RUSH: I just saw, by the way, ladies and gentlemen, Air Force One with Barack Obama. Let me tell you a little bit about that plane. We’re talking aviation today. Let me tell you a little bit about Air Force One and Andrews Air Force Base. If you are landing, if you ever have the right approach at Baltimore Washington International and you’re on the right side of the airplane, look out the window and you will see the tarmac at Andrews Air Force Base, and you will see a bunch of corporate jets that are made available for members of your government using taxpayer dollars. You will see Boeing 757s. You’ll see Boeing 737s. You’ll see Boeing 767s. You will see Gulfstream vs. Gulfstream IVs. You will see a wide variety. You’ll see gazillions of corporate aircraft flown by your government officials, including members of Congress, all on taxpayer dollars.
So Obama takes off in Air Force One today. Whatever airplane he’s on is called Air Force One. Until then, it’s known by its tail number. I think the tail number he’s on is 28,000. It doesn’t matter. Do you know that every trip the president takes, there are two Boeing 747s? They both go. One’s a decoy; one carries the president. Security. Before the president leaves, a cargo plane leaves with his limousine. So the limousine is on the ground when he gets there. The press is riding in the real Air Force One. The other one is a decoy. I don’t care where it goes. If he takes a trip to Russia, both of them are going. You want to talk about expense? You want to talk about taxpayer dollars? ‘But, Rush! But, Rush! It’s the president.’ I know, but that’s the point. It’s okay for him? People flying corporate jets are using their own money, for crying out loud, to fly ’em around.
Obama’s using ours, George Bush used ours, and we don’t complain about that, and just because it’s the government, we don’t complain about it? We’re out of whack. We ought to not be complaining about any of it, is the point. One other thing. All of the related industries associated with private or even general orb private aviation, commercial aviation. Have you ever heard of…? Mr. Snerdley, have you ever heard of landing fees? You have? You’ve heard of landing fees? Well, I don’t know how many of you people have heard of landing fees, but depending on the airport you go to, it can cost you 800 bucks to land, 800 bucks to take off. You know where the money goes? To the governmental authority that operates the airport. In New York, that would be the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
I don’t know if it’s still this way, probably is ’cause they don’t want private aircraft in there, but at LaGuardia, last I looked years ago the landing fees were 800 bucks. Well, they have the gate fees for the commercials, yeah. But yeah, it costs you to park. You have to rent a parking place overnight if you’re there in an FBO. My point is that this business of private aviation supports probably two million people that work in it around the country in all aspects — and that may be a relatively small number. Yet it’s another aspect of American capitalism that is under attack and under assault today by the very people who claim to care about the ‘little guy.’
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RUSH: Back to the phones to Lorain, Ohio. Brian, it’s great to have you on the program, sir. Hello.
CALLER: How you doing, Rush?
RUSH: Just fine.
CALLER: Don’t you think that you’re going just a little bit far when you try to compare the security of the president of the United States and the corporate, um, perks with the, um, corporate jets? Is — is — as far as, uh, Air Force One is concerned?
RUSH: No. I think Air Force One is just as much a perk for the president as a corporate client or a corporation buying, if you want to call it ‘perks.’ I don’t look at them either as perks. Both are necessary. What I reject is the notion that the president of the United States, his necessity is acknowledged but the necessity of others — as determined by their own business demands and desires — is now being destroyed. It’s none of Obama’s business or yours or anybody else’s, if a corporation wants to buy a private jet for whatever reason to fly it around. It’s none of your business. I did not say Obama should have to get rid of his airplane. I didn’t complain about Obama flying two Air Force Ones precisely because of security. What I said was neither case is any of our business.
CALLER: It’s absolutely our business. When these corporations are losing billions of dollars left and right, and these — the CEOs, who really don’t deserve to fly around on a corporate jet. They — they’re bleeding money hand and foot, but yet they can — they have the comfort of walking onto a corporate jet and being whisked off to wherever they want to go.
RUSH: Thank you. You, sir, are a great example. I cannot thank you enough for calling. I mean that from the bottom of my heart. I wanted America to hear the petty, small-minded, ignorant class envy that you have been made to believe by devotion to the Democrat Party for however many years you’ve been alive, ’cause what you just said is the most scary, nonsensical, ignorant thing that has been said on this radio program in a month.
CALLER: It has nothing to do with class envy. It has everything to do with common sense.
RUSH: Everything you said —
CALLER: Absolutely.
RUSH: It’s none of your business if they’re losing money.
CALLER: If it’s publicly traded corporation it is.
