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Feb. 27, 2015 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:26
February 27, 2015, Friday, Hour #1
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Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 247 podcast.
Greetings once again to you, ladies and gentlemen, music lovers, thrill seekers, conversationalists all across the fruited plane.
It's Rush Limboy, it's Friday, and you know what that means.
Live from the Southern Command in Sunny South Florida.
It's open line Friday.
And here we are.
We've arrived at the end of another busy broadcast week.
And time now for open line Friday, which is an attempt to expand the freedom and liberty of callers on the phone.
Now, as you know, this program is not governed by the First Amendment except for me.
I am what's known as a benevolent dictator.
This program is tightly screened in terms of who gets on the air to say what.
And Monday through Thursday, you have talk about the news of the day, stuff that I'd be interested in so that I can sound interested and passionate and all that.
But on Friday, I throw all that out, and you can talk about anything.
I don't have to care about it.
I don't have to know about it.
I don't have to have heard about it.
That may be hard for you to do, but give it a shot.
The point is, whatever you want to talk about is uh is fair game.
It's an opportunity to we extend here, and it's done for many reasons.
A to give me a break, let you people carry the show at least one day a week.
Uh, and and then just to see what kind of creativity we have out there.
So have at it, telephone numbers 800 282 2882, and the uh email address, Ilrushbo at EIB net.com.
All right, I uh you know, I think I'm gonna have to stop my hobby.
Reading the tech blogs, because I just got profoundly depressed.
Last night.
Problem is when you read the tech blogs, you can't avoid their political comments as well.
I mean, it's all thrown in the mix.
You know, I read the tech blogs because I'm one of the latest on the gadgets I like.
I want to hear the latest rumors on what's coming with the things I care about.
And in order to get to that, you have to read all the other posts that these people put up, and it's just it's just depressing, folks.
I I don't know uh normally this kind of stuff doesn't get to me because it's it's not a shock, it's not a surprise.
But the uh the ignorance coupled with arrogance and hubris from some of these tech bloggers on the FCC's vote yesterday on on net neutrality.
One of the most disturbing comments, and it disturbs me because these are young people in the millennials, and they think they know everything, like all young people do.
I mean, that's there's nothing new about that, and I'm well aware and familiar with it.
They think they know everything.
They've got a lot of arrogance, a lot of hubris, a lot of conceit.
And they don't know diddly squat.
They are supporting the erosion of their own liberty, and they think they're doing the exact I one if I saw this once, I said two or three times.
Massive landmark legislation was created yesterday.
There was no legislation.
What happened yesterday is technically unconstitutional.
FCC does not have the authority to do what they did.
Rewriting telecommunications law falls under the rubric of Congress.
And it just so happens this Congress has pretty much shirked its duty and responsibility in this regard.
This Congress is not objecting when its power is usurped, either by Obama or a bureaucracy, or a cabinet agency or what have you.
Now I understand all that, but just to read these people talking, they think it was legislation, and you might think that's a nitpicking point.
But it's not a nitpicking point.
It goes to understanding exactly how things happen in this country, legally, constitutionally, how laws become laws.
And what we had was across the board, all these young people automatically, blindly, happily, arrogantly supporting this power grab.
And thinking it was going to expand their freedom for one reason the telecommunications companies are gonna get spanked.
That's what they think it means.
And it just the reason it's depressing is to see this kind of ignorance among educated people.
And I know it's out there.
Don't misunderstand.
It's not low, this is new.
I understand it.
It just happened to hit me last night.
I'll get over this by Sunday.
If I'm able to hit one 275 yards off of T. I'll forget about this.
But it just it just got to me last night.
They're just surrounded by so much ignorance, surrounded by so much stupidity.
I don't even know if stupidity is the word, but it's dangerous is the uh is the point.
And coming as it does in the midst of every other government expansion and takeover that hasn't worked and hasn't fulfilled its promise.
You know, Obamacare is not what it was going to be.
The stimulus is not what it was going to be.
Nothing that Obama has promised, nothing the Democrat Party's promised, nothing the American left has enacted, has even come close to accomplishing the goals they all had for it, promised us.
None of it, and yet, in the face of this, in the midst of this dramatic failure after failure after failure, resides never-ending hope that this time they're going to get it right.
