RUSH: John Boehner last night in Washington, we have a montage of Boehner, Eric Cantor and Kevin McCarthy talking about the vote to extend the payroll tax. They defied Obama. They put the Keystone pipeline in it. They put the Keystone pipeline in there, and Obama feels like he has been challenged on this, disrespected on this. He claims he’s going to veto it. Here’s what our guys said.

BOEHNER: We’ve passed a large bill that contains many of the priorities of our caucus and the White House. We’ve worked to find common ground.

CANTOR: We’ve just had a strong, bipartisan vote on the House floor. It’s time for the other side — Harry Reid as well as the president — to compromise.

MCCARTHY: When the Founding Fathers sat down to craft a type of government that they wanted to see that was by the people and for the people, they looked at that and said, “You’re gonna have to have compromise.”

RUSH: There you go. So the Republican leadership in the House of Representatives believes compromise. That’s right, folks, compromise! That’s what you want, the American people want compromise: You want our guys to work with the Democrats. At least there is a positive note here, and that is that Boehner and Cantor and these guys said it’s time for the Democrats to compromise. Normally it works the other way. Normally we are the ones are supposed to compromise. But, noooo, not this time. But still, this is what they say. Using the language of the left.

This, I’m telling you, their political consultants, their pollsters, their advisers are telling them the independents want compromise, the independents want Democrats and Republicans to work together. The independents and the moderates don’t like all this gridlock and confrontation. So whoever is structuring the Republican language here, we can tell that the establishment consultants and pollsters are making sure that they use language that they think the American people want to hear — and I think they couldn’t be more wrong.

Meanwhile, here’s Dingy Harry. Let’s go ahead and play this. This is this morning in Washington, Dingy Harry on the Senate floor. Remember, now, when our guys get too critical — when our guys don’t compromise, when our guys stand steady on their turf, hold the line — that’s not good. The independents aren’t gonna like that! “Oh, no, no, Rush! The independents, you’re gonna send ’em off. They gonna be racing off to the Democrats. They don’t like this confrontation, don’t like this bombast, don’t like any of this stuff that you have to offer.” Now, this is where the independents are going. This is the kind of thing that’s attractive to the independents.

REID: (whispering) The House has passed a bill that I have said — and non-Democrats have said — is a dead duck, DOA, dead on arrival. It’s here, it’s dead, and they don’t want vote on it.

RUSH: Somebody explain something to me. If the independents are gonna run to the Democrats whenever the Republicans are obstinate and don’t compromise, why are they gonna go to this? I mean the Democrats are the ones that always say, “The budget’s DOA! The bill is DOA. It’s dead. It does not have a chance. We’re not voting for this.” Do you realize how we’ve been lied to, and do you realize the contradictions? We’re told, “Independents are gonna flock to people that talk about compromise, want to work together, get things done, cross the aisle.” Democrats don’t talk that way. The Democrats say that bill stinks, that bill is dead on arrival. “They want to kill 8100 people,” Barbara Boxer said.

Republicans want 8100 people to die because of this bill, and we’re told that’s where the independents are gonna go? That’s what our candidates are told. That’s what our consultants tell ’em, and that’s what the Republican establishment believes. So what’s wrong with the Keystone pipeline? They’ve moved it away from the precious Nebraska Sand Hills now, so what’s the objection now? (New Castrati impression) “Well, it still could cost pollution, Mr. Limbaugh. That pipe could still rupture and wreak havoc throughout the Midwest and throughout this entire nation of black oil be all over everywhere and destroy crops and the snail darters! It’s too big a risk. We just simply can’t go for it, Mr. Limbaugh.”