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April 8, 2011 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:32
April 8, 2011, Friday, Hour #1
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Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 24-7 podcast.
That doesn't answer how long it's been on because when I looked at the switch, it was on.
And you normally turn it off in here at like 11 o'clock.
As far as I'm going to, it's been on for 24 hours.
All right.
Well, it damn well had better been off.
That's all I'm saying here.
Live from the Southern Command in sunny South Florida.
It's Open Line Friday.
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You don't get on the air otherwise.
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What's a few dead babies between friends?
I mean, that's really where we are here.
Folks, in discussing the pending government shutdown, we're talking about pennies in addition to everything else.
We are more than happy to fund Planned Parenthood.
The Democrats are more than happy to fund Planned Parenthood, but they will shut down this government if there is a writer to the continuing resolution that funds the military at war in Libya, Afghanistan, Iraq.
So it's fine to pay Planned Parenthood.
In fact, the regime is insisting on it.
And they're calling this women's health.
Chuck Schumer and the rest of the Democrats are out there describing this as a Republican assault on women's health.
Or alternately, they say that the Republicans are focused on the usual social issues that the independents don't care anything about.
But what it boils down to is what's a few dead babies between friends.
Obama's got no problems ordering a moratorium on drilling for oil, but he will not support a moratorium on drilling for babies.
Now, remind me, who are the people hoping Republicans cave on a moratorium on abortion so the Obamas can take their vacation?
Yeah, they're going to Colonial Williamsburg.
I don't, it's a long time since they took a vacation.
Rio, yeah, it's been at least two weeks.
So they got another vacation at Colonial Williamsburg.
Obama's demanding this thing get settled in time so he can go to colonial Williamsburg.
He has threatened to withhold pay, compensation from our troops, but refuses to withhold money from Planned Parenthood.
Now, how is that hope and change working out for you?
Eleanor Holmes Norton, as her name is pronounced by Al Sharpton, Eleanor Holmes Norton has called a government shutdown the equivalent of bombing innocent civilians.
She is mad because the Republicans want to eliminate federal funding for abortion.
Are there any more innocent civilians than unborn babies?
Are they not the essence of innocence?
And in the middle of all of this, we have to understand that we're talking pennies.
$60 billion, $70 billion, $100 billion, $30 billion.
It's pennies compared to the debt.
It's pennies compared to what Paul Ryan's budget is dealing with.
And Dingy Harry on the floor of the Senate, maybe one of the dumbest statements he's ever made, and that's a tough competition.
There have been a lot of them.
This morning, Dingy Harry on the floor of the Senate told about the health risks to his wife and daughters and nine granddaughters if he agrees to the Republican cuts.
Now, he's one of the wealthiest guys in Searchlight Nevada.
One of the wealthiest guys in Las Vegas.
One of the wealthiest guys in the country.
And apparently he will not spend a dime of his own money on his daughter's, granddaughters, or wife's abortions.
Well, because that's what women's health is in this debate.
Don't think it's about anything else.
If this is offending your sensibilities, it damn well should, because that's what we're talking about here.
The only women's health issue these clowns care about on the left is abortion.
They don't dare call it that.
They want to fund Planned Parenthood.
Why?
Planned Parenthood earns its money performing abortions.
That's their definition of family planning.
So, no matter how serious the health threat, Dingy Harry says he will not spend a dime of his own money on his kids' and grandkids' health, slash their abortions.
If the government money's cut off, they're toast.
Dingy Harry's daughters and granddaughters are toast.
He's not going to take care of them.
It's your job, don't you know?
It's your responsibility.
Obama has canceled a campaign trip to Indiana so that he can continue to refuse to compromise on any budget plan and block any continuing resolution.
Now, that's dedication, folks.
He is dedicated to blocking it all.
In fact, he's so dedicated to creating a government shutdown, he's even willing to give up his latest vacation to Williamsburg so he can be on hand to block any funding for U.S. troops.
He will not dare leave Washington.
When there's a chance to block funding that would pay military people, he'll hang in there and make sure to block it.
