RUSH: “Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) took to the Senate floor today to draw attention to a video of a top EPA official saying the EPAÂ’s ‘philosophy’ is to ‘crucify’ and ‘make examples’ of oil and gas companies — just as the Romans crucified random citizens in areas they conquered to ensure obedience.” Now, in setting this up, I just want to remind you — and, again, I’m always cognizant of the fact that we have a considerable number of new audience members in the last six weeks who are not up to speed or in context. So indulge me for a moment if you’ve been a regular listener for a number of years here. To the Democrat Party as currently constituted, the American left, Big Oil, Big Retail, Big Success is their enemy.
They believe in The State. They believe in The Government doing everything for everybody. They want the power; they want the control. And if you’ve paid any attention whatsoever over the years, you cannot deny that every Democrat under the sun has demonized Big Oil. The gas price goes up a penny, and the Democrats get into gear and start targeting Big Oil. Big Oil executives! They want to raise taxes on ’em, want to blame ’em. Obama’s trying to get rid of oil and replace it with batteries and green technology, which is pie-in-the-sky. There’s no business there. One of the things, one of the challenges I’ve always had in these 23 years is convincing non-ideological people just who liberals are.
It’s been one of my quests, in fact. It’s one of the things that keeps me showing up here every day. It’s an unfinished job, it’s an unfinished project, to finally find ways to get through to people who are not ideological. And by that I mean they don’t live life — or analyze life — in terms of liberal versus conservative, left versus right. In fact, they might hate that. These are the people that don’t like labels. These are the people that think that looking at people that way is simplistic. It’s not. And, by the way, there’s nothing wrong with simple. Simple is always best. Complex is unnecessary. That’s why I like to make the complex simple and understandable.
So if you are one of these non-ideological people who when you hear, for example, me issue warnings about who liberals are and what they really believe, you have to hear this. This is an appointed official at the EPA. This is somebody Obama wants there. Obama himself has said oil is tired and old and we have to get rid of it. That should matter to you. Oil is the fuel of the engine of freedom. Oil is directly tied to standard of living, prosperity, opportunity for prosperity and freedom. It’s not a pollutant. It’s not any more dangerous than anything else that’s organic and found naturally on this planet. What is illogical and borders on the insane is the hatred the left has for oil.
That’s what’s insane.
That’s what’s illogical.
That’s what’s irrational.
There’s no reason to hate oil! But they do. And they hate people who work in that business. Now, that may sound extreme. People don’t want to believe that kind of thing. So every once in a while you get a gift, and we have it: This EPA administrator. I don’t have to tell you what the left thinks, because we have a member of the Obama administration doing it for me. His name is Al Armendariz. (I don’t know if I’m pronouncing that right.) But he is the EPA Region 6 administrator. This is from May 2010, two years ago, in Dish, Texas.
This is who liberals are. This is who Obama wants in power, because this is also what Obama believes. You may as well just assume that Barack Obama is saying this. All these people that said, “Gee, how did this guy get past Obama? Does Obama know these people?” Yes! They didn’t “get past” him. He finds them. He has people that find these people. Barack Obama is going to get around Congress any way he can. The EPA, writing law in the form of regulations, is one way he’s gonna do it. Two years ago, Dish, Texas, Al Armendariz…
ARMENDARIZ: I gave an analogy to my staff about my philosophy with enforcement. It was kind of like how the Romans used to conquer little villages in the Mediterranean. TheyÂ’d go into little Turkish towns somewhere, theyÂ’d find the first five guys they saw, and theyÂ’d crucify them. And then, you know, that town was really easy to manage over the next few years. So you make examples out of people who are, in this case, not complying with the law. Find people who are not complying with the law, and you hit them as hard as you can and you make examples out of them. It’s a deterrent factor.
