It's Rush Limbaugh and we're kicking off a brand new week of broadcast excellence here on the EIB network.
It's great to have you here.
As always, the phone number, if you want to be on the program, is 800-282-2882, the email address, ilrushbow at EIBnet.com.
Snerdley just asked me, why aren't you talking about the unemployment benefits and the income inequality?
You know, I'm trying to turn over a new leaf here.
I am not going to get trapped by this soap opera, which is what the news is.
That's what they want us all talking about.
And you can watch the cable news networks to find out what the soap opera is.
And the soap opera is simply what the Democrats want you to think the news of the day is.
And that is whatever the Democrat agenda is.
So the Democrat agenda is we've got to get people's attention distracted from Obamacare.
So guess what?
We need to extend unemployment benefits.
And we'll tug at people's heartstrings again.
It's cold.
It's miserable.
And people have lost their unemployment benefits.
How could we be so cruel?
Force the Republicans into that.
And of course, income inequality and all that.
And I've been there, done that.
And I just, just it's like right on CNN right now, polar vortex grounds 2,500 flights.
Polar vortex grounds 2,500 flights.
So now we're creating this brand new weather disaster, man-made, obviously.
And we just cannot escape this.
And I have here.
Sorry not to let this go.
But folks, I am, if I'm obsessive about anything on this program, it is the truth.
Our last caller, it troubles me a bit, and I don't mind admitting it to you.
I'm not, and don't misunderstand, I'm not taking any of this personally.
I'm digesting it professionally and asking myself aloud here, letting you into my thoughts.
How can I do this better?
We just had a guy call who admits to listening every day.
He's a smart guy.
You could obviously tell he's a smart guy.
He's an entrepreneur.
He's a self-starter, small businessman.
He's done well.
He's done poorly, but he's a smart guy.
And he clearly understood what Obamacare was all about, but he didn't at the same time.
And I asked him, your regular listener here, I told you what it was going to be.
Why are you surprised?
That's not a criticism of him.
I'm asking that because for three and a half years, I've done my level best to explain.
To me, this is simply taking information in, processing it, and figuring out how I can do this better.
Because to me, defeating the left is all about honesty and truth.
They're not.
How many times have I said, if we could just get people to understand on an ideological basis what liberalism is, how much easier it would be to explain to everybody every element of the Democrat Party agenda if they understood liberalism or statism, take your pick, whatever you want to call it.
So I'm constantly searching for ways to be more persuasive To be taken seriously, because I'm not, I don't make things up.
I mean, I'm not, I don't want to advance, I have an agenda too, and I don't want to advance it falsely.
I don't want people believing what I say if I'm lying to them.
And consequently, I don't lie.
I want everything to be legit, you know, up and up.
Global warming is a great example.
It's a full-fledged, now-documented hoax.
Yet, if you listen to the news media, it's still in full swing and it explains why this cold snap.
And I have here in my formerly nicotine-stained fingers a website, Business Insider of all things, that explains the polar vortex.
Now, I want to read this to you as tundra-like temperatures and wind chills, as cold as 70 below zero, fan out across the country.
Everybody's blaming the polar vortex.
Polar vortexes are nothing new, they occur seasonally at the North Pole, and their formation resembles that of hurricanes in more tropical regions.
Fast-moving winds build up around a calm center.
Unlike a hurricane, these are frigid polar winds circling the Arctic at more than 100 miles an hour.
The spinning winds typically trap this cold air in the Arctic and keep it there.
But the problem comes when the polar vortex weakens or splits apart, essentially flinging these cold wind patterns out of the Arctic and to us.
NOAA scientists have suggested, which means they don't have the foggiest idea, National Oceanic Aeronautical Administration,
whatever scientists have suggested the warming temperatures in the Arctic, warming temperatures in the Arctic may be responsible for the weakening of the polar vortex.
So you see, it's magic.
Why it is man-made global warming causing record cold because warming temperatures in the Arctic may be responsible for the weakening of the polar vortex.
And when the polar vortex weakens, it's more likely to break apart and become a factor in our winter weather.
And for example, boys and girls, a 2009 polar vortex breakdown drove temperatures in parts of the Midwest down to minus 22 degrees Fahrenheit.
