RUSH: Let’s go to the audio sound bites. We’ll start here with Obama. This is from Monday. He was interviewed by Beliefnet.com politics editor Dan Gilgoff, and Gilgoff asked Obama this question: ‘Do you believe that Obama in the Arab street could hate America less if they saw that you were elected because of your faith background and your brushes with Islam in your past?’
OBAMA: I don’t think that it would change the minds of the hard-core ideologues of the Islamic world movement. I think they would see me as a Christian and an infidel and a Westerner. They wouldn’t view me any differently, I think, than any other American president. I do think that for the average Arab or Indonesian or Nigerian or Tunisian Muslim on the street; that my familiarity with their culture would have an impact. I think that they would view America differently if I were president, and that that is not just symbolic. That is something that could be used in a constructive way to open greater dialogue between the West and the Islamic world and that ultimately could make us more safe.
RUSH: Oh, Barry, please. You know, you’re starting to disappoint me here, pal. You don’t want to go there on this question! What do we have here? What we’re being told now is that we Republicans, we’re going to have to nominate Republicans based on their acceptability to Democrats and the media — and now we’re going to elect presidents based on their acceptability to Muslims! You know, if I had been Obama… I like this guy. I mean, personally, I like this guy. There’s no difference in him issue-wise than Hillary, but I like this guy. But these people throw these hanging curveballs, and he’s whiffing. If I’m Barack Obama and I know that the Clintons are out there push polling on my middle name being Hussein, and if they’re out there trying to get Bob Kerrey to say I went to madrasahs and stuff, secret Muslim. They’re out there spreading this stuff in mailings and push polling and so forth, so I get a question from some clown at Beliefnet.com: ‘Do you agree that a Muslim in the Arab street…?’
You say, ‘I’m not answering that! What are we talking about? I’m running for president of the United States, not the president of Saudi Arabia,’ and just get rid of it. Now, another question surfaced: Are the Clintons getting into Barry’s brain? There are news stories out there that they’re getting to him, and Mrs. Clinton thinks so. Mrs. Clinton is saying so. We’re getting inside his head. The Wall Street Journal today with an editorial: ‘Is Barack Obama this Clueless?’ He can go back and remember the nineties and Reaganism, but does he forget what the Clintons were all about? Because the Clintons are now Clintoning him the way they did all of us back in the nineties, and he doesn’t see it! Barack, don’t you understand what’s happening to you here, pal? You are being targeted for destruction by Clinton, Inc. — only you are being targeted because you are an uppity black man. You’re not being targeted because your policies are any different. You’re being targeted because you represent a threat to Mrs. Clinton’s diabolical quest to reclaim power, and her husband’s perverted view for his thrills and Jills when he gets back in. They’re toying with your head. They’re out there trying to destroy you; they’re doing it on the basis of race. At some point, you can’t just sit there and take this stuff. Here’s Obama:
This is on the Today Show today, and the cohost Meredith Vieira says, ‘Now the former president’s in South Carolina, probably reminding voters that during a Clinton presidency, the economy did very well.’ By the way, Hillary’s not there. She’s flown out to Los Angeles, probably to give Ron Burkle a piece of her mind and then do some campaigning on the Super Tuesday states. Now, Clinton hung around South Carolina. I think they’ve ceded it, but they don’t want the blacks to think they have. So Clinton is running around to churches and little communities, going door-to-door, acting like the first black president, but the polling data all shows — and, of course, this could be off the charts once the returns come in, but these are black voters we’re talking about. So the Wilder Effect is probably not in play here. But I’m convinced they’re hoping to lose South Carolina to a huge black vote going for Obama, but they don’t want to look like they don’t care about it so Clinton’s left. But Clinton is not doing things designed to appeal to a large number of blacks.
He’s going door-to-door and talking to them one or two at a time, so that they can say (Clinton impression), ‘Hey, what do you mean, Limbaugh? We didn’t cede that state. You can’t get anything right. Actually, you get everything right, but I can’t say that. You can’t say that, Limbaugh. We gave it our best shot in South Carolina. Who better than the first black president, to go in there and try to win that state for my wife?’ That’s not what they want to happen. Anyway, back to Meredith Vieira’s question. All right, Clinton’s in there. ‘He’s running around South Carolina reminding voters that during a Clinton presidency the economy did very well. During the debate on Monday, you brought up his name several times, at one point saying you can’t tell who you’re running against sometimes. It led some to say Barack has Bill on the brain. That guy is really getting to the senator. What is your response to that? Is he getting to you?’
