RUSH: To the audio sound bites. I want to take you back to last Wednesday, May 26th, on this program I said this.
RUSH ARCHIVE: [L]ook at the people now lining up with me, maybe not by name, but more and more people are using the word ‘failure,’ ‘incompetence,’ ‘inexperience.’ Where’s Colin Powell? I’d like to ask: Where is General Powell? Why isn’t General Powell being interviewed? Obama was The Man. He was ‘what is needed.’ Powell we were told, was the quintessentially perfect Republican candidate. Where is the great, brilliant, brave, moderate Republican Colin Powell weighing in on this? The man who said Americans wanted more government. The man who was so impressed with Obama, he threw the entire Republican Party and the country under the bus. Colin Powell, who walked away from fellow moderate John McCain. You know, I was attacked for questioning Powell’s motives and loyalties back then and predicting Obama’s failure was spun as somehow unpatriotic. As if it’s unpatriotic to share wisdom regarding failed political philosophies, especially when combined with zero executive experience. That has become disastrous.
RUSH: That was Wednesday. Wednesday I said, ‘Where’s Colin Powell?’ Well, let’s go to the audiotape. He showed up Sunday, four days later. On Wednesday I said, ‘Where General Powell?’ Four days later he shows up. Jake Tapper said, ‘As a former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, what do you make of this push and pull between the federal government and the states?’
POWELL: When I was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and as Secretary of State and National Security Advisor I have watched a number of these kinds of crises come and go. I’ve seen hurricanes, tornadoes, riots in Los Angeles, the tsunami, and in every instance what I have sort of learned from all these is that the national government — the federal government, the president — has to get involved as quickly as possible. And if you don’t then public opinion starts to drag you, the media pushes you, and so when something like this clearly is going to get beyond the capacity of whoever caused it, get beyond the capacity of local authorities, I think the federal government has to move in quickly and move in with — to use my favorite expression — decisive force to demonstrate that it’s doing everything that it can do.
RUSH: Well, there is General Powell. I asked on Wednesday, ‘Where is he?’ and he shows up on Sunday. He pops his head out and I guess he saw his shadow and predicted two more months of Obama failure. He said Obama’s not doing enough here. He’s moved too slowly in asserting leadership in the Gulf oil response, and the time has come for a comprehensive total attack on the problem, said General Powell. Jake Tapper then said, ‘You didn’t see that from [the regime] in this case?’
POWELL: I think the president correctly said the other day that he was monitoring it, following it, and essentially been on top of it from the beginning. But that impression was not conveyed to the American people, and the comprehensive speech he gave the other day I think he would have been better served and the nation would have been better served if he’d given it a few weeks earlier. But I think the federal government now is fully engaged and it’s become more than a problem of just stopping an oil spill. It’s an environmental problem, economic problem —
RUSH: Yeah.
POWELL: — the welfare of the people —
RUSH: Yeah.
POWELL: — in the Gulf region —
RUSH: Right.
POWELL: — and how do we get it all cleaned up —
RUSH: Yeah.
POWELL: — and how is it affecting people.
RUSH: Yeah, yeah.
POWELL: So it’s more than BP —
RUSH: Yeah.
POWELL: — and a hole in the ocean floor.
RUSH: Yeah.
POWELL: It is a major problem that can only be dealt with by the federal government and all the resources of the federal government, and that’s what the president is now doing.
RUSH: No, he’s not, because the federal government can’t do it. They don’t know the first thing about it. We have evidence of that on display for the past six weeks! That’s the whole point here. Obama hasn’t the slightest clue. Obama had a little press briefing today — not a presser, he had a little press briefing today. At his news conference or his appearance, he specifically mentioned going after — for possible criminal liability — not just BP, but Transocean and Halliburton. And he sends that doofus Eric Holder down there. He’s talking to local and federal prosecutors down there. That’s what they’re doing. Your government, my government, our government’s primary focus is lawsuits, trying to find out if there was any criminality and going after British Petroleum and going after Halliburton and going after Transocean. As far as federal government taking ownership of the issue, I mean you can go out there and you can be the face of it if you want, and you can try to be inspirational (Obama doesn’t know how to do that) and you can try to make it look like you’re on the case but you can’t do that when you traipse off to Chicago on vacation and you can’t do that when you’re out shooting hoops while you’re on vacation in Chicago.
I’ve seen some of the most amazing pictures, by the way, of that vacation. Folks, I am exercising all of the manners and restraint I can to refrain from commenting on some of the pictures I have seen of the vacation weekend of the First Family in Chicago. I shouldn’t have even brought it up because it’s unfortunate. It’s sort of mean. I’m teasing you and I can’t tell you about it. (interruption) Well, I can’t go there, Snerdley. There’s nothing to gain by going there. Don’t goad me. Don’t even try. Don’t go for it. You’re not going to get me to talk about this. (interruption) What diet? Whose diet? (interruption) The special diet? You mean for Michelle? She’s on a diet? (interruption) Oh. I thought she was just doing that for everybody else. She’s on it, too? Well, I’d like to be on her diet if it’s a healthy diet. I’m not going to tell you, Snerdley. I don’t care how much you goad me. As George H. W. Bush once said, ‘Wouldn’t be prudent.’ Wouldn’t be prudent to go there. Not going to go there.