Now, in fact, I don't even think it's that far.
I don't think they even recognize that what's happened here to heretofore is a failure.
It's just this this blind trust and faith in government is uh I I I've never had it.
When I was a kid, I did not have all this kind of idealism.
I did not think the government was the great equalizer.
I wasn't looking for a great equalizer.
I thought I was the equalizer.
I thought what happened to me was up to me.
I didn't run around wanting somebody to punish my enemies.
I didn't want to punish my enemies other than by succeeding against them.
And all of this, I'm I'm fully aware it's the education system.
I've I've explained all this before, and I understand it.
And you I didn't find I didn't find anybody in the tech blogger community who is worried about this.
I found unanimous support for this.
And wide held belief that it was legislation.
Wide hill belief it's legitimate law.
And you know, Verizon had what I think is one of the most clever reactions to it.
Verizon, who these people hate.
Comcast, Verizon, ATT, you name it, they are reviled.
They are despised simply because they exist.
Verizon's press release announcing its reaction was all in Morse code.
Because what we've done here is take ourselves back to regulations and a mindset that existed in 1934.
We are enacting rules to govern the internet that trace back and rooted back to 1934.
So Verizon thought that to illustrate that point, they would have their press release in Morse code with a translation underneath, oh man, what are they just ripped to shreds?
It wasn't funny, it was insulting, it was backwards, it was typical, it was an example of what a bunch of mean SOBs Verizon is, and it's a thin skin, how they can't take it just to it was just stunning.
I've got to stop reading these things.
I've got, I mean, you know, I mean I've always been worried about my own intelligence being adversely affected by hanging around stupid people.
It can happen.
And and and this is um it's just disappointing.
I have such high hopes for uh for young people to uh to figure it out.
And and these are the same people that just can't stand the government spying on them.
The same people who are more animated about that than anything, and the same government that they don't like spying on them has just enabled their ability to do so even more, plus other things with this.
And they don't see it because, and this is the this is the great lesson of liberalism.
What has what were the reason this has succeeded is because the left has had great success attacking capitalism and successful companies, treating them and having them thought of as the enemy that need to be destroyed and cut back.
And there's only one company that's allowed to make profit in the tech world.
And that's Apple, and even then they're not happy about it.
At any rate, uh the Verizon statement in Morse code protesting net neutrality ruling is hilarious.
I mean, it really the whole thing to illustrate the point.
And there's all kinds of reasoned, intelligent commentary about what's wrong with this.
It's easily discovered, it's easily found, and it makes total sense.
And it's all being uh entirely and totally full-fledged ignored.
And I just I just had to get that off my chest because enacted legislation.
I don't know.
It's just disappointing, folks.
And I should know better, I know because this is the way the youth of America have been treated, educated, and it's unrealistic of me to expect a different outcome.
That's the that's just the bottom line.
Now, there are a couple things we didn't get to yesterday that I promised we would get to today, and one of them involves the upcoming Supreme Court case involving subsidies and Obamacare and the state exchanges versus the federal government and its exchange.
The oral arguments are going to come in early March.
The decision will come in uh June, probably sometime.
And what's at stake here is there are at present a lot of people, don't know what the number is, but it's in the millions, who are receiving subsidies to buy Obamacare, who, if you read Obamacare and apply a letter in a law to it, are not entitled to them.
Obamacare, as written, says, and it was put in there on purpose.
This was written on purpose to put political pressure on governors.
That the only way citizens of this country could apply for and qualify for subsidies to help them pay for Obamacare because it's so damn expensive, was to register and sign up through a state exchange.
Well, not all the states set up exchanges.
John Gruber, who insulted everybody, tell me how stupid they are and how they use people's stupidity to pass Obamacare purposely, it's explained on countless occasions, that they did it this way.
They required governors, states to set up the exchange because they they thought the alternative would put so much pressure on governors that they would all sign up.
In other words, people that live in states that do not have exchanges are not legally entitled to subsidies.
That was written in on purpose.
It's not a mistake.
It was something that was not something that they forgot about and left out, it was not something they weren't thinking.
They did this on purpose.
And the governors didn't buckle.
