RUSH: New York Magazine, John Heilemann. This is the coauthor of the book Game Change, that made the movie, Sarah Palin, the absolute worst thing that happened to America. Sarah Palin, the absolute worst thing that ever happened to John McCain. Sarah Palin, the absolute worst thing that ever happened to the Republican Party. Those guys. It’s a long piece. And his point is that for Obama and company this time around, it’s all about fear. There’s no hope and change. There’s no bringing people together. There’s no unity. There’s no postracial, no postmodernism, no post anything. We’re not unified. The world is not in love with us. All of the stuff that was promised or alluded to in 2008, down the tubes now.
But this guy, the author, John Heilemann, gets it right this time around. It’s all about fear. Obama’s got nothing to run on. So he’s gonna try to scare the public with clever ads and half-truths, 100% lies, anything that he can use. Here, let me read one sentence. This is a long piece. I’m not gonna bore you with the whole thing, but I think I can get to the nub of this with the sentence here that’s near the end of this long story. “For all their brio, ObamaÂ’s people know their campaign could be derailed by myriad events outside their control.” That’s the key. For all of their brio, for all their confidence, it’s their time.
“ObamaÂ’s people know their campaign could be derailed by myriad events outside their control: dismal job numbers, a spike in fuel prices, hostilities in Iran, an economic shock from Europe, the overturning by the Supreme Court of health-care reform.”
I would like to make what I think is a profound correction to this. Every one of those things that this writer claims is out of Obama’s control has in fact been caused by him. Everything that is listed here as a potential pitfall that’s out of his control is something Obama has made happen. Well, maybe he hasn’t caused the Europeans’ problems, but he’s out there urging them to do the wrong thing to fix it. He’s urging them to spend. He’s telling Merkel and the rest of these people, don’t go austerity on us. Spend, spend, spend. That’s what he’s urging them to do.
In fact, let me give you a number. I got a shocking number for you. CNBC story: “Greece to Leave Euro Zone on June 18,” according to some wealth manager. “Greece will leave the euro zone on June 18 if the populist government wins the countryÂ’s elections on the 17th as the rest of the euro zone rounds on ‘cheaters,’ Nick Dewhirst, director at wealth management firm Integral Asset Management, told CNBC.com Monday.” He told CNBC.com this yesterday. Now, here’s the great line. This is the stat. Germans have to work until they are 67. Germany is bailing out Greece, right? What are they bailing out? They’re bailing out the status quo.
Germans have to work until they’re 67 to pay for Greeks who retire at age 50. That’s the dirty little secret here. There is no austerity. Obama is urging all of this status quo be built upon. But you go look here, outside their control, dismal job numbers. Who’s killed the job market? Obama, by controlling it, by trying to fix it. With specific policies, Obama has killed the job market. A spike in fuel prices. Who the hell is responsible for that? We have drilling moratoriums in the Gulf of Mexico. We have no Keystone pipeline. We have no drilling in Alaska, no drilling anywhere, no new drilling. We’ve got all kinds of oil. One man stands in the way and his party, Barack Obama and the Democrats. Hostilities in Iran. Well, we’ll take that off the list. I think Obama didn’t cause that. I don’t think he cares, really.
“An economic shock from Europe, the overturning by the Supreme Court.” He’s the one who wrote an unconstitutional health care law. He and the Democrats are the ones who’ve made this possible. They guaranteed that an unconstitutional law would be reviewed by the Supreme Court. So they’re gonna run on this campaign of fear now. But let me tell you what this campaign’s gonna be. This campaign is gonna be a referendum on Obama. Meaning this campaign will revolve largely around things he has had a large measure of control over: jobs, fuel prices. These are things that a president can positively or negatively effect. He may not have the direct control of the price of oil, but I’ll guarantee you, if we had a president — this is another good example. The American people may not be able, all of us, to get our arms around this, but not approving the Keystone pipeline. On the one hand, they hear this president and his party for years complain about dependence on foreign oil. Here is non foreign oil. This is oil from Canada, an ally that would come to the United States, and he’s standing in the way of it, contradicting himself.