The government shutdown has shut down all other stories, too, and that's a shame.
The quagmire in Libya.
You had a general saying we may be sending ground troops in there.
Did you hear about that?
Skyrocketing gas prices.
How's that trade-in working for you?
Even stories about the real long-term budget deficit or Paul Ryan's sensible plan to fix it.
And of course, Obama has got to be very thankful that everybody's sidetracked and focused on what adds up to pennies and abortion.
No wonder he won't compromise.
But remember, remember, ladies and gentlemen, the meaty was telling us how important it is to compromise?
Oh, yes.
We must make sure the independents love everybody here.
Compromise, we must compromise.
Of course, they just mean it's important for Republicans to compromise.
And what that means is it's important for Republicans to give up.
It's important for Republicans to cave.
News media has gone completely off the deep end with their Cassandra-like predictions of a cataclysm if there's a government shutdown.
The headlines are hilarious.
I have three pages here of fear-mongering headlines.
Workers brace for effective government shutdown, AP.
Military families worry about looming shutdown, AP.
Government shutdown could impact local weekend events.
NBC, Washington.
Government shutdown, park closures would deliver economic blow to Utah.
Federal government shutdown to cost Dayton $100 million a week.
Iran's press TV, U.S. government shutdown to halt troop pay, and they're celebrating.
The Iranian news agency is reporting, we don't get paid.
Military doesn't get paid.
Doesn't Harry Reid, by the way, represent a state that has legalized prostitution.
How concerned can he be about women's health?
Think progress: 11 ways the Tea Party-inspired shutdown will hurt the economy.
Government shutdown could hurt housing.
13 ways a government shutdown could hurt you.
Government shutdown will hurt Cape Fear region.
Government shutdown could hurt small business.
Government shutdown will hurt Michigan's children.
Government shutdown could hurt thousands.
Why?
A government shutdown would hurt blacks more than most.
Oh, yeah.
Minorities, hardest hit during a government shutdown.
Government shutdown, 13 ways it can hurt you.
U.S. government shutdown could hurt recovery.
Does a U.S. government shutdown really hurt American foreign policy?
Report shutdown would hurt military families.
Government shutdown could hurt real estate.
I'm just halfway through three pages of fear-mongering headlines from the media eagerly awaiting and hoping for a disaster from a government shutdown over pennies and abortion.
And in Wisconsin, the news media, the rest of the Democratic Party are all up in arms over the Wisconsin Supreme Court election.
Turns out the initial numbers, which were reported by AP as a courtesy, were not correct.
Did you hear about this, Snerdley?
Turns out that the Republican Justice David Prosser is actually more than 7,800 votes ahead, which, of course, has infuriated the media.
They thought they had this thing safely stolen.
And then this clerk in Waukesha County forgot to count 14,000 votes.
I read this and I said, well, it's about time we got in this game.
Normally, it's the Democrats that are uncovering votes that they missed.
And look at how the Democrats and the media are running around acting like stuck pigs.
And they want an investigationist woman.
The problem is that this Republican clerk had a Democrat take a look at everything she was doing all along the line.
And Democrats said, I'm sorry, but everything's legal here.
Everything's above board.
That woman's chances for advancement in the Democrat Party are now put bye-bye.
But she said everything the Republican clerk did.
There's some people upset that this incompetence on the part of the Republican clerk doesn't actually help, that it creates some of the controversy.
So I understand that.
We could deal with that perhaps later in the program.
But it's still, when I saw this, I have to tell you.
All right.
Just yesterday, I gave a big monologue on how we're going to have to learn to play the game the way they do.
And voila, voila, we find 14,000 votes and ours are legitimate.
So Justice Prosser way ahead by more than 7,800 votes.
The media going after this poor county clerk who didn't include one city's counts in what was sent to the AP.
Now, never mind that there is no law saying that the AP should be told about the preliminary vote counts at all.
They just do this as a favor to AP.
And never mind that the AP should have noticed that the city's numbers were far too low.
There was something about this that should have raised a red flag.
