RUSH: Groton, Connecticut. Steve. Great that you called, sir. And I appreciate your patience. Hi.
CALLER: Thank you, Rush. And copious amounts of ex-Air Force aircraft electrician dittos to you.
RUSH: Thank you very much, sir. I appreciate that. You know me, I’m a big aviation guy. Anything to do with it, electronics, wings, you name it, I love it.
CALLER: I do, too. Loved it, lived it for ten years. A couple days after the election I just absolutely felt like I’d be kicked in the stomach. I could not understand —
RUSH: Why, did you think that we were going to win and you couldn’t believe that we lost, or was it something else?
CALLER: I thought it was a slam dunk for Romney. I really did.
RUSH: Why did you think that? Seriously. I’m not criticizing. No, no. I’m not criticizing. I’m genuinely curious. Why did you think that?
CALLER: Because, you know, I had hope that the American people would exercise just a small modicum of common sense when you compare the two.
RUSH: Well, yeah. I know.
CALLER: But I remembered back to something that I learned at the Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies —
RUSH: Yes, what would that be?
CALLER: Well, I had a professor there, and he talked about the incrementalism (unintelligible) of liberalism, and I think what we saw on this Election Day was the culmination of that. It’s they’ve completely taken over the school system. Our schools are nothing more now — not all of them, but they’re predominantly liberal indoctrination camps, and then when these kids come home, if they’re not killing a zombie on their PlayStation, they’re being told by the mainstream media that everything they learned in school is correct and they don’t have anybody that’s counteracting these points of views, teaching them critical thinking skills.
RUSH: Wait a minute. What about their parents?
CALLER: Well, you know, the problem is I think like maybe a third generation where the schools have been controlled by the liberals and I don’t think the parents disagree with what these kids are learning. Now, my kids are grown and my wife and I always had a policy of after school we all sat down at the dinner table together, and I asked questions, “What did you learn in school today.” And my kids knew, you better have an answer. Now, if I had a disagreement, we’d calmly, openly discuss why I thought things were one way and why, you know, their teacher thought it was another way, and, you know, I always taught ’em to be respectful, but you can go ahead and say, “Hey, what about this point of view?” And I mean they put up with that actually more in college, the liberal indoctrination, than they did through the public high schools and elementary schools.
RUSH: Liberal indoctrination begins with day care.
CALLER: That’s probably true, yes.
RUSH: Obama is one of the kids. He is the product of his education. Everything Obama is doing, I guarantee you, is the result of what he was taught by his mentors when he was a teenager or even younger, it’s what he and his buddies at Harvard sat around, bitched and moaned about in the faculty lounge or whatever, about what they would do if they ever got in power. Their minds have been totally conditioned to accept anti-capitalism, capitalism is unfair. Obama is one of those guys, and so are a number of people that are his age. That’s how long this indoctrination has been going on. You’re right, it’s a long game.
CALLER: It is.
RUSH: It’s like the old Soviet Union. We have four-year election cycles here. The Soviet Union, the old communist Stalin, these guys, they didn’t care, sit back for two years, that’s all right, ’cause their goal is the next hundred years. So if you’re living in hundred year cycles, if you’re living in cycles that outlive you, you understand you might lose a couple years here or a couple of months or what have you, but you never lose sight of the long term. You never concede defeat and you never give up, you never stop.
CALLER: Right. Right. And to support that, actually, I just recently moved to Groton. I’ve only been here about five weeks. I lived in the second congressional district of Illinois that actually elected Jesse Jackson Jr. while he was sitting in the puzzle factory at the Mayo Clinic, and he won by a landslide.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: And I look at that, and I go, how does a Republican ever win a district like that?
RUSH: You won’t.
CALLER: You’re absolutely right. Now, you know, Connecticut is no red state, either, but I just found it astonishing that, you know, people in that district just don’t care, it’s Jesse Jr., he’s gonna win, and that’s that. And Rush, before you cut me off today, I have one thing I have to say or I’m gonna get a flying pan upside my head. Happy 30th anniversary to my wife, Tina.
