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June 28, 2011 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:38
June 28, 2011, Tuesday, Hour #2
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Hour number two on day number two of our fill in adventure together.
I'm Mark Davis from WBAP Dallas Fort Worth.
And we got two more hours to spend together today, and then Rush returns tomorrow, making all of us individually and collectively happy.
Let's take a look at a few other things going on in the news.
214 787-1820.
What?
Oh, sorry.
What's the overunder on when I give my local phone number on the national show?
Oh my habits.
Bing bing bing.
There should be a small electric shock, 1-800-282-2882.
Oh blow.
All righty.
What we have is the opportunity before us, if I could get my act to get it, to refresh where we've been and explore a path of where we are now going to go.
In fact, first thing let's do is let's take a look at some folks who have hopped on the line during the break.
We've uh talked some spending cuts.
We've talked about getting uh President Obama in on the uh on the debt ceiling talks and what effect that's going to have.
Uh we had a suggestion come in our first hour in the world of calls uh about uh about how to cut spending, and that we had a gentleman who called in and said, How about 10% everything, everybody across the board?
And um except, he said, and this is where you get into intro, you know, what's a sacred cow and what's not, and he said, except for I think he said social security and the military.
Mm-hmm.
Well, what has to examine what would happen to Social Security spending if people were allowed to opt out of it, if people were allowed, and and and I I'd love to, and listen, even with the hit the economy uh has taken in the last few years, because you remember 07 and 08, I got this a lot.
I got this a lot.
They said, uh hey, talk show boy, hey, Mr. Social Security privatization.
What if a whole bunch of people had tied their reins to the private economy when the stock market went in the toilet?
Huh?
Well, I thought about that and they they had a good point.
The marketplace is what it is.
The stock market is what it is.
When you hit yourself to that wagon, you will be taken where it goes.
And I told those people that if they had um hitched themselves to that privatization wagon, you know, like early 07 only, well, that might have been um quite the death plunge.
However, if they uh were of a certain age where they had ridden the stock market up to fourteen thousand, you know, and then endured the drop that we all endured, that they still, on a net basis,
might still be far better off, and in fact, if they've been in the system for X amount of time, would definitely be better off than with the uh the sleepy investment structure that Social Security is and the paybacks that it offers.
So the marketplace is going to be what it's gonna be.
And I will always, even with the occasional hemorrhage, feel better about the prospects of tying your retirement and tying your golden years to the American economy while it still exists, than I will about um having it get stuffed into the black hole of uh of a government box.
1-800-282-2882.
Yes, that's the actual phone number.
Um, it's kind of cool because when we had the guy call up about uh about about military spending, and oh my gosh, don't cut that.
And I said, hang on a minute, because as much as I revere the military, and as much as I uh lament, I mean, there's some things we need to spend more on in the military, like veterans' benefits, like military pay, like uh certain armament budgets so that we can make sure that our guys and gals always have exactly what they need in wartime and not in wartime.
But are there occasional bases we might close?
Are there is is there fat in the military?
Is there bloat in the military?
I'm sure there is.
And if we find it, I think we could uh make friends across all kinds of political lines.
And that's not why I'm suggesting it.
You don't just do things to make friends across political lines.
That's very Mitt Romney of me, uh, or would be.
Uh you do things because they're right, and sometimes you do things that are so universally right that both Democrats and Republicans, conservatives and even some liberals say, wow, that was the right thing to do.
Finding bloat and waste everywhere is a good idea.
Even if some of it might be in the military.
Um as soon as you say something like that, you think, oh boy, here come the calls from military and military wives.
And here is a proud military wife just up the road for me in Oklahoma City.
Elizabeth, what a pleasure it is to have you.
Welcome to the Rush Limbaugh Show.
Mark Davis filling in.
How are you?
Hi, thank you so much.
I'm doing great today.
How are you?
I'm just fantastic.
Good.
I actually grew up in in Texas, both my husband and I, so we're Texans at heart.
Well, I'm very, very proud to have you here in Russia's world.
Before we begin, would you do me the honor of telling me about your husband?
What branch, where is he?
What's your story?
He is Air Force.
Um we're stationed at Tinker, of course, in Oklahoma City.
