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June 8, 2012 - Rush Limbaugh Program
37:24
June 8, 2012, Friday, Hour #2
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Greetings to you music lovers, thrill seekers, and conversationalists all across the fruited plain.
Rush Limbaugh on Friday.
Let's go!
Live from the Southern Command in sunny South Florida.
It's Open Line Friday.
And you know the drill.
Whatever you want to talk about on Friday, that's el perfecto.
That's fine.
Doesn't have to be anything I care about, which is the rule Monday through Thursday.
And the reason for the rule is I don't want to sound bored.
If I sound bored, I'll be bored, and nobody wants to listen to that.
On Friday, I take a giant career risk.
I risk being bored by talking about something I have no interest in.
That's what Open Line Friday is.
You can talk about what you want.
Questions, comments, feel free.
Telephone number is 800-282-2882.
And the email address, LRushbo at EIBNet.com.
Daily Caller has an interesting story.
Mitt Romney, Mitt Romney would collect at least 72 of the 110 electoral votes available in eight battleground states if Obama's current polling numbers, as reported by the Huffing and Puffington Post, are overstated by a mere 1%.
Now, let me go back to Wednesday on this program, the day after the Wisconsin recall election.
And I remember leading off the program with what I thought was the key point of the day.
And everybody had their thoughts of what's the big lesson.
And a lot of people were, I mean, the impact on unions, the literal loss of membership in public employee unions in Wisconsin was profound.
It was one of the reforms that Walker initiated was an end to the state deducting union dues off the top of a union member's paycheck.
The union member never saw it, just like the taxes, never saw the money.
The state deducted it, and it went to the union, and then it went to the Democrats.
And by the way, I have to tell you, I'm really pleased about something.
I read voluminously last night about the Walker recall and the latest opinion punditry.
And I was excited to see how many people are writing about the lesson learned in the Walker recall.
And basically, if I had to synthesize it, it would be the point that I have been pounding home for two years now.
Finally, taxpayers have realized that they are paying for a deal they don't get.
Taxpayers finally woke up and realized that lifetime public employee union member gets a job, works for 23 years, retires, and gets 90% of salary as the pension and full health care until they die.
And people who are out of work or don't make very much money are paying the taxes that fund all that.
And finally, people woke up and realized that's not sustainable.
I can't tell you how many people have come to that conclusion or realize that that's one of the primary lessons that has been learned by the public in all this.
And that is fabulous.
Because folks, you know, private sector union membership is down to 7%.
The construction workers' unions, the private sector union workforce is 7% of the U.S. labor force.
It topped out way back in the glory days at around 30, 35%.
Now, government union percentage is a little bit higher, but it's coming down as well.
There was a profoundly educational campaign.
As the unions, when they retrace their steps here, They're going to rue the day they did this recall.
They're going to rue the day they did all the recalls because all that happened is the general public was educated.
The general public woke up and finally understood what all they were paying for.
And then they coupled that with the entitlement mentality of union people who would go on vandalous rampages if they didn't get what they want.
So there are people writing in the aftermath of the Wisconsin recall about the real death of the unions and that initiative of walkers, where union members could opt out of the state withholding their union dues, that pretty much was akin to, do you want to be a member of a union or not?
And before the initiative, 60,000 people in Wisconsin were having their union dues withheld by the government.
They never saw it.
Something like 40,000 union workers opted out of that.
It was a death knell.
So that's all good.
The second thing, and in a political sense, almost as important, because we know how flawed the exit polls were.
I mean, at 9 o'clock with the polls, calls at 50-50 too close to call on the cable networks.
And by the way, the cable networks knew that that wasn't true.
I wish I could tell you how I know that, but I would be betraying a courtesy, and I don't want to do that.
But trust me, when you saw the Chiron graphic on the network at 9 o'clock race too close to call, they knew it wasn't too close to call, because I'll bet you you also heard this.
When you saw the Chiron graphic race too close to call, you then heard somebody say, but we expect to call it in the next hour.
Well, if it's too close to call, how do you know you're going to be calling it within that hour?
The networks all send out memos, and the exit polls go to every network.
They all combine, they buy them, and they all get the same data.
And they all send memos out to their on-air staff and producers at memos, series of them, in the course of the afternoon.
