RUSH: I wish I could JIP it but I’m not going to JIP it because… maybe we should JIP a little just to give you a sample. Charlie Rangel is on the floor of the House giving the most hilarious example of doublespeak I have ever heard in my life. For example, he said (imitating Rangel) ‘I couldn’t find one lawyer, I couldn’t find one friend who told me that I should take the floor today and explain myself
So nobody’s even listening to him. They’re in there having their own conversations, and Rangel, this is the funniest ‘I never did it’ in my life. (imitating Rangel) ‘All I’ve ever done is public service. That’s it. The prosecutor was in the Army 40 years, yeah, that’s all I’ve ever done, that’s all I know.’ (laughing) Forty years, four apartments, no taxes on rental property, and how do you own rental property in the Dominican Republic on what he’s made as a legislator? His salary is sizeable, it’s more than what most Americans make, but it’s not the kind of thing you can own rental property in the Dominican. You want to hear a little bit of it? Our microphones are there, it’s the House floor, Charlie Rangel, ‘I am not going away. I’m not going anywhere.’
RANGEL: But my lawyer says don’t offend them. My friends say don’t go to the floor. And I say, what are you gonna do me? Huh? Suppose I do get emotional, suppose I do think of my life, the beginning and the end, are you going to expel me from this party? Are you going to say that while there’s no evidence that I took a nickel, asked for a nickel, that there’s no sworn testimony, no conflict —
RUSH: What do you mean?
RANGEL: — that I have to leave here?
RUSH: What do you mean?
RANGEL: As much as I love you Democrats, I figure it would be easy — I’m the guy that was raising money in Republican districts to get you here, but that doesn’t mean that I criticize you for saying, ‘Hey, that’s great then, but I’m running for reelection now.’ I mean do what you have to do. And Republicans, hey, you don’t have much to run on, but, you know, but what the hell, if Rangel is an embarrassment based on newspaper articles, I can see why you would do it. But think, think, isn’t this historically the first time that it appears as though partisanship has entered the ethics committee? Isn’t it historically the first time that the recommendations of the subcommittee of investigation is turned down?
RUSH: Right. You get the flavor of this. Rangel again saying that he didn’t have one lawyer, not one friend tell him to take the floor, don’t want to offend the committee, don’t want to offend the ethics economy. He makes $174 grand a year and he says he didn’t notice. (imitating Rangel) ‘Everybody does it. All right, maybe I was guilty of insensitivity. I thought that I was being treated the same. Nobody ever told me that I was being treated differently.’ So you didn’t notice that an extra $800,000 that you didn’t earn that somehow is in your bank account, you just didn’t notice and nobody is treated any differently than you are. (imitating Rangel) ‘I raised money for you to run against the Republicans. Ask the Republicans, they know, I was raising money for you.’ He’s dumping on them now. He’s chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, oversees the IRS and all of our tax laws, and he wouldn’t think he had to report $800,000 in extra income. There you have it, Charlie Rangel. And nobody knows why he took to the floor today other than he’s trying to defend himself. He was complaining earlier that, (imitating Rangel) ‘Well, the way they’re talking now, the hearing won’t even happen until after my primary. Yeah, after 40 years, and then if I win the primary they’re having the ethics hearing right before the general. How does that happen?’ (laughing) Ask Obama, Charlie, because Obama is out there throwing you overboard and under the bus at the same time. Obama said, ‘It’s time to retire with dignity.’ It’s time to get out of there with dignity.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: First, I have to issue a correction on Rangel. It was not $800,000 he didn’t recognize. I confused a couple things. It was $80,000 in back taxes from his rental property. He failed to report personal assets totaling as much as $780,000 in financial disclosure reports, but the 800 grand is 80. I just confused the two: 780,000, I rounded up to $800,000. The bottom line here is he said (doing impression), ‘I’m not going away. I’m going to defend myself. I love the Congress, and I love my country — and I want one last chance to dip my hand in the cookie jar before they kick me outta here,’ which is the bottom line.