RUSH: Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Teddy Kennedy, he yelled an awful lot. He yelled all the time. Sometimes he yelled and got out of control, and we’re told today how he was a ‘uniter’ and how he was a legislator. You know what? I actually want them to put Ted Kennedy’s name on the health care bill. I want ’em to do it. The DC elite just don’t get it. In fact, they don’t get the reaction to the coverage out there. They are in a totally different world from the rest of this country. I think one of the easiest, sure-fire ways to defeat the health care bill is to put his name on it. So I officially today, as host — only host — on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network, suggest and join my friends on the Democrat side of the aisle: ‘Yes, please name Obamacare after Ted Kennedy. Please do so. It’s only appropriate. Do it this week! Do it during the funeral. Do it during the memorial service. Do it while the nation’s attention is riveted.’ Ahem.
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RUSH: To South Windsor, Connecticut. Stewart, hello, sir. Nice to have you with us on the program.
CALLER: Yeah, Rush, you know, I’ll tell you, yesterday’s monologue, as I was listening to it, it was just brilliant, and not only brilliant, but accurate. And I said to myself, ‘There is no way the mainstream media is going to be able to report accurately on what Rush said. This is no way because that would make the health care system and what they’re trying to do look so poor. There’s just no way. Rush put ’em in a box,’ and sure enough, as you reported today from how they reported on you, they couldn’t do it. All they could say was, you were basically middle of the road.
RUSH: Yeah, and ‘tame.’ I was ‘restrained’ and ‘dialed back’ when I said I was not comfortable being critical of Senator Kennedy. Well, that’s very nice of you to say, Stewart. I appreciate that. You’re right. I knew that they would not pull any clips. The last thing they want to do is to make me look good, and the last thing they want to do is have any coverage of me that humanizes me against their devilish, demonic portrayal of me all of these years.
CALLER: May I ask you a quick question?
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: I think — and I would like you to comment. I don’t think Obama… I think he’s too narcissistic to let Kennedy’s name go on this bill. I think he thinks he could pull it through himself, and because of his narcissism, won’t want him on there — and, you know, to that Fox poll that Snerdley was talking about. I think the more Barack Obama talks about health care, the more people are angry about it. The less he talks about it now that he’s on vacation, I think people are letting it go away. I think he’s had you see his own worst enemy.
RUSH: Yeah, there’s no question that the more he talks the worse it gets, and Fox did do this poll today saying that the opposition to his health care plan has ‘stopped falling,’ which is the strangest way to word the results of a poll I have ever heard. But that’s what they said. As to your question about the narcissism of Obama, that is a great question. Because Obama, with health care, is trying to build a monument to himself in Washington. Obama wants to be FDR the Second. He wants to be the black FDR. And put Teddy Kennedy’s name on it…? (chuckles) Yeah, his ego is such that that might stand in his way.
I, frankly, am hoping, however, that they do name the health care bill after Ted Kennedy, and I’m hoping they do it in the Senate. Which was his body where he served — as George Will said, ‘for over one-fifth of the time the Constitution has been in existence.’ (laughing) Think of that. And the great thing about that is the Constitution is still there even after Ted Kennedy in the Senate for 52 years. But it’s threatened by the Most Merciful, The One Lord Barack Obama. That’s a good question. Would Obama go along with it being called Kennedycare, the Ted Kennedy Memorial Health Care Reform Act and blah, blah? (interruption) Well, now, I don’t know, Snerdley. Snerdley said, ‘Nobody’s going to remember the name of the bill. They’re going to remember Obama getting it done.’ Obama will see to that, yeah. But see, here’s another out for Obama.
If you put Kennedy’s name on the bill, when the thing turns into a disaster you blame him and there’s nothing he can do about it. ‘Oh, it’s the Ted Kennedy bill. It’s all screwed up. I had nothing to do with that bill. It’s the Ted Kennedy bill. We did that in honor of Senator Kennedy. That’s why it’s screwed up.’ (chuckles) Well, that’s a great question, Stewart. He is narcissist enough to be concerned about that. Speaking of naming the bill under Ted Kennedy, we have a State-Run Media montage here, day two: pushing health care for Kennedy. Here we have John King of CNN, Jessica Yellin of CNN, Roger Simon of Politico, David Gregory at NBC, David ‘Rodham’ Gergen at CNN, Brian Williams of NBC, Kelly O’Donnell at NBC, and Kiran Chetry at CNN all talking about the passing of Senator Kennedy and health care reform.
