RUSH: You know, there’s been a lot of talk about plagiarism in this campaign. The charges have been going back and forth from Mrs. Clinton to Obama, Deval Patrick, and they continue. Mrs. Clinton had a couple things to say last night that also boggle the mind. By the way, welcome back to Open Line Friday, I am El Rushbo, he of the dulcet tones and the vocal vibrations, the rhetoric and resonance reflected coast to coast here via the Golden EIB Microphone. By the way, Hillary is plagiarizing her husband, they’re both plagiarizing John Edwards. The point is none of this is new. It’s not plagiarism, folks, that matters here. It is two things. There is nothing new in liberalism. It’s all old. It’s just repackaged and recycled with different people on the box, but it’s the same old has-been stuff. The second thing is authenticity. We’re being told that Obama is this revolutionary new kind of political figure, that there’s never been a figure in politics like him. I mean all these Democrats out there say these political rallies, why, this is changing the world kind of stuff, Elijah Cummings is saying. This is all old hat, none of it’s authentic. It’s not authentic to Mrs. Clinton; it’s not authentic to Barack Obama, not even authentic to the Breck Girl, John Edwards. Let’s listen to two sound bites here as Mrs. Clinton finds her voice again. Campbell Brown, the moderator at the debate last night says, ‘Senator Clinton, describe what was the moment that tested you the most, that moment of crisis.’
HILLARY: Everybody here knows I’ve lived through some crises and some challenging moments in my life, and I am grateful for the support and the prayers of countless Americans. But people often ask me, how do you do it, you know, how do you keep going? And I just have to shake my head in wonderment, because, with all of the challenges that I’ve had, they are nothing compared to what I see happening in the lives of Americans every single day. You know, the hits I’ve taken in life are nothing compared to what goes on every single day in the lives of people across our country.
RUSH: Okay. How many of your hearts melted, those of you watching this last night? Oh, what a brave woman, why, what a courageous babe, sitting there and understanding all these hits that she’s taking are nothing compared to life in this country, this foul, besmirched, recession-driven country, that people in this country are really taking the hits because they’re poor, and they have no future and we’re destroying the planet with global warming, all of these things? Well, no less than the New Republic has a little blog entry today, ”Clinton’s Best Moments Not Really Hers?’ — The Obama campaign wasted no time in sending out an email that claims Clinton’s best moment of the night was plagiarized from John Edwards.’ In fact, we gotta play the second sound bite to wrap all this up together. Keep this in mind. Her point here in the first bite was, all these hits I’m taking, they’re nothing, Campbell, they’re nothing compared to what goes on every single day in the lives of people across our country. Here’s bite two.
RUSH: What is it, throwing in the towel? Does it sound like she’s throwing in the towel there and giving up? But not just that, ‘We’ll be fine, whatever happens, don’t worry about me. Don’t cry for me, America. I am Evita Clinton. Don’t cry for me. I’ll be fine. I’m rich. My husband’s rich. And he can start dating again. It will be fine. We’ll be fine. Obama will be fine. You will continue to get the excrement sandwich. But we will be fine. We need to make sure the American people have something to eat besides the excrement sandwich, but we will be fine.’ Okay. So Clinton’s hits, nothing compared to what the American people take and don’t worry about us, we’ll be fine. Hillary Clinton, you just heard say, you know, whatever happens, you’re going to be fine, you know we have strong support from our families and our friends. I just hope we’ll be able to say the same for the American people, blah, blah.
John Edwards: ‘What’s not at stake are any of us. All of us are going to be just fine no matter what happens in this election. But what’s at stake is whether America is going to be fine.’ And, ‘I want to say this to everyone: with Elizabeth, with my family, with my friends, with all of you and all of your support, this son of a millworker’s gonna be just fine. Our job now is to make certain that America will be fine.’ That was the Breck Girl earlier this year in a debate. Mrs. Clinton stealing from the Breck Girl. No authenticity whatsoever. Then Josh Marshall, who is a liberal blogger, writes this. ‘I mentioned at the end of my debate blog that the pivot of Hillary’s powerful concluding remarks came from Clinton’s ’92 campaign. Clinton had various permutations of it back then. ‘Clinton in ’92, the hits that I took in this election are nothing compared to the hits the people of this state and this country have been taking for a long time.’ Hillary Clinton last night: ‘You know, the hits I’ve taken in life are nothing compared to what goes on every single day in the lives of people across this country.” Now, Josh Marshall says, ‘Well, let’s be a hundred percent clear, nothing in the least wrong with this, it’s a great line, but I think it shows the silliness of the plagiarism charges based on a few borrowed lines.’ Yeah, it does, Josh, it shows the total stupidity of the charge of plagiarism. What it illustrates here is that there are no new or fresh ideas anywhere, including with Obama.
