RUSH: Government shutdown. We talked yesterday about Mike Lee, Senator Mike Lee, and his efforts to repeal or defund large parts of Obamacare as part of the continuing resolution. Folks, the Republican establishment — GOP, RNC — is not interested in this at all. Quite the contrary. I mean, we’ve got Republican Party leaders actually advocating for the total implementation of Obamacare now, under the theory, “Look, it’s law.

“You can’t stop it — and, if you shut down the government, the Republicans are gonna get blamed again just like 1995. It’s a lose-lose Proposition. Just go ahead and let the law be implemented and watch it implode and kill the Democrats that way.” I don’t intellectually understand it. A, the 1995 budget battle. There’s a great story by Daniel Mitchell, National Review Online posted all the way back in February of 2011.

It prints out to four or five pages on your printer, but it is a great detailed story of how the 1995 budget shutdown really did not hurt the Republican Party. It wasn’t a deathblow. And, in fact, not only did it not really do that much damage to the party, it was a good thing for the country, the 1995 budget battle, and the aftermath. It’s a fascinating piece. I’ll link to it at RushLimbaugh.com so you can get an advance read of it.

“Why Republicans Can’t Back Down.”

This was written, again, back in 2011 about another continuing resolution fight all the way back then, when it was thought there might be a government shutdown.

The IRS employee union says, “We don’t want Obamacare.” This is the most unpopular federal program ever, and the Republican Party is choosing not to align itself with a majority of the American people on it. It just boggles the mind.

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RUSH: Here you have one of the most unpopular pieces of legislation ever. Every day another group comes out in opposition to it. Today it’s the IRS employees union saying, “We don’t want Obamacare.” A vast majority of Americans do not want Obamacare. The Republican Party has a golden opportunity to align themselves with the majority of the American people, not just Republicans, but independents.

Every demographic is represented in this mass of people that don’t want this. But the Republican Party has made the decision to side with Washington. “Well, you know, it’s law now. We can’t stop it.” Well, I’m sorry, but the Defense of Marriage Act was the law, and Obama and the Democrats said, “You know what? We’re not gonna defend it anymore. We’re not gonna litigate it. We’re not gonna enforce it,” and that was a Democrat law!

Our immigration laws are the law, and they don’t enforce those. If our current immigration law was simply enforced, we wouldn’t need to be doing anything. There are all kinds of examples. Reagan’s Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act of 1988 was the law. Democrats had no problem overturning that once Rostenkowski got beaten up by a bunch of ladies in the Blue-Haired Bloody Mary Gang one afternoon. Where would Scott Walker be if he’d been afraid of a government shutdown in Wisconsin?

I don’t understand this thinking.

Well, I do understand it. That’s the problem.

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RUSH: I want to stay focused on this Obamacare business, because it’s because really illustrative. It’s indicative of things, it’s eye opening, and it’s puzzling as well. You know what Obamacare is; it’s the nationalization of one-sixth of the US economy. But it’s far more than that. It essentially allows the federal government to dictate control over whatever aspect of life they want, because virtually every aspect of life is going to have ramifications on health care costs.

So if, for example, the government decides that obesity is a leading cause of increased health costs, then they can, under this law, start mandating behaviors and diets and any number of things by you, if you are to get health care down the line for whatever ails you. They can dictate any behavior they want because all behavior will be linked to health care costs at some point in somebody’s life. It is a breathtaking amassing of power.

In addition to that, it destroys private sector businesses.

What Obamacare is effectively doing is transforming the 40-hour workweek to a 30 hour workweek. Now, how does that help the middle class? Obama’s out giving speeches, telling everybody that he’s now focusing once again for the nineteenth time on jobs, and he’s focusing on the economy, because all these scandals have just been nothing but distractions. “Phony distractions.” He’s gonna focus once again.

He’s gonna get this done, because “Washington” hasn’t cared enough. Washington hasn’t paid enough attention. Well, as this health care law is implemented, companies have been downsizing their staffs, or they have been converting full-time employees to part time so that they do not have to pay them health care benefits. At least the first couple or three years of the law. How’s that helping the middle class?