OBAMA: Oh! He’s not getting to me. It’s just that I think in the Clinton campaign they have had former President Clinton delivering a bunch of inaccurate statements about my record. So naturally I’ve got to make sure that those are corrected. I’m confident [what] the American people are looking for is a president they can trust and somebody who’s talking to them in a straightforward way about how he or she is going to solve their problems. You know, all we’re talking about, I think, is the need for consistency.
RUSH: Yeah. (sigh) An answer that lands with a what? Ptu! Sort of little thud out there. Does Clinton get into your brain? No, of course not, of course not. I just want them to start telling the truth, the Clintons out there listening to this — (Clinton impression), ‘Oh, man, this guy just doesn’t get it, expecting me to tell the truth? Ha-ha-ha.’ Barry? Barry, Barry, Barry. (interruption) Well, you know, how’s Barack supposed to go up against old Bill? I think you take this question, ‘What’s your response? Is he getting to you?’ and say, ‘No, no, he’s not getting to me,’ and then you don’t talk about the inaccuracies. You don’t talk about all of this, to the point of getting them straightened out. What you say is, ‘I find it fascinating, Ms. Vieira, that my opponent and her husband have to lie about me in order to stand a chance in this election. If anybody’s getting into anybody’s head, I am into their heads! They thought they had this wrapped up. They thought they were the candidates of inevitability, and I’ve come along, and I’m loved and adored when they are distrusted and despised. So if anybody’s gotten into anybody’s head, it’s me getting into their head! Next question.’ It’s called offense. Come on, Barry! Meanwhile, Slick Willie kept up the Obama attack. This is last night on the campaign trail. An unidentified reporter says to Clinton, ‘Is Obama running against you or Hillary Clinton or both of you?’
CLINTON: I thought he was running against me in Nevada for a while when he said the Republicans had the — most of the new ideas and challenged the conventional wisdom of the nineties. I thought we challenged the conventional wisdom in the nineties.
RUSH: See, now? (laughs) For once, I think Clinton is telling the truth. I think Clinton’s got such me, me, me, narcissistic thing; that when Obama talks about the Republicans back in the nineties, they’re the ones that really had transformative ideas, Clinton can hear that, ‘Well, that SOB! I’m the one! I’m the one that redefined politics in the 1990’s. What is he talking about Republicans? ‘I think he does take that personally, and says, ‘I think he was running against me, I think he was, and he’s going to pay,’ and here’s Obama’s response to the Clinton attacks. This is on the campaign trail.
OBAMA: Senator Clinton and President Clinton have been spending the last month attacking me in ways that are not accurate. Senator Clinton announced while we were still in Iowa that this was going to be her strategy and called it the fun part of campaigning, and I don’t think it’s the fun part to fudge the truth.
RUSH: (groan) Barry, do you know how much you have in your arsenal you’re not using — and you’d make sure every word of what you would say about them would be the truth. At some point you gotta call attention to the fact they’re lying about you. The one thing you gotta understand, Mr. Obama, everybody knows the Clintons lie, and they don’t care! If they cared, there wouldn’t be the Clintons today. You have to understand: People marvel at how they get away with it, and it’s happening to you now. You weren’t tilling a farm back in nineties. You were paying attention to stuff. You have to know how they work. Now that you’re the target of it, you’ve got so much evidence. They get on you about this Rezko guy. It’s called Norman Hsu. It’s called Charlie Trie. It’s called the Buddhist nuns. It’s called no controlling legal authority. The list would take longer than I have here to go through. You know, for every Rezko you’ve got in your life — there can’t be too many of these because you haven’t been in politics that long — there’s gotta be ten or 15 on the Clintons.
Now, it doesn’t help that some of the guys that Obama has out there speaking for him are some of the guys that you couldn’t hear if they had a megaphone. Tom Daschle, ‘the Puffster;’ and John Kerry. John Kerry is out there saying (haughty John Kerry impression), ‘I’m nooooot going to let him get Swiftboated. Weeeee’re going to deal with this when the time is riiiiight.’
John, the time is now! He’s being Swiftboated now.
