{"id":25791,"date":"2007-05-31T01:01:01","date_gmt":"2011-05-19T05:25:31","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-05-19T05:25:31","modified_gmt":"2011-05-19T05:25:31","slug":"freedom_and_optimism_not_collectivism_made_america_great","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2007\/05\/31\/freedom_and_optimism_not_collectivism_made_america_great\/","title":{"rendered":"Freedom and Optimism, Not Collectivism, Made America Great"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

RUSH: You think that this Hillary idea of restricting corporate pay and giving the public access to it and veto power, you think that\u2019s ever going to happen? Our old buddy Barney Frank in the House of Representatives is proposing the legislation that she\u2019s talking about in the House, to rein in CEO pay, and they\u2019ve already done this, by the way. One of the first things that Clinton did in 1993 as part of his massive tax increase, was to limit the deduction that corporations could take on executive pay over $1 million. He exempted athletes and entertainers of course, just the evil CEOs. You know what the result of that was? Hello, stock options, and hello bonuses — and guess where stock options led us? That led us to all kinds of other legislation. They\u2019re never, ever do get this right. But there\u2019s something else at work here. You know, when you hear Democrats talking about ‘fairness\u2019 — which is an elusive concept. It is impossible to implement fairness countrywide. It\u2019s as complex and elusive as trying to down something like climate change and global warming and find a singular explanation for it, such as manmade carbon dioxide. It\u2019s just absurd. <\/p>\n

‘Fairness,\u2019 to Democrats, is misery spread equally. Are they not all miserable? Are they not all unhappy? You don\u2019t see them smiling — and when they do smile, when Mrs. Clinton smiles, it looks forced. They\u2019re not having a good time. They\u2019re not enjoying their lives, and their supporters certainly aren\u2019t. They get up miserable. They get up angry. They get up filled with rage. Who would want to live that way? They tell us then that we\u2019re miserable and that we should be miserable, and so they want to spread the misery, and that equals ‘fairness.\u2019 Nobody should be happy if everybody\u2019s not happy. We\u2019ve heard straightforward pronouncements by Al-Qaeda, be it from bin Laden or al-Zawahiri, take your pick — Ahmadinejad in Iran — straightforward pronouncements of what their intentions for us are. It doesn\u2019t seem to faze a large portion of the American public. Have you ever asked yourself why? Well, some of it has to be due to the security that we have enjoyed since 9\/11, because somebody is taking it seriously, and his name is George W. Bush! Enough Americans do realize the stakes to continue to support the man who is taking what these enemies of ours say seriously. <\/p>\n

Some people in this country are not so far removed from 9\/11, and they know what actions need to be taken to keep us safe. In the meantime, an increasing number of average, ordinary Democrats think 9\/11 was an ‘inside job.\u2019 It\u2019s totally irrational, but they\u2019re there, and they believe it. So when somebody likes Mrs. Clinton comes along and starts talking about — or any Democrat, in fact. You know, when Hillary goes around and talks about ‘we\u2019re all in this together.\u2019 Yeah, we\u2019re all in the misery together, and big government is the cure for this, and redistribution of wealth and opportunity. Why that sells to certain people is because, A, they\u2019re miserable. B, they\u2019re failures. They\u2019ve failed to make it at least as far as their dreams had carried them, and so most people never blame themselves for their own shortcomings or problems. It\u2019s always somebody else\u2019s fault. It\u2019s always some other entity\u2019s problem. It\u2019s the neighbor\u2019s fault, whoever. Most people, very rarely when trying to assess their problems, start with themselves. They\u2019re not honest about it. It\u2019s Bush\u2019s fault that I\u2019m miserable, or it\u2019s Limbaugh\u2019s fault. It\u2019s conservatives\u2019 fault, or whatever they come up with. It\u2019s inane, but they come up with these things. <\/p>\n