Contrary to Obama’s belief, the majority of the American people do not think oil is a problem. They see him standing in the way of progress, is what it all boils down to. Obama, 50 years old, he’s rooted in 50-year-old policy. There’s not one thing that Obama represents that is progress. He stands against progress. People know this, they sense it maybe more than know it. And it’s all out of kilter, and it’s leading to decline. Now, while they’re running this campaign of fear, this author, John Heilemann, also points out that the Obama campaign intends to portray Romney as, quote, “the most conservative nominee Republicans have had going back to Goldwater.” I hope they do.
This is Romney’s big problem. He’s not conservative enough for many on the Republican side of the aisle. So if Obama tries to tag this guy as Goldwater or Reagan, bring it on, that would be the best possible endorsement Romney could get. People don’t fear Barry Goldwater anymore. People are not afraid of Barry Goldwater. They fear Obama. People don’t fear Romney. They don’t fear Ronald Reagan. They don’t fear George Bush. They fear Obama. They don’t fear Goldwater. This is what I mean about Obama being 50 years in the past, along with some in the Republican establishment, by the way. Obama has bought into this notion that a conservative nominee equals a landslide defeat, i.e., Goldwater. Whoever is running Obama’s campaign, and Obama himself, do not know what they’re doing. All this talk about they’re the most brilliant strategists and consultants and so forth, they’re throwing things up against the wall hoping it’ll stick.
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RUSH: So John Heilemann says that Obama’s gonna campaign on fear, and he’s going to run ads and make speeches comparing Romney to Barry Goldwater. He’s gonna say, “Romney is the most conservative Republican nominee since Goldwater!” That Heilemann piece also quotes some of Obama’s handlers as saying that they “plan to freeze Romney like a bug in amber at the end of the dinosaur era.” Well, that’s Alinsky. That’s right out of Rules for Radicals: You pick the target and the freeze it; you isolate it, and then you destroy it.
They’re gonna “freeze Romney like a bug in amber at the end of the dinosaur era.” All the while Obama is what? Running on the same platform that FDR ran on 80 years ago. That’s what we’re faced with here. That’s what “forward” is? It’s doing an 80-year retro? And then from TheHill.com: “Obama Team Struggles Find 2012 Campaign Theme.” Oh, yeah! At TheHill.com they’re fretting. They’re wringing their hands over Obama’s campaign theme.
Yes, “President ObamaÂ’s campaign has yet to find a clear 2012 reelection slogan that carries the heft of 2008Â’s ‘Change You Can Believe In.'” Well, that’s what happens when you can’t run on what you’ve done. That’s what happens when you have a dismal record. That’s what happens when you haven’t done one thing people want more of. So you need a theme. You need some sort of a device to fool people. So you come up with a theme of fear moving forward and Romney is this or that. It’s pathetic.
And all of this is creating this notion that things just aren’t right. This is just not the way things have happened in this country. I don’t mean the campaign. I mean actual life, living circumstances, this just… This is not America. Having no big dreams for the future, having no grandiose ideas; no big things to reach for, to aspire to. This doesn’t sit well. It’s distinctly not American, and people don’t want to sign on to that. People don’t want to sign on to the notion that our best days have happened. Nobody who is an American who has kids wants to sign on to that, that our best days are behind us.
It’s not America.
It’s not the America people have known, telling people there is no hope. There may be change, but there’s no hope. All these new norms. Eight percent, 9% unemployment. The new norms of having a house meaning nothing. The new norm of gasoline and fuel prices through the roof. The new norm of graduating from college and being in debt to the point that no matter what job you get you’ll never pay it off. It just doesn’t sit well. It’s not what people bargain for. And this is the main thing Obama’s got going against him.
He doesn’t even realize it.
He thinks it’s a plus.
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RUSH: Nah, the beauty is the American people are not gonna tolerate this. They don’t want this country to be over. They don’t want the best days to be behind us. People in this country are going to triumph over this, over this administration, over Obama. They’re gonna triumph over the Democrat Party. They’re gonna triumph over this decline and reverse it, and that’s what I think is already underway as we speak.