This hour of the Limbaugh Wire brought to you by Galileo Galilei
By Simon Maloy

At the top of the final hour, Lewis again noted that “hell has frozen over for most of the Northwest,” adding: “Thank you, Al Gore.” OK, so he doesn't like Al Gore. Then who is Lewis' preferred sort of climate scientist? The “great environmentalist” Bjorn Lomborg, who, like Lewis, is lacking in credibility and has falsely attacked Mr. Gore. As a demonstration of Lewis' lack of credibility on climate science, we point to the thermometer. Lewis claimed the climate hasn't changed “one iota,” explaining: “How long have we been -- even had a thermometer? A hundred and fifty years? Middle of the 19th century, perhaps? And the Earth has been around how long?” Well, no, actually. Galileo invented his own type of thermometer, and he was standing on the shoulders of the ancient Greeks. The first sealed thermometer goes back to 1641.

Moving on from climate change, Lewis returned to attacking public schools and teachers unions, advocating a child tax credit to pay for education. From there it was a smooth segue to the Employee Free Choice Act, and rote repetition of the falsehoods conservatives have adopted regarding “card check”: The Obama administration is “taking away ... the secret ballot”; the unions and “Vinny looking over your shoulder” want “to take away the secret ballot.” No, wrong. EFCA will not take the secret ballot away from workers.

After the break, Lewis took a couple of calls and returned to attacking the publicly funded education system, as well as teachers, who “lean predominantly to the left,” practice “indoctrination,” and abuse the power of their positions.

Another break and Lewis noticed that the Dow Jones average has actually gone up over the past few days. Of course, this has nothing to do with Obama (we guess Obama only has the power to depress the market). According to Lewis, the market boomlet can be attributed to Warren Buffett criticizing mark-to-market policies on CNBC.

After arguing with a caller over Fannie and Freddie and discussing the Federal Reserve and monetary policy at length, Lewis closed out the program with one last attack on the “socialism or incompetence” of the Obama administration.

Highlights from Hour 3

Outrageous comments

LEWIS: How long have we been -- even had a thermometer? A hundred and fifty years? Middle of the 19th century, perhaps? And the Earth has been around how long? And we're going to take a microcosm, a few decades from 1976 to 1998, and we're going to say, “Well, forget about the other billions of years. This proves it. We've got a crisis.”

“Socialism” watch

LEWIS: Hey, excuse me, gang, but didn't George Bush take a rashing for his signing statements when he would sign a bill and then say, “Look, I don't have to spend everything in this bill. I don't have -- I have my constitutional prerogative. If I think it's unconstitutional, I won't enforce the bill.” It's called a signing statement. I seem to recall Bush getting a lot of flack for that. Odd.

Yesterday, President Obama issued his first signing statement, saying that "[l]ook, I can bypass parts of this bill if I think it's not constitutional on my interpretations of the Constitution."

Gee. Hey, Chris Matthews, you still got that thrill up your leg? I haven't heard you. Hey, Keith Olbermann, you going to talk about this at all?

Well, don't worry, nobody will notice, but the point is, the hypocrisy goes on. “We're going to close. We're going close -- get out of the war immediately.” No, it won't be until the end of 2011. “Well, wiretaps, they're bad.” No, he supports that, too. The DC gun ban? “I was for DC gun control.” Now the Supreme Court rules -- I'm against it.

This guy, I don't know if it's just socialism or incompetence. Either one, there may be a turning tide pretty soon here, folks. I'll see you tomorrow.

America's Guest-Truth Rejector

LEWIS: Speaking of unions, have you heard of this card check legislation? This is unbelievable. People wonder why some of us on the right are so apoplectic about this administration: the tax increases, the nationalizing of health care, of the economy, the debt, you name it -- and now taking away of the secret ballot?

The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that this Change to Win big labor consortium is now threatening banks who receive TARP bailout money from exercising their first amendment rights on the Employee Free Choice Act, the card check. What the unions are demanding is that if your place of work is not unionized, all you have to do is sign a card with, you know, Vinny looking over your shoulder, but you sign the card and that's going to suffice for a vote. Right now, you sign a card to authorize an election and then you have a secret ballot after management gets its say and the union gets its say. They want to take away the secret ballot.

Folks, the secret ballot is fundamental to a fair election. It is what prevents voter fraud. It is what prevents people getting their votes bought because if somebody wants to buy my vote, they don't know how I'm going to vote in a secret booth, but if they're standing over me and they paid me a hundred bucks to vote this way, they're going to know 'cause they can watch me right out in the open sign this card. Now, far be it from me to suggest corruption in unions, Jimmy Hoffa, but this is pretty scary stuff. This is pretty scary stuff.

Echo chamber

Cited discredited climate-change skeptic Bjorn Lomborg.