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June 17, 2013 - Rush Limbaugh Program
35:20
June 17, 2013, Monday, Hour #2
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Hi, folks.
Welcome back.
A thrill and a delight to have you with us, Rush Limboy at the EIB Network.
800-282-2882 is the number if you want to be on the program.
The email address, we do check them, of course, El Rushbo at EIBNet.com.
Okay, so Lindsey Graham on Meet the Press yesterday, talking about the Gang of Eight Bills, said that the Republican Party is in a demographic death spiral as a party, and the only way we can get it back and get back in the good graces with the Hispanic community is to pass comprehensive immigration reform.
Now, there are two things going on here.
And my entirely uninformed, wild guess opinion is that at the root of this is money.
I think a number of elected Republicans are taking a look at their donors and are listening to their consultants.
And they are seeing that people who donate big amounts of money to them want amnesty.
That's number one.
And do not make the mistake of de-emphasizing or not placing enough attention on emphasis on this, because it is true.
In this instance, you know, a lot of people would like to believe that all this is about ideas and consequences.
And my friends, there is a growing phenomenon in this country of crony capitalism taking place.
For example, there's an old wives tale, an old myth that basically holds that big money, moneyed interests, always support Republicans.
And that just isn't the case anymore.
Big money supports government.
Major American corporations, corporate America, have you noticed, I have, over many recent years, doesn't criticize big government at all.
I forget when I first noticed this, but I remember the first time the realization hit me, I was genuinely surprised because I used to be a believer in this old wives tale.
Wall Street big money CEOs were Republicans because they wanted government out of their way.
That used to be true.
And when I first started, when it first started registering on me that that's out the window and that major corporate interests now get in bed with government, I can give you an example.
It's not by any stretch the only one.
With Obama, there are many of them, by the way.
But take a look at General Electric.
GE got in bed with Obama on green energy.
Obama was funneling federal money to GE for research and development into green issues.
GE, of course, took it.
The CEO ends up on an Obama commission on job creation and so forth.
GE is not paying any taxes On $5 billion of profit.
And they found a way to profit from being involved in government.
And it's not just GE.
More and more corporations are profiting from being involved in government.
Being involved in the EPA, being involved at the Department of Agriculture.
So the old idea that big money corporations or Wall Street wants nothing to do with big government because it's an obstacle is going out the window.
It's not just the exact opposite.
Corporate cronyism is on the increase.
In fact, there's a story about it, theatlantic.com, the security industrial complex.
And it is all about the new relationship that corporate America has with government.
Government's willing to give it money, enable it to profit in order for partnerships with Obama.
There were a number of these partnerships that kind of raised eyebrows during Obamacare, for example.
Hospitals, insurance companies got in bed with Obama to fund Obamacare TV ads.
Now, these people happen to want the influx of illegal immigrants because they are cheap labor.
It's theatlantic.com, the security industrial complex.
We'll link to the story at rushlimbaugh.com.
So in this whole amnesty bill, immigration pathway to citizenship comprehensive reform, I would urge you to stop thinking about ideas and consequences and the Constitution, because that's not at play here.
What's at play here is money.
If these elected Republicans are told by their donors that the money is going to dry up if this amnesty thing doesn't happen, what are they going to do?
And if there's a lot of it, if there's a lot of corporate PAC money, corporate personal donation money coming from people who want amnesty, what's going to happen?
Now, on the other side of it, when Senator Graham says we're in a demographic death spiral as a party and we've got to get back in the good graces of the Hispanic community, what he's talking about is the optics.
We mentioned this earlier.
The story, as developed and promoted by the drive-by media, is that Hispanics hate Republicans.
Whether it's true or not is irrelevant.
The fact that it exists as it does is what's relevant.
And since it exists, since the Hispanics reportedly, reputedly believe this, the Republicans think that they have to do something to show them that they don't hate them, that the optics are wrong.
And Senator Graham is simply saying we have got to pass immigration if for no other reason to tell the Hispanics we don't hate them, to counter this perception that they have that has been created.
And if we don't do it, then we are forever going to lose those votes.
Now, those votes are not even 8% of the turnout in 2012.
We're talking about an electorate, a percentage of the electorate under 8%.
There are certainly other demographic areas for Republicans to shore up.
And it is true, if Mitt Romney had received 70%, if everything else stayed the same, if Romney had received 70% of the Hispanic vote, he still would not have won.
