Posted on 10/28/2015 5:04:50 PM PDT by Kaslin
RUSH: This budget deal -- and every time this subject comes up I have to point out that, well, even 25 years ago when this program started, to discuss something like the federal budget was one of the biggest mistakes you could make in terms of programming content. I mean, it was so esoteric and so boring, and it contained its own language that did not relate to people. It was instant death. You just didn't talk about the budget.
My, how things have changed. This budget deal -- and we first alerted it to you on Monday, saw a little flash news blurb from Bloomberg detailing what the House Republicans were doing, getting ready to do. And they've done it. They have crafted a budget that essentially gives nobody any reason not to vote for Hillary Clinton.
It is astounding what they have done, particularly when you balance it against what they've promised us they would do. They have reneged on every promise, written and oral, that they have made, beginning back in 2010 when it comes to what they would do vis-a-vis the budget, government spending overall, and how they would behave in battle with the Democrats. They've tossed it all aside.
Everything Obama wants and then some is in this budget. Raising the debt limit over $1 trillion which takes it off the table as an issue all the way through next year. The budget is also a two-year budget which takes it out of the presidential campaign which makes whoever the next president is, and the next Congress, they're saddled with this budget. I mean, every budget is technically a one-year budget. I know this, and they can make 10-year projections, five-year, what they've actually done here is try to craft a two-year budget.
And when I went through it last night and looked at it, and I went back and with the assistance of a column written by my buddy Andy McCarthy at PJMedia.com, I started boiling. I was literally infuriated. I have to tell you, folks, I am beyond able to understand the political thinking now of the Republican leadership in the House of Representatives, particularly as it relates to the presidential race. I can't figure it out. What they are doing makes literally and absolutely no sense. It makes no sense in dollars and cents. It makes no sense budgetarily. It makes no sense politically. They're not even an opposition party. They're not even pretending anymore to be an opposition party.
When you look at what they've done with this budget -- we'll get into some details -- basically all you need to know is whatever Obama wants, he's got. Whatever Hillary wants, she's got. Whatever you thought you were voting for in 2010 and 2014, you've been lied to, in terms of how your representatives were gonna fight the Democrats, fight spending, fight this constant bloat. We can now officially claim that the Republicans are responsible for five trillion additional new dollars added to the national debt. Spending bills originate in the Congress. The president could ask and demand and do whatever, but he can't write the bills, he can't write the laws. All he can do is sign them or veto them.
We turned over the writing of the budget to Obama and the Democrats, essentially. It wouldn't be much different if they had started the whole process and completed it. So I don't know how this helps them. I don't know how they think it helps them. I don't know why it's happening. Is this all because of the demands made by donors? I mean, that's the latest excuse we're given for everything else they're doing. "Well, the donor class, they're demanding this, and donor class is demanding amnesty, donor class is demanding nuke deal with Iran." Is what explains this budget deal, that donors are demanding all of this? Or have the Republican leadership just become a bunch of pathological actual left-wingers in the last couple years?
I don't see the difference in the current Republican House leadership. When it comes to government spending, the whole philosophy behind government spending, big government, I don't see any difference between the Republican leadership and the Democrat leadership. When I look on the Democrat side I see Pelosi and Reid and everybody cheering the budget. Are they still scared to death of Obama? Do they still think that they have to show that they can work with Obama, be cooperative, let Obama have everything he wants otherwise the media's gonna call them racists?
We've got a year to go, for crying out loud, just one more year of this. And they are going to put it on paper that we get two more years of this. It's the most confounding thing. We've got one year of Obama left, but the Republican leadership in the House has passed a budget, or is about to, that will essentially give us another year of Obama in terms of philosophy on government size and spending.
Are they doing this to prove that they can be bipartisan? Do they think that's gonna help them in the presidential race? Are they doing this to show they can cooperate? Are they doing this to show that they love and support entitlements and nobody should think Republicans are gonna take anything away from them. Are they that defensive? Are they that scared? Are they that convinced the media can define them and there's nothing they can do about it so they may as well do everything the media is demanding of them so that the media will shut up and not be mean to them anymore? Is that what's going on here?
Are they hell-bent on showing their ability to cooperate, cross the aisle? They think that's helping the presidential field by doing this? Are they ambivalent? Are they unfeeling in any way about...? Folks, the blatant lies that Republicans in the House have told their voters during campaigns. All the documents, the contracts, the pledges that they wrote and signed that none of this would happen. Virtually everything they pledged not to do, they are doing in this budget deal.
