This hour of the Limbaugh Wire brought to you by Rush's difficulties with “naturism”
By Simon Maloy

OK, so it turns out that Gov. Mark Sanford wasn't on the Appalachian Trail at all, but apparently decided to go to Argentina to spend a few days driving along the moribund coastline of Buenos Aires... in the wintertime... without telling his staff or his wife. Anyway, these past few months of listening to Rush have given us a taste for wild conspiracy theories, so we just have to point something out here -- Gov. Sanford left last Thursday to go on his surprise junket to Appalachia or Argentina or wherever, and he's back at work today. Rush announced rather abruptly last Thursday that he would be off Friday, Monday, and Tuesday, and is also back to work today... And let's not forget that our own Greg Lewis also spent the weekend on the “Appalachian Trail,” and came back with some “Sanford '12” swag and a hyper-conservative economic outlook. So, clearly, what's happened here is that Sanford, Rush, and Greg have teamed up to hatch a nefarious plot to use the power of Limbaugh's megaphone to get Sanford elected in 2012, while Greg works from the inside to sabotage the Limbaugh Wire -- America's first and only line of defense against the Dittohead onslaught. It makes perfect sense. We're on to you, Greg...

Rush got things rolling today by saying the Obama show never stops. Last week, Rush said, he thought it would be fun to do an entire show without mentioning Obama, but Obama has permeated so thoroughly every aspect of life that it might be impossible. Then Rush aired a sound bite from The Early Show in which CBS News' Harry Smith asked the president about golf. Obama said his time on the links is the only time he gets to be outdoors and feel like he's not in the bubble. This is incredible, said Rush, because even he gets grief when he leaves to play golf, which is what he was doing in Hawaii over the weekend. Rush gets notes, he said, from his own audience telling him to stick to the issues because golf is an elitist game. Now Obama gets out there and says golf keeps him in touch with common people, said Rush, and the press are dying to know what golf does for him. Obama abandoned his family on Father's Day to go play golf, exclaimed Rush, adding that if the president is as bad at golf as he says he is, then he's not having fun. Rush guaranteed Obama has a boomerang slice.

Then it was on to the press conference yesterday, which Rush said was a “smoke screen” that had something to do with cap-and-trade legislation and the huge tax increases it will bring. Rush also said that he knew Obama would call this press conference when he saw that Obama's approval ratings are “plummeting.” Anyway, Rush said that Fox News' Major Garrett had the “question of the day,” because the look on Obama's face as he answered it was “insolence.”

Rush then noted that Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) says Obama needs to get tougher with the mullahs. He's upset that Iranian diplomats are still invited to Fourth of July parties. Rush said he has a way around this -- all they have to do is say they're serving Hebrew National and Iranians won't show up. Tough luck, Rush, but Mark Davis already beat you to that low-hanging fruit. Anyway, Rush said that Obama even got testy with Chuck Todd in saying that he won't enumerate consequences for Iran because we don't know how this thing is going to play out. They're shooting people on the streets, said Rush, but we don't know how it's going to play out.

After the break, Rush said he noticed a story when he was away golfing that he though would cause fireworks -- Goldman Sachs paying out huge bonuses because of a fabulous first six months of 2009. This reminded Rush of the Obama supporters that called in last week who were mad because they see Obama giving all the money to Wall Street and big business, but not to them. Rush wondered what industries are having a huge 2009 aside from the EIB Network and the U.S. government. Rush said he expected outrage -- he thought Obama was going to cap their pay and limit bonuses. And then we learn today from The New York Times, said Rush, that Citibank is going to give raises instead of bonuses. Rush wanted to know where the outrage is. Maybe these Obama callers had a point, he said.

