Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 24-7 podcast.
Okay, so CBS News is reporting that they have decided that James Crapper, uh, Clapper, Clapper is the fall guy on taking uh Al Qaeda out of the talking points for Susan Rice.
Now, this guy has a storied past.
This guy has told us that the Muslim Brotherhood was our buddies.
A bunch of secular, they're no different than the Shoeshine guys down the end of the block.
And uh he also didn't know that terror attacks had taken place in London in the middle of them.
So they've decided to jump on this guy.
He looks like Ed Rollins, a little a full well, actually, just like Ed Rollins.
Um if if you've had you want to I like to put faces to names if people don't know.
It looks like Ed Rollins combination of Ed Rollins and Steve Schmidt uh is is what the guy uh looks like.
Greetings, folks.
Great to have you here.
It's L Rushbow and the EIB network.
And we are at the always distinguished and prestigious Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
Try this headline.
It is from a paper called a San Francisco Appeal.
Nudists rally at City Hall to oppose Wiener proposal.
I'm sorry, folks.
I just I know it's bathroom humor, but gee whiz.
I saw this and I just I could I couldn't I couldn't pass it up.
Here are the details on the story.
Nudists rally at San Francisco City Hall to oppose Wiener proposal.
A group of nudists today, I guess actually would uh yesterday filed a lawsuit, federal court seeking to stop the San Francisco Board of Supervisors from passing an ordinance that would ban nudity in the city.
The supervisors are set to vote Tuesday on a proposal by the supervisor Scott Wiener that would prohibit the display of genitals or buttocks in city plazas or parklets.
The van would also apply to sidewalks, streets, and public transit.
Uh gypsy Taub, one of the nudest organizers of the rally, who took off her clothes at a board committee hearing on the issue last week, said the legislation would take away our freedom to be ourselves in our own city.
So you see, you see, this is in the small little microcosm, maybe not the best example, but this in our discussion of freedom is exactly the kind of thing I mean.
I don't mean to say Scott Wiener's one of us.
But but as far as these nudists are concerned, Scott Wiener may as well be me.
Or and and what is freedom to them?
They don't take off their clothes wherever they want.
At some point in San Francisco, this will pass.
Because these people get what they want in that city at some point.
I mean, an addictomy is now paid for by the by the people.
Um it's it's gonna happen.
Once the left proposes something, it doesn't.
By the way, the CIA, you might be interested in knowing the CIA, the CIA has decided, because they got to cut some budgets somewhere, that they are going to vastly cut back on their climate change slash global warming outreach program.
The CIA.
Did you know the CIA had a global warming climate change outreach program?
I I knew that NASA was reaching out to Muslims.
You know, I thought that sounded familiar, Sterley says we did the story.
I I thought it sounded familiar when I saw it today.
Anyway, so nudists rally at City Hall to oppose Wiener proposal.
Here's Debbie Blabbermouth Schultz.
Debbie Blabbermouth, if I can find it, I've got I just folks.
I'm sorry about this.
I just these audio sound bites, I need ten hands to do this.
Here it is.
Number 21.
Debbie Blabbermouth Schultz.
This was uh we're just getting this.
It was last Wednesday during an Emily's list forum on women and the 2012 election.
Take a good look when the House convenes after this next Congress is sworn in at what our side of the aisle looks like versus the Republican side of the aisle.
I mean, they got whiter and more male.
And We now have a majority, minority, and female Democratic caucus.
Yeah, all fine in history.
All fine and good until you realize that this woman's party moved heaven and earth to defeat African American Mia Love, African American Alan West, and replaced them with white men.
So the hypocrisy is written.
It's another major point.
I just I don't want to offend any of you independents or moderates about being critical here, but I did it's I mean, this guy's Wasserman Schultz runs around talking about how looking universe we are.
And they're not about diversity, they are about liberalism.
Marion Barry, the former mayor for life for Washington, D.C. is upset every Thanksgiving.
The former mayor for life gives out turkeys.
Sort of like what Santa Claus does uh at Christmas.
He gives out turkeys to poor people.
And maybe people who aren't poor, but whoever can score one gets one.
But he's upset.
Tis the season for DC's elected officials to gin up some goodwill by attaching their names to Thanksgiving Turkey giveaway.
You know, though, as I read this story, I'm wondering who buys turkeys?
Am I the only one?
Seems like everybody gets a free turkey these days.
Five council members are hosting turkey giveaways this year in Washington, including Mary and Barry, whose annual giveaway almost always generates news.