And um having a great time learning all the all the ins and outs.
If you hear some squealing, that would be my daughter.
Well, that there's nothing there.
I'll tell you what, you will never hear me ever complain about the sound of a child during a talk show call.
Now, if the kid goes nuts, we might have to talk, but for now it's nothing but beautiful ambient uh ambient sound.
So what you got for us today?
Well, I heard about, you know, the guy who's saying we should cut ten percent of everything but military and I think social security.
And uh I know that when people think cutting military budgets, they think, well, that means that we're gonna have to, you know, use really old planes and really old tanks and you know, closed military bases, but I think it would my husband comes home and he's very financially minded, and there's a lot of little things, just like in you know, in your own budget at your house that you could cut, like paperwork.
I mean, all the papers that they print off for things that they really don't need all those papers for.
I know that sounds silly, but you know, little things like that.
No, I I mean it does it in all.
Uh but because it it's the last thing that we that we really ought to do is uh is say about certain things that we cannot cut them.
There's there's always something and and listen, uh and maybe a better idea is to s is to go at all of government and say, we're gonna we're gonna take ten percent away.
You find ten percent you can get rid of.
That but make that step number one, and then come back and say, okay, is there anything that we have cut in this ten percent that we just can't live without?
I mean, really cannot live without.
And if we find that we really have cut into muscle, then maybe we put a couple of things back.
Or maybe if we it's just like in your own household budget.
Well, sure, exactly right.
I mean, you say we gotta get rid of this, gotta get rid of this.
Maybe there's something you cannot get rid of, but maybe you found another budget line item that could you could get rid of 15 or even 20% of.
Right.
And and doubling up on things that you don't need to double up on, and that's a lot of the stuff that he finds that really frustrates him as you know, just a lot of of wasteful things.
And it's little things.
It's not things like, you know, using too much gasoline on a plane or sending too many people out.
It's little bitty things that would be really easy to cut out.
Which when you look at, you know, when you look at the family structure and the family budget, which is an easy thing because everybody has that, those are the kind of things that really make the difference.
It's nickels and dimes, like our grandparents always said that that's well listen, best to your husband and Elizabeth, thank you so very, very much.
I deeply, deeply appreciate it.
And uh just uh thanks for for honoring us with your call today.
All righty, one-eight hundred-two eight two two two eight eight two.
Um I'm just looking through some of the things that are uh that are making the news today.
Every once in a while you'll get one of these.
So let's uh let's examine it.
It's the collective uh basket of stories that contains lawsuits based on religiously inspired uh garments.
A former stockroom worker for Abercrombie and Fitch is suing them in federal court, saying she was illegally fired after refusing to remove her Muslim head scarf while on the job.
Yes, it's another hijab story.
Now, uh I know I can I can hear people I can I could hear the the sounds of knee jerking.
I I could hear them across uh the fruited plain.
There's only one way to go at this.
Every once in a while, uh the I'm I'm an enormous believer in religious freedom, even for the religions who have a shockingly high percentage of people who want to kill us, there are certain uh religious freedom issues.
But uh some of this stuff uh about head scarves and uh and things uh make me a little nutty because sometimes you have the right to assert the freedom to to uh mm uh dress yourself religiously, and sometimes you just don't.
Uh you know, the full face burqa does not work for your driver's license picture, okay?
I mean, it just doesn't.
If a bank, for example, has a rule that says, you know what, no head covering, you know what it means?
It means no head covering.
And if that's problematic for you religiously, it's called find another bank or whatever.
I mean, and I love this what's about discrimination.
Well, that's discrimination.
No, it's not.
Same rule for everybody.
That means, you know, that my son can't go in in his ball cap, of course he's eight, he probably doesn't have an account.
Uh it means you can't go in in your in your ball cap, and it means let the the Muslim ladies cannot go in in the in the full head scarf thing.
If the bank says no head covering, they mean no head covering.
But this time, though, it's uh the opportunity to work in the stock room at Abercrombie and Fitch.
Honey Khan said a manager at the Hollister Company store, I guess a subset of Iber Abercrombie and Fitch, at Hillsdale Mall, San Mateo, California, hired her while she was wearing her hijab.
