RUSH: Well, I found out Hank Haney is not mad at me. He’s just partially mad at me. He’s just a little bit mad at me. But he understands that I have a full-fledged job. Sorry. I had to do that. I just can’t help stirring it up. You tell me to stick to the issues, and I’m going to talk about golf.
Greetings, folks, Rush Limbaugh, the EIB Network. Great to have you here. Can’t wait to talk to you. Telephone number, 800-282-2882. The e-mail address, ElRushbo@eibnet.com.
I’m a little hoarse today, folks. I am fighting off successfully the full impact of the ravages of the common cold virus, fighting it off. I’ve had this tight congestion in there, and normally it would begin in my throat and lose my voice for a day, but it has not happened. It’s a little hoarse today so just be advised and beware.
The same guy who has taken at least eight vacations in the last year is calling his own voters lethargic. Barack Hussein Imam Obama is trying to buck up the Democrat base telling them they’re lethargic, ‘People need to shake off this lethargy, people need to buck up,’ Obama told Rolling Stone magazine in an interview being published on Friday. ‘Making change happen is hard,’ he said. No, it’s not. It’s been easy as pie. We have seen how easy it is to destroy the American private sector. It’s been a year and a half. It hasn’t taken that much. But it has required one thing, a Democrat Party running the show. It has required a Marxist president in charge of the Democrat Party. And the same people have been running our education system. The same people have been running the unions; the same people that have been running the cities that are broken; the same people who have been running everything that’s been run into the ground, the Democrat Party, the American left. Destruction, Inc. Destruction personified. Look at the success they’ve had in just a year and a half, and I mean success from their perspective. It’s absurd. And now we’ve got health care kicking in. This has to be repealed.
This is a disaster waiting to happen when it is fully implemented. Making change is hard if you got a public school education. Well, look who’s been teaching people. The American left. The American left’s a one-party wrecking crew. Look at this: ‘Americans’ view of the economy turned grimmer in September amid escalating job worries, falling to the lowest point since February. The downbeat report, released Tuesday, raises more fears about the tenuous U.S. economic recovery. It also further underscores the disconnect between Wall Street and Main Street; consumers’ confidence fell further even as stocks rebounded in September.’ Now, here they are bashing Wall Street. Let me tell you why stocks are rebounding, two reasons. The Federal Reserve is buying stocks. Your average, ordinary asset manager is not the one buying stocks. The Fed is. They’re trying to prop up Obama. And they’re creating a bubble. This is an artificial elevation of the stock price, and at some point the bubble is going to burst.
Look, I’m sorry to be negative here. The other thing that has happened to the extent that there are stock buyers, purchasers riding the price up, it is people excited about the fact that the Democrats are no longer going to be in control of Congress come November in their minds. There are two things driving this. It’s not Wall Street greed. The greed is in our nation’s capital. ‘A tenuous economic recovery underscores the disconnect between Wall Street and Main Street. Consumer confidence fell further even as stocks rebounded.’ This is the AP. They want you to believe that Wall Street’s making out like bandits. And, by the way, folks, there are people who know how to make money during economic destruction. People make money during all economic circumstances. It’s the truth. The short sellers. There are people who get rich during times like this, and there are people who get rich during boom times. But the idea here that people on Main Street are in sad shape because Wall Street’s in good shape is typical drivel, typical Democrat leftist drivel, as though it’s a zero-sum game. We’re back to the same old belief that Main Street is having everything it has stolen from it by the evildoers on Wall Street, and it is all a crock.
Remember during the Bush years we were told that if we feel like we’re in a recession then we’re in a recession? Guess who’s made more money than anybody else in the last two years? George Soros. George Soros, who’s funding the destruction of the Democrat Party, is making more money than anybody else in the last two years. And George Soros is not pledging to give his away to charity, like these idiots, Buffett and Gates are. George Soros is not pledging all this philanthropy. He’s not trying to score points. He’s trying to screw, and he’s succeeding at it because he’s bought the Democrat Party and Barack Hussein Imam Obama. Why is it shocking consumer confidence is down? Who would think that that’s even possible during these rosy economic times? What do these yokels in the Drive-By Media think?
And then there is this: ‘U.S. Economy ‘Close to a Destructive Tipping Point,’ Glenn Hubbard Says. — ‘America is very close to a destructive tipping point,’ co-authors Glenn Hubbard and Peter Navarro warn in their new book Seeds of Destruction. ‘We must change how we conduct our politics and economics… or we will inevitably go the way of all once-great nations and suffer an irreversible decline.’ Hubbard, dean of Columbia Business School, joined Dan Gross and I to discuss the ‘major structural imbalances’ facing America, chief among them being the government’s profligate spending. Hubbard, you may recall, was chairman of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers during George W. Bush’s first term. As you might expect, he is a strong advocate of smaller government and lower taxes. But Hubbard and Navarro, a business professor at UC Irvine, are also harshly critical of Bush’s ‘gross mismanagement’ of the fiscal stimulus bequeathed to his administration by President Clinton. Specifically, Hubbard chastises his former boss for the creation of a new unfunded federal mandate, Medicare Part D.’
