This hour of the Limbaugh Wire brought to you by the Limbaugh book club: 1984 and other books he hasn't read lately
By Greg Lewis and Karl Frisch

A funny thing happened on MSNBC's Morning Joe earlier today. Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) told host Joe Scarborough that "[i]t's not up to Rush Limbaugh to decide who ought to be in the Republican Party." Here's the funny part: So far, nearly every Republican politician who has spoken out against Limbaugh this year has been shamed into apologizing to the de facto leader of the conservative movement. Will Price break under the weight and pressure of Rush's heavy influence? If we're lucky, we'll get to witness another Phil Gingrey moment on today's show, though we admit the odds of that probably aren't too high. (But since a filly won the Preakness for the first time in 85 years this weekend, we're feeling a little lucky today.)

Anyway, Limbaugh kicked off the program today discussing Obama's commencement speech at Notre Dame yesterday. Rush first attributed the controversy over the speech -- that Notre Dame would allow Obama to speak -- as just another example of the liberalization of American universities. Rush then explained that the "obligatory message" from Obama to graduates is: don't do any work. He says Obama wants graduates to focus on service and giving back, but how can they give back if they don't have anything?

Then Rush made it apparent to his audience that he hasn't read Orwell's 1984 in many years. He went on to compare the language "Newspeak" that was invented for the novel to what Obama was saying in his speech. Rush even gave us some examples of "Newspeak"- "war is peace," "freedom is slavery." Then, Rush came up with one example -- one -- of Obama's "Newspeak": "Morality is immorality." Rush repeated it over and over as the show progressed, noting later: "What I want to discuss here today rather is technique that Obama is using to make himself as a radical look like a reasonable guy when he is just extremely radical, and he's calling people who hold positions of morality the radicals. It's Orwell, it's Newspeak, it's doublespeak, whatever you want to call it." We can think of a few words to describe Limbaugh's assessment.

Rush elaborated on Obama's commencement -- Obama made the pro-life position the "extremist" position, and his own "radical" position the moderate one. Rush then quipped that this is just how the "liberal mind" works, and said it also applies to unions. "What do they call it? The Employee Free Choice Act, right? Card check. What it really should be titled is 'The Union Brass Knuckles Busting On Your Knees Act,' because that's what it is. There's no free choice whatsoever in the union Free Choice -- the Employee Free Choice Act."

A bit more on infanticide, because that's what we all want to hear about from Rush for the nth time, right? Said the right-wing talker: "As I mentioned, several years ago he made the case for killing babies born alive and giving legal protection to the doctors that did it, and it did not cost him politically. So Obama, after advancing his case for infanticide, and the protection of the doctors, he went on to become United States Senator and then president." Rush also made an incredible fuss that Obama said in his commencement address: "So let us work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions." Rush declared that with this, Obama made an "outstanding demonstration of the low art of political seduction."

After a break, Rush was back on his favorite topic of last week- Nancy Pelosi and her nefarious lying. Limbaugh pondered the possibilities of a "truth commission" or an independent council. Rush figured they would eventually exonerate Pelosi since Democrats "run politics in this country right now."

Anyway, the rest of the hour included more discussion of Obama's Notre Dame commencement address, as well as more smears and attacks on the phony infanticide issue and Obama's religious background. After a classy montage of the best of Reverend Wright, Limbaugh commented that Obama "didn't hear" Sykes at the White House Correspondents Dinner just like he never heard anything offensive by Wright in his 20 years at the church. So that means El Rushbo finally addressed that thing he wasn't going to address. And instead of recapping Rush's flimsy argument on Obama's support of infanticide, we'd once again like to simply point you to how he's just wrong about it.

Highlights from Hour 1

Outrageous remarks:

LIMBAUGH: What do they call it? The Employee Free Choice Act, right? Card check. What it really should be titled is "The Union Brass Knuckles Busting On Your Knees Act," because that's what it is. There's no free choice whatsoever in the union Free Choice -- the Employee Free Choice Act.

[...]

LIMBAUGH: As I mentioned, several years ago he made the case for killing babies born alive and giving legal protection to the doctors that did it, and it did not cost him politically. So Obama, after advancing his case for infanticide and the protection of the doctors, he went on to become United States senator and then president.

[...]