The manager said it was okay to wear it as long as I love this.
It was okay to wear it as long as it was in company colors.
If it's a Hollister colored hijab, you're good.
Four months later, though, she says, a district manager and human resources manager asked if she could remove the hijab while working.
And she was suspended and then fired for refusing to do so.
It's the latest employment discrimination charge against the company's so-called look policy, which critics say means images of mostly white young athletic looking people.
Uh they're based in New Albany, Ohio.
They say they do not tolerate discrimination.
Uh okay.
But do they practice it?
Okay.
We need to go to the meanings of some words.
What is discrimination anyway?
If you're discriminating in ways that are arbitrary and cruel, that's that's not good.
But does a company have the right to say, you know what?
Our employees are going to look a certain way.
Yeah, I guess it me it depends on what they mean.
I mean, I personally don't care if if somebody's going in to buy a pair of twenty-four inch waist jeans and and and someone uh you know has a hijab, I who cares?
If I ran the company, I'd I wouldn't care.
But if you run the company and you care, guess what?
It's your company.
Now, it gets a little more complicated than this in some cases.
There was a story of a Starbucks that hired a young lady who is apparently was a little person.
She's like, I mean, literally.
A what what is the what word can you is dwarf okay?
I guess midget will get you in trouble.
I I don't know.
So she's uh I think dwarf is actually medical.
So she's like three feet tall.
And they hired her at Starbucks.
They said that the spirit apparently was, let's give this a try.
Yeah, it didn't work out.
It just didn't work out.
First of all, you ever worked at Starbucks, you are moving and grooving.
You're over here, you're over there, you're over here, you're over there, and then you gotta kind of interact over the counter, you gotta get up there, and so she had a step stool.
And it was doodle boom, step stool, up, doodle, boom, step stool.
It was a nightmare.
And and the and the store eventually said, Oh, God, we tried, we tried.
You know, but they take a look at the prospect of I mean, it was slowing things down, it was it was unworkable, folks are you know, tripping over if not the step stool, then maybe even you, we don't want that.
Somebody's gonna get hurt, it might be you.
We gave it the old college try.
It didn't work.
We're sorry.
She, of course, has sued.
Um that one to me, I th I think the the the clothing store case, I mean, that I I mean I'll be really honest with you.
They probably don't really mean this, but I think that they are concerned that the Muslim girl working in the clothing store is gonna freak people out.
Which, let's face it, it probably will.
Fairly, unfairly whatever.
You come on, please.
It happens.
Stock room.
You know it happens.
Now there is that's the interesting thing, is is you know stockroom versus outfront.
I mean, I don't know.
You know, I would suggest that any clothing store, if you're in the stockroom today, you could be out front tomorrow.
I don't know.
But what right does a company have?
Some right, little right, no right, of to have the employees look a certain way.
Now, if if if your first thought is to say none, that everything should be appearance blind, let me introduce you to a concept called Hooters.
And boy, I don't know about where you live, but we got 14 things that are that are opening up and read about this in I Love Dallas Fort Worth, chapter 512.
We have there's a little sports bar called the Tilted Kilt.
There's uh there's a barbecue joint, I think, called Twin Peaks.
There's another bar no, that's I think it's a barbecue.
There's a there's another oh, the barbecue place with scantily clad women is bone daddies, yeah, right.
So the whole uh which clearly our I offer those up, not just for a titillation and advertising adver uh uh advertising purposes, but to share with you the the mantle of businesses that exist that clearly are appearance related, and that seems to pass muster.
But uh I don't know if she's gonna win this suit here for for the right to wear the hijab at work uh at an Abercrabian fitch or Hollister store.
But the Starbucks story with with the the lady who was three feet tall, th arguing that she had some right to work there, even if it was a danger to herself, others, and a hindrance to the manner in which that business dispatched its business, the world has truly gone crazy.
When we are making rulings based on how we feel about uh is that disability or whatever, how we feel uh you know I I have every ounce of the proper empathy for what it's like to go through life being three feet tall.
That that's gotta be a challenge every day.
But if I let my empathy, if I allow that to morph into an attitude that forces three foot tall employees into work environments where the business is hurt by it, then I'm crazy.