US economy close to a destructive tipping point, says Glenn Beck Hubbard. America very close to a destructive tipping point, coauthors Glenn Beck Hubbard and Peter Navarro warn in their new book Seeds of Destruction. We must change how we conduct our politics and economics or we will inevitably go the way of all great — once-great nations and suffer an irreversible decline. Hubbard, the dean of Columbia Business School, joined Dan Gross and the author of this story, Aaron Task to discuss the major structural imbalances facing America, chief among them being the government’s profligate spending. Glenn Hubbard was chairman of the president’s Council of Economic Advisors during the Bush first term, George W. Bush, as you might expect, he’s a strong advocate of smaller government and lower taxes, but Hubbard and Navarro, a business professor at UC Irvine, are all harshly critical of Bush’s gross mismanagement of the fiscal stimulus bequeathed to his administration by Clinton. Specifically Hubbard chastises his former boss for the creation of a new unfunded federal mandate, Medicare Part D.
I have to agree. Every time I ripped Medicare as the new Republican created entitlement, Tom DeLay would call, ‘You misunderstand. This is market reforms,’ he said. ‘This is a great entitlement.’ Well, it’s just not something that Republicans do. It’s not something Republicans do. Anyway, these guys are right on the money. The US economy is close to a destructive tipping point. Rahm Emanuel knows it. He’s heading back to Chicago. Axelrod knows it. He’s heading back to Chicago. Geithner knows it. He’s stuck, little Timmy. Who else? Summers knows, he’s heading back to Harvard. Christina Romer, she knows it, she’s headed back to Berkeley. Not only is Orszag gone, he went and got married. None of the Obama team decided to show up. Nobody, no administration has had this kind of defection this soon into its first term that anybody can remember. And Axelrod even admits, I have a story, he’s interviewed by Dana Milbank, the Washington Post. Axelrod is saying he’s actually disappointed. He thought they were going to be able to come in and change Washington. He thought they were going to be able to come in and get rid of politics as usual just by showing up. He really says this to Dana Milbank. I don’t know if he really believes it. Maybe he’s one of these cowed people caught up in The Messiah who really thought just by showing up they were going to redefine the way this country worked and just by showing up they were gonna create a utopia.
There has to be a reason these people are leaving. I mean if you’re enjoying what you’re doing — There’s a story in the stack here, Snerdley, and it’s in the Wall Street Journal about retirement and why many self-made people never retire and that’s because they love their work. Retirement’s not in the vocabulary. Their work is their life; their work is their enjoyment; their work is their vacation; their work is what gives them meaning as opposed to old money that inherits it and doesn’t know what to do with it; doesn’t know how they got it. All they think is they’re better than everybody else because they inherited it. Here’s the interesting thing. Axelrod is admitting to Dana Milbank of the Washington Post he thought things were going to be better, he thought things were gonna change, utopia. He doesn’t use that word, it’s mine. But he’s leaving. He’s leaving in disappointment, we’re told. Or is he leaving in happiness because they’ve succeeded in destroying everything, so now he’s out of there. He’s supposed to be running to reelect but he’s getting out of Dodge to do it.
All these other people, I mean they’re leaving for one of two reasons: mission accomplished, or, uh-oh, ain’t working out the way we thought. Now, we’ve all acknowledged while they are book smart, they’re genuinely ignorant, devoid of common sense, real-life experience people. This might be their first taste of actual implementation without any check and balance on them of what they believe. It might be the first time that they’ve gone beyond just the theoretical discussions in the faculty lounge. Now, don’t misunderstand. I know liberalism’s been tried all over the world, but, remember, these people said we’re the ones we’ve been waiting for. These people believe it had never been done right. These people believe it hadn’t been properly funded. These people believed the Soviets, ah, they killed too many people. Mao killed too many people while being brilliant. It hadn’t been done right and nobody could stop ’em. Republicans couldn’t stop ’em. The media was on their side, nobody could stop ’em. They have no excuses.
In a year and a half they’ve implemented a tremendous amount of Obama’s agenda, and it isn’t working. People always ask me why are liberals so mad, why are they so unhappy? Well, face them squarely in the mirror every day. It doesn’t work. To the extent that these neophytes really believe this stuff is going to create a panacea; to the extent that they really believe that equality and sameness and political correctness and government spending is going to equalize, make everybody happy, to the extent they believe that they’re witnessing the utter failure of it. I mean they are learning here, government does not create wealth. Government cannot create wealth. All government does is confiscate it. That’s all government does. Like I asked you yesterday, why in the world if you work someplace do you want the government to raise taxes on your employer? How does that help you? It doesn’t help you when the government confiscates because they cannot create wealth. They also thought they’d be able to shut me up. That failed, too, again. So are they leaving in happiness, or are they being honest when they say they’re unhappy and burned out or what have you?
