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July 18, 2013 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:31
July 18, 2013, Thursday, Hour #1
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Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 24-7 podcast.
And greetings to you, music lovers, thrill seekers, conversationalists all across the fruited plane.
Rush Limboy, your guiding light, and I think I'm becoming a psychologist in explaining the Republican Party.
It's the only way you can explain them.
It's psychological.
And so I will endeavor to try that today.
But that's a lost cause.
I mean, even if you get it right, you explain it right, then what?
They think I'm the problem.
The New York Times has a story today.
The New York Times has a fascinating story.
The media, if I didn't know better, there's a story by Thomas B. Edsel, who used to be at the Washington Post.
This is the guy who wrote the piece in November of 2011 explaining how the Obama campaign was going to give up on the white middle-class vote.
I think he's at the Huffing and Puffington Poster.
Maybe he left there and is now at the New York Times.
I can't keep track of these people.
He was revolving door with all these different liberal institutions.
But he got a piece today quoting Republican after Republican after Republican saying, boy, they'd be winning everything if it weren't for talk radio.
The Republicans would be winning everything, including the White House.
And Snerdley, my first book, is even quoted.
This story claims that the way things ought to be was the beginning of the end of the Republican Party winning the White House.
I, folks, kid you not, this book quotes some Republicans saying that.
I've got it here in the stack.
I wasn't going to talk about this right now.
This is how this show happens.
I've got it buried somewhere down in the stack here.
So I get, no, no, they're going on the record.
They're named.
I mean, I'm only mentioned once.
No, twice.
I'm mentioned twice by name and then the book.
But talk radio in general is mentioned throughout.
And traditional conservatism is mentioned throughout as the problem.
With the Republican.
It's nothing I haven't warned you about.
This is what I say.
It's not surprising.
I told everybody this has been coming.
This is not even the first such story.
Thomas B. Edsel.
Snerdley now is hustling to the computer and Googling it because he is rightfully outraged and is trying to find it.
Anyway, I'll get to it in due course.
Folks, I am off tomorrow.
It's that time of year annual member guest golf tour.
Oh, and you know what else is happening this weekend?
I probably am going to embarrass them by doing this, but and I am so unhappy I can't be there, but I have this commitment every year to play in this member guest golf tournament.
My cousin Steve, Steve Jr. and his beautiful wife Marcia are celebrating their 40th anniversary this weekend.
And they've got this big, big family to do with it.
And I just, I was sick when I had to write the decline email.
But that commitment is a commitment.
So They're breaking out the finest of the food and the silverware you use once every 10 years and the plates you use once every 10 years and that stuff.
And they're just going full bore.
So I wanted to wish them.
They are the parents of Stephen III, who's video playing the piano with the Star Spangled Banner with the Bush bobblehead doll I told you about three weeks ago.
And their other son, Chris, is the prosecuting attorney in Cape Girardeau.
Can you not find it, Snerdley?
Oh, he's out right.
He's reading it.
I thought he was mad because he couldn't find it.
You found a Thomas B. Ed Sol.
So you see, these people are going on their record.
I guess I better find the damn thing now.
I'm not trying to.
Jeez.
I'm not trying to tease you with it, folks.
But I had all this light-hearted stuff at the front.
Like, here, study, unattractive people are targets for cruelty at work.
Once again, one of the undeniable truths of life.
The New York Mets have a pitcher by the name of Matt Harvey.
And apparently, he's a Don Juan.
He's a swordsman and knows it.
And he gave an interview to men's journal.
And some of the things this guy said, just he's got this gorgeous model blonde, 45-inch legs, 5'11, 5'12, whatever, model girlfriend.
And he's out talking about all the girls he wants to meet and how he wants to do it and how he wants to do it in private and how he wants to pull it off like Derek Jeter has.
And how he wants to date celebrities and he wants to date actresses.
And what Jeter did, yeah, that's what I'm after.
And then they put a picture of his girlfriend.
You say, what in the name of Sam Hill is this guy thinking?
I mean, even if he, it's not just what is he thinking.
Why say this?
Anyway, maybe time for some advice to Matt Harvey.
I mean, he's the next New York stud, 24, 25, got it all.
Good looks.
Starting pitcher hero status, all that sort of stuff.
Another little light-hearted thing here: the secret to higher earnings for women.
This is from the UK Daily Mail.
No, marry a poor man.
Now, you thought the secret to high earnings for women was to be ugly?
No, it is no, no.
It's marry a poor man, how your pick of partner affects your paycheck.
