Limbaugh: "We have just been delivered the biggest pile of manure yet with this health care speech"
March 03, 2010 2:31 pm ET
From the March 3 edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:
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Let's just say this with you:
Republicans? Good.
Democrats? Bad.
If Obama wanted to give you another tax cut, you'd probably argue against that.
Rush the magic blimp boy, Lived by the mic
Swallowing his little pills, and smearing whoe'er he liked
Little Glennie Becker loved that rascal Rush
and blamed it all on liberals and worshipped silly Bush
Rush the magic blimp boy, Lived by the mic
Swallowing his little pills, and smearing whoe'er he liked
Rush the magic blimp boy, Lived by the mic
Swallowing his little pills, and smearing whoe'er he liked
Together they would blabber about the evil libs
and project all their inner hate and drool upon their bibs
Ditto headed GOP'ers would bow where e'er they came
and parrot all the talking points and play their silly games
Rush the magic blimp boy, Lived by the mic
Swallowing his little pills, and smearing whoe'er he liked
Rush the magic blimp boy, Lived by the mic
Swallowing his little pills, and smearing whoe'er he liked
A dragon lives by lying, and so it is with Rush
The light of truth can not find him, no evil makes him blush
His twisted fantasies take flight to do the country harm
And even Glennie's silver tongue will soon lose all it's charm
Those they've been misleading, this empty headed pair
Are soon to find that in the end, neither of them care
And so the ad sales plummet, deeper every day
Until at last their racist shows evaporate away, Oh
Rush the magic blimp boy, Lived by the mic
Swallowing his little pills, and smearing whoe'er he liked
Rush the magic blimp boy, Lived by the mic
Swallowing his little pills, and smearing whoe'er he liked
Can someone give me a good reason why Congress and the President should push forward on a bill that people don't want?
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/healthcare/september_2009/health_care_reform
Currently only 44% of people want it. 52% does not want this. The President is pushing for a simple majority to push this through. But the people do not want. So why go forward?
Nope, Rasmussen is considered one of the most unreliable, Tommy. As I said, nice try, though.
You're not a very good concern troll. Talk to yourself.
In the meantime.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703436504574640973183026230.html
http://www.nationaljournal.com/njonline/mp_20090911_5838.php
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1274530/posts (shows Rasmussen wasn't the most accurate - but pretty damn close)
You use three notoriously biased sources to shore up your false talking point regarding another biased source. Nice try, but you still fail.
http://ncpp.org/?q=node/114
You seem to be forgetting that this country sent a whole lot of members of the Democratic Party to Washington DC not too terribly long ago, and many of those elected ran on a platform that called for Health Insurance Reform.
I believe that clearly states the will of the people.
In seriousness, I didn't support him on most things because I disagreed with him, but I didn't make the assertion that he should change course every time a new poll came out. That's no way to govern. That's chaos.
That's the way our system is supposed to work.
and LOL with the yous. I haven't heard that in years.
If it were my call I'd simply expand Medicare to everyone. We'd have universal health care for all. I could care less about protecting the health insurance companies. The medical needs of the people of this country are a greater concern to me than their profits.
Without going into too many details, this is a very personal issue to me. I lost my fiancee a few years ago. There were several factors that played a role in her death, and I'm pointing a sole finger of blame on any one thing, but flaws in our system doubtlessly contributed to this.
This is not intended as a "pity me" moment. I've moved on to a new life. I have a new love in my life and we're making plans to get married. I'm doing very well.
Nevertheless, this is, as I've said, very personal to me and will remain that way until we find a way to prevent the circumstances that contributed to her death from ever happening again.
So Tommy, with all due respect, I hope you understand why I just don't give a damn about what any of the polls say on this issue. I know, without question, without pause, without doubt, that providing reasonable health care to all is more important than any concern any person to is against reform can raise.
I remember a time before HMOs. They were suppose to help and had a far different effect than what they were suppose to do. Instead of containing cost they did the exact opposite. This is why I get concerned once the government starts to involve themselves in this area of life. So going off half cocked like Mr. Obama is asking for Congress to do right now I believe is bad policy.
see if this helps
Hey Tommy - the only, and I mean the ONLY poll that matters took place in November 2008.
No more from me.
One of the important things I learned about 'prejudicing' polls in my stat. class was how important the phrasing of the questions is.. and from Yes, Minster/Prime Minister (BBC series from the 1980's), how the order of the questions can be.
a) It's 1/6th of GDP, yet these costs contribute very little to the overall strength of our economy.
b) It's nowhere near 1/6th of GDP in countries with have universal health care.
Also note that the US is 34th in the world in terms of quality of health care - above Cuba, below Costa Rica. (Nothing against Costa Rica, of course, which is a fine country, but their GDP per capita is a quarter of that in the US.)