Are they unconcerned about destroying the economy? Are they so secure in their own existence that they don't care what happens outside their own lives? Are they set now for the rest of their lives because of the votes that they have secured for big donors? Are they happy that in the places they live there isn't any unemployment, there isn't any real difficulty managing the cost of living?
Are they unconcerned about destroying our culture? Do you have any idea what this budget's gonna do to our culture? This culture is creating more dependence and more dependence. It's practically designed to put people on the welfare rolls. It's practically designed to tell people to stop relying on themselves and look to government for whatever you need or whatever you want. That's not who we are. But that's what this budget deal does.
The spending caps that they negotiated with Obama? They've blown those up. The one thing that they won, spending caps, they got rid of them themselves in this deal. I'm trying to understand, are they totally in debt to K Street? Do they all have jobs waiting for them on K Street? It doesn't compute here. Who are these people in the House Republican leadership? What are they? I'll tell you what I've concluded, and it's something that I have forecast before, mentioned before. We've even discussed it on this program.
I think what's going on in Washington right now -- and it isn't new, it's just more visible than it's ever been. I think there's all kinds of bipartisanship going on in Washington. I think there's all kinds of cooperation going on in Washington. I think that it's kumbaya time. I think they are linked arm in arm. I think the bipartisan project is to destroy conservatism. I think they would be happy. They would prefer... I'm talking about the Republican leadership. Not the whole membership, but the Republican leadership.
I have the idea they would be happier with Hillary Clinton as president than Ted Cruz, and that's not a feeling. I know that almost for a fact. I know that with almost ontological certitude. They, as members of the inside-the-Beltway establishment, no way, no how do they want anybody like Ted Cruz in the White House. They would much prefer Hillary. The only thing that explains this, looked at in any kind of prism of common sense, is that there is a combined bipartisan effort to finally render conservatives and conservatism as irrelevant as a pockmark.
The only thing that explains this: This is not good budgeting. Not only is this not conservative, it's not even Republican, even moderate Republican. This is rubber-stamp liberal Democrat budgetary philosophy. This violates every pledge and promise that they've made in election campaigns going back to 2010, repeated in 2012 during the presidential race, and repeated again in 2014. And I shall remind you word by word of some of the pledges they've made, the contracts they wrote, reminiscent of the Contract with America.
I actually think... You know the Democrats want to get rid of conservatism. They want to get rid of all opposition. That's their modus operandi. The thing here is the Republican leadership in the House and Senate, I think, wants to do the same thing. I think we're a burr on their butts. I think we're a pain in the rear to them. I think they much more resent us than they do liberal Democrats. Romney gave it all away the other day. He gave it all away when he came out -- and have you noticed how there hasn't been any reaction to that anywhere?
I have been studiously observing. Mitt Romney comes out, laments/longs for the good old days when we all get the same facts. There were only three different places you could get news America: ABC, CBS, and NBC. Those were the good old days. Those were the good old days when everybody got the same news, everybody got the same facts, and it's easy to collaborate. Democrats and Republicans could work together. But now we have these insurgent, extremist right wingers in this New Media confusing everybody with different facts.
And he also did give some lip service to saying the left has their own version, but he's not concerned about them because the extremists on the left still have the same facts that the Democrat Party has. However, us? We extremists on the right. We seem to be operating with a totally different set of facts and the mainstream doesn't want to deal with it, and the establishment doesn't want to deal with it.
So Romney comes out and sides with the people who called him a liar about paying his taxes, who told everybody he hated women and hated his employees and allowed them to get cancer and didn't care -- and put the dog on the roof of the station wagon -- and much more incendiary stuff designed to destroy his career and his reputation, and that's who he thinks his friends are. So Romney let it out of the bag with this idea that the good old days, you have to go back 25, 27, 28 years to find them. (paraphrased) "Yeah, everybody got the same news!
"Everybody got the same facts! There weren't any controversy day to day over what was what. We could collaborate and get along and everything was fine and dandy and hunky-dory. Yeah. Now we can't do." There hasn't been a... I haven't found any reaction to that anywhere. Have you, Mr. Snerdley? Have you seen it? (interruption) Not a peep. And to me it was the biggest news because it confirmed long-held suspicions. But there hasn't been a repeat of that. There hasn't been a repeat. There hasn't been anybody. I have not seen it other than where it originally appeared, in Breitbart.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Now, back to the budget deal for just one or two things here. I mentioned at the outset that the Republican leadership has violated practically every promise they made to voters in 2010, 2012, 2014 about how they would behave if they were elected. And what they would do to stop Obama, stop the Democrats, stop the spending. One of the things that Boehner promised was three full days, 72 hours to read all legislation before voting on it.