Now, in the in the past, Marion Barry, as in the past, he's declining to say who paid for the turkeys that he's giving away.
And he's also not saying whether or not the donors of the turkeys have contracts with the city.
He says, suppose they are.
So what?
You all beat up on good people for doing good things, I'm not ever telling.
And what he's really upset about here, he said only liberal white folks who are interested in disclosure rules for turkey giveaways.
He's upset at the liberal white folks because they want accountability.
They want to find out where the turkeys are coming from, and Mary and Mary don't want to tell them.
Only liberal white folks.
Yes.
Interested in disclosure rules for turkey giveaways.
He added that it's the same types who are interested in other good government initiatives like the city's open meeting laws.
Look who leads it.
He's ripping liberal Democrats, white liberals.
He expects them to look the other way and not demand or ask for accountability when he's out there playing Santa Claus.
NBC News, the newest family budget killer.
The $300 cell phone bill.
It's the biggest bill in the house outside of the mortgage payment.
TJ Pinalis of Austin, Texas, holds his nose, writes a check to Verizon Wireless every month for about $325, astonished.
The telephone service now occupies the number two slot in the family budget.
But NBC News heard that lament again recently as readers responded to a story about a wireless trade industry report claiming average cell phone bills are going down.
And of course, people no, they're not, they're going up.
In fact, some cell phone bills are averaging close to $100 a month.
Which for a lot of people making the cell phone a luxury.
But I remember the people that have Obama phones.
They have the free phones and they have up to 120 minutes free.
And they know exactly how to get an Obama phone.
And it doesn't take much.
Now, I I don't know, you know, the quality of the phones.
I don't know what kind of add-on service that you uh that you get.
But it's clear, ladies and gentlemen, there's too big a dichotomy here.
This this is not fair.
Some people paying $300, $400 a month for cell phone service, and some people aren't paying anything.
What's the solution?
Nobody should pay anything.
The government just like should take over hostess and save the Twinkies and save the unions.
Take over the cell phone bill payment process.
It's like they're taking over student loans.
Wouldn't you rather have the government paying for your cell phone bill?
You wouldn't.
You won't.
As far as I'm concerned, this is a responder to NBC's polls, far as I'm concerned, seems like a huge ripoff, but what do you do?
Our family never eats out.
There's a lot of stuff we don't do because of our cell phone bills.
You believe this.
Cell phone bills are keeping people from buying food or eating out at restaurants.
Cell phone bills.
Do you even care what yours is, Snertley?
Do you even look at your cell phone?
You do?
Well, are you in the $300, $400 a month average payment range?
You are.
Well, that's uh.
HR can't believe you pay that much.
Okay.
Audio sound by time.
Ted Koppel's back.
And Ted Koppel says that I have made bipartisanship impossible.
Me and John Stewart.
Made bipartisanship impossible.
Last night, George Washington University during a Calb report forum on ethics and excellence in journalism, Marvin Caleb of the Kennedy School, interviewed Rock Center's special correspondent Ted Coppel.
He said, in a recent interview with Bill O'Reilly of Fox, you derided ideological coverage of the news as bad for America, making it difficult if not impossible for Congress to reach across the aisle and find compromise.
You also, oh, people are asking me, Rush, what would your compromise be on on the fiscal cliff?
I have a proposal, a moderate m little proposal.
Because I have heard, I got I got an in I got an email of deep intel this morning, where there are going to be powerful forces trying to drive a wedge between me and Grover Norquist.
You know, Grover Norquist has the the no tax pledge.
And there's a, I think it's one of these political roundup stories.
And one of these little each news item is a paragraph, sort of a highlight of either what's coming today in combination of what happened yesterday.
And there, and I was alerted to this by somebody who said they're going to try to drive a wedge to you between you and Grover.
And what they're going to try to do is say Grover is adamantly opposed to any tax increase anywhere, anytime for anything.
And they think if they can get you to do a Bill Crystal, and just come out and say, you know, folks, if we can get the guaranteed spending cuts, I can see raising time.
They want me to do this, the pressure gonna be brought to bear on you, Rush.
So with that in mind, I've I've been pondering it a bit.
And I'll share with you later as the program unfolds my thoughts on this to the extent that they matter.
But anyway, here's Ted Coppel, and and Marvin Cow said uh you Bill O'Reilly used to you derided ideological coverage of the news as bad for America, making it difficult, if not impossible, for Congress to reach across the aisle, find compromise.
You also wrote in an op-ed piece, this is not good for the Republic.