So I've got that.
Bloomberg is coming out against escalators.
Mayor Doomberg is trying to shut down escalators so people will walk up the stairs in order to be healthier.
First, he came after the cigarettes, then the trans fats, then the supersized drinks and the salt.
And now Boomberg is at, oh, it's elevators.
Elevators and escalators.
You know, I have a story here.
I didn't get to this.
Another one of these medical stories.
And let me summarize this for you.
It's about water and the brain.
You ever had a brain freeze?
You ever had writer's block?
You ever just, your brain just stops and you're confused and you forget what you were going to say?
They say this latest medical mumbo jumbo says that is because of brain dehydration.
They say that when you have brain lock, brain freeze, drink a glass of water.
The absolute best brain food there is is water because the brain needs to be hydrated.
And get this stat.
You know, all of the health experts say you got to get out there and you got to work up a good sweat.
This story says that 90 minutes of sweating is the worst thing that can happen to the brain.
That 90 minutes of sweating, as in a workout or what have you, does just terrible damage to the brain.
It shrinks it.
Dehydration brought on by perspiration actually destroys brain cells, much like they say that alcohol does.
The story says, however, to reverse this, drink some water, rehydrate the brain, even a cocktail or a beer now.
And it can be a great way to unlock your brain when it seems to have stopped working in the think or thought process area.
So I've got that.
I'll get to that.
Here's this: it prints out to like four pages this New York Times story by Thomas B. Edsall.
And I've got to, you know what?
I need to do a housekeeping thing for 2F by T.
I need to do that.
Oh, the reason I was telling you, I'm not going to be here tomorrow.
We're going to do Open Line Friday on Thursday today, Mr. Snerdley.
So whatever you want to talk about on the phones today, pretend it's Friday.
And if I don't care about it, it doesn't matter.
Usually, that is one of the primary requirements.
I have to be interested in what you're going to talk about or you don't get on.
But we'll broom that today.
Has the GOP gone off the deep end?
I'll tell you what, just the thing about this, and not just this story, because there are many like this.
The Republican part, we've got gay bashing going on.
We have race bashing.
And right in there in the mix is conservative bashing.
Here's the thing, though.
We conservatives don't control anything.
Nothing happening in this country is because conservatives are in charge.
This country is in a state of decline, a state of decay.
This country is rotting from the inside out.
And we don't have any say.
We don't control anything.
Conservatives don't control anything in government.
Zero.
Conservatives don't even have any hold on the GOP.
The Republican leadership is not conservative.
We don't have any say-so over the Republican Party system.
And yet everything's our fault.
Their inability to win, their inability to get along with people, their inability to be liked by Hispanics, their inability to be liked by blacks, their inability to be liked by gays.
It's our fault, folks.
That's what this New York Times piece essentially says.
Even though we conservatives don't do anything, we don't have any power.
We don't control anything.
Nothing that is happening in this government is happening because of us.
And yet we're being blamed.
This is just the latest piece, and it may be one of the most pointed, but we, all of us, you and I, all of us conservatives, we are being blamed.
And in this piece, I And talk radio specifically are being blamed for the plight of the Republican Party.
As though the Republican Party and what it's doing has no effect on how it is perceived.
The Republican Party's actions apparently have nothing to do with the Republican Party's political status right now.
The status of its political forge.
It's the most amazing thing.
We don't control anything.
We barely have a voice in the Republican Party.
We have a couple senators, we have a couple members of the House, and that's it.
And yet, this is all our fault.
And it started with me and this show and my book, The Way Things Ought to Be, and then Talk Radio.
Fox News is not mentioned in this story.
I don't think this is just a bunch of Republicans named, by the way, dumping on conservatives and talk radio and me.
But folks, how in the world is it our fault what's happening to the Republican Party?
Well, let's explore one of the theories in this piece.
They say that talk radio and conservative opposition to amnesty has provided or given an image of the Republican Party that's caused people not to like Republicans.
But we don't control any the Republicans are in office.
The Republicans are the ones that have the political power, but somehow they escape any accountability.
It's almost like there's a limbaugh theorem that attaches to them, just as there is Obama.
It really is intellectually, it's the most amazing thing.
I don't have the power to do anything.
I can't raise anybody's taxes.
I can't approve amnesty.
I can't stop amnesty.
And nobody on talk radio can.
And there isn't anybody in the conservative movement who can.
And yet it's us who are responsible for the poor image Republicans have.
They have nothing to do with it themselves.
Their own actions are irrelevant.