‘Weeeeell, we’ll get to it. We’re not going to allow it to happen to him what happened to meeeeee. It isn’t going to happen.’
John, it’s happening! Except in your case it was the truth; they’re lying about Barry. They’re deciding your own party by race.
Daschle’s out there saying (soft-spoken Daschle impression), ‘Tim, I am truly concerned — very, very concerned — over the divisions that are popping up in our party. You know, Tim, it’s all about family, and I’m really concerned.’
This is really great. Here, you want to hear Daschle? We got Daschle here. This is a conference call with reporters, the Puffster talking to Jeff Earle of USA Today, and the question is, ‘On the subject of President Clinton, do you think what he’s doing is unpresidential or, you know, dignified given his role as a party head?’
DASCHLE: I think that it’s not presidential. It’s not, uh, in keeping with the image of a former president, and I’m, frankly, surprised that he is taking this approach. That’s a disappointment for many Democrats.
RUSH: Come on!
DASCHLE: We’re going to be releasing today a new organization, the South Carolina Truth Squad, and our purpose is to respond forcefully to each and every one of these false accusations and set the record straight as quickly as we can. That’s the purpose to this truth squad and our efforts this morning, and from here on out.
RUSH: Well, you’re getting started here a little late. I’ll tell you how the Clintons work. I can’t believe you people don’t know this. Okay, so the Clintons say that Barry had made love with two goats in Seattle when he was 18. You guys start your research to find out if it’s true. You say, ‘No, it wasn’t,’ and here’s all your evidence. ‘He was never in Seattle. He doesn’t like goats.’ By the time you get your response out there, the Clintons are saying, ‘By the way, it wasn’t just two goats. It was a mule.’ So then you start researching the mule, and you found out he doesn’t like mules, and he still wasn’t in Seattle. The Clintons come back and say, ‘When he finished with the mule, he went and smoked and sold cocaine,’ and they’re going to keep you running in circles on this stuff. This is unbelievable.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: I’m just sitting here thinking about this audio sound bite that we just played from Tom Daschle. He was asked, ‘Is Clinton being undignified and unpresidential?’ (doing Daschle impression) ‘I think that’s not presidential. It’s not in keeping with the image of a former president. And I’m, frankly, surprised that he’s taking this –‘ come on! Frankly surprised? You cannot possibly be! ‘That’s a disappointment for many Democrats.’ That’s another big one. (doing Daschle impression) ‘Tim, we’re going to be releasing today a new organization, the South Carolina Truth Squad, and our purpose is to respond forcefully. No, no; I said forcefully — to each and every one of these false accusations and set the record straight as quickly as we can. That’s the purpose of this truth squad.’ I have never heard these Democrats so inept and so incompetent when they ran against us. Daschle was Harry Reid on steroids. These two guys, the most partisan guys in Washington, once George Mitchell left town started examining steroid use among baseball players. I’ve never heard such milquetoast, mealy mouthy, inconsequential attack rhetoric in my life. ‘We’re going to have a truth squad. We’re going to get reports out fast.’
Phil in Traverse City, Michigan. Welcome to the Rush Limbaugh program. Hi.
CALLER: Hi, Rush. This is Phil from Traverse City, Michigan, where we could use a little bit of global warming right now.
RUSH: Don’t worry, it’s out there.
CALLER: Rush, a long time ago in college, I learned in economics 101 that you tax what you want less of and you subsidize what you want more of. And I notice that the Democrats in their current stimulus package, they want to extend unemployment benefits and they want to extend food stamps, suggesting that I guess they want more unemployment and they want more obese people.
RUSH: They want more dependent people. Those people vote for them. This is Liberalism 101. You got the econ 101 right. Liberalism 101, create as many dependent sponges as you can, who have no recourse for their needs in life but the government, especially when run by Democrats. This whole notion, by the way, of extending unemployment benefits, you’re exactly right. Why go find a job if they’re going to extend unemployment benefits for six months? And, of course, they mention this because they want to sound fair, they want to sound compassionate, because this economy is about to go into recession. It’s already bad enough with millions and millions and millions and millions of Americans losing their homes and their Visa cards and their MasterCards. Food stamps will save the economy, and the food stamps combined with unemployment, why, believe me, the more people sitting on their ass with their hands out waiting for the mailman once a week, the better the country is as far as the Democrats are concerned.