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Nov. 14, 2013 - Rush Limbaugh Program
37:45
November 14, 2013, Thursday, Hour #2
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Hi folks and welcome back.
It's great to have you here, Rush Limbaugh, the EIB Network, the Limbaugh Institute Advanced Conservative Studies where we endeavor, and we pull it off, have more fun than a human being should be allowed to have.
Telephone number if you want to be on the program is 800 282-2882.
Email address L Rushbo at EIB net.com.
I probably am going to be talking about all of this today in a little different way than what you're going to hear anywhere on cable news.
The um the problem with with anybody that's in the news business, and I don't care where they are, is that they get caught up in the narrative that's established for the day inside the beltway.
Whoever establishes it.
And they miss, in my opinion, the big picture.
So now everybody is analyzing this on television within the political framework of who does it help and who does it hurt.
And how can it help Obama?
Did he save himself?
Did he make it worse for himself?
What about the Democrats?
What should the Republicans do?
Which I'm going to comment on in a moment.
And everybody, I think, is missing that this is an already abject failure.
It can't be fixed.
It has done irreparable damage.
And in order to prevent any more, it just needs to be stripped and repealed.
Now I know Obama's not going to do that.
I'm not being unrealistic.
But the pressure needs to be kept on Democrats not to find a way to make this acceptable to them.
If we are to actually have a way of getting rid of this, this is this is it remains unconstitutional.
I mean, even the Wall Street Journal headline, Obama will allow.
Obama can't allow anything in this regard.
Obama does not make the law.
He does not determine his he his oath of office is to uphold it, and he's in violation, folks.
He is not upholding the law.
He is changing it willy-nilly by granting waivers, any number of things.
Promising you can keep your plan and then not letting you and then reinstating your plan, but no mention of what the premium's gonna cost you.
None of this is permissible under the Constitution.
This is this is this is the kind of authoritarianism that our founders stridently feared and tried to do everything they could to prevent.
And it's just it's it's a it's an absolute disaster.
People have been irreparably harmed by this.
They've lost their jobs because of this.
Companies have laid people off to stay in compliance with this law.
People have been laid off so that the company can stay in business because of the punitive damage this law inflicts on businesses.
Insurance companies have pretty much seen their epitaph written for them years out, but they have just been told that they're not going to exist.
So they're trying to maximize what they can before that day comes.
People have been converted from full part or full full-time jobs to part-time jobs in order to comply with the law.
Some people have been given waivers.
The unions don't have to play ball with this.
Self-insured people don't have to play ball with this.
It isn't fair, it isn't equitable, and it isn't solving anything.
All it is doing is making a real mess that is hurting real people in every way this law touches people, it harms them.
There are no benefits.
If there were, the drive-bys would have a parade of people on TV day and night singing this law's praises.
And talking about how their lives were saved by the law.
That doesn't happen.
Nobody has a success story here.
It's an absolute mess.
It can't be fixed.
And there lies the pitfall for the Republican Party.
The Republican Party, I really believe, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.
From years and years of bullying and taunt the The Republican Party is Jonathan Martin.
The Democrat Party and the media are richie incognito.
The Republican Party is afraid of itself.
It's afraid of what it believes.
It's afraid to speak up.
It's afraid to oppose.
It's afraid to do anything for fear of what's going to be said about it.
For fear of you have very few Republicans with the actual courage to stand up and oppose this totalitarianism.
And look what happens to them.
Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, thankfully, they're undaunted by it.
But the Republicans, because of this, and post-traumatic stress disorder is just the way I'm characterizing it.
I try to be illustrative here.
But they clearly are in a state of shock.
It's either that, there's only one other alternative.
The other alternative is they want the law to survive.
That, of course, may be a reality situation.
Some Republicans may be entrenched enough in the Washington establishment that they want the law to survive, that they want government to have this kind of role in people's lives and in society.
Who knows?
But I think for many of them, they're just scared.
I think that there's an abject fear of standing up, particularly to Obama, but Democrats in general, there's an I know there's fear of the media.
Republicans have been full-fledged intimidated.