The Republicans are perceived as a really bunch of nice guys, but talk radio is making people doubt them.
The Republicans are perceived as a, you know, a bunch of people who really want to compromise, really want to get along with people.
They really want to make deals.
They really want to be bipartisan, but they can't.
The Republicans can't because of me and my first book and talk radio.
It's the most, I mean, that's why I say this is psychological.
Here you have the people in politics and the Republican with the power.
I mean, John Boehner, Speaker of the House, the Republicans run the House of Representatives somehow.
They're not able to really do what they want to do because of me or because of you or because of talk radio.
But we don't control anything in government.
We don't have one say-so about anything.
I mean, literally, zero, folks.
We don't control anything.
We haven't been elected to anything.
We don't have any power whatsoever.
And yet, look, Obama somehow is not held accountable for what he does.
That's our fault.
The Republicans are not held accountable for what they do.
That is also our fault.
George Zimmerman wasn't held accountable for what he did.
That is our fault.
If I didn't know better reading this piece, I would think the media wants Republicans to win the White House.
There's just one problem: me.
If I didn't know better, I would say the media and the Democrat Party really do want the Republicans to come back.
They really want the Republicans to start winning things.
But damn it as talk radio.
I wasn't going to mention this yet.
I got to take a break now.
Sit tight.
You read the piece?
Enough of it?
Okay.
So, I mean, I'm telling you, have I interpreted it correctly for all right?
Way back.
Don't go away.
So this explains why the left is always trying to drive me and other conservative talk radio hosts and other conservatives off the air.
They're trying to save the GOP.
Ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you what this means.
I've told you over and over again that the left, and I'm now going to expand that to say Washington.
Washington will always tell us what they fear.
That was why they set out to destroy Sarah Palin.
They fear you.
They fear conservatives.
Conservatives are the monkey wrench.
You all are the only thing standing in the way of Washington transforming this country into something it was not founded to be.
And this story in the New York Times has multiple purposes.
It tells us who they fear, and it also illustrates who they're going to try to destroy and who they have been trying to destroy.
We even have people in the Republican Party who profess to be conservatives.
But they're not.
They profess to be.
They're constantly urging caution and reason and restraint and things.
And while doing that, they claim to be objecting to the same things we do.
They claim not to like Obamacare.
They claim not to really like amnesty immigration reform.
But their solutions are to trash us, to trash conservatives and propose ineffective, minimalistic policies that end up involving more government.
Anyway, I'll give you some of the actual data from this piece.
And I do have to do a housekeeping thing on a little special that we got going at 2FIT.
So I'll do that when we get back.
So go away.
All right, here you go.
Thomas B. Edsall, the writer of the New York Times piece, discussing today.
Thomas Edsall, currently the Joseph Pulitzer and Edith Pulitzer Moore Professorship in Public Affairs Journalism at Columbia University, writes a weekly column for the New York Times online edition.
So what do we have here?
Have a journalism professor at the nation's foremost J school practically calling for the silencing of opposing opinions.
The silencing of talk radio.
You know, these guys, they love Europe.
They want to be just like Europe.
You know, there's no talk radio in Europe.
That's why I think Europe is bliss.
Now, a little housekeeping thing.
We had, it probably was my fault, although it really wasn't.
I had a little bit, just a tiny little misunderstanding yesterday at 2fbit.com.
I announced toward the end of the program, we're running a special.
I love these Turvis tumblers, the 12-ounce Turvis tumblers that are just ideal.
They are perfect for summertime consumption of beverages, particularly those in which you're going to include ice, because they're insulated, yet they still hold a lot.
They're insulated.
The ice doesn't melt nearly as fast, and the glass doesn't get all sweaty and drip on you.
That is a big deal to me.
And we have logoed this thing up, and we've patented the hell out of it.
We have the 2F by T Rush Revere icon on one side, and in a picture of me, the Revered Rush on the other.
So here's the deal.
You go to 2FBT.com, you buy two of these tumblers, and we're throwing in a case of tea free, whatever flavor you want, as long as you use the offer code.
The offer code is Tumblr2013.
But we had some problems.
People thought that when they bought the Tumblr, that the tea would automatically show up in the checkout cart.
It doesn't.
The way it works is you pick out the case of tea that you want, as though you're going to buy it.
You go to our website, 2fbytea.com, you find the case of tea that you want, and then you buy the two tumblers, and then you have that in the shopping cart, and then you apply the promo code, Tumblr2013.
And the application of promo code then renders the tea at no cost in the shopping cart.
