RUSH: Holy smokes. Holy smokes! This is great. I love it! I love it, folks. You know, the left has gone nuts. They literally have gone nuts on this climate change business. Trying to keep up with things here breaking just as the program is started.
I want to go through some of the things that Cortez and some of these other people are proposing. They really believe this! I gotta calm down. I gotta slow down. I’ve gotta be reasoned and deliberate here.
Greetings. Great to have you. Rush Limbaugh and the EIB Network at 800-282-2882.
If we just shut up and let these people speak, we may end this whole climate change issue inside of two years. Just shut up. It’s gonna be very tough for me to do, but the thing that got my reaction here, Pelosi has created this brand-new committee, a select committee to deal with climate change, and she did not put Ocasio-Cortez on it! Ocasio-Cortez has been snubbed!
Ocasio-Cortez is leading this thing among the Millennials and the Democrat freshmen. And Pelosi has named this new select committee just announced they’re not gonna put Cortez on it. This is gonna cause delectable fireworks. But let me just run through some of the things — and you all have a proper background, understandings of climate change. You’ve been here 30 plus years. You’ve heard me detail everything there is about it.
Some of the new proposals that they have somehow let loose, they want to rebuild every single building in America. They want to phase out air travel in 10 years. They are promising government jobs and health care for everybody. And they’re suggesting that if we don’t have the money for it, no big deal, just print some. There’s a story in Politico today quoting Cortez as saying deficits don’t mean anything.
My friends, I love this in a way because I’ve been theorizing lately about how telling people that we can’t afford it, not a reason to do something, doesn’t work anymore with these people because it doesn’t matter. We don’t have the money to do anything. We’ve got deficits, $21 trillion national debt. It’s not stopping anybody from spending more, proposing to spend any more. Now they’re coming out and just being honest. It doesn’t matter whether we have the money or not. And if we don’t, just print it.
Now, out there in the Millennial population, we literally have a bunch of young people who believe that the earth is not gonna be habitable when they hit 65. I’ve tried to tell you they really believe this. You would not believe — I did a special survey after the State of the Union. Trump didn’t even talk about climate change. You would not believe the number of Millennial news sites and blogs that were outraged, livid. It was the number one criticism these people had, that Trump didn’t mention climate change.
And you could read in the stories they wrote about it that they’re genuinely scared to death. It is a crime what has been done to these kids. It is literally a crime the way they have been propagandized from the moment they started watching television, from early childhood. They literally believe this planet is under destruction as we sit here today and that human beings in the United States of America are responsible for it, primarily Republicans, and they’re calling for drastic action.
And so Cortez and her band have proposed it. Rebuild every building in America. I’m not making this up. They are dead serious. Phase out air travel in the next 10 years. Lord, thank you for my enemies. These people have now proposed what they literally believe what they think is necessary. And I find myself reacting to this much as I did reacting to things 20 years ago. Said, “Nobody is gonna believe this. Nobody’s gonna support this. Everybody’s gonna see how wacko this is.”
Now, I’ve learned. Some people are gonna support it. Some people are gonna support banning air travel. Some people are gonna think it’s a great idea to tear down every building and rebuild every building so it will be environmentally proper. I mean, literal impossibilities. We cannot ban air travel. The world would be brought to a screeching halt. The rest of the world isn’t gonna do any of this. And then you get to the printing money aspect.
So the great thing here is that they are, for whatever reason, showing all of their cards. And they are demonstrating exactly what they think is necessary to save the planet. And we’re all gonna benefit from this expose. So I’ll have more details on this as well as Pelosi — what would you call this? I mean, this is a major slap upside the head. A brand-new Select Committee on Climate Change and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will not be seated on this committee.
Pelosi’s appointed three other freshman Democrats to the panel. Eight Democrats to the new special climate change committee. (laughing) Cortez isn’t on the climate change committee! I have to tell you. I think Pelosi knows this is all a crock, she has to. I mean, folks, this is insane. This is literally childish. This is Romper Room type stuff and she’s gotta know this. So she has to placate these people and give them their little committee. And putting mostly freshmen on it means that she’s not taking it all that seriously.
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RUSH: You think I’m making it up. Here’s one of the proposals from the Green New Deal people. A provision in the Green New Deal. Quote: [E]xpanding high-speed rail to ‘a scale where air travel stops becoming necessary.’” What has our education system done? What in the world has it done to people? It has turned them against progress. It has turned them against prosperity. It has turned them against greatness.
