RUSH: We’ve been chronicling the actions of John Boehner, Speaker of the House, since Monday, and we first learned on Monday that there was a bill that the Republicans were working through the House. Remember, let’s go back to December. Let’s go back to the cromnibus, which is what they call the omnibus budget. Well, let’s go back even farther than that just to set the table here.

After the Republicans experienced their landslide victory in November, and for the Democrats it was a landslide defeat. I mean, it was deep. It comes on the heels of the 2010 landslide defeat for the Democrats, and it’s deep, it’s broad, it’s widespread. It’s not just federal seats, but state, local, you name it, the Democrats just took a beating.

There still needs to be work done because the federal budget operating on a continuing resolution was to expire on December 11th, I believe it was, which meant that we needed another one of these emergency budget sessions to keep the government operating or there would be a shutdown. And that begot a massive routine, how-many-times-have-we-been-there debate, on the government shutdown. And Republicans all over Washington were saying, “We can’t, oh, no, oh, my God, we can’t have a government shutdown! Oh, my God, we’ll get blamed for it. The Hispanics will hate us, the African-Americans, women, oh, my God, we can’t have a government shutdown.”

Others are saying, “Look, we can’t keep doing the budget this way. You’ve got an opportunity here now to do another continuing resolution just for two or three months, get you into the new year when the Republicans take control of the Senate as well, therefore own the legislative branch. And then do a budget, a real budget that would take us to the end of the fiscal year in September.”

That’s not what happened. The Republicans, in what appeared to be a cave-in and buckle went ahead and crafted a budget deal for the remaining months of the fiscal year, which is ’til September 30th of this year. And many people thought they squandered an opportunity. That, in effect here, they’ve got two years where they were gonna run the show and they just let the Democrats participate in writing the whole budget for the remaining year, which is essentially one of those two years.

However, there was one element of the budget that was not part of the omnibus budget bill that runs through the end of this fiscal year, again, September 30th, and that was the Department of Homeland Security. And the reason for that was that the Republicans secretly planned to use the Department of Homeland Security budget as a means — they said they intended to do this — as a means of thwarting Obama’s executive actions on immigration.

Now, back when they were talking like this, back in December when the Republicans were explaining to their voters and constituents this is what they were doing, many voters and constituents, using intelligence guided by experience, “They’re just slamming us again here. They’re just telling us they’re gonna take on Obama, but they’re not gonna take on Obama. They’re not gonna do it. They’re just telling us this ’cause they know we won and we want to really deal with this and they don’t want to deal with it. And they really favor amnesty so they’re just telling us they’re gonna do it.”

Well, it turns out that on Monday it appeared that Republicans had prepared legislation that indeed would defund two or three, maybe four departments within the Department of Homeland Security that would indeed defund them and would indeed imperil and make difficult Obama’s plans for executive immigration, amnesty, by denying him the money for it.

Well, this begot a much talked about — on this program — story from the Associated Press in which they attempted to shame Boehner by falling prey to the influence of the kooks and the extremists in the Tea Party who are part of the new arrivals in the House having won election in November. And they were doing their best to shame Boehner, and, in terms of image and in the Drive-By Media, cast him as a coward, willing to go back on his word and now afraid of the conservatives and new arrivals by actually aligning with them.

This led people to believe that Boehner really didn’t mean it, that it was all part of a continuing effort to mollify angry conservative Republican voters who indeed want this kind of behavior. They want the Republicans to block Obama and his efforts at amnesty and everything else he’s going to use executive actions or orders for. Well, Boehner responded to this by doubling down on it and letting it be known that this is exactly what they intended to do.

Which takes us to last night and this story from the UK Daily Mail. Do you know how often you hear me saying, “And the next story from the UK Daily Mail”? Do you know how much we’re getting from this one source about news in America that doesn’t show up in other places in America? It’s been that way for quite a while. The UK Daily Mail, UK Independent, you name it, it’s amazing. Now, the Drive-By Media in this country has this now.

John Boehner’s bartender plotted to kill him. This was the news last night. “Country club employee arrested for plan to poison wine after he blamed ‘meanÂ’ Speaker for getting him fired. A former bartender at an Ohio country club patronized by House Speaker John Boehner has been charged with threatening to murder the 12-term congressman by poisoning his wine.

