RUSH: Drive-By Media, something happened yesterday. They changed their tune on these cuts somewhat. Listen to this montage.
JONATHAN KARL: The spending cuts represent only a fraction of total federal spending. With the cuts, the federal government will spend about $15 billion more this year than it spent last year. Their impact won’t be felt right away. The government must give employees 30 days notice before they can force them to take that one unpaid day off. That means you’re really going to see the impact sometime in April.
BILL PLANTE: People here admit that it could take several months for the public to really feel the pain.
MAJOR GARRETT: Those terrible things, should they occur, won’t happen rapidly. The public could say, maybe the president cried wolf.
RUSH: What happened yesterday to make these people all of a sudden say, “You know what? It isn’t gonna be that bad.” I wonder what coulda happened yesterday that made these media people actually start telling the truth about this? Anybody have any ideas? What happened?
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Here’s another example of what has me ashamed, embarrassed that some of the smartest people in our country — our leadership — see fit to insult the people of this country, to scare them, to lie to them, to fearmonger in this way. Again, folks, you heard it in that audio sound bite. We’re spending $15 billion more next year.
With the sequester, with the so-called Draconian cuts, we’re gonna spend $15 billion more this year than last with the sequester. Why will anybody be laid off? Why will anything be cut? If we froze every item in the budget, if we froze every department and kept it at the same level, we could do everything this year that we did last year. And if we don’t start doing things like that, all of these predictions that these people are making are gonna happen. The dirty little secret is this stuff is going to happen someday if they get their way.
These calamities, these crises will all happen somewhere down the road.
The lie is that doing what they want now will stop them.
The truth is, letting them continue to operate as they have been will cause all these calamities to happen. The truth of the matter is that everybody, Republicans and Democrats alike, know it. They all know this. It’s another thing to have the courage to tell you, but they’re all kicking the can down the road with all of this. It’s to the point now of being insultingly infantile and ridiculous. Here’s the president back on Tuesday of this week. This is how the president weighed in on this. This was the president’s attempt to scare, to frighten, to panic the people of this country.
OBAMA: Emergency responders, like the ones who are here today, their ability to help communities respond to and recover from disasters will be degraded. Border Patrol agents will see their hours reduced. FBI agents will be furloughed. Federal prosecutors will have to close cases and let criminals go. Air traffic controllers and airport security will see cutbacks, which means more delays in airports across the country. Thousands of teachers and educators will be laid off. Tens of thousands of parents will have to scramble to find child care for their kids. Hundreds of thousands of Americans will lose access to primary care and preventive care like flu vaccinations and cancer screenings. This is not an abstraction. People will lose their jobs. The unemployment rate might tick up again.
RUSH: Might tick up? People lose their jobs? All of that, folks — no cancer screenings, everybody’s gonna get cancer, no meat inspections, teachers, educators laid off — even though the federal government doesn’t pay them. Look, here. I’m doing what I swore I wouldn’t do. I’m reacting to it. I want to go back and play you again the media montage of mere moments ago. Something happened yesterday, and a bunch of media people started changing their tune.
A number of media people said, “You know, this isn’t anywhere near as bad as these people say. People aren’t even gonna feel this. There is a shift taking place away from the president on this ever so slightly. Members of the media are beginning to ask, “Is the president saying the sky’s falling too often now, too many times?” ‘Cause none of this is gonna happen because of the sequester, but it all will happen if we don’t do the opposite of what they’re suggesting here. Listen to this media montage again…
JONATHAN KARL: The spending cuts represent only a fraction of total federal spending. With the cuts, the federal government will spend about $15 billion more this year than it spent last year.
RUSH: Stop the tape!
JONATHAN KARL: Their impact won’t be felt —
RUSH: That’s Jonathan Karl of ABC News. “With the cuts, the federal government will spend $15 billion more this year than it spent last year.” So why does anybody get laid off? Why does anybody need to not get tested for cancer? It’s absurd, folks. It’s utterly infantile and ridiculous. Here’s the rest of the montage…
JONATHAN KARL: Their impact won’t be felt right away. The government must give employees 30 days notice before they can force them to take that one unpaid day off. That means you’re really going to see the impact sometime in April.
BILL PLANTE: People here admit that it could take several months for the public to really feel the pain.
MAJOR GARRETT: Those terrible things, should they occur, won’t happen rapidly. The public could say, maybe the president cried wolf.
RUSH: They’re not gonna happen at all. So something happened yesterday and the media started changing their tune.
