Rush Limbaugh has been soundly criticized for supposedly saying that he hopes Barack Obama doesn't succeed as President. That's not quite how it went down, as I have touched on before. Limbaugh was saying that if Obama can be taken at his word, his intention is to draw America deep into socialism; from Limbaugh's perspective as a student of history and a staunch conservative, socialism is dead wrong for America (as it is for any nation) and will do nothing to help America's current woes. Thus, if Obama wants socialism, Limbaugh doesn't want his policies to succeed.
Of course, when the media decide to quote Rush Limbaugh, it is exceedingly rare that they quote him correctly. This time was no exception.
In a recent interview with Sean Hannity, Rush had the opportunity to set the record straight - listen to his position in his own words (as well as addressing lots of other issues, including why the GOP lost the last election and where it is headed):
Limbaugh must have hit a chord, because the Obamessiah took aim at the most popular talk show host in the country himself:
President Obama warned Republicans on Capitol Hill today that they need to quit listening to radio king Rush Limbaugh if they want to get along with Democrats and the new administration.For this reason (and other obvious ones, too), we now look toward an issue that conservatives have been warning about for months, even as far back as last February: the so-called Fairness Doctrine. A brief recap...
"You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done," he told top GOP leaders, whom he had invited to the White House to discuss his nearly $1 trillion stimulus package.
This is basically a policy that would require all talk radio stations to provide equal air time to opposite viewpoints of anything controversial spoken or reported.So, the 'Fairness' Doctrine -- by the way, there's that uber-liberal concept of 'fairness' again...! -- is a way that Obama and the Democrats could easily use to shut down the loudest voices of opposition - Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and many other talk radio hosts at the national and local level. Without the opposite message being broadcast to millions of people on a daily basis, the only message that will get out to the public is the one message that the Obamessiah wants. Sounds vaguely like the old Soviet Union, does it not? Or maybe China? Or any other Communist nation where the state controls the media? That's what we'd have here, only the media would be voluntarily submitting to Obama's control - they already have.
It is illegal -- according to the Constitution, for whatever that's worth to liberal Dems -- to prohibit or abridge free speech. Now, without getting into all of those exceptions like shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater, this is a pretty basic right that pretty much everyone understands. It means that the discussion and debate of ideas shall not be silenced.
Anytime someone on the radio says something controversial, someone who happens to believe differently can call the radio station and demand equal time to express the opposite viewpoint, and the station cannot refuse. So, you'd end up with idiots walking in off the street -- potentially with absolutely no experience or ability to hold a coherent thought, much less an audience -- to fill the airwaves with verbal garbage. What will happen in that case? The audience goes away because no one wants to listen to garbage. When the audience goes away, the advertisers go away, and when the advertisers go away, the station goes away.
And, with an army of rabid zealots ready and willing -- because most of them are on welfare and don't have real jobs to occupy their time during the day -- to swamp radio stations with protests at the slightest hint of perceived controversy, this is a very real possibility. Don't believe me? It's already happened, when one radio station tried to air an extremely damaging interview during the campaign (more examples of Obamessiah's silencing ways here, here, here, here). So, this is a very serious issue, one that could strike at the heart of anyone who isn't an Obama Kool-Aid drinker.
Limbaugh, however, is not one to take such things lying down. He responded to Obama's attack via Byron York at NRO:
According to an account in the New York Post, President Barack Obama yesterday told Republican leaders, "You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done." With George W. Bush now off the stage, it may be that Obama and some of his fellow Democrats view Limbaugh, and not John Boehner, Mitch McConnell, or any other elected official, as the true leader of the Republican opposition. This morning I asked Rush for his thoughts on all this, and here is his response:
There are two things going on here. One prong of the Great Unifier's plan is to isolate elected Republicans from their voters and supporters by making the argument about me and not about his plan. He is hoping that these Republicans will also publicly denounce me and thus marginalize me. And who knows? Are ideological and philosophical ties enough to keep the GOP loyal to their voters? Meanwhile, the effort to foist all blame for this mess on the private sector continues unabated when most of the blame for this current debacle can be laid at the feet of the Congress and a couple of former presidents. And there is a strategic reason for this.
Secondly, here is a combo quote from the meeting:
"If we don't get this done we (the Democrats) could lose seats and I could lose re-election. But we can't let people like Rush Limbaugh stall this. That's how things don't get done in this town."