RUSH: A deterrent. You hit ’em as hard as you can. Find people not complying with the law. I gave an analogy to my staff about my philosophy with enforcement. He’s talking about oil here. Kind of like how the Romans used to conquer little villages in the Mediterranean. They go into a little Turkish town somewhere, they’d find the first five guys they saw and they’d crucify them. And then that town was really easy to manage over the next few years. This is who these people are. Had you not heard this, Dawn? This is who they are, folks. This is the governing philosophy of this administration. This may as well have been Barack Obama saying this.
Here’s the full transcript. “I was in a meeting once and I gave an analogy to my staff about my philosophy of enforcement, and I think it was probably a little crude and maybe not appropriate for the meeting, but IÂ’ll go ahead and tell you what I said: It was kind of like how the Romans used to, you know, conquer villages in the Mediterranean. TheyÂ’d go in to a little Turkish town somewhere, theyÂ’d find the first five guys they saw and theyÂ’d crucify them. Then, you know, that town was really easy to manage for the next few years. ItÂ’s a deterrent factor.” Explaining the EPA as following the Romans’ philosophy for subjugating conquered villages.
That’s how this guy wanted to deal and was dealing with oil and gas companies, legitimate American and international corporations. He hates them, he wants to subjugate ’em, he wants to crucify ’em, just because he can. And he’s bragging about how to do it. That’s who they are, my friends. This is who the American left is, the worldwide left. That is their plan and their philosophy and their approach for everybody and everything they disagree with. Here’s another sound bite.
This is Barack Obama, January 2008. He’s a senator, interviewed by the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board. They’re having a discussion about energy and the environment. Obama was asked, “What about alternatives, including coal? What are your plans for alternatives using coal?”
OBAMA: What I’ve said is that we would put a cap-and-trade system in place that is as aggressive, if not more aggressive, than anybody else’s out there. So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can. It’s just that it will bankrupt them because they’re gonna be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s being emitted.
RUSH: So in 2008 Obama told the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board that he intended to put the coal business out of business by making it financially impossible for them to stay in business. And, by the way, in Obama’s home state of Illinois they are closing coal-fired power plants. At that same editorial board meeting, Obama described his energy plan in general.
OBAMA: When I was asked earlier about the issue of coal, you know, under my plan of a cap-and-trade system, the electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.
RUSH: Get rid of coal, demonize oil and gas and try to find a way to replace that and electricity rates will skyrocket. This was the plan. Now, the mainstream media didn’t report any of this. The San Francisco Chronicle released the tape, but they didn’t make a big deal of it back when Obama said it. It was left up to us. They’ve not hidden who they are. Obama has not hidden who he is. This guy, Al Armendariz. They’re oil-phobes. These people are dangerous, folks. They pose a clear and present danger.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: By the way, the interior secretary, Ken “The Cowboy Hat” Salazar, said, “Gasoline could get to nine dollars a gallon. Nobody knows where it’s gonna end up.” Nine dollars a gallon. The regime is saying that with a shrug of the shoulders. You notice this Al Armendariz guy was speaking to colleagues. Have you noticed we only hear the left’s real plans when they’re talking with their colleagues, with fellow travelers. That’s how we heard Obama’s comments about the bitter clingers as well as his plans for moving to us single-payer health care system when he was talking to the unions. When he’s talking to fellow travelers at the San Francisco Chronicle. That’s when we hear he’s gonna put the coal business out. He never tells you that. He never says this stuff in public. He only says it to his friends, and Al Armendariz, same thing, down there in Texas, with his colleagues, and here’s how I’m gonna crucify, as Reverend Wright would say, going to crucify Big Oil, so forth.
Let me tell you what that was about. At the same time of this tape of Al Armendariz down in Texas, 2010, he was targeting at the EPA, this same guy was targeting a company called Range Resources. A company based in Fort Worth. Range Resources is the company that discovered the Marcellus Shale field in Pennsylvania, the biggest natural gas field in America, one of the biggest in world. Range Resources discovered it. This guy, Al Armendariz, claimed that Range Resources’ fracking had contaminated groundwater in Texas. He issued an order to just shut them down, the guy you heard on the tape. The Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates oil and gas drilling in Texas, found no evidence that Range Resources had polluted anything. And finally, just last month, two years after the fact, the EPA withdrew its order and a federal court dismissed the EPA’s case.