It has turned them against the pursuit of excellence. It has turned them into cowards. I mean, high-speed rail developed to “a scale where air travel stops becoming necessary”? This is so absent reality that I’m kind of a little stumped here in reacting to this. But I don’t know that I want to be on the rail line from New York to London. High-speed rail? Sufficiently widespread enough to make air travel unnecessary? And they think trains are not gonna pollute, trains are not gonna…?
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RUSH: Now let’s move on to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. A Politico story: “The Democratic Party’s base is rallying around calls for massive social welfare programs like Medicare for All, a federal jobs guarantee and a Green New Deal — all of which would cost trillions of dollars and potentially bust the budget.
“Yet a small but growing chorus of progressives say that policy makers are thinking about deficits all wrong: The red ink, they say, is not that big of a deal. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, (D-N.Y.), told Business Insider last month the notion that the government needn’t worry about balancing its books should be ‘a larger part of our conversation.'” If we run out of money, we just print some, she says. We haven’t had any money for a long time, and we’re not gonna let that stop us. We’re not gonna let people use the fact that we don’t have the money stop us.
So now we go to the audio sound bites. This was this morning on NPR’s Morning Edition. Steve Inskeep was interviewing Cortez about the Green New Deal. First question: “One reason people who are politically conservative are skeptical of efforts to combat climate change is that it sounds to them like it requires massive government intervention, which they just don’t like. Are you prepared to put on the table that, yes, that they are right, that what this requires is massive government intervention?”
CORTEZ: It does, yeah, I have no problem saying that. Why? Because we have tried their approach for 40 years. For 40 years we tried to let the private sector take care of it. They said, “we got this, we can do this. The forces of the market are going to force us to innovate,” except for the fact that there’s a little thing in economics called externalities, and what that means is that a corporation can dump pollution in the river and they don’t have to pay for it. And taxpayers have to pay for cleaning up our air, cleaning up our water, and saving the planet. And so we’ve already been paying the costs except we have not been getting any of the benefit.
RUSH: Well, you know, I really do think it’s a shame what our country, what our education system, whoever’s responsible for it, what they’ve done to these people. This woman is… I’m trying to find a charitable way. She’s just an ignoramus. She doesn’t know what she doesn’t know, and what she does know is so cockeyed that it’s difficult to deal with it with a straight face. But the problem is she’s not alone. It’s widespread. A whole lot of people in her generation have bought into this silly notion.
As far as she’s concerned, the United States is responsible for climate change. As far as she’s concerned, climate change is real and is gonna destroy the planet in under 30 years. Well, in her case, 12 years. We’ve got 12 years. It’s absolutely absurd. The whole thing intellectually, scientifically is absurd — and yet they buy it hook, line, and sinker. Now their proposals here, which we detailed: Phase out air travel in the next 10 years, government guaranteed job for all, rebuild every single building in the USA!
None of this is practical. Now, what they’re gonna say — what somebody in the Democrat Party’s gonna say to this — is, “Heeeey, don’t really believe all this. This is just the starting point. You know how negotiations work. You always ask for much more than you expect to get. You always put some throwaways in there. They don’t really think they’re gonna ban air travel, and they don’t really think they’re gonna destroy and rebuild every building.”
I understand the philosophy of asking for a lot more than you think you’re gonna get, but I do think these are true believers, and I think she really does believe the United States is the biggest failure. When in fact (snort), if she would tour the world and look at any socialist country or country with tyranny, dictatorship, poverty, the degree of pollution, the environmental mess… China and India, the messes they make environmentally dwarf the United States.
Yet none of her proposals would have anything to do with China or India. It’s strictly an anti-American agenda here under a false premise that we are the large, guilty party in polluting. But even at that, pollution’s destroying the planet, climate change is? It really kind of makes me sad, what has been done to these people. They go through life scared to death every day literally thinking that there’s something they can do to control climate — and that if they don’t, they’re gonna die before they hit 65.
Next question. “You’re talking about things that obviously would cost a lot of money and you don’t specify where the money’s gonna come from other than saying it’ll all pay for itself.
CORTEZ: Yeah. I think the first thing you need to do is — is kind of break the mistaken idea that taxes pay for a hundred percent of government expenditure. It’s just not how government expenditure works. We can recoup costs, but oftentimes you look at, for example, the GOP tax cut — which I think was an irresponsible use of government expenditure. But government projects are often financed by a combination of taxes, uhh, deficit spending, and other kinds of — of investments. You know, bonds?