Not here. This is being rammed through. This is going to have to happen today. It has to happen before Paul Ryan becomes Speaker so his fingerprints are not on it. This is supposedly Boehner's gift to Paul Ryan, a clean Speakership with no budget battles in the immediate future, the budget's done, no arguments with the Democrats. The conservatives out in the country can't do anything to you because it's a done deal, no threats of government shutdown. Boehner thinks this is his present to Ryan as new Speaker, a clean slate when it comes to the budget.
But to make it happen, they have to violate the promise and the pledge that Boehner and the leadership made. If the vote happens before 11:36 p.m. tomorrow, then Boehner's pledge would be violated. It's 144 pages. It raises the debt limit by a trillion dollars. Why does it take 144 pages to do that? But there are many more promises that were made and pledges that were signed way back when.
Let's talk about a Pledge to America, a little pamphlet the Republican leadership put out. It had all kinds of pictures of Boehner and Paul Ryan and Kevin McCarthy, other Republican leaders. And this Pledge to America began thus: "An unchecked executive, a compliant legislature, and an overreaching judiciary have combined to thwart the will of the people and overturn their votes and their values, striking down long-standing laws and institutions and scorning the deepest beliefs of the American people.
"An arrogant and out-of-touch government of self-appointed elites makes decisions, issues mandates, and enacts laws without accepting or requesting the input of the many. Rising joblessness, crushing debt, and a polarizing political environment are fraying the bonds among our people and blurring our sense of national purpose."
Well, we all read that, those of us who did, we all heard that, those of us who did, "Man, these guys get it. These guys get it. They're gonna go in there and they're gonna stop this stuff. They understand all this elites are implementing things with executive action. The will of the people is being thwarted. Spending is out of control." We bought it. We elected 'em in droves. By the way, this pledge was made when all they had was the House. And this pledge did not say anything about we must have the Senate before we could do any of this. That came later.
They were making these promises when all the Republicans controlled were the House of Representatives, folks. And when they won the House of Representatives, that's when they said, "We can't do any more. We need the Senate." But yet they made these promises when they didn't control the Senate. The Republicans in this Pledge to America promised to do a lot of things to address this crisis. "They said they had 'A Plan to Reform Congress and Restore Trust.' They committed to change the abuses of Democratic leadership, who had 'consolidated authority, abusing the letter and spirit of the House rules to get the outcome desired, while ignoring voices of the American people, the minority, and even dissenters within [its] own party,'" and they were gonna make the Democrats pay for that. It's right from the Pledge to America.
When you hear that now, if you happen to read that now, how do you not snicker or get enraged? When you remember all of the complex, voluminous, endless bills, great consequence, that would no longer be dumped on members, they'd be given no meaningful opportunity to read the legislation, much less propose changes. Everything they pledged just kind of drifted away by the wayside when reality set in.
Further from the pledge: "We recognize that if we are truly committed to addressing the American people’s highest priorities, the House of Representatives must operate differently -- differently from the way the Democrats do now, and differently from the way Republicans did in the past. Change begins at home." This is what they promised to win the House. And here's the requirement to read the bill part of the pledge: "We will ensure that bills are debated and discussed in the public square by publishing the text online for at least three days before coming up for a vote in the House of Representatives. No more hiding legislative language from the minority party, opponents, and the public. Legislation should be understood by all interested parties before it is voted on."
Can't blame Republican voters for eating this up. It's exactly what needed to be done. It's exactly what they promised to do. So they were elected and they gained control of the House. And then we began to hear, "Wait. We forgot to tell you something. None of this can be done 'til we have the Senate." But this just scratches the surface on pledges and promises which were made.
I was the only real conservative available to vote for in the general election of 2012, at least in states representing about three quarters of the electoral votes, almost exactly the same percentage that Lincoln won on in 1860. A handful of patriots made that possible with grassroots effort only. Not a single dime was spent.
Those are simple facts.
Those who voted for me knew all of that, and understood, considering the current state of the electorate and our political process, that success in the election was virtually impossible, and decided to exercise their sacred franchise for what actually represents them anyway, instead of being cowed into voting for what doesn’t represent them, out of craven fear.
