This hour of the Limbaugh Wire brought to you by Rush's “grand slam”
By Simon Maloy

Kicking off the second hour, Rush complained about the length of Obama's speech, saying that it was pushing 55 minutes and wondering who can sit through a 55-minute speech and be inspired. This speech, said Rush, is dry, political garbage. Obama, said Rush, just grates on him (as if you hadn't figured that out anyway). He's a “know-it-all,” is “arrogant” without any reason to be, and has “all the answers” even though he's never run anything except his own mouth.

Then Rush moved on to a New York Times article on the Iranian election, saying that it demonstrated the Iranian journalists are just like journalists in the American state-run media. The money quote, according to Rush, was: “As voting began on Friday morning, journalists gathered to watch Ayatollah Khamenei cast his vote in a mosque near his home in southern Tehran. Just after 8 a.m., a set of brown curtains opened and the leader emerged, a gaunt 69-year-old with glasses and a long white beard, with a black turban on his head and a black clerical gown draped around him. The journalists, mostly Iranians, gasped and then chanted a religious blessing.”

Still not done with American journalists, Rush aired an audio montage of a variety of news personalities comparing the results of the Iranian election to the Florida recount in 2000. Rush said that these people don't understand that there is no freedom in Iran -- all of the candidates were selected by the mullahs, and they want Ahmadinejad. Rush wondered if the media are “really this idiotic,” saying that Ahmadinejad was going to win regardless. They're “naïve” and “stupid,” said Rush, adding that Sarah Palin knows more of the ways of the world than the people covering her.

Then Rush aired for us one more time Obama's comment from Friday in which he praised the robust debate in Iran. Rush said that Obama's remarks look even more foolish today than they did on Friday.

After the break, Rush said he had some people watching Obama's speech to the AMA, and apparently one of the primary arguments that Obama made during this speech is that without reform, the system will be more expensive than it already is. This is how the left tries to sell everything, said Rush, but we can not pay for what the government is running now, and Obama wants to expand health care and somehow this will make it cheaper? It's the same thing with Social Security, said Rush, which is also bankrupt. This is another typical, false Obama argument. Rush also said he read today “somewhere” that Obama was open to tort reform, and then aired a clip of Obama saying that he understands that malpractice suits are causing problems for doctors, but he's not advocating caps on malpractice rulings and wants to work with the AMA on scaling back defensive medicine. Rush said that this is just mean and dishonest -- he tells them that he understands that malpractice awards are causing them problems, but the very next sentence is “screw what I just said.” This is like Lucy Van Pelt pulling away the football from Charlie Brown, said Rush.

After another break, Rush read from a Chicago Sun-Times article reporting: “As U.S. stock markets plummeted last September, the Senate's No. 2 Democrat, Dick Durbin, sold more than $115,000 worth of stocks and mutual-fund shares and used much of the money to invest in Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc.” After noting that a Durbin spokesman denied any impropriety on Durbin's part, Rush counseled his listeners not to buy it, saying that Martha Stewart went to jail for much less.

Then Rush said this weekend was a “grand slam” for him, based on what the country learned about Obama. The stimulus plan, Rush said, is a disaster, and Vice President Joe Biden “has now admitted it.” That admission, according to Rush, was on Meet the Press yesterday morning when Biden said that unemployment projections were made at a time when “no one realized how bad the economy was,” and that: “Everyone guessed wrong at the time the estimate was made about the state of the economy was at the moment this was passed.” Rush said that Rush didn't guess wrong and neither did the Republicans in Congress. Then Rush said we learned from Thomas Friedman's New York Times op-ed this weekend that the Iraq War was a success, which meant that Obama, in addition to being wrong on the economy, was also wrong on Iraq. We didn't take this to be quite the earth-shattering revelation that Rush did, seeing as Friedman has been declaring the Iraq war a success since March 2003. Anyway, these two bits of info combined with some silliness about the “global cooling” trend were the evidence of Rush's “grand slam,” and Rush said that now we know why Barack Obama didn't want Republicans listening to Rush -- he got it right.

Then Rush aired audio of Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) on CNN yesterday saying that he hopes Obama will support the challengers in Iran. Rush said Obama hasn't said a word, instead he's been out there lying to the doctors. Rush said there's been a “quasi-administration reaction” from Biden, who said on Meet the Press that the administration is waiting to see how the situation in Iran will shake out. Rush responded: “Cannot bring himself to say he stands with the people of Iran who want freedom. They can't -- this is just a dangerous bunch of people that are running this whole show, domestically, internationally.”

Leading into the break, Rush took a call from a woman who said she was happy to have the choice not to have health insurance, and she doesn't want to lose that. Rush said her liberty is at risk with Obama in the White House. There are a lot of people who don't want health insurance, said Rush, and they'll lose that choice if Obama gets what he wants.

After the break, Rush explained that he had hoped to avoid more Obama sound bytes, but this next byte, Rush said, is an outrage that Obama knows is not true. Rush then aired audio of Obama, in his speech today, saying the people who claim that Obama's public option is a Trojan horse for single-payer aren't telling the truth. They are telling the truth, Rush retorted. This is precisely government-run health care -- it's government-run everything with this guy.

Rush's next caller wanted to know what was really behind the 10-year cost estimates on health care. Rush said George Will touched on this -- every budget is a lie, and now we're supposed to believe they're telling the truth with a 10-year projection? They can't afford any of this to begin with. Obama's trying to nationalize the U.S. healthcare system, said Rush. He wants to take that money out of the private sector and put his administration in charge of it.

One more caller, this one saying that Medicare is already controlling doctors like his father and what they get paid, and that's affecting private-sector insurers. Rush said that Obama is saying we need more options, but we already have 1,300 options, and adding the government option will mean a serious decline in those private options that are already out there.

Rounding out the hour, Rush said that the best reporting on this country is from the UK, and the Telegraph is reporting that the “government [is] looking at expanding a pioneering scheme in Flint, one of the poorest US cities, which involves razing entire districts and returning the land to nature.” This is the era of Obama, said Rush -- shrink to survive, bulldoze portions of 50 cities. This is Michigan and this is Flint, said Rush, and it's been Democrats running this state and this town all these years. This is the kind of stuff you see in horror films that happens in other countries, but not here.

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

Highlights from Hour 2

Outrageous comments

LIMBAUGH: Meet the Press yesterday, Joe Biden was asked by David Gregory, “Dr. Romer from the White House -- the assertion that you could keep unemployment at 8 percent, go down after that. In fact, it's now 9.4 percent. Was it oversold?”

BIDEN [audio clip]: At the time, no one realized how bad the economy was. The projections, in fact, turned out to be worse. Everyone guessed wrong at the time the estimate was made about what the state of the economy was at the moment this was passed.

LIMBAUGH: They did not guess wrong. I did not guess wrong, and the Republicans in Congress did not guess wrong. Stimulus plan is a disaster. Biden has now admitted it.

[...]

LIMBAUGH: There has been a quasi-administration reaction from Joe Biden on Meet the Press yesterday. Question: “You don't want to recognize Ahmadinejad as the president at this stage?”

BIDEN [audio clip]: Well, I'm not -- look, that's what they're announcing. We have to accept that for the time being, but there's an awful lot of question about how this election was run, and we'll see. I mean, we're just waiting to see. We don't have enough facts to know -- to make a firm judgment.

LIMBAUGH: Cannot bring himself to say he stands with the people of Iran who want freedom. They can't -- this is just a dangerous bunch of people that are running this whole show, domestically, internationally.