RUSH: Yesterday on a progressive talk station in Los Angeles a Hispanic host, guy name Mario, is talking to Bill Clinton on the phone, and the host says, ‘Is it time for some type of enforced media accountability?’
CLINTON: We either ought to have the Fairness Doctrine or we ought to have more balance on the other side, because essentially there’s always been a lot of big money to support the right-wing talk shows, and let’s face it, you know, Rush Limbaugh is fairly entertaining, even when he’s saying things that I think are ridiculous. I never minded having somebody be heard who disagreed with me. But if you only have one side like this blatant drumbeat against the stimulus program, this doesn’t reflect the economic reality we’re facing.
RUSH: All right, now, this is not accidental. This appears to be coincidental. Go on a leftist host show and here comes the question do we need some type of enforced media accountability. Has this nerd never heard of the First Amendment? That’s constitutionally not permitted! Enforced media accountability is not permitted by the US Constitution. But it’s not just coincidental that Clinton shows up and has this question asked, and has this answer. Here’s a former president now in favor of the Fairness Doctrine. We’ve had members of Congress, from Dick Durbin, to Tom Harkin, Maurice Hinchey, they’re getting ready to do something. They won’t call it Fairness Doctrine, they’ll go at it in a much more stealth way, but they’re only going to go after a certain element of media, and that’s conservatives on talk radio. They will not go after any other media platform. They won’t go after blogs — well, they may, but that’s going to be more problematic for them. But they’re not going to go after television, they won’t go after newspapers ’cause they are considered ‘the press,’ and ‘the press’ is mentioned in the First Amendment. We of course are not considered to be part of media. But it’s dead serious. They want to wipe out all dissent. They want to clear the playing field. They don’t want any dissent on the stimulus. (doing Clinton impression) ‘We gotta get rid of this guy, Limbaugh, he’s entertaining, yeah, but to line up against the stimulus package like this, I mean we can’t have that.’ We can’t have that, huh? Let’s go back and listen to his wife April 28th, 2003.
HILLARY: I am sick and tired of people who say that if you debate and you disagree with this administration, somehow you’re not patriotic, and we should stand up and say, we are Americans, and we have a right to debate and disagree with any administration!
RUSH: Okay, aside from the first and maybe second wife similarities there in speech pattern, here is Mrs. Clinton defining patriotism as dissent against a sitting administration, in this case the Bush administration. Now her husband and no doubt Mrs. Clinton want to silence all dissent. They want to shut everybody up and they’re making it look like it’s just some coincidence. (doing Clinton impression) ‘That’s right, Limbaugh was asked that question, what am I gonna say, I gotta be honest about it, but you’re sitting out there and thinking it’s some sort of conspiracy. Well, I think you ought to have your head examined.’ Mr. President we know full well what’s happened, you guys have telegraphed it, you’ve made it plain what your intentions are. I have a plan on this, by the way, ladies and gentlemen, but I, El Rushbo, am not prepared today to divulge the plan other than to say I’m going to confront President Obama directly on this and I’m going to ask him for an answer up or down on what his intentions are regarding enforced media accountability.
He’s got every one of his big minion supporters out there advocating for it. He publicly has said during last year’s campaign that he’s not focused on it, doesn’t really care about it, he’s not that interested. But of course he provides the leadership here, and I’m not going to ask it on my behalf. I’m going to ask it on behalf of my industry. When I started my program in August of 1988, there were 125 radio stations doing talk radio. Today there are 2,010, 2,020 radio stations doing talk radio. It’s not our fault we have succeeded. It’s to our credit. We’ve done so in the free market. Clinton talks about the big money that accrues, and that’s not fair. Big money accrues to the Super Bowl, Mr. President, big money accrues to American Idol, big money accrued to The West Wing, programs with large audiences that succeed are going to attract, quote, unquote, big money. It’s called business. It’s the whole point. This is a business. There are a lot of radio stations. There are a lot of employees at these radio stations. Radio is a business that is highly regulated by the federal government.
I think it’s time for those of us in radio to be told flat-out what the intentions of this administration are. There are a lot of jobs that will hinge on this. There is a lot of revenue that will hinge on this. These radio stations are owned by people, they have employees, they have made investments in any number of things in order to have these radio stations on the air, and I don’t think the radio business is going to sit back and let this happen. But there’s a lot of fear out there. JP Morgan Chase and Citibank announced today they’re going to suspend temporarily all home foreclosures until Obama and Geithner come up with their plan. Now, what that means is that they are scared to death, they are literally scared to death of this administration and what they might do and how much they need more federal money. So they go up and they get grilled on Capitol Hill about having to show more compassion to people, so they have suspended temporarily all home foreclosures in lieu of Obama coming up with a plan. I have to think this is what it was like living in the Soviet Union. Remember in the Soviet Union we heard stories of people in their homes that go to their bathrooms and whisper when they wanted to tell each other what they really thought and warn them of what was coming? They were afraid they would be bugged if they were in public rooms in their house?