And I was privy to a bunch of these, and it was right there.
We expect to call the race between 9 and 10.
There's a percentage chance that we will not, percentage chance that we will.
So my point is that everybody knew, despite what was being reported on the air at the time, that the exit polls were worthless.
It wasn't 50-50.
It wasn't too close to call.
But they like viewers, and the indecision and the unknown makes people stay tuned longer.
I understand all that.
But when it was all said and done, I know that one of the most important things going on at the White House, they're looking at all the polling data they've got from all over the country and they're saying, what if this isn't right?
What if none of these polls are accurate anymore?
How many years has it been?
How many elections has it been where the exit polls are dead wrong?
You go back to 2004, and the first two waves of exit polls had John Kerry elected.
Never forget old Bob Shrum.
The story goes that Bob Shrumu ran Kerry's campaign, went into him at 5 o'clock in the afternoon when the second wave came in and said, Mr. Kerry, may I be the first to say to you, Mr. President?
The real votes came in.
They started being counted.
The exit polls were nowhere near.
So they said, okay, what's wrong?
Why are our exit polls so wrong?
They started a methodology.
Then they discovered that they oversampled Democrats by 4 to 5% in the exit poll, like they do every other poll during the course of the year.
So are the polls right?
That's what they're asking themselves.
So here comes this story.
The Daily Caller.
Mitt Romney would collect at least 72 of the 110 electoral votes available right now in eight battleground states if Obama's current polling numbers are overstated by simply 1%.
If they're off by 1%, Romney would win the electoral majority in Colorado, Iowa, Missouri, Ohio, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Wisconsin, if there is simply a 1% undercount.
And if undecided voters there split evenly between Romney and Obama, that would give Romney at least 253 electoral votes, just a few shy of the 270 that he would need.
But if the undecided voters break for Romney by two-thirds, Romney would win all of those states' 110 votes.
That'd push him well above the 270 needed and earn Obama a helicopter ride home to Illinois.
Trey Grayson, director of Harvard's Institute of Politics, is quoted here in the Daily Caller story as saying it's a good reminder.
Small shifts in votes can play a big role in electoral votes.
Really?
Grayson predicted that the battleground states are likely to break together, resulting in a strong showing for one candidate or the other.
Not going to be split.
A lot of these states have things in common, including mid-Western geography and higher than average populations of white voters.
Tuesday's recall vote in Wisconsin was a good indicator of how badly some pre-election polling can perform.
So now I guarantee you there is abject panic out there because Axelrod and Plough are asking themselves, my gosh, what if our data's wrong?
And they're believing this notion how lovable and popular and likable Obama is.
That's why this poll that came out yesterday, the New York Times CBS poll, 67% the American people want Obamacare overturned by the Supreme Court.
Only 24% want it upheld makes you wonder what's the real number if they're willing to tell us that it's two-thirds.
What if it's 75%?
What if it's really 70%?
What if in that 24% there are some people afraid to tell the pollster that they don't like Obamacare?
This is what they're asking themselves.
And state by state, they're looking at the independents and the undecided.
And they're really looking at the undecided.
Are these people really telling us the truth?
And you know they're trying to factor things like the Wilder effect and the Bradley effect.
And then there's the new specter they're considering.
Are people just trying to screw with the pollsters?
People just having fun with the pollster, purposely telling them things aren't true just to screw up the outcome.
They're thinking about all of this because it's been too many elections in a row where the exit polls are way off.
And by the way, a lot of the pre-election polls were too, but not as bad as the exit polls.
Let's take a quick time out as it is.
It's Open Line Friday, as you know, and we've got your phone calls to squeeze in.
Bill Clinton has come out, publicly, abjectly apologized for speaking out against the regime and speaking against the revolution.
He came, he spoke against the revolution.
And Corey Booker.
Corey Booker has just been said to be dead.
Corey Booker is dead to us from the Obama campaign.
Corey Booker is dead.
See, Booker, Booker was angling for a cabinet post in the second term.
And that's what the White House reacted.
No, no, he's dead to us.
That ain't going to happen.
This might be, this might be the best thing ever happened to Corey Booker for his career.
A, he was honest.
B, he stayed in tight with the money people.
