Great to have you here, Rush Limbaugh, executing assigned host duties, flawlessly meeting and surpassing all audience expectations on a daily basis.
Great to have you here.
Telephone number 800-282-2882 and the email address, LRushpo at EIB.com.
This is from the Washington, D.C. CBS affiliate.
But it is, I think, this just spells out one of the results from the latest Pew Research study.
This is not good.
The Pew Research Study is the one that shows Democrat voter enthusiasm way, way up all of a sudden.
In the swing states, and the story from the Washington, D.C. CBS affiliate headline is, only 15% of Democrats believe economic news is bad.
According to a recent study from the Pew Research Center, new data found that just 15% of Democrats believe that recent economic news is mostly poor, a percentage that took a significant drop from the 31% of Democrats last month who thought the economic news was mostly bad.
According to the study, the 15% clip is among the lowest percentages during Obama's nearly four years in office.
Meanwhile, nearly 60% of Republicans find that most of the economic news is bad.
Among independents, the percentage is 36% who think the economic news is bad.
And both of these data sets remain virtually unchanged from a month ago.
So the, I mean, you can fool some of the people all the time, but the good news here is that the drive-bys are not fooling anybody but the fools.
They're not, I mean, they're not creating new fools.
They're not converting people into fools.
All they're doing is preaching to the fools.
You believe only 15% of Democrats think the economy is in bad.
Why would you say that?
If you didn't care, if you didn't care what the state of the economy was, then you probably would think it's okay.
And I'd venture to say that there's a heck of a lot of Democrats who probably don't care because they don't depend on the economy.
They depend on the government.
And the government's always there regardless what the state of the economy is.
No, I'm not just saying that to be provocative.
There's a huge partisan divide in this country, issue by issue or category by category.
When you have, put it, 85% of Democrats think the economy is fine.
What does that tell you about those people?
We are at depression era growth rates, shrinkage rates, however you want to categorize it.
60% of Republicans think that most of the economic news is bad.
So there are 40% of Republicans who think it's okay.
Somebody sent me an email during the break.
Rush, why would a president want to be photographed and seen with all of these rich people when he's supposed to represent the little guy?
You know, I thought, that's an interesting question.
I wanted to think about that.
Off the top of your head, Snerley, here's Obama.
We're in the midst of, I guess maybe Obama knows only 15% of Democrats think the economy is bad.
But let's just say, why would Obama, did Michelle, why would they do all these vacations?
Why would they live the opulent lifestyle?
Why would they hang around ostentatiously highly consuming people, rich people, wealthy with all the trappings, Jay-Z's 40-40 club with that giant pyramid of champagne?
Why would Obama do this if he wants to be seen as a man of the little guy, a representative of the little guy?
Why would he do it?
Okay, Sturdley's answer is that the little guy likes reality celebrity shows.
I have a different theory that, of course, is far more devious and far more cynical than your theory.
If you are President Obama and if you are going to make your bones on taxing the rich, if your entire reason for getting elected is to tax the rich and to focus on them, how unfair, and they're not paying their fair share, what better could you do to illustrate it than hang around them amidst all their opulence?
Why, look at that.
Look at that.
You only have to point it out.
It speaks for itself.
Look at that house where Obama's.
Look at the cars there.
He's right.
Those people aren't paying their fair share.
The rich aren't being hurt at all in any of it.
Look at that.
That's right.
Go nail them, Barack.
That's my take.
That's my take on it.
That's Hollywood, baby.
That's Jay-Z.
That's Green Ivy.
The baby.
No, not the Obamas.
Look at the.
Well, they see the opulence.
Maybe not the rich in terms of the enemy, but it doesn't have to be just the Hollywood people he's hanging around with.
It could be a lot of these fundraisers he goes to are at Sarah Jessica Parker's place or Anna Winters.
It's certainly not the dregs where he's hanging out.
If you want to make the point that there are plenty of rich people with a lot of money who could afford to pay more, why not hang around and illustrate how they're living?
Have the cameras accompany you around, and there you go.
