RUSH: I want to share two quotes with you. Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) in the Tulsa World newspaper today: ”Every time I have run into hysteria, world coming to an end, I’ve been on the opposite side and it’s turned out to be right.’ He recalled the bomb shelters built in the 1950s, warnings in 1970s of another Ice Age and the Y2K concerns. And, now it is almost the same way.” Michael Crichton, in a speech on complexity: ”[T]here is nothing more sobering than a 30-year-old newspaper. You can’t figure out what the headlines mean. You don’t know who the people are. Theodore Green, John Sparkman, George Reedy, Jack Watson, Kenneth Duberstein. ‘You thumb through page after page of vanished concerns — issues that apparently were vitally important at the time, and now don’t matter at all. It’s amazing how many pressing concerns are literally of the moment. They won’t matter in six months, and certainly not in six years. And if they won’t matter then, are they really worth our attention now?
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RUSH: Here’s Walt in northern Michigan. Welcome to the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: Good afternoon, Rush.
RUSH: Hi.
CALLER: After hearing your assessment on the reasons for this big credit crunch, I have to say you’re correct, because this morning, I took the time to call five different banks in my area. There was no problem getting a loan. As long as you qualified, they had the money to grant that loan to you. If you had your 20% down, you could get your home mortgage, and if you had the necessary down that the bank requires, ’cause they require different amounts of money down at the various banks on a vehicle, you’d get your vehicle loan. So your assessment has got to be right.
RUSH: This is even more powerful because you were calling banks in Michigan, where there’s a recession going on.
CALLER: That is correct.
RUSH: A liberal Democrat recession taking place in Michigan, you called five banks, and you could get a mortgage?
CALLER: I can get a mortgage — yes, if I wanted to get a mortgage, and I qualified, I had the 20% down, I would —
RUSH: I want to know how you asked them. You didn’t go see them personally, right? You just called them on the phone?
CALLER: I just called them up on the phone, and I asked to speak with the bank manager, and when I got that person on the line, my questions were very simple and direct: Are you having any difficulty getting money to loan? And the answer, in all cases, was no. As long as you had the qualifications and you met the criteria for the loan, you would get it.
RUSH: Well, it sounds just like the old days.
CALLER: It is, exactly.
RUSH: If you had your 20% down — now, did you tell them that you work with ACORN or that you’re a minority and if you could get a subprime loan, did you ask that?
CALLER: No, I did not.
RUSH: You ought to try that just for the fun of it. You ought to call another bank just to see what they would tell you.
CALLER: It just goes to show that this claim about credit not being available to banks and banks not lending to other banks has got to be a lie to get this money from the taxpayers into their system to rob it.
RUSH: There’s something even more simple and fundamental to examine. Let me ask you a question. How many of you people, when you are shopping today, last week, yesterday, last night, how many of you have been refused to use your credit card? ‘Sorry, we’re not taking credit cards, the credit crunch, we can’t take credit cards, you gotta pay in cash.’ Is that happening to anybody? And then after you use your credit card to charge whatever it is you’re buying, does your credit card company call and say, ‘You gotta pay the balance in full. We’re not carrying this over’? Is that happening to anybody? We’re told the credit markets aren’t lending. Well, it’s the fed that lends to banks, so that’s still going on. I don’t know. We have to understand here, folks, we are laypeople when it comes to this, and our life experiences may not be reality as is being preached to us from Washington. I have an ongoing line of credit that I do not use, but I have it at my bank and it’s up for renewal, and I got a note from the banker, ‘Hey, do you want us to get in touch with the accountant, get your latest tax return and renew this?’ I said, ‘Sure, go ahead.’ It’s automatic. They didn’t call me up and say, ‘Hey, by the way, gotta cancel the line of credit.’ (interruption) Why are you frowning at me on this line-of-credit business? You’re frowning at me about this. He thinks something stinks about it. At any rate, it’s interesting to have people go out on their own and see if they can get money, especially to buy a house. Guy said five banks would lend him the money if he had the proper down payment.
