RUSH: So what do we have here? We have Obamacare. And the real sticking point in the House of Representatives — there is one that triumphs over all — is abortion. Obama says he wants the bill on his desk by when? Easter. Therefore, the way to characterize this, President Obama and the Democrats in a showdown over abortion on Easter. Showdown over abortion on Easter. That’s reducing Obamacare to its essence. Here’s Pelosi this morning on Capitol Hill at her weekly press briefing.
PELOSI: I feel very confident that the up-or-down vote on the majority rule proposal that will come to the House will satisfy members’ concerns about the Senate bill.
GIBBS: Notice she does not say she has the votes. If you’re confident, vote today, Madam Speaker. Now, what is this? Let’s break this down. ‘I feel very confident that the up-or-down vote on the majority rule proposal that will come to the House will satisfy members’ concerns about the Senate bill.’ What is she talking about? The majority rule proposal that will come to the House — that’s not the Senate bill because she then says, will satisfy members’ concerns about the Senate bill. So she’s a talking about reconciliation. This takes me back to Hoyer. They’re going to reconcile first and then they’re gonna send it to the Senate, ‘You put it in there and you send it over to us.’ You know what’s going to kill this? Aside from the content what’s going to kill this is this process, this very process. When people learn, like you people listening to this program have learned, when they learn the process, people will instinctively know this is not how this happens in our country. This is not how laws become law.
By the way, a little shout-out here to Bart Stupak in Michigan. How does it feel to be treated like a Republican, Bart? The cable TV people are just nothing more than Obama surrogates. Every time they interview Stupak they bore into the guy. ‘You really want to be the reason why we lose health care in America? Do you have no shame? You really, really, really want to be evil and the reason we don’t all have health care?’ It’s the same thing they were asking Scott Brown, except he was a Republican. Stupak is a Democrat.
Let’s get these next two out of the way. This is Gibbs, White House spokesman, on MSNBC this morning. He was talking to the cohost Savannah Guthrie along with F. Chuck Todd. Question: ‘For a president that really, really prides himself as a consensus –‘ Savannah, would you show me one consensus he’s built? These people in Washington are so insulated, they haven’t the slightest clue. Would you show me where he’s ever unified anything, Savannah? His own chief of staff is out leaking in the press how rotten a guy he is, and if it weren’t for his chief of staff they’d be in real trouble. There’s no unity between himself and the chief of staff. He’s complaining about his wife nagging him on his cholesterol and everything else. No wonder the guy smokes and drinks. Show me the unity, Savannah! It’s no use, folks. All these false premises, all these templates, story lines. All right, here’s a question. ‘For a president that really prides himself as a consensus builder, does it kind of turn his stomach that he’s now at a place where he has to really get health care by this 51 person vote as opposed to the more traditional means of a supermajority in the Senate?’
GIBBS: We got health care done, not with 51 but with 60 votes. That’s what passed the Senate back before Christmas. In most households, I bet in Chuck’s household, I know in my household, 51% represents a majority viewpoint. I don’t think that’s a crazy concept here in America.
TODD: But you made the decision —
GIBBS: The president understands that he’s the president and he’s gotta lead this country. We will continue to talk to Republicans. We have added their ideas throughout this process. They seem to not want to take ‘yes’ for any sort of answer. We are going to work every day here in the White House over the next two or three weeks to get health care done.
RUSH: It’s silly to waste time on this guy. He’s a glittering jewel of colossal ignorance. So we’ll move on. Savannah Guthrie and F. Chuck Todd are talking to their own correspondent, Mike Viqueira, about Representative Eric Massa deciding not to run for reelection. This is the guy that’s been accused of sexually harassing a male staff member. Savannah Guthrie says, ‘Obama really prides himself as a consensus builder. For lack of a better word here, is this a sideshow on Capitol Hill?’
TODD: Eric Massa was a ‘no’ vote on health care. Does he now become a ‘yes’ vote since he’s not running for reelection? Huh. It’s sort of an odd fallout on that front. Thank you, Mike Viqueira.
VIQUEIRA: He was one of the ones they were hoping to get to switch.
RUSH: I think he’s already switched, is right. (laughing) F. Chuck, he switched already. But F. Chuck here is basically saying that these allegations could be good for Obamacare. So here’s a guy whose life is probably really damaged here, it’s been leaked by his own party, no doubt, that he had a sexual harassment allegation against him by a man in his office, and here’s F. Chuck, man, oh, man this could really help Obamacare. What a great thing.
Okay. I never thought this would happen. I never thought this would happen. We have a montage of some media people calling Obama out on reconciliation flip-flop. Now, some of these don’t surprise me. Greta Van Susteren, Larry Kudlow. However, the perky Katie Couric is in this montage, as is Anderson Cooper.