I made it sound yesterday.
I will accept full blame for this.
I made it sound as though the tea would automatically show up as El Fribo.
And it was fast.
One of our customer service people got an email from a guy who used to run security at the AT ⁇ T Pro-Am out at Pebble Beach.
And I recognized his name.
They sent the email on to me.
And this guy had run security for eight years.
And he mentioned Stalin, my security chief.
And he told the customer service representative, I was a great guy because he had seen me interact with the public at this tournament.
It was a great guy.
He'd been there for eight years.
And he was a new customer and so forth.
So we got him straightened out.
And I just wanted to pass the story along because it's a great story.
So you have to select the tea.
The case of tea is free when you buy the two tumblers, but you've got to select the case tea and put it in the shopping cart.
And then when you apply the offer code, then the tea price is zeroed out and you're just buying the tumblers.
And the offer code Tumblr2013, it's lowercase, no spaces.
Tumblr2013.
TwofbyTea.com.
Sorry for any confusion.
I can understand when I explained it yesterday.
Thought that the team would just be thrown in, but you got to select the kind you want.
We don't know that you have to select the kind of flavor.
Okay, here's the story.
Thomas B. Edsel in the New York Times headline, Has the GOP gone off the deep end?
Starts this way.
Thomas Doherty, a patronage czar and political enforcer for former New York Governor George Pataki, reached the breaking point last week when he read that House Republicans were preparing to slow walk the Senate immigration bill to death.
Thomas Doherty turned to Twitter where he said, if Senate immigration bill gets ripped apart and ultimately defeated by House GOP, I've decided to leave my political home of 32 years.
Sad.
So here's a guy, supposedly a patronage czar and an enforcer for Pataki, former governor of New York, all upset that the Republicans might not cave and go ahead and support the Senate.
The Senate amnesty bill is a disaster.
Even Rubio is trying to walk back from it.
The Senate amnesty bill is utterly unworkable.
It's another instance of Obamacare.
And this guy said he reached the breaking point last week when he read that House Republicans were preparing to slow walk the Senate immigration to bill to death.
If that bill gets ripped apart and ultimately defeated by the House, I'm going to leave the party.
And then Doherty talked to the writer, Thomas B. Edsel, said, came to the conclusion my party has elements within it that dislike homosexuals and think America is still in the 1940s.
Now, while we talk about freedom and liberty, that liberty and freedom only seem to be acceptable for some.
So Thomas Doherty tells this writer for the New York Times that not only is he mad that the House may not take up the Senate amnesty bill, which is a disaster, he then has to say he's ticked off because he's come to conclusion that his party has elements within it that dislike gays and elements in it that think this country is still in the 40s.
They talk about freedom and liberty, but it's only for some.
And this guy is portrayed as a mainstream Republican who wants the Democrats to get whatever they want.
Thomas Doherty apparently wants the Democrats to get whatever they want and then blames a bunch of people that don't have any power whatsoever.
Folks, you and I, I mean, what can you do?
You can call Washington, and that's about it.
But in terms of real power, you and I don't have any real power over this over anything.
We have none.
We don't have any hold on the GOP.
We control nothing in government.
Zero.
And we're getting blamed for this.
This goes on.
It says here that Thomas Doherty, no liberal, Thomas Doherty, no liberal is he, is representative of the growing strength on the right of the view that the Republican Party has gone off the deep end.
So this guy, Doherty, who wants the Democrats to get their amnesty bill, who wants the Democrats to get their gay marriage, wants to agree with the Democrats on everything, is said to be a representative of the growing strength on the right.
He's not on the right.
These guys are all caving to the Democrats.
They are all.
This is psychological.
I am convinced this is a psychological issue.
They are standing by and watching decline.
They are observing this decline and do nothing about it except try to help the left move their agenda.
And you and I are the problem.
Then Doherty said, no, I'm sorry, new guy now, Tom Korologos, premier Republican lobbyist, ambassador to Belgium under George W. Bush, said in a phone interview, their rigidity is killing them.
It's either holy purity or you are an anathema.
Too many ideologues have come in.
You don't win by what they're doing.
And there it is.
Too many ideologues.
This guy, Tom Korologos, has let the cat out of the bag.
The Republican Party has too many ideologues, i.e., too many conservatives.
There aren't enough just plain old average run-of-the-mill Republican losers anymore.
There are too many ideologues.
And who's responsible for that?
Well, as you read the story, you find out I am.
My book and me are responsible.