“According to federal prosecutors, the failed assassination plot was hatched by 44-year-old Michael Hoyt last fall –” this is in October “– after he was fired from the Wetherington Country Club. Investigators say Hoyt, known at the country club as ‘Bartender Mike,Â’ blamed Congressman Boehner for his termination in mid-October. When questioned by the authorities, Hoyt reportedly said evil voices coming from his car speakers and his radio at home told him the House speaker was the devil.”

Wow. I thought Air America was off the air.

Who’s out there saying that Boehner is the devil? He’s also blaming Boehner for Ebola. Or that’s what he heard. He heard that Boehner was responsible for Ebola. “In his rantings to police, the 44-year-old failed mixologist –” i.e., bartender “– also allegedly blamed the Ohio Republican for spreading Ebola and said he had been planning to shoot Boehner with his Beretta .380 automatic. According to a criminal complaint from October, Hoyt told an officer ‘he was Jesus Christ and that he was going to kill Boehner because Boehner was mean to him at the country club and because Boehner is responsible for Ebola.'”

Now, this goes back to October. Who in the world was beating up on Boehner back in October? Who was it? This guy’s hearing voices, but I mean you go back to October, take a look at the Drive-By Media and some of the efforts to intimidate Boehner that had been launched on the left side of the aisle in the Drive-By Media and elsewhere, who knows what this guy heard. He’s clearly a nut case. He’s clearly got some screws loose. The synapses are not firing in a coordinated way in the guy’s brain. Clearly a Looney Toon. But nevertheless he had these designs.

“In the course of the investigation, police uncovered that Michael Hoyt sent a rambling email to BoehnerÂ’s wife of nearly 42 years, Debbie, to complain about her husband a day before he called the authorities. In his appeal to Mrs. Boehner, Hoyt said he wanted her husband and another person, an Ohio doctor, to hand-deliver his termination report to him, or have him transported to a ‘secure locationÂ’ so the three of them could have ‘an honest conversation,'” about why the bartender got canned.

“‘If I had any intention of hurting Mr. Boehner, I could have poisoned his wine at Wetherington many, many times,’ Hoyt reportedly wrote to Debbie Boehner. He added a cryptic note saying they can ‘work together and succeed orÂ….. fail miserably.'”

Now, again, notice that this came to a head back in October, which was during the height of the Democrat attacks on Boehner, right before the midterm elections. And also this guy, just to remind you, just to repeat now, this guy claimed that Boehner was responsible for Ebola, which, look, my memory is what it is. The Democrats tried to claim this about the House Republicans.

For example, Democrats claimed the Republicans cut funding for research for the Ebola vaccine and the National Institutes for Health and the CDC in general. Remember that? Yeah, the Democrats blaming the Republicans for cutting all the research funding, blaming Republicans for hitting the National Institutes for Health or cutting them funds, CDC, and specifying that it was the Republicans.

And they always do this. Republicans are poisoning the water. Republicans want your kids to get sick and die. I mean, it’s silly. And they were out there blaming the Republicans for the spread of Ebola right about the time this guy is getting mad at Boehner for spreading Ebola. You do remember that now, El Snerdbo? Absolutely right. Will those Democrats now be blamed for inspiring this lunatic? You remember when one of the shooting incidents took place in Colorado, what’s the first thing Brian Ross did, ABC? Tried to pin it on the Tea Party.

The name of the shooter was announced, and the first thing Brian Ross did, investigative reporter for ABC News, was run to the nearest Tea Party roster to see if he could find the guy’s name on it. There was no indication anybody in the Tea Party had anything to do with it. So will we see a similar pursuit in the Drive-By Media trying to find whoever it was this guy Hoyt was inspired by in the Democrat Party?

Now, after all of that, we get to today. And Boehner — I haven’t heard it yet — but Boehner gave a speech on the floor of the House and apparently just lashed out at Obama over immigration and a number of other things in a way, apparently, that all of us have been hoping Boehner would do for years.

Now, again, I have to say this with a caveat because I haven’t heard it. All I have here is a published Drive-By Media report, and this is what it says. “‘Enough is enough!’: Boehner fills House chamber with high drama as he lashes out against Obama in high-stakes immigration battle — and throws his own words back in his face. House speaker mocks Obama for going outside the US Constitution after teaching constitutional law.

President ‘has ignored the people, ignored the Constitution, and even his own past statements.’ Republicans aim to use Homeland Security funding bill to kill Obama’s plan to mainstream 5 million or more illegal immigrants.”