SNERDLEY: Mr. Obama, you need to prove to us that you have fresh ideas. I demand that you have fresh ideas. We want to hope in your fresh ideas, and so far, you’ve demonstrated none.
RUSH: Thank you. The Official Obama Criticizer, Bo Snerdley. The stuff coming out of all these candidates’ mouths is the same old same old; it’s the same old recycled stuff. There’s nothing new, and there’s nothing authentic. The lines may be good, but there’s nothing authentic. And, of course, one of these candidates, this new rock star type figure, at least with conservatism, there are new approaches as compared to all we have, medical savings plans, changes in Social Security, new ways to deal with the illegals, how to handle the economy. Conservatism is the ideology of change. Conservatism is the agent of change, not those other guys.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: A couple more thoughts on this. You know, PMSNBC on their website has this thing called the First Read. I guess everybody is trying to do their version of ABC’s The Note, a website that was basically a day planner for what was going on in politics and what was in the newspapers and so forth, these wonks get up at three o’clock in the morning, four o’clock, start writing this stuff up. Now MSNBC has one of their own, The Politico has one, Mike Allen does. I don’t know who the author of this little segment is on this one because I just had this one little part of it. ‘Hillary’s Closing Line,’ it is called, and remember now, you just heard the closing line. In fact, let’s go back. You may just be joining us. Play number 14 again, Mike.
HILLARY: No matter what happens in this contest, and I am honored, I am honored to be here with Barack Obama. I am absolutely honored. (applause) Whatever happens, we’re going to be fine. You know, we have strong support from our families and our friends. I just hope that we’ll be able to say the same thing about the American people. And that’s what this election should be about.
RUSH: Right, right, right, right, right. Okay. So there it is. That’s what we’re talking about here. This is from MSNBC, whatever their early morning mishmash. ‘Clinton ended the debate on a VERY conciliatory note and for the first time sounded like a candidate who realized she might not win. It must be an odd position for her, but the confidence she exuded for just about the entire debate disappeared there at the end. Was she showing some vulnerability — a la New Hampshire — that might actually help her with some undecided voters? The Clinton campaign loved her closing remarks and sent a YouTube of it. But combine this last statement with her lack of negative attacks on Obama throughout the debate. As The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder notes.’ Now listen to this, if you want to talk about somebody that did not understand and doesn’t get what’s happening, Marc Ambinder at the Atlantic Blog, ‘This was the night where we all learned that Hillary Clinton understands the moment in history we are in, and that she is smart enough and gracious enough to realize that her party is more important than personal vanity, that there are things she just cannot say about Obama because it would hurt him in the fall, and that more likely than not, she will not win the nomination.’
Mr. Ambinder, I respect all of you Drive-Bys, but I have to tell you, your narrowness of focus continues to boggle my mind. There was nothing original in this. This is a sympathy play. She might have been throwing in the towel. When you see her say this in addition to hear it, I have been pointing out for weeks, this woman, Hillary Clinton, has been driven by one thing for 35 years: the presidency. It is the thing that has animated her. It is her family, it is her daughter, it is her life, it is her career, it is her vacation time, it’s her car, all these things that you consider important in your life, your family, all of those things are this run for the White House. To sit here and think that she’s going to be okay if she gets her backside handed to her by an inexperienced rookie? Black guy to boot? This is hilarious. To think that she’s discovered she cares more about the party — Mr. Ambinder, they haven’t given up anything yet. She’s still ahead in Ohio, tied in Texas, and don’t forget, they could still blow up this convention. It depends. If this is the conciliatory, the other day I asked, they could be bought.
Give them something big, like build ’em a toll bridge across the Potomac with the revenue going to Clinton’s Library and Massage Parlor, or, how about this, I mean just speculating, but if we’re going to say that she’s conciliatory, getting out of this, she knows that it’s up, and it’s over, given there’s going to be a Democrat-controlled Senate, given there’s probably going to be a Democrat-controlled House, given there’s probably going to be a Democrat in the White House, would a Supreme Court nomination not sail rightly through like a hot knife through butter? What better place — if you can’t get the presidency, how about a lifetime appointment to the US Supreme Court? You can mess America up from there almost as easily as you can from the White House. In some cases, a little easier, because at the Supreme Court you can write your own law if you can find four other idiot judges to go along with you, and she’ll have them. If you have to go to Mozambique to find your precedent, go there. Look, I’m just speculating. Because everybody is on this bandwagon now that she’s conciliatory and she might have realized that her time is up.