And I really do like to think that I'm not crazy.
You be the judge.
All righty.
Mark Davis filling in for Rush on the EIB network.
Back in a moment.
Tuesday, June 28th, Rush Limbaugh Show.
Mark Davis filling in from Texas.
Let's head in the same time zone, but way north and head up to Wisconsin.
The magnificent state of Scott Walker and uh and and apparently attempted strangulation in the Supreme Court chambers in Appleton Robert, Mark Davis fill it in for Rush.
How are you?
Uh, just great.
You're doing a great job, Mark.
You're very kind.
Thank you.
Have you heard that story about the about the supposedly but in in in you know while hashing out some of the uh the public employees' court cases that you had Supreme Court justices in a strangling match?
Yeah, they're trying to go after Prosser.
I mean, it's another liberal I don't know.
Yeah, let's get to what you you called about means testing.
Let's do that first and I'll tell everybody that story of the night.
I don't want to take up all your time on that.
Go ahead.
Okay.
Well, I don't think Dolly's ten percent on everything but Social Security and Medicaid and the military is gonna get anywhere in balancing our budget.
If you just look at the numbers, the other the other two are just too great.
I also think I'm first of all, I'm retired, I collect Social Security.
I also have a good pension that I've invested well through my life.
Social Security helps me, but it isn't needed.
And I'm not rich, I'm middle class.
Well, it's you don't think you don't think just continue.
If I I don't think there's anything wrong with means testing Social Security and Medicare.
I think they should be left for the people that really need them.
All right, let me share what people say.
Let me share, let me share what people say to that who object to it and see what your answer would be.
Because I'm intrigued by the debate.
I tend to feel the same way that you do.
I'm not hostile to means testing.
But here's a hard thing for those of us uh entertaining it to say.
You know what that does.
It involves r and first of all, when I when I talk about sloth or slovenliness, I realize that if you're uh at retirement age and don't have any money, it doesn't mean you were lazy.
Sometimes you fell on hard times, sometimes just life didn't work out the way.
I understand that.
But in some cases, you will wind up punishing people who have prepared well for their retirement and rewarding those who did not.
What kind of message is that?
Now in our tax codes.
Does that make it right?
It's it's it's no different.
And I and I agree with you.
I know a lot of people that worked all their lives, spent every dime they had, never saved, and are counting on Social Security.
And I guess that's just the way the cookie crumbles, they'll get it.
And the rest of us that don't really need it, maybe should get a reduced amount to make it last for everybody.
I mean, there the means testing, there's a strong argument for means testing.
It diverts government money to people who need it the most, and it would save a ton.
But the message, the message just kills me that if if you and I and a handful of other Americans um actually show the the hard work and responsibility to provide our own nest egg, gee, kind of like people used to do, uh, we get screwed.
However, if you retire with nothing, you get money.
I don't know how to work away through that one.
All right, Wisconsin's choke gate.
I will share the details next.
You know, if in a given state, which is already lately God's gift to talk shows, Wisconsin with a wonderful, wonderful governor like Scott Walker and uh just just magnificent things happening.
I mean, you could watch Wisconsin morph into first a purple and then ultimately maybe even a red state, ooh, dare I dream.
But uh and if amazing things are gonna happen there in terms of real economic reform that the nation would do well to echo, if in the midst of that drama we are going to have um Supreme Court justices uh strangling each other or what or okay, it's chokegate.
We go to National Review Online and the Corner Blog and Christian Snyder, who shares the following.
With the Wisconsin Supreme Court devolving into a storyline only Vince McMahon could love, rumors are still swirling about what actually happened when two justices engaged in a physical confrontation behind closed doors on June thirteenth.
Justice Anne Walsh Bradley claims Justice David Prosser choked her.
Prosser denies he choked Bradley and claims she initiated physical contact.
In the past two days, multiple sources with firsthand knowledge of the incident have been able to provide more details as to what exactly happened behind closed chamber doors.
The week before the legislature was set to repass the collective bargaining provision, three of the four conservative justices were ready to issue a ruling reinstating the Union law as originally passed.
Prosser, on the other hand, wanted to wait longer to avoid the appearance that the court was rushing their decision through.