So the story we have in the AP on Monday is now played out in full force, in full display on the floor of the House today, two days later. Should also note the White House has promised to veto the Republican bill, and most Democrats will support him. This is gonna be a pretty big showdown, possibly a Department of Homeland Security shutdown as well.

A Republican budget amendment that would hamstring Obama passed 237 to 190. Now, here’s this is Dave Martosko writing, once again, UK Daily Mail. “John Boehner created the first live-action high drama on the House floor Wednesday, staking out a no-compromise position on blocking Barack Obama’s sweeping immigration plan and reading aloud 22 examples of the president’s past claims that he lacked the authority to put it into action. … Angering Democrats, the House speaker spoke during a floor debate to defend an amendment to the Homeland Security Department’s budget bill that would forbid the cabinet agency from spending any money to implement it.”

So here we are two days left, the story hits on Monday from AP, and it looks like they’re following through on it. And let’s not forget that even before the AP story on Monday — Snerdley, you’ll back me up on this — before this all happened, the Republican leadership, after the vote — remember the vote on the Speaker where they came up one vote short of the veto? We had stories that Boehner was out there getting even and he was cutting the traitors out and eliminating their committee assignments and this sort of thing. And then Boehner denied that and said (paraphrasing), “No, I got no problem with it.” And all of that fell by the wayside, and it looked like Boehner had aligned himself with conservatives. It looked like it, which is what begot that AP story on Monday.

It says here that “Boehner openly mocked Obama for what he said was an effort to evade the U.S. Constitution, throwing in his face his past claims that he wasn’t a ‘king’ or an ’emperor.'” We gotta take a brief time-out, but that’s where we are today, and I hope we’ll have some sound bites of this floor speech before this program expires today so we can judge it rather than just reading it about it.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Okay. Now, folks, there’s always a caveat when we’re talking about the Republican leadership here. It’s time for a caveat — and, again, this is intelligence guided by experience plus some reporting from one of these new websites that I have been trumpeting here, Conservative Review. Now, here we go: Boehner’s House speech today, a floor speech rattling the rafters. I mean, he’s pounding Obama, just ripping Obama…

Well, not quite the way you or I would, but much more so than anybody in the Republican leadership has dared rip Obama, ever. Boehner even cited the 22 times Obama said he couldn’t ignore or create his own immigration law despite doing it. Well, let’s play the string out, because here is what I have discovered, ladies and gentlemen, as I’ve walked all the way through this.

Boehner’s talking tough.

Boehner is going to move legislation that would defund the elements of Homeland Security which would implement Obama’s amnesty, which means it would be shut off. However, that has to go to the Senate. Yeah, the Republicans run the Senate, but the Chamber of Commerce runs the Republicans. The Wall Street Journal runs the Chamber of Commerce, or vice-versa. So who knows if this even comes out of the Senate. Who knows?

There may even be a bill that dies in the Senate and Boehner and the House Republicans do what they’re doing today just for the purposes of demonstrating their toughness and their resolve, and they’re going after Obama, and it’s meant to satisfy you. It’s meant to get you all fired up and thinking, “My God, they’ve finally seen the light! They’re finally going after Obama. They’re finally doing what we elected ’em to do.”

But all along the bill is gonna die in the Senate.

If it doesn’t die in the Senate, if somehow gets through there, we know what’s gonna happen next: Obama’s gonna veto it. What comes after that? Do they try to override the veto? Apparently not. Conservative Review has the story. Details coming up after the next break. Here’s the headline: “Boehner Prepares to Pay Obama’s Amnesty Extortion.” Just sit tight. Apparently this story claims that Boehner is preparing for the time after Obama vetoes this, or the Senate blocks it, and it’s gonna make it happen.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: All right. So let’s review. We’ve got Boehner on the floor of the House this morning raising hell about Obama, pointing out Obama’s contradictions, pointing out that Obama himself has said 22 times, different occasions, that he himself could not ignore the Constitution. He could not create his own immigration law.

Essentially Boehner’s on the floor of the House this morning ripping into Obama the way we’ve always wished Republicans would do daily, as a matter of course. And it is noticeable. It’s so different from the normal way Republicans in Washington deal with Obama that it is front-page news at the UK Daily Mail and a number of places. And it’s got people all excited. Maybe Boehner’s finally listening.