Hey Tommy - A poll is taken every 2 years. It's called an ELECTION. Obama ran on health care reform. He won. Now he's fulfulling his campaign promise. Got a problem with that?
There are, of course, other arguments:
* The bill is pretty good, and some drastic reform is certainly necessary. It'll also reduce the deficit pretty substantially.
* It'll be political suicide not to.
* Remember, people liked the bill when the House and Senate passed their own versions last year.
* 44% - 54% is not a mandate, particularly with the scale of misinformation against this thing. I'll concede that it's understandably a bit troubling, but it's not like the polls are 20% - 80%. The polls also include strong liberals who are angry that the bill is actually a centre-right proposal, being about as far from single-payer as any reform could possibly be.
* Besides, a majority supports the main provisions of the bill (along with a public option).
* It's ridiculous that the US - as the wealthiest country in human history - doesn't provide health care for all of its citizens. Affordable health care is not a privilege; it's a right.
A follow up question. Should the debate be over at this point? If so why? Why the rush? Considering we are about to have a bill passed that won't actually change anything (in a fundamental way) for 4 years.
That question has been asked over and over since the Truman years. Because delay = killing reform.
It pains me to say this (as an Oklahoman-bred type who, though quite liberal, appreciates a good Republican), but I think the national GOP is far more interested in returning to power than about governing the country. After all, look at the senators and representatives who voted against the stimulus bill but then negotiated behind closed doors to put their earmarks in it. Likewise, it's become quite common for Senate Republicans to filibuster something they later voted for; most egregiously, they filibustered an urgent defense appropriations bill, evidently only to slow the Senate down.
The "rush" is because the Congress needs to move on to other things, and it's time that HCR finally be resolved. Besides, as a reminder: health care reform did pass. The House voted for a bill, and the Senate voted for a similar bill. The only thing left is for the House to pass the Senate bill, and then probably both chambers will pass a bill of amendments. This will probably be done by reconciliation - but to clarify, the bulk of HCR will NOT be passed by reconciliation. It's already passed, with 60 votes in the Senate.
Look, health care is THE most difficult domestic problem in America, even more difficult than Social Security reform and education. Every president of the past 70 years that has tried to do something failed. The Democrats in particular have tried repeatedly to get universal coverage, but have always failed. Even Republican presidents pushing more modest cost-reduction plans have either totally failed or made only a symbolic victory. Here's a brief history:
T. Roosevelt - tried to push a progressive HCR plan, failed.
FDR - tried to put HCR in Social Security, was attacked by the AMA, failed.
Truman - tried to pass universal health care, AMA called it "socialized medicine" and a "communist plot," failed.
Eisenhower - pushed plan to reimburse health insurance companies for giving insurance to those who didn't have it; failed by filibuster.
JFK/LBJ - got Medicare, but that was the best they were going to get. Still quite an achievement, but it took three years to get it to pass.
Nixon - pushes national, comprehensive health care - essentially a buy-in to Medicare - but gets rejected by congressional liberals and labour unions. However, he did make the NIH the powerhouse of research and funding that it is today, so overall a pretty positive development.
Reagan/H.W. Bush - Medicare does payment by diagnosis rather than treatment, not much else. Costs rose, people fretted, nothing happened.
Clinton - famously failed due to coordinated Republican attacks and weak-willed Democrats; led to massive losses in 1994.
W. Bush - Beyond ruining the country, his Medicare D managed to be arguably the worst legislation in modern American history: an enormous entitlement package that didn't solve the problem it was designed to solve, yet will cost over 10 trillion dollars. That it wasn't Bush's biggest failure is a testament to how bad his presidency was. Outside of that, health care costs continued to rise, insurance companies became more powerful, and the influence of lobbyists grew stronger.
The fundamental political problems are, as always, lobbying and partisan bickering. However, the biggest problem seems to be that most Americans have health care, and are extremely sensitive about changing it. Now, one can attribute this to either selfishness or reasonable self-interest, but it's ALWAYS been the case that the public turns against an HCR plan. This is why the issue is usually only seriously considered periodically.
Because every day 1,400 people lose their insurance coverage. Because every day 125 people die due to a lack of available/affordable health care.
Need any more reasons to "rush" this thing along? Because after all, this debate has only been going on for the past 40+ years. Nothing is being rushed. Make a note of it.
Rushing into something that is bad is dumb.
See stimulus.
Just because you think health care reform is bad doesn't mean it shouldn't be passed. Unless you think the country should listen to you and your "polls".
I say grind Rush down for fertilizer. Or maybe insecticide. If he was soylent green, i wouldn't eat him.
What does that even mean?
Don't bother to answer, SeaBag... I won't be checking.