RUSH: “You know, bonds?” She just figured out that taxes do not fully fund government? I mean, anybody that knows there’s a deficit knows that. This is pointless. “The first thing we need to do is kind of break the mistaken idea that taxes pay for a hundred of government expenditure.” Government expenditure is off the charts. There’s nowhere near the tax revenue to support this. There can’t be with a $21 trillion national debt, an annual budget deficit of four to $800 billion. Anybody… That’s the problem. You can’t tax your way out of fiscal irresponsibility. Of course, to these people, the answer is simply print more money.
Next question: “I get that. But deficit spending is borrowing money. It has to be paid back eventually, somehow, like through taxes.”
CORTEZ: Yeah, and I think that is always the crux of it. So when we decide to go into the realm of deficit spending, we have to do so responsibly. We ask, “Is this an investment or is this actually gonna pay for itself?”
INSKEEP: So you’re saying, “Borrow the money; make the investment. The economy will grow; we’ll pay off the debt”?
CORTEZ: Absolutely! Because we’re creating jobs.
RUSH: You know, this woman has no idea what she just said. He says, “So you’re saying, ‘Borrow the money; make the investment. The economy will grow; we’ll pay off the debt’?” “Absolutely! Because we’re creating jobs.” She just described the Trump tax cut! Which in the previous bite she tried to rip to shreds! The woman doesn’t know what “economic externalities” are. She tried her best to use a word she thinks nobody knows. She botched that big time. She certainly… She just doesn’t know.
But all of this belief system she has is predicated on a hoax that the planet is being destroyed by the American lifestyle. American progress is destroying the climate, and she’s not gonna be able to breathe the air in another 12 years. As I say, folks, I’m glad that this is happening. I’m glad they are announcing their proposals. I’m glad they are coming forth with what they think has to be done in order to save the planet: High-speed rail everywhere so that we don’t need air travel anymore, rebuild every American building after you tear ’em down, and who knows whatever the hell else.
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RUSH: One more sound bite here. This Pelosi press conference today. Remember, she named the new climate change committee and Cortez is not on it. That is a huge slap, and here’s Pelosi talking about how they’ve submitted their proposal. It’s just a proposal, but they’re dead serious about everything in it. Pelosi was asked about the Green New Deal and if it is a useful baseline or not.
PELOSI: I, frankly, haven’t seen it. Uh, but I do know that it’s enthusiastic and we welcome all the enthusiasms that are out there. We welcome the enthusiasm that is there. Uh, the Green New Deal points out that the public is much more aware, uh, of the challenge that we face and that is a good thing, and I welcome the Green New Deal and any other proposals that people have out there.
RUSH: Meaning, “I think it’s a crock. I can’t say that. It’s a bunch of foolishness. I really like the enthusiasm but I’m not gonna put ’em anywhere where they can do anything about it.” That’s what this means. “I haven’t seen it”? (laughing) It’s the most important thing in the world to these freshmen, these Millennial freshmen. It’s the most important thing, and the woman that runs the place hasn’t seen it and proudly says so. “I welcome all the enthusiasms that are out there. We welcome the enthusiasm that is there.
“The Green New Deal points out the fact the public is much more aware of the challenge that we face…” If that’s true… It doesn’t mean that. The Green New Deal does not point out the fact the public is much more aware. The Green New Deal, if it’s at all exposed for what it is, is going to shock the American people of what the left really intends to do to this country in order to deal with it! If I’m Pelosi, I’ve gotta do everything I can to make sure this thing is not taken seriously, as it is spread.
I’ve gotta do everything I can to make sure that nobody thinks this is the main, primary Democrat Party agenda. This is a killer! This is a guaranteed landslide loss, if this is something that the Democrat presidential candidate or all these nominees adopt. Can you imagine on the campaign trail Kamala Harris and Bernie Sanders and all the rest of them arguing about who’s gonna be the first to cancel air travel in America? “I’m gonna make sure it happens in 10 years,” says Bernie.
Kamala Harris says, “We can do better than that. We can cancel all jet air travel in nine years,” and then Beto O’Rourke weighs in and says, “You know, I’ve done some SEAL team training, and we could substitute jet travel with jet packs! We can get everybody in a jet pack and learn how to fly these things,” and then they’ll start to debate on this crazy premise — and then when it comes time to get rid of every building?