Gainesville, Florida. Jeff, welcome to the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: Good afternoon, Rush. I hope this call finds you well.
RUSH: Thank you, sir, very well.
CALLER: Listen, this is an aside to why I called, but I just wanted you to know that I got an $8,000 loan yesterday to replace the air-conditioning in my home.
RUSH: How much of a down payment did it require?
CALLER: Zero down payment, 6.9% interest.
RUSH: How many years?
CALLER: It will be about four years.
RUSH: Four years to pay for your new air conditioner?
CALLER: Yes, sir.
RUSH: Zero down payment. Are you a minority?
CALLER: Not yet.
RUSH: (laughing)
CALLER: But, Rush, the reason I called…
RUSH: (laughing) Tell me.
CALLER: I wanted to seek your counsel. Something that occurs to me that is happening with Governor Palin is the fact that everybody seems to be very concerned with the fact that she is only a heartbeat away from the presidency, and yet no one in the media seems to be concerned with the fact that Nancy Pelosi is only two heartbeats away from the presidency. Can you explain that to me?
RUSH: Yeah, I’ll try. It’s nice that you bring that up, though, because I didn’t get to the stories in the stack yesterday, but there were two — I think one in the Washington Post, one in the Los Angeles Times really ripping Pelosi to shreds over the way she handled the vote on the floor of the House on Monday night. Even though she got exactly what she wanted, I think, she wanted the bill to fail, but she coulda done that without doing what she did, making the partisan speech and all that. She’s dense. She’s a San Francisco liberal. The reason the media, though, is not going to express concerns about Nancy Pelosi being two heartbeats away is because they would love to see her in the White House. They would love to see some extremist, ignoramus leftist radical like Nancy Pelosi in the White House.
Folks, you have to understand something, and this is a psychological trick, but to liberals, liberalism is not partisan. This is why Drive-By Media people consider themselves to be objective. They are not partisans. Liberalism is not a partisan ideology. Liberalism is natural. Liberalism is what it is. Liberalism just is everything. It’s not a choice, it’s intelligence, it’s enlightenment, it’s common sense to them. What is partisan is conservative and conservatism. That’s what’s partisan. I saw a defense, what brought this home to me, I saw some erstwhile media critic — somebody who, I can’t remember the name, he’s been for the most part pretty good over the years — analyzing what all this hubbub of the extreme leftism at MSNBC and Brokaw went in there and got Olberdorkk and Matthews pulled off of anchor duties during debates and election coverage. This media critic said, ‘You have to look at these people — they’re not partisan. The leftists at MSNBC are not partisan. They are objective in defending their worldview. Conservatism is what’s partisan to them.’ Now, I, on the other hand, consider myself a partisan because I know that conservatism is an applied intellectual pursuit. Liberalism is the most gutless choice you can make, as I say frequently.
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RUSH: Here is Joe in Pulaski, Virginia. Hi, Joe. Great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: Super mega dittos from the heart of the impoverished Appalachian mountains, Rush. It’s an honor.
RUSH: Glad to have you here. I’m glad you can still afford to make a phone call.
CALLER: (laughing) Yes, gets rough sometimes out here in the working world. But I wanted to call and let you know that I just deposited a check this past Tuesday for $30,000 unsecured loan. So where’s the credit crunch?
RUSH: Wait, wait, wait. You got a $30,000 loan?
CALLER: Yes. Unsecured.
RUSH: No collateral?
CALLER: No collateral.
RUSH: Does the bank know you well?
CALLER: No. Well, I guess so, obviously. (laughs)
RUSH: Have you had loans from this bank before?
CALLER: Yes. Uh-huh.
RUSH: Okay. And you’ve paid them all back?
CALLER: Yes, uh-huh.
RUSH: You have a good credit rating and history with this bank.
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: Okay, so you walked in the bank and you told them, ‘I need 30 grand’?
CALLER: Yep.
RUSH: Did they ask you why, what for?
