RUSH: Arnie, in a truck, which means he’s a target of the Obama administration, in Vermont. Nice to have you, sir. Hello.
CALLER: The great socialist state of Vermont.
RUSH: Right.
CALLER: Rush, I can’t believe the all-knowing, all-powerful, all-seeing Maha Rushie does not see that he is being played like a fiddle from the far left. They don’t want the conversation being on the good conservative policies coming out of the conservatives Washington. What they’re doing is they’re starting a fire over in a corner, and they’re saying, ‘Look! Look! See? See? Look! Everybody look over here,’ and that’s what they’re doing. They’re deliberately picking a fight with you so the people of the country don’t focus on what they’re supposed to be focusing on — and I think, Rush, they’re playing you like a fiddle.
RUSH: What are they supposed to be focusing on?
CALLER: They’re supposed to be focusing on some of the conservative ideas: low taxes, less government, less regulation, out of Washington to come out of the —
RUSH: Arnie —
CALLER: — conservative corner.
RUSH: Arnie —
CALLER: — but you know they don’t want that conversation.
RUSH: Arnie, I love you.
CALLER: Yeah, yeah. Thanks. I appreciate it. Well, we love you, too, Rush.
RUSH: But it’s calls that make me think, ‘What have I done, wasted my time?’
CALLER: No! It’s not wasting time.
RUSH: I just finished a record ratings speech to CPAC laying out the conservative agenda, Arnie! It’s being talked about all over the place. It’s been replayed on CNN; it’s been replayed on Fox. We’re talking about it here. I am illustrating the fraud that is the Obama agenda. I am representing conservatism. You don’t even hear it. You think I’m being ‘played like a fiddle.’ When we get a call like this, I say, ‘What’s the point? I could go play golf.’
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: I got a couple e-mails today that echoed the sentiments of the previous caller. Let me deal with this for just a second here, folks. The notion that I’m being played like a fiddle, the notion that I am being distracted from the Obama agenda, the fact that I am not putting forth the conservative principles. These have to be seminar e-mails and seminar phone calls. What’s the point here? I mean, conservative ideas coming out of Congress? Could somebody tell me where they are? This notion that Democrats are picking a fight with me and playing me, taking the focus off the conservative ideas in the Republican Party? Folks, that’s the point. There aren’t many conservative ideas in the Republican Party right now. They are shell-shocked at the Republican Party. They live in the world of polls. They live in the world of focus groups. They live with a constant media barrage that Obama’s great and that they are just gnats best dispatched with.
The threat to the Republican Party isn’t just moderates. They do present a challenge. Notice the Democrats are not going after any moderate Republicans here. The Democrats are going after me because my ideas and my exposing Obama for what he is remains the only threat to Obama completely dominating. If I’m being distracted, and if I’m fiddling while Rome burns, would somebody tell me where anybody else is standing up and focusing the truth on the Obama agenda? If I didn’t matter to them they’d leave me alone and they wouldn’t dignify responding to anything I do. It’s just the exact opposite. Snerdley came in, I was not going to tell you people this, and I’m still a little nervous. You know I don’t like talking about myself. Snerdley yesterday came in about ten minutes before the program, he was in tears, and I said, ‘What’s wrong?’ And he said, ‘I don’t know how you do it and you don’t deserve it.’ I said, ‘What are you talking about?’
He said, ‘I can’t stand it anymore, all the lies and all these hits. The White House is out trying to destroy you; the Democrat Party is out trying to destroy you, they’re lying about what you’re saying, they’re making things up about you. How do you put up with it? You don’t need this. Why are you still doing this?’ And he said to me, ‘Look, everybody asked me, ‘Why are you putting up with this?’ You’ve got yours. You could retire, live like a king behind some gate. You could go play golf, and you could read about the encroaching socialism in the newspaper every day and call the TV show now and then and say, ‘I tried to warn you, but I haven’t got time to talk, I got a tee time.’ And you could get in your car and drive wherever you wanted to go. You don’t need this. Why are you doing it?’ And he says this in a really pained way. I didn’t say anything. He provided all the answers. He said, ‘Everybody knows you’re doing it for everybody else. Doing it for us,’ and he’s partially right. The thought of retirement never enters my mind anyway. Remember, I’m not quitting ’til every American agrees with me, and that hasn’t changed. These people are not going to drive me outta here.
This mindless twit butt boy criticism is not going to drive me outta here. I said it at CPAC, I love the country and I wish everybody could experience what’s happened to me. I’m in awe that I love it so much I’m willing to do what I can to fight for it. I believe in it. I’ll tell you, when I get calls like the last one, ‘I’m being played like a fiddle,’ sometimes I do ask myself, ‘What’s the point here? What really is the point?’ Why put in all the effort, if people aren’t going to get it anyway? But I know those are few and far between. So let’s look at this Michael Steele/Rush Limbaugh thing. That’s just a brush fire to distract people, right? It’s far more than that. First, the White House was thrilled that Steele and I are disagreeing. Now they’re thrilled that we are not disagreeing and that Steele apologized. Do the media realize how idiotic they sound? Yesterday they’re jazzed, Steele has taken a shot at me, Steele has said what everybody thinks. Then Steele apologizes and they’re happy about that. And you know why they’re happy about it, because they say, ‘See, Limbaugh is such a grand pooh-bah that within 24, 36 hours, every public figure who takes a shot at him is going to have to apologize.’ They think it’s wonderful. We’ve been through this over and over. What they are trying to do is discredit and marginalize the only national critic they’ve got.
You know, the citadels of conservatism are many. We have publications; we have websites; we have think tanks. Very few are daring to take on the Obama agenda, and very few are daring to put forth the conservative agenda that many of them claim to be leading the movement. The Heritage Foundation is about the best think tank out there for advancing conservative principles, but some of the publications, not all of them, but some of the publications on websites are phoning it in every day, they’re just phoning it in. Nobody is standing up for conservatism. Nobody is defending other conservatives. Conservatives right now are trying to take each other out. I’m trying to take the Obama administration down a peg or two, and have everybody understand exactly what’s coming out of this administration, what the point is, and I will be willing to do this for as long as is necessary.