He didn't throw them overboard.
C, he showed a spine.
Quick timeout.
We'll be back.
We'll start with your phone calls again since it's Open Line Friday when we get back.
Nashua, New Hampshire, Open Line Friday.
Steve, I'm glad you called.
Welcome to the program.
Oh, yeah.
Hi, Rush.
I happened to be listening to NPR last night.
I don't make a regular habit of doing it, but I just have it on the car radio.
And they had the author.
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
Why couldn't you change the channel in the car?
I could, but actually, the reason I left it on is because they were talking about the Obama administration being tough on national security.
And I was curious to what their position was on it.
See, that's exactly.
Okay.
Okay.
What'd you hear?
All right.
So they had the author on, and he wrote this new book about how tough the Obama administration is, surprisingly, on national security, including discussion or a chapter on the cyber attacks, like in Iran.
And the program host precisely was concerned about leaking national security secrets.
And the host asked the author, aren't you concerned about that?
And the author said, oh, well, that was okay.
They specifically went to the Obama administration officials, and they gave it the okay for the information that he put in the book that he released.
So therefore, regardless, even if the information didn't come from the Obama administration and they somehow got it on their own, they went to the Obama administration and the Obama administration okayed, according to this author, the specific release of that information or else he would never have released it.
What did the NPR host have to say to this?
Didn't go into that, but somehow that kind of absolved the author.
In other words, that was like okay because the author didn't release anything that the Obama administration knew about it and that they didn't say who in the Obama administration, but that of course he would go to the Obama administration, made the request, and they said, oh, that information was okay.
That's already out there.
Not surprised.
So I thought it was interesting.
The reason I raised the point is because you don't even have to get to the question of did the information come from the Obama administration initially.
Let's say that the author got it on their own through mistakes or whatever.
Then, of course, they say, well, they're concerned about releasing national security issues.
Then they go to the Obama administration.
And according to this author, the Obama administration said, okay, you can release that information.
So it doesn't even matter where it came from.
Obama administration went along with releasing the information.
Was a guy's name Clayman, Daniel Clayman?
I may have been.
It's a brand new, it's a new book.
And apparently there's only one chapter on cybersecurity, and the other chapters are on drones and that kind of stuff.
Basically, the premise being that surprisingly, the Obama administration is pretty tough on national security.
Exactly.
Very interesting coincident timing, isn't it?
Yeah.
All right, Steve, I appreciate it.
I just got an email from my good friend, Professor Hazlet.
Good friend of mine that I met back in Sacramento when I was there in 1985.
I think.
No, I might have met Professor Hazlett later in the year 1984, but certainly 1985.
He said, Rush, I'm just listening to the Obama clip that you played where he said that it's offensive to suggest that his administration is leaking.
Now, how can he know that this suggestion is offensive unless he knows who's leaking?
I mean, if you were president and you didn't know where the leaks were coming from, wouldn't you want to ferret out the leaker right now?
But how do you know to be offended unless you know who's leaking?
You can't possibly be offended by this unless you know who the leaker is.
And then it makes these points.
Here's what the public knows.
One, there are abundant national security leaks.
Two, the regime has the ability to create such leaks.
Number three, the regime has motive to create such leaks, make Obama look macho and all that.
And number four, the regime is not doing anything to stop these leaks, like appoint a special prosecutor.
Instead, they're trashing people who are making a reasonable inference after reviewing the evidence.
Now, the New York Times, how can they know that the original source for their secret classified documents is not Obama?
How can they know that?
In fact, the source for the leak has to be either the Obama administration or the Pentagon.
Has to be one of the two.
If it's the Pentagon, somebody over there needs to be fired.
If it's the regime, if it's the Obama regime, then Obama has to come clean with the American people, and somebody, or maybe a lot of people, deserve to be fired.
How can this not be an issue?
How can they not appoint a special prosecutor?
That's the question Professor Hazlett asks.
Now, he's asking it rhetorically, but I have an answer to that.
This is all 100% political.
In Obama's mind, this is nothing more than a political tactic.
It is the playing of a political card.
It just happens to be stuff that people think is classified.
But Obama doesn't care.
Obviously, he doesn't care.
They're not trying to find out who leaked it.