So the pitfall for them, I think, is that they want to be seen participating in the fix for Obamacare because they think that there is political gain to be made there.
They are under the impression, and now the way I visualize this or I should better say illustrate this, the Democrats propose something, whatever it is.
And the Republicans never say no.
The Republicans are obsessed with, well, we got to have an alternative.
They're always on defense.
They're always reacting.
There is not proactive Republican policy anymore.
They're always reacting, and it's, I think comes from the assumption, I really do believe that they believe they are a genuine minority, that most people in the country, not just the media and the Democrats, don't like them, think they're unhip, uncool, oddball extremist weirdos, and they don't like that, of course.
But as the minority, they feel naturally defensive about things.
So Obama proposes this massive health care plan.
The media makes it look like everybody in America wants it, but the polling data has been clear on this.
The American people, by majority after majority after majority, have never wanted it.
Have never liked Obamacare.
There's not been a single poll since the early days of this that show a majority of people wanting it.
The 2010 midterms were all about Obamacare and massive numbers of America showing up to polls to vote against it and the debt that Obama was piling up, called a Tea Party.
So there is this temptation that the Republicans have in this posture that they occupy that the Democrats propose something, in this case Obama, who they think is universally loved.
And they think he's universally respected because of his race, and they feel he's it's not worth opposing him because of his race.
It's not worth it.
So here's this plan.
It's an absolute mess, it's a total failure.
And the worst thing the Republicans could do right now is be working in a way that would help fix this.
The Republican Party does not, should not be seen as part owners of this.
I don't think the Republican Party should do anything to salvage this.
I don't think there's anything in it for them to be seen as working with the Democrats to make this work.
Nothing electorally.
Just like being for amnesty and immigration reform is not going to help them, but they believe it is, do they not?
Why is that?
Because I think they feel defensive, shell-shocked, PTSD, what have you.
What the Republicans need to be doing is taking advantage of all of this chaos.
And it's it's it's unconstitutional.
It isn't it is what's happening here is not happening according to the law.
The Republicans ought to be working to scrap this.
They ought to be working to repeal this.
That's what a majority of the American people want.
And I continue to sit here in amazement, as I said for many months now.
You have this majority of the American people opposed to it, and it seems to me that that is a large number of Americans the Republican Party could connect with on a fundamental issue and become the champions of the people who oppose this.
It seems to me, from outside the beltway, of course, as made to order for a party that wants to come back to life.
You've got an issue that a vast majority of people oppose, and now they really don't like it and are angry at it.
They have been personally, they've lost their jobs, they've lost income.
They have lost their insurance.
I mean, the opportunity to be the white knight and come in and say today is not the Landrew bill, which I'm going to get to in a minute.
The Democrats think the white knight here is the Landrew bill because the Landry bill would reinstate your policy forever, not just a year.
That's why I think a lot of Democrats might end up rejecting what Obama proposed today and go with her bill.
I'll tell you about her bill in detail in a minute, because it dovetails with Fred Upton's bill that's going to be voted on on Friday, of course.
I don't know what Obama did today might totally upend the Upton bill.
But we'll see.
That the tomorrow is Friday, and we'll have a lot to try to analyze here on the program today, plus get your calls in.
If here's the point, the Republicans need to be pushing for total repeal and they should settle for nothing.
That helps fix this.
They do not, they should not, I can't understand even why they would want to be seen as being part of the fix when this is causing the Democrat Party and Obama's precious relationship with the American people to unravel.
The same people who just a month ago were saying, don't do anything, Ted, don't do anything, Mike, just stand aside.
It's going to implode.
They're now saying we could be watching the end of liberalism.
Dr. Krauthammer unfoxed it.
We could be watching the end of liberalism here.
George Will thinks we could be watching.
Well, if we are, then don't try to fix this.
Don't try to be seen as big people.
Don't if you really believe that this signifies the end of liberalism.
And what do they mean by that?
What they mean by that is that the American people, after a hundred years, well, let's say 50, what they mean, the people who are saying this could be the end of liberalism, what they mean is that the American people, the low information voters, are finally going to see what a wreck big government, liberalism, and the Democrat Party are.