RUSH: Thirtieth anniversary?
CALLER: Yes, sir.
RUSH: Wow, congratulations, sir, that’s absolutely wonderful.
CALLER: Yes, it is.
RUSH: Oh, that’s so great to hear.
CALLER: Yeah.
RUSH: I mean, that is just the greatest thing I coulda heard today. You’ve been married 30 years and you’re happy about it, I couldn’t be happier for you.
CALLER: Yeah, it’s been a wonderful ride.
RUSH: Oh, man. You made my day. You keep on, man, keep on. I bet your wife is ecstatic, too, right?
CALLER: I hope so.
RUSH: She’d have left you if she weren’t, trust me.
CALLER: Yes. Yes.
RUSH: All right, that’s great. Absolutely. See, that’s how you get the women vote, folks, that’s how you do it. That’s exactly how you do it. See, I’m learning. I’m learning.
Here’s Jennifer in Lloyd, Iowa. Welcome to the EIB Network. Hi.
CALLER: Hey, Rush, this is just an honor to talk to you, and I want to wish you and Kathryn a happy Thanksgiving.
RUSH: Same to you. Thank you very much.
CALLER: Sure. Hey, I was just calling. My husband picks up children for church and stuff, and there was —
RUSH: Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Your husband picks up children for church?
CALLER: Yep.
RUSH: You mean like as in a bus driver?
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: Okay.
CALLER: He does.
RUSH: Phew.
CALLER: Oh, sorry. But he does that and we had, I think she’s about fourth grade, and she was talking to my husband, this was about a month before the election, and she said —
RUSH: Wait, wait. Who’s about fourth grade? Somebody he picked up?
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: Okay.
CALLER: Yep. And so they were talking, and she said, “We’re gonna vote for Obama.” And he’s like, “Why?” “Because he’s gonna give us more money.” And she said, “We don’t like Romney because he has so much money and he doesn’t give away any of his money.” And my husband said, “Whoa, whoa. Romney has earned that money. That is his money.”
RUSH: Didn’t matter. Right? Didn’t compute. What do you mean, earned it?
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: It’s still unfair.
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: Earned it? Earned it? What are you talking about? She’s a fourth grader.
CALLER: Yes. Yes.
RUSH: Okay. So where do you think she learned that?
CALLER: Well, I mean I think it was probably from her parents, but like the caller before was talking about how our schools —
RUSH: Don’t discount that she’s hearing it every day in school, either.
CALLER: Yes. Yep.
RUSH: What a rotten, mean guy Romney is. Look at all the money he’s got and he hoards it. He’s got it in the Cayman Islands, and he builds big houses for his family but not for anybody else.
RUSH: And he’s got an elevator for his cars in his house, his garage, and do you see what he does with dogs? He hates dogs. He puts ’em on the roof of his car on vacation. All this stuff. The number of people, I’ve seen in polling, that think Romney hates dogs, you’d be amazed.
CALLER: Huh.
RUSH: Because Obama’s running those ads in the locals and the states and so forth about Romney being a cold, heartless guy, dog on the roof. They actually had commercials with a dog looking panicked in a cage on the roof of a station wagon heading down the road.
CALLER: Whoa.
RUSH: Replicating the Romney family vacation.
CALLER: Wow.
RUSH: But, yeah, I mean, sure, Obama was gonna give them money. He shoulda said, “Where’s it gonna come from?”
CALLER: He should of, but he also said, “Another thing that Romney does, Romney gives a lot of his money to charity. So he’s giving his money.”
RUSH: Doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter. Romney wasn’t giving his money to the fourth grader. It’s all that matters. What’s charity? Don’t know what charity is. Fourth grader has no clue what charity is.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, I mean, I heard it during the campaign. I ran into people, and it wasn’t many, but I mean if I ran into one or two, I know there are many more out there, “Romney hates women. Romney hates dogs.” The thing that boggles all of our minds is that whether we even like Romney or not, we know that that’s not true. There’s no way that somebody hates women. You and I can’t relate to an adult who actually thinks that. But they’re a there. Just like the four-year-old who gets on the bus. “We’re voting Obama ’cause he giving us money. Romney hates dogs,” or whatever.
