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Jan. 3, 2013 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:48
January 3, 2013, Thursday, Hour #1
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Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 247 Podcast.
And greetings to you, Music Lovers, Thrill Seekers, Conversationalists all across the fruited plain.
Rush Limbaugh back here in the saddle, the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies, a thrill and a delight to be with you as we kick off a brand new busy broadcast year here at the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Happy to have you here, folks.
Telephone number.
If you want to be on the program, 800-282-2882, the email address, L Rushball at EIBNet.com.
So the deal, the Cliff deal happened, and exactly as I thought it was going to happen.
Folks, I I have to tell you, I am sitting here and I had so many observations.
But I am stunned.
I just have to tell you, I'm I'm I'm stunned at how after now four years, none of the conservative or Republican inside the Beltway establishment, even now understands who they're dealing with in Barack Obama.
How many of our core beliefs are we going to throw away in this misguided belief that we can finally get to what matters?
There is a prevailing opinion out there that, well, this deal, you know, it's actually a pretty good deal.
Yes, it keeps taxes the same, lowers taxes, and nobody's taxes got cut.
There was not a tax cut.
I'm blue in the face already, and we're only two minutes into this.
Anyway, so we got the tax.
Here's the deal.
We have the taxes off table.
Yes.
And now Obama's going to be forced to talk about spending.
What?
Obama's not through raising taxes on everybody, folks.
Obama is saying we raise taxes, but the rich still aren't paying their fair share.
They're still not paying it up.
He's going to come back for more.
There aren't going to be any spending cuts.
There isn't going to be any entitlement reform.
Would somebody show me the evidence to suggest Obama can be pressured to doing anything that he doesn't want to do.
I I I sit here in stunned disbelief.
But at the same time, I feel like I'm a member of the smallest minority in this country.
When I listen to people and conservatives, Republicans inside the Beltway, when I listen to them talk uh and the things that they say and the things that they think about this deal, I don't have anything in common with them anymore.
It's stunning to me.
Really is.
And I'm curious, we'll go through the program today, and I I before I unload on the whole thing, I'm curious what you all think of this.
I just I'm really I have to I have to figure out where we all are in this because I'm telling you that this things are spinning out of control while uh i i in ways that frankly I never imagined.
And I still don't think that people have the understanding of what we're up against.
And until that's understood, until it's admitted to, we're never gonna make any real significant progress on it.
In the meantime, Kim Kardashian is pregnant.
You see that Kim Kardashian and Kanye West are gonna have a baby.
It's a beautiful thing, isn't it wonderful?
And then there's this story.
Studies suggest lower mortality risk for people deemed to be overweight.
That means the heavier you are up to a point, the less likely you are to die.
Thin people are more likely to die than people who are overweight.
Doesn't surprise me.
I remember when I, you know, as a kid, I was always been a chunky kid.
I was always made fun of as a chunky kid.
I remember I was 10 or 11 years old.
We're playing football one Christmas day afternoon.
It's muddy.
We're getting all our new clothes dirty and making our mothers mad.
And I started being taunted for being chunky, and I said, Let me tell you something.
If this world is hit with a nuclear blast, I got enough on me to survive much longer than you do.
Turns out I was right.
The overweight are less likely to die than the thin.
Anyway, here's Kim Kardashian.
She was on entertainment tonight on CBS uh last night uh talking about uh about pregnancy of during uh it was in Las Vegas.
Listen to this amazing stuff.
You're having morning sickness cravings.
I haven't yet.
Um I wouldn't say that it's been easy because it's, you know, it's been um but no morning sickness.
My sister has made it look so easy.
And it's it's not as easy as people think.
It is um, you know, a little painful.
There's a lot of growing pains.
Well, who knew?
Who knew?
Oh, there you have it.
Kim Kardashian on pregnancy is not as uh not as easy as people think.
Wow, we're just you know, appealing to the low information voters.