You got Jay-Z and you got Beyonce.
You got the golden champagne bottles.
Understand, they covered a few of them.
The whole pyramid was not available.
But the point that you want to make is if you're Obama, there's so much money out there, and these people aren't paying their fair share.
Now, Obama doesn't say this while he's with those people.
This is pure optics.
This is just creating the impression or cementing in these people's minds the reality.
There's a lot of rich people and they aren't paying their fair share.
But even more than that, they can afford a tax increase on them.
I mean, to these people, higher taxes are nothing.
These rich people live alike.
They blow their money like it'll never run out.
So make it look like it will never run out.
In the midst of this economic downturn, show people who have endless money, huge houses, lots of cars.
And it's another way of countering the whole idea that the economy is in bad shape.
And for these people, it only is for the Hoi Poloi.
And guess who's looking out for them?
Barack Hussein Obama.
I think that's why he's doing it.
That and to raise money, of course.
No question.
And he's out there doing it to raise money, but it's also the optics of this.
Okay, now the audio sound bites.
This is pretty good.
Bill Hemmer, this morning on Fox News Channel, title of the show America's Newsroom, and he had the Obama campaign press secretary on a guy named Ben Labolt.
And Hemmer hammered the guy.
All this guy wants to talk about is Romney, and Hemmer hammers the guy on Libya.
Question: The administration now confirming that the deaths of four Americans last week in Benghazi came as a result of a terror attack on September 11th.
It was not a spontaneous protest, as the consulate has previously suggested.
How damaging is this to your campaign when it comes to perceptions of foreign policy and keeping Americans safe?
In terms of the situation in Libya, I'd refer you to the director of the National Counterterrorism Center's testimony yesterday.
They're conducting an investigation right now to find out who perpetrated this violence and to bring them to justice.
Listen, Governor Romney weighed in before he had a full set of facts about a developing situation.
We're not going to do that.
The president isn't somebody who shoots first and aims later.
Whoa, you hear how this works?
See, I pointed it out with Stephanie Cutter.
He asked him, look, you guys are really blowing in the Middle East.
I mean, you've got a situation here keeping Americans safe.
You may not be able to keep Americans safe.
You're blaming it on this video and so forth.
Look at Mitt Romney.
Look at Mitt Romney.
Romney weighed in.
You know, the problem is, Romney said the same thing Obama said, only said it first.
Romney ripped that statement that came out of the Cairo embassy.
Well, so did the regime later.
Obama and the boys walked back that statement, that pre-apology.
The difference is Romney looked presidential.
We can't have that.
Romney got nothing wrong in what he said.
And the problem for these guys is that Mitt Romney did look like the president.
And that's why they've got to cut it down.
And that's why they've got to stop it.
But Hemmer does what all journalists used to do.
He doesn't let him get away with this.
Hemmer said, look, the president has addressed the American people officially on one occasion in Rose Garden.
Will he address this again and clear up a story that changes by the hour?
What he's saying, look, you guys and the president are saying that the video is responsible.
We now know that that wasn't the case at all.
Will the president have another meeting or appearance and straighten this out?
A career national security official shared with the American people the information that we have about this at this time.
We're not going to engage in speculation like everybody watching this.
Everybody watching this knows that President Obama is the commander-in-chief.
It's his job.
Will he address the American people and clear up these stories?
Well, listen, the administration testified before Congress yesterday and shared the information that we have at this time.
Let's talk about what the contrast here is with the other side.
Governor Romney is somebody who hasn't outlined a foreign policy, hasn't outlined a plan for America's relations with any region of the world.
He hasn't outlined a plan to end the war in Afghanistan.
He didn't mention Al-Qaeda.
Yeah.
So, Hemmer tries one more time.
So, LeBolt doesn't care about anything but criticizing Romney, which is his job.
But Hemmer is still doing in this interview what journalists used to do.
You had a dead U.S. ambassador, one of our leading members fighting this war overseas, a man of enormous respect, and he is gone.
That's right.
And that's why the administration is engaged 24 hours a day in an investigation right now to find out exactly who perpetrated that violence.