All right, here’s a question. How can such a media savvy president blow such a glorious opportunity as this thing in the Gulf? Every day, first year, been on TV, he decides to go into hibernation when this thing hits. That is an interesting question. He was on television every day. This thing hits, and he goes into hibernation. When 9/11 happened, remember the Democrats running around, ‘It’s just a shame this didn’t happen Bill Clinton was president. If only he had a real crisis to define himself by.’ They were a little jealous it happened with Bush. So I guess was it Malia — Obama’s little girl, the daughter — when the president was in there shaving. Scrape, scrape. He looks like he shaves, what, twice a week? Anyway, he’s in there shaving, and Malia walks in (child impression), ‘Daddy? Daddy? Did you plug the hole yet?’
No, honey. I’m still working hard on that, but I am gonna sue that hole. You can be sure of that!
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Connie in Claremont, California, great to have you on the EIB Network. Hi.
CALLER: Rush, it’s great to talk to ‘the most dangerous man in America.’
RUSH: Thank you very much.
CALLER: My husband and I were just listening to you describe all this bad press that Obama is getting over this oil spill.
RUSH: Yes?
CALLER: And given the fact that they don’t know much about anything else but they are pretty politically smart, do you think that he is allowing this bad press to continue and he’s allowing this disaster to get to the crisis point where there’s a public outcry and —
RUSH: Now —
CALLER: — he takes over the oil companies?
RUSH: Now, doesn’t need an excuse to take ’em over. If he wants to take ’em over he’ll do it sometime. This is not making him look competent. The last person that anybody wants in charge of the oil companies right now is Obama. The way he’s playing this… I mean, his buddies in the media are saying he looks incompetent. They’re saying he looks like a stooge, like a tool! He doesn’t know what he’s doing. Obama couldn’t plug the hole if he wanted to, and there’s no way he could keep the oil gushing if he wanted to. There’s nobody who doesn’t want to plug the whole. There’s not a single person out there. There may be some wackos who enjoy this. There may be some environmentalist wackos who enjoy this ’cause they think it’s going to help them in their PR case against oil in the first place.
But there’s nobody involved here with any sense that doesn’t want to stop this leak. Obama? There’s nothing for Obama to gain by this thing happening, going on and on and on, especially now when he’s taken charge of it and it keeps happening. Now, you know, he made a big gamble the other day with the press conference. If the top-kill method had worked then he’d be able to lay claim to something. But that was never in the cards because the top-kill method had been brought to a screeching halt the night before. We were all deceived. The top-kill method was not even going on when Obama did his press conference and was talking about how the likelihood of success here was between 60 and 70%. You know, I don’t think this is his idea.
He didn’t start the leak. He’s not keeping it going. He really is impotent here, regarding this. There’s nothing he can do. He can stand there and order people around. He can send the attorney general down there to threaten suits for criminal activity and all that. But he’s not doing one thing oriented toward stopping the leak ’cause there’s nothing he can do, which is the only fair assessment. The only reason people are harping on him about it is because he said (impression), ‘This is the day where the sea levels will stooooop their rise! This is the day where the earth begins to heeeeal!’ He set himself up as a messiah. He set himself up as Mr. Competent. He was gonna change all these horrible things that Bush had done. He was gonna change the direction of the country. So when you set yourself up as The Messiah, you better be able to turn water into wine, and he can’t do it. Here’s Pete in Ocala, Florida, welcome to the EIB Network, sir. Hello.
CALLER: The Democrat Party is like your cat Punkin and Barack Obama’s like the puppy Abbey.
RUSH: Okay. For those that just tuning in I have a cat, 13 years old, an Abyssinian named Punkin, got a little puppy now one-year-old, an English sheepdog named Abbey. What’s the correlation?
CALLER: Okay. Punkin was in the right place at the right time. I mean, she had an idyllic lifestyle. Her future was nothing but blue sky and sunshine. She lived on your estate. Then along comes Abbey — this just yapping, barking little puppy — and the dog acts up the household routine. And the Democrats, they had motivated their constituents, they assembled the coalition. The media handed them the 2008 elections, so they had it made, but Obama came along. He is attractive and cuddly but he’s also inexperienced and can’t focus. So he’s kind of like Abbey. He’s kind of been barking, barking, barking, just upsetting everything and we’re going to see the effects in 2010.
RUSH: Well, when you put it that way, I can see some credence here. You have my cat who owned the house for 13 years. Whatever happened, the cat ran it. One day this miniature lion shows up and starts running around barking, trying to play, and upsets the cat’s whole world. They are peacefully coexisting now, folks. But I gotta tell you, Abbey has become so possessive… I don’t have time to tell you. Remind me to tell the story tomorrow. This is hilarious. I’ve even got some video to show you, but I don’t dare. I can’t show you so I shouldn’t tease you with it, but it’s a funny story.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: If I give Kathryn a hug while sitting on the couch in a room, the dog attacks me. I mean, not viciously, but she wants to get in on the action. She starts barking. I have iPhone video of this. Then I’ll leave and the dog will follow me, keep barking at me. ‘You leave my mother alone! You leave her alone!’ It’s the funniest thing you’ve ever seen.