RUSH: Let’s go to the top of the day. This is Dianne Feinstein introducing the Chief Justice.
FEINSTEIN: It is my distinct honor to present the Chief Justice of the United States, the honorable John G. Roberts, Jr., who will administer the presidential oaf (sic) of office. Everyone, please stand.
RUSH: Yes, my friends, she said ‘oaf,’ with an F, ‘of office.’ Now, the actual ‘oaf’ of office was botched out there. I don’t know who botched it. I don’t know if John Roberts got it wrong or if Obama got it wrong, but they shoulda put it on the teleprompter.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: I, Barack —
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: — solemnly swear.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: I Barack (Bleep) Obama do solemnly swear.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: That I will execute the office of president to the United States faithfully.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: That I will execute…
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Faithfully the office of president of the United States.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: The office of president of the United States faithfully.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: And will to the best of my ability.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: And will to the best of my ability.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: Reserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: So help you God?
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: So help me God.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Congratulations, Mr. President.
RUSH: Yay! Amen. So there you have it: the oath of office. We bleeped out the middle name of Barack Obama in deference to Senator McCain, who saw to it that members of his staff were rebuked and let go. Entire state parties were criticized for the use of Obama’s middle name so we bleeped it out in deference to Senator McCain. (interruption) Yes, Mr. Snerdley? Well, yeah. Snerdley, ‘Did you hear Roberts ask him, ‘So help you God?” Yeah, it’s in the oath. Yes. Roberts had to prompt Obama to say it. Yeah, let’s listen to it again. If you want to nitpick this thing, because we’ll just… It was a botched oath in a whole lot of ways. Remember, you’re going to hear bleeps of Obama’s middle name in deference to Senator McCain here.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: I, Barack (Bleep) Obama, do —
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: I, Barack —
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: — solemnly swear.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: I, Barack (Bleep) Obama, do solemnly swear.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: That I will execute the office of president to the United States faithfully.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: That I will execute…
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Faithfully the office of president of the United States.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: The office of president of the United States faithfully.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: And will to the best of my ability.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: And will to the best of my ability.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: Reserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: So help you God?
PRESIDENT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: So help me God.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Congratulations, Mr. President.
By the way, here’s what happened. ‘The crowd packed on the west side of the Capitol grounds serenaded President Bush [with] ‘Nah nah nah nah, hey hey, good-bye,” the old song by Steam from the Sixties. ”Nah nah nah nah. Nah nah nah nah! Hey, hey, hey! Good-bye.’ That’s what they were singing when President Bush was introduced. It was extremely disrespectful. ‘The crowd packed immediately below the podium received Bush in stony silence when he took his seat on the stage surrounding the podium where Barack Obama was scheduled to take the oath of office to become the 44th president of the United States. The jeers…’ This is, by the way, from The Hill newspaper. ‘The jeers are among the final public feedback Bush will receive as president.’ No condemnation, no… (laughing) I’m telling you, folks, one thing hasn’t changed in the course of human history and human nature: All of this is going to come back to bite these people. This disrespect is going to come back and bite these people big time on… You know, in nature’s terms, not on ours, but it’s going to come back and bite ’em.
We have an excerpt here from President Obama’s inaugural address. Remember, yesterday, CNN had a lead story in which they suggested that the words in the inaugural address would be ‘chiseled into marble.’ So, as I say, it’s a very disjointed speech. It’s impossible to honestly analyze this. It was a clunker. It tried to be all things to all people, tried to have memorable line after memorable line. As such there were no memorable lines. The audience was down and depressed. There was no buzz here. So the best we can do if you didn’t hear it was let you hear some of the sound bites.
OBAMA: Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. (chiseling stone sound effect) Words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace.
RUSH: Yes.
OBAMA: (chiseling stone sound effect) Yet, every so often, the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms.
RUSH: A clear day in Washington today.
OBAMA: — America has carried on not simply because of the skill (chiseling stone sound effect) or vision of those in high office, but because we, the people, have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbears and true to our founding documents. So it has been, so it must be with this generation of Americans. (chiseling stone sound effect) That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. (chiseling stone sound effect) Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. (chiseling stone sound effect)
RUSH: Okay. (chiseling stone sound effect) That’s the beginning of… (chiseling stone sound effect) Okay, okay! We’re not chiseling my words, we’re chiseling his! The beginning of Obama’s inaugural address today in Washington, complete with the words, already in the process of being chiseled into marble.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Here’s another sound bite from President Obama in his inaugural address telling his supporters that they’re going to have to work, which of course was not the deal they thought they had made.
OBAMA: We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions, that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.
RUSH: That work goes on every day outside of Washington, DC, by the way. People that make this country work are doing what they do each and every day, but we were chiseling the words into marble there, since CNN predicted yesterday that the words would be eventually chiseled into marble, so we’re just getting a head start.
Back to the phones, Tina in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Great to have you here.
RUSH: Thank you. Thanks very much. I appreciate that.
CALLER: Okay. Well, I just thought the speech was clipped, it was jittery, and it was really hard to understand. There was no real comprehensive — I don’t know. I didn’t like it.
RUSH: Well, yeah, it was disjointed, it didn’t have a theme, it was not very memorable, there was no flow.
CALLER: No.
RUSH: Wishful thinking and platitudes. But there wasn’t anything new in it.
CALLER: No. There wasn’t. And I think he and Elizabeth Alexander both need speechwriters.
RUSH: (laughing)
CALLER: (laughing)
RUSH: Elizabeth Alexander. I loved Elizabeth Alexander. Everybody’s missing the point about Elizabeth Alexander.
CALLER: The GPS, I get the GPS sound.
RUSH: Well, she was a brilliant pick, she was a brilliant pick. I mean, I don’t think anybody who picked her intended her to epitomize the whole day as she did with that poem, but she saved the day. She got people to focus on her poem rather than what they had just heard Obama not say.
CALLER: Well, that’s true.
RUSH: Absolutely. You know, she and Lowery both hit grand slams. The bases were loaded.
CALLER: Oh, yeah.
RUSH: Tina, thanks for the call. Appreciate it.
CALLER: Okay, bye.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: It’s gag time. Here’s Bob Shrum on MSNBC just moments ago.
SHRUM: The most prominent flavor of this waaaas its evocation, its deeply moving evocation, both of the moment and of the enduring America. There were lines in this speech that I think will get chiseled on granite. And it had to be a little discomforting because it signaled generational change not only in terms of age but in terms of a sharp break with policies. (chiseling sound effect)
RUSH: Just this whole day is surreal, filled with omens. (chiseling sound effect) I’ll tell you about them tomorrow.