The bottom line here is the AP, the Democrats are furious that their candidate, Kloppenberg, does that name, you know, I normally don't comment on people's names, but Kloppenberg, doesn't it sound like something could step in?
Well, she did.
She did step in it with a big victory speech out there.
And, oh, yeah.
I mean, they've even got mock Harry Truman headlines, graphics on the newspapers.
Anyway, AP Democrats furious that their candidate, Kloppenberg, they declared her the winner when she was a whopping 204 votes ahead, by the way.
An insurmountable lead, of course, when you're the Democrat and you have a 204-vote lead.
It's going to be hard to find enough votes to make up the difference, but they're going to try.
They're going to bring in the Al Franken lawyer.
They're going to bring in the same lawyer that found the votes for Christine Gregois in Washington and the same lawyer that found the votes for Franklin in Minnesota.
They're going to bring in the same guy into Wisconsin here.
So naturally, the media now doing everything they can to discredit the evil Republican county clerk, even though Democrat officials, as I said, have been looking over her shoulder every step of the way, said everything's been done completely on the up and up.
But a scapegoat must nevertheless be found.
A brief timeout here, ladies and gentlemen, we've got to take a brief break.
It's the EIB Network.
It's Open Line Friday.
Back with more right after this.
Open line Friday, Rush Lynn Boy, half my brain tied behind my back.
A conservative incumbent surged to a commanding lead in Wisconsin's hotly contested Supreme Court election Thursday after a predominantly Republican county clerks announced, or clerk announced that she had incorrectly entered vote totals in the race as a referendum on Governor Scott Walker's division union, a divisive union rights law.
Waukeshaw County Clerk Kathy Nicholas, a former Republican staff member in the Assembly Republican caucus, the Waukesha County Board has criticized her handling of past elections and lack of oversight in her operations.
Now, there's a history of secrecy and partisanship surrounding the Waukesha County Clerk, and there remains unanswered questions, said Scott Ross, director of the liberal group, one Wisconsin Now.
Now, needless to say, one Wisconsin Now is a radical leftist 501c3 tax-exempt charity, hell-bent on putting liberal Democrats on the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
They are also major opponents of Governor Walker's reform initiatives, despite the IRS prohibition against lobbying by 501c3s.
The bottom line is that they had a Democrat looking at this every step of the way, and it's all legit.
And the Democrat said so, but that still doesn't matter.
They are still fit to be tied.
You know, they just, the Democrats do not like to have tables turned on them this way.
They do not like their own tactics when they are used against them.
In fact, the Reuters headline ballot find threatens to upend Wisconsin election notice.
When not all the ballots were counted, we had a legal result now, according to Reuters, when some ballots were found legally cast ballots.
All of a sudden the election is upended.
Officials in Waukeshaw county on thursday said a final review of paperwork and records uncovered thousands of uncounted votes a potentially stunning development that could upend the contest.
No, it wouldn't upend it, it would decide it.
There was no finality to this, 14 000 votes that were not counted that were found unofficial returns on wednesday gave the Union Backed challenger, Joanne Klappenberg, a narrow 204 votes statewide lead over the Republican David Prosser.
But late thursday a county clerk in Waukeshaw, a Republican stronghold, said the votes not included in earlier totals had resulted in a net gain, 75 080 or 77582 votes for Prosser.
My gosh, my friends.
How dare, how dare these votes threaten to upend the Democrat victory?
How dare state of Wisconsin snatch defeat from a tremendous victory for the Democrats in their media minions?
Meanwhile, the AP and that they're the real culprits in this story is also decrying the upending of their victory.
Ballot error threatens to upend key Wisconsin Supreme Court election.
Now, despite the claims of the AP, despite claims from UH Reuters, the Republican clerk in question here, Ms Nicholas, did not incorrectly enter any votes.
In addition, she did not fail to count any votes.
She did not misplace any votes.
No ballots found were found that had been overlooked.
The votes were counted correctly and documented correctly in the formal certification process.
The only error came when this county's votes were not added correctly for the unofficial results given to the AP on tuesday night.