To make the argument about me instead of his plan makes sense from his perspective. Obama's plan would buy votes for the Democrat Party, in the same way FDR's New Deal established majority power for 50 years of Democrat rule, and it would also simultaneously seriously damage any hope of future tax cuts. It would allow a majority of American voters to guarantee no taxes for themselves going forward. It would burden the private sector and put the public sector in permanent and firm control of the economy. Put simply, I believe his stimulus is aimed at re-establishing "eternal" power for the Democrat Party rather than stimulating the economy because anyone with a brain knows this is NOT how you stimulate the economy. If I can be made to serve as a distraction, then there is that much less time debating the merits of this TRILLION dollar debacle.
Obama was angry that Merrill Lynch used $1.2 million of TARP money to remodel an executive suite. Excuse me, but didn't Merrill have to hire a decorator and contractor? Didn't they have to buy the new furnishings? What's the difference in that and Merrill loaning that money to a decorator, contractor and goods supplier to remodel Warren Buffet's office? Either way, stimulus in the private sector occurs. Are we really at the point where the bad PR of Merrill getting a redecorated office in the process is reason to smear them? How much money will the Obamas spend redecorating the White House residence? Whose money will be spent? I have no problem with the Obamas redoing the place. It is tradition. 600 private jets flown by rich Democrats flew into the Inauguration. That's fine but the auto execs using theirs is a crime? In both instances, the people on those jets arrived in Washington wanting something from Washington, not just good will.
If I can be made to serve as a distraction, then there is that much less time debating the merits of the trillion dollar debacle.
One more thing, Byron. Your publication and website have documented Obama's ties to the teachings of Saul Alinksy while he was community organizing in Chicago. Here is Rule 13 of Alinksy's Rules for Radicals:
"Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it."
While Limbaugh is the biggest fish they're targeting, he's not the only one to sound the warning bells:
Brian Maloney at The Radio Equalizer explains Obama's El Rushbo problem:So you see, the warning signs are clear, and they are out there RIGHT NOW. The American people need to wake up and realize that their most basic freedoms are at stake...they have some skin in this game whether they know it or not!Beyond the absurdity of a Democrat barking orders at his political opposition, he's especially foolish to air his fear of Limbaugh and talk radio in a public setting. Now, what was long suspected by conservatives has been verified by the man himself.No wonder the Barack is singling out Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.
The timing was no coincidence: after a rocky first week in office, the Obamists are also faced with a resurgent Fox News Channel, where ratings have been climbing since the moment he took office.
In particular, Hannity's Limbaugh interview, which took place in the latter's Florida studios, scored fantastic audience figures for the former's network. In overall viewers, Thursday's Hannity nearly trebled his MSNBC competition and almost doubled CNN's Larry King.
And after a wildly successful fall ratings survey, talk radio is looking forward to record numbers with the installation of the Obamists.
UPDATE: Melanie Phillips has more on Obama's Alinsky tactics at The Spectator today:But as I pointed out here, such use of community organisation also follows to the letter the template for social revolution laid down by Saul Alinsky, the Marxist ideologue and activist who set out in his book Rules for Radicals how capitalism would be overthrown by the mobilisation of the masses and the whipping up of their discontent. The strategy revolved around creating apparently moderate local organisations that would be manipulated by community organisers -- effectively deniable political agitators -- to foment grievance and dissent. Alinsky’s thinking permeates ACORN and other community groups that in the past were associated with or funded by Obama, and which push an agenda that is as coercive and corrupt as it is seditious. America's First Community Organiser promised ACORN during his campaign that within his first 100 days in office he would invite them in to discuss how they could help him change America.
It has started already.
There is no strong, conservative leadership in the ranks of elected Republicans; instead, all the big conservative leaders are in the new media. Thus, Obama and his Democrat minions are going to target them instead. Once conservatives in the media are silenced, the Obamessiah will proceed with not only cementing a permanent Democrat majority in Congress, the courts, and the entrenched bureaucracy, but also with the rapid acceleration of socializing America. Without conservative opposition, he will succeed, and probably fairly quickly.
If he succeeds, America will cease being a global leader in anything, Americans will see their prosperity wither and die in the name of 'fairly' redistributing their wealth, and the last best hope for freedom dies.
Get involved NOW. Get informed, get active in contacting your elected representatives, and start spreading the word to everyone you know. The American people are all that stands between Obama and the forced suicide of America.
There's my two cents.
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