But that doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter.
There are two things at work here.
All of the moneyed interests, the donors and the political consultants, are telling these Republicans the money is going to dry up if they don't support amnesty.
And the big money people want it because they want it for various other reasons.
It has nothing to do with the Constitution or the law.
They want it for their own specific interests, a case of business, cheap labor, any number of other reasons.
But you can't rule the money out of this.
In fact, the money is the number one reason behind this.
But the Republicans do believe Graham is being honest here when he says that the party is in a demographic death spiral and the only way to get back in good graces with the Hispanic community is to pass immigration reform.
And it's immigration reform because that's reputedly what the Hispanics want.
If the Hispanics wanted something else, then they would all be for that.
Senator McCain has admitted that they're not going to get one vote after passing amnesty.
He's admitted it.
He said that's not the purpose.
The purpose is to get us back in the game with Hispanics.
Right now, we're not even in the game, he said.
They won't even listen to us.
They won't listen to our campaigns.
They won't listen to our message.
We've got to do something to show them that we don't hate them.
Then they'll at least listen to us, and then we have an opening where we can take our message of whatever it is.
Limited government, belief in the individual, free markets, be the best you can be, join us, on and on and on.
But they believe right now the Hispanics won't even listen to them.
No less than Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey also said the Republicans' presidential prospects are forever over if they don't pass this legislation.
Now, my question to that, and I'm sorry for being so silly and naive and stupid, but I ask myself, why does Bob Menendez care whether we win the presidency or not?
I mean, a better question.
Why does Senator Menendez want us to win the presidency?
Why does Senator Menendez want us to be in the presidential sweepstakes?
Wouldn't Senator Menendez really love it if we were aced out?
Wouldn't every Democrat, and from Obama on down, their mission is to eliminate all opposition?
Don't forget.
So when Democrats also join Senator Graham and say, yep, you guys, you better do something fast or you're never going to have a chance at the presidency.
Is that what they want?
The Democrats want us to win the presidency, and that's why they're advising us on the right way to go on this legislation.
That's how it appears to me that Senator Menendez and other Democrats have said the same thing, too.
You guys are never going to stand a chance if you don't change your views on Hispanics.
If you guys don't change your attitude here on immigration, you're never going to win the presidency.
The Democrats, they want us to win the presidency.
That's news to me, too.
Now, the caller's question, why now admit this?
And to me, that's not a recent admission.
The fact that they think they're not even in the ballgame with Hispanics right now, and the only way to get in a game is by supporting this immigration reform bill.
That's, I don't know, I've known that for as many years as they've been trying to pass amnesty.
The key thing, I think, for everybody to really look at here, you know, forget the, you know, how many are going to vote Democrat, how many are going to vote Republican.
That's not how the Republicans are looking at this.
I guarantee you, they're not.
They're looking at it financially.
Number one, all of their big money wants the bill.
All of the Republican major donors want this bill.
I'll give you some names.
The Koch brothers, Sheldon Adelson.
I mean, they want the bill because they want the influx of new labor.
They want it.
They're not concerned with how anybody's going to vote down the line.
As long as these guys can stay aligned with whoever is running government, they're in Fat City.
So it doesn't matter what party runs a government, as long as they're in bed with them.
And while you and I naively sit out here and talk about the Constitution and right and wrong and the law and this kind of stuff, when that is not really a factor here, there are other factors.
And I think Senator Graham says, look, we're in a demographic death spiral.
Hispanics hate us, and we got to get back in their good graces.
The only way to do it is passion.
I think they do believe that.
Remember, their consultants are telling them this.
The people they hire, the people they pay to run their campaigns are telling them this.
Why wouldn't they believe it?
If Frank Lunch comes in and tells you just what his focus group says, what are you going to believe?
If Mike Murphy, or take your pick, Steve, what's his face, the guy that ran McCain's campaign?
Steve, what's the ball guy?
If he comes in, Steve Schmidt, if he comes in and tells you, you know what, you're never going to get another dime if you don't do right.
What are they going to do?
These are the people they trust.
Let's take a break.
I must take an obscene profit time.
Don't go away, folks.
By the way, let me tell you something else, folks.
As a conservative, I have not changed my mind on conservatism's appeal.
And if the Republican Party wanted access to this brand new population because they wanted to go full bore conservative to them, that'd be another thing.
But there's no evidence the Republican Party is interested in conservatism, at least not as I am.