And here's a NASA illustration of the polar vortex and it's splitting in two.
And I've got a graphic here.
I'm not going to bother showing it to you because it didn't print out.
Doesn't matter, no big deal.
Now, this is reported here as fact, as news, but the word suggested was used in connection with what scientists think.
So despite the polar vortex freezing everybody's buns off, it's because Arctic air is getting warmer and it's breaking down the boundaries of the polar vortex.
Now, I'm here to assure you, this is a crock, But this is how the left works, and this is how you don't have anybody in the media questioning this.
All you have to do is have somebody put this news out.
The agenda has been set.
Man is causing the climate to warm, period.
Nothing, there's no challenge to that.
There's nobody in the American news media that does not believe that.
Well, nobody, there are some detractors, but I'm on ABC, CBS, NBC, New York Times, Washington, in the drive-by media, there's nobody questions it.
And so something like this, there has to be something man is doing that causes this, and there isn't.
But then to have insult to injury, we have warming temperatures at the North Pole, where the ice sheet formed earlier and is larger than it's been in a while.
There's no warming of any kind going on in the Arctic is the point.
And yet, Arctic air is getting warmer, causing the vortex to split apart and fling itself at us.
Okay, fine.
Well, by Friday, it's going to be 40 degrees, where today it's five below.
Wherever it's five below today, it's going to be 40 by Friday, five days from now.
Okay, so what's going to happen to put that boundary back in the polar vortex?
Is the Arctic air going to all of a sudden get dramatically cool again and the vortex is going to seal itself back up?
This is all absurd stuff.
And I just, you know, sometimes I mentioned to this guy, I get a better example for you.
This guy that I quoted a moment ago wanted to know what Obamacare is going to be like three to five years down the road.
And I said, pick your government bureaucracy.
Pick one.
Is there any that you enjoy dealing with?
And I cited the DMV, which is everybody's default.
But actually, if I want to be more accurate, dealing with the government on Obamacare is going to be more like dealing with the IRS than with DMV, because they are the ones, they are the enforcement arm of Obamacare.
They're the ones going to be assessing the fines.
They're going to be the ones to whom you have to prove you're following the law.
Your tax return is going to become even more important.
And that's where you're either going to be given a stamp of approval or a penalty for not following the law on Obamacare.
So the IRS is going to end up playing an ever larger role in everybody's life.
Three to five years down the road, if something isn't done about this, it's going to be something you're not going to want to put up with.
Your health care isn't going to be any better.
Medicine isn't going to be any better.
It's not going to be any more efficient.
It isn't going to be cheaper.
None of the things that Obama promised you are going to come true.
Your premiums aren't going to go down.
Your deductible isn't going to go down.
You're not going to be able to keep your doctor.
You already know this.
You can't keep your plan.
You already know this.
Bottom line is, what is going to happen in the next three to five years of Obamacare is nothing any citizen would ask for.
Simplest way I can explain it.
If you could devise health care for you and your family, here's what you want to just write whatever you want your health care life to be.
Whether you want to have insurance or not, just write it down.
Whatever you want, whatever would work best for you is not even going to be available for the vast, vast majority of Americans because you're not going to have any control over your health care, which is the bottom line.
None.
In three to five years, if nothing changes, the only place you're going to be able to go for health insurance and medical treatment will be the United States government and specifically the IRS and the Department of Health and Human Service.
That's going to be your option, unless you have a lot of money and can set up a health care system for yourself, a network of your own, which is not in any way a part of the nation's system.
And that will exist.
It does exist in Great Britain.
In Great Britain, do you think the Queen and your royal family messes around with the National Health Service?
They don't.
Wealthy people in Great Britain have their own hospitals.
They've got their own doctors.
There will be now.
The British government is not happy about it, and they constantly target those people.
is going to happen here, but it's going to require a lot of wealth, thereby exempting the vast majority of people.
It isn't going to be good.
They call it whatever they want, single payer.
That disguises what it actually is.
But what the regime is hoping for is that in three to five years, that you will have all forgotten that you ever had anything different, that you ever had anything better.
That's the objective.