The Goldman Sachs people are basically running the show, said Rush, because they got bailout money from AIG. It was the one financial institution that was not bailed out, and the one institution that fell was Lehman Brothers, which just happened to be Goldman Sachs' major competitor. Rush then aired audio of himself saying in March that the real outrage is that AIG sent bailout money to foreign banks and Goldman. Rush said he thought this would be a big deal, though he has mixed emotions on it. Rush said he's all for companies doing well, but we're looking at an industry that this administration targeted and blamed, and people ended up supporting Obama thinking he was for the little guy, and now, because of bailouts, these firms are doing well when no one else is. The state-run media did not make a big deal over this, said Rush, but there could be outrage among Obama voters over this. This is not how they thought this was going to play out, Rush said. They thought they were going to be in “fat city,” not Goldman Sachs.

After another break, Rush took his first call of the afternoon, this one from a man wanting to know how long it took Rush to fly to Hawaii. Nine hours to get there, eight and a half to get back, Rush said. Then Rush switched gears, pointing to an entry on the New York Times' Green Inc. blog reporting: “Going without clothes on beaches and other vacation spots is commonly called naturism -- a description that implies helping the planet, as some practitioners claim to be doing.” Rush said he has a problem looking at most people when they're clothed, but now we're being encourage to go nude. What about skin cancer? Rush said these people are nuts, and he guaranteed that the people we're talking about here are nothing to look at. He hasn't seen them, but he knows these people. He added: “I know the left. I know liberals. All right, would you want to see [Sen.] Barbara Mikulski [D-MD] nude on a beach? Would you want to see [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi [D-CA] nude? OK, do I make my point? OK?”

Then Rush read from a Boston Herald story on reports that the Obamas might vacation on Martha's Vineyard this summer and could “spend two weeks at the end of August in the East Chop section of Oak Bluffs -- an enclave where the black upper crust has vacationed for generations.” Rush was aghast at the term, “black upper crust,” asking how many minorities there are in Martha's Vineyard. Rush assumed that when Obama goes to Martha's Vineyard, he'll condemn the racism there.

One more break and Rush came back with another caller, this one saying that Obama's acting classes must have paid off because the preplanned question with the Huffington Post reporter threw him for a loop. Rush said that the second that question came, he knew it was staged, and aired the audio. Rush said that anybody with half a brain knows the whole thing was a set-up. The story is that Obama didn't know what question he was going to get from the HuffPo guy, said Rush, but that he was going to get a question from an Iranian. The intended image, Rush said, is that of the Iranian people desperately wanting to know what Obama thinks. Rush then aired audio of Fox News' Mike Emanuel saying it was unusual behavior for the president to go from the AP to Huffington Post. Rush said that the “Associated Press gets the first question since Helen Thomas is, you know, off chewing cud somewhere.”

Anyway, Rush then asked if we remembered the outcry over Jeff Gannon's appearances in the White House press room during the Bush years. It was a “national crisis,” said Rush, and everyone blamed it on him. Rush said that the media went out and tried to destroy Gannon, calling him a fake reporter and an imposter, but now we have a blogger in the front row at a presidential press conference. But here's the thing -- Gannon was a fake reporter. He worked for a fake news agency, and he plagiarized RNC talking points in his news stories.

Greg Lewis and Lauryn Bruck contributed to this edition of the Limbaugh Wire.

Highlights from Hour 1

Outrageous comments

LIMBAUGH: It's not called nudism anymore -- naturism. These people are nuts. They're actual Looney Tunes. Snerdley, I'm gonna knock it. I'm gonna knock it. These people -- I guarantee you - I guarantee -- I don't want to be stereotypical here, but I guarantee you, the people we're talking about here are nothing to look at. They're nothing to write home about. They're not -- you wouldn't put their pictures in a magazine. I guarantee you. Trust me on this.

No, I haven't seen them. Don't -- I just -- I know these people. I know the left. I know liberals. All right, would you want to see Barbara Mikulski nude on a beach? Would you want to see Nancy Pelosi nude? OK, do I make my point? OK.

[...]

LIMBAUGH: The Associated Press gets the first question since Helen Thomas is, you know, off chewing cud somewhere. And the first question always goes to Jennifer Loven of AP, and then after that, went to -- and what I worry -- the Politico story is, is that the reporters in the front row looked over at Rahm Emanuel, who laughed at them, smiled again. According to them, gave them a wink.