The reformatted report from Brookfield did not end up in the early vote summary the county prepared for the news media, and that's where all this really lies.
The news media's preliminary report did not have these counts, and because they didn't get these counts all of a sudden now there's something suspicious here.
But no votes were ever misplaced.
They just weren't reported correctly to a p.
But they were reported correctly to county officials who are both Democrats and Republicans which, after all, is what matters.
But there's still going to be hell to pay.
You watch, it's going to be fun.
We'll be back after this.
Now here is what a Democrat official said from the Milwaukee Sentinel at the news conference with Nicholas, that's the Republican county clerk.
Ramona Kitzinger, the Democrat on the Waukeshaw County Board OF Canvassers said, quote, we went over everything and made sure that all the numbers jibed.
And they did.
Those numbers jibed up.
We're satisfied they are correct.
The Democrats.
He said, i'm not going to stand here and tell you something that's not true.
Okay, Ramona Kitzinger, a Democrat, examining everything.
Say, hey, I'm not going to stand here and tell you something that's not true.
The numbers jibe.
We are satisfied they are correct.
Now, conspiracy theories about what happened here, you know that they're going to blossom and bloom all over the internet.
But again, Ramona Kitzinger, the Democrat on the Waukeshaw County Board of Canvas, said she's satisfied the new numbers are correct.
But it's not over yet.
It's not over yet.
The margin may now show that David Prosser is ahead by over 7,000 votes.
But the legal wrangling could be just beginning.
The challenger, Joanne Kloppenberg, will almost certainly pursue a recount because of the perceived irregularity here.
Now, for just a brief aside, this 7,000-vote margin frankly makes sense.
If you look at the November results, if you look at all of the news media education that took place during this battle, where the Democrat senators fled, if you take a look, I mean, people just don't change their minds on a dime like this.
The idea that this Democrat challenger could win the Supreme Court race or that it even be that close didn't make any sense here.
Even when you learned that the union spent $3.5 million on television ads and everything else, so this 7,000-vote victory margin makes all kinds of sense.
And the one area, I talked to Governor Walker yesterday afternoon after this program in an interview for the upcoming issue of the Limbaugh Letter, the most widely read and subscribed to political newsletter in the country, by the way, mine.
And we agreed that in terms of messaging, the whole term collective bargaining rights has somehow attached itself to people across the country as the essence of fairness.
Such that if a state or an entity of some kind seeks to deny citizens, union members, their collective bargaining rights, it is seen as an act of profound unfairness.
It's a messaging thing because, of course, collective bargaining, when you're talking about a public union, public sector employees, who are they collectively bargaining against?
Taxpayers.
They're bargaining against the people as a whole.
Now, collective bargaining rights established itself as a phrase of fairness when there was a genuine evil boss, cigar chomping, suit-wearing, jet-flying CEO of some greedy company.
And collective bargaining was like the essence of fairness, the workers getting the little crumbs that they could.
So the whole concept of collective bargaining rights in the minds of the ignorant, the people that don't pay a whole lot of attention, people who are governed by their feelings and emotions, it's a tough one to overcome.
There's going to have to be something to replace collective bargaining rights here as a phrase to explain what's going on.
You can say it's money laundering.
You can say it's usurpation, taxpayer dollars, because that's what it is.
But still, This is the one thing that would argue against the race being close is the perception that somehow the evil Republicans wanted to deny fairness and a right to fair negotiations, collective bargaining.
Nevertheless, this 7,000 victory, 7,000 vote victory makes far more sense.
Now, there's a part of me that would love to believe that this whole thing was a Republican ploy.
Isn't that, I mean, don't you think the same way?
There's a part of me that would love to believe that this county clerk, Ms. Nicholas, held those votes back on purpose to be sprung just the way she sprung them, to totally deflate and take the air out of the Democrats who are prancing around victorious.
Mayor Daly used to do it.
Mayor Daly used to hold back on reporting Cook County until the downstate votes came in from Illinois, the conservative.
He waited to find out how much he needed.
Mayor Daly waited to find out what the Democrats needed from Cook County, ask the Kennedy family about this.