The Democrats ran ads, and people believed them. And yet you cannot convince them of the truth about Barack Obama. You cannot convince them of the truth of what he’s doing, no matter what you do, no matter how you point it out, as reasonably, as slowly, as patiently, and as in deep concern as you can, explain to people how Obama’s policies, not him personally, how his policies are destroying job creation. No impact. Their minds are made up. No impact. I don’t pretend to have the answer, other than to say those people, as we sit here today, are to be defeated.
But now the tipping point, you know, we lost the country. According to this election, we’re outnumbered now, at least in presidential elections, people that vote national issues, we’re outnumbered. Now, some people say, “Ah, Rush, look, there’s a lot of fraud out there.” Okay, maybe there was, but even if we have hit the tipping point, it is far closer than it ought to be. The number of people who have been easily, easily persuaded that the things that made this country great are corrupt is astounding to me. Something as simple as the explanation for where prosperity comes from.
Hey, I got a great example here. You know what? Michael Gerson. He’s a former speechwriter for Bush 43. He’s a columnist now at the Washington Post, and he’s got a piece here, “Making economic advancement realistic.” And let me give you a couple pull quotes from this piece. One is, “Growth is one thing, but it is not enough where a personal benefit from growth is not assured.” Now, ostensibly, Gerson is one of us, and ostensibly, theoretically, Gerson is a capitalist, and theoretically, Gerson believes in the concepts of capitalism, that economic growth is how you benefit the vast majority of the people.
But now he’s established a caveat here in terms of his recipe for what the Republicans need to do. Growth is one thing, and growth is fine, but it is not enough where a personal benefit from growth is not assured. And then this. “The Republicans’ task is to make capitalism work for everyone.” Now, let me really get controversial. Some people, after I say this, are gonna wish I hadn’t. And, see, this is the rub. There is not yet ever been the person or the government or the system who can guarantee that everybody personally benefits at all times throughout their lives. It’s not possible. The only person that can do that is the person.
But Gerson is saying that the challenge or the task of the Republicans is to come up with a version of capitalism that assures people of a benefit from economic growth. If the economy’s growing, and people don’t benefit from it, then what good is it? That’s his point. I fervently disagree with this, lest there’s any doubt. But it’s this next one. “The Republicans’ task is to make capitalism work for everyone.” Nothing works for everyone. And there’s that word again, “work.” The GOP’s task is to make capitalism work for everyone. Stop and think, now. Is that even possible? Is there a system, is there a person, is there a government, is there a place where whatever is going on works for everyone?
Let’s look at domestic oil prices. When domestic oil prices fall, you would say that that’s working for the consumer, because the price of energy declines, because if the price of oil declines, the price of oil products are going to decline. Well, that ain’t working for the oil producer. And, in fact, this actually happened in the seventies. I don’t know how well people remember. The seventies is one of these decades that a whole bunch of garbage happened, not very many people remember it. But it was bad.
The domestic oil price plunged to such low levels that a bunch of domestic oil companies could not stay in business. It was great for gasoline prices at the pump, but the producers capped their wells, never, ever to be productive again. That didn’t work for the producers. They got creamed. Capitalism, by definition, does not work for everyone. But nothing else does, either. There is no system that works for everyone. Everyone is primarily responsible to themselves. And if you turn that over to somebody else, you’re cooked. You turn over your security, you turn over your prosperity, you turn over your economic opportunity, you turn it over to somebody else and I guarantee you you’re not gonna do nearly as well as if you handled it all yourself.