What did you mean?
Now, doesn't the question kind of spell out what Coppel says?
So what do you mean is a little redundant?
But anyway, here's what he said.
You cannot in a democracy expect people to be able to reach across the aisles and make the accommodations for important issues if they are terrified that in so doing they're going to expose themselves to the wrath of either the right or the left.
Either John Stewart's humor or Rush Limbeau's sharp tone.
So what does this mean?
It means that our brave and courageous elected officials would be happy to work with one another.
They would be happy reaching across the aisles, as it said.
They'd be happy compromising here and compromising there.
Like Harry Reid would be thrilled to work with Mitchell McConnell if I would just shut up and if Stuart would stop making jokes.
Does anybody believe, especially now that there's any I mean, Harry Reid before the election said that if Romney won, we're not working with him, to hell with Romney, to hell with the Republicans?
We are not compromising, we're not working.
There is no such thing as liberal compromise.
Look at the election returns.
Look at the results.
Look at the aftermath.
We lose.
What do we do?
We beg to be forgiven for taking the positions we took.
We beg to be accepted by the people that beat us.
Okay, okay, we'll we'll we'll we'll we'll come out with an amnesty plan.
Okay, and okay, okay, we'll we'll come out, we'll we'll give away abortions and contraception to women.
Okay, we'll we'll make all kinds of accommodations to what we believe.
Did the Democrats ever, when they lose an election, do you ever see the Democrats publicly speculate, you know, maybe we lost because we're too strident on the on the abortion.
Maybe we lost because we're too associated with the unions who are destroying businesses.
Did the Democrats ever do?
Did the Democrats ever I mean, look at Debbie Blabbermouth Schultz here?
I'm proud to say that we uh we have the most diverse and colorful Congress in the history of the country, and the other side just a bunch of old white guys, as two of our fine minority candidates were replaced by old white Democrat guys.
I really, folks, I've my father, my father, would not believe my life.
My father would not believe, he knew Ted Coppel.
I mean, he knew who Ted Koppel, he watched Nightline.
He could not, my father would not believe that if he was watching Rock Setter last night, which he wouldn't have, but had he been watching Roxitter last, he would not believe that Ted Coppel would be blaming his son for the lack of anything getting done in Washington.
And then my father would be happier with me than he'd ever been.
But he still couldn't believe it.
He would not believe this.
He'd look at my mother and say, what did we miss when this kid was growing up?
He couldn't even hit a curveball, and now the Congress is blaming him for the fact they don't get anything done.
Uh it is.
This is what the fourth election in a row, and now that every day since the election, I have been blamed in one way or another.
There's more to this.
Um Marvin Calb said, well, remember years ago when we knew every cameraman who was taking pictures.
I don't know who's taking the pictures anymore, Ted.
I don't know that they're even working for a network.
This is this is cows lament that they've lost their monopoly.
And now they got all these people in the journalism business, they don't even know who they are anymore.
It's just too many people out there.
Too many people in journalism.
Too many cameramen.
Gee, Ted, it's impossible to know everybody doing this.
What is that?
When you go to see a doctor, you're not asking that doctor what his or her politics are.
You simply want that doctor to deal with you on the basis of her best professional expertise.
And whether or not our critics want to believe it, I argue, and I think you'll agree with me, that there really was a time, and there really remain in this country today.
Men and women who can be professional journalists, capable of objectivity.
That doesn't mean that they don't go home at night and rail against the darkness.
It doesn't mean that they don't have favorites in an election.
To this day, you've known my wife Grace Ann for many, many years.
Grace Ann doesn't know how I vote in an election.
Really?
I don't tell her.
I don't think it's appropriate.
I don't believe that.
I just don't believe it.
I just don't believe it.
Yeah, not even Marvin Cow bought this.
When Copel said, you've known my wife Grace Ann for many, many years.
She doesn't know how I vote in election.
Really?
I don't tell her.
I don't think it's appropriate.
That's how good a journalist, Ted.
He doesn't even betray how he votes to his wife.
And she has no clue.
Ted Essex's wife has no idea how he is uh voting.
Now, Snerdley snerdly said, What in the world are you stopped?
What in the world have you prevented from happening?
What do you mean these guys all over you preventing people from crossing out?
What have you stopped?
You haven't stopped any.
They had first two years Obama had a total Democrat Congress, could have done anything he wanted.
There wasn't anybody could have stopped him, and he didn't need anybody crossing the aisle to get anything done.