And I'm going to, I have said, and I still say it, I stand by it, and I believe it from the bottom of my heart.
The liberals are the biggest, most partisan ideologues in this country.
I don't care if you go to Los Angeles, New York, or Washington, the most partisan, angry, miserable, unhappy ideologues are the Democrats.
And everything they do is ideological.
And here is a premier Republican lobbyist who doesn't get it, who thinks that Republican ideology is the problem in Washington.
We've got to get rid of and clear the decks of Republican ideology, which would just pave the road for the Democrat ideologues.
Does anybody in here really believe it?
Democrats are not ideologues.
That is all they are.
Everything to the Democrats is political.
I'm telling you, folks, this is a psychological issue.
These people, calling themselves Republicans, are in the process of caving to the left or caving to the ruling class, caving to whatever.
They're caving to something that is not Republicanism and it is not conservatism.
The next paragraph from Thomas B. Ensel: a number of prominent figures in the Republican Party share this harsh view of Tom Korologos.
Jeb Bush warned last year that both Ronaldus Magnus and his own father would have a hard time fitting into the contemporary Republican Party, which he described as dominated by an orthodoxy that doesn't allow for disagreement.
What in the name of Sam Hill are these people talking about?
Ronald Reagan fought these people.
These people defeated Ronald Reagan in 1776, and he didn't go away.
He came back and beat them in 1980.
Reagan fought these people.
Goldwater before him fought these people.
Bill Buckley fought them.
These people don't have any real agenda.
They don't have any real vision.
They've abandoned limited government, constitutional, limited government, just as the left has.
But worse, they pretend that they haven't.
They pretend that they still believe in limited government.
They still pretend they believe in limited constitutional government.
But I'll tell you, the contempt that all of these people who are named have for conservatives and conservatism is abundant and apparent throughout.
A few months ago, Bush, Jeb Bush, expected to run for his party nomination in 2016, took it up a notch.
And they quote him at the CPAC convention in March.
I don't have time to get into that.
Let me take a break.
They next quote Dole.
I'll continue with this, but I have to break for our next obscene prophet.
I know.
Don't go away.
I went back, ladies and gentlemen, back in 2009.
That would be four years ago, almost four years ago, in November 2009, Thomas B. Edsall wrote a story with the headline, the Intolerance Party.
GOP strategists worry ideologues are bad for the party's future.
2009.
First year of the Obama regime.
And he's back.
He's got it again.
He just recycles the story.
And in that 2009 story, Mr. Snirdley, he blames me as well.
This professor of journalism at Columbia, who's writing articles suggesting that all opposition to liberalism be silenced.
2009 has a piece.
He's been saying the same crap for four years now, probably even longer than that.
So what happens?
It's time for the four-year revision.
So he goes out and he finds a new bunch of Republicans to talk to.
He probably calls them up, says, hey, I've got this premise.
And you guys are really cool, but it's guys like Limbaugh and conservatives that are holding you back.
And they're more than eager.
I mean, I don't want to take Thomas B. Edsel out of the equation.
This is his premise.
The fact that he's found Republicans to go along with it is its own story, but it's his premise.
And he's had this story, again, almost word for word in the expression of the principle of it, the main contention, four years ago.
And again, blaming me.
From the 2009 article, the dangers facing elected Republicans who share the views of the strategists, Republican consultants, are reflected in the firestorm that hit Georgia Republican Congressman Phil Gingery when he had the temerity to confront Limbaugh.
So Thomas B. Edsall is livid at these Republicans who criticize me, then they hear about it from you, and in a cave and apologize to me.
That just really ticks him off.
It just really makes him mad.
But he's quoted in this story that's out today, Bob Dole, Bill Crystal, Paul Krugman, Norman Ornstein, Thomas Mann, Ed Rogers,
formerly the chairman of the formerly named Barber Griffith and Rogers Group, former aide to Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, John Feary, Pete Wayner, Bill McInturf.
He's got one voice in here who disagrees with the premise, and that is Bill McInturf, who's a pollster.
He's the founder of Public Opinion Strategies.
And McInturf disputes the premise, but he's the only voice that Edsel found.
Again, folks, it's his premise.
It's the New York Times writer's premise, the J. School professor at Columbia.
But he's found plenty of Republicans happy to agree with him, happy to amplify what he believes.
And I just have to remind you again, you and I don't control anything in government.
Zero.
We have no hold on the Republican Party.
The Republican leadership, the party system, we can't do it, but we are the impediment.
We're the thing standing in the way of the Republicans being loved.
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