But you see, ladies and gentlemen, there’s a word that is applicable within any economic structure or system that is devised that is simply unacceptable in America today, and that is failure. We just think it’s not fair that people should fail at something. And it breaks our heart, and it’s so distressing. And so we want to protect people from failure. And that’s, I think, a large part of the emotional appeal of Obamaism. The emotional appeal of Obamaism is that, go ahead, don’t worry about it, you fail, you’re really not failing, we don’t even acknowledge failure. We believe in outcome-based success, and that is, when we say you’ve succeeded, you’ve succeeded. When you fail you really won’t fail, we’ll take care of you.
So a lot of people are scared to death to take risks because there’s always the possibility of failing. So if you’ve got some messiah that comes along and assures you that even if you fail, you’re gonna be cool, what are you gonna do? You’re gonna go with The Messiah. “The GOP’s task is to make capitalism work for everyone.” Capitalism works the best for the most. It may not be perfect, but this country has proven it, capitalism is simply the best way for a culture and society to organize itself.
There has been an all-out war and attack on capitalism since longer than I’ve been alive. I mean, it’s been as long as capitalism has been understood to be what it is. That’s nothing new. And we’ve had periods of this country where the socialists have won, the progressives, FDR, Woodrow Wilson, and we’ve come back, but I actually don’t think we have come back from FDRism. We still have all the vestiges of it. In fact, we got even more. We got Social Security, got all that stuff. We got the Great Society, and then we got the War on Poverty, and we just added. We got Medicare, Medicaid. I don’t think we’ve recovered from FDR. I think FDR is, in fact, the root of the very problem that we’ve got. I think FDR sowed the seeds for the problems that exist today.
But we gotta make capitalism work for everyone? Nobody knows how to do that. What is working for everyone? Everybody has a hundred thousand dollars a year, what is capitalism working for everyone? It used to be opportunity. Opportunity is what people wanted. Opportunity is all they wanted. Just give me a shot. Just let me prove myself. Just let me have at it. Let me try to be the best I can be. Let me use whatever talents and ambition I’ve got. Let me employ excellence as it applies to me, as I know it. That’s out the window, and now people are demanding outcomes. And of course we have some messiahs coming along guaranteeing or promising outcomes. Obama, Santa Claus, whatever you want to call it.
“For Republicans, the problem runs deeper than Romney’s persona. The GOP’s economic message is well past its 1980 expiration date. It’s not enough to promote growth in an economy where a personal benefit from overall growth is far from assured.” Well, who the hell can assure growth for everybody? Who can assure success for everybody? Nobody can. And, by the way, this kind of talk is said to be why we’re losing. But all I am is the mayor of Realville. “The traditional Republican pro-business agenda is necessary, but it does not adequately grapple with human needs, the prerequisite for personal prosperity.” A pro-business agenda does not adequately grapple with the human needs and the prerequisites for personal prosperity? Well, what the hell does? Does a pro-government agenda do that?
“The GOP’s task is not only to make capitalism more efficient, it’s to make it work for everyone.” That sounds wonderful. I’m sure when he signed off, Gerson thought he’d written a winner here. But that’s not what capitalism is. And now I’ve got, “Rush, don’t talk that way. That’s not how we’re supposed to be, no, no, no. You’re talking winners and losers, and there aren’t any losers. We can’t be the party of winners only. We gotta take care of the losers.” I understand. I understand the fear, but I’m just saying, we’re drifting away from the things that have made this country remarkable and great, and we are really drifting away from a country which offered the opportunity for vast prosperity and wealth to the maximum number of people ever on this planet.
We’re casting it aside. We’re throwing that away for something so much less, something with so little expectation, something that’s supposedly guaranteed that can’t be, and that’s economic security and happiness. And all you have to see to see the proof of that is to look at every miserable liberal voter, other than the rich ones. They’re all miserable. They’re not happy with what they’ve got. They’re not happy with their lives. The promise is never fulfilled, it’s never met.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Very simply, folks, making capitalism work for everybody is not capitalism. That is a command economy. Capitalism working for everybody is not capitalism, and, by the way, it’s not possible. There’s not one bit of proof that it can be done.
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