And that points up that's really not what these guys are saying.
When they when they accuse me of preventing compromise, when they accuse me of of scaring Republicans to not crossing the aisle, that's not really what they're talking about.
They're talking about something entirely different.
I'll explain that.
I have to take another brief time out here at the bottom of the hour because our first opening monologue went longer than the programming format allocates.
And we're back, Rush Limbaugh here on Thanksgiving week.
It's great to be with you.
It's a thrill and delight always.
Telephone number is 800-28282.
Email address L Rushball at EIV net.com.
Here we have, this is last night, and I guess this was on uh C-SPAN televised it.
The George Washington University Caleb Report Forum on ethics and excellence in journalism.
And we put together here a montage of Marvin Cowb, the host and Ted Koppel, a guest, talking about the way the media in America used to be when they started in the business.
Now we all do this.
In whatever business we're in, we all go back and talk about the way it used to be.
These guys are lamenting the loss of their monopoly.
Because that was real power.
They shaped opinion, and that was their purpose.
They may think that they were objectively reporting the news, but they're living in fantasy land if they believe that.
They shaped opinion.
They determined what was covered and how.
And more importantly, they determined what wasn't covered.
They had their choices.
They knew who they wanted to win.
This there's never been this pretense of objective, well, it's always been a pretense at objectivity.
So when these guys, for example, lament the fact that uh Congressmen, Senator bunch of cowards.
They're afraid of my sharp tongue or John Stewart's humor.
They're really not saying, they're really, really not saying that I am thwarting compromise.
What they're attempting to do is simply discredit me throughout and entirely, on anything and everything that I say, that I am unworthy of this microphone.
I am not worthy of the position that I have earned.
I'm not worthy of it.
I should not be on the air, is what this means.
Because this notion that members of Congress are afraid, look at if they're afraid of anything, it's the mainstream media.
They're afraid of the charge of racism.
The one thing that shut down the Republican Party in the last uh five, six years is that charge, maybe even longer than five or six years.
And now this pursuit of Susan Rice, the uh Graham and McCain actively trying to stop her nomination to be Secretary of State, James Clyburn of the uh Congressional Black Caucasians is out now saying that using the word incompetent, describing a black is racist.
It's a code word, just like lazy.
Well, of course it is.
This is where we are in our culture.
Of course, any criticism of any African American is racist.
Why, there wouldn't be any criticism if it weren't rooted in racism.
And this is what they want everybody to believe.
But anyway, jumping down here a little bit.
Listen to Koppel and Marvin Cowb lament the good old days.
Take it back to when you and I were young, and when you and I began in this business.
The good old days of journalism.
When you and I were young, there were three networks.
Nightline.
We had 70% of all the homes watching television at 1130 at night.
Really?
These days are lucky to have 25%.
I remember being able to charter a plane from Rome to Istanbul in the mid-60s.
I remember being able to charter a plane from Rome to Istanbul?
That was Marvin Cowb.
I'm sorry for the interruption here.
But what does that mean?
You think it's economic?
You get saying it.
So I remember the days where the bottom line didn't count.
I remember the days when we didn't have to be concerned about capitalism and profit.
This is your point.
I remember the days I could charter a plane from Rome to Istanbul, and nobody said anything.
But now I can't.
I'm stuck here at the Kennedy School in Boston and occasionally let me out to do forums like this in Washington.
That's what he's saying.
No.
Now they had they had big budgets, but they didn't have to make a profit, was the point.
I'll never forget when Lawrence Tish bought CBS.
And the first thing he's looking at the balance sheets of every division at CBS says, you know what, I gotta cut some people out of news division.
This news division is losing its tail.
And Dan Rather had a cow, publicly had a cow.
And when I started making speech, a news divisions should be exempt from the bottom line.
News divisions ought not have to play that game.
I mean, what our our task is too important.
Our role is too fundamental.
Our job means too much.
We shouldn't have to make a profit in here.
Yeah, I'm in the First Amendment.
I remember about this time I was in uh Sacramento, in fact, 1984, 85, whatever, and Brokaw was in town, and he was doing something with a local NBC affiliate, and they arranged a phone interview with me, and I asked him about this.
I said, I can you explain something what what is it about news and its its desired exemption in the bottom line?
Well, no, no, no.
I think Mr. Ratter's, of course, very wrong about it, have to show.
But he knew.
He knew that it was a wrong thing to say in public.
Okay, let's take it back to the top.
I mean, of all the things I remember the good old days.
