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RUSH: The Obama campaign, they continue to be in a tizzy over this New Yorker cartoon. Let me ask you a question. Obama and his team are upset over a cartoon on the cover of The New Yorker, a leftist publication, that makes him look like a Muslim, that makes his wife look like a terrorist Muslim, that has the American flag burning in the fireplace, under the portrait of Osama Bin Laden in the Oval Office. The Obama campaign and The Messiah himself were said to be very, very upset over this. Let me ask you a question. Who is it that gets upset over cartoons? Muslims. (Gasping) Dawn's in there saying, "He didn't say that." Yes, I did, I'll say it again. (laughing) I just love tweaking these people. Who is it that gets upset over stupid cartoons? Muslims, intolerant Muslims.
I have a theory about this, and we've got audio sound bites. They're out there saying, "You know what the piece missed?" Typical of liberals, they're saying that most Americans are too moronic to understand the sophisticated satire here, that what this piece needed was Rush Limbaugh painting the picture on the cover. That would have clued in the great unwashed that it was a joke, otherwise the great unwashed will not get that this is satire. Here's the point of this piece. I have figured this out. A lot of you people have written me and said, "Rush, you're missing the point on this. This is a Hillary and Bill Clinton plant." No, it's not. Who's in the New Yorker. David Remnick. Leftist. Huge, in the tank for Obama, the whole magazine. Covers on magazines don't just happen overnight. There's a lot of thought that goes into covers, there is a lot of debate, strategy and so forth. You don't just call a cover artist and say, "Hey, give me a cover of Obama and Michelle Obama in the Oval Office, we're doing a cover here." This had to be discussed. So therefore this was done for a reason.
Now, they've satirically portrayed other public figures on the cover here, but the purpose of this is specifically to make the readers of New Yorker think that's how conservatives look at Obama, not how they do, but how we do, and it's proven by all these liberals out there in the Drive-By Media saying what the piece missed was not having Rush Limbaugh painting the thing. So the purpose of this piece is to convince as many people as possible that it is us, the conservatives, who are out there making the point that he's a stealth Muslim working for Iran or whoever, when in fact all that came up during the Democrat primaries. It was the Reverend Jackson just last week who wanted to make Obama a member of the New Castrati.
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RUSH: Now, I want to complete the thought on this New Yorker cover here, because I think this is key to understanding. I have a theory about this, but I think this New Yorker cover is actually a setup. We all know that the New Yorker is a radical-left magazine. They are desperate for Obama to win the presidency. This is what you have to understand. New Yorker is not trying to pull a move here to get Hillary nominated and they're not for McCain. They desperately want Obama to win. So in that sense, why in the world would they run something that's harmful to Obama in their minds? They're not trying to harm Obama here. So they put a cartoonish drawing on their cover. They knew full well that it would draw all kinds of attention. But to hurt Obama? This is not what they intended. Nobody informed the Obama camp this was coming. Nobody called 'em up and said, "Hey, gang, we've got this cover coming. You're gonna love it. It's gonna really nail the right wing and the way they talk about you."
This cartoonish cover, here's the bottom line. This New Yorker cover happens to stereotype, not the Obamas. It stereotypes conservatives as racists, sexist throwbacks. That's the intent of this cover: to reinforce that Obama is a victim of right-wing haters lying about him and his wife. It is Obama and the left that kept perpetuating the notion that we are saying he was Muslim and that his wife was unqualified. The New Yorker is selling magazines when they smear conservatives as racist and sexist. Obama gets to run around like he's doing and claim to be a victim, and wheeze-whine about it, by the way, that's quite unbecoming. If he doesn't get a handle has to be a victim every three or four days to keep his popularity up, it's going to come back and haunt him. So we are left watching all this while we are the ones who have been smeared by this.
The Obamas are not the ones being smeared in this cover. And of course the Drive-By Media, they're all you upset because you people are a bunch of rubes and idiots and you won't understand that it is you that are being made fun of, that it's you that are being criticized. They're afraid you're going to think, "Wow, even the libs think Obama is a Muslim. Wow, even the libs think Obama loves Bin Laden!" That's what they're deathly afraid of. Because they don't know, they don't have any confidence at all that you have any brains.