If they're saying that, that's what they believe.
The end of liberalism means that the people who vote for it finally wake up and see what a disaster is and no longer do.
If that's what you believe, then do not make one move to try to fix this.
Don't move in to try to be the white knight that helps save the policy that was canceled.
That's the trap.
Now Obama's proposed, you know what, you won't keep your plan for another year.
I can see Republicans wanting in on that action.
I can see Republicans wanting to be seen as helping you keep your plan.
Total mistake.
If you believe, if they believe this is the end of liberalism, then they had better stand aside and let it implode like they told us a month ago, six weeks ago, it would do.
That's when they said to Cruz and Lee, don't do anything, get out of the way.
Don't try to repeal it.
Don't try to defund it.
You can't win that vote anyway.
Don't try to delay it.
You can't win it, it's going to implode.
Okay, then why are the Republicans so desirous of helping fix it?
Some Republicans.
It isn't fixable, is the point.
It's already broken beyond repair.
It cannot be fixed because it cannot work, as Obama has promised.
And as the Democrats have promised.
It just can't.
And we're living that truth.
It's not because I'm saying it that it does.
Is it working now?
Every day there's a new piecemeal band-aid fix for that problem or that problem.
The website doesn't work.
Where is the evidence that there's any foundational indication this works?
There isn't.
It can't.
By design it can't work.
This is not the role of government.
This is not the role of government.
I think what Obama did today, this whole thing is ultimately pointless, except from the political standpoint of maybe saving his bacon.
Well, he's not up, but his party's bacon.
This is a this is an affront to freedom loving people.
The damage that's been done to people, Obama keeps talking about the Democrats, it's only 5%.
It's 15 million people.
I thought they loved everybody.
I thought they're the ones that have compassion for everybody, but now 5%, 15 million people.
Well, that's maybe the cost of them business.
Really?
These are real people.
Real children.
Real illnesses they get.
They've been led to believe by the Democratic Party one illness is the end of their life.
Financial ruin is on the other side of one illness.
I mean, what they've done to people, the things they have told people are doing it to football.
They're creating in football, it's a death game.
More and more people now not going to let their kids death game.
It's instant death.
It's instant they're doing it all over again with practically everything in our culture, culture.
Everything is a crisis, everything is death, everything is vile sickness, unless you let them run your life.
But they can't.
Okay, I'm gonna take a break here and we'll come back and now start interspersing your phone calls at some point here, the alternative.
I mean, that's what the my mind with the Republicans is stay out of this.
Don't fix it.
It can't be.
Don't don't don't have this desire of being seen as compromising and helping make it work.
The American people don't want this.
Bring yourselves back to life and come up with a solution that repeals this and leads people out of this muck here.
Gives them their lives back.
On the other side, though, is the Democrats and what they want to do and how they react to this.
We'll get to that at some point, but I want to get your phone calls in first, so don't go away.
Is that not a right way to put this?
Destabilizing the market.
It's a graphic up on CNN right now.
Thank you.
America's health insurance plans.
Changing rules could destabilize the market, result in higher premiums.
It is gonna result in higher premiums.
Your policy that's been canceled being reinstated is going to result in higher premiums.
Now, I know what you're saying is how?
Why?
I'm gonna explain to you before the program ends how that happens and why.
But it it is rooted in the fact that there's another law over here called Obamacare That has mandates and requirements that the insurance companies have spent three years getting in compliance with.
They are at tremendous cost, they're going to have to charge to go back and reinstitute something that yesterday was illegal.
Because the president's waved a wand to go in and reinstate something that's illegal that was substandard that they have been planning for three years to remove from their portfolio.
They're going to have to raise the premium price in order to be able to provide that service.
What they're guaranteeing in the policy.
And you will note that Obama didn't say when he was waving his magic wand today, and allowing you to keep your canceled plan and allowing the insurance companies to reinstate it.
You didn't hear him say at the same price you were paying, did you?
Then we haven't gotten to the Mary Landrew plan.
Mary Landry is one of ten Senate Democrats who was joining with Obama.
She said one night on hardball back on it was uh uh 2009.
