RUSH: As you know, over the course of the recent past, I, El Rushbo, your host; have been openly speculating that there has to be somebody behind Obama and his campaign, somebody who had the idea. Somebody said, ‘Obama, you’re the guy to deliver us from bondage, the Democrat Party. Hillary can’t do it. We don’t like the Clintons anymore. You are unassailable because of your skin color. You are articulate. You have this messianic quality. We’ll write your speeches for you; we’ll put your campaign together. Plus — as an added bonus, Obama — we’ll make it look like it’s all your decision.’ Do you remember in the early days of the Bush administration, after the 9/11 incident, Bush made some soaring speeches. Do you remember this? And what was the Drive-By reaction? The Drive-By Media’s reaction was, ‘Who’s writing these speeches?’
Then they found out it was Mike Gerson, and then Gerson was getting all kinds of puff piece stories in the Drive-Bys: the New York Times, the Washington Post. Anything to further the notion that Bush is an idiot who couldn’t tie his shoes or tie his tie without some assistance. But have you noticed in the Obama campaign, we don’t hear anything about anybody behind this guy! We might hear about David Axelrod. You don’t; I do. I tell you about David Axelrod. You might hear about his campaign manager, this guy named Plouffe, but you don’t hear about it much. They have succeeded in presenting the picture (the image, if you will) that Obama is totally in charge of everything that happens. He’s in charge of everybody that gets hired. He’s in charge of writing every speech. He is the brilliant strategerist and tactician. I mean, there’s no question, and I’ve said, ‘This can’t be. This guy just does not have enough experience to be pulling all this off the way he is and writing these speeches and so forth.’
So I said, ‘There gotta be somebody.’ Not an Oz. I don’t mean in a conspiratorial way. I don’t mean some Oz behind a curtain yanking the strings, but somebody, some pro, some hack that has made a strategeric decision that Obama is the perfect front man for the leftists and the radicals to take over the party — and, lo and behold, from Thomas Lifson, who runs the American Thinker blog: Soren Dayton of RedState, also one of our favorite blogs here, ‘Notices that Barack Obama’s choice of Jim Johnson to make vice presidential choices is worse than previously understood.’ You’ve heard about this Johnson guy. He’s got ties to Countrywide, the home lender; very close ties to Angelo Mozilo, the guy that ran it. He’s a Democrat Party hack, a lobbyist and all this — the exact opposite of what Obama claims his campaign is all about. However, according to RedState, there is more on Johnson.
‘In 2001, he joined Perseus, LLC, as vice-chairman. Perseus has a number of funds. Among them are the Perseus Soros Biopharmaceutical Fund LP, which Perseus co-manages. It was formed in 2000 with capital commitments totaling $449 million to make investments in life science companies.’ So Perseus — it might be Perseus, I’m not sure. I’ve never heard it pronounced. It’s P-e-r-s-e-u-s. ‘Perseus is a business partner with George Soros; and Johnson, one of Obama’s vice presidential vetters, is the vice-chairman. Incidentally, the Say Anything blog notes that Perseus also seems to own the publisher of the Scott McClellan book.’ So George Soros’ business partner is helping select Obama’s veep. How interesting that Obama just keeps coming up with friends and appointees with very dubious associations, who are no more than Democrat Party hacks. Some change, eh?
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Professor McCarthy has just sent me a brief note saying it’s Perseus, or Perseus, is one of the two, he’s a hero of Greek mythology who killed Medusa. That’s the name of the company that Jim Johnson, the guy vetting for Obama’s VP works for; founded by George Soros. Welcome back, folks. El Rushbo here behind the Golden EIB Microphone. Here is Obama describing the head of his vice presidential search team, and this is what he said about the guy.
OBAMA: I am not vetting (pause) my VP search committee for their mortgages. You know, these aren’t folks who are working for me. And, you know, ultimately m-m-my assumption is — is that, you know, this is a discrete task that they’re going to be performing for me over the next two months. Everybody (pause) uh, eh, you know, who is tangentially related to our campaign I think is going to have a whole host of relationships. I would have to hire the vetter to hi– to vet the vetters.
