All Episodes
Previous Next
Aug. 26, 2013 - Rush Limbaugh Program
37:43
August 26, 2013, Monday, Hour #2
| Copy link to current segment

Time Text
You know, speaking of the civil rights coalitions and the Martin Luther King 50th anniversary speech on a steps in a Lincoln Memorial on Wednesday.
It's not just Obama who is going to be making a speech.
You know who else is going to make a speech and who isn't?
Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton.
Both of them, Carter and Clinton both are products of the Jim Crow South.
Bill Clinton's mentor and one of his early idols was an Arkansas senator by the name of J. William Fulbright, who was a segregationist.
Not one Republican is speaking.
At the Martin Luther King 50th anniversary, whatever they're calling it, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
Great to have you back, folks.
Rush Limbaugh, the EIB network of the Limbaugh Institute, the telephone number if you want to be on the program, 800-282-2882.
Look, I assume some things are understood, but maybe not.
I do not do not add meaning where I'm not stating any.
Just because the you know, some some of the like this Hill.com story that says a number of black lawmakers are not happy with Obama because of the he's not down for the struggle.
And then I've been told privately, folks, that there's a there's a lot of unhappiness, but doesn't mean that they're gonna turn on him.
It's the exact opposite.
They're all afraid to.
Everybody's afraid to go against the regime.
Both parties.
Republicans are afraid to go against Obama en masse.
I mean, there's three or four of them who aren't, but that's about it.
But it's the same thing in the Democrat Party.
I'm just telling you what I've been told privately.
I'm telling you what's actually there.
But I'm not saying when I point that out that the civil rights coalition is going to end up supporting Republicans or abandoning Obama.
That is that's not my point.
But it is true to say what I have been told privately, that not every Democrat is on board 100% with what's happening.
And not every Democrat feels invincible, and not every Democrat thinks they're gonna win every election from here on out.
And not every Democrat thinks that what's happening is for the best in this country.
A number of them have told me privately that you know, some of them know that if you're gonna tax the hell out of people, they have to be earning some money.
If you're gonna tax the hell out of people, you're gonna have to have people at work.
And we don't.
They're somewhat concerned about the debt, too.
It's not very many, folks, but I'm just telling you it that it would be helpful to keep in mind, as you go through the political day here, that I mean, this doesn't change the so-called Republican branding, and it doesn't mean Democrats are going to abandon Obama, but it does mean that the the well, it can mean if uh if cards are played right.
These you have a party winning elections that doesn't trust the voters.
I'm telling you, there are ways to get them.
They are vulnerable.
And I think one of the things that would be helpful, and I don't see any signs of this either, is if the Republican Party would stop this silly attempt to be like the Democrats and start representing the opposition.
You'd be amazed at what would happen if you had a Republican Party, an active Republican Party establishment that was representing the people that elected them, that was that was attempting to stop this and accomplish something else.
You'd see a lot different attitude in this country.
One of the reasons for the melees and the this fog of depression that we've been talking about is the fact that there isn't any opposition.
Real opposition.
Not even on the field.
That's right, there's not i in in the in the realm of yeah, there's all kinds of opposition here.
There's opposition on the blogs, there's opposition uh uh in in books and in Fox News, but there isn't any political opposition.
And so all of the opposition is essentially leaderless.
We're not in the political game.
We're not about getting votes uh in in Congress, House or Senate, or or any of that.
And it's also frustrating.
A Democrat's appeal is all emotional.
As most appeals are.
Anyway, there are other things in the news if you're just joining us, the audio soundbite roster today.
17 of the 24 sound bites that we have, or 27 sound bites that we have, or about me.
And I mixed emotions about playing them all.
But my staff is urging me to do it.
What they want me to do is just play them.
Bam, bam, bam, thank you, ma'am, without any comment between them.
Just play them.
For the fun of it.
I can't.
I tried.
And I can't stop myself from commenting on these things as they go by.
Here's the next one.
If I don't play one now and then, we're never going to get through them all.
This is a continuation of Greta Van Susterin and Joe Trippy on Greta's show on Friday night.
Trippy has just said that he doesn't like Obama going after me.
That's not good.
Obama ought not be focusing on me.
He needs to be focusing on elected Republicans.