The officials working around.
I got you.
I'm going to move on.
I just want to be clear on this.
There is no plan right now for President Obama to tell the American people what happened.
The administration will constantly update the American people as soon as new information is known.
And what we know now is that Mitt Romney came out shot before he aimed.
He didn't know what he was talking about.
He didn't look good saying it.
And he didn't even talk about Al-Qaeda.
One more before we go to the break.
Yesterday, CNN's newsroom, Wolf Blitzer, totally in the tank.
Wolf used to be a serious newsman.
Wolf did.
Wolf used to be a serious newsman.
He just, he's an Obama fanboy now.
He's got a co-anchor at Ashley Banfield.
And it's in a situation room, and they're talking about Obama being a Letterman and the secretly recorded video of Romney.
And Banfield says, Joe Biden skirted this issue, said, I'm going to let Romney's take tape speak for itself.
But Wolf, did you feel like this was President Obama getting tough or not getting tough enough?
Is he leaving this for the super PAC?
You know, I think what's clear is that he really came across very smooth, very confident, very presidential in that interview with Letterman last night.
He was really at the top of this game.
In the scheme of things, you know, who's going to get you more votes?
A meeting that could be tense with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or go on Letterman and come across as well as he did last night.
I think the answer is pretty clear.
So it's all about votes, which we've always known, but here's Wolf admitting it.
It's not about statesmanship.
It's not about security in the region.
Who would you rather meet with to get votes?
Netanyahu, who can smoke you, or Letterman, the clueless dunce who's going to let you have a run of the show so that you don't even have to say anything, and Wolf Blitzer thinks that you shine.
And Obama didn't say anything.
He just sat there and looked professorial.
Well, they even fist-bumped Letterman once.
He didn't say anything.
Do you see the interview?
He didn't say anything.
He ripped into the video and so forth.
Oh, he did say that he got tough with the Muslims over there.
He told them that they have to protect our people.
He read them, the Riot Act.
Yeah, right.
But here you have it, Wolf Blitzer.
What would you rather do to get votes, Ashley?
Go sit around with Netanyahu or go with Letterman.
No question, Obama did the right thing.
Really?
Half my brain tied behind my back just to make it fair.
You know how old I am?
Well, yeah, I'm 61, but I am so old.
I remember when Letterman used to be funny and it was presidents who were serious.
That's how old I am.
And now look at what's happened.
It's Letterman, the comedian, who used to be funny, who's now getting all serious on it.
And the president goes on as the comedian joke guest.
Who's next?
Timothy in Leland, North Carolina.
Great to have you on the program, Timothy.
Hello.
Hi, Rush.
First off, I'm a huge fan, and it's just awesome to get to talk to you today.
Thank you, sir, very much.
But secondly, I tuned in during lunch, and I heard one of the audio soundbites where one of the newswomen mentioned that the economy is getting close to bottoming out, showing signs of recovery.
And just analyzing that statement, it is just extremely contradictory to me because for the economy to bottom out, that would mean that it is still trending downward.
So we're traveling on a downward path.
And for it to be in a recovery, the economy needs to trend upward from that, you know, from bottoming out.
So, you know, by saying that we're close to hitting the bottoming out of the economy, I don't know how you could say we were ever in a recovery to begin with.
That's interesting.
These people have been saying that we've been in a recovery since 2009, and yet yesterday they just realized we're in a recovery.
It was just unbelievable to me that, you know, grab sound by two.
I want to play again what you're talking about.
It's actually a montage.
And this we have since learned.
The news people you're hearing here are reacting to an AP story today, which cites census data.
Timothy, census data from 2011 shows that people are moving, moving homes, moving out of parents' house.
And that's what means the economy's recovered.
That alone, that's it.
Less than one half of 1% of the population moved, and the media, that's it, the economy.
We're finally roaring now.
People are moving around out there.
They're leaving their parents' home.
They're changing homes.
They're moving around, finding work.
Wow, that's what they're reacting to.
And this was the montage we put together.