LIMBAUGH: What I want to discuss here today, rather, is the technique that Obama is using to make himself as a radical look like a reasonable guy when he is just extremely radical, and he's calling people who hold positions of morality the radicals. It's Orwell, it's newspeak, it's doublespeak, whatever you want to call it.

America's Truth Rejecter:

Rush continues to assert that Obama supports "infanticide."

Clips from this hour:

Limbaugh claims Obama "made the case for killing babies born alive and giving legal protection to the doctors that did it"

Limbaugh: Employee Free Choice Act should be titled "The Union Brass Knuckles Busting On Your Knees Act"

This hour of the Limbaugh Wire brought to you by the evils of "giving back" to the community
By Greg Lewis and Karl Frisch

Rush began his second hour in his trademark unfocused style. Bear with us as we try to cover all the various bits he touched on. First, Rush bragged about a story that Buffalo Sabres owner B. Thomas Golisano would be moving from New York to Florida to "escape" high taxes. Rush was overjoyed, because this meant there was another curmudgeonly rich guy following his lead.

Then Rush briefly mentioned Stephen Moore's and Arthur Laffer's recent Wall Street Journal column, which he said was evidence that people are moving away from states that have high taxes. (Rush later revisited this issue before briefly alluding to Brian Jennings' new book, Censorship: The Threat to Silence Talk Radio.)

Quickly moving to another subject, Rush talked about a Portland, OR Chrysler dealership owner who will have to declare bankruptcy because his dealership was being shut down, as Rush put it, by Obama and "car czar" Steve Rattner. Rattner, Limbaugh noted, also happens to be reportedly constructing a multi-million-dollar mansion on Martha's Vineyard, which makes him "one of the ultimate hypocrites" because he'll be living what he calls a "wasteful lifestyle."

Rush then read from a column in the "far left" Business Week magazine titled, "The Great Ethanol Scam." Rush concluded that this was further proof that ethanol was a scam to secure more votes from the agricultural community.

After a break, El Rushbo took a couple of calls from dittoheads who were really upset over the Notre Dame controversy. The first caller had attended a pro-life prayer at Notre Dame yesterday and described her experience, and Rush again expressed his displeasure that Notre Dame invited Obama.

Next, Rush had a discussion with a caller who asserted that the Catholic Church is all about individualism, complaining that all of the Notre Dame students clapping for Obama and chanting "Yes we can" didn't understand that Obama, who spoke about having been mentored by a Catholic cardinal, is a total collectivist. Left out of this conversation, of course, was the Catholic Church's record of community service or the Catechism of the Catholic Church itself which details that God created the Church community "to make men holy and save them, not as individuals without any bond or link between them, but rather to make them into a people."

Rush responded to the caller by repeating his point that Obama doesn't want the graduates to strive for success but to give back, again asking what graduates "have" to give back. Allow us to answer Rush's question: While most college graduates might not have material goods, many of them do give back in the form of volunteering: AmeriCorps, Peace Corps, and Teach for America are among the plethora of opportunities college graduates have to give back.

As Limbaugh returned from the next break, he informed his audience: "I hate this whole concept of giving back." He lamented this again, repeating comments he has been making during his show today.

After another break, Rush played audio clips from "egghead" Tim Geithner being interviewed by Newsweek's Jon Meacham. During the interview, Geithner echoed Obama's point from last week that after we get "growth back on track," we'll have to "commit" to get back to living within our means and give up a lot of things. Limbaugh's interpretation of this was that Geithner was blaming Americans for the recession. According to Geithner, as Rush interpreted it, you caused this, you wanted too much, and after the recession, you'll have to give up a lot of things.

Highlights from Hour 2

Outrageous remark:

LIMBAUGH: By the way, I hate this whole concept of giving back anyway. That somehow it is the duty of the successful to give back.

Echo chamber:

Mentions of Stephen Moore and Arthur Laffer's WSJ column; Brian Jennings' book Censorship: The Threat to Silence Talk Radio.

This hour of the Limbaugh Wire brought to you by Tom Price's forthcoming apology to El Rushbo
By Greg Lewis and Karl Frisch

So it's come to this: Rush began the third hour seemingly excited about a new round of layoffs at a Caterpillar plant in Indiana. His excitement stems from Obama's claim that Caterpillar would be able to rehire employees if the stimulus bill had passed, which turned out not to be the case. But now it has come to the point where Rush is eager to wave around any story about workers being laid off.