Trippy says, let me.
People like me focus on Limbaugh.
Don't elevate Limbo.
They're just upset that Obama focusing on me elevates me.
And they don't like that because they're in the media now like I am.
And so there is a uh uh uh a professional competitiveness, in addition to political disagreement.
What?
What do you not understand about?
They are Trippy's in the media right.
Not a but he's in the media.
That's where he's earning his paycheck now.
And so his assessment until the next election, when he'll go back and he'll be a maybe not.
He wasn't a consultant in 2012.
He stayed on Fox.
But there is a um Scott was telling Levin, I sent Levin a note like that.
Mark Levin's book, the uh Liberty Amendments, is a is a great book with actual prescriptions that does nothing but take the directions offered in the Constitution on what to do constitutionally to repair damage such as that the country has faced and is facing now.
And a lot of the criticism of Lynn Levin's book is purposely wrong.
He's not calling for an overall brand new constitutional convention where anybody can go in there and rewrite the convention.
He's talking about a series of state conventions that we control.
It's all in the Fifth Amendment.
The book explains all this, but it's being purposely misrepresented by conservatives.
And I told him, I said, and this is, folks, it's it's sad to say, but one of the truths is there are two things.
One of the truths is that in the conservative media, there are some who look at Levin or mere as competitors, and they're not going to talk about his book.
And they're certainly not going to sign on to it, and they're not going to promote it, and they're not going to support the premise, because that, in their view, diminishes them.
So they'll ignore it or criticize it.
There's no unity in this conservative media business, folks, because everybody in it wants to be considered the smartest guy in the room.
In fact, there's there's a lot of competition in the conservative media, which, by the way, is normal and healthy, but it's also a factor.
And then there's a second thing that is happening here, and that is when you when you get to, as we just mentioned, Congress, House and Senate, you can count on two hands, the number of Republicans who actually want to do anything about this right now.
The others want their own version of Obamacare, their own version of Amnesty, their own version of the continuing resolution.
There isn't any opposition.
You can count on two, ten people probably, who are daily not afraid to Speak up about their opposition to what is happening.
And by that I mean Obama and Democrat policies.
So that's all I'm saying.
You know, when when when Trippy says Obama, don't mention Limbaugh, let me do that.
In addition to politics, there's a little media, competitive, competitive.
It's not so much because he's he's uh he's liberal, but he's in the media now.
And you know, I'm sure that these guys would love to have Obama mentioning their name.
That's all I'm saying.
It's no more than complicated than that.
Now here's and I don't mean to be calling anybody out, and it doesn't matter to me anyway, because things are what they are.
But this is the continuation of that conversation that Trippie was having with Greta about, you know, Obama mentioning me and whether or not that good, bad, indifferent makes sense or not.
He singles out in this instance uh Rush Limbaugh.
It makes him look like uh like Rush is really under his skin, and as I think Rush says it lives rent-free in his head.
I mean, it really does.
I mean, there's something very different about it than just saying, well, you know, there's a fight in the in the two parties.
I mean, it's something different about it.
No, you're right about that, and it does, it puts a light on Rush.
It actually makes Rush empowers him, makes him even bigger than than he might be.
I mean, if the President of the United States calling you out, that that's good for you.
So I don't again, I would have left that up to Democratic strategists and folks like me that are out there, and and they've got, you know, in and I don't really understand it.
I I agree with you.
I think it doesn't make any sense.
Doesn't make any sense.
Let me explain it to you.
Joe, let me explain it to you.
Back in December of 2008 or January of 2009, the Democrats did a poll.
And that poll showed that I am the most hated Republican in a poll of Republican names, elected and unelected.
And so Democrats, you know this as well as I do, Joe, everything is done by polling.
So if my name shows up, they'll use it.
So in the first you should go back and look this up, Joe.
First two weeks of Obama's administration as a leader of all the congressional people in Senate, House, Republican, Democrat, and he tells Boehner and these guys to stop listening to me.
That that's not how things get done in Washington.
And that's because of a poll that was there, or maybe he really believes it.
And ever since whenever they do a poll, my name must show up, and that's why my name is mentioned.
That's why these guys do it.
There's another reason.
They think that they have so this goes back to open line Friday question.