Ladies and gentlemen, so much to uh say about this situation we find ourselves in.
What the first thing I want to do, I want to go back to December 6th on this program, me, and replay for you a three-minute clip of me laying out what was ahead of us.
And this is I'll just tell you up front, I called it, nailed it on the head.
Here it is.
Compromise is impossible.
All that can happen and all that will happen is one side will concede.
And what Obama wants is a confession.
And when this is all said and done, Obama wants it understood that this problem was caused by George Bush, that the Republicans are responsible for the debt, the Republicans are responsible for the deficit, the Republicans are responsible for the entitlements, maybe not being able to pay what their promises are, because Bush didn't take enough money from people who can afford it.
Bush instituted tax cuts twice, 2001 and 2003, that we couldn't afford.
When or if the Republicans concede, that will be the story.
That all of this, the seeds have been planted, the sprouts are growing and they're soon to bloom.
Bush did it.
Bush and the Republicans did this.
And the founders to Bush did this.
This country was founded improperly and unjustly and immorally and unfairly.
And we finally reached a tipping point where those guys they couldn't live off their illusion.
And now 230 years have been a mistake, and now we're fixing it.
And at the end of all this, the Republicans will end up admitting that Obama is right.
Now, Boehner's not gonna call a press conference and say any of this.
That's not he won't have to.
The media will take care of this for Obama.
A confession.
Republicans admit that if there had been higher taxes for the past decade, there wouldn't be a deficit, and the national debt would not have grown.
The budget would have been balanced.
In fact, we'd still have a surplus.
We would still have the Clinton surplus if Bush hadn't cut those taxes.
Tax cuts are to blame.
That will be the single lesson learned when this is over.
Tax cuts caused this.
And 98% of the American people will be told that tax cuts for two percent cause this, and they will accept that.
They will believe that.
So that down the road, the next time what what are the Republican Party?
What is that what are they singularly known for?
Cutting taxes.
So ten years from now, five years from now, a Republicans back in the White House, maybe proposes tax cuts.
Oh, we can't do that.
Look what happened the last time we did it with Bush.
Look what happened.
And Obama will be removed from the equation.
In fact, Obama's involvement in the equation will be as the fixer.
Obama will be the savior.
He will be the solution.
He will have identified The problem.
He will have persuaded the country of the problem, and he will have beaten back the Republicans into admitting that they were the problem.
That was just a month ago that uh made this point, December 6th.
Let's listen to what the president himself is saying about this.
If I can get these two pieces of paper separate.
Here's the president.
Tuesday night, January 1st in Washington at the White House.
A central premise of my campaign for president was to change the tax code that was too skewed towards the wealthy at the expense of working middle class Americans.
Tonight, we've done that.
Today's agreement enshrines, I think, a principle into law that will remain in place as long as I am president.
The deficit needs to be reduced in a way that's balanced.
Everyone pays their fair share.
Everyone does their part.
That's how our economy works best.
That's how we grow.
So he got his confession, folks.
He got his confession from the Republicans.
And then he declared that this agreement enshrines the principle that tax cuts cause the economy to falter.
Central premise of my campaign for president was to change the tax code to skewed towards the wealthy.
Republicans agreed.
They raised taxes on the rich, except they didn't.
That's the dirty little secret in all of this.
There are two kinds of rich people in this country.
There are the income wealthy, and they have just have it socked to them.
And then there are the really rich people, the asset wealthy, who didn't even get touched in this deal.
Warren Buffett will still pay a smaller income tax rate than his secretary.
Because Warren Buffett will not see a tax increase on his assets.
Nor will Jeffrey MLT GE, nor will any of the people who are asset wealthy in Hollywood.
Asset wealth was untouched.
Asset wealth, in fact, had some carve outs.
Asset wealth was left entirely alone.
Hedge fund people, big-time investors, and people who've already made it and derive most of their income from the value of their assets, assets and the income that that throws off.
