RUSH: This is Jan Crawford. She’s at CBS News. She was on television this morning, CBS This Morning, reporting about the reaction to Obama’s remarks that the court, Supreme Court, should not overturn the health care reform law.
CRAWFORD: The president appears to be laying the groundwork to take on the court if it strikes down that law. For the second straight day President Obama gave his take on what the Supreme Court should do: uphold his signature domestic achievement. Monday he seemed to suggest the court didn’t even have the power to strike down the law. On Obama’s comments, Republicans pounced.
RUSH ARCHIVE: What is this, the court must understand? That is a threat.
CRAWFORD: It went beyond talk radio. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell released a statement saying the president lacked fundamental respect for the separation of powers. Yesterday afternoon the judges struck back. A federal appeals court in Houston issued an order to the Justice Department to explain whether the president really meant the court had no power to strike down the law.
RUSH: And that’s the key, and I just saw Attorney General Holder on television, (paraphrasing) “Of course we’re gonna respond. Of course it will be an appropriate response. And of course we understand Marbury v. Madison. Of course we understand the court’s final say-so on whether laws are constitutional. But we must remember that the court has always practiced deference,” said Holder. The court’s always been deferential. So he’s trying to have it both ways. “Oh, yeah, we understand the court strikes down laws of Congress. They better not strike this one down.” But, again, at the risk of being redundant, Obama knows that there’s judicial review. He knows that the court does this. He’s not ignorant or stupid or uneducated. What he did yesterday had nothing to do with the court, not purposely.
The unintended consequence is that he has shown a profound disrespect for the court, and he is relegating them to a status in his mind of being inconsequential. They’re simply there to rubber stamp him. And if they don’t rubber stamp him, they are in the crosshairs, and that’s his message to ’em. They had better rubber stamp his health care bill, and if they don’t, then they’re targets. And the way they’re targets is he’s telling the American people, “Those guys, those judges, they’re taking away your health care. They are the ones that are gonna make it so that you have financial ruin if you get sick. They are taking away what I gave you.” Ladies and gentlemen, it is so beneath the dignity of the ofice of the presidency. It’s just striking, it really is. It defies description.
I must be honest with you here. We’ve faced this countless times before during the Clinton years with the Democrat Party and the people at the highest levels of their leadership showing total disregard and disrespect for traditions, ethics, just being polite, manners, showing respect. And I don’t know about anybody else, but I’ve always struggled with how to react to it and how to explain it to people in a way that is persuasive. I guess I’ve always struggled with the way to explain to people to pierce the partisanship. ‘Cause I don’t need to persuade you. You all know how atrocious this is. You know how shameful, how embarrassing this is. But his audience doesn’t, the people he’s speaking to you.
You’d like to be able to get to them. I’d like to be able to shake their shoulders, “Wake up and understand what’s happening here.” I don’t know that I’ve ever successfully been able to do that, not consistently. I know that converts happen. But I’m into my 24th year hosting this program, and I am still struggling, as I think a lot of conservatives, slash, Republicans are, with the best way to react. See, the problem is I live in Realville. I have a profound respect for the intelligence of my audience. I can’t relate to what Obama’s doing. I wouldn’t lie to you to try to advance my own fortunes. I couldn’t. My conscience wouldn’t permit it, number one. Number two, it’s not who I am. I could not do what he’s doing. And as such, I can’t relate to it. I can understand it, but I can’t relate to it. And we’re up against people who don’t care if he’s lying.
All they care about is the food stamp check. Am I gonna keep my health care? Will abortion still be legal? That’s all. And he’s counting on that. He’s counting on his audience to be dumb. He has no problem disrespecting them or the vast majority of the American people. I’ll give you a reminder, an example, to illustrate what I’m talking about here. Shortly after Obama was immaculated, there was an incident in Detroit where the federal government was giving away vouchers for cheap rentals, I think is what it was. It doesn’t really matter for the purposes of this story. And what happened was that wherever people were told to go in Detroit they were flooded with people. Cookie, we don’t need the sound bites from the archives. Don’t go get ’em. I’m not gonna spend that much time on it. All these people showed up and our affiliate in Detroit, WJR, sent a reporter out to talk to the people.
“Why are you here?”
And their answers, to me, as an American citizen, were depressing. And if I had been president, I would have been ashamed. I would have been really bothered that people voted for me based on this. But this is exactly what he wants. These people showed up, and they said, “I’m here to get my free place to live.”
“Well, who’s going to pay for it?”
“I don’t care.”
“Well, no, really, where’s the money coming from?”
“It’s coming from Obama’s stash.”
“Well, where’d Obama get it?”
“I don’t care. He’s got it, and that’s why we love Obama. He’s giving it to us.”
I would have cringed. If I had been president and people showed up and thought that’s what my presidency meant, I would have cringed. I would have flown to Detroit, and I woulda had a meeting, and I would have done a speech, and I woulda said, “Let me tell you what this country is all about and how you prosper in it.” Instead, Obama exploits that ignorance; exploits that stupidity. And I don’t mean stupidity in a pejorative sense. I’m just trying to be descriptive. But he exploits people who have nothing and whose only hope of getting something, they think, is if a president gives it to ’em. I can’t relate to that. I understand it. He’s a welfare state guy. He’s a redistribution of wealth guy. He wants people to love him because he wants them to think that he’s the only reason they’ve got anything. And we’ve gotta peel off some of those people somehow.
Everybody talks about the independents. To heck with them. Well, not “to heck;” we’re gonna have to peel off some of the ignorant here. We’re gonna have to. I don’t know what percent… (interruption) Well, I don’t know, because I’m not ignorant, and I don’t know how to relate to ’em. But I do know that it’s possible for the ignorant to learn. It happens every day in this country. It’s possible for the ignorant to become educated. It can happen. So this is the problem I have here is to try to refute what the president’s saying in a way that’s persuasive to people and they just don’t hear it as criticism, because then they chalk that up as, “That’s just usual. You’re just criticizing Obama ’cause you don’t like him.”
No. I’m criticizing him because I seriously, sincerely in the depths of my heart believe that this man is harming the foundations of this country. I don’t think there’s any question about the fact that he does not like this country as founded. Anyway, that’s just a little personal struggle.