I want the best for everybody.
I want the best country we can have.
I want everybody doing well.
I want everybody attempting to acquire wealth.
To do that, we're going to have to reform the tax code.
The income tax is the number one obstacle to the creation of wealth in this country by design.
Earning a wage, earning income is not a pathway to wealth in this country anymore.
And that's markedly different.
It's a crying shame.
I believe, never have changed my mind.
I believe conservatism sells every time it's properly explained.
I believe conservatism is attractive to everybody who hears it.
This college student had called and told about how he explained me to his class 100% reversal rate once they were properly exposed by him to who I am and what I believe.
But if we're going to grant amnesty to whatever this number is, let's go with the number they're using, 11 million.
And if nothing else changes, those 11 million are going to stay poor.
They're going to stay dependent.
What good is that for them?
And they're not going to be approached with a conservative message.
I think that we can get, I think conservatism, a conservative Republican Party could get a majority of practically every demographic group, but not if they are going to be remaining poor,
not if they remain dependent on the government, because what we stand for is too big a risk for people who are already okay depending on Santa Claus.
Freedom is a hard sell to some people.
Hard work is an even harder sell to some people.
The virtues of both haven't changed.
Conservatism as a virtue is triumphant over anything it's up against.
And I'm not afraid of 11 or 12 million people arriving in this country.
When I hear Senator Graham say or Senator McCain say, well, we need access to them.
Yeah, but you're not going to.
How are you going to approach them?
Is your message going to be, we don't hate you like they've told you?
We don't look what we did.
We supported amnesty.
We supported immigration.
We're perfectly fine with you being here.
The Democrats own those people by 70, 80%.
If they're not approached with an alternative message, if they're approached with just a copycat message or a message that says, hey, we like you too, then there isn't going to be any transformation.
So I'm not, I mean, I love immigration when one of its major features is assimilation.
But this is being done, Senator Graham just explained here.
There are people who are in favor of this either for financial reasons or because, and this is especially the case of Democrats, how they're going to vote.
Democrats need a permanent underclass.
And it's still a fact of life.
Americans in this country, it's still the case.
Americans in this country still have upward mobility.
Some Americans, not all, a smaller number, but some Americans still do advance economically.
And they advance upward out of the reach, in many cases, of the Democrat Party.
Those people have to be replaced.
Hello, amnesty.
I think, like anything else, liberalism, this kind of amnesty, is damaging to these people.
It is not helpful.
It is they're going to end up being just like every other so-called beneficiary of liberalism.
They're going to be suffering.
They're going to be economically dependent.
They're going to be poor.
Their families are going to be busted up.
All of this is going to happen unless there is a change, a demonstrable change in the overarching way these people are appealed to.
Okay, Nelly in Aurora, Illinois.
Great to have you here on the EIB Network.
Hello.
Hello.
I was listening to you last week, and I wanted to tell you, you are correct.
There's a lot of Hispanics, a lot of them, that are against amnesty.
I myself have lost three jobs due to that fact.
They'd rather have two illegals instead of me, which I am an American citizen.
And I'm glad the black people are starting to speak up to.
During that time, they do not want black people working there.
They'd rather have illegals working.
Nelly, hang on.
I need to catch up.
What did I say last week that you're agreeing with me about?
There's a lot of people that are Hispanic that are against amnesty because it's going to bring so many people.
We cannot find jobs right now.
Low-income jobs.
The most I have made, I worked myself up.
Well, that's one of the purposes.
I hate, you know, folks, I really, sometimes the truth is really not comfortable.
But low-wage labor is one of the reasons that this issue has supporters.
It's one of the purposes.
It is not, let's say, I was making $17 an hour.
They'd rather have two persons doing my job, not giving any paying Social Security.
Well, no, they have to pay that, but you're talking about other benefits.
They're downsizing you with two people who are part-time, so they don't have to pay anybody benefits.
Exactly.
Exactly.
And it's happening to the black people I have worked with.
I have friends that they find ways for them to get them out of the job so they could slid in some more.
Doesn't matter.
Those people are going to be supporting Obama and the Democrats no matter what.
That isn't going to change.
It's sad that it's happening, but it isn't going to change the way they vote.
But we don't like it when they say all of us Hispanic want amnesty.
That is true.
You're Hispanic?
Yes, I am.
Oh, you are?
Okay.
And I'm black, too.
Well, do you hate the Republicans?
I'm independent.