Some of them have forgotten what built this country, what allows this country to lead the world. Some of them know and resent that we lead the world. They resent out the country was built, because it\u2019s led to their misery. They don\u2019t think that they\u2019re factors. They don\u2019t think they\u2019re that important. They think that life\u2019s an excrement sandwich, and some days all they get\u2019s mayonnaise on it. So they\u2019re out there, and they want everybody else to be miserable. ‘We\u2019re all in this together.\u2019 How else can somebody entertain the thought that we all ought to be miserable if they have forgotten or if they have never been taught what it was that built the country? We\u2019ve got growing wages across the board, despite this illegal immigration stuff that\u2019s going on, prosperity, GDP, stock market, whatever measure. I know the first quarter growth rate of the economy was stagnant. You have spikes like that, but my gosh, folks! My parents would not any more understand my life… You know what my dad was…? When I got out of radio when I was 29, I figured that was about the fifth time I\u2019d been fired, ‘Well, if I haven\u2019t made it playing top 40 records when I\u2019m 28 or 29, I\u2019d better get out of it because, you know, it\u2019s a teenage market.\u2019<\/p>\n

So I went to work for the Royals. When I lost my last radio job, I was making something like $22,000 or $23,000 a year. I was out of work for three months. I decided what I want to do, and I was in Kansas City, and I liked living there, so a friend of mine at the Kansas City Royals said, ‘Why don\u2019t you come work for us? We need a group sale director.\u2019 Okay, I got $12,000 a year to start at age 29. I called my dad. My dad could not have been happier. God bless him. He thought radio was a waste of time. He never forced me out of it because I quit everything else prior to that. I was a Boy Scout. I was a tenderfoot for a year in the Boy Scouts! All you gotta do is join to be a tenderfoot. I got nothing done. My first camp-out I got the goldbrick award because I was just a bump on a log. I didn\u2019t do diddly-squat. I quit everything — except baseball, Little League baseball. But that was just vocational stuff. So he never pulled me out of radio, but they were constantly worried. ‘Where is playing Donnie Osmond records going to lead our son? Nowhere! What\u2019s the social relevance?\u2019<\/p>\n

So when I called and told him that I was joining the Kansas City Royals, ah, he was ecstatic. Twelve thousand dollars a year, and this is 1979. He said son, ‘If you play your cards right, and you be there 30 years, you may make $50,000 and get a car, company car.\u2019 His formative experience was the Great Depression, and World War II, and if you didn\u2019t get a college degree (which I don\u2019t have) you didn\u2019t have a chance. That was just his world. He was trying to be a good father. He was ecstatic. After five years I left the Royals making $17,000 a year. I got a thousand-dollar-a-year raise every year, and went back into radio, and he started getting worried all over again. But I was just pursuing my passion. The point is, my father would no more relate to my life today — he\u2019d be thrilled by it, don\u2019t misunderstand — and I think, you know, we\u2019ve always had arguments in this society about, ‘Well, is this the generation that\u2019s not going to do as well its parents?\u2019 We are nowhere near that yet, but the misery index crowd would love for you to believe that that\u2019s the case. You know, over the course of my career, people have come up to me and sought advice on getting into radio, and I said, ‘Well, the worst thing you could do is go talk to people who have failed at it, because they\u2019ll tell you that you shouldn\u2019t do it, that the business will eat you up and spit you out. Make sure you talk to people who have succeeded at it.\u2019<\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to run into people who\u2019ll tell you won\u2019t be able to do something. You can find people to tell you you can\u2019t do something, because many of them don\u2019t want you to if they\u2019ve failed at it. It\u2019ll make \u2019em feel bad. You can always find negativism. You can always find pessimism. You can always find these things. But the opportunities in this country today are profoundly better, and yet people do not grasp it. They don\u2019t grasp it. They don\u2019t understand it. In fact, people wondered why the news of the economy was not a factor in the \u201906 election. I think one of the reasons for that is people now just demand and expect a roaring economy. There\u2019s no appreciation for it. There is an expectation of it — and when we have a downturn, that\u2019s when there\u2019s hell to pay. But no more will there be any laudatory congratulations for a perceived politician who has brought prosperity. (interruption) Well, when a Democrat does it, the media will trump it back up again and try to create — but there\u2019s this expectation, our expectations have risen, which is fine, but coupled with that is the fact that people just have lost touch with how this country was built. We\u2019ve got growing wages across the board. We\u2019ve blown records out of the water in employment; life expectancy is growing every year. <\/p>\n