We had this guy asked ask me, how come with all of these assaults on you and all these attacks over 25 years?
How come you're still number one?
How have you withstood it?
Well, in their minds, they think that they have so successfully demonized me that calling me the leader of the Republican Party is a way to make sure that the low information voter never ever looks at the Republican Party in a positive light.
And this is what the Washington Post babe said was the reason Obama mentions my name.
I think it's much more involved in detail than that.
But there is some branding in it.
But the real reason is that they haven't been able to take me out, and they keep trying.
That's what is propelling it all.
They haven't been able to destroy the relationship that I have with you, the audience of this program.
And that befuddles them, and they keep trying.
So all of these reasons are uh uh applicable.
And this goes back a long time.
Let's go back 2004.
The Democrat primaries.
We have a montage of Howard Dean on the stump.
2004, Howard Dean attempting to get the Democrat presidential nomination.
We are taking our country back piece by piece from the Rush Limbaugh's.
You have the power to take back our country so that the flag no longer represents solely Rush Limbaugh.
You have the power to take back our country.
So that the flag never again is the sole property of Rush Limbaugh.
You have the power to take back our country, so that the flag of the United States is no longer the sole property of Rush Limbaugh.
This country does not belong to Rush Limbaugh.
Move over.
I want my country back again because the flag of this country does not belong to Rush Limbaugh.
You have the power to take back the flag, so it is no longer belongs solely with Rush Limbaugh.
It must have been somebody in his audiences with the American flag and the stars and stripes, except the stars must have been a picture of me.
Everywhere he looked and saw the American flag, Howard Dean saw me.
Candy Crowley.
CNN, this is Friday night situation room.
The fill-in host of Jessica Yellen, and it's time to promote Candy Crowley and her Sunday show, State of the Union.
And they're talking about Obama saying the Republicans are afraid of me.
That happened on Friday morning.
They were still talking about it Friday night.
Jessica Yellen said to Candy Crowley, does the President have a point in what he said to Chris Cuomo, which is Republicans are scared of some of their constituents?
Absolutely they are.
Well, they're scared of an uh challenge from the right.
There is, I'm not sure about the Rush Limbaugh part as much as.
We absolutely know that there are Tea Party challengers out there on the Senate side and the House side willing to go after these guys.
So Jessica Yellen then continued with her interview.
We've heard the president talk about what he doesn't like from, as you say Rush Limbaugh, Republicans in Congress.
What is his play?
What can he do to get something done in the budget fights in the fall?
It's always better if they can get him out of Washington in August, and he looks better on the road talking from the perspective of the American people about what they need than he does in Washington, talking about how he can't do anything.
And so I think this is going to be a campaign moment for the White House.
Right.
So I'm on their brain, in their brain, no matter where they go.
Here's Don Lemon, CNN again.
By the way, this does not include all the mentions at MSNBC who are still under a ban on this program.
I've got a ban on anything said on MSNBC ever appearing here.
Why give those people added audience?
Why amplify the literal insanity that happens on that network?
So they're banned, which of course forces us over to CNN if we're going to get sound bites from Democrats.
And here Don Lemon, the anchor, is speaking to New York won Road to City Hall host Errol Lewis about Obama, saying that Republicans agree with him but are afraid of me.
And this is how that went.
Do these people exist, these Republicans who secretly agree with the president but fear Rush Limbaugh?
Have you ever met any of the people who are not a man?
Oh, I'm sure they do.
Yeah, no, absolutely they do.
I mean, look, people go into the legislature because they like deal making and compromise, and they've probably done it all their life at the city council level or as county commissioners or in their state legislature.
They get to Congress into this incredibly polarized situation, and they can't make a move.
And party leadership is demanding that they take 40 worthless waste of time votes just to make a point.
And it's not really what a lot of people went into politics for.
Oh, absolutely the president's right about that.
Absolutely these Republicans fear Rush Limbaugh because Rush Limbaugh doesn't tolerate deal making and compromise.
And that's all these people want to do from the first day of dog catcher all up to town council and city hall.
That's all they do in politics.
Make deals, and they get to Washington.
That's why they want to go.
They want to make deals and they get there and they can't because of Rush Limbaugh.
So this is what these people really think.
I gotta take a break.
I just a break.
I just see the clock here, folks.