They played it in the first hour.
It's what he's reacting to.
Big headlines on the economy this morning.
Are we on the road to recovery?
There's great news out this morning on the economy.
Are we really turning a corner?
Great news.
It looks like this recovery really has legs.
The economic downturn may have bottomed out.
It was a machine gun fire of good economic reports.
We finally hit a bottom that you're seeing this recovery really take hold.
Breaking news into the newsroom.
Another sign, the real estate market could be improving.
So, Timothy, you're right.
I don't know what you said.
We're bottoming out three years after the recovery began.
And that's what you've noticed.
Right.
So, I mean, wouldn't we, I don't see how we could be recovering until we've bottomed out and continued on an upward path from there.
So, you know, that was just my take on it.
Well, do you think we are recovering?
No, absolutely not.
I still have to work 12 hours a day just to get by.
Well, I work about 18, so I hear you.
Nobody believes that, but I do.
Anyway, Timothy, what do you do, by the way?
I'm a civil engineer.
Civil engineer?
Yes, sir.
Yes, sir.
I work for a contractor.
We build water and wastewater treatment plants.
That, that is, that's tough.
You have to be smart as a whip for that.
That's a lot of education to become a civil engineer.
Where did you go to school?
I went to school at the University of Cincinnati.
University of Cincinnati?
Yes, sir.
And how's the economy dealing with your business or where you work?
Well, tell you what, Rush, it was tough in the beginning.
We were bidding a lot of work without success.
But, you know, with the true American spirit, you've got to adjust to it.
And we've made adjustments and found a way to get around that.
And now we're starting to do quite well.
So you lowered your bids on the front end, and then you added in the real costs when the job was done, and they had no choice but then to pay you.
Correct.
Another way to do that.
Just kidding.
Don't answer that.
I'm just kidding.
I am a contractor, but the true answer to that question would be, you know, we found better ways to do things because, you know, the economy forces you to do that.
Right, you had to.
Exactly.
Okay, Timothy, in Leland, North Carolina.
Thanks very much for the call.
All right, folks, I got to take a brief time out.
There's not enough time right now to be fair with another caller, even if it was a creep who wouldn't deserve much time.
Take the brief time out here at the bottom of the hour and come back before you know it and resume.
A little, I don't know what the word is, melancholy today.
It's the last day that I will be able to use my Mophie.
Well, but there aren't going to be any new ones for a while.
I have to use my new iPhone naked for it, could be two months.
Yeah, I know they don't.
Even if there weren't a new adapter, there wouldn't be a new Mopi for a couple of months.
It's just the way it is because it's a different form factor on the phone.
So this is the last day of my trusty Mopi, which doubles the battery life of the iPhone.
It goes away.
It won't fit on the new one.
Not only will it not fit, doesn't have the right connector because they've redone the connector.
I got an email from Mophi.
I think I'm having a little funeral.
I got an email from Mopi saying when we have the new iPhone 5 Mophy, we'll send you an email, but they didn't say when they were going to have it.
So I'm going to be joining the rest of the plebs with the phone plugged in all the time.
Keep it charged.
Actually, battery's better on the new one than the current one.
But it's a sentimental attachment I have to the Mophy.
No, I don't buy cases.
I don't do that.
I buy Mopi.
That's the case with the battery.
But I have Mophis haven't been born yet.
I still have Mophys in their original packaging and have never been used.
And now it's like they're going to be aborted.
Unless, you know, maybe I will give this phone, you know, wipe it and then give the phone away to somebody and then the Mophi can still be used.
Recycling.
Yes.
Recycling.
Oh.
Recycling.
Anyway, I've been thinking about the last day for my Mopi.
There's a part of me that wasn't going to be upset if the iPhone 5 was late because I would still be able to use the Mophi.
Snerdly shouting, this phone better be here tomorrow.
Okay, Joshua in New Smyrna, Florida.
It's great to have you on the EIB network.
Hello.
Mega Ditto's Rush.
Like you just said, I'm here in Florida.
We're not seeing too much recovery in our small business.