RUSH: It’s none of your business. Unless you work there, it’s none of your business they’re losing money and how they fly are none of your business at all, Brian. And the fact that you think it is your business, that you think you can elect a bunch of totalitarian Stalinists to impose penalties on businesses? You probably think tax cuts for the rich are bad, too.
CALLER: Taking away their aircraft is a penalty? Taking away something as (garbled) as that is a penalty?
RUSH: Let me ask you a quick question, sir.
CALLER: Sure.
RUSH: I have one minute. Every CEO of every major corporation in America losing money is forced to get rid of his jet. I put that out there. Let’s just say that happens.
CALLER: Okay.
RUSH: Tell me how your life has changed.
CALLER: My life will not change at all, but my perception of their greed and their feelings of their entitlements will change. We’re all in this mess together, Rush.
RUSH: No, we’re not.
CALLER: You leave… You lead from the front.
RUSH: No, we’re not.
CALLER: You also set the example.
RUSH: Brian?
CALLER: You understand me?
RUSH: No, I don’t understand you. If I understood you, I would check myself into a mental asylum.
CALLER: How can you ask…? How can we ask your employees to take a pay cut when you’re playing around on a corporate jet?
RUSH: We are not ‘all in this together.’ Most of us are in this because of blind obedience to a failed belief system of people like you. You are causing more harm to the advancement of this country by the idiots you’re voting for and by the people that you support and elect, than any corporate CEO in this country could ever hope to damage this country. We’re not all in it together. I am not participating in the recession. I’m not allowing the ignorance of people like you to make me miserable or unhappy.
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RUSH: I actually feel sorry for people like Brian. I really do. I mean, for a guy like Brian, it’s obviously easier to tear down people above him — people he doesn’t even know, people he has no clue about their lives, how they got where they are. It’s easier to tear them down than to try to lift himself up, which was the point of my question: ‘Okay, take away these guys’ jets. How is your life any better?’ Well, he told us it isn’t any better, but he actually admitted he actually feels better because he’s gotten even with them. Now, the argument seems to be — Brian, I hope you’re still out there. The argument seems to be that if you receive gov’ment money then you can be told how to live, and you can be told what to do with it. So, I would like to talk to all of you who have received student loans.
You see, if we ever get to claim government back, those of you who get student loans, you’re going to find out what it’s been like. We’re going to tell you. We’re going to tell you how you have to spend that money and we’re going to tell you when you have to pay it back and we’re going to tell you where you have to live and we’re going to tell you what you can and can’t spend that money on. We’re going to tell you. In fact, we’re not even going to loan you the money. The loan’s going to go to whatever college you want to go to. You’re never going to see the money and the rest of you out there who are accepting federal money — Social Security? Fine.
You think it’s your money, but it’s not anymore. It’s the taxpayers that I don’t know who are paying your Social Security now. Something else. Any of you getting any kind of government money. Welfare? We’re gonna tell you how to live and what you have to do to get it, and what you can’t spend it on — and if we catch you in the grocery store buying People magazine with it, you lose it. How about that? If we catch you in the grocery store buying a bunch of M&Ms and Budweiser and whatever else with the welfare payments that you’re getting from the American taxpayer, guess what? You go cold turkey. If you take any kind of federal money, any kind whatsoever, we’re going to tell you how to live, if that’s the rule now. I’m going to tell you. I’m infuriated at anybody who takes federal money.
I’m infuriated these guys on Wall Street are doing this because this is exactly what they knew had to be heading down the pike. It’s why I’ve always said the more you can go through life without taking anything from anybody the freer you’re going to be, because the less obligations you’re going to have. People always say, ‘Rush, why don’t you run for office?’ Because that’s the epitome of the problem. Running for office, all it is is putting your hand out, both hands out, as many hours as you can stay awake a day, and you’re asking people to put money in your hands. And if you think they’re giving you that money — if you think all of them are giving you that money — just because they like your ideas, you’ve got another think coming. They want a return. So you spend your elective career paying off and paying back, and you have no freedom.
Screw it! I don’t want any part of it. The last time I was in debt, the last time I was broke, I vowed, ‘I am not going to owe anybody anything ever again.’ That became my life’s objective, ’cause I hated the prison that it put me in. I’ve been fortunate. I’ve been able to for the most part accomplish that — and I know that a lot of people never will, but there are still things about this whole notion of being beholden to people. Look at the poison that this is causing and roiling our society now, all of this bailout money. Look at how… I thought the election of Obama was going to unify people! I thought it was going to make us all love one another and a new ‘era of responsibility.’ Hell, this country is more at odds with itself than it was during the Bush administration. The left is just as mad today as they were then.
There’s nothing you can do to make ’em happy. No matter what you give them that they demand or ask for, it is never enough.