KING: There was a change in the political dynamic after President Kennedy’s assassination. Will there be a change in the health care dynamic after his passing?
YELLIN: Senator Kennedy’s death will inspire his colleagues in Congress to find a way to pass health care reform.
SIMON: If President Obama wants to carry the torch that the Kennedys had passed to him, President Obama’s going to have to pass health care.
GREGORY: …as the result of the Senator’s death, because he was such a champion for health care.
GERGEN: This may open a new window for Barack Obama to bring Democrats and Republicans back to the table in Teddy Kennedy’s memory.
O’DONNELL: Democrats are saying respect for Kennedy could change minds now. National sorrow has created political momentum before.
WILLIAMS: I received an e-mail today that said, ‘In lieu of flowers, let’s pass health care reform.’
CHETRY: To honor his memory, could lawmakers find the inspiration to reach across the aisle and get health care reform passed?
RUSH: Well, I want to throw my hat in this ring here, and I want to endorse the Kennedy health care bill as named. I want Ted Kennedy’s name on the bill. I think it would be a fitting tribute, a fitting memorial. It would point out the hypocrisy of the Democrats, because this bill has nothing to do with the health care he got. It had nothing to do with the struggle that he engaged in to live. Ted Kennedy wanted to survive; he wanted to live. There’s nothing about this bill that is emblematic of the way he went about his life and his health care. So it would be appropriate. They’re a bunch of hypocrites anyway, so put Ted Kennedy’s name on the bill. And that would make it even tougher for the thing to get public support. (interruption)
What is it, Snerdley, what is it? Well, they don’t need them. I know. This is a big myth. Why do they keep saying they want to get Republicans on this? They know it’s bad. They know it sucks. They want Republicans to be able to take the fall. They don’t want to go it alone ’cause they know nobody’s going to like this. They know we don’t like it now. They’re going to force it on us anyway. They want to be able to have fingers to point at Republicans, or Republicans to point fingers at, pure and simple. They don’t even need to fill Kennedy’s seat. They can do this and are already talking about doing with reconciliation, 51 votes. They don’t need to fill his seat. They’re going to anyway but they don’t need to. They don’t need Republicans.
The biggest pitfall out there is, sadly, Senator McCain. Because he’s trying to put together one of these Gang of 14 deals, he’s trying to broker bipartisan support for (doing McCain impression) ‘these need the reforms,’ minus the public option. And I know he said some good things about tort reform and all that, the Democrats will never go along with. But I were the Republicans, I’d just back out. I wouldn’t say anything, just don’t be a part of this. Let ’em put Ted Kennedy’s name on it. And run with it. But, you know, you got Straight Talk Express out there veering from one side of the road to the next and you never know where it’s going to end up and it’s frightening, folks. (chuckling) It’s frightening. I’m just remembering Chris Matthews saying, ‘Obama is the last Kennedy brother.’ The extinguished torch has been passed! Here’s Joe Biden on the Today Show today, Matt Lauer said, ‘Many people said he was the crucial ally to Obama as he attempts to get health care reform. What does his loss mean to that effort?’
BIDEN: Well, God willing, maybe his loss and all about him will be the catalyst to make people come around and begin to compromise to get something really important done.
RUSH: This is a Democrat disunity problem. Here, by the way, is one half of the waitress sandwich team: Chris Dodd, yesterday in East Haddam, Connecticut. He held a press conference to talk about the passing of Senator Kennedy, and a reporter said, ‘With Senator Kennedy’s passing, is this going to add urgency, spur passage of his health care bill, do you think?’
DODD: That’s what Senator Kennedy dedicated his life to. I’m dedicated to it in his memory. I will do everything I can, as long as I can stand in the United States Senate, to help us achieve that goal.
RUSH: Keep going. Keep going.
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RUSH: When it comes to the health care, why not pass a health care bill the American people want? Why not just do that and do it for Teddy? A liberal’s liberal, from the bluest of states. Seriously, folks, how elitist can you get? Do it for Ted Kennedy? Massachusetts got a health care bill that’s screwing up their health care. It’s screwing up their budget. They want to get rid of it and we don’t want it. Polls show we don’t want this bill. And Ted Kennedy was not our senator.