VAN SUSTEREN: Plan B, reconciliation. President Obama didn’t always think, though, that it was a good idea.
KUDLOW: Mr. Obama had a different message back in 2007.
COURIC: In 2007 when President Obama was a Senator, he criticized the use of the reconciliation process in health care reform. Is this a case of where you stand depends on where you sit?
COOPER: He flip-flopped on this. Clearly now he’s going back on what he said on the campaign trail, basically saying he’s prepared to ram this thing through Congress with a 50-plus-one vote.
RUSH: Okay, I take it back. They’re just pointing it out. But they’re not upset by it. And they don’t think there’s anything fraudulent about it and they don’t think there’s anything hypocritical about it. They probably think it’s good for Obamacare because that’s all that matters, is it good for Obamacare or is it not. ‘Dung Heap’ Harkin, there he is right there on MSNBC, just said Pelosi doesn’t have the votes yet. Trust me, my friends, on this, don’t doubt me. They don’t have the votes, they’re nowhere close to having the votes, and the more convoluted this process gets the even angrier people are going to get.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: So he wants Obamacare passed on Easter. Do you realize this guy ruined our summer, this guy ruined our Thanksgiving, this guy ruined our Christmas, and now he’s going to ruin our Easter by trying to ramrod something nobody wants down their throats — and on Easter! There’s something very symbolic about that. I’m going to get to that. Obamacare was born on Christmas Eve, and now they want to resurrect it on Easter. Some might say that the bill was conceived on Christmas Eve but the template will fit a messiah if it passes. How better to portray yourself as a real messiah if your signature issue is born (or conceived, whatever) on Christmas Eve, and dies and then is resurrect on Easter. The only prob… (interruption) Well, I know it’s not a virgin birth since we’re all getting the shaft here and getting screwed but it’s also going to be a problem with his Muslim friends with the timing here. He coulda done it on Ramadan and it would be a little bit better for them, but never mind that. There is some irony that Obama’s great, great, great plan that is going to ostensibly improve the country’s health, all hinges on whether the federal government will pay for the killing of babies or not — and deciding that by Easter.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: This is Bob in Worcester, Massachusetts. It’s great to have you on the program, sir.
CALLER: Rush, it’s a big honor to talk to you.
RUSH: Thank you very much, sir.
CALLER: About this congressman from Utah who’s brother’s offered the judgeship on the Court of Appeals?
RUSH: Oh, yeah.
CALLER: I wanted to ask your opinion on it. I was thinking that if he does change his vote on this, this could really backfire big time for the White House because I think the outcry on this would be so severe that it could cost ’em — who knows? — a half a dozen or a dozen votes, just from the storm it causes.
RUSH: Maybe. I don’t think the White House is looking at it that way. I think they might think it might hurt the congressman who allows his vote to be purchased with the appointment of his brother, but Obama doesn’t care what happens to the congressman.
CALLER: Rush, you don’t think it would scare off maybe five or six or ten that might be on the fence?
RUSH: Why? The Louisiana Purchase didn’t send any Democrats running the other way, and the Cornhusker Kickback didn’t send any Democrats running the other way.
CALLER: Well, when you add ’em all together, Rush, the people are starting to really get fed up, you know?
RUSH: Well, I know. No question. This whole process is really ugly, and people start to see this. This is not how this stuff gets done, especially since it’s all happening because no one wants it. This is a total stab in the eye at the American public, the American people. They have expressed themselves clearly and frequently and proudly on this. They want no part of it, and so rules are being broken. Corners are being cut. The Chicago way: Whatever it takes to get this done. There is just something about this that rubs people the wrong way, besides the content of the bill. The content of the bill is bad enough. But the entire process here is also something that is just not working in Obama’s favor, except he doesn’t care. I mean, the thing that you have to understand about Obama is he doesn’t care. He has three years before he has to face anybody. He doesn’t care.
He doesn’t care what you think of the process. He doesn’t care what you think of the bill. He doesn’t care whether you like it or not. He does care if he can convince a number of Democrats in the House to give up their careers and fall on the sword in order for him to get his bill, his monument. He doesn’t care what you think. And the vast majority of Democrats in Washington don’t care what you think. The testament to that is right before your very eyes. Since last August, they have telegraphed it. Hell, they haven’t telegraphed it; they’ve advertised it. They don’t care what you think. They don’t think you’re smart. They don’t think you’re smart enough to know what’s good for you. But they know this isn’t good for you. This is only good for them. They don’t care! The party of supposed compassion and love and tolerance and understanding — the party of ‘the little guy’ — doesn’t care about you at all. Not a whit. And it’s not ’cause I’m saying it. It’s right out there for you to see each and every day.