If you like the insurance that you have, you'll be able to keep it.
Kay Hagen, Mary Landrew, Mark Begge, ten Democrat senators who joined with Obama as they were running, as they were supporting legislation.
They were supporting Obama.
They weren't running, they're up this year.
They were next year.
They were promising everybody, you get to keep your plan if you like it.
And Obama did kind of share it with them today.
That, you know, hey, no, I wasn't the only one.
I mean, there's some other people did it too.
Let me uh let me uh let me ask a question.
So Obama, Obama does his presser, and by by the way, I would I would be remiss if I didn't point this out again.
That pressure was announced for 1135.
At 1140, John Boehner is conducting a little press gathering.
Now that doesn't happen unless there's coordination.
Boehner's not going to go out and upstage the president.
I mean, even if they were that that's just protocol.
That would not happen.
So Boehner's not going to go do that unless it's already known that the president's not going to be showing up at 11.35.
You agree with me on that.
Boehner's not going to particularly, this bunch of Republicans would never go out there and be accused of trying to upstage the boy one dude.
It would never happen.
And Pelosi did one before Boehner.
So my point is they announced it at 11.35, but everybody knew it wasn't going to be 11.35.
He started at 12.05.
And he spent two minutes on the hurricane in the Philippines, the typhoon, giving this program plenty of time to open up while he, you know, our theme is playing, and I'm introducing the show while he's wrapping up the Philippines, And then he gets right into his health care portion, right as this program begins.
I predicted it too today to a couple of people.
And they said, Well, you sound like you got Obama in your head.
I said, no, no, it's the other way around.
I'm living rent-free in his.
He was forcing us to gyp this.
Because he knew that everybody, everybody in the media was salivating to hear what he was going to hear.
And what did he do?
Can I can I give you his promise?
Here's what he said.
If you like your old plan, you can now try to get it back.
If you can.
I'm going to allow your old plan to be made available.
So go for it if you think you can get it.
But you know what else he said?
I'll have to check the sound button on the transcript to be Sure.
But he, even while telling you you'll get your old plan back, he still insulted the plan.
He if you want your old plan back, you can get it, but it's not going to be what we intended for you.
Something like that.
He just, even though he's going out there trying to do a mayor culpable, he can't.
It's just not he's he's not capable of accountability.
So uh well, the end of liberals.
Snerdley's still in there fuming over how this is supposed to be the end liberalism.
Well, that's what Dr. Crowhammer said.
And then they had a parade of people on Fox who were being asked to agree with that, and everybody did.
And I know, but but stop and think of what it means, though.
I mean, if this is the end of liberalism, if if this what that means is this is causing low information, people to vote for Democrats to wake up and realize it's a mistake.
This is this is ending the whole notion of the welfare state.
That's what the end of liberalism is.
Is that what people think today?
And I guarantee, but if my point is, if you do believe that, if you think that this has the potential of waking people up to the horrors of liberalism and voting Democrats, then the last thing you'd want to do is help fix it.
You would want to let it go ahead.
You do everything you could to help this thing get repealed.
You would do everything you could to break this further, right?
If you believe, if you want this to be the end of liberalism, the last thing you should be doing is trying to offer a fix.
I'm talking about Republicans now.
And I'm being repetitive.
But here's the question.
So Obama says to you that if you like your old plan, you can now try to get it back if you can.
I'm allowing you to try to get your old plan back.
I'm allowing the insurance company to make your old plan that's now illegal available to you for one year.
What are you going to do a year from now, folks?
The election's over, and you're right back where you were, and you're going to lose it again, and there's no getting it back then.
What are you going to do a year from now?
What's the what what's the point if it's eventually going to be taken away from you anyway, and the president today just said, no matter what, you're going to lose your plan.
You're going to lose your plan.
It's just not now, but next year.
And that's why it's another thing.
If the Republicans help fix this even for a year, when it ultimately gets taken away from people, the Republicans do not want to have any fingerprints on that.
The pitfalls, the Pratt Falls, the minefield that's out there for the Snerdley has just inquired, the official program observer wants to know why did Obama do this today.
And uh to avoid being lame duck.