After reading about Obama's new policy on greenhouse gas emissions and CAFE standards, Rush went back to discussing Nancy Pelosi, explaining to his audience how to best investigate the issue. An independent council, he said was a way to use the left's own tactics against them. Another option would be a truth commission. Rush ultimately concluded that whatever the option is, the entire Democrat [sic] Party is lying.

Limbaugh continued this discussion after the break saying that the Pelosi issue is diverting discussion to talk about how Bush lied about WMDs and Iraq intelligence. As he described it, the torture memos prove that Democrats were briefed on waterboarding 43 times, and yet they still voted to fund the CIA. Rush said that Pelosi knew about it and could have threatened Bush to cut off funding every year between 2002 and 2005.

Rush then noted the media response to his comments last week that Pelosi should break the glass ceiling by following in the footsteps of other male House speakers and resign. Following this, Rush made our day by addressing Rep. Tom Price (R-GA), who, as we mentioned in Hour 1, rejected Rush's notion of leaving Colin Powell out of the GOP. Rush, never one to take kindly to criticism, was stupefied that Price would say that Powell is a better Republican that Dick Cheney. How could you say Cheney was worse for the party than Powell, asked Rush, considering Powell supported Obama. Then he played an audio clip in which Democratic strategist Bob Shrum said, 'We'd take Colin Powell in a second, and we don't want Rush Limbaugh." To which Rush responded: "You've got Colin Powell. This is the whole point -- you've got him, and you didn't even have to do any outreach. All you had to do was nominate an African-American, and you've got Colin Powell."

Then Rush actually took a caller who disagreed with him over Notre Dame. The caller noted the majority of students and alumni at the university supported the decision to have the president give the commencement address and argued to Rush that a university is supposed to provide a forum for a broad range of ideas and opinions. Rush ducked the question, insisting that the caller unknowingly criticized universities who try to silence the conservative point of view because they are pure, unadulterated leftists.

In the final segment, Rush took a few more callers to round out the hour. The first dittohead remarked that her intuition had assured her that Pelosi was lying. The caller said that Pelosi was a disgrace to her House seat, to her party, and to women in government. Rush explained to the caller that nobody cares about Pelosi because the media hasn't "demonized" her like they did Newt Gingrich. The next caller had some complaints about the NPR reporter who gave the commencement address at his girlfriend's law school graduation ceremony, and this managed to relate to Gitmo, so Rush was obviously thrilled.

That's it for today's Limbaugh Wire. Please, soak in our archives as we revel in Rush's money quote from today's broadcast: "I hate this whole concept of giving back."

Highlights from Hour 3

Outrageous remarks:

LIMBAUGH: How in the world can a Republican say that Colin Powell is a better Republican than Dick Cheney? How -- and that's what Tom Price said here, and Scarborough applauds him for some reason. How in the hell can you say that Dick Cheney is worse for the Republican Party than Colin Powell? It was Colin Powell who endorsed Obama after the Republican Party gave Colin Powell the exact kind of nominee he claims to want, some moderate squishy guy who was going to go work with Democrats. I mean, really, throw me out of this. Rush Limbaugh or Dick Cheney better Republicans than Colin Powell, and Price says, "No, goodness." And then also, same show, Scarborough, Bob Shrum -- I guess you can't keep him off TV these days -- Scarborough said, "To hear Dick Cheney say we'll take Rush Limbaugh in our party but not Colin Powell, would Democrats take Colin Powell in a second?

SHRUM [audio clip]: We'd take Colin Powell in a second, and we don't want Rush Limbaugh.

LIMBAUGH: You've got Colin Powell. This is the whole point -- you've got him, and you didn't even have to do any outreach. All you had to do was nominate an African-American, and you've got Colin Powell. The Democrats, this is -- now, the Republicans, some of them, are starting to speak up here. Republican leaders on Sunday backed Dick Cheney's attacks on Obama, calling the former vice president a strong asset for the party.

Clips from this hour:

Limbaugh responds to Price; says all Dems "had to do was nominate an African-American and [they've] got Colin Powell"