We didn\u2019t just get here by accident. We got here by virtue of a distinct American culture, and all of this is happening while the Drive-By Media and some liberal Democrats are out there telling everybody how miserable they are. ‘It\u2019s time for a change. We can\u2019t continue to go on this way,\u2019 and it burns me up when I hear this. It burns me up not for political reasons. (I mean, that\u2019s a given. ) It burns me up because I\u2019m into inspiring people. I\u2019m into motivating people. I\u2019m almost a cheerleader for this country. All conservatives are. All we want is the greatest country we can have, and we know how we got here and we know how we going to stay here and how we\u2019re going to grow, and it isn\u2019t running around talking about collectivism and having the public have veto rights over CEO pay while Mrs. Clinton hitches rides on a corrupt business owner\u2019s jet while hoarding her own millions that she admits to having. That isn\u2019t what made the country great. Hillary said the middle class made the country great. I had this quote earlier today. Hillary said the middle class made the country great. I don\u2019t disagree with that, but I disagree with the tone and the implication of her statement. It\u2019s an attack on achievers. It\u2019s an attack on the wealthy. <\/p>\n

I\u2019ll tell you what made the country great. It\u2019s the I who make this country work. <\/p>\n

I don\u2019t care if they\u2019re rich, middle class, third our fourth quintile. It\u2019s the people that make this country great, not government, and not government policies, and not government regulations. It is the freedom that we all acknowledge we have that allows us to pursue whatever our dreams and ambitions are, as unfettered as any people in the history of civilization have ever been. That\u2019s what sets us apart from all other countries in the history of human civilization, and it\u2019s the liberals who are trying to look at this prosperity right in the eye — which is right out in front of our faces every day — and tell us we should be miserable, that it\u2019s unfair, that it\u2019s not right, that it\u2019s not going to last, and this all needs to be torn down. The fact that there are people who are running around panting with their tongues out (panting) lapping all that up, is a testament to the fact that if you browbeat people long enough and consistently enough with how miserable they are, and you blame other people for their misery and you get them thinking that a magical government program or a singular politician is going to come along and make them happy, you can sell it, and that\u2019s exactly what they\u2019ve done. It flies in the face of what is right in front of everybody\u2019s eyes to see. Just like people have the freedom and the ability and the affluence to ignore the threats from Al-Qaeda and Ahmadinejad. <\/p>\n

‘Well, let \u2019em threaten. We\u2019re the United States! There\u2019s nothing is going to happen. We haven\u2019t had another attack since 9\/11.\u2019 <\/p>\n

Why? Do you think that is, accidental? I guarantee you Mrs. Clinton hasn\u2019t had anything to do with keeping the country safe, and neither has John Edwards and neither has Barack Obama and neither has John Kerry. They have done everything they can to undermine this country\u2019s security by undermining our attempts at protecting ourselves in foreign theaters of war such as Afghanistan and Iraq.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Something else I\u2019ve noticed out there — and I don\u2019t know if you have, but all of a sudden we have Barack Obama now entering the policy arena. He\u2019s not just uttering platitudes and bromides. Now he\u2019s got this universal health care plan, or this health care plan. They say Obama is getting serious now. His health care plan basically is raise taxes on the rich, and you have Hillary out there with her collectivism, and that\u2019s basically it. What are the other Democrats saying? I don\u2019t know what\u2019s Biden saying about anything, not that it matters, but I don\u2019t know what he\u2019s saying. I don\u2019t know what Chris Dodd is saying. I don\u2019t know what Bill Richardson is saying. But if those guys want to get noticed they better start talking socialism, because that\u2019s what the Drive-By Media is going to promote, because that\u2019s fair. ‘It\u2019s fair and it\u2019s equitable, Mr. Limbaugh. It\u2019s equitable! It\u2019s the only way we can survive as a nation with pure happiness and fairness is socialism, collectivism. We don\u2019t like those terms, but that\u2019s what it is.\u2019 That\u2019s the voice of the New Castrati. <\/line><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: You think that this Hillary idea of restricting corporate pay and giving the public access to it and veto power, you think that\u2019s ever going to happen? Our old buddy Barney Frank in the House of Representatives is proposing the legislation that she\u2019s talking about in the House, to rein in CEO pay, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nFreedom and Optimism, Not Collectivism, Made America Great - The Rush Limbaugh Show<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2007\/05\/31\/freedom_and_optimism_not_collectivism_made_america_great\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Freedom and Optimism, Not Collectivism, Made America Great - The Rush Limbaugh Show\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"RUSH: You think that this Hillary idea of restricting corporate pay and giving the public access to it and veto power, you think that\u2019s ever going to happen? 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