Which building in Washington will these people to want tear down first and rebuild? The White House, because that’s where Trump is. That, of course, would be where the greatest source of global climate change destruction is taking place. Let them start actually debating this in their prime time…? Pelosi’s gotta do something to make sure that these people are not openly disrespected, but that this thing can’t become part of the Democrat Party platform. You and I are hoping that it does.
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RUSH: Hey, I just stumbled across… I’m trying to move off of this, folks. I’m trying to move off, but I just stumbled across an actual excerpt from the Green New Deal. This is in relationship… I didn’t mention that they also have a plan to end cow farting in 10 years, because cow farts are methane. Methane is supposedly one of the most destructive gases to the atmosphere out there. So I have this passage from the Green New Deal.
“We set a goal to get to net-zero, rather than zero emissions, in 10 years because we aren’t sure that we’ll be able to fully get rid of farting cows and airplanes that fast, but we think we can ramp up renewable manufacturing and power production, retrofit every building in America, build the smart grid, overhaul transportation and agriculture, plant lots of trees and restore our ecosystem to get to net-zero,” in 10 years.
Do you remember that I shared with you the story earlier that when it gets below zero — below 32 degree and colder — that batteries begin to lose their efficiency? And when you approach 10 degrees, five degrees, batteries lose as much as 40% of their fully charged power. So what’s that do to the range of your car if you’re driving an electric car or anything else with a battery in it that’s exposed to those temperatures, the inefficiencies?
By the same token, in real cold whether or not outside of storms, wind is not nearly sufficient to drive all the windmills. In other words, during wintertime, folks, there simply is no way that alternative or renewable energy can even come close to maintaining the power grid as we know it. Now, I can’t tell you how many times since I’ve been doing this program I have told people that they want to get rid of cows.
“The reason they tell people not to eat McDonald’s is because of cow farting,” and people look at me and think that I’m making it up, that I’m just exaggerating so as to get people’s attention. “Rush, come on. Nobody thinks they can control cow farts and nobody thinks that cow farts are destroying the planet.” I say, “Yes! You’ve got to hear it. They do,” and then I’ve also said, “If they’re serious about this, they’ve gotta get rid of jets.
“They have to get rid of them. With what they say about jet engines and what they say about pollution in the upper atmosphere, they’ve got to get rid of them.” “Rush, c’mon. These people don’t think that,” and now here they are in their own words. “We’re not sure we’ll be able to fully get rid of farting cows and airplanes in 10 years, but we think we can ramp up renewal manufacturing and power production, retrofit every building in America…” And here comes Kamala Harris, exactly what I suggested is gonna happen.
These Democrat presidential candidates are gonna get in on this. Kamala Harris has tweeted, “I’m proud to co-sponsor @AOC and @EdMarkey’s Green New Deal. We must aggressively tackle climate change which poses an existential threat to our nation.” When you put “existential” in there, it means it is dire. It means it is right now! “Existential” is one of those words that people in Rio Linda have no clue what it means. All you have to do to understand it is look at the word.
Exist. Existential. Exist, right now. The existential crisis. It’s a big, dressed up word that simply means it’s real and it’s now. It’s not down the road. So here comes, I guess what is now the front-runner, Kamala Harris (impression), “I am proud to cosponsor your effort to get rid of farting cows and airplanes in 10 years!” I think some of our prayers are being answered here, folks. It may not the look like it right now — and, by the way, a lot more people than you think are gonna be cheering this.
Don’t let that depress you. There’s a bunch of young Millennial people that think this is exactly what’s necessary. You don’t know how scared they are. You don’t know how scared they have been made. You do not know the literal, existential fear they face every day over the end of the planet. It is why they cheer a story from the ChiComs if they say they successfully grew seeds on the Moon.
I’m not making this up. They cheered that story, because that means we can colonize the Moon now. (impression) “We don’t have to go to Mars to save ourselves! We can grow seeds on the Moon! (sobbing joyfully) It means we can live. We can survive. We can move beyond Earth!” You know who I hold partially responsible for this? It’s none other than The One, Barack Hussein O. He promoted this crap. He utilized it to the best of his ability.
He, by authoring that silly speech he made after he won a primary (impression), “This is the day the sea levels began to come down,” or whatever it was he said. It was irresponsible. But I think… I think Obama is at the root of so many things. He’s at the root of the Mueller investigation, that whole hoax on Russia collusion. He is single-handedly responsible promoting this hoax of climate change.