He doesn't want a special prosecutor.
It's not a big deal.
Okay, so I'm looking at the kill list.
Big whoop.
Okay, so I'm telling everybody that we're the ones that did the Stuxnet virus to undermine the arena.
No big deal.
It's not a big deal to him.
It's a political opportunity.
And I don't think there will be a special prosecutor.
This issue has achieved its purpose.
Look, folks, somebody has leaked three times very detailed and very damaging stuff.
Do you see any sense or urgency at the White House to find out who?
All you got, all we got today was Obama saying he's offended that anybody would think it's him.
But how can he be offended if he doesn't know who's leaking?
No, that's not deep.
It's just being offended is being offended.
If you're offended, somebody thinks you're leaking, then you have to know something about it.
And everybody, I think this is a great, great example of how inside the beltway Washington does not understand what we're dealing with here.
In the old world of Washington, where on things like this, the two parties genuinely did come together, special prosecutor get to the bottom of it, and then in that fight, the partisanship erupts and people try to protect turf and so forth.
But to get to the bottom of it, or at least put on the show of caring to get to the bottom of it, would happen.
So they're all lining up, and all the experts are predicting a special prosecutor.
Oh, yeah, there's got to be one.
No question about it.
There isn't going to be a special prosecutor.
This is the regime that defies federal judges.
Federal judge said this moratorium on drilling is illegal.
And Ken Salazar, the Interior Secretary, said, you.
We're going to enforce our moratorium.
They didn't care about the Constitution when they wrote Obamacare.
And they argued to maintain a piece of legislation that is unconstitutional.
This issue has served its purpose.
Where's a book out there now about how courageous and macho Obama is?
There are news stories about how he's Mr. Tough Guy.
He's looking to kill lists and he's personally picking the bad guy targets.
Well, that's important because up to now, people have questioned just how much Obama really is interested in the war on terror.
I don't think it's a big deal.
I mean, if you go back and listen to him talk about the things he said about the war in Iraq and the war in Afghanistan and Club Gitmo and everything else, he didn't take it seriously.
It wasn't a problem.
The problem was Obama looked like a wuss.
Problem solved now.
This is just how Obama does things.
National Security, everything is nothing more than its value as a political item.
That's all.
I think to try to attach the traditional conventional ways of Washington to Obama is to misunderstand what we're dealing with here.
I mean, in the real world where people care about national security, If you don't think America is exceptional, if you don't think that America is a justified superpower,
why would you care about national security if you believe, as many of us think Obama believes, if you believe the United States is an unjust superpower and an illegitimate superpower,
if you think we have only acquired that status by virtue of stealing from the other people and nations of the world, if you think that we don't deserve this greatness and superpower stuff, then what value is attached to our national security anyway?
If you think the country is basically guilty, which necessitates you bowing or apologizing, what is there to protect here?
Mr. Limbaugh, you realize how offensive this is.
Yeah, I do probably do you, because if you look at Obama in the standard traditional political ways, the standard traditional political prism, you're going to say, why no special prosecutor?
And you're going to assume that, well, because he doesn't want to indict himself.
That's not why.
This has served its purpose.
If Obama has his way, there won't be another word said about this.
Not by him.
He dealt with it today.
I'm offended.
Anybody would think that I'm a leaker.
And the New York Times is right there saying he didn't leak to us.
Obama didn't leak.
How do they know?
Just saying, I'm just saying you can't look at this guy.
It's like when I read liberal journalists talk about how Obama is obviously struggling with policies to reduce America's indebtedness.
I laugh.
Do they think he cares?
Where's the evidence that he cares about reducing the deficit or the national debt?
He doesn't care.
But they are convinced that because they look at the traditional politics, we've got a deficit problem, a spending problem, an economic problem in the old ways of Washington.
What you would do is announce policies, try to have legislation that's designed to, quote, unquote, reduce the deficit.
Whether you intended to or not, that's what you would make people think you're trying to do.
Fiscal responsibility.
He doesn't care.
Where's the evidence he cares about fiscal responsibility?
How can you say that he cares about it given what he's done in three and a half years racking up all this spending?
National security to me is the same thing.
I just don't think we're looking at this guy.
Well, I am and you are.