Have you noticed as you travel around and congregate with people, have you noticed some people want to whisper more and more to you what they want you to know that they think? They’re afraid of being overheard by somebody, and maybe not it’s an authority that’s going to overhear ’em, they just don’t want maybe their average citizen to overhear them and start browbeating and berating them. I notice this wherever I go, more and more people are whispering or talking very quietly about what they want, and it’s really tough for me because, you know, I have trouble hearing when people are speaking normally. But when they start whispering it just frustrates me because I can’t hear what they’re saying. But I’ve noticed it happening more and more, people are just more and more afraid to say what they really think in a number of places. So we’ve got the bank CEOs scared to death. We’ve got one CEO that’s standing up, Jack Pelton at Cessna.
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RUSH: Okay, Bill Clinton has said we gotta have enforced media accountability. ‘All the big money has gone to support right-wing talk shows.’ Mr. President, if I may, all the big money is not in talk radio. It’s all your Library and Massage Parlor. What I wouldn’t give for the amount of money that’s been donated to Bill Clinton and his Library and Massage Parlor! That’s where the big money is in this country. Now, how unhappy can these Democrats be? They’ve got 60 votes in the Senate. They own the House of Representatives. They occupy the White House. They control the media. Just what do they want? Karl Marx said it. You know what ‘peace’ is in Karl Marx’s definition? The absence of opposition to socialism. That is peace. The absence of opposition to a leftist, to a socialist, and that’s what they’re aiming for this is a major transformation of the United States, as Obama promised. Let’s not forget Clinton in 1994, June. He was flying in to dedicate some train station in St. Louis, and he called the morning show in our blowtorch affiliate there, KMOX.
CLINTON: After I get off the radio today with you, Rush Limbaugh will have three hours to say whatever he wants —
HOST: Would you like to leave a message?
CLINTON: — and I won’t have any opportunity to respond. And there’s no truth detector. You won’t get on afterwards and say what was true and what wasn’t.
RUSH: Isn’t this amazing? That sounds like exactly what I’m saying about the Drive-By Media today. And he had the Drive-By Media totally in his tank, too. That was 1994. They’re writing stories about the power crackling in his tight-fitting jeans as he strolled Catalina Island. We had Nina Burleigh promising a ‘Lewinsky,’ promising a BJ just to thank Clinton for keeping abortion legal. I mean, the press was totally in the tank. It’s not really a new concept for them with Obama. It’s just total now. It’s 100%. Gone is any curiosity. Gone is any attempt to keep people in power, honest. They have aligned themselves with the Democrat Party and the leftist machinery of Obama. Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals number 13: ‘Isolate the target, polarize it, paralyze it.’ Make sure you pick an individual, not a group or a company. It has to be an individual. That’s exactly what they did to Bush. Bush didn’t respond. I do. Nevertheless, this is their attempt going forward.
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RUSH: One more thing. Bill Clinton knows this. ‘All the big money’s in talk radio.’ What big money? Where does this money come from? All the money in talk radio comes… Do you know where the money in talk radio comes from, Snerdley? Where does…? (interruption) Well, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second. Well, you’re getting closer as you keep taking these wild guesses. I asked Snerdley, ‘Where does all this big money in talk radio come from, in any radio?’ He said, ‘From advertisers, from big business, from commerce.’ Yeah. Where does that come from? Where does that money come from? From the audience, exactly right, the people that buy.
Mr. President, the big money in radio or the big money in Super Bowl or the big money in American Idol or wherever you want to go that there’s big money, in the private sector, the big money comes from our audiences. The big money comes from listeners. Without them there wouldn’t be any money. We don’t run around fundraising. We don’t run around asking for donations. Listeners! Loyal, lovable, totally appreciated listeners who purchase products and services advertised on radio. There is no ‘big money.’ There’s no George Soros here as there is in Air America. There’s no party behind talk radio, as with Air America and the Democrat Party. There’s no big money here at all. There’s certainly not any big money like you got, Mr. President, from the ChiComs and your illegal campaign donations. We in talk radio don’t engage in crooked real estate deals.
We didn’t bring in people to our studios for coffee and shake ’em down, promising not to criticize them on the radio if they will just pay us off. We don’t bring in interns here and start using cigars in nefarious ways. We don’t have massage parties here in our broadcast studios. Well, I can’t speak for some of the long-haired, maggot-infested FM types and what they’re doing in their studios. (laughing) But I haven’t had one visit from a ChiCom advertiser. I haven’t had a guy that owns a Chinese restaurant in Little Rock walk in to some office with $200 million in unsigned money orders for me for big money. I haven’t people from Dubai, from the United Arab Emirates, from Saudi Arabia pay me 150 to $400,000 for a speech ripping my own country while I’m in theirs! I don’t do things like this, Mr. President. My money, our money comes (just as government’s does) from the American people — and our money is puny compared to yours. Clinton Global Initiative? We don’t have anything like that. What big money, Mr. President?