Prosser thought he had an agreement with Liberal Chief Justice Shirley Abramson to delay release of the opinion until Tuesday of the following week.
As Monday arrived, there was no word from Abramson on whether the decision would be issued the next day.
At 5 30 PM, Prosser and the other conservative justices marched around the chambers looking for Abramson, who was found in Justice Bradley's office.
Prosser stood outside Bradley's door talking to the justices in Bradley's office.
The discussion got heated, with Prosser expressing his lack of faith in Abramson's ability to lead the court.
According to one witness, Bradley charged toward Prosser, shaking her clenched fist in his face.
Another source says they were literally nose to nose.
Prosser then put his hands up to push her away.
As one source pointed out, if a man wants to push a woman who is facing him, he wouldn't push her in the chest, unless he wants to face an entirely different criminal charge.
Consequently, Prosser put his hands on Bradley's shoulders to push her away, and in doing so made contact with her neck.
Should I continue with this?
Are we in is this beneficial?
At that moment, another justice approached Bradley from behind and pulled her away from Prosser, saying, Stop it, Anne, this isn't like you.
Bradley then shouted, I was choked.
Another justice present replied, You were not choked.
In a statement following the incident, Bradley maintained Prosser put his hands around my neck in anger in a chokehold.
These are Supreme Court justices.
This were to happen at the United States Supreme Court, whom do you envision?
No, no, no, no.
The play that parlor game on your own time.
Is it away?
Is it a Ginsburg Scalia thing?
Sotomayor Roberts, it probably said play it on your own time, I'm sorry.
Oh, but let's wrap this up.
On Monday night, Bradley called Capitol Police Chief Charles Tubbs to talk to him about the incident on the morning of Wednesday, June 15th, Capitol Police Chief Tubbs joined the justices in a closed door meeting where he discussed issues relating to workplace violence.
During the meeting, Chief Justice Abramson actually reenacted the incident on Chief Tubbs, no doubt an amusing sight as the diminutive Abramson mimicked choking the tall portly police chief.
During her demonstration, Abramson emphasized that Prosser had exerted pressure on Bradley's throat.
There was no pressure, interrupted the justice who had initially broken up the incident.
That's only because you broke us apart, shot back Bradley.
This exchange led several meeting attendees to believe Bradley was making up the charge as they took her rejoinder as an admission that there was no pressure applied to her neck.
Exactly.
During the Wednesday meeting, Bradley urged the justices present to take a vote on whether Prosser should be forced into me, anger management counseling.
The threat was implicit.
If they didn't vote her way, she would be forced to take the next step against Prosser, which they took to mean filing a restraining order against him.
The other justices balked, wondering whether they even had the authority to order Prosser into any type of counseling.
Some thought it would be demeaning to prosser to have to go to counseling when he had done nothing wrong.
And in the end, Bradley realized she didn't have enough justices on her side and no vote was taken.
So where are we now?
Justice Bradley has not filed any kind of charges against Prosser.
Instead the story was leaked to the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism, funded by George Soros, if you care about things like that, who used three anonymous sources to back up Bradley's story, there were six justices present at the time of the incident, four of whom would be more likely to back Prosser's version that leaves Abramson and Bradley is the only two remaining justices present.
Speculation is abundant as to why Bradley decided to forego a criminal complaint against Prosser.
I mean, gosh, ma'am, if he strangled you.
She decided again to go to the press ten days after the event.
Some say Bradley's complaint wouldn't have stood up if given the scrutiny of a criminal investigation.
While Bradley has not filed any charges against Prosser, an investigation was initiated by the Capitol Police, who quickly turned the case over to the Dane County Sheriff David Bahoney.
Okay, do we feel fully briefed on Choke Gate in uh in Wisconsin?
There's one thing that jumps out of this that uh that I want to mention and maybe you guys want to weigh in on Does anger man uh the whole anger management counseling thing was just so stupid in this story, but whenever I see it invoked, does anger management counseling let's see, how can I does it work?
I'm sure that sometimes it does.
And there are people who have like anger issues, who have like self-control issues where their fuses are just this short, and you know, there are things that you can do about that.
Counseling is one, I'm sure, you know.
Medication is another, sorry, Scientologists.