In three to five years, just wipe out your memory that there was ever anything better, that there was ever anything more efficient.
Three to five years, they want most people to think this is what it is.
It's the best it's ever been.
Brought to you by Barack Obama and the Democrat Party.
Hi.
How are you?
Welcome back, Rush Limbaugh.
Ron Johnson is a from Wisconsin, senator from Wisconsin, and he's going to file a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Wisconsin today.
He's avoiding the D.C. district court, which Obama is trying to pack.
And he is claiming that the carve-out for Congress and their staff directly contradicts the plain language of the Obamacare law and that it violates the intent of Congress in passing the law.
He contends also that Obama can only legally change the law by going through Congress.
He points out that the Office of Personnel Management, in order to carry out Obama's orders, had to claim that members of Congress are small business employees.
The drive-by has never reported this.
Let me backtrack a minute.
Late last year, members of Congress in the fall of last year, members of Congress staff who earn up to $174,000 a year, congressional staff, anywhere from $90,000 to $175,000 a year.
Once they discovered the truth of Obamacare, they said they can't afford it.
Members of Congress staff, the people that work for congressmen and senators, said they couldn't afford it.
Well, just stop right there.
How can you, if they can't, and they're making 175 or 130 or 140.
So they demanded subsidies.
And Obama, in order to keep Congress tamed and on a leash, said, okay, but the way I'm going to do it is through the Office of Personnel Management, not through the exchanges.
You qualify for subsidies if you earn less than 400% of the poverty level.
It's some complicated formula.
But they were not subjected to that.
Obama said, I'm just going to, he said, this is totally, this is why Johnson's suing.
He does not have the authority.
He does not have the power to willy-nilly change or exempt or do anything to this law that changes it.
But he said to members of Congress, I'll get you your subsidies through the Office of Personnel Management, not the exchanges.
What Johnson's lawsuit has illustrated is that the Office of Personnel Management, in order to carry out Obama's orders, has to claim that members of Congress and their staff are small business employees.
And they're not.
They're government employees.
They are not small businesses.
They are not independent contractors.
They're straight, down-the-line employees.
It's preposterous for them to be considered small businesses, but that is what their qualification, their classification has to be in order for the Office of Personnel Management to subsidize their health care.
Anyway, Johnson says the legal basis for our lawsuit includes the fact that the OPM personnel management ruling forces me as a member of Congress to engage in activity that I believe violates the law.
It potentially alienates members of Congress and their constituents since constituents are witnessing members of Congress giving themselves and their staff special treatment, both of which are clearly true.
I don't think any of this is going to help him.
I don't know what's going to happen with his lawsuit, but that he's nevertheless suing over these Obamacare exemptions for Congress.
And he's making the point that Obama legally cannot do any of this.
And he's right.
Of course, Obama can do whatever he wants if nobody tries to stop him.
And he has been.
This law has been changed.
This law, as it's being implemented, is nothing like the law that was signed by Obama and passed by Congress.
He's exempted unions, 2,500 other small businesses over certain periods of time, usually leading up to elections and so forth.
It's a disgrace.
It's unconstitutional.
It's against the law.
Anyway, Senator Johnson is filing a suit.
The story out of Freeport, Florida, talk radio is responsible for creating the bad impression of Obamacare.
I don't have time to give you the details here.
I'll do it.
We come back from the break, but that's classic, too.
Talk radio is responsible for, not the faulty website, not the incompetent website.
No, no, no.
Talk radio is responsible for it.
And the Pope.
Yeah, this story out of Freeport, Florida, which is in the Panhandle, is all about how providing health care in rural areas is really hard now because of Talk Radio.
In this rural part of the Panhandle, Christopher Mitchell finds few takers when he delivers his message about the importance of exploring insurance options under Obamacare.
People in the conservative-leaning area of the panhandle of Florida tend to have a bad impression of Obamacare because of negative messages they hear on talk radio or from friends, says Christopher Mitchell, marketing director for a network of nonprofit health clinics.
And even for those with insurance, a doctor's visit may require a long drive because there are few providers in the area.
I guess talk radio's response over the long drive.