So there are a lot of states that do not have exchanges, and a lot of people that do not legally qualify for Obamacare subsidies.
So what the regime did was set up a subsidy program for the federal exchange, healthcare.gov.
That is against the law, if that matters anymore.
It is not permitted under the actual law of Obamacare.
It's not permitted.
You can only get a subsidy via state exchange.
Well, the Fed said we can't have this.
This is unfair, it's unequal, defeats a whole purpose.
We can't the subsidies is the trick.
The subsidies is how everybody thinks they can afford this.
Getting a government handout, getting a government gift, why that's key to making this work.
So they started offering subsidies at healthcare.gov, and now there's a lawsuit on this.
And oral arguments are coming up.
And these people are getting subsidies.
There are people currently receiving subsidies when they buy health insurance, they're getting it illegally.
And so where we are now with this, what happens if the court finds against the regime and does find that the regime is in violation of the law and that these subsidies must stop.
There is a body of thought out there that this is exactly what the regime wants.
Right?
And I will explain why.
And it makes perfect sense that they would not be upset at all if they lose this case.
And I'll explain why when we get back.
Don't go away from it.
Open line Friday, Rush Limbaugh and a cutting edge of societal evolutions, Ben Sasse, or SAS, I don't know how you pronounce it's SAS.
Yeah, he's a Republican senator from Nebraska.
His name is SASS.
It's S-A-S-S-E pronounce it SAS.
All right.
The Supreme Court case we're talking about here is called King v.
Burwell.
That's how the legal beagles describe it.
It's actually King versus Burwell.
But the elites say King v.
Burwell.
Take your pick.
It's going to have oral arguments March 4th.
It is very important.
It challenges the legality of 75% of Obamacare.
The subsidies that the federal government has been paying to health insurers on behalf of people in the 37 states that chose not to participate in Obamacare without these subsidies, people can't afford this.
They were never going to be able to afford this.
This is an abomination from day one.
So they're not going to be able to afford it out of their pocket, but they'll pay higher taxes for it.
They just won't know how it's going to be applied.
But it's going to cost everybody more money.
It already is.
37 states opted out.
And so the federal government had to move in and start providing subsidies for people in 37 states.
And we all want the court to decide in favor of us.
We want Obama and the regime found to be in violation of their own law.
However, when that happens, if that happens, what happens to the people in 37 states and their subsidies?
If the court rules that those subsidies are illegal, then what happens?
See, the regime is very, very, I think the regime's looking forward to this.
The regime is hoping that those subsidies are taken away.
And you know what'll happen next?
You know what happens then if there's not a plan in place.
What'll happen next is the Republicans will be attacked for having caused this.
The Republicans will be blamed for taking health care away from 75% of the American people.
The Republicans will be blamed however many people are not going to get dialysis now, or however many people are not going to get whatever it is, life-saving treatment and support systems that they are on.
The Republicans are going to be blamed for taking health care out of the hands of the American people.
And the regime, I think, would love this.
And so what is happening at the moment, the Republicans, God help us on this.
The Republicans are strategizing on a way to continue those subsidies until they figure out how to deal with this.
If they win the case.
And Mr. Sass here, the senator from Nebraska, says the GOP needs a PR plan and they need it fast.
If the justices prohibit the Treasury Department granting subsidies to patients living in states without these exchanges, then the fine print that regulators wrote to protect people means that big insurers will be allowed to drop Obamacare patients mid-year.
And we're talking about a lot of patients.
Cynics in the regime might be banking on precisely that.
The Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell claimed in Senate testimony earlier this month that the regime has no plans.
and No plans to help the 7 million citizens who could lose their coverage in the weeks following such a ruling.
And here's the way that gets translated.
Chemotherapy turned off for maybe 12,000 people.
Dialysis going dark for 10,000 people.
And on and on, and I mean a horror story after horror story, and every one of them on television.
And every one of them being blamed on the Republicans for hating Obama and hating Obamacare, being anti-black, anti-immigrant, anti-woman.
So the Republicans are trying to figure out what to do here if they win it.
Hi, welcome back.
Great to have you.
Rush Limbaugh, the EIB network, it's open line Friday.
Now, Ben Sass, the Senator of Nebraska has an idea.
He has a proposed solution for this.