I could charter a plane from Rome to Istanbul.
I can take three reporterets with me, by the way, at the same time.
Nobody's back to when you and I were young, and when you and I began in this business.
The good old days of journalism.
When you and I were young, there were three networks.
Nightline.
We had 70 percent of all the homes watching television at 11.
Really.
These days are lucky to have 25 percent.
I remember being able to charter a plane from Rome to Istanbul in the mid-60s.
If I did a piece out in the field, it would be three days sometimes before that piece got on the air.
Remember years ago when we knew every cameraman who was taking pictures.
I remember a woman by the name of Koenig, wasn't it?
Yes, Marie.
Marie Koenig.
My memory may be playing tricks on me, but I think I still remember hearing Edward L. Murro's reports being rebroadcast on the BBC.
If you eliminated MSNBC, Fox and CNN, it would probably improve American democracy overnight.
I'm not saying that we can ever return to the good old days.
That's gone.
That's done.
That is seen as hopelessly old fashioned.
I was about to say, Ted, those days are over.
If you eliminated MSNBC, Fox, and CNN, it would probably improve American democracy overnight.
You see, there's too much democracy out there.
There are too many opinions.
There are too many people saying too many things.
And this guy, Limbaugh is the is the root of it.
This guy Limbaugh started All this.
There wouldn't be an MSNBC if it weren't for Limbaugh.
There wouldn't be a Fox if this is what these guys think.
There wouldn't be any of this alternative media if it weren't for Limbaugh.
All we'd have to deal with is CNN.
And we still have 70% watching us.
But when the competition kicked in, they couldn't hold their audience.
So now they lament the good old days.
And by the way, what is this charter plane from Rome to Istanbul?
Don't you liberals know you're supposed to take the train, save the environment?
Yeah, I'm wondering how these uh these how these people at CNN feel hearing Ted Koppel and Marvin Cowb talk about how American democracy would be improved if they didn't exist.
The guys at CNN think they are Ted Koppel and Marvin Kalb and those old guys in the old days.
They um nobody watches CNN enough to affect democracy either way, is the is the bottom line.
But anyway, uh it it's it's funny to listen to these people let reminisce.
They had their monopoly, and that's what they can't stand, and that's why, folks, I'm I I really believe that's why they've gone all in partisan now.
I think the nature of the media beast uh is is competition, obviously.
They were always able to sweep that under the rug.
They were always able to act like they were all colleagues, ABC, CBS, NBC, that they didn't care about the ratings when they always did.
They didn't care who was number one when they always did.
They didn't care who made what when they always did.
Uh but now that now that they don't have their 70 shares, and now that they don't have this dominance, and now that they don't have this power, they are in a funk over it, and it has forced them out from behind the curtain, so to speak, in a in a wizard of oz kind of circumstance.
And I really believe that that they have thrown away the pretense to objectivity in a fit of anger over what's happened.
And I think they try to prove to themselves each and every day they have not lost that power they used to have.
I think that's the reason that they're so partisan, so admittedly partisan.
I think that's why they've clearly chosen sides that have made no bones about it anymore.
It's all about demonstrating to themselves, as as well as everybody else, that they've still got that power.
And they have this deep resentment for all of us interlopers.
As I described yesterday.
These uh these anchors, I've I don't know, you people remember these anchors, the Jennings, the Kronglikes, uh, Cronkites and uh and they were gods in their own minds.
They were gods.
I mean, yet LBJ saying, I've lost Cronkite, I've lost the war.
You don't think Cronkite ate that up?
You know that Cronkite was aware and used that kind of power.
I mean, they loved it.
Anybody would probably.
And now it's uh it's gone, but they still like to pretend that it's there, but these are the same people always preaching diversity too.
These are the same people always preaching inclusiveness.
These are the same people preaching uh more the better.
The gorgeous mosaic.
But where is the gorgeous mosaic when it comes to thought?
Where is the diversity when it comes to see that's not what they they want diversity of surface characteristics, but they don't want diversity of actual thought.
They want one dominant way of thinking, and anything outside that dominant way has got to be taken out or dealt with or discredited somehow.
We start on the phones, we're gonna go to Rick in Los Angeles.
I'm glad you called, sir, and it's great to have you here.
Hi.
Hello, Rush.
Thank you for having me.
You bet.
Um I'm hoping you can help me out with something.
I'm I'm confused about something, and I figured you're the only guy who can help me out.
So it's a question regarding the grand bargain and budget negotiating.
And I kind of understand baseline budgeting.