They were not touched.
But the income wealthy, those who have what they have by versus virtue of being paid somebody by somebody, you got sucked.
You got sucked to the point that you're never going to be able to accrue wealth.
And that has been the point.
The whole point of the income tax is to prevent the acquisition of wealth.
But the asset wealthy.
Have you heard that discussed much in the probably not.
Carried interest is how hedge funds and it's very complicated thing.
But the simplest way to explain what carried interest is.
It's income that's taxed at the capital gains rate, which is now 20%.
That is one half of the new income tax top bracket rate of 396 or 40%.
That's a huge difference.
Cap gains 15 to 20 percent.
That is the increase that the asset wealthy are going to see.
Now when Obama talks about raising tax on the rich, that's who people think he's talking about.
The Warren Buffett's and uh Bill Gates is and I'm telling you, they're not touched.
And the hedge fund people not touched, and the Wall Street people not touched.
Neither party, by the way, wants to touch them because these are the people donate to political campaigns, to both parties.
These are the people that bundle campaign donations.
These are the people that go out and fundraise, as well as donate.
Untouched, folks, the asset wealthy, scot-free.
Other than the five percent increase in the capital gains rate.
And here's Obama fulfilling this illusion that the rich just had it handed to them.
Well, the income rich did just have it handed to them, but they are not the wealthy.
And they are not the people Obama wants the low information voter to think he's talking about.
The people who are not paying their fair share.
If you want to look at it that way, I happen to hate that expression because I think it's bogus.
But since that's the language of the day, I'll use it.
The people that Obama talks about who are not paying their fair share still aren't.
And the people who are already paying the vast majority of the tax burden are now paying more of it.
It's ridiculous what has been agreed to here.
It is absolutely unbelievable.
And here's Obama now claiming that the sole reason we have an economic morass and an economic problem is because we've had all these tax cuts for the rich.
And the Republicans have confessed that he's right about that.
By agreeing to raise the taxes on the income rich.
Obama got his confession.
Here's one more of Obama before we go to the break.
And I believe that there's further unnecessary spending in government that we can eliminate.
No, but we can't simply cut our way to prosperity.
Cutting spending has to go hand in hand with further reforms to our tax code so that the wealthiest corporations and individuals can't take advantage of loopholes and deductions that aren't available to most Americans.
And we can't stop.
Look at folks, if you really want to believe him on this, go to start asking anybody about the carried interest loophole, which was untouched, and you will quickly learn, you don't have to learn, I'm telling you, that everything Obama's saying here is bogus.
There aren't going to be any spending cuts.
The Republicans are not going to have any new leverage.
The media is not going to pressure Obama into now cutting spending because the Republicans bit the bullet and raised tax.
There isn't going to be any of that.
Republicans keep throwing away aspects of their core beliefs under this silly belief that that's how we'll get things done.
um Finally get to what matters we'll get this tax business off the table, and now we can focus on spending.
We're running out of core beliefs to throw away, folks.
Obama's victory here has been massive, profound, sweeping.
Unbelievably large.
Take a brief time out, we'll be back and continue after this.
We haven't fixed anything.
We have not solved anything.
There is nothing that this country faces, serious consequence.
That was dealt with in this most recent agreement.
All there is is a continuing collapse of this great country, a collapse of the economic system, a collapse of the political system.
We've got politicians of both parties running around slapping themselves on the back.
What a great deal.
Everything's a crisis.
Now the last minute we solved nothing.
We didn't deal with one fundamental problem.
Not one fundamental problem facing this country's been dealt with.
We've papered over a bunch of uh kick the can down the road.
We've engaging in in showbiz, theatrics, political theatrics.
But nothing was done of any substance whatsoever than by Obama, who is succeeding in his warped desire to transform this country.
I was on Hawaii on vacation.
I'm watching after the Republicans agreed to raise taxes on the rich, Obama goes to the Eisenhower executive office building for a pep rally, a campaign rally complete with supporters to applaud the rich getting stuck with all this again.