In fact, according to Senator Inhofe and other experts, the environmentalists have still not been able to produce a single case to prove that fracking contaminates groundwater, but this little bureaucrat thinking he’s Mr. Hot Stuff, doing the bidding of Barack Obama. Yes, I’m mad. I am spitting mad over this. Everybody ought to be. This little bureaucrat, on his own, admitting to his colleagues that his job is to crucify Big Oil and big gas the way the Romans did it. You go in and you find five guys, whether they’ve done anything or not, and you crucify them. You make an example, and that’s how you scare everybody into not doing anything you don’t want ’em to do.
So this Range Resources discovers the Marcellus Shale field, biggest natural gas field in America, and this guy accuses them falsely of contaminating groundwater because of their fracking technique, and orders them to be shut down. And he can do it. He’s doing Barack Obama’s bidding. It takes two years, and finally the whole thing’s thrown out with no evidence whatsoever. Two years this company had to endure. This is EPA terrorism. And that’s who these people are. And that’s why you need to see these people in an ideological framework, folks. It’s who they are.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: E-mails during the break: “You just say — you just SAY — all this stuff about Al Armendariz shutting down Range Resources. You don’t cite a source!” Okay. It’s Forbes magazine. Like I’m gonna make this up! Forbes magazine has the details on what Al Armendariz tried to do, or what he did do to Range Resources, all because why? What did they do? They discovered the largest natural gas field in America. That’s a crime! Because they used fracking to do it, and the left believes that fracking contaminates groundwater. There’s no evidence. They looked at it for two years. There’s no evidence whatsoever that fracking contaminates groundwater.
But because the left is against the discovery of oil and gas, they’ll simply lie about the destruction of the environment in the process of getting more oil and gas, because they hate it. (New Castrati impression) “Why do they hate oil and gas, Mr. Limbaugh? That’s a ridiculous thing to say!” They hate oil and gas because it equals freedom. It equals something the government is not providing. The government doesn’t provide oil. Therefore, there are no votes in it. The government doesn’t provide natural gas. The private sector produces it.
The private sector is the enemy.
It’s just that simple.
The challenge for you is to believe it, folks, ’cause that’s who these people are. Senator Inhofe said, “[I]t’s clear that EPA did not base these three studies on sound science,” the fracking allegations, “or engage in the proper scientific process; the agency has been using questionable authorities while usurping the rightful regulatory authority of states,” meaning Texas. If anybody’s gonna shut down Range Resources, it’s Texas that does it. Al Armendariz can’t come in as an EPA, you know, little Nazi, come in and do it. But he did it.
“EPA clearly went through with these investigations based on preconceived conclusions with the explicit goal of tying potential environmental harms to hydraulic fracturing,” whether it exists or not. There’s a moratorium on drilling for oil in the Gulf of Mexico, folks. I don’t know what more evidence anybody needs. The Keystone pipeline? You have to have the courage to believe that’s who these people are. There are hundreds of thousands of jobs waiting for the Keystone pipeline. There’s all kinds of new domestic oil we have. We would be less dependent on Middle Eastern oil. Obama’s opposed to it.
“Why?”
Who cares why? The fact is he’s opposed to it; that ought to be enough to disqualify him.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Department of Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said, quote, “No one knows,” close quote, if gasoline prices in the US will reach nine dollars a gallon. He acknowledged the possibility is outside his control. Salazar was talking to reporters. He was asked if gasoline prices could reach nine dollars a gallon as they have in Greece. “I don’t think anyone can speculate what will happen with respect to oil prices and gas prices because they are set on the global economy. … What we see happening today are the influences first of unrest in places like the Middle East and Iran, which disrupt the markets and allow the futures markets to play on some of what they see … and secondly the huge demand that you’ve started seeing in places like China, India and Brazil.” So nobody knows if the US is headed to nine dollars a gallon. No, nobody knows. Can you imagine if George W. Bush had said, “Nobody knows. We might be headed to nine dollars.” Can you imagine the conniption fit?