I listen to the Republican.
Do you think the Republicans are a bunch of mean people because they don't want amnesty or they're not for immigration?
No, no.
I think people don't understand.
They do not know what's going on.
They do not listen.
They do not read.
They have blinders on.
True.
And a lot of things are going to come down now.
Obamacare, this.
Where are they going to get the money?
How many more people are going to be on welfare?
How many people do I see that I have to pay for my groceries?
I know.
And everybody has some card to buy food with.
Look, I'm an employer.
I'll tell you, when people get a load of what is going to happen to their paychecks, when next year, when Obamacare fully kicks in and all these other things, it's going to be a shock to people.
And even then, when that happens, the stories are already written to blame Republicans for it.
You wait.
That'll be the PSPS.
If the Republicans hadn't opposed this for so long, I can't think of how they'll lie about it, but they will.
They'll find a way to blame the Republicans.
And when that happens, then the Republicans right now who are in two separate modes.
Whatever their big money people want, that's what they're going to support.
And if people hate them, they'll support anything they think will change that.
And look, I'm blue in the face.
I know how seductive it is, but I'm blue in the face.
I don't know how many times I have mentioned how destructive it is to be so concerned with what other people think of you.
But most everybody is.
That isn't going to change.
It's what drives the media, in fact.
But man, if I could wave a magic wand, I'd do a lot of things with it.
Then one of the things that I would do would be magically erase from people's emotions the fact that they care what other people think about them.
I know that'll never happen.
I know that people who don't care what other people think is going to remain an undiscoverable minority.
It matters to practically everybody all the time.
And it also matters to the Republicans.
They believe.
They believe that the Hispanics hate them.
They believe the Democrats have succeeded in making that happen.
They believe there's only one they can do to change that one thing, and that's support what the Democrats are in favor of.
Because they think that'll make people not hate them.
I've learned through practical experience that's not possible.
You can't behave in a way to change people that don't like you.
You can't say things in a way that'll change people that don't like you.
Because it's about them.
The people running around thinking the reason they're hated or disliked is because of them and something they're doing wrong.
That those people that hate them or don't like them, they must be right.
It's a facet of human nature that amazes me.
The idea that we grant other people, we think they're all together, we think they're all hip, they don't have any problems, they're cool, and if they think we're screwed up, they must be right.
It's just the way human nature is.
And then there's this desire to please people, to please other people.
Interpersonal relationships depend on it, and then it expands to practically everything.
But it just, it's giving away so much power.
It just took me a long time to literally not care.
And I'm thought of by many people as really odd in that regard.
And this constant quest for fame.
What is it?
Desire to have people love you.
That's what it is.
All these young kids vomiting everything they have about themselves want to be loved, want to be loved by everybody.
So caring about what other people think is, in some cases, it's the most important thing animating people's lives.
I'm just telling you, when it overtakes a political party and supplants their principles and ideological belief system and so forth, then you have problems.
Anyway, Nellie, I'm glad you called.
I appreciate it.
I must take another obscene profit timeout.
Don't go away, folks.
We'll be right back.
Okay, back to the audio soundbites.
Let's start with number 19.
Here's Senator Graham.
There were two soundbites of his that we have from ETH Press.
Here's the first one.
After this interview, I'm going to leave you on a positive note.
I think we're going to have a political breakthrough.
The Congress is going to pass immigration reform.
I think we're going to get plus 70 votes.
I've never been more optimistic about it, so it would be great if we could pass immigration.
Now, 70 votes in the Senate.
That bill, if it happens, goes to the House.
Now, there's been some confusion about what would happen in the House.
There's a thing in the House called a Hastrit rule, and that is a bill is not, it's not, it's historically called the Hastrat rule.
It's not something that's actually literally codified, but it's what everybody knows it to be.
And it basically says that his former speaker, that a bill will not be brought to the floor of the House unless the whip count is such that there's a majority of Republican support for it.
Now, one of the original thoughts was that Boehner would bring the bill to the floor of the House before it was known or even without majority Republican support.
Supposedly, that's not going to be the case.
Supposedly, Boehner is going to invoke the Hastrat rule here.
So it all boils down to what happens in the House.
And of course, you know the theory.
Passes the Senate, goes to the House where the House has their own bill that looks really, really good.
And then those two bills go to conference committee where they get negotiated.
Two different bills have to become one.