Um we're racing through these pretty quick now.
We might get all 17 in now that I do.
Here's an interesting statistic.
Ladies and gentlemen.
Matt Welchett Reason.com is citing some numbers here from Sunday's Washington Post.
And here it is in a nutshell.
The federal government today has about 4.1 million employees.
Now, as an aside, vast majority of them are union.
But four point one million employees is more than the populations of twenty four states.
This is back in 2010.
4.3 million employees, more than the population of 24 states.
Shocking, isn't it?
And you you could say, well, in that sense alone, we're outnumbered, because how do you think the vast majority of those people, federal employees, mostly union vote?
Here's Don in Miami.
Don, glad you uh call.
Great to have you on the EIB network.
Hello.
Yes, good afternoon, Rush.
Um told to get right to the point, so I will.
Um, you know, if the if President Obama is going to make statements and be critical of you, the least he could do is agree to uh schedule a debate directly with you rather than uh having a debate with you uh you know surrogately through the media.
So, President Obama, pick up the phone, call Rush, schedule a debate.
You can you could seem to have time to give Beyonce Leno show.
You must have time to debate Rush.
Why do it on the Leno show?
Why not right here?
No, I'm saying he got time to go do it there.
He should have time to do it with you.
Oh, I see.
Yeah, if he goes on, but he's not time to do all these other things.
Yeah, that's true.
That's true.
Okay.
And you know what?
You could agree that you just ask questions.
And he can just give the answers.
You know how much you can pick a person at back.
You know, that actually is not a uh uh a bad suggestion.
You're you could you could go far in a debate with any liberal just asking the right questions.
That is absolutely right.
Well, there's no way Obama would uh would do that because he's got no reason.
There's nothing to gain for him by doing that.
But I appreciate the thought.
Don, thanks much.
We will be back.
Meeting and surpassing all audience expectations every day, Rush Limbaugh, the Limbaugh Institute for advanced conservative studies.
Have you noticed something listening to these clips?
There is a there's something that every one of them has in common.
Every clip that we've played so far has been the media or a guest bouncing off of Obama mentioning me as the number one problem in this country.
When you boil it all down, that's what he's saying.
He's yeah, yeah, yeah, these Republicans, you know, they're afraid of limbaugh.
The reason they won't agree with me is because they're afraid of limbaugh.
In every one of these clips, and we have uh we've played eight of them now.
Not a word about Obama's policies and the destruction taking place in the country.
Not a word about what Obama has done to the Constitution.
Flouting it, ignoring it.
Not a word from these people in the media about what Obama's policies have done to the people.
No jobs, debt, housing values, not a word about Obama's unilateral actions, not a word about Obama's evisceration and destruction of the health care system.
Not a word about Obama and his policies relationship to high unemployment.
Nothing, not a single word.
Every sound bite excepts the Obama premise that the problem in America is me.
And if it weren't for me, if I weren't on the radio, that there would be all of this progress because the Republicans would have no one to be afraid of.
And then they could cave totally and agree with Obama.
So in all of these sound bites, a guy on the radio, the premise is that a guy on the radio is stopping the most powerful man in the world.
Damn it.
The media accepts that premise.
There is not one syllable that analyzes Obama's role in the state of this country.
They all agree something's wrong with the country, but they agree that it's me.
Thank you.
not Obama.
And I haven't done anything to the country.
I don't have any power to do anything.
I can't give money away to buy listeners.
I can't pay listeners off with phones or food stamps or anything.
I can't come by my audience by buying it.
I can't promise my audience anything and then give it to them.
I can't get an audience by telling the audience how rotten all the other hosts are, which I don't do anyway.
But Obama does all that.
Obama buys votes, he buys love, he buys affection, and then he goes out and he tells everybody how rotten other politicians are in the Republican Party.
I don't do any of that.
And I'm the problem.
As stated by the President of the United States, I'm the problem.
If I were just not here, if I just go away, or if the Republicans would grow a pair and no longer be afraid of me, why who knows what they could all get done together.
So these sound bites feature not one word of what the President of the United States has done.
Not one word about the policies of the President of the United States or his party.
Every one of these soundbites so far has just talked about how divided we all are, and how poor old Obama has got such great things he wants to do, but he can't because of me.