Uh and and and yes, that's uh thoroughly valid issue.
But from I if I've always wondered about the of all the people who are funneled into anger management uh counseling, I just kind of wonder how many of them really need to be there.
And if there is anything that really uh and here here let me usher this into another category of stuff.
I'm sure there is a need for this thing I'm about to mention.
Don't get ahead of me.
You know where I'm going, don't you?
I guess there is, but I just I wonder how it goes.
I can only think that it only makes things worse.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Sensitivity training.
Oh, God save us from sensitivity training.
Are there boorish, loutish, racist, misogynists uh around us?
Sure, of course.
I tend to hope that just the normal enlightenment that comes from living in a hopefully enlightened world sorta takes care of that over time.
If you take somebody who is a bigot, or if you take somebody who is a woman hater or a racist or a whatever, and you stuff them into the tin can of sensitivity training, the first thing that occurs to me is all you do is just marinate them in resentment.
And whom do they resent?
Do they resent the people who put them there?
Oh, maybe.
But no.
The real resentment is that in sensitivity training.
And I mean the people who actually probably need it in some form.
But what they need is enlightenment that just should come.
And I don't know how to magically wave a wand and enlighten people who are Neanderthals in certain ways.
But uh once you stick somebody in sensitivity training, let's say someone is revealed that let's say some guy doesn't like black people or doesn't like Hispanics or doesn't like Jews or doesn't like women or doesn't like Christians or doesn't like whatever.
The first group they're going to blame is the group they don't like in the first place.
Yeah, here's what happens when somebody dares to speak up against fill in the blank.
And they're only going to resent them wars.
Anyway.
All right.
Well, I having made life simpler in those ways.
Let's let's pause and come back and get into some more uh budget talks and social security talks and debt ceiling talks.
Anything else you want to do from the world of government to the world of the presidential campaign to uh any manner of uh of a number of things we have r right out there in in New Mexico where we've a fire licking at the uh the base of a nuclear facility, that's never good.
And uh just various other things that are in the news on this Tuesday.
Rush is back tomorrow, thrilled by that and thrilled to have you and your calls next.
Mark Davis in for Rush on the EIB network.
It is the Tuesday Rush Limbaugh Show.
Rush is back tomorrow.
Mark Davis with you from WBAP Dallas Fort Worth.
And it is an honor.
Let's see where we are headed next.
A lot of spending talk as well there should be.
We are in Houston.
Bob, Mark Davis, you're on the Rush Limbaugh Show.
How are you?
Fine, Mark.
Thanks for taking my call.
Um back to that spending question about the 10% cuts and and you were talking about the military and all that a while back.
Yep.
Um I'm I'm wondering if maybe we can go to back to the last year or years of the Clinton era and roll back all that uh roll back spending to those era uh to those uh budget levels across the board.
And I haven't heard anybody suggest that, and I'm just wondering if that's probably a good idea if it was saying good enough for Clinton.
Uh then uh then, you know, basically it uh it would good enough, it's it's good enough for us.
Let's spend a moment because there's there's some genius in in your observation.
A lot of talk lately, here we are in 2011 talks about rolling things back to 2008 levels.
There's a lot of talk of that.
Surely it's only three years.
How much of a cut can that be?
Well, with the profligate spending of of these people in this regime, it it's it's a pretty large step backwards.
If in your uh philosophy of going back to the end of uh of the previous completed democratic presidential term, I mean, after eight years of Clinton, if everybody says everything was so darn hunky dory as he left office in uh at the end of January of 2001, let's just go back there.
Because listen, I love George W. Bush, but let's face it, government got bigger under George W. Bush.
And um that would be a fascinating way to phrase it, and a lot of people might s nod their head, but then when they take a look at the numbers and realize how much cutting that would be, they would realize what what a binge we've been on.
I think it's brilliant.
Oh, exactly.
I I think it's about half.
I mean, the the budget uh budget outlay in somewhere around 1999 was about one point six trillion, and now it's about three point something trillion.
So um yeah, I just think it would it it would take us back to uh an era that's that was acceptable to everybody, and we hear about it all the time.
Republicans calling for a return to Clinton era spending levels.
I it's double genius.