No, they they want to win the House in 2014 so that there's no lame duck.
If they win the House in 2014, he will be a dictator.
It won't mean he pretend about it.
Congress is gonna be a rubber stamp.
If he if if they win the House in 2014, hold the Senate, just rubber stamp rubber, whatever he wants.
There's no lame duck.
No, this is to save the 2014 elections.
That's all this was today.
The save the 24 for Obama.
And he necessarily has to help the Democrats.
That's incidental.
He's not doing this to help the Democrats first.
He's doing this to help himself get two years of authoritarian, unquestioned unstoppable presidency.
You know, most second-term presidents the last three years are largely inconsequential because everybody starts focusing on the race for the next president.
They start talking about being lame duck, and Obama knows this.
He doesn't want to be a lame duck.
Plus, he's not, he's not through transforming America.
He's not through fixing the immoral way this nation was founded.
He's not through getting rid of all the evils and the in unfairness and the discrimination and mean spiritedness that this country was founded with.
Anyway, let me go to the phones.
I've been threatening to do this for minutes.
It's oh look at this.
Dawn, Chattanooga, Tennessee.
Hi, welcome to the EIB network.
Hello.
Hey, Russ.
Um, this is actually Dawn's husband.
She had to take another call.
Oh.
That's what happens when you're on hold on this show for quite a while.
Do you know what she was going to say, or are you just going to take over?
I do know what she was going to say.
Okay.
Have at it.
She wanted to talk about how we've made a decision to move our daughters a surgery that my daughter's having.
She was born with a lot of internal birth defects, and at six years old she's already had seven surgeries.
Jeez.
The surgery that she has coming up is one that ideally we would like to postpone because there's still other issues that they're trying to sort out and determine if she needs to have other surgical interventions.
And if we would if we were able to postpone it, then we would um they would be able to combine the surgeries.
But because of all the changes that Obama's made to the health care, the way health care works, we're having to jump the gun and get that done now because there's a possibility that we might lose insurance at the end of the year through her company and um be forced into the exchanges.
You might be canceled, that's right.
Or your daughter might not end up being covered uh, you know, once the health and human services secretary looks at the case and looks at how much money might be required versus the success possibility.
That's that's that's that's that's what they can do once they get total control of this.
That's exactly right.
And you know, the whole thing about, well, is this medical medically necessary?
And right now we're traveling out of state so she can get better coverage than is available to us locally, and we wouldn't be able to do that.
Yeah, but it sounds like what you're doing is you're actually taking action now just to make sure you can take action.
You sound like to me like you're worried that you might not be able to actually do the surgery if you wait too much longer.
That's right.
Or afford it, one of the two.
Yeah.
That's exactly right.
Okay, now I'm uh uh Dawn's husband, thanks for the call.
I appreciate it.
Now, stop, folks, stop at what we just heard.
Stop and think what we just heard.
Dawn and and and her husband might be totally wrong.
We don't know.
They their their fears might be ungrounded, but their reality is that they're scared to death.
The reality that they are being forced to live with because of this mess is that the surgery for their daughter would ideally come months from now, but they are afraid to wait because they think it might not be allowed, or they might not have the insurance for it, or they might not be able to afford it.
Now you can you can sit there and say, well, they're just being paranoid, Mr. Limbaugh.
This the reality is this is what this is doing to people.
Dawn and her husband are real people, and their daughter is a real six-year-old who has real problems.
And the parents are like any other parents.
They want the best for their daughter, and they're scared because they don't know.
They don't know enough about what the future holds.
They don't know if they're going to be able.
If they're going to be allowed, permitted, what have you.
Now, you can say, come on, Russ, there in any way they're gonna be denied.
That's not the point.
They could be dead wrong about this.
Their fears could be unfounded.
But the fears they're having are real, and they wouldn't be happening.
They this would not even be a concern had Obama not attempted and the Democrats to take over the health care system.
This wouldn't even be a concern.
It'd be a problem they would have with their insurance company and doctors they would iron out.
As it always used to be.
But now the doctor, the insurance company, and the hospital all have to comply with the Leviathan known as the federal government.