And we're imagining here winning.
This is where we're getting favorable Supreme Court ruling, which is going to take subsidies away from 37 people of 37 states.
It's just going to take their health care away from them.
And as we've discussed, the drive-by's and the media, the regime would no doubt be thrilled at this.
Because remember, all of this is this health care is not about taking care of people.
It's not providing for people.
It's not about illness and making people well, it's about control.
I know that sounds extreme, but don't doubt me.
And I'm here to tell you, you know as well as I do.
37 people in 37 states have their health care taken away, and the regime's going to be happy, never let a crisis go to waste.
Where's the compassion in that?
They're going to see a political opportunity to once again blame the Republicans, which they hope will have a very effective negative impact on their presidential chances in 2016.
So when Obama turns its guns on the holdout states and their 37 governors, the political pressure to adopt Obamacare will be crippling even after the Supreme Court rules in our favor, supposedly.
And Senator Sass here openly writes that he fears that most governors will fold in the face of a victory at the Supreme Court.
Now the victory if the Supreme Court, if I may make a temporary departure, the victory would be profound for upholding the rule of law, limiting the administration, upholding the Constitution.
What they are doing in so many areas is outside the Constitution.
Not just Obamacare, but immigration, the FCC, net neutrality, practically everything.
And Obama is out bragging about how he is expanding his authorities.
He said this at the MSNBC Telemundo town hall meeting on Wednesday night.
He's bragging about how his authorities are being expanded, all the while saying he's not violating any statutes.
His authorities are expanding under the rubric of prosecutorial discretion, which is BS.
And he needs to be reined in.
I have no idea what the court's going to do.
Frankly, I don't think we're going to win this just based on experience.
You know, my old adage, experience guided by intelligence.
And here's the question.
Is it reasonable to think that something that hasn't happened is going to happen?
Or is it more reasonable to think that something that has happened is going to happen again?
What I mean by that, the Supreme Court already punted its first opportunity to find Obamacare unconstitutional.
And there are some people who think that the court took this case because it realizes it made a mistake back then, and is going to use this case to correct that prior mistake, and they're going to rule these exchanges, federal exchanges, unconstitutional.
I don't think the court ever admits to making mistakes.
I don't think that's what those people in the court think.
I don't think they think that way.
They don't run around that kind of self introspection.
I think it's more reasonable to assume that if they looked the other way once, they'll look the other way again.
But if it comes down strictly to an interpretation of the law, the regime doesn't have a chance here.
If this were a sane world, and if it were a relatively clean, uncluttered, uncorrupted world, the regime wouldn't have a prayer here.
They have violated the Constitution in no man how many ways.
Not just the establishment of these exchanges in violation of the law.
And the court finding thus would be profound.
It would be great.
And now look, in the face of a major and necessary victory, upholding the Constitution, the Republicans are worried sick.
How such a victory could destroy them.
And they may have a point.
Knowing full well how the regime will play it with their buddies in the media.
I just think it's important to point out that the regime is not going to be unhappy at all if they lose this.
More people thrown into chaos and more opportunity to blame the Republicans for it.
A year and a half out from the next presidential race.
So Senator Sass's idea.
He says he's he fears that most governors will fold, and that we've already seen some Republican governors finesse their principles to expand Medicaid and secure extra federal money.
The new pressure will be even more acute.
And if the governor's cave, Obamacare's never going away, he writes.
Obamacare's command and control regime will reduce families' choices, thwart innovation, and chart a path of European-style debt and rationed access to health.
All that's true.
And then he says it doesn't have to be this way.
He proposes a two-part strategy to avoid snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
First, in the event that the Supreme Court strikes down the subsidies as illegal, fines against the regime.
He says that Congress must be prepared to offer immediate targeted protection to the people hurt by the regime's reckless disregard for the rule of law in the first place.
Meaning, okay, there's a bunch of people out there.
People patients have signed up through healthcare.gov who have subsidies who should not have them.
They did not legally qualify.
Violation of the law, but they've got their subsidies.
And subsidies are enabling them to have the all-important health insurance, which allows them to have the all-important health care.
And a ruling a victory would force it to be taken away.