But, Rush, you know, I'm even more worried about something else.
You talk about the impending fiscal clip quite a bit.
And I wanted to know, I wanted your take.
Do you see a currency crisis occurring here in the United States as we continue the expansion of the money supply, as we continue the explosion of our national debt?
That's a toughie.
Here's the logical or the rational line of thinking.
If you're going to have QE3, which is more printing of money, at some point there has to be a corrective action for that.
And that means there has to be a contraction of the money supply.
And when that happens, Joshua is when interest rates could get volatile.
And if there is a significant uptake in interest rates after QE3, this whole QE3 thing is just designed to get Obama re-elected.
It's designed to prevent the economic collapse on paper.
Just as far as appearances are concerned.
Of course, it's not going to do that at all, but it's designed to make it avoid, make it not happen while it could hurt Obama.
But when they have to contract the money supply, because somebody we're going to have to, or else all kinds of problems, then you've got the uptick in interest rates.
And it's possible that one of the places to look for guidance on this might in fact be Japan.
Japan just went for QE8.
They're in their 20th year of this.
20th year of economic essential stagnation.
No growth, shrinkage, no prosperity.
They're on the verge of war with the CHICOMs.
It's not pretty.
There are a lot of people that have the fear that you do, that the currency crisis could, however you define that, rampant runaway inflation.
The purpose of the Federal Reserve is to prevent exactly what they're creating.
That's what everybody's so upset about.
Their job is to prevent exactly what they're creating or potentially creating.
Yeah, exactly.
I just, you know, it's a real fear for me, you know, not only as a, you know, working in a small family business, but, you know, I love this country.
And, you know, I'm looking at, you know, I'm looking at a scary world that we live in.
Yeah, you and me both.
You and me both.
I wish more people saw it the way you do.
And maybe they do, and we just don't know about it.
But I really wish more people saw it the way you do.
I too love the country.
I love it dearly.
I am hurt by what I see happening.
I'm hurt, genuinely hurt by what I see being done to it on purpose.
And I'm bothered that apparently so many millions of people don't see it, or if they do, don't care or don't think it's going to affect them one way or the other for whatever reason.
And the thing that bothers me most about it is that the people who are getting hurt are the people like you.
You are continuing to keep your business open.
You're doing everything you can to keep it open and to pay your employees.
And you're playing by the old rules that we all grew up believing would pay off in the end.
Industriousness, hard work, playing it as close to the straight and narrow as you can, and basically thinking that this in itself will be its own reward.
You find out that people like you, the Democrat Party, you pose the problem.
You're not paying your fair share here or you don't care about other people not doing as well as you are, whatever.
It's really, really frustrating.
And you know, the country's got this major partisan divide over a number of issues like this.
And the way you're missing, it sounds to me like you don't want to take an easy way out.
You want to get this all fixed.
Exactly, Rush.
I mean, we need interest rates to go up.
And I mean, that's what's going to happen.
Yeah, but see, not too fast and not too soon.
There's your currency crisis right there.
If interest rates spike dramatically, look at gas prices rigged.
They're already through the roof and continuing to rise.
If you add massive inflation to it real quickly, you've got a consumer crisis where people won't be able to.
I agree with that, but I think that Japan's still in their crisis because they're keeping that interesting.
Okay, so you are of the school.
You're of the school that they're artificially keeping interest rates way too low and that this is ultimately the harm itself.
Well, they are, yeah.
I mean, you know, we're all feeling inflation while they're telling us it's not here.
Yep.
And it's, you know, it's just, of course, will lead to stagflation.
Yeah, and hopefully not in the future hyperinflation, but and then disinflation, and that's just as bad.
Well, Rush, you know, it was an honor, an absolute honor to talk to you.
You're a hero of mine.
I've been listening to you since I was a.
I wish I had a better answer for you.
I really do.
I wish I had a better answer.
I'm not.
None of us are in control of money supply.
11 people are, basically one guy.
And his objective with it is not what yours or mine would be right now.
His objective is political.
Disinflation is very...
Disinflation...