So there's a new player in this equation, and it is the Leviathan.
And it's the one thing nobody can control, and the one thing nobody can predict, and the one thing they know that really doesn't care about their daughter.
Whoever's running health and human services, whoever's running Obamacare doesn't care about their daughter a lot, not like they do.
They care about other things money, politics.
You name it.
And this is exactly the kind of thing that's happening all over this country.
Dawn and her husband, who you just heard are human beings.
They are Americans.
They live in this country.
They've got a daughter that needs surgery.
At a certain point in time, they're having to take action.
They wish they didn't have to take it this time because they're afraid they might not be able to get treatment as she needs it later.
And that's only one reason.
There's this new player in town, the federal government and Obamacare, and the massive regulations and laws and allowances from the White House.
This is what's wrong with this.
It used to be that Dawn and her husband would deal with their insurance company at the doctor, and daughter would get treated by hook or by crook.
It would happen somehow.
But the decision's been taken out of Dawn and her husband's hands.
Decision may have been taken out of the hands of the insurance company.
It may have been taken out of the hands of the doctor because there's this thing called Obamacare.
Everybody has to be in compliance with.
That's what's wrong with this.
And again, it doesn't matter if they're right or wrong about it.
Because that'll eventually be deduced.
It's what this is causing them to go through and how it's causing them to reorient their lives.
And who knows what else they're having to try to do in order to get the best for their daughter?
Because it's not up to them anymore.
Be back after this, folks.
Sit tight.
And we head back to the phones.
This is Joe in Las Vegas.
Joe, welcome to the EIB network.
Hello.
Thank you, Rush.
Las Vegas, I strive to be the best I can be because you inspire me, ditto, Mr. Limbach.
Thank you, sir, very much.
Rush, four weeks ago during the shutdown, uh, I'm pretty sure I heard Harry Reid say in the answer of your question, why would we want to help them?
I mean, the Republicans were putting together bills to fund the necessary parts of the government, and Harry Reid stood there on the podium in front of everyone and said, why would we want to do that?
Let's get a particular children.
Joe, let's get specific.
That's exactly right.
This was cancer stricken children at a particular hospital that treats them.
And Harry Reid said, why would I care about that?
In a moment of pure honesty, when he totally dropped his guard, and he had to go out and try to explain that and then cover his tracks on it.
Why would I care about that?
I got constituents in Nevada that I have to worry about.
Why would I really care about that?
You know, you're you're it's interesting that I take your call right after Don's husband, because he also pointed out something about their employer.
That's that's where right now he gets his insurance, and he's not sure that his coverage is going to be provided by his employer next year.
Another reason why to move up the surgery.
And that points out what employers are doing and what they have to do to stay in compliance here.
They have to also plan ahead to stay in business and deal with this.
But you are exactly right.
But you so you think we should be doing the same thing?
Well, well, I uh if I was the Republicans, I because it would look crass, but I would say, look, if we need to either repeal it, and then we will put our plans in together of what how we feel we should do with the cross the state lines and all the things that they're that the Republicans are are offering.
But this piecemeal action of every six months or every two weeks the president doing that has to go.
That's the end of that.
I agree.
Be it the budget, be it health care, be it whatever.
Everything is piecemeal because that's how the Democrats keep this crisis uh attitude alive in everybody's minds.
I I wish I wish the media would just pick up on that and someone really you know the president needs to put on his big boy pants and do what's right for the country because it's it I really do feel, and I talk to a lot of customers and people out in the country, we are a laughing stock.
I mean it's getting to the point where it's almost ridiculous.
Well, uh yeah, I know, but as far as the media is concerned, I I still think I see all this talk about the media uh leaving Obama or giving Obama a hard time.
Don't don't be fooled here, folks.
When the rubber meets the road, when the pedal hits the metal, vice versa.
The media is gonna be in there covering for the guy, defending the guy.
They're n they're not gonna abandon Obama.
Even even if if if if they would somehow be going down the ship with it, because they are.
I just I don't I don't see the media being oops, I gotta take a break.
That's it, folks.
I went way long here, so this is just enough time to say hang in there.
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