I just don't think that the wizards of SMART see this guy the right way.
They look at him, the traditional prism of American politics, and we're dealing with somebody that's totally outside that prism in ways they don't want to admit.
They're scratching their heads.
Why no special prosecutor?
We got to get to the bottom of these leaks.
No, we don't.
The leaks were no big deal.
As far as Obama's concerned, I didn't, okay, kill this, big deal.
Stuck snap.
Everybody thought we did it anyway.
All I did was confirm it.
Big whoop.
In the meantime, I've shown that I'm tough on the Iranians and I'm trying to sabotage their nuclear plan.
That's all I care about.
People think I'm a wuss.
I've now made them look like I'm trying to undermine their nuclear plan.
And I'm a big, tough macho guy because I'm personally wiping out terrorists.
Mission accomplished.
Special prosecutor.
Don't make me a liar.
Are you kidding?
Audio soundbites today.
CBS this morning, soundbites eight and nine here.
Ed Charlie Rose, who doesn't know any more now than he did back in 2008, is talking to Bob Schieffer, Bob Schieffer in, because this is the segment on Friday where they promote Slay the Nation coming up on Sunday.
So they bring Schieffer in, and all the networks do it.
Bring Schieffer in.
So, Bob, what do you have planned on Sunday for Face the Nation?
And Schieffer goes through his guest list and what he hopes to learn and what news they hope to make.
And then they just have a general discussion about the news.
And Charlie Rose and Schieffer decide that they want to talk about Obama's week, WEEK, how bad this week has been as the prelude to promoting Face the Nation.
What do we have here?
Simply a bad week, or is this something at the core of the present reelection effort that may be troubling for a while?
The numbers that are really going to count is what will the economic numbers be in October.
Those are the numbers that voters will have right in their heads as they get ready to go in to cast their vote.
Not a good week for the president by any stretch of the imagination, but I would just caution all those who think this is now over.
There's a lot of months, there's a lot of days to go before we get to Election Day.
But this has not been a good week.
No, no, it hadn't been a good week.
It's a horrible week out there.
But, Charlie, we still have time to monkey around with the numbers here at CBS.
We still have time to do our polling here at CBS.
We still have time to really paint a really rosy economic picture here at CBS.
There's a lot of stuff we can do here, Charlie.
Yeah, it's a bad week, but that's now.
And who knows what these next months will hold?
The economy can recover here on CBS, Charlie.
We can see to that.
The economy can recover on Face the Nation on CBS, the CBS Evening News.
Yeah, we can make that happen.
Then Bob tries to convince himself and Charlie that Obama can pull it off, salvage all this in the debates.
That's right.
Charlie says, well, does it suggest some nervousness, Bob?
It does, doesn't it?
I mean, look at today's New York Post.
Bam on Corey, Corey Booker, Mayor Newark.
He's dead to us.
There's this idea that anybody who's not on the same page gets criticized, has to go forth and apologize as President Clinton did.
This is going to be quite a campaign, Charlie.
I think it's the numbers in October and the debates in October that I think are going to be the tipping point here.
You know, we've never really seen Mitt Romney go one-on-one.
He had all those people out on the stage with him during the Republican primaries.
I think what is going to be crucial here is when those debates happen in October and you see Mitt Romney on one side of the table and Barack Obama on the other.
I think in the end, that may be what decides all this.
All right, so another panicking.
Maybe we at CBS can't make the economy look good enough on CBS.
Obama, we have to rely on this guy's superior intellect, his superior debate skill.
That's where he's going to pull it out.
So the bottom line is they're worried.
They are worried for the one.
And they're talking to each other about trying to make each other feel not as bad as they do.
Okay, got to take a brief timeout.
Obscene profit timeout.
Sit tight, my friends.
Back in a moment.
Having more fun than a human being should be allowed to have.
Back to the phones to St. Louis.
Jim, thank you for the call.
You're next.
Hello, sir.
Hey, Rush.
I sound a little nervous.
It's because I'm so excited to talk to you.
I had the chance last week of visiting your portrait on the little flood wall down in Cape Girardo.
And I'm going to report that it's well.
Is that right?
You went down to the river wall.
Yeah, and I tried to hug your portrait when a Buffett train almost ran me over.