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RUSH: We'll go to Nate out on Long Island. Nate, I'm glad you called. Welcome to the Rush Limbaugh program, sir, hello.
CALLER: Rush, it's an honor and a pleasure to speak to you.
RUSH: Thank you, I understand.
CALLER: Hope things are going well by you. Rush, here's my point. You talk about the Drive-By Media, and I've listened for years about the Drive-By Media, and I believe that the New Yorker magazine, they are sending a warning to Obama that if he continues going to the center, they're just going to turn on him.
RUSH: I don't think that's what's going on.
CALLER: You know, because I think they are the ultimate left-wing magazine, and they're sending a message to Obama. That's just a thought I had and I'd like to hear what you think about that.
RUSH: I said in the opening segment here, I think what this is is an attempt -- look, the New Yorker wants him elected. The New Yorker is not going to abandon him, the New Yorker is not going to throw him overboard for McCain, and they're certainly not going to throw him overboard to try to get Hillary, they're not into that, that's not what's going on. This was a caricature of us, Nate. This New Yorker cover is an attempt to make us, conservatives, look like racists and bigots and throwbacks. It's trying to convince people that we're the ones saying this about him. This is not intended to harm Obama. Now, they may have goofed up because it's having to be explained. Any time a joke, any time satire has to be explained it may have missed its point and of course the editor is out there trying to explain what this was all about. Let's go to the audio sound bites, let's listen to the Drive-Bys explain what this was all about. Here's Craig Crawford who is as irrelevant as you can be in the Drive-By Media. He was on MSNBC's The Verdict last night, which is also as irrelevant as a Drive-By TV show can be. The fill-in host David Shuster said to Craig Crawford, "How in your view should Obama address this New Yorker cover?"
CRAWFORD: It might have worked better to have maybe Limbaugh or a conservative on the cover painting this picture to better make their point.
RUSH: So they think it missed its goal, it missed its point. They needed me on the cover painting the picture so as to illustrate this is what conservatives think. This is who the Drive-Bys think. The Drive-Bys believe that this was an attempt to besmirch us, folks, and it was, or it is. The Drive-Bys are just concerned that the people of The New Yorker didn't get it. Same show, same fill-in host, David Shuster, talking to Tanya Acker, who is a Democrat analyst, said, "I want to ask you about the New Yorker cartoonist, Barry Blitt. He defended the cartoon today. He said, 'I think the idea the Obamas are branded as unpatriotic let alone as terrorists in certain sectors is preposterous. It seemed to me that depicting the concept would show it as the fearmongering ridiculousness that it is.'" That's what the cartoonist said. Illustrating and proving once again my point that his attempt here was to besmirch us, ladies and gentlemen. So this Democrat strategerist and activist, Tanya Acker, was asked for her reaction to what the cartoonist said.
ACKER: If the cartoon made clear that this was the right-wing machine at work, you know, if Rush Limbaugh was painting that cartoon, it would have been much funnier, I think we would have gotten it. But I think that as it is, it's just too close to the rumors that are being spread.
RUSH: So two Drive-Bys, well, one Drive-By and one analyst on the same show in different segments say that the thing that would have made it work was to have me on the cover painting it. I must again ask you this question. Obama, all these Drive-Bys are upset over a cartoon that makes Obama look like a Muslim. Now, who gets upset over stupid cartoons? Muslims. (interruption) No, I do not wish to refine that remark. I want to make sure that remark is heard and quoted accurately. Let me try it again. Obama and all these people are upset about this New Yorker cartoon. Well, who is it that gets upset about stupid cartoons? Muslims, radical Muslims, radical extremist Muslims are the ones that get upset over cartoons. Now back to the audio sound bites. Bob Beckel, Fox News Channel, Fox & Friends this morning, the fill-in cohost Clayton Morris asked Beckel and Monica Crowley, who was also on the program, about the New Yorker cover, and Crowley said to Beckel, "Why didn't Obama just laugh this off? It's satire."