American citizens, workers, producers, people that hire other people, job creators, were being punished.
The illusion was that they were now finally going to pay their fair share.
They were being punished is what was happening.
And Obama was leading a pep rally of low information Obama supporters applauding the punishment of fellow Americans for the crime of succeeding and not paying enough to the government.
So the Republicans go along, okay.
Well, we'll we'll concede.
We'll confess.
Our tax cuts on the rich have been the problem all along.
So the collapse continues.
Fixing nothing continues.
It continues.
Sad news out of Hollywood, folks.
Devastatingly bad news.
Bradley Cooper, uh Zoe Saldana calling it quits.
It's got Hollywood shaken up.
This was thought to be one of the dream couples.
I mean, people magazine sexy as people alive couples, and they're calling it quits again.
They called it quits some time ago.
They got back together and everybody's happy and the world was right, and now they've fallen apart, and people don't know how to deal with this.
Devastating.
It's a great magazine cover.
Uh, but Bradley Cooper, Zoe Saldana, and Katie Holmes and Jake Gillenhall are day.
Did you hear that?
Uh listen now, this is according to an Italian tabloid.
Uh, and that is being denied.
It's very important to point out that the Gyllen Hall Holmes dating combo being denied.
But we wanted to report that big news to you, even though it is being denied.
Now, the uh president of the United States was reported by Fox News Ed Henry last week after the Republicans agreed to raise taxes on the rich.
Ed Henry says that Obama is calling, getting the Republicans to break its tax pledge, quote, one of the most consequential policy achievements of the last twenty years.
Unquote.
Don't doubt me.
From the from the first moment, I mentioned the theory that what Obama was seeking was a Republican confession.
A Republican concession.
Republicans agreeing with him that tax cuts for the rich, starting with Reagan through Bush really led to the problems that we have today economically.
And that that's what Obama was really wanting the Republicans to agree to.
That was his political aim, to be able to get the Republicans to confess.
And I can tell you, I was not named, but many conservative commentators inside the beltway poo-pooed that theory and mocked it and laughed at it, and yet the president now has twice confirmed it.
He goes to the pep rally at the Eisenhower executive office building and leads a pep rally applauding the punishment of the so-called rich.
Their taxes go up.
They're being punished.
That's what the low information voter thinks.
That's why he's applauding.
It's their fault.
Now we're finally going to get the economy moving.
Now we're going to get the deficit down.
Then we're going to get the debt down.
The rich are going to pay their fair share for the first time in a long time.
Damn Obama did it.
And the Republicans admitted it.
That's what was at stake here, and that's what's happened.
It will still be poo-pooed and mocked and laughed at, but the president himself said one of the most consequential policy achievements of the last couple of decades was getting the Republicans To break its tax pledge, getting the Republicans to give up on this notion of low taxes.
And Obama's not through.
Obama has cut a video, ladies and gentlemen.
A video distributed by his re-election campaign, which has no reason to exist anymore.
Obama is not running for re-election.
But the campaign still exists.
And they're still raising money.
And they're still spending money.
And Obama has cut a video.
And in this video, Obama reiterates his belief that the wealthiest Americans aren't paying their fair share.
This video is running today.
After the deal.
After tax increases for the rich, Obama has a video running.
The wealthy still aren't paying their fair share of taxes.
And in this video, Obama outlines a second term agenda ranging from environmental policy to gun control to immigration.
He starts the video by celebrating the tax increases, making our tax code more progressive than it's been in decades.
Obviously, still more to do, says the president, when it comes to reducing our debt, and I'm willing to do more as long as we do it in a balanced way that doesn't put all the burden on seniors or students or middle class families.
Wait, I thought this what do we call this deal that just happened anyway?
I don't even know what this deal is called.
It's not the debt limit deal.
That's coming up in February.
