RUSH: We had this story yesterday, didn’t have a chance to get to it. “Squeezed by rising living costs a record number of Americans — nearly one in two — have fallen into poverty, or they are scraping by on earnings that classify them as low income. One in five American children live in poverty.” Now, stop and think of this, folks. One in two Americans are now poor or low income. Now, this is the kind of story that usually comes out when a Republican is in the White House. Seriously. You don’t get these kinds of stories when a Democrat’s in the White House. We had a story yesterday about homeless children. I said to myself, “We don’t get these kinds of stories when a Democrat’s in the White House. What’s going on?”
And then, and then I remembered. The New York Times, in an op-ed two weeks ago on a Monday, Thomas B. Edsall (now at the Huffing and Puffington Post) wrote a piece in which he said that the Obama campaign was writing off white working class families. They were going to focus on the poor. The focus is on the votes of the poor and the votes of minorities. They are forgetting white working-class voters, meaning they know they can’t get those votes. The white working class is hurt; the white working class wants to work. Obama has policies that are destroying the creation of jobs. They know it. So Obama’s not even gonna make a pretense in the campaign.
Therefore, what’s Obama need? More poor people! More people who are told they’re poor. More people who are told they’re poor because Wall Street stole from ’em. More people who are told they’re poor because the 1% have taken everything from ’em. So when you see a story — it’s at US News World Report, it’s at MSNBC, it’s everywhere — one in two Americans are now poor or low income. Well, Obama’s not failed. It’s like I said on Greta last night. I reminded everybody: January 16, 2009, Wall Street Journal calls, “Can you give us 400 words on what you hope for the new president?” I said, “It won’t take 400, I can do it in four: ‘I hope he fails,'” and an excrement storm erupted.
I, for six months, was the only guy carrying that message and that water.
So I said last night to Greta, “He has not failed.” From his perspective, he has had resounding success: Bankrupting the country, joblessness, increased debt, a transfer of money from the private sector to the public sector to government that’s never been done before on this level. The cutting down to size of the private sector, the class warfare, he’s succeeded — and when you see one in two Americans are now poor or low income, and you understand Obama’s gonna spend a billion dollars in his reelection targeting those people? The more poor the better. (New 
Castrati impression) “That’s a very cynical view to have, Mr. Limbaugh!”
It’s not cynical, Mr. New Castrati. It’s political. It’s how I analyze it. I defy anybody to tell me that this is something Obama doesn’t want. Remember, one of his own lackeys writes in the New York Times that white working class votes they’re not interested in. (summarized) “We don’t think we can get ’em. We’re gonna go after the disadvantaged, the poor, the hungry, the thirsty, and the minorities.” Well, the more of them the better, and to the extent that you might not be able to really expand substantively the number of poor you can still convince a lot of people that they’re poor. It doesn’t take much for Obama to make a speech and depress everybody. Blame it on Wall Street, blame it on the 1%, blame it on the rich — as though he was gist inaugurated yesterday and the last two to three years happened with somebody else in the Oval Office.
So I look at this: Dismal prospects, one in two Americans are now poor or low income? Success! Bammo! Bull’s-eye! Home run.! This is where Obama is heading. “The latest census data depict a middle class that’s shrinking.” Remember, now, Obama was gonna “focus like a laser” on them — and who was the middle class liaison? Joe Bite Me! Obama appointed Joe Bite Me to supervise the stimulus, all other kinds of things to make sure the middle class had a spokesman, had somebody standing up for ’em — and now “census data depict a middle class that’s shrinking as unemployment stays high and the government safety net frays. The new numbers follow years of stagnating wages for the middle class that have hurt millions of workers and families.” Yep, that’s what Obama said in Osawatomie, Kansas!
It’s all the rich people’s fault!
It’s all the Republicans’ fault!
It’s worse than he knew when he was inaugurated. He inherited all this from George W. Bush.
But it’s exactly what he wants.
It’s how he intends to win reelection.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Pittsfield, Maine. We’re gonna take a phone call here in the first hour, and it’s from Tim. Tim, thank you, sir. Great to have you with us.
CALLER: Rush, it’s a pleasure to talk to you! Rush, I’m getting a little bit tired of Barack Obama and the liberals in this country hijacking the language of what “poverty” is, okay? I grew up in the 1970s. When I was 21 years old I got left with two kids under the age of three, okay? I had $112.52 a week is what I was taking home.
RUSH: What, did your wife run out on you or something?
CALLER: We got divorced, yes.
RUSH: Yeah?
CALLER: I got left with two small children. I hitchhiked back —
RUSH: Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Your wife did not want the children?
CALLER: No. I hitchhiked back and forth to work for nine years before I had enough money to put a vehicle on the road all the time. My father always told me and I worked my way out of it, and what they’re doing is they’re poisoning these kids’ minds, and they’re doing that — how they’re doing that is they’re teaching them that hijacking the language about middle class and poverty.
RUSH: Right.
CALLER: In other words, I work all day long. I work 60, 65 hours a week. I still work a lot of hours, and I’m 53 years old today, okay? I own my own home. I worked my way out of this because I knew how to work my way out of it — and the thing of it is if you’ve got a roof over your head and clothes on your back and you’re paying your bills and you got a little bit of money left over? Man, you’re middle class! You’re not poor. You’re not poverty stricken. You’re middle class. And part of the reason the education system is failing is because they’re doing these kids a bad disservice by teaching them that they’re poverty stricken, that somehow or another they’re never going to be able to get up over this.
RUSH: Yeah, you’re right. You are right. You are nailing this. You’re exactly right and the story that I just had where now the Bureau of Labor Statistics says one out of two Americans live in poverty? That is flat-out BS.
CALLER: It is.
RUSH: It’s flat-out BS. But you’re nailing it. The language is being totally corrupted. The reason why this is being done — it is sickening and it’s pathetic but the reason it’s being done — is they want people to think they’re poor. They want people to think that they are victims of Wall Street, of the rich, or whatever. They want people to think that if it weren’t for others who have more than they do, that they’d be happy. It’s pure, 100% class envy. This is why I maintain to you that Obama and the Democrats (and they’re one and the same) relish a story with the headline: “One Out of Two Americans in Poverty.” It’s made to order for “See what the Republicans did to you? See what Wall Street did to you? I’m here to help you! I’m here to help you. I’m here to give you health care. I’m here to put your kid into college. I’m here…” This is exactly it. You have nailed it. That’s precisely the whole point of this.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: You know, the truth is, ladies and gentlemen — and this is something the left, the Democrats, have to rewrite out of history books; they have to take it out of the economics books — wealth does trickle down. What is called “poor” today would have been considered upper middle class just a generation, two generations ago. What is today called poor. I’m not exaggerating, look at Robert Rector at Heritage and his stats.