RUSH: First the train derailment, Amtrak train derailment. Now, obviously, this is a tragedy, there is injury, there is death. And I must sadly be the one to remind you that there is a political component to this, and you will be hearing about it very soon. The political component to this is going to be — and it will not be very long. In fact, it may have already happened. I haven’t been able to monitor all this stuff constantly since this accident first happened.

It’s predictable as easily as the sun coming up in the morning. We’re gonna hear that we need to really ramp up infrastructure spending. We’re gonna hear hand-wringing, see hand-wringing and complaints, “How could this have happened? We are letting our country just become dilapidated right in front of our eyes. Where is all the infrastructure spending?” And at that point somebody needs to say, “You have asked for over a trillion dollars in infrastructure spending since 2008, and we’d like to see where the money already allocated for infrastructure spending has actually gone.”

The original Porkulus bill, $800 billion that soon became close to a trillion dollars. The vast majority of that was for infrastructure, right? Rebuilding roads, rebuilding bridges, rebuilding schools. How much of it actually went to that? Since the original Porkulus, how many other times has the Regime gone on television, wrung its hands, and practically cried about the need for infrastructure spending?

The point is, they’ve gotten it. They have gotten every dime they have asked for for infrastructure spending, and yet they are going to try to convey the idea that they haven’t had enough, not nearly enough, and this Amtrak derailment is a great, glaring example of it. And of course this will be used as more ammunition to further raise people’s taxes.

And I would hope in a presidential campaign year, I would hope that some of these Republican candidates, maybe if it’s just one, would stand up and push back and say, “Did you ever stop to think that we have given you enough money on infrastructure, that whatever the problem here, if it indeed is that, should have been addressed long ago given the over trillion dollars you have asked for already?” And simply demand an accounting: “Where has all that infrastructure money allocated for that, where has it actually gone?”

You know what we’ll find. We will find, just as in the original stimulus bill, it went to teachers unions and public employee unions, particularly in the early days of the recession to keep them employed while other people were losing their jobs, because as employees they continue to pay union dues and union dues are how money allocated to unions end up back in the coffers of Democrat Party campaigns and other efforts.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Grab sound bite number 20. This is Josh Earnest at the White House press briefing just now. Tell me where you just heard this.

EARNEST: The president has been a longtime advocate, uh, for investing in our infrastructure and making sure that we, uh, have the kind of 21st Century infrastructure that we know is gonna be critical to the success of our country. Just yesterday the president’s budget director, Shaun Donovan, sent a letter to House appropriators raising concerns about this.

RUSH: What do you think that was about? He got a question about the Amtrak derailment. Oh, yeah, it’s an infrastructure-spending problem. He went on to blame the Republicans for not spending enough on infrastructure, not authorizing it. It’s as predictable as the sun comes up in the morning.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: By the way, we’ve got new information on the train derailment, the Amtrak train. It turns out that the train was speeding. The train was going too fast for the turn. Uh-oh! This means human error is a real possibility, and it may not be the fault of the infrastructure. So we’ve got to get out in front of this. The train was speeding. The engineer is not saying anything. Somebody at the Regime is gonna get to him and fix it so that he will not admit speeding because this has got to be the infrastructure.

They’ve got a brand-new crisis here, and to prove it, here’s Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary. A reporter said, “Are there any conversations going on between the White House and Capitol Hill about Amtrak funding?” Is that not automatic? Is that not axiomatic? Here we have a train derailment, and before anybody knows why or what’s the cause, we immediately need more money! And why do we need more money? Because the Republicans have been stingy!

“The Republicans have underfunded it, just like they’ve underfunded the War on Poverty and underfunded everything else. The Republicans don’t care about people on trains.”

Do not laugh. That is the narrative. That’s the template.

Here’s Josh Earnest…

EARNEST: Well, we’ve been very clear about what we believe is the appropriate level of funding for, uh, Amtrak. In the president’s budget is, umm, I think what’s nearly a billion-dollar increase in funding for Amtrak. Republicans, unfortunately, are currently considering legislation, uh, at the committee level that would actually cut funding from Amtrak’s budget by, I believe, a quarter-of-a-billion dollars a year.

RUSH: You see how this works? It’s so convenient! We have a train derailment, and at that very moment, the Republicans are holding committee hearings on reducing Amtrak funding. Obama, meanwhile — at the same moment — is trying to get a billion dollars more for Amtrak and for infrastructure. What a great guy Obama is! Oh, man! Is this guy the best president we’ve ever had or what? And are those Republicans a bunch of mean-spirited butts.

Those creeps! We just hate ’em! They don’t care about people. All they care about is their rich friends and themselves. (This is the way it goes.) In fact, it’s probably human error and speeding. Never mind we don’t have a billion dollars to increase Amtrak spending. In case anybody’s noticed, we are $18 trillion in debt. We don’t have any money. Practically everything we spend is money we don’t have anymore. But it doesn’t seem to matter to anyone.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: The latest update from Amtrak, the engineer driving the train took that turn at a hundred miles an hour. The speed limit for the train at that turn is 50 miles an hour. They could have spent a gazillion dollars on infrastructure at just that turn and it wouldn’t have made any difference. But I predict to you, I don’t care how widespread the news gets that the engineer was doing twice the speed limit at that turn, despite all that you’re gonna end up hearing infrastructure, Republicans stingy, don’t care enough, don’t allocate the money.

In fact, they’re trying to cut Amtrak at this most desperate moment in time. (crying) And Obama will be portrayed as the compassionate savior once again. Groundwork is already being laid for that.