You see, the plumb line they operated from was a principled American standard. They actually believe in representative self-government enough to line up their actions with their rhetoric.
In 2012 your plumb line, and the plumb line of most Americans who call themselves “conservatives,” was, sadly, fear of Barack Obama...a fear that led them to cast their ballots for the most liberal governor in history, a man who clearly didn’t represent the things in which they say they believe.
And you wonder why our political class continues to build crooked buildings on shifting sand?
You wonder how and why it is that your worst fears come upon you anyway?
The standards of the fine patriots who supported me remain the same, to this day. God bless and keep them.
One last thing: You have NO RIGHT to tell anyone that they must violate their conscience in how they exercise their sacred franchise. Please stop doing that. It’s un-American.
‘Each of you, for himself, by himself and on his own responsibility, must speak. And it is a solemn and weighty responsibility, and not lightly to be flung aside at the bullying of pulpit, press, government, or the empty catchphrases of politicians. Each must for himself alone decide what is right and what is wrong, and which course is patriotic and which isn’t. You cannot shirk this and be a man. To decide against your convictions is to be an unqualified and inexcusable traitor, both to yourself and to your country, let man label you as they may. If you alone of all the nation shall decide one way, and that way be the right way according to your convictions of the right, you have done your duty by yourself and by your country — hold up your head! You have nothing to be ashamed of.’
- Mark Twain
‘When you become entitled to exercise the right of voting for public officers, let it be impressed on your mind that God commands you to choose for rulers ‘just men who will rule in the fear of God. The preservation of a republican government depends on the faithful discharge of this duty. If the citizens neglect their duty and place unprincipled men in office, the government will soon be corrupted; laws will be made not for the public good so much as for the selfish or local purposes; corrupt or incompetent men will be appointed to execute the laws; the public revenues will be squandered on unworthy men; and the rights of the citizens will be violated or disregarded. If a republican government fails to secure public prosperity and happiness, it must be because the citizens neglect the divine commands, and elect bad men to make and administer the laws.’
— Noah Webster
‘Impress upon children the truth that the exercise of the elective franchise is a social duty of as solemn a nature as man can be called to perform; that a man may not innocently trifle with his vote; that every elector is a trustee as well for others as himself and that every measure he supports has an important bearing on the interests of others as well as on his own.’
— Daniel Webster
‘Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost.’
— John Quincy Adams
‘Let each citizen remember at the moment he is offering his vote that he is not making a present or a compliment to please an individual—or at least that he ought not so to do; but that he is executing one of the most solemn trusts in human society for which he is accountable to God and his country.’
— Samuel Adams
‘There remains the one standard that has not yet been universally used, namely, the choosing of candidates on moral grounds. A nation always gets the kind of politicians it deserves. When our moral standards are different, our legislation will be different. As long as the decent people refuse to believe that morality must manifest itself in every sphere of human activity, including the political, they will not meet the challenge of Marxism. Contemporary history proves that modern political leaders, devoid of a moral inspiration and relying solely on a mass basis (might makes right), proves ineffectual in time of crisis.-
— Fulton Sheen, ‘COMMUNISM and the CONSCIENCE of the WEST’ -1948
Thats time not worth spending though. These people chose their side and FOUGHT to stay on that side. Plenty of time has elapsed for deathbed conversions. They should be treated as the leftists they are.
What we need to stop doing is wasting our time trying to talk sense to committed leftists intent on working against conservatism. Think of it like the unrepentant alkie or junkie. Sometimes a family just has to say “We did all we could” and just cut them off.
We are now going into our FOURTH election since the GOP and the PDS wing of FR worked so diligently to trash Palin. The very same people today preaching the lesser evil doctrine today were the people doing all in their power then to keep the GOP liberals in power and assist the actual Democrats in socializing America. Now ponder the $7 trillion id debt, the lost of age old institutions and all the rest they ‘accomplished’ for the left since.
Four.
Enough. They aren’t our friends, they aren’t conservatives and their actions show they work against everything we are about. They arent fixable and the facts are ridiculously clear on the ground that they don’t want to change course.
As per usual.
Why did we vote for them again, can someone remind me? Anyone?....,
Because you screwed up and listened to leftists on Free Republic and elsewhere telling you things you knew were not true like “It’s a lesser evil”, “They are better than Democrats” and “If you don’t you hate America and love Obama?”
Funny how after the GOP caved and gave Obama every major issue he wanted, those same people are still here telling toy that you have to keep doing what resulted in the polar opposite of what you wanted isn’t it?