We’ve already lost nine million jobs since Obama assumed office in January of 2009. Nine million jobs have just vanished! They no longer exist. They’re not waiting to be filled because they don’t exist any longer, which makes the unemployment rate of 7.6% a little misleading. If the same number of jobs were available today as when Obama took office, that 7.6% unemployment rate would be closer to 11%, even today, while they claim the economy is recovering and rebounding.

But when you wipe nine million jobs away from the universe of jobs, then of course the percentage of people out of work is gonna be expressed is a much lower number. So jobs are being lost, full-time jobs are being converted to part-time jobs. None of this is helping people. None of this is helping people grow their lifestyles, get raises, or find jobs that pay more money. Just one of the reasons Obamacare should be repealed: It guts the 40-hour workweek.

The 40-hour workweek is one of the defining characteristics of the American middle class. Obamacare defines full-time employment now as 30 hours per week, and it does that by law. If you work 30 hours a week, you gotta be covered. Over 30 hours, you have to be covered. Less, you don’t. Guess what employers are doing? The president says he cares about the middle class, but his legacy is to take full-time work and turn it into part-time work.

He says he’s gonna “build the economy from the middle out” while he rips 25% of the hours and pay out of the middle class! How can this happen? Well, it can’t. He thinks he’s setting a floor with this? These people are so whacked out, he thinks he’s setting a floor with this. He’s setting a ceiling with the 30-hour workweek and the 50 employees a business has to have to abide by Obamacare. If they got 49, they don’t.

Every incentive in this bill is for employers to get rid of people, convert ’em to part-time, or fire them. That’s the incentive, if the businesses are to stay open. Regarding that, I will not lose my place here. This is a great time to share with you a little story here from the UK Telegraph. There’s some clown over there named Matthew Hancock, and he’s in the government. He’s in the British government.

He is a cabinet minister of “Business and Skills.” He is the “business and skills minister,” and “Mr. Hancock, the business and skills minister, has said that companies have a ‘social duty’ to employ young British workers rather than” just seek profit. He said “that employers should be prepared to invest in training British staff rather than simply looking for ‘pure profit.’

“Asked whether he believes that a company should train British workers ‘at the risk of a little bit of profit’ rather that employing foreigners Mr. Hancock said: ‘Yes, yes I do.’ He added: ‘I think that the Government has a responsibility too. We have a responsibility to support that training.'” Well, yeah, he’s in the UK but how many people like this live and work in the Obama regime? The purpose of a business is to provide employment. The purpose of a business is to provide health care.

The purpose of a business is to make charitable donations to the community. The purpose of a business is to create a wing for children at the local hospital. How’s a business supposed to do this if it doesn’t make a profit? So here you have in the UK the business and skills minister out there opining against profit, saying, “That’s bad, if a company focuses on that. A company needs to focus on training workers!”

No. The workers get trained before they get there.

Sure there’s some on-the-job training. It’s called internships, or it’s called entry-level minimum wage. But “at the business” is not where everybody learns how to do what they’re doing. Some people that you hire have to already know — and, hopefully, some of them that you hire are the best that you can get. But this is liberal thinking at its best. “The purpose of a business is to hire people. The purpose of a business is to have jobs! The purpose of a business is to provide health care, and any business that seeks profit is to be suspected.”

How else is it going to stay in business?

How else is it going to continue to operate?

How is it gonna keep the doors open?

Why the Republican Party doesn’t see all of this as an opportunity to advance itself in contrast, here you have Obamacare, which the vast majority of people — and it’s growing — don’t want it, oppose it. And even now labor unions, two major unions send Pelosi and Reid letters saying don’t you dare implement, this is hurting our workforce. They went along with this for whatever stupid, dumb reasons, thinking that they were gonna be on the inside, and they find out that their union members are gonna get the shaft here when it comes to health care benefits and wages and everything else, because the incentive for every business is to let people go, fire them, or employ them for fewer hours, convert them to part time. That’s the incentive in Obamacare.