It's exactly what happens.
He would know how many votes he needed to win.
Now, that's not what happened here.
As much as we might dream, as much as we might enjoy seeing the Democrats get a little of their own back, we would still love to see this.
This whole collective bargaining notion, again, federal employees do not have it.
And this could be part of the education campaign that needs to be undertaken here.
Federal employees do not have collective bargaining rights against the citizens of the country.
None of Obama's federal employees do.
And it was Jimmy Carter, thanks to Jimmy Carter, that federal government employees do not have collective bargaining rights.
FDR was opposed to them.
I think George Meany was opposed to them, one of the early labor leaders.
The feds did have them.
Jimmy Carter took them away in 1978, so they only had them for a few years.
They were first given collective bargaining rights.
Unions were, public unions, by JFK back in 1963.
So they had them for 15 years.
And they were taken away by Jimmy Carter, a Democrat.
Who, by the way, Jimmy Carter, I'm sure, folks, there's somebody at the Democrat Party sending out marching orders talking points because Jimmy Carter is out saying today that the number one form of human rights abuse in the world is discrimination against women.
Discrimination against women on the very day that Harry Reid admits that he will not pay for his granddaughters to have abortion.
He wants to wait for the federal government to do it.
That's why he will not support a compromise here.
Chuck Schumer out talking about the Republicans want to deny women their health funds and such.
It's a code words for abortion.
And him, Jimmy Carter, joins this cacophony with the allegation that the discrimination against women worldwide is the number one form of human rights abuse.
At any rate, I was talking to Governor Walker yesterday.
This fact that there are no collective bargaining rights for federal union employees, but there are in his state.
And he made the point.
He said, you know, you tell them, you know, really they should take their complaint to President Obama because he does not grant federal employees.
I said, Governor, they're not interested in any.
This is all about you.
They're coming after you.
They're trying to destroy you personally and politically, which he knows.
Yeah, that's right.
The American people, those who have bought into this silly notion of a government shutdown, are being held hostage so that people can get government-funded abortions.
Well, look at Obama has clearly said he's not going to sign a compromise that would pay the military during a shutdown.
He will not sign a writer that'll do it.
He will not include it as a separate bill.
He won't sign that.
It's a distraction.
And he won't go along for a defunding of Planned Parenthood.
So Obama's position is, I'm going to go to the mat making sure women get federally funded abortions.
I don't care whether the military gets paid or not.
But by the way, fix this so I can head to Colonial Williamsburg with my five women who hang around me.
You got to listen to this.
Last night, Alexandria, Virginia, is a town hall.
Well-known Democrat Representative Jim Moran and it's an unidentified guy.
I think this is a military vet.
Have this exchange about a possible government shutdown and how it'll affect the troops.
Why are you here tonight and not in Congress trying to figure out how to stop this from happening?
I take exception to call it my comments.
Now I'm talking.
And you can sit down when you finish.
I really do take exception.
I'm sure you do.
I didn't say anything caustic.
Can you explain why the troops are not going to get paid?
You had an opportunity to speak.
Now it's time to sit down.
Will I take exception to you calling my comments caustic?
Sit down, please.
That's Congressman Jim Moran telling a voter and the citizen to sit down when the citizen wants to know why troops are not going to get paid.
The answer is because we must continue to fund Planned Parenthood.
Now, I don't know.
If you're like me, you've probably heard that the United States doesn't pay for abortions.
It's called the Hyde Amendment, right?
We don't pay for abortions.
So what is all this?
Well, it's about funding for Planned Parenthood.
That's right, Mr. Lembaugh.
That's exactly right.
This is the sometimes interruptive voice of the new Castrati.
That's right.
I interrupt you whenever it's necessary.
And we're talking women's health issues, Mr. Lembaugh.
We're talking about Planned Parenthood.
It's extremely important and it must be funded regardless.
Right.
Well, what does Planned Parenthood do?
Planned Parenthood is concerned about Planning Parenthood.
Right.
Like as in there won't be any parenthood.
That's alright.