And I think it was time for tour groups.
How many rotten eggs and tomatoes were on my portrait that day?
None.
None, really.
They must clean it off every day.
Well, the only issue I had was whether you were approvingly looking at what's her name, Jacqueline Baker, who was dancing next to you.
But I thought it was very appropriate glare for fair, and I just loved the shrine.
The reason I called was the New York Times.
I love to read it.
I can't afford to because it's 250 a copy.
But they had an editorial on the.
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, Jim, Jim.
When you say you love the New York Times, you mean for the entertainment value, right?
Oh, absolutely.
You're not in love with the New York Times.
It's not your Bible.
That's not what you mean.
It is the funniest Bible I have ever seen.
All right, okay, all right.
I just wanted to stipulate for the audience.
Oh, absolutely.
But I want to tell you that it may be too funny for people to, you know, conservatives to read.
But let me just give you a chance, a little example.
On June the 4th, lead editorial was called Who's Welfare question mark.
It talks about the fact that the IRS ought to go after certain conservative groups and what they're doing.
And I looked at the article, and I'm reading it to the lead editorial, and I'm trying to figure out what did they do these groups, and what are they going to do to us?
What it says is that they're going to, quote, return full control of Congress to the Republican Party.
Well, I'm thinking to myself, since 1960, when I was first publicly aware of politics, how many times, how many years have the Republicans controlled Congress?
I think four.
Yeah, when they won the House in 1992, it was the first time in 40 years.
No, I'm talking about, no, yeah, that was, and for four years, I believe.
So what they're saying is that's a threat.
Democrats have controlled both houses every year since then.
I mean, before, since 1960.
Jim, what is your point?
That's a problem?
They've got a problem with the Republicans having control of the Congress.
Well, yeah, to the New York Times it is.
Well, I just think that that is incredible when you realize that what they're saying simply is, here's what we're worried about, that Congress may sometime in the history of the United States have Republican control.
And I'm thinking, what better example of showing where they're coming from?
And you know who they're really busily investigating these days?
The Karzai family in Afghanistan.
Now, why would they worry about them so much?
The Karzai family?
Yeah, the president.
And they're talking about if you take one of the lead articles.
To protect Obama.
They've got to protect Obama somehow.
Remember, it's macho time in Washington.
We've got Afghanistan cooking.
We got Obama pulling out.
We've got to make sure Karzai maintains some level of control over there.
The place doesn't blow up, making Obama look bad or his decision look bad.
So the New York Times threatens to investigate Karzai.
Karzai reads the New York Times.
Everybody is supposed to be very, Karzai is supposed to be intimidated by what the New York Times might report.
This is trying to keep him in line.
Also, that Obama's not embarrassed.
The New York Times is all funny pages.
But you don't need any evidence that they're liberal other than they print every day.
That's it.
Jim, thanks.
I appreciate it.
Kevin, Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Welcome to the EIB Network.
Hello.
Hey, Rush.
Real honor to speak with you.
Thank you, sir.
Longtime listener, first-time caller.
I was wondering if you had any thoughts on I'll have another being scratched from the race, no chance of the triple crown.
Well, I'll have another is not going to have another.
Right, right.
You know what?
I just learned that today, and I only saw the headline, so I don't know any details.
All I know is, all I know is that the sports media has been trying to destroy the trainer of this horse.
They have been really going after this guy.
Apparently, he has a history of doping horses that he's trained, and the networks that televise are not being honest and open about who this guy is.
So the print sports media guys are trying to let everybody know just what an unsavory character the trainer is.
But it's, I guess, a disappointing thing because this horse was reputed to be the best chance for a triple crown, and I don't know, winner, triple crown winners.
And I don't know since the 70s, tendinitis is the problem, not concussions.
Concussions are not a problem in horse racing.
If the horse had a concussion, they'd run him.
But tendinitis got to sit the horse down.
Snerdley, I'll bet you an iPad.
I don't know what you'll pay, but I'll bet you an iPad there's no special prosecutor.
You're not going to take that bet.
Well, all of Official Washington is convinced there's going to be a special prosecutor.
I really, I wonder how long is it going to take for Official Washington to figure out exactly who we're dealing with here?
Anyway, one hour to go, folks.
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