RUSH: Here’s Bob in Port Charlotte, Florida, great to have you on the program, sir.
CALLER: Dittos, Rush.
RUSH: Thank you.
CALLER: I’m calling because I oppose this START treaty. I don’t know how we could conclude a treaty with Russia reducing nuclear weapons that does not include China. China’s been increasing their military power for years now and —
RUSH: Wait. You misunderstand this. This is not about China reducing nuclear weapons. It’s not about Russia reducing nuclear weapons. It’s about us reducing ours.
CALLER: Yeah, but how does that help —
RUSH: It doesn’t help. That’s the point.
CALLER: That’s why I oppose it.
RUSH: Do you think we’re actually gonna tell the people that hold all of our debt, ‘Hey, by the way, get rid of your weapons?’
CALLER: So what’s the purpose of it? It does nothing to make this world safer.
RUSH: No, no, no, it’s all about Obama. He wants to burnish his credential as a peace president, reducing nuclear arms. It’s all about having the strength and the power to stare down Vladimir Putin, whose mistress is on the first cover of Russian Vogue. You know, there’s a new edition of Vogue magazine in Russia. It’s called ‘Voguesky.’ That’s exactly right. (interruption) I’m not kidding. There’s a new version of Vogue in Russia and Putin’s mistress is proudly identified as such, and get this, she’s a gymnast! Putin’s mistress is on the cover of ‘Voguesky’ and she is a gymnast. So Obama wants credit for staring down the Russians. The Russians are saying we don’t care when this gets done, we’re not under any pressure.
Let’s go to the audio sound bites, number 26. This is F. Chuck Todd just a moment ago on Andrea Mitchell, NBC News, Washington, and they’re talking DeMint trying to have the spending bill, START treaty and all that read on the Senate floor. Mitchell said, ‘The White House put out a statement calling Senator DeMint’s threat, which apparently is a very real threat, to read the entire treaty on the floor; ‘this is a new low,’ says the White House, ‘putting political stunts ahead of our national security.’ Yeah, it’s a political stunt to have senators know what they’re voting on. ”The Washington game-playing the American people are sick of.’ Part of the White House’s lashing of Senator DeMint. Do they think they can get by this? Will it stay on the floor if they continue to read it?’
TODD: They’re hoping DeMint is overplaying his hand. By forcing the clerk to read the bill I think they’re hoping that somehow other members of the Republican caucus, you know, go to Mitch McConnell and Kyl and say, ‘Hey wait a minute, guys, this is getting ridiculous, this is now gonna hurt all of us.’ That is something the White House is hoping could happen if DeMint goes through with this. Let’s see what happens. You hear these threats a lot, and they can get started and then suddenly someone backs off and says, ‘Yeah, okay, maybe this does look ridiculous.’
RUSH: Yeah, it looks ridiculous to read the bill on the floor. You notice now the total reversal here in common sense. Nobody knows what the START treaty says. DeMint says let’s read it. Clerk shall read the bill, Senate rule. Let’s read the bill. Find out what’s in it. ‘We’re putting political stunts over national security.’ Really? President Obama, you mean to tell us that you have something in mind for this country that equals national security? That’s what’s hard for me to stomach, that President Obama actually has national security in mind with the START treaty. There’s nothing in there to tell the Russians what to get rid of. It’s all about what we’re gonna get rid of. Robert Gibbs, the rest of the media, is angry that somebody will read legislation before voting on it. That’s being called a political stunt now. That’s how upside down and out of whack everything is.
Here’s Dennis in Oneida, New York. You’re next. Great to have you here. Hello.
CALLER: Hello. I was just wondering, how stupid they really think we are, ’cause on Monday between ten and two on the TV, I seen an ad going across the bottom of the TV screen saying that Russia wants to upgrade their nuclear weapons and build new ones. And here they want us to downgrade ours.
RUSH: Yeah. That’s about it.
CALLER: So I’m just wondering, how stupid they are.
RUSH: Who?
CALLER: In Washington, Obama and them.
RUSH: No, it’s not stupid.
CALLER: I mean I’m not too smart myself, but I know there’s something going on.
RUSH: Well, no, you’re smarter than you think you are. You’re looking at something that doesn’t make sense and you’re thinking it’s ’cause of you. No, it doesn’t make sense because you think, well how could somebody be so stupid? It isn’t stupid. The question, why would somebody want to weaken our nuclear presence? That’s the question, not how stupid they are.
CALLER: Yeah?
RUSH: Why would a president of the United States want to purposefully weaken US national security? That’s the question. And it’s a question a lot of people don’t even want to confront, don’t even want to admit, they can’t conceive that such a thing could ever happen.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Why would Obama want to weaken the national security of the United States? Why would he want to weaken the national defense of the United States? Simple: Consistency. Why change now?