We'll cave again.
Fiscal Cliff deal.
That's right.
Fiscal Cliff deal.
I thought the fiscal cliff protected the middle class.
I thought the fiscal cliff protected seniors and students.
But no, they need more protecting.
See that.
Fact of the matter is that those people's taxes are going up too.
The temporary payroll tax cut did not make the cut.
And so are going to see on average a thousand dollars taken out of their paychecks this year.
Because the payroll tax cut expired.
So there's already a middle class tax increase there, and there will be more.
But Obama's not through raising taxes.
And the understated point here is that what is taking place is an attack on individuals, particularly younger people.
Younger people who seek to acquire wealth.
That's been part of the American dream for as long as there has been in America.
Wanting to improve your lot in life, wanting to improve your standard of living for you and your family.
Parents have always wanted their kids to do better than they did.
That's been part of this thing called the American Dream.
And acquiring wealth has been part of it.
Now that stinks.
The desire for wealth is now filthy.
To want wealth is immoral.
It's unjust because wealth has been the problem, don't you see?
People doing well.
That's been the problem all along.
That's what Obama believes, and that's what he's succeeding in persuading a lot of people to agree with him.
Young people have always sought to acquire wealth, but you can't acquire wealth without income.
Taxing income, as Obama is doing and wants to do even more, is aimed at harming those who haven't yet acquired much wealth, but want to.
Your kids, maybe even you.
Now Obama's protecting those who already have their wealth.
Obama is at war with those who have not yet acquired their wealth but would like an opportunity to do so.
Those are the people that Obama's cheering minions at this pep rally were opposed to.
People who wish to acquire wealth.
Now, this is, folks, it is it is very important to understand this.
Two kinds of wealth in this country.
And I've talked about it before, but I've never used these terms.
I'm trying to use different terms here in a way of being more explanatory.
Income wealth versus asset wealth.
Asset wealth is that group of people who are already rich, already wealthy, and do not need income to stay wealthy.
They are not seeing any tax increase to speak of it.
Maybe a 5% increase in capital gains, but that is it.
In fact, several of the asset wealthy got carve outs in this fiscal cliff deal.
The asset wealthy, Democrat donors, Democrat bundlers, Hollywood types, hedge fund types, Wall Street types.
The very people that Obama is ginning up hatred for are the very people exempted.
And in their place are the income rich that people are being encouraged to resent.
People are being encouraged to hate.
Obama is encouraging people to feel good when these rich people get stuck with higher taxes.
Except the real truly rich people in this country aren't being stuck with higher taxes.
asset wealthy.
I mentioned it in the first half hour, the carried interest loophole.
This is such an outrageous loophole that if you could get beneficiaries of it to be honest, they would tell you it's unfair.
They would tell you they can't believe they're getting away with it.
Let's say a young entrepreneur, say in Silicon Valley, starts up a big firm and it goes bang gangbusters, he sells it for hundreds of millions of dollars.
He has now become asset wealthy.
What does he do with his money?
Well, he invests it here and he invested it there, and maybe he starts a hedge fund, or maybe he starts a fund that will ask other people for their money that he will invest.
So he takes other people's money, he invests it, and if that money shows a gain, it's a very complicated thing.
Basically, understand carried interest.
Just think of it as income on assets that's taxed at the capital gains rate instead of the income tax rate.
And that's who the asset wealthy are.
And carried interest was not touched.
And the reason carried interest wasn't touched is because who it is that benefits from it.
By the way, I'm I'm not on a warpath here against these people.
I'm I'm don't I don't resent anybody.
I don't want it to be understood here.
I I don't want to use government to get even with anybody except people break the law.
I don't want government getting involved with any.
So don't confuse things here.
I'm I'm I'm not, I'm just telling you to lay it a land.
The people in the asset wealthy class comprise those who donate in great amounts to political campaigns, candidates, and politicians.
And because of that, they are untouched when it comes to new tax increases.