And because of me, conservatives won't roll over.
Even conservatives who aren't in government won't roll over.
Now, I personally find this fascinating.
Simply as a study.
I mean, this would be an excellent study for one of you scholars in waiting, wanting to do a research paper or a doctoral thesis.
We got 17 sound bites today, in every one of them.
I'm the problem.
In every one of them, if I would simply cease being here, if the Republicans would grow up here, then Obama's greatness could not be denied.
A guy on the radio from noon to three every day.
Not one word about Obama's policies and their effect and impact.
Not one word about what Obama's done in destroying the greatest healthcare system in the world, what Obama's doing to America's energy fortunes, what Obama has done to the debt circumstance, people's home values, student loans, the worthlessness of an education, none of that is discussed.
None of the real destruction taking place in this country and why is being discussed at all.
What's being discussed is why Obama can't get anything done.
And it's me.
Much of conservatives won't roll over and finally just play dead.
All because of me.
And compared to Obama, I don't have any power at all.
It's the most amazing thing, all I'm able to do here.
If you listen to the media, if you listen to Obama whine and complain, and you hear the media pick up his refrain, if you hear the media accept his premise, they then start whining and moaning about me.
And all the greatness that lurks out there, but isn't happening because of me.
Somebody who doesn't have, in a comparative sense, any real political power at all.
Sometimes I was telling Mr. Snerdley, I dream how big My audience could be if I could give away $38,000 to every American.
If I could give every American food, if I could give every American who doesn't have one a cell phone.
And by the way, if I were going to do that, it'd be iPhones, not that cheap stuff Obama gives away.
Think of the audience I can have.
Yeah.
Yeah, all I have to do is listen for a week.
That's all it would take me.
Just look at look at the size audience I would have.
And then if I had a media, if I had the whole media making my case for me and defending everything I'm doing.
And if I had the media destroying every other talk show host.
Wonder how big my audience would be.
Wonder how much power I would really have.
But I can't give anybody $38,000 a year like he can, or 50.
I can't give everybody a phone.
I cannot give everybody food stamps.
I cannot grant illegal aliens citizenship or their parents with a snap of my fingers.
I can't buy one listener.
In fact, it's worse than that.
My success is largely determined by how many of my listeners actually spend their money.
Obama couldn't compete in my business.
But I could compete at his.
You give me $3 trillion to give away, play Santa Claus with, and a media that rips into everybody I don't like and destroys them?
Why, nobody could stop me either.
Okay, back to the phones.
And Jessica in Nashville.
Jessica, great to have you on the EIB Network.
Hi.
Rush, it's an honor to speak with you.
I'm a 30-year-old Rush baby.
I just love you.
You were talking about the MLK anniversary event earlier, and I was wondering why the organizers, instead of Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, a couple of old white guys, why they wouldn't want to include people that really exemplify what MLK was hoping for, like Dr. Benjamin Carter and Condoleezza Rice, just because they're conservative?
Pretty much.
That's pretty much it.
See, here's the thing.
The dream, the dream, and here's a media alert.
I'm about to step in it.
You guys want to have some fun here, because I'm about to step in it.
In their world, I'm about to step in it.
The dream that Martin Luther King spoke of is nowhere in sight.
What he spoke of 50 years ago, judging people by the content of their character, not their skin color, nowhere in sight.
There hasn't been any substantive improvement in racial relations since he made that speech.
The fact that these guys are going to go get a couple of white guys from the Jim Crow South, with roots of the Jim Crow South, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, and they're not going to have, not just the Democratic Party of Carson or Condoleezza Rice, there's not one Republican anywhere near that I've seen anyway on the speaking roster.
But I think if Dr. King were alive today, if Dr. King were alive today, what's happened to the civil rights movement would not have happened.
Can you, look at, I better not mention any names here.
There's really nothing to be gained by it.
There are just, there are some people, I think would embarrass the heck out of him, or bother him greatly, who have presumed to inherit his movement and his mantle, if you will.
But, this country is racially divided, I think largely because the president's the first African American, and no criticism is permitted, and that just sets stage.
But no, I don't, I can't think of any other explanation other than those people are conservative, and that's not the message that the organizers want heard on Wednesday.