Talk radio's put a speed limit of 25 miles an hour on the highway, making sure people take a long time to get to the doctor.
And then Talk Radio called the doctor and said, don't be there when the patient shows up.
Be on the golf course.
Talk radio doing all of this.
You think maybe these, the point of this is that rural people are a bunch of dumb hicks who don't know anything.
And they're being lied to by people on talk radio, and that's why they don't like Obamacare.
It has nothing to do with the fact that maybe they've tried to log on to healthcare.gov and it doesn't work.
This is funny.
Jay Carney at the White House got a question at the press briefing today from Ed Henry about Muchel staying on in Hawaii as a birthday present from Obama.
His question was, Mr. President, Mr. President, the First Lady stayed behind in Hawaii, and the White House said that that was an early birthday present from the president.
Does that mean that he is paying for her flight back?
As with all personal travel, the First Family will appropriately fund personal expenses, Ed, and in line with travel of past presidents and First Ladies, the First Lady will travel via government aircraft.
But you're accurate in your description that this was her decision to remain at actually the president's suggestion in Hawaii to spend time with friends ahead of her upcoming very big birthday.
And, you know, if you have kids, you know that telling your spouse that they can go spend a week away from home is actually a big present.
What a guy.
So Obama did give his wife permission to stay in Hawaii as a president.
It was his suggestion is what Ed Henry was told here by Jay Carney.
Let me tell you how these expenses work, folks.
It's the same for candidates.
Moochell is going to get on a government plan.
It'll probably be a Boeing 757.
And she'll get on with whoever.
She's staying at Oprah's Place in Maui.
She's staying at Oprah's Place in Maui with Gail King and Valerie Jarrett and Eric Holder's wife.
That's the coffee club.
Well, but that's the, that tells me the country is going to be run from Maui.
If Valerie Jarrett's there and Muchel is there, then that's where the country is going to be run from.
But anyway, the way the expenses work, she'll get on board a government plane, a Boeing 757, and she will pay, she will pay the first-class equivalent airfare, even if it costs $18,000 an hour to fly that airplane.
She will pay the cost of a single first-class seat for herself and whoever else from the families on board.
That's how it's technically drawn up on paper.
And that's what Jay Carney was talking about.
George Will was on, let's see, I guess it's a Fox News Sunday.
Yep.
During a panel segment, Fox News Sunday, George Will was asked if he believed, as some commentators have suggested, that the election of de Blasio, the mayor of New York City, indicated a resurgence of liberalism.
And George Will said that he wasn't sure that it does mean that.
He hopes that it's the case, though.
He hopes that it is a resurgence of liberalism because George Will said there is no better messenger for conservative principles than liberals in government.
And therefore, George Will said, go ahead, let de Blasio do whatever he wants to do.
Will said that in three years, New Yorkers will be begging for a return to a pre-de Blasio, New York City.
Now, this is kind of like the theory we heard.
I first heard it in 1992.
Had a caller call, Rush, go ahead and let Clinton win.
The country will find out what a bunch of rotten applesy Democrats are, and they'll never elect them again.
And I've heard somebody's called it every election.
Rush, just let the Democrats win.
It'd be the best damn thing could ever happen.
People see, folks, I don't see this theory saving Detroit.
I don't see this theory saving Illinois.
Why is it going to save New York?
And I understand it intellectually.
Okay, elect a liberal.
Let him go Hogwarts.
Let him go nuts.
Let him go raising taxes.
The thing is, that's been going on in cities all over this country, San Francisco, Detroit, you name it, New Orleans, and they never throw them out.
And the citizens never clamor for anything different.
I'm not aware of it anyway.
Anyway, do you think that's the best, that there's no better messenger for conservatism than liberals in government?
I mean, Obama got re-elected, didn't he?
After totally whacking the economy and jobs and destroying health care, Obama got re-elected.
Now, the 2010 midterms stand as a stark exception to that, but I don't know.
I think that I've never thought that that works.
I mean, just you've got to present people an alternative.
I mean, New York just had, what, eight years of abject meddling in the middle of everybody's life, liberalism, and they asked for even more of it.
They got Bloomberg telling him, I can't do this here, can't do that there, can't eat that there, can't do anything, can't think that, can't walk there, can't drive there.