So Governor or Senator Sass says his two-part strategy, in the event the court strikes down the subsidies, Congress must be prepared to offer immediate, targeted protection to those people hurt by the regime.
Obamacare took these patients hostage.
Conservatives have a duty to save them.
Now, that's okay.
I'll go for that.
You might, they don't think they're being held hostage.
They think they're getting subsidies and they think they're getting health care and they think they're getting insurance, and they're all happy as they can be.
But they are being held hostage because what they have is illegal.
They have government welfare benefits, essentially, that are illegal.
And if the court rules a certain way, they're going to be taken away.
So Senator Sass says that within a week of this victory, if it happens, he will introduce legislation that uses the 1985 COBRA law as a temporary model to protect those people harmed by Obamacare.
Cobra offers workers who've lost their jobs the option to keep their health coverage for 18 months.
So Congress should offer people who lose insurance the ability to keep the coverage they picked with financial assistance for 18 transitional months.
This would simultaneously avert the full-scale implementation of Obamacare in these 37 suddenly desperate states, and it would help protect suffering patients entangled in the court's decision to strike down illegal subsidy payments.
Second, he says that Republicans need to unify around a specific set of constructive longer-term solutions and in turn the 2016 presidential election to a referendum on the two competing visions of health care.
Now Cobra, you still have to pay for it.
That's the thing about COBRA.
Uh you you're allowed to pay for it at the current price.
It's being made available to you.
If you lose your gig.
And he's talking about subsidizing that we're just going to trade subsidies.
He's not he's not going to propose that these people who might lose their subsidies in 37 states now have to pay for it for 18 months.
He's talking about a new set of temporary subsidies offered by the Republicans to rescue these people who will they're going to try to make the case that it's been Obamacare that abandoned them, not the Supreme Court, not Republicans.
That's going to be the battle setup.
Andy, in an effort to win the battle in the minds and hearts of the American people.
Hey, it's not us that took the subsidies away from you.
You were never legally entitled to them in the first place.
The court was simply upholding a law.
The regime never should have provided them to you in the first place.
But we are here to say today.
We're going to pre-keep you in role for 18 months, and we're going to make it temporary, and in these 18 months, we're going to come up with a plan to fix all of this and use it as a competing vision against Obamacare that Senator Sass hopes would become a central part of a presidential campaign.
What's your one takeaway from this, Mr. Snerdley?
What is your one takeaway from this?
The one takeaway is that after the Supreme Court, this is now all hypothetical here, but after the Supreme Court, if they find against the regime and the subsidies are cut off, who's coming in to save the day?
Republicans.
With what?
Subsidies.
And they think there's no other way around this.
So the whole concept of government subsidies is doubled down on by Republicans.
I don't I don't know of another way off the top of my head, but at some point the 18 months COBRA, it goes away.
And there has to be a new program set up to replace the expiring coverage that people get via COBRA.
Just keep in mind, the regime wouldn't mind if all this happened.
I think they wouldn't—not only would they not mind, they may want this to happen.
They may want this kind of chaos.
They probably already have made deals.
They probably already have found, say, people that are on dialysis in the 37 states with federal illegal subsidies.
And they're already made deals with this patient.
We're going to feature your story when you lose your dialysis in June when the court rules.
They've got they're going to have them ready to go.
Look what the Republicans have done now.
Their hatred of Obama is so boundless that they're willing to let patients die in order to deny Obama the success.
I can hear it all now.
And that's what the regime wants.
You're going to take a timeout here, my friends.
Don't go away.
We'll be right back.
Get to your phone calls.
We always do in hour one of Open Line Friday.
It is Open Line Friday, Rush Limbaugh, America's real.
Anchorman.
And this is John in Orange, New Jersey, as we kick it off.
John Gray to have you on the program, sir.
Hello.
Hey, Rush.
How are you, my friend?
Absolute pleasure.
Thank you very much, sir.
Appreciate that.
You know, every night I'll put the news on and I'll, you know, and I see stories day after day.
And it makes me shake my head and say, you know, what is happening to our country?
Can I can I ask you a question here?
You say every night you put the news on.
What news?
What time do you turn on what news?
Well, uh, I put Fox News on, and honestly, I will put Fox News on at six o'clock and watch Brett Bear.