They want a pro-government, anti-Republican, anti-individual liberty, anti-self-reliant message.
And Dr. Carson doesn't fit that bill.
And Condoleezza Rice doesn't fit that bill.
They need to have people speaking who talk about the need for government.
They need people talking about the uh the Republican racism that still exists and so forth.
And it's uh this is only going to exacerbate things further.
But again, I just want to remind you.
I have been told privately by some in the civil rights coalition today that they're not that happy with Obama as the lead speaker on Wednesday because he's not down for the struggle.
Now he'll carry the message.
But but what they've told me is that his message is not going to be theirs.
His message is going to be his.
He makes every event about him.
It won't be about Dr. King, except peripherally.
It won't be primarily about Dr. King.
It might be worded to sound like it, but it's going to be about Obama, and these guys know Obama wasn't there in Selma.
Like John Lewis was.
He wasn't there.
Do I think they've got a valid reason to be that Obama's not.
Yeah, they've got a valid reason to be concerned.
They're right.
He's g he makes every event about himself.
He'll say things like his dad was only able to become what he became because of Dr. King.
His dad became what he became because he remembered Selma.
And he'll throw out the usual shibboleths, so forth.
But these guys all know that he's going to make the event about him.
When it's all said and done.
No, they didn't come to me.
I've just spoken to them, you know, in random at various events and so forth.
No, then nobody seeks me out to tell me these things.
I just, you know, in these private conversations, I hear things.
And they've all sworn.
I mean, I've promised them I would not identify them.
Obviously, they wouldn't tell me anything if I was going to do that, but it's not a whole bunch of them.
Don't misunderstand anyway.
Uh Jessica, I appreciate the call.
This is Laura in Bremerton, Washington.
You're next to the EIB network.
Hi.
Hello, Rush.
It's a pleasure to speak to you.
Thank you very much.
I just wanted to make a comment about all these idiots that are out there saying, don't listen to Rush.
Uh don't believe Rush.
He doesn't have anything to say that you really want to hear.
I have several liberal friends.
And we I am a guide-in-a-world Republican conservative and we talk politics every so often.
And you know, I've been able to turn very few of them around because I don't have the gift, I guess.
However, these people that are talking to all these liberals and everybody on the talk shows and everything.
It's like talking to a bunch of two-year-olds where you say, Don't do this, and the first thing they're going to do is do it.
So you'd be surprised how many of my friends you have turned around after they've listened to the guys on the talk shows say don't come to him and they immediately go in and listen to the this is another reason why Obama and the Democrats try to besmirch the name.
They they don't want anybody actually listening because that puts them at risk.
You're absolutely right.
The people that say these things about me are people have never listened.
They just get it secondhand, thirdhand information about it.
Tom Dashel, after the 2002 midterms, we will never forget this.
Buttress is your point.
Tom Daschle, who was the Democrat Senate leader.
The 2002 midterms, the Democrats thought they were going to just really win big.
I mean, the formula says the opposition party scores magically.
They think everybody hated Bush, and nobody was in favor of the war in Iraq Or Bush's it hadn't happened yet, but that Bush was talking about.
They really thought, and the Wellstone Memorial, they thought that they had just convinced everybody that they're that Bush's election wasn't even legitimate.
And the 20, the 20, uh, 2002 midterms came along, and they didn't do anywhere near as well as they expected or lied to them about.
And Tom Dashel let the cat out of the bag.
It turns out that the Democrats had been doing some polling on me.
And Dashel went out there in a post-election press conference and actually said I'm paraphrasing.
Our experts have told us that not everybody listening to Limbaugh is a Republican or a conservative, that he converts a lot of people.
He went out there and said this, and he was surprised.
Because they sit in their little world and believe that everybody believes the propaganda they put out.
So what your story is that your liberal friends who actually listened here, we get calls from people like that all the time.
It doesn't happen in mass, but it does happen when they give the program at least a week.
And that's what the Democrats don't want to happen.
That's why all the demonization is to get people to not even try listening because they think no point.
They're just going to get nothing but mad.
Okay, my friends, that's it for this busy, busy broadcast hour, but there's another busy broadcast hour straight ahead.
Right around the proverbial top of the hour break corner, and we'll come back and pick up right where we left off.
▲
Export Selection