And they said, give us even more by electing a socialist communist.
I'm not sure the theory holds up.
I mean, it's you can say that it is a strain of illustrating absurdity by being absurd.
But the problem is, this isn't illustrating absurdity.
This is canonizing it.
You know, I illustrate absurdity by being absurd, but this is a showbiz in that sense, and the humor of the bits we do to illustrate it, but nobody is governed by it.
12 years of bloom, sorry, 12 years of Bloomberg.
And if this theory that the best thing for conservatism is a bunch of liberals in power, then we should have elected whoever was running as the Republican or conservative in New York after 12 years.
But no, the people of New York said, not only do we like this, we want even more of it.
So I don't think the theory holds out.
George in Lynchburg, Virginia, you're next.
I'm glad you waited.
Welcome to the program, sir.
Thank you.
You know, George Will may be right, though.
When I worked in Germany during the 1980s, we had an expression.
If you want your kid to be a socialist, send him to an American university.
If you want him to be a capitalist, send him to the University of Moscow.
He would see what socialism was really like in Russia.
He would not see what capitalism was like in an American university.
Yeah.
Well, it was just an expression.
Mega Dittos from the Tea Party in sunny warm Lynchburg, Virginia.
Hey, you like rubbing it in, don't you?
You know what the temperature is where we are today?
You want to know what it is?
It's 80.
You look at all those wind chill maps, and we aren't even, we don't even have a color.
We're not purple, we're not blue, we're not red.
We're 80 degrees today.
And here you call.
I wasn't even going to mention it, but you call and you start rubbing it in.
We're going down to zero tonight, by the way.
Well, see, that's the price you pay.
You mentioned a minute ago about being blamed on talk radio.
Did you know that every shooter in the mass murders had one thing in common, and that was none of them were ever known to have listened to talk radio.
And maybe that's a way to predict violent behavior.
Somebody who doesn't listen to Rush Limbaugh.
I'd like that.
Folks, he's absolutely right about that.
But in every case, the media looked for a link to either me or the Tea Party or what have you.
You know, we predicted Obamacare.
I mean, when you did, we're just in lockstep with the truth, and you are too.
And the thing is, we predicted what would happen to Obamacare.
Can I talk to you about my niece who's on the Coast Guard ice cutter, the Polar Star?
They're heading on an emergency mission down to Antarctica right now.
There's ships down there, the Russians and the Chinese.
The Russians took in the global warming expedition.
They were 13 miles out in open water, and all of a sudden they're caught in ice.
And now the ice is so bad, it looks like it could actually crush the ships that are out there.
And when I was down to South America a couple of years ago, during what should have been the growing season, it was so unseasonably cold that crops were failing.
So down in the South, I know they're not experiencing any global warming.
Well, this polar start has three diesel engines and three gas turbine engines, produces over 100,000 horsepower, and it can break through 30 feet of solid ice.
Wow, 100,000 horsepower.
And your niece is on it.
Yeah, she's an officer in the Coast Guard.
We're just so proud of her.
She's a real no-nonsense, beautiful girl who is just trying to protect the environment.
I went to her graduation at the Coast Guard Academy last spring.
Yeah.
And Joe Biden was the commencement speaker.
And he was telling the Coast Guard: not only are you going to do what the old Coast Guard is known for, that is interdict drugs and terrorism and so on, but now you have to contend with man-made global warming.
And you could watch the cadets.
Their eyes were rolling.
It was sort of like, what is this?
Well, they are going to have to.
I mean, the people that run the hell armies out there saying global warming poses one of the greatest threats to national security.
I mean, they're all in it.
They're all in it.
Well, congratulations.
It's great to know that your niece, that you know somebody on this on the ship going down to rescue these lunatics.
Somebody has to do it.
I mean, they're human beings.
My question is: how many trees are we going to have to plant to compensate for the stupidity of these people on board the something for tomorrow, ladies and gentlemen?
It's in the New York Times: Success could cost you your health.
I'm not making it up.
The headline actually reads: Can upward mobility cost you your health?
The point of this is: success could harm you.
There is a cost to these resilient people who strive and make it.