CALLER: Mmmm, yep.
RUSH: You told them and they were satisfied. No collateral, no nothing? They didn’t ask you to put your house up or anything?
CALLER: Nope. Sure didn’t.
RUSH: So they gave you a check for 30 grand and you deposited it and now you’re going to go out and use it?
CALLER: (laughs) Yes, sir. So where’s the credit crunch? I feel used and abused.
RUSH: I am starting to have some questions here. This now makes the fourth person today who has called here and said they have been able to get a loan — or they would be able to buy a house if they had 20% down based on what the price of the house was, and what the mortgage was going to be and so forth. I haven’t had anybody call me and say that their credit card’s not been accepted. I haven’t had anybody tell me that they have to pay their credit card balance in full, that credit won’t be accepted. So it seems to me — and admittedly this is anecdotal — we’ve heard from people all over the country today. This is Virginia. We’ve heard from Michigan today, and Michigan the state’s in a recession. Apparently consumer credit is still available, readily so. Apparently.
So what kind of lending are we talking about here that’s not happening? Well, there’s gotta be some lending not happening. They’re telling us a liquidity crisis, and banks are not lending to each other, apparently. See, I hate to be suspicious of my government. I really do here. Yeah, I know we’re still getting… Well, I don’t get them, but a lot of people still receiving applications for new credit cards.
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RUSH: Bradenton, Florida. Mike, you’re next on the EIB Network, sir. Hello.
CALLER: Yes, sir. I appreciate being on your show. And when I was on hold I took advantage of getting a hold of my mortgage person — she’s on the line with us — Deborah. And she was telling me that, you want a loan, come to the bank, they got all kinds of money to loan.
RUSH: Really?
CALLER: Deborah?
DEBORAH: Yes, sir? We’re trying to get people in to do mortgages and the phones are just dead.
CALLER: She has a goal of $1 million a month she needs to meet to loan money, and she wants to put out there, and —
RUSH: Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. Deborah is at the bank?
CALLER: Correct, she’s been doing it for 31 years in the mortgage business.
RUSH: Okay, so she’s the lender, the loan officer?
CALLER: Correct.
RUSH: And you just put her on the phone saying we’re desperately trying to find people to borrow money to buy houses?
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: ‘Cause she needs to lend a million dollars a month to meet her targets?
DEBORAH: Yes.
RUSH: And nobody is calling her because they think there’s no credit?
DEBORAH: People are scared to death. I sat next to a lady that hoped she could sell her house and she’s afraid she couldn’t because nobody would be able to pay cash for it because there was no money on the street, so I handed her my card.
RUSH: Let me ask you this, Deborah. With all that’s gone on in the housing market, I would assume — I know Florida may be a little bit different in certain parts of the state — but I would have to assume that houses have become a little bit more affordable?
DEBORAH: Very much so.
RUSH: Very much so. So it’s easier to buy a house, especially first-time people getting in, and you’re willing to lend them the money and the mortgage and so forth. Now, how many of your mortgages, even now, do you have to write in such a way that they will be purchased by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac?
DEBORAH: Almost all of them, either FHA or Fannie/Freddie.
RUSH: Folks, this is key to understand. She just said that she has to write these, that means a certain amount of money down, certain requirements, whatever they are, because in order for Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae to buy them, they have to loan money at all these banks in certain ways. And why do you want to sell the mortgage to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac? Got 30 seconds.
DEBORAH: We only service our loans, we don’t fund them.
RUSH: Ohhhh. So you’re not actually the one loaning the million dollars a month?
DEBORAH: Right.
RUSH: A-ha! Thank you, Deborah, and thank you, Mike. This is how Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, government-sponsored enterprises, end up owning your house. And they now own 70% of the mortgages in this country.
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RUSH: The more people that call here and start talking about how easy it is to borrow money, I’m beginning to think we’re getting scammed on this. We got 300 million people in this country, and the best two we can come up with to run for president’s McCain and Obama? Talk about Sophie’s Choice.