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: George in Charlotte, North Carolina, welcome to the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: Hello, Rush. It is indeed an honor to speak to the all-knowing, all-caring Maha Rushie.
RUSH: Thank you very, very much. It’s great to have you with us.
CALLER: Yes, sir.
RUSH: You bet.
CALLER: I heard you about an hour ago playing that part of Obama. I had never heard that about what he said on the coal companies. I cannot believe that a man that is supposed to be even a US citizen, which I doubt, would even say that we will tax you to death or we will fine you to death or we will put you out of business.
RUSH: Grab audio sound bite number two, Ed. Here’s what he’s talking about. This is Obama, January 2008, San Francisco Chronicle editorial board meeting.
OBAMA: What I’ve said is that we would put a cap-and-trade system in place that is as aggressive, if not more aggressive, than anybody else’s out there. So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can. It’s just that it will bankrupt them because they’re gonna be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s being emitted.
RUSH: Barack Obama telling the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board he’s gonna put the coal business out of business by making it impossibly expensive to be in business. You’ve never heard that quote?
CALLER: No. If we do not in November get this dictatorship socialist regime out of office, you had mentioned earlier how many millions of illegals are going back to Mexico.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: We will be better off to get on the bus with them with their gross national product twice what ours is than stay here and try to go into business.
RUSH: Well, what makes you think they’re on the bus?
CALLER: Well, probably not, but —
RUSH: Think they’re taking the hoof express.
CALLER: — knowing Obama he’s probably gonna pay for their fare back.
RUSH: Back, yeah, he needs ’em here. Absolutely. See, that’s great. George had not heard that quote.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: I want to go back, audio sound bite number one, Al Armendariz two years ago in Dish, Texas, describing how they’re gonna squash Big Oil.
ARMENDARIZ: I gave an analogy to my staff about my philosophy with enforcement. It was kind of like how the Romans used to conquer little villages in the Mediterranean. TheyÂ’d go into little Turkish towns somewhere, theyÂ’d find the first five guys they saw, and theyÂ’d crucify them. And then, you know, that town was really easy to manage over the next few years. So you make examples out of people who are, in this case, not complying with the law. Find people who are not complying with the law, and you hit them as hard as you can and you make examples out of them. It’s a deterrent factor.
RUSH: That is Al Armendariz talking about how he’s gonna “crucify” oil and gas companies just because they exist. I said earlier today, “This is Obama. This guy is an appointee. Obama wants him there. These are the kinds of people that Obama has populating these agencies.” So today at the White House press briefing, the Fox News Channel’s Chief White House correspondent Ed Henry said to Jay Carney, the White House spokesman, “The president’s approach going back to the campaign of ’08 was about ‘hope and change,’ setting a new tone. Somebody saying we should ‘crucify’ the oil industry. Why is that person still working at the EPA? He’s a political appointee. What’s going on here, Jay?”
CARNEY: He — he — he’s apologized, uh, and he’s, uh… What he said is clearly (long pause) not representative of either, uh, this president’s belief, uhhh, in the way that we should approach these matters or in the way that he has approached these matters. Either, uh, from this office here in the White House or at the EPA.
RUSH: Not true. So this guy is saying, “Hey, this Al Armendariz, he doesn’t speak for Obama!” He does speak for Obama. We’ve got the tapes of Obama describing how he’s gonna put the coal business out of business. He’s gonna make it too expensive how to operate. We have him saying how electricity rates are gonna skyrocket. So he’s got an appointee at the EPA crucifying oil and gas companies. And Carney says, “Well, no, no, that’s not the president! This is not representative of this president.”
It is!
He’s a political appointee.
Armendariz is there for a reason, and that is he is Obama.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Obama said he was gonna crucify the coal industry to the San Francisco Chronicle. This Armendariz guy is “crucifying” little oil and gas companies like Range Resources. He’s doing Obama’s bidding! They’re all on the same team.