And there’s a caveat here, folks. Let me go through the process again. The House is gonna pass this bill, and this bill is going to defund certain elements of Homeland Security Obama needs to fully implement his amnesty program for these five million illegals. Without the money, he can’t do it. The House is gonna pass the bill to defund those departments in Homeland Security. That bill has to go to the Senate. The Senate could bottle it up, could die in the Senate. We don’t know yet what we’re dealing with there. We think we do, but we’re not sure.

But maybe the long game, complete with a long strategy here, is in the works. Maybe the House bill will actually be passed by the Senate. One of two things is gonna happen. Either it’s gonna get killed in the Senate or it’s gonna pass and Obama’s gonna veto it. That’s the one thing we know, that the House bill is going to end up being blocked, do we not? It’s either gonna not make it through the Senate or Obama’s gonna veto it. So the focus really needs to be on what happens after either the House blocks it or Obama vetoes it. What then?

Well, let’s go back to this website, Conservative Review. “Just as the ink dried on our column praising Republican House leadership for proposing a solid bill defunding ObamaÂ’s amnesty –” and, by the way, let me point something out here. Within the conservative community, both average, ordinary Americans and the conservative political community, conservative media, there’s a lot of good people. And there are a lot of people who really hope that the Republican conservatives elected do the right thing, and they give them the benefit of the doubt.

No matter how many times we’ve had our faces slapped, no matter how many times they’ve dangled a carrot in front of us and yanked it back, no matter how many times we continue to extend goodwill to them, it’s a point to be made, we continue to give them the benefit of the doubt. That is why for two years the House Republican leadership, the Senate Republican leadership, wouldn’t get anywhere near criticizing Obama. Instead what they’re doing is parroting Obama.

They’re out there saying we need to get the Hispanic vote just like the Democrats say we have to do. They’re out there saying we’ve got to sign on with the Democrats on amnesty or we’re never gonna win the White House. They will not criticize Obama; they don’t want to be accused of racism; you know the drill. And then all of a sudden, out of the blue, Boehner does this.

Now, the common-sense attitude would be hands off, don’t buy it, this is so out of the ordinary, don’t fall for this. I mean, these guys have ever talked this way. These guys have never spoken this way about Obama. They’ve never called Obama out this way. They have never said this stridently in public that they oppose Obama on immigration. I’m talking about the House Republican leadership.

Out of the blue one day over the weekend and into Monday, all of a sudden we get a totally different House leadership. And notice even this publication, in a spirit of goodwill, in a spirit of open-minded, benefit of the doubt, wrote a column praising Boehner, just as I, on Monday and Tuesday, was praising Boehner.

But let’s continue with their piece. “Just as the ink dried on our column praising Republican House leadership for proposing a solid bill defunding ObamaÂ’s amnesty, John Boehner has, once again, reminded us why we are all so leery of offering positive feedback on GOP leadership. Although he is giving conservatives what they want in the first round of legislation, with six weeks to go until the funding deadline for DHS, Boehner appears to have other tricks up his sleeve.

“When asked by a reporter during a press conference whether he would be open to passing a ‘clean’ DHS funding bill (without defunding amnesty) before the February deadline, Boehner demurred, saying ‘our goal here is to fund the Department of Homeland Security.’ He refused to stand before the American people and say in no uncertain terms that the peopleÂ’s House will fund every aspect of the DHS but not one penny for lawlessness.”

He refused to say that.

“By now, Obama can see straight through BoehnerÂ’s equivocation with full confidence that he will never engage in brinkmanship. Then again, Boehner already told Obama to ‘do what you gotta do’ on executive amnesty.” And this we know. In fact, we also know that in December Boehner, talking to Obama, it might have been at the White House (imitating Boehner), “Come on, just give me one more chance.” Do you remember this? Just give me one more chance to go back to my caucus and get this done, meaning, agreeing with Obama on amnesty.

That’s why what happened over the weekend and Monday was so surprising because it was so out of character for any Republican, particularly Boehner. And they write here, “It is even harder to take Boehner seriously on DHS funding, and an even bigger slap in the face, when he is preparing to pay ObamaÂ’s extortion by proposing amnesty bills before the February 28 DHS funding deadline.”