The great illusion here is that the low interest voter, the low information voter, doesn't know asset wealth from income wealth, just knows that the rich are rich.
He doesn't like them, and it's unfair, and they've become rich in dishonest ways.
That's what the low information and any tax, any government policy that takes money back from damn well go ahead and do it.
They don't know asset wealth from income wealth, which is the great benefit Obama has because the truly wealthy in this country aren't being touched.
The truly wealth, Warren Buffett's tax rate still lower than his secretary's.
Even with the voted buffet rule, even with all that PR with Buffett out advocating, have you noticed all these super asset wealthy people are in favor of raising your taxes?
Do you ever hear them say that their taxes ought to go up?
They might say, I'm not paying enough in taxes, I would, but they never say the carried interest loophole needs to be adjusted or gotten rid of.
They say we need to raise income taxes.
They don't pay income taxes.
So they, in effect, are helping the effort to raise taxes on the income rich, which is in fact an assault on individuals, particularly younger people who want to acquire wealth.
The income tax is designed to prevent the acquisition of wealth.
And we'll be back after this folks don't go away.
Now, Obama says he's not through raising taxes on the rich.
There's still more to be done.
The rich still aren't paying their fair share.
It could well be that he's gonna go after these hedge fund guys and others who benefit from the carried interest loophole.
There are a lot of them.
I mean, and not in in relation to the population, but there still are a lot of every hedge fund, every hedge fund's income is via carried interest.
It isn't called income.
And it's taxed currently 15%.
And what did Cap gains did it go to 20%?
I'm not sure.
I'm still confused, but I think that's what it was headed for, 20%, which is half of the top income tax rate.
But Obama, at the end of the day, has no loyalty to anybody but himself.
And he's now he's done with donors.
I mean, they've done for him what they can do.
He's not running for president again.
I know, I know, but I'm not going there.
He's not running for president.
So he's he's done with donors.
He doesn't need bundlers, he doesn't need donors, he doesn't care about the Democrat Party.
He has no loyalty to anybody but himself.
And so it could be that they're next.
We'll find out when it happens, because they will start squealing like you can't believe, even though many of them think they're getting away with theoretical murder.
Don in Chicago, let's grab a quick call here.
Great to have you on the program, sir.
Welcome back.
Hello.
Thank you.
Thank you, Rush.
It's a great honor to be the first caller of 2013.
I'll try not to disappoint Rush.
I don't believe that this is a great deal.
And in fact, Larry Cudlow today gave it one star out of possibly three.
But I think there is one victor in this whole thing, and I think he's a guy in Texas named George W. Bush, because for 98% of the people in the United States, George Bush's tax cuts are now the law of the land.
They will not sunset, and it's gonna take both the House and the Senate to get anything changed.
So I think there is a victor.
I think we have to be optimistic, like you always say, and one of the time, this is the best deal we could get.
Wait, wait, wait.
I'm I'm all for optimism.
But but uh what where tell me I need to know where's the value in saying Bush wins his tax rates are unchanged.
Well, for all these months and even years, uh the president has been saying that George Bush's tax cuts have caused the recession, have caused the inflation, have caused all this other stuff.
The Bush tax look, the Bush tax cuts for the rich did that.
These these these middle class is 98% you're talking about who's does tax rates are not gonna change.
There's an asterisk until we get a Democrat House of Representatives.
We get a Democrat House of Representatives, those those tax cuts are not permanent till the end of the world.
The next Congress can change them.
They can change them tomorrow if they want.
They can change them in the debt limit deal.
You get a Democrat House of Representatives to go along with Obama and a Democrat Senate.
Those rates are going up.
It's in the cards.
Nothing.
Nothing is safe, folks.
Be back in a second.
By the way, Democrats, ladies and gentlemen, are talking about going back to pre Reagan income tax rates, which were as high as 70%.
There are Democrats talking about the economy can withstand that.
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