And I'll specifically look at the scroll on the bottom of the screen.
Right, the uh ticker.
The ticker.
Because and actually that's a good question, yes, because what is the news?
Yeah.
But anyway, so I have it on last night, and I see this picture don't know on the bottom of the screen.
And I honestly had to take a double take when I saw it.
And I see the uh the announcement on there from Facebook that uh they needed to add a um a fill in the blank option for when you sign up for Facebook now to identify your gender.
And then it's it because the previous fifty-eight existing options weren't sufficient.
And you know simple guy.
Uh yeah, maybe you maybe I'm clinging to my gun.
No, no, hey, no, I'm not gonna cut it.
No, no, no.
I just want to make I hear you're at fifty-eight possible existing options for gender.
Correct.
You sure it's gender and not race.
Uh gender.
I I I I didn't Man, what have I been missing?
Well, what that's what I'm thinking.
So anyway, I've 58 different gender options.
Well, and I will make a wager with you, Rush.
Not that I'm a gambler, but if you go on and query, go on um USA Today or anywhere and look at the options.
If you've ever heard of half of them, I'll buy you lunch.
That might surprise you.
Uh uh.
I Rush uh I'd like to tell you I think I'm a pretty sharp dude.
I've never heard of three quarters of them.
Never.
And again, I I I just had to shake my head on it.
Well, give me a couple.
I don't have them right in front of me.
Well, give me an example.
I mean, there are just you know, it's I I guess I'm not gonna be able to do that.
This is not this is not good caller performance.
I mean, they call and talk about something, and you don't have any examples of it.
That's why I am not a radio program host like yourself.
I I did not uh I'm not gonna do it.
Well, I've always said this is not as easy as it looks, uh not to try it at home, but you don't even remember 58.
You know what that was is straight male and straight female still an option?
Uh I I believe so.
I think those are one and two.
And then you know, and then uh there was a whole bunch of buy, and then there was side.
I think there was one that said ghostly or I I saw I I was scrolled through them and I'm like, wait a minute.
Okay, well here, I've got some of the options.
I have even while speaking to you, I have let my fingers tickle the keyboard.
Androgyne, gender fluid, intersex, neither, transgender.
Those are just some of the fifty-eight.
Do you know what an androgyne is?
No, I'm still I'm still.
Do you know how to spell it?
Do you know how to spell it?
No.
It's A-N-D-R-O-G-Y-N-E, and G Y in a guy and uh you know what that so andro means Andro put andro and giant together.
What do you get?
Hmm.
I get confused.
I get confused.
Well, what is gender fluid?
That was the one that got me.
How could you be gender?
I mean, what is a what is it, depending on which way the wind blows?
No, gender f fluid is a fluid.
It's uh it could one of two meanings.
It's either liquid, a fluid, or it floats and has a different meaning from day to day.
Right.
That's what I mean.
Which way the wind blows.
Right.
Today I'm this, tomorrow I'm that.
Then you've got intersex and transgender.
Yeah, it's just been handed.
I've right here.
Formerly Nicotine stained fingers, I have all fifty-eight, and they're alphabetized.
Agender, androgynous.
You know what androgynous is, right?
Uh uh.
That means you can't tell by looking.
That means you don't know.
You could be either.
Depends on the viewpoint of the person looking at you.
Uh-huh.
Androgynous it just means there's no way to tell.
I mean, that's a that's the simplest way to define it.
There is cis C I S. There is CIS gender, CIS female, C I S male, C I S man, C I S woman, cisgender female, cisgender male.
What is CIS and cisgender?
Does anybody know?
There you go.
So now you have to buy me once, you know.
How about male to female?
That means you've had a chop a dick off of me.
Male to female.
MTF.
Neither.
Neither.
It means you don't have a gender.
Fifty-eight different options on Facebook.
Transfeminine is male to female.
It's just it's I guess it's multiple choice, and choose as many as you want.
Back after this, folks.
Folks, you know, it's ever since Obama, these Um these different registration forms.
It's not just gender now that they have all these different options.
Look at the different options you have under race.
But even at Facebook, with these with these 58 options, there were some Facebook members that were angry that they weren't described in these 58, and they demanded a blank form to fill in what how they identified themselves.
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