That's a popular myth.
How is it, Mr. New Castrati, that parenthood earns its money aside from government grants?
It's the number one provider of abortion.
And yet it gets federal money.
What for?
To buy staples?
Letterhead?
Bumper stickers and posters?
So apparently the federal government is funding abortion.
And cover hell or high water, they're going to continue to fund abortion.
Calling it women's health issues or what?
Let's go to the phones.
Where are we going to start?
Theo in Woodside, California.
Great to have you on the EIB network.
You are up first.
Hi, Russ.
I'm a little nervous, so you'll have to bear with me.
All right.
I'll be happy to.
Thanks.
I wanted to make a comment about Harry Reid's argument.
If we have a government health care plan, then why do we need Planned Parenthood for women's health?
Well, it's a great point.
It's redundancy.
If the Obamacare fails to get the abortion done, Planned Parenthood can come in and finish it.
But if Harry Reed's arguing that we need it for women's health, for cancer screenings, and all these various health things, isn't that what the government health plan will be doing?
Yeah, I know.
Nobody's cutting cancer screenings here.
That's just every bit the smokescreen is Senator Schumer suggesting that the Republicans want to cut women's health services.
It's all a smokescreen.
You are exactly right.
You are very perceptive.
Very, very shrewd.
You are exactly right.
There's absolutely, we got Obamacare out there.
There's no way any of these allegations.
It was like Jesse Jackson says this is a return to the Civil War.
Have you heard that?
Theo, thanks for the call.
If the troops are not paid by their commander-in-chief, I have a question.
If the troops still engage in battle, if they go to wall and they execute the orders issued by their commanders, if the troops are thus not paid by their commander-in-chief, are they his slaves?
What would you call it?
Can those serving in the military just walk off the job?
I don't think so.
So if Obama does not sign the bill to pay his troops, then it sounds sort of like forced labor to me.
I mean, it's one thing, folks.
We can all agree on this.
It's one thing to have to pick cotton, but to be forced to risk your life overseas without being paid, that's the worst kind of forced labor to me.
Are you kidding me?
How can the President of the United States, on the eve of the anniversary of the Civil War, the 150th anniversary, threaten to withhold payment to Americans who not only risk their lives for their country, but are required by law to serve or face court-martial after they volunteered?
I believe desertion in wartime is still a capital offense.
But if these wars are just kinetic military operations, maybe an unpaid warrior who walks off the job only gets jail time because we're not at war.
The regime won't say so.
These are kinetic military actions.
But I think the Reverend Jackson might want to rethink his Civil War analogy.
I mean, it's getting ludicrous.
Eleanor Holmes Norton claiming this is the same thing as bombing innocent civilians.
Jesse Jackson says the government shutdown would be a return to the Civil War if the president refuses to fund the troops, if the commander-in-chief refuses to pay the troops, and Congressman Jim Moran in Virginia tells a voter who wants to know why the troops aren't being paid to shut up and sit down.
And if these guys expect these troops to stay on the job, it sure sounds like Obama has more in common with President Jefferson Davis than he does with President Lincoln.
We'll be back.
Don't go away.
Let's be a little honest here, folks.
Let me just perhaps verbalize what many of you are thinking.
I've been thinking this ever since 1995.
Won't it be a little disappointing if they don't shut down the government?
I mean, I'm hoping they do.
Don't you?
Don't you?
Why just want this thing shut down?
We all know what a whole lot the government actually won't be shut down.
We also know the impact is nothing like what the liberals and the media tell us it's going to be.
But wouldn't it be just and right if the government experiences a little bit of this recession, like the private sector has?
Okay, so some people aren't going to get paid, so some people aren't going to get a check.
Welcome to the club.
The private sector has been horribly impacted by this government.
The private sector has been horribly impacted by Barack Obama and his economic policies.
The government has not been affected at all.
The government's done nothing but continue to leech and grow.
Yeah, I meant the line snurtly.
Obama's got more in common with President Jefferson Davis in this whole mess than he ever had with Abraham Lincoln.
Damn right.
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