So we're you know we have a baseline and we're projected to go certain distance out into ten years, and we have a deficit.
And as part of That baseline, taxes on December 31st are going up for everybody.
So that's already in the books.
It's already in the budget.
I hear a lot of talk about raising taxes for the wealthy on December 31st, but that's really not what's happening.
What's happening on December 31st, if it doesn't go up for everybody, what the Democrats and the President want to do is reduce taxes for those people making under $250,000.
The problem I have is I always thought that the Democrats and the President said if you're going to reduce taxes, you have to pay for it.
Have they proposed how they're going to pay for that tax decrease?
Well, yes, the taxes on the rich and the elimination of loopholes and deductions for the rich is uh is how they're going to pay for all that.
But look, you know, you're on to a couple of things here.
As far as most people are concerned, and I I really believe this is true.
Uh most people do you realize I saw some exit polling data.
Do you realize um uh uh I I gotta find it, I don't want to paraphrase it, but it's it's um well one level it's stunning and shocking, and then when you stop and think about it, it isn't really, but th the vast majority of people who voted think the Democrat Party is the party of lower taxes.
I mean it's not even close.
The Republicans have lost that issue entirely, according to exit polling and other data as well.
The the Bush tax rates are portrayed by Obama and the Democrats as only benefiting the rich.
The Bush tax rates, this why I think there's a part of me that says, go ahead and and let them do what they want to do.
And let's let's let's illustrate.
Let's have everybody's taxes go up, as you say.
With the Bush tax cuts expiring, everybody's taxes are going up.
Not just but everybody's taxes are going up anyway, no matter what deal is made, because of Obamacare alone.
Everybody's taxes are gonna be skyrocketing, no matter what deal is done.
So, but this notion of of paying for the tax cuts doesn't apply to Democrats, is the answer to your question.
Yeah, because the tax cuts to the rich, you're saying that's how they're gonna pay for it.
That's already in the baseline budgeting.
All taxes are going up.
We're going up from 36 to 39.
whatever percent for the rich.
That's already in the baseline.
Yes, but there's also taxes tax.
The capital gains rate is going up.
There's other taxes that only supposedly affect the rich.
But that's already in the baseline.
That's already in there.
No, that that's technically not in the in the baseline.
The the um the that that's I know what you're trying to say.
Wait, you what you're trying to say is that the budgetary effect of the Bush tax rates expiring has already been calculated.
It's already known.
And so whatever they say about it is smoke and mirrors, right?
That's essentially what you're saying.
That's right.
And if you're gonna lower taxes for anybody, you have to increase more taxes somewhere else, over and above the Bush tax rates being fine.
Because that's already in the numbers.
If you're gonna reduce taxes on 2500, you have to propose a budget cut somewhere to pay for that.
Or even more taxes, more than the capital gains rate going to twenty percent, more than the tax rate going to 39.6.
Are you uh are you are you being facetious here or or do you really believe what you're saying here?
You believe this pay for it jargon that you're using?
Oh, I absolutely believe that lowering taxes creates growth.
I'm using their argument against the because there's no such thing as paying for a tax.
If we if we don't if we don't dispatch with that line of thinking, if we don't get rid of this notion we have to pay for tax cuts, because underlying that is that the government is automatically entitled to every dollar that is produced, earned, created in the country.
The idea that tax cuts have to be paid for has by definition, the government's entitled to every dollar.
And we've got to get rid of this way of thinking.
So I'm asking if you're doing this sarcastically.
Yeah, but that's exactly but that's exactly my point.
You can use this against the Democrats.
What the Democrats are saying is the reason why they want to lower taxes on the middle class is because it's helpful for the economy, and they're not proposing to pay for it.
So aren't they acknowledging that lowering taxes and not paying for it is a good thing.
Well, no.
No.
That that's that's I I know I know what you're you're you're trying to conclude near.
And it's it's a it's a nice, it's a nice you're trying to catch them in something.
But they're not going to be caught.
The Republicans are not going to catch them in anything.
The Republicans are going to go along.
I fear.
Maybe not.
We'll see.
I appreciate the call.
Let me take a time out here, folks, because I must.
I have no flexibility here.
Okay, very simply, fiscal cliff.
I believe if you're gonna raise anybody's taxes, then you ought to raise everybody's.
Raise everybody's, not just the rich, raise everybody's taxes.
Let's be fair.
But I don't think taxes are the reason we're in this mess.
We're not gonna solve this mess until we start cutting spending.