RUSH: This is unbelievable. This is exactly what I mean. By the way, I was wounded to the heart today, or last night, because as you all know, I have the deepest admiration — the most profound respect and love — for Camille Paglia. I think Camille Paglia is absolutely brilliant in what she does, but she in the tank for Obama. And she has a little paragraph in her latest column that takes to task conservative talk radio, which she has been listening to and has very much enjoyed it for 20 years. Twenty years? I’m the only one doing it for 20 years! She doesn’t mention any names, but she says we’re just going off the deep end here with these criticisms of Obama that he can’t speak without a prompter, that he’s really not that bright, that we’ve called him a Marxist. I’ve never called him a Marxist; maybe some other people have. (interruption) Snerdley said, ‘Why haven’t you called him a Marxist? We’ve been waiting.’ I haven’t called him a Marxist. I haven’t gone into this Muslim business. But anyway, it’s clear that she included me in some of this, and she’s such a brilliant lady, but you listen to this bite. Camille, listen to this with me again, please. Mike, play this from the top and I want you to start it with the sound up from the beginning because the last time we aired this, mere moments ago, we left out three key words. He’s at a press conference in St. Louis, and he’s describing — I might start and stop this, Mike, just so you know. It’s a portion of his remarks on the head honcho of his vice presidential search.
OBAMA: I am not vetting (pause) my VP search committee for their mortgages.
RUSH: Stop the tape. Why not? Why not, sir? This is a comment in reaction to the fact that this guy is in bed with Countrywide, which is under some scrutiny because their role in the mortgage crisis. I don’t know what culpability they’ve got, but they’re not looking good right now for a lot of reasons, and that’s where this guy is from. He’s got an association with the guy that heads up Countrywide. The whole mortgage thing is something the Democrat Party is trying to make political hay out of and blame on ‘predatory lending.’ Well, predatory lending might equal Countrywide, and yet this is a guy Obama’s gone out and asked to secure his search committee who’s got ties with all of this. This is another illustration here that there’s nothing new and nothing unique and there’s nothing refreshing, just a recycling of the same old party hacks. Look, Camille, I’m sorry. Obama doesn’t know anything about picking a vice president. He probably only figured out where the Senate dining room was six months after he got there. He’s just not been there very long. There’s something else going on. I don’t mean a conspiracy. There’s just something else. Hit the tape. Let’s resume it.
OBAMA: You know, these aren’t folks who are working for me. And —
RUSH: Stop the tape. What? These are not folks working for him? If you dig deep, as I have, what you find out is Obama means he’s not paying them, that they are volunteers. But they’re not working for him? They are the guys, this guy and his partner in crime, Eric Holder? Eric Holder, by the way, was the guy who secured the pardon of Marc Rich when Clinton was fading into the sunset while stealing some china on his last day in the White House. He’s not working for him? These guys don’t work for Obama? It may be true; they might be working for Soros. ‘They don’t work for me. What the hell! Here’s the next bite.’
OBAMA: You know, ultimately m-m-my assumption is — is that, you know, this is a discrete task that they’re going to be performing for me over the next two months.
RUSH: Stop the tape! Wait a minute. They’re not working for you. They’re ‘performing’ for him. They are ‘performing’ for Obama. Ah, they are court jesters! They are clowns. The court jester in the old days when there were court jesters, these guys to keep the king all mused and so forth. Kings were generally insane and in a bad mood all the time, chopping people’s heads off, they bring in the court jester and they called him the fool. They had such a low, low, low opinion of entertainers back in those days that they called him the fool. So these guys are fools? They’re not working for Obama, they’re performing a task. I know, I know. ‘Rush, you’re going a little bit too far here in parsing this. Okay, let’s listen to more.
OBAMA: Everybody (pause) uh, eh, you know, who is tangentially related to our campaign I think is going to have a whole host of relationships.
RUSH: Stop the tape. Tangentially? I know this is a challenge for those of you in Rio Linda. Let me define tangentially involved in a campaign. Michelle Malkin put it best. Michelle Malkin said, ‘Tangentially, Obama, is the cleaning lady at your Iowa campaign headquarters. Somebody choosing your vice president and vetting candidates is not tangential.’ It’s not a tangent. It’s not something that is irrelevant, it’s not something unimportant. So he’s just said these people aren’t working for him, that they are performing a task for him; he’s not vetting the search committee for their mortgages, and ‘everybody whose tangentially related to our campaign is going to have a whole host of relationships.’ He said, of course people are going to know some scoundrels. I know some scoundrels. Everybody in my campaign’s going to know some deadbeats. Everybody at any campaign is going to have some questionable associations, but you can’t go out there and vet them. Here, here’s how he wrapped up.
OBAMA: I would have to hire the vetter to hi– to vet the vetters.
RUSH: No, you haven’t hired vetters ’cause they’re not working for you! They’re not working for you. He hasn’t hired vetters to vet the vetters. It wouldn’t be a bad idea. Given the vetters that he’s got I think it would be a smart thing for Obama to get some vetters on these vetters, to vet the vetters. I mention all this, ladies and gentlemen, simply to illustrate that the image that is being created of Obama is not deserved.