Bob, thank you very, very much.
Let us head next to Tulsa living on Tulsa time.
Grants, Mark Davis, welcome to the Rush Limbaugh Show.
How are you?
I'm great.
It was good to speak to you again.
Thank you.
I'd like to uh make a statement.
I don't want to be telling like I'm being provocative.
I just don't know how else to say this.
Oh, can't have that.
Don't worry about it.
Back in the Reagan years, when, you know, the Republicans started taking over the federal government.
Back in the Reagan years, they went on a they went to war with the American worker.
And we used to have protective tariffs who protected them, which protected American workers.
And now they've turned it completely around where the American worker is the problem of why companies can't make any money because the American worker is just too greedy and asking for too much.
And you have CEOs that make 140 million or 400 million dollars a year or whatever the deal is.
And I'm just wondering why are Republicans at war with the American worker when it comes to protecting their jobs.
Okay.
And you didn't want to be provocative?
Really?
I don't.
No, I'm saying it sounds like that.
No, I've listened.
It's perfect.
It's perfectly okay.
You feel provocatively about it, so it's okay.
It's perfectly okay that you use incendiary language like the war on the American worker.
It is nothing of the kind.
It is a decision that we have to make in the American economy.
Let me give you 60 seconds on this and then you just tell and then you take it back and take your own 60.
It'll be great, because I really do respect your view.
However, we have a choice to make.
We can either have protectionist policies that will indeed lead to more stuff made in America.
And I love stuff made in America.
And that also means that every American family budget in our great nation will just get nuked with higher costs.
It just will.
And the reason that politicians of both stripes, I mean, you'll get a lot of Democrats striking this populist tone at times.
It's pretty hard to tell people.
If you tell them with one hand, we're going to protect American jobs and we're going to have tariffs and all this good stuff, that just sounds great.
And you'll get a nice big hooray at some Fourth of July picnics.
And then you tell them, oh, yeah, and by the way, that trip to Walmart for $100, it's now $140.
That speaks very, very loudly, especially in tough economic times.
So do we as an American economy, do we are are we going to because it's kind of funny?
If you're going to talk about the war on the American worker, how about if I come back at you with punishing the American consumer by making things artificially more expensive?
I mean, we can we can both play that game.
Floor is yours.
I believe that if you uh protect American workers and they make more money, they have more money to spend.
And if you tell foreign competitors you want to do business in the United States of America, you have to pay for that privilege to do so.
Why certainly back before Reagan did what he did and then the Republican Congress by dropping tariffs.
You can't tell me one thing that is cheaper in price now by a foreign competitor of when it was made here in America, and I'd like to challenge you to do so.
Well, no, you're using if we're going to use, you know, nineteen seventy-nine dollars in today's dollars, I absolutely can, especially when inflation has has been virtually non-existent.
And if we were decided to go back on this and throw on all kinds of tariffs uh and wrap it in the happy language of protecting the American worker, again, would it do that?
Yeah, I I suppose it would.
Silly me, I believe in the American worker enough and the American workforce enough and the American economy enough that I don't believe that we need to rape the budgets of every American family by making things artificially more expensive so we can feel good about being tough about the Chinese.
How about let's outdo the Chinese?
How about let's outdo India?
How about let's find the things that we're better at and just be better at it?
Uh in instead of um I'm not gonna suggest that you're whining because you're not, and I do respect your view.
Uh, I'd like to I'd like the American economy to compete.
I know the playing field.
They'll say, well, the playing field's not level.
I understand that.
But I don't want to level it out in a way that punishes the American consumer.
I love Walmart.
I love Walmart.
However, I have the same crisis of uh mixed feelings when I walk in and find out that everything is is made uh by the ChaiCons.
I don't like that.
But I think I like even less making things artificially more expensive to protect the American worker when instead I'd like to see the American economy and the American workforce be responsive and nimble as I know it can.
All right, Mark Davis Infor Rush, be right back.
It's the Rush Limbaugh Show for a Tuesday.
Hour number two will draw to a close within mere seconds.
So let me just give you a little uh heads up on what I envision as we as we come back.
Uh there is some there's some items in the news about campaign finance.
And I got some thoughts and I'll share them next.
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