us.
We can teach them to give others the benefit of the doubt, particularly those with whom they do.
What has any of this got to do with children being afraid because of what happened in Tucson?
See, Michelle did not get the memo from, I guess she wasn't even listening to her husband make the speech where she said, oh, he said, oh, this doesn't matter, but he did have a butt in there.
He always has a but, Which cancels out whatever has preceded the butt.
Most kids are on Facebook.
We can teach them the value of tolerance, the practice of assuming the best rather than the worst about those around us.
Mommy, mommy, I really hate the people down the street, but Mrs. Obama says we should love the people down there.
How can I help?
How can I like the people down the street instead of thinking poorly?
But mommy, mommy, and mommy, why are we huddled in the corner?
What does this have to do with what happened in Arizona?
We can teach them to give others the benefit of the doubt, particularly those with whom they disagree.
Mommy, mommy, what does it have to do with Arizona?
So we can help our children by giving them the criminally false impression that the healthy political debate in this country led to this bloodshed.
Is that what Mrs. Obama is continuing to say here?
We can teach them to give others the benefit of the doubt, particularly those with whom they disagree.
You ought to assume the best rather than the worst about those around us.
Anyway, this is just a portion of it.
An open letter to parents from Muchel Obama following the tragedy in Tucson.
Okay, we're back.
Rush Limbaugh Open Line Friday, Lisa in Prairie Home, Missouri.
Nice to have you up first today on the program.
Hi, Rush.
How are you?
Very good.
Thank you.
Hey, I want to give you a happy belated birthday, and I want to tell you I'm sleeping wonderful on my sleep number bed that you gave me.
Hubba-hubba.
Yeah.
Anyway, I have a comment to make.
I'm disappointed also in Charles about his comments that he made about Sarah Palin, about the shooting.
Sarah Palin can't win no matter what.
Just to give a flip side of it, what if she would have came out immediately in response to it, and then they did find a book of Sarah Palin's at his house?
Then they would have creamed her all over again.
She just can't win.
You see what I'm saying?
Well, that's the point.
It is clear to me, ladies and gentlemen, that the White House considers her their number one threat.
That's all this means.
They don't think anybody else in the Republican hierarchy right now is the number one threat.
Don't, you know, it's no accident and it's not a coincidence that you can't get up every day without seeing a couple, if not more, stories, newspaper TV aimed at ripping, criticizing, destroying Sarah Palin.
It's gone beyond the realm of belief now that there's serious news behind all of these stories, that there's any real journalism going on here.
It's not that at all.
It's attack dog journalism, and it's largely coming the White House news center.
It's also to, I'm dead serious about this, it's also to ignore and not report on the rising oil and gasoline prices and the rising food prices and the obvious impact this is going to have on the economy and a recovery they desperately want you to believe.
White House is essentially, in journalistic terms, put crosshairs on Sarah Palin.
There's no question that this is what they're trying to do.
Sarah Palin, that's who they are trying to destroy, is that's who they fear is the biggest threat to Obama.
And don't think for a moment the Republicans don't know that either.
They know it.
By the way, I want to thank the mother for a note that I just received.
Dear Mr. Limbaugh, my daughter's first question after the Tucson shooting was, why are they bringing up Rush Limbaugh?
Right on, Mama.
Right on.
Thank you, Lisa, for the phone call.
Happy Sleeping.
Johnny in Indianapolis.
Welcome to the EIB Network and Open Line Friday.
Thanks, sir.
How are you?
Very good.
Hey, if an event such as the one that took place in Tucson had happened in Canada, the UK, or Germany, do you think the Congresswoman would still be alive?
Yeah.
You spoke about health care?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I have no way of speculating on that.
Well, I just think that she's got the best treatment in the universe.
I think that from what I hear is that.
I know what you're saying, but the best health care in the world still exists in parts of Canada for certain people.
If one of their elected officials got shot, I'm sure their elected officials would get the best.
I mean, our problem with the Canadian healthcare system is not that it's horrible.
It's that it's unfairly distributed.
It's that it's we've heard of all the lines, people having to come to the United States for routine procedures.
But the ruling class is always going to get taken care of.
Same thing in Germany.
I mean, we've got, hell, even in Germany, we've got U.S. military institutions, institutions, installations with fabulous health care there.
So I know what your point is.
We've got the best healthcare system in the world, and this episode demonstrates it.
And I think that's true because no matter where you go in this country, you're going to get the best health care.
It could happen in Tucson.
It could happen in San Antonio.
It could happen in Buffalo.
You're going to get the best in this country.
That's what people are so concerned about Obamacare because it's going to destroy this.
It's going to motivate people, if that's the right word, to not even go in to the medical profession.
I mean, if you are, in this country, if you are an illegal immigrant and have no money, you still get the best health care in the world.
And with a smile on the professionals' faces.
It's Open Line Friday, Rush Limbaugh, the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
And we have first hours in the can.
We have to take a brief time out here at the top, and we'll come back.
There are a lot of items in the stack of stuff here, folks, that have nothing to do with the shooting in Tucson or the president's wonderful nothingness of a speech, records, news items that have been not covered because of this event.
We'll try to get to some of those as the program unfolds.
Barney Frank, I'm upset at the Obama administration over phishing.
It's a huge, shoot story.
▲
Export Selection