BECKEL: In this case there's not much to laugh at. You know, they talk about you can't make fun of Barack Obama. There's two reasons you can't. One, he's black, and I can say that as a liberal, and two, he hasn't been around that long to build up a record that you can make fun of.
MORRIS: Well, John McCain, though, was quick to come out and also condemn this article.
BECKEL: It angered Rush Limbaugh.
RUSH: What? When did I get angry over this? I didn't get angry over this. I think it's funny. I get the satire. I love this kind of pushing the envelope stuff. McCain renouncing, denouncing, condemning, is his number-one campaign behavior. But I want to go back here to what Beckel said, 'cause, you know, when I did an appearance on Sunday morning on Fox & Friends to discuss Tony Snow, in the second segment they asked me about politics, and I think it might have been Clayton Morris, I'm not sure, said, "You've got this great list, I heard you go through it once, this great list of all the things we can't say about Obama." I said, "Well, it starts out with Maureen Dowd making fun of his ears and he walked to the audience, said, 'I don't like you making fun of my ears. I'm very sensitive about it.' So we can't talk about his ears. And then we can't talk about his wife. We can't talk about his race. Can't talk about his lack of race. Can't talk about his color, lack of color. We can't talk about his preacher. We can't talk about his terrorist buddies that blow up the Pentagon, or want to. We can't talk about his buddies that engage in fraud in the real estate market. We can't talk about his middle name. We can't talk about the flag pin."
I went through all of this. Now apparently the Fox & Friends crew did this whole routine on their own yesterday morning, and that's why I think Beckel here says, "They talk about the things you can't make fun of about Obama." So the list is obviously circulating out there now, and he said, "There's two reasons that you can't make fun of Obama. One is he's black," and we can't say he's a liberal, Bob. Bob says we can say he's a liberal, no. We're not allowed to say he's a liberal. He told us that we're not allowed to say he's liberal, it's the politics of the past; it's old-fashioned politics or whatever. He hasn't been around long enough to build up a record that you can make fun of. Yes, he has, Bob. He has no record, not in the Senate anyway. He's got a lot of time spent as a community organizer. People say, "What's that, Rush? What is a community organizer?" Think Al Sharpton.
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RUSH: Senator McCain was also asked about the New Yorker cover. This was on the Early Show on CBS today. The cohost Maggie Rodriguez said to Senator McCain, "Have you seen the cover of The New Yorker? Your feeling? Is it satire? Is it acceptable?"
MCCAIN: I don't think so. I'll leave that judgment to the American people. I can only state my personal opinion. I think it's -- If it's an attempt at satire, uh, it's wrong. It's wrong, and it's offensive.
RUSH: Gee whiz! These people need enemas. He is just too wound up here. Everybody's just so tight, it's unbelievable. I wonder. (interruption) That's a good point, Snerdley. I wonder if Senator McCain will renounce me for my take on the New Yorker cover. "If it's an attempt at satire, it's wrong." What if it's not an attempt at satire? Is it still wrong? Senator McCain, you said here, "If it's an attempt at satire, it's wrong. It's wrong and it's offensive." What if it's what they really think over there? (laughing) We know it's not, but would that make it acceptable? And then Maggie Rodriguez says, "Well, you championed a comprehensive immigration reform bill. Now as the nominee, you admit you wouldn't vote for it if it came up today. Why not?"
MCCAIN: The point is not that I would vote for it or not vote for it. The point is it failed twice. Senator Kennedy and I, and a group of senators brought it up twice and it failed twice.
RODRIGUEZ: The fact that it failed, does that tell you that the American people didn't want it or that your party didn't want it?
MCCAIN: The American people didn't support it. I still believe that we reflect the views of the majority.
RUSH: What a question. "Does it tell you that the American people didn't want it or your party didn't want it?" (laughing) At any rate, that's Senator McCain. He hasn't really changed his mind on it. He just realizes he hasn't sold us yet, and he's going to keep trying to sell us on the whole concept of amnesty and "comprehensive immigration reform." He just he knows he hasn't done it yet.
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