And the theory is that the fix is in in the House, and the Senate bill will basically be the version of the bill the House agrees to in conference, so that the one bill the House ultimately and the Senate ultimately vote on will be the conference bill that will be pretty much like the Senate bill, and therefore it passes.
So goes the theory, because there are a number of Republicans who have already signaled, Congressman Ryan among them, that he's in favor of Senate bill or something like it.
Still a theory.
Nobody knows for sure, but it is one of the things being bandied about in terms of alerting people.
The purpose there is so those people will exert pressure on the House.
Make sure that doesn't happen.
The other theory is that the bill is designed to die in the House and provide the Democrats with a campaign issue going into 2014.
Now, here is, again, this is Senator Graham.
This is the sound bite that generated a call earlier today.
If we don't pass immigration reform, if we don't get it off the table in a reasonable, practical way, it doesn't matter who you run in 2016.
We're in a demographic death spiral as a party, and the only way we can get back in good graces with the Hispanic community, in my view, is pass comprehensive immigration reform.
If you don't do that, it really doesn't matter who we run, in my view.
Now, the Hispanic percentage of the vote in 2012 was a little over 8%.
Do you know where the increase in Obama turnout was?
This will shock you if you don't know this.
Obama's vote totals were down from 2008 to 2012, but there was one demographic that was way up.
And you know what it was?
Elderly black women.
And elderly black women pushed the percentage of the black vote Obama got even higher than it was in 2008.
And people thought that was impossible.
But it happened.
Obama got a greater percentage of the black vote because of elderly black women in 2012 than he did in 2008.
So using the Graham theory here, we need to also offer amnesty to elderly black women or offer them something because they don't like us either.
Well, no, seriously, we're going through all of this for 8% of the electorate.
Ought to tell you just how big a role money is actually playing in this and not electoral politics.
Senator Rubio on ABC's This Week was interviewed by Jonathan Carl, who said, Are you being played by the Democrats senator?
Chuck Schumer is playing you, is essentially the charge.
I don't, quite frankly, I don't even know what that means because the fact of the matter is using you to try to accomplish something that Democrats want and is not a conservative bill.
Immigration reform is something that all Americans recognize has to be done.
I mean, I don't focus a lot on public polling, but if you look at these public polls, it's clear the vast majority of Americans understand that what we have in place in this country is de facto amnesty, a broken legal immigration system that needs to be reformed.
So Senator Rubio insisted that he wasn't being played by Senator Schumer.
But we learned early today, actually over the weekend, a New Yorker story by Ryan Lizza that Obama's running the gang of aid bill, not Schumer.
That's, ladies and gentlemen, if you missed the first hour of the program, the big story in immigration today is that the immigration bill is being run out of the White House.
Just like the IRS scandal was not localized in Cincinnati, the IRS targeting of Tea Party groups was taking place at headquarters in Washington.
And there is nobody that's going to convince me that Obama was not involved.
I don't expect to ever find a memo proving his involvement, but there doesn't need to be one.
Everybody working for him knows exactly what he wants.
Everybody working for him is there because they know what he wants and they don't have to be told.
IRS, FDA, EPA, Attorney General, DOJ, Department of Agriculture, you name it.
They're all Obama's in these places.
But nobody thinks Obama's gotten involved in the gang of aid bill at all because of the limbaugh theorem.
There's a steadfast procedure and policy of Obama.
Hands on nothing.
Fingerprints on nothing.
Here's Senator Menendez.
I mentioned this earlier.
He was on State of the Union on CNN on Sunday.
I would tell my Republican colleagues, both in the House and the Senate, that the road to the White House comes through a road with a pathway to legalization.
Without it, there'll never be a road to the White House for the Republican Party.
So you think without passage, you can't elect a Republican president.
I'm convinced that the last election had a demographic shift in the nation.
Now, here again is where I get to illustrate my utter naivete.
But I don't understand why the Democrat Senator Menendez wants us to win the White House.
Can somebody out there explain to me why Senator Menendez wants the Republican Party to have a pathway to the White House?
I'm looking for a pathway to the shadows.
He says that the Republicans are never, ever going to win the presidency again unless they agree with the Democrats on this immigration bill.
Why does he want Republicans to win the White House?
A Democrat.
That I don't understand.
There was no demographic shift either.
And folks, there was not a demographic shift in this nation after the election involving Hispanics.
I believe their turnout was even down from what it was in 2008.
So this is all a myth, this demographic shift.
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