People are like, well, that'd be great.
Here's the problem with disinflation.
Disinflation, the manifestation, without getting into the financial world legalese definition of it, the manifestation of disinflation or deflation is that people who manufacture a product cannot sell it for what it costs them,
And so they shut down it once they and by the way, even if they could sell it for what it cost them, there's no reason to make it if there's no.
If at the end of your 18-hour day where you've worked yourself to the bone and all you've done is made back exactly what it costs you to produce whatever it is you produce, why do it?
There has to be some profit.
Disinflation prevents profit.
You simply cannot sell what you produce or even your service that you provide for what it costs you.
That's what it is.
It's not the opposite of inflation in the sense that the currency becomes super, super valuable.
It's also a function of worthlessness, but it has a different set of circumstances attached to it.
You just disinflation is depression, and businesses just give up and quit.
There's no reason to stay in business.
There's no reason to sell anything because you can't even make back what it costs you.
And that's what happens when disinflation sets in.
Anyway, Joshua, thanks for the call and your very nice words.
I really appreciate it.
Standby audio sound by 26.
Barack Hussein Obama this afternoon is in Coral Gables, Florida.
There's a Univision show called Meet the Candidates.
And Obama's the guest.
And the co-host is Maria Elena Salinas.
She said, Mr. President, we have reports.
The White House said today the attacks in Libya were a terror attack.
Do you have information that it was Iran or al-Qaeda was organizing the protest?
Now, listen, what do we know?
We know it was a terror attack.
It was planned two to three days in advance.
We know it had nothing to do with the video.
We know that our ambassador was tortured now before he was killed.
You can see the pictures.
They've been posted.
You don't want to.
He was more just dragged through the street.
This poor man was tortured horribly.
The reaction that this administration has had to this is so insufficient.
But even now, even now, knowing what we know, the White House, Jay Carney has agreed.
The video had nothing to do with this in Benghazi.
Here's Obama answering the Univision question.
Do you have any information about this attack?
Terror attack, Libya, Iran, Al-Qaeda, who behind it.
We're still doing an investigation, and there are going to be different circumstances in different countries.
And so I don't want to speak to something until we have all the information.
What we do know is that the natural protests that arose because of the outrage over the video were used as an excuse by extremists to see if they can also directly harm U.S. interests.
Well, we don't know yet.
And so we're going to continue to investigate this.
We've insisted on and have received so far full cooperation from countries like Egypt and Libya and Tunisia.
This is, I don't know, malpractice or what have you.
The video had nothing to do with this.
And he's not going to tell us what happened till after the investigation.
Yeah, we're still investigating.
We got a crime scene tape up.
The FBI is over.
It's an investigation.
So we can't discuss the investigation.
You never do.
We never do discuss criminal investigations.
We know that with the video, natural protests arose because of the outrage over the video.
It wasn't the video.
Our ambassador was tortured before he was murdered.
No leadership whatsoever.
I don't think Barack Obama is capable of leadership.
He's capable of Svengali-type mesmerizing, but he's not capable of leadership.
Was it al-Qaeda?
Oh, we don't know.
We don't know.
They know exactly what went on.
They're just not going to tell anybody till after the election.
If then, and I'll tell you, this media montage replayed them going yuck-yuck over this economic recovery.
Wait till you, I've already printed out stuff, show prep for tomorrow about economic news around the world.
Wait till you hear there's no recovery out there, much less here.
It's going to come back and bite them in the kazoo.
Okay, now one of the stacks I have for tomorrow about the economy is the CHICOMs.
The CHICOM economy is slowing down rapidly.
That's just the, it's admittedly a tease.
I don't have time to go into it right now, but I've got it for tomorrow.
That's not good for us, folks.
And other international economies are slowing down as well.
And Bernanke is not going to be able to do anything about those to try to save Obama's skin.
Also, the new study, air pollution from grilled hamburgers is worse than from trucks.
I kid you not.
It's righty.
I'll save that for tomorrow, too.
So we'll see you tomorrow on the last day for my MOFI.