How hard is that to oppose? How hard is that to contrast as a Republican Party, come out against all that? Why would you take such a universally unpopular piece of legislation of the opposition party and sign on to it? Forget conservative versus liberal for a minute. The Republican Party is still the Republican Party. Theoretically they still want to beat the Democrats. Where is that? Where is the push-back? The Republicans have a built-in, automatic way to align themselves with people of all demographics, of all age-groups, all institutions, all races, religions, creeds, ages, you name it, because they all make up the group of people that oppose it.

And this is not a passive opposition. This is visceral. The people that oppose this bill actively oppose it. There’s no ho-hum, “Yeah, I don’t care, but I don’t really like that.” I mean it is an active, committed opposition to this piece of legislation. And the Republican thinking at the highest levels is, “It’s the law of the land. We can’t stop it. Go ahead and let it be implemented, and it’ll implode.” Well, no other entitlement has. This is the same kind of thinking that I remember hearing back in 1992. “Rush, go ahead and let Clinton win. Let those Democrats win, Rush. And the people will see how bad these Democrats are. They’ll see what damage they do and that will be the end of them.” Well, it hasn’t worked yet.

So let Obamacare fully implement, and it’ll implode, and we’ll be there to pick up the pieces. Well, you better get your opposition to it stated front and center. You Republicans better let people know that you oppose this, otherwise if you come across as liking this, helping this, supporting this, and it does implode, you’re not gonna be around to pick up the pieces. You’re gonna get blamed, by your own voters. It’s what I don’t understand. The holy grail should be the end of Obamacare.

You want to turn more part-time work into full-time work? End Obamacare. You want to increase your take-home pay? End Obamacare. You want your health care costs to get cheaper? End Obamacare. You want to increase jobs and grow the US economy? End Obamacare. Slogan after slogan after slogan writes themselves. None of this is a negative. I mean, it’s a positive. It’s the best thing anybody could do to get the economy going, stop Obamacare.

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RUSH: I just got a note from a great guy, Louie Gohmert, member of Congress from Texas, and Louie said, “As always, you’re right.” But then there was a “but.” And Louie said, “Obamacare will implode. Socialism always implodes.” Which is true. How long did it take the Soviet Union to implode? 60, 70 years. It will. Socialism never has worked. It will always implode, but Obamacare’s not gonna implode next year. It’s not gonna implode in time for the 2016 presidential election. It’s designed to actually look kind of cool the first couple, three years.

Fines are cheaper than health insurance policies. It’s gonna be onerous. It’s not gonna convert itself from an anti- to a supported position overnight. It’s gonna implode, but you gotta run out of other people’s money first. I mean, to sit around and wait for implosion as a policy? Ah.

Bob in Long Beach. Great to have you on the program. Open Line Friday. Hello, sir.

CALLER: Hello, Rush. I hear you talking and I hear a lot of people talking about defunding Obamacare, and I don’t think that’s gonna work because Obama has the bank. He has the Treasury department. He has the collection agency. He has the checkbook, and he has the money. Whether or not the House appropriates the money or not, he’s gonna get it wherever he damn well pleases and he’s gonna fund it. The whole idea of defunding it’s a joke to me. You’re assuming he’s gonna play by the rules. Big mistake, in my opinion. He’s got all the money in the world.

RUSH: Republicans playing by the rules is a big mistake, you said?

CALLER: Oh, yeah, assuming that Obama will play by the rules.

RUSH: Oh, assuming Obama’s gonna play by the rules.

CALLER: It’s a big mistake.

RUSH: Oh, yeah.

CALLER: He’s got the bank. He’s got the bank.

RUSH: I get it. I get it. So, the Republicans, they repeal the funding and (imitating Obama), “I don’t care, I’ll get Ben Bernanke to write me a check.” Sadly, folks, the man has a point.

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RUSH: Look, it would not be automatically easy for Obama to just spend money that had been repealed, not the amounts that we’re talking about. I know he doesn’t care what the law is, but it wouldn’t just be a snap of his fingers. That’s not what they’re afraid of, by the way, folks.