She cares more about her party than herself, that’s the thing, but none of this, the bottom line, folks, none of this is authentic, none of it’s new, none of it’s revolutionary. It’s all been said before by Clinton, by the Breck Girl, and others. It’s been written for these people to say by the powers that be behind the scenes. Conservatism is the new ideology of change. Conservatism looks at problems and tries to solve them: Social Security reform, entitlement reform. People want real change, it is our side that discusses it and would bring it. These people are just a bunch of hacks. They’re regurgitating things from the Democrat Party playbook for 30, 40 years ago, just with a different speaker.
All right. To the phones. Open Line Friday, Jim in Granger, Indiana, you’re up first today. Nice to have you, sir.
CALLER: Mega dittos, Rush. I’ve been listening to you since Bush 41.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: And my comment is, I think Barack is just Bill Clinton-lite. I was listening to his speech the other day, thinking, ‘Where have I heard this rhetoric with saying absolutely nothing before,’ and it was Bill Clinton first time he ran.
RUSH: Yeah. Exactly right. I’m sorry you had to call and basically say what I’ve been saying for the first 40 minutes. But, if you picked that up on your own and didn’t need me, then my feelings are hurt, but I’ll get over it — (laughing) — just kidding. I’m just throwing that out there for the Drive-Bys.
CALLER: Yes, I’m part of the mind-numbed robots.
RUSH: That’s exactly right, waiting for your marching orders.
CALLER: Yeah, there you go, there you go.
RUSH: But, look, keep in mind as you realize this, what is the great thing that we’re hearing that Obama brings to this? That is his authenticity, and it’s something we’ve never foreseen in politics. Just the exact opposite. There’s nothing authentic about this. It’s just rehashed drivel, bilge, from previous campaigns, uttered by equally phony people. Mr. Snerdley, I need you back here as the Official Obama Criticizer.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Now for another criticism of Senator Barack Obama, we turn to the Official EIB Obama Criticizer, Bo Snerdley.
RUSH: Thank you, Mr. Snerdley, the Official Criticizer of Barack Obama here at the EIB Network. But I must respectfully disagree with our Obama criticizer on one point. I think that there is a new idea. I’ve actually thought about this. It doesn’t take away from Mr. Snerdley’s criticism of Obama as a phony or inauthentic, but there is a new idea, and it’s been running around, it’s actually not new, but it’s become almost an official stamp of the Democrat Party and the American left. And that is the concept that America is bad and failed, that Americans just can’t cut it, that we need help from government, and we need help from illegal immigrants. Look at the Obamas. They are hugely successful. They are black. They are spreading the idea, though, that black people can’t make it in America. Not only that, they’re spreading the idea that nobody can make it in America, and that is the new idea. If you Democrats want to claim that you have a new idea, then you can steal this from me because it’s yours already. The new idea is that no one can make it in America.
Now, this has always been one of their underpinnings, one of the foundational building blocks of their ideology but now they’re out in the open with it, now they’re saying it out loud, now their presidential candidate, a black man and his wife who have made it and are hugely successful, are telling everybody else they can’t. Where did they learn this attitude? They learned this attitude at their Ivy League skrools, they learned it in their hate-America church. They think — and they might be right — that they are the first generation with this attitude. Do you think Mr. and Mrs. Obama want a better life for their kids than they had for themselves? They’re like all normal parents, wouldn’t you think? But do you think they’re telling their own kids, you can’t make it in this country? ‘What do you mean, Daddy, we see you running for president, what do you mean?’ ‘No, son, you can’t make it, you can’t make it. Tell ’em, Michelle, they can’t make it, can’t make it. That’s right, boys, you can’t make it, not in America. Girls, girls, you can’t, especially you girls and you’re black, especially you can’t make it in America.’ ‘But Mommy, but Mommy –‘ ‘No, listen to me! This country is failed, it’s over, you can’t make it unless, of course, Daddy gets to be president.’
Last night, Barack Obama, as his silver-tongued beliefs were flowing out of his magical mouth, saying he believed in hard work and American values. You know, the old-fashioned ones. But when you really listen, you can see that his projected policies prove that he’s lying, as he did not believe that. He believes in massive protective government in all aspects of our lives like every other liberal does because you’re incompetent, you can’t overcome the obstacles in life, you can’t get past those people at Wal-Mart that are going to cheat you. You certainly can’t get past those people at Exxon that are going to cheat you. You cannot get past all of those people at the five and dime and at the Kwik Shop, they’re going to cheat you. And of course, you can’t get past those rich people. The only people that are going to treat you right, the only people gonna care about you will be people in government, massive protective government in all aspects of our lives, because Barack Obama does not believe in us or this country or American exceptionalism, and that, ladies and gentlemen, is the new idea that Barack Obama and the whole Democrat Party are peddling.