Actually, folks, it doesn’t matter, because what is is what is and we are at a tipping point. We’re on the precipice of the destruction of the wealth-creating engine of this country. That’s the American people. We’re on the verge of it. The guys that write this book On the Tipping Point are exactly right. FDR, LBJ, Obama had huge Democrat majorities. How many more experiments of this sort do we need to prove what a failure they are? They have such overpowering egos. They’re sitting there and saying, ‘Well, FDR didn’t do it right. He didn’t spend enough.’ LBJ, ‘Hey, he didn’t do it right, he got caught up in the Vietnam War.’ Obama, The Messiah, they had no excuse, nobody could stop them. They’re lying to themselves if they’re saying the Republicans got in the way because the Republicans didn’t. They’ve redefined how this country works. They have their boot on the neck of the private sector. They have their boot on all of our necks. They’ve lavished our dollars on their friends and bureaucrats. They confiscate wealth. They do not create it. Even Obama’s voters know it. What was her name, Velma? Velma Hart. ‘I’m exhausted defending you,’ and this or that. She may not know it in so many words, she may not think it as I’m expressing it, but she finally figured out, ‘You know what, this guy can’t make me rich. This guy can’t get me a new house. This guy and his policies, this guy cannot enrich my life.’ She may not want to full-fledged admit it yet, but she knows it.
Axelrod, instead of skating out of town you need to take credit for all that you and your boss and your party have done. You need to take credit for destroying the American health care system, for destroying job creation, for destroying home ownership. This is their record in a year and a half. This is what they’ve done. That’s why we’re at the tipping point. Instead of running out of town, ‘Well, I gotta run Obama’s reelect. Well, I gotta get back to Berkeley. Yeah, I gotta get back to Harvard. I gotta get married before she figures out I’m an absolute dork. I gotta go get married,’ whatever. They’ve done a lot. Axelrod, you have done a lot. You have changed the country and we’re trying to change it back. We want our America back. This is the third time this rotgut’s been tried. The New Deal, the Great Society, the war on poverty, and now European socialism under Obama, it’s the third time it’s been tried. It doesn’t work, it hasn’t worked, it isn’t working, and it won’t work. It’s a shame I have to stop because this is a hell of a roll. And Hank Haney really isn’t all that mad at me. He’s a little sad.
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RUSH: Do you remember Rahm Emanuel, when these clowns first got into Washington after Obama was immaculated, maybe even before that, Rahm Emanuel said (paraphrase), ‘A crisis is a terrible thing to waste.’ Now what is Rahm Emanuel saying? He’s saying, ‘A crisis is a great thing to escape from! I’m getting back to Chicago!’ He’s running away from a crisis. They got all kinds of crises. They’ve created ’em, and Rahm Emanuel, ‘I don’t think I can make chicken salad out of this. I’m heading outta here.’
I got a note from a friend. The friend says, ‘Hey, Rush, the ruling class are not used to being rejected like this. They’ve never been rejected in their lives. Obama’s never been rejected, so to be rejected by the voters is quite a stunning blow to their egos.’ And that’s an interesting point to me. You know, I’m looking at Obama, he’s out there exhorting — here he is, he and Joe Bite Me both — I mean, these need to go read a Dale Carnegie book, or The Power of Positive Thinking. You don’t win elections by wagging your finger at voters and say, ‘buck up,’ after you take eight vacations in the last two months! And Bite Me? Nobody can find any evidence any work Bite Me’s been doing anyway! These guys go in front of their Democrat audience and say, ‘Hey, hey, hey, you guys need to buck up out there. You need to shake off this lethargy. You need to stop whining out there.’ Really? You need to stop whining? They’re lecturing their own voters! And I’m serious about this because, at heart, Obama resents voters. I know he has this need to be loved and adored as the supreme leader. And, you know, all statists, authoritarians, do want to be loved. They find out that, as authoritarians, they’re never loved; they’re hated, despised, and feared, ultimately.
So I ask myself: What are they even messing around with voters for? Because at the end of the day, they resent voters. At the end of the day, the ruling class resents they even have to subject themselves to elections. And every time the ruling class loses, be they Republican or Democrat (but especially Democrat), every time they lose an election, who do they blame? John Kerry, who once served in Vietnam — blame the voters! The voters are stupid! He did it yesterday. When they lose elections, it’s the voters who are stupid. So I ask myself: Why do they want this massive outpouring of love and support? It’s an impediment. You know, authoritarians hate elections. Elections are like wars: inconvenient things. They haven’t gotten to the point yet where they can cancel elections — they have to go through the motions here, make people love ’em to win elections — but from that standpoint, that context, they probably are shocked and depressed. They are being rejected. Not used to it.
