{"id":8923,"date":"2014-07-11T17:09:04","date_gmt":"2014-07-11T17:09:04","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2014-07-11T17:09:04","modified_gmt":"2014-07-11T17:09:04","slug":"after_five_and_a_half_years_i_hope_he_fails_remains_the_most_memorable_expression_of_opposition_to_obama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2014\/07\/11\/after_five_and_a_half_years_i_hope_he_fails_remains_the_most_memorable_expression_of_opposition_to_obama\/","title":{"rendered":"After Five and a Half Years, “I Hope He Fails” Remains the Most Memorable Expression of Opposition to Obama"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Listen<\/a><\/p>\n

RUSH: Your host once again maligned and misrepresented. And, by the way, I need to give you a heads-up on something here, folks, before we head to the phones on Open Line Friday. This so-called lawsuit that Boehner is threatening to file against Obama for behaving outside the Constitution, for basically breaking the law, for doing things presidents are not constitutionally permitted to do, I think you should know that certain news organizations are now associating my statement in January of 2009, “I hope he fails,”<\/a> with the Boehner lawsuit. <\/p>\n

There is an effort to conflate the two, and in order to do that you have to purposely misrepresent and misunderstand what I said and what I meant when I said, “I hope he fails.” Now, I know, you\u2019re tired of this. You\u2019ve heard this. You knew exactly what I meant the moment I said it. <\/line><\/a>Furthermore, so did everybody else. Everybody else knew exactly what I meant, but they pretended they didn\u2019t so that they could create a phony narrative that I actually wanted the country to fail because I couldn\u2019t stand a Democrat succeeding in making the country work, so I wanted the country to fail. That\u2019s what they were trying to make everybody believe I meant. <\/line><\/p>\n

And of course it was just the exact opposite. I wanted Obama to fail at what he has done. I wanted him to fail at growing government. I wanted him to fail with his economic policies. Look what they\u2019ve done. I wanted every Obama policy to fail, and if that happened, the country would be spared. I wanted to save the country. I was offering a defense and a desire to protect the country by saying I hope Obama fails. So let\u2019s go to C-SPAN Washington Journal this morning. This is the host, Peter Slen, I think is his name, and he took a call from Mike in Memphis.<\/p>\n

MIKE: My solution is for the Congress, the lack of cooperation between the legislative government with the executive branch is appalling. And it\u2019s killing us. It\u2019s like they\u2019ve adopted Rush Limbaugh\u2019s “I hope he fails” philosophy. There\u2019s no cooperation. Obama cannot do it by himself and it\u2019s gonna kill us. This country is being destroyed from within. Obama needs to call out the military to secure the border. The Tea Party right-wing Republicans, they\u2019re just sitting there and not offering any solutions to problems. I think it\u2019s purely racism and prejudice of the black president.<\/line><\/p>\n

RUSH: All right, what do we do with this? I mean, we clearly are dealing with the quintessential low-information voter here. I mean, this is classic. There\u2019s so many contradictions in what this guy said, so many factual inaccuracies. And it\u2019s out there. It\u2019s out there on C-SPAN. He says Boehner and the Republicans have adopted Rush Limbaugh\u2019s “I hope he fails” philosophy. No, they haven\u2019t. Here\u2019s the thing. Lack of cooperation is killing us? No. The only thing that is even giving us any hope is the gridlock. If it weren\u2019t for the gridlock, if it weren\u2019t for the Republicans occasionally refusing to go along with what Obama wants, we\u2019d be in worse shape than we\u2019re in now. <\/p>\n

But this guy doesn\u2019t even understand. He says there\u2019s no cooperation. Obama can\u2019t do it by himself. Obama\u2019s doing it by himself and he\u2019s bragging about doing it by himself, and he\u2019s promising to do even more by himself. “If they won\u2019t do their job, well, I will. I\u2019m not gonna sit around and wait for them. I\u2019ll go ahead and do it. I\u2019ll do it.” And he\u2019s doing it. That\u2019s why he\u2019s being sued. He\u2019s doing more than the Constitution permits him to do. He doesn\u2019t need any cooperation. He wants fall guys. He wants people to take the hit when the things that he does go wrong from our perspective. They don\u2019t go wrong from his. <\/p>\n