If I were in your position, I’d be pretty pissed that my so called fellow ‘conservatives’ here lied to my face and made me look like a sucker.
You allowed fallacious thinking to bamboozle you into voting FOR turning the Republican party hard left in a way where "your self esteem was and still is intact."
Fortunately for you as well as the rest of us, Romney lost.
Thib, Norm describes you pretty well in his post #82.
of course we are conservatives
we are just not conservative zealots devoid of reason
there is much to be seen if you don’t look through the wrong end of the binoculars. once you migrate away from the far fringe, you see the vastness of conservatism as it truly exists
The differences between them are so minor as to be laughable with regard to "choice." You pretend that there was a choice. You are only fooling yourself. And, as you projected onto Eternal Vigilance, you are so desperate to keep your own self-esteem intact, that you carry on with this charade and get angry at folks who used to be where you still are, but who have figured out that the deal being offered by left-leaning politicians that now dominate both major parties is almost literally "Heads I win, tails you lose."
Just because you are still falling for it doesn't change the reality that that is what you are falling for.
My choice was to use my vote, the one tool I had, to dilute a bad substance (Coke or Pepsi, equally crappy) so that it would be that much weaker.
You went ahead and allowed yourself to be manipulated into voting for crap that you didn't want in the first place.
OR DIDNT YOU? Norm Lenhart is becoming more and more convincing in his argument that indeed, people like you WANTED what Romney has to offer. You WANT the political equivalent of crap like Coca-Cola and actually think it's "better" than Pepsi, metaphorically speaking.
Wake the hell up.
Sorry, Thib, but including yourself in the ranks of conservatives is like a goldfish including itself in the ranks of swordfish.
Kick and cream all you want. You arent getting the candy bar. As badly as you want to redefine what being a conservative is, it isn’t about compromise. And it isn’t about big tent bullshit. It’s about preservation, not expansion into liberalism.
I see women in their 40s dressing like teenagers all the time. Guess what they arent? Teenage girls. Guess what a liberal standing up scream how conservative their views are while preaching accepting liberal Republicans is? Aliberal. Not a Conservative.
1984 was a great book but I’m not going to lie to myself about living in it. And you arent going to lie about what conservatism is without getting called on it.
“Norm Lenhart is becoming more and more convincing in his argument that indeed, people like you WANTED what Romney has to offer.”
Thats because Norm Lenhart has people on FR every hour of every day proving all on their own with no input from him that he’s right all the way down the line. Not because he says he is. Because reality shows he is. You should just accept it Finny. Don’t accept it because he wants you to. Accept it because the facts show you the truth.
It sucks. He will be the first to say it sucks and he wishes he were wrong. But every day on the most right wing sight there is, and in the general population at large, the people prove he’s correct. ;)
You don’t seriously believe that isn’t so ?
Now, either Thibodeaux and millions of others who claim the label "conservative" understand why Romney has zero businesses being a Republican but still operate on an obsolete model of party loyalty, or they are happy with the general direction Romney wants to take the country. They are one or the other. I am very much afraid they are the latter.
In which case, again, it is a total waste of time right now even thinking of depending on the Republican party for anything except as a source of voters to convert to the new "third" party.
And at that, it is better approached as a true second party because with guys like Romney passing as "Republican," the two major parties actually represent only one product or choice (cola soft drink) in two different brands, Coke or Pepsi. It is a hugely apt analogy. We only have one major party going by two names, these days; it's time NOW to go Second Major Party, Cruz and all, if Norm is correct.
So many things have gotten worse, it’s hard to remember them all. What has gotten better ? I can’t name a single thing. If I lived in some other place with an intact values system of right and wrong and had a place to described to me as today’s USA, I would say evil had won there. Instead of Charlton Heston raging on the beach at the end of “Planet of the Apes”, you’d have Ben Franklin mad as hell at everything that had been done for us, all ruined, and for what ?
“And if you are correct, Norm,”
Just wanted to point out that you added an extra word there.
“And you are correct, Norm,”
Fixed it for you. ;)
Most people expanded the ability to lie to themselves without shame, remorse or regret. So there’s that...
Are you still pimping that bullshit party line ? We call that trolling, Hoss.
You and Congressman Virgil Goode. If he wasn’t on the ballot in my state, my vote would’ve gone to you.
If you think Willard was the “Conservative” alternative that Conservatives should vote for, you need to spend some time in the nervous hospital next to Karl Childers and his bucket of French fried taters.
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