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RUSH: Here’s that Washington Post story: ‘A Sadder but Wiser Axelrod Packs His Bags.’ This is Dana Milbank writing. ‘Well, we in the capital are relieved to know that we are not the source of Axelrod’s digestive distress. But if Washington didn’t take those 25 pounds off of the 6-foot-2-inch Axelrod frame, this town did take something else from Axelrod and his boss: the notion that they would arrive and that the culture of politics would change.’ Axelrod’s depressed. ‘In that sense, Axelrod, who announced a few days ago that he will return to Chicago in the spring, is leaving in defeat. It’s not really an electoral defeat: Though Democrats will probably experience a shellacking on Nov. 2nd… Rather, it’s the notion that Obama, who declared on election night that ‘change has come to America,’ has failed to change Washington, a belief shared by 53 percent of Americans in the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll.’ Has he really failed to change Washington? He hasn’t, in my mind. He’s grown it. Washington’s expanded. It’s far more involved in our lives and getting more so each and every day.
Later on in the story: ‘In a smart and well-timed profile of Axelrod in the current issue of the New Republic, Noam Scheiber describes an idealistic Axelrod made ‘very dour,’ as an administration colleague put it, by the Washington culture. The campaign he designed for Obama to run against Washington in 2008 ran headlong into the Washington dealmaking necessary to get items such as health-care reform through Congress.’ See, I knew it. I knew that’s what upset — these people are autocrats. To a certain extent I believe this, and I think they do, too, they showed up and just because of their presence people are going to lay down. Obama had this massive, messianic-like popularity. They got into town and whatever Obama want, it was going to happen, no resistance, no opposition. And they couldn’t believe it. They simply could not believe it because the ruling class is not used to being rejected. They haven’t been rejected throughout their lives. So to be rejected by voters is — and even members of their own political class — quite a stunning blow to their egos.
‘As Scheiber wrote: ‘During the campaign and the first months of the administration, it had been possible to believe Obama wouldn’t have to choose between his twin goals of passing legislation and taming Washington. But, over time, a combination of structural factors (the effective 60-vote requirement in the Senate) and circumstances (a Republican Party determined to oppose him at every turn) made the choice inescapable.” That’s bogus. The Republican Party couldn’t stop him at any turn. They couldn’t. Not ’til Scott Brown got in there. ‘Obama’s promise of change in Washington was a noble idea,’ writes Milbank, ‘but ultimately either naïve — if he really thought he could fix this town — or cynical — if he knew he couldn’t but told voters he could.’
So, what is this aimless whining from Axelrod? (crying) I thought we were going to change the culture of politics when we got to done. There’s more to this than meets the eye. There’s more to all these people exiting than meets the eye. They are confronted with a failure that goes beyond the success they’ve had in destroying the private sector. They’re not universally loved and adored. People don’t bow down and genuflect. People want them out of town. It’s gotta be a shock and this is when these kind of people get dangerous. This is when they start saying, ‘Why the hell do we need elections in the first place? Why the hell are we subjecting ourselves to these idiots that live in this country? Why do we have to waste our time persuading them to vote for us? Don’t they know it intrinsically?’ So they end up resenting all of us for their disappointments, whatever it is that depresses them. What president in our lifetimes has ever had it is easy? They talk about how hard it is. Obama had supermajorities in both houses of Congress. The opposition party couldn’t stop him. He’s had a press, for crying out loud, that’s gonna die of anal poisoning if this keeps up. What in the world’s Obama got to be disappointed about? He bows to other leaders because in his heart of hearts he thinks he should be bowed to. He’s trying to show other people how he should be treated.
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RUSH: Old Barry is in Madison, Wisconsin, goes back to the old stomping grounds, had a bunch of really fun times during the campaign there. Washington Post: ‘Obama Looks to Reenergize Youth Vote, Get Late Democratic Surge for Midterms — When Obama steps onto a grass quad at the University of Wisconsin on Tuesday, he will deliver a newly tailored, more personalized campaign appeal aimed at ginning up enthusiasm.’ Right, and he’s going to do that, ‘Stop being so lethargic, stop whining, get out there and love me again, get out there and act like you love me again. The only thing about that might work, it’s not like any of these kids has anything to do other than go to class. They don’t have jobs, Snerdley. (interruption) Well, it’s a good point. Who do they blame for not having jobs? Who do they blame? Look, we’re talking about University of Wisconsin. Probably Bush. We’ll see.