And then we get Obama needs to call out the military to secure the border? Who made it insecure? Who opened it? Who\u2019s keeping it open? Who\u2019s promoting it as open? Who\u2019s down there welcoming everybody in? Who\u2019s looking at it as a Democrat voter registration? Call out the military to secure the border? That\u2019s what the Tea Party wants to do, and yet the Tea Party right wing, they\u2019re just sitting there not offering any solutions? That\u2019s all they are offering. We and the Tea Party have countless solutions to these problems. They are the antithesis of Obama policy. <\/line><\/p>\n

Now, for those of you, and I know you\u2019re there, except you don\u2019t. Most low-information voters don\u2019t know, by definition, how could they? They don\u2019t know enough to know they don\u2019t know anything. So most low-information voters don\u2019t know they\u2019re low-information. That\u2019s the funny thing about this. We can talk about them all day long and nobody\u2019s gonna think I\u2019m talking about them, because there\u2019s not a low-information voter out there who actually thinks he or she is low-information. They always think you\u2019re talking about somebody else. But this, January 16th, 2009<\/a>, right here on this program just for the sake of getting it out there again because there is an effort being made to associate my “I hope he fails” with this Republican lawsuit.<\/p>\n

RUSH ARCHIVE: I don\u2019t need 400 words. I need four: I hope he fails. Well, what are you laughing at? See, now, here\u2019s the point. Everybody thinks it\u2019s outrageous to say. Look, even my staff, “You can\u2019t do it.” Why not? Why is it any different, what\u2019s new, what is unfair about my saying “I hope liberalism fails”? Liberalism is our problem. Liberalism is what\u2019s gotten us dangerously close to the precipice here. Why do I want more of it? I don\u2019t care what the Drive-By story is. I would be honored if the Drive-By Media headlined me all day long: “Limbaugh: ‘I hope Obama fails.'” Somebody\u2019s gotta say it.<\/p>\n

RUSH: And they did. They headlined me. I was all over. I owned the media and I don\u2019t even have a PR firm. And to this day, when they think it serves their purpose, they revive me saying, “I hope Obama fails.” And they always attempt to convince people that what I really meant was that I wanted the country to fail. I\u2019ve actually heard some people explain it to others this way: “You know what Limbaugh really wanted? You know what he\u2019s really afraid of? Limbaugh\u2019s afraid of a Democrat coming in and the economy booming and the country going great guns. He just doesn\u2019t want that to happen when the Democrats are in office \u2019cause he knows it\u2019s the end of what he believes. So that\u2019s why he wants Obama to fail. He wants Obama to fail, meaning he wants the country to fail, so that the Democrats don\u2019t get any credit.” <\/p>\n

That\u2019s how they were trying to portray what I had said, when they knew that\u2019s not what I meant. I meant exactly what I said. I have never supported liberalism. I know exactly who and what liberalism is and what it does. And if everybody did there\u2019s no way anybody would want more of it. Well, not everybody. You\u2019re always gonna have a few, but we\u2019ve not lost the country. I don\u2019t care what they say about the tipping point. We have not gotten to the point where a majority of Americans just want to give up on their ambition, on their desires, on their families. It hasn\u2019t happened. The media would love you to believe that we\u2019ve reached that point, but we haven\u2019t. <\/p>\n

But for me it was I don\u2019t want anymore liberalism. I\u2019ve seen enough of it, I know exactly what it does, worldwide, nationwide. I have seen what liberalism does, and I was hoping Obama would fail in his attempt to transform this country into something it was not founded to be.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, stop and think of something for a second. We are five and a half years into the Obama presidency, five and a half years, and my statement and explanation on January 16th of 2009 — this is two weeks, maybe a week before Obama was even inaugurated, my statement, “I hope he fails,” remains the most memorable and standing expression of opposition to Obama in five and a half years. <\/p>\n

I\u2019m a guy on the radio. A guy on the radio a week before Obama\u2019s inauguration says, “I hope he fails,” and that, even after five and a half years, still stands as the strongest statement of opposition to Obama that there is. That\u2019s where the media goes to illustrate opposition. They don\u2019t go to anybody in the Republican Party and what they\u2019ve said. They go to a guy on the radio. What does that say about the political opposition to Obama? It means there hasn\u2019t been very much if my statement is still the go-to statement for the media after five and a half years. Here I am, I\u2019m still explaining this after five and a half years? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: Your host once again maligned and misrepresented. And, by the way, I need to give you a heads-up on something here, folks, before we head to the phones on Open Line Friday. 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