Breitbart News had it: “Rep. Aaron Schock (R-IL) said the outlines of the specific legislation that will be considered are still unclear, but he said he expects in time that Boehner will bring bills addressing border security, visa reform, aliens brought to the US illegally as children and ‘what do you do with the 12 million who are here illegally.’ [Â…] ‘Certainly, you have to do visas because 40 percent of those living here,'” blah, blah, blah.

Here’s the point of this. I’m doing my best here to cut to the chase. The feeling now is, the thinking is that what’s happening now is for show, that 28 votes to get rid of Boehner is a scary thing for Boehner, and he can read the tea leaves. He knows that the Republican base is not happy with the Republican leadership, either at the RNC, the Senate, or the House.

So on Monday we get this total 180 where Boehner is hellfire, and he’s hell-bent, and he’s calling Obama out, and he’s gonna pass this bill and we’re gonna defund illegal immigration, executive orders and so forth. But what has been discovered, what the people here at these websites claim to have discovered is that after Obama vetoes it is when we need to pay attention, and that it’s already be planned for. And that essentially what’s gonna happen is that Boehner is preparing several separate pieces of legislation, several bills that, together, would equal comprehensive immigration reform, and supposedly he has aides working on them even now.

He plans to push them in early February. So if all of that is true, then what’s happening now is simply a sham effort to convince you that your House Republican leadership is listening to you and attempting to implement what you want, as stated often and over and over again in election after election and poll after poll, you name it. But apparently all this is is a surface maneuver designed to hide the real intent, which is to, after Obama vetoes it, just give up, “Okay, well, we tried.” And they hope to get your credit. They hope that you will praise them for the effort they engaged in after Obama goes ahead and implements his executive amnesty, after vetoing the Republican effort.

They’re hoping that what you will say — this is the theory — they’re hoping that what you will say, “Finally, our guys tried, all right,” when this story claims that this is all a ruse, that it’s already done. All of this is just for show, just designed to get you to be all excited that they’re really finally trying to implement what you want versus their opposition to it. So we’ll keep a sharp eye. We’ll know, it’s not gonna be long. February is gonna be here before anybody knows it.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: All right. I got three sound bites from Oba… Why do I keep confusing these guys? From Boehner’s fiery floor speech today. We’ll get to them in an el jiffo, but first I want to get started on the phones. Jason in Lake City, Florida. I’m glad you called, sir. Great to have you. Hi. How are you?

CALLER: Hi. Great, Rush. Thanks. I’m looking at this just a little bit differently. I think that Boehner, he truly is like a Soprano. And with his authority being challenged by Obama, I think he’s just had the last straw that broke the camel’s back. And look at what he did to the Republicans at —

RUSH: Okay, wait, wait, wait. I want to follow this. I got sidetracked with that “Boehner is one of the Sopranos.” You think that what’s going on…? You disagree with everything I just said? You’ve got a different take; is that right? That’s okay; that’s fine. I’m just asking.

CALLER: You know, I do in a way because the only thing that seems to get him really ticked off is when people challenge his power.

RUSH: Who, Boehner or Obama?

CALLER: I’m sorry, sir. What was that?

RUSH: Boehner or Obama?

CALLER: Well, both. Boehner right now.

RUSH: Boehner. Okay.

CALLER: Yeah. We basically have two thugs going at each other, Obama and Boehner, and Boehner’s really upset ’cause he knows that he’s in big trouble with his base. Look what he did to the people that opposed him. I mean, he took ’em off all sorts of important commissions (sic), and so to me it just it seems like really —

RUSH: See, I’m hearing a different version of that. I’ve heard the first story that he took a couple guys off, but then went and made nice with ’em.

CALLER: Yeah, right. (chuckles)

RUSH: No, I mean… (sigh)

CALLER: I’m sure they had their backroom talks and stuff, but when was the last time he got so upset over something that wasn’t about his authority or his power? You know, I mean, look at his track record. That’s my view on that.

RUSH: Okay, so where do you come down on all of this? You think that’s not what’s going on? You think Boehner is simply in a huff because Obama is challenging his authority?

CALLER: I do, because they didn’t run on anything, any principles in the past. Ever since he’s been, you know, in power —

RUSH: I gonna stop you. With all due respect… You know I’m the politest host ever. I invite people to call here and I try to treat ’em as politely as I can, but there times I profoundly disagree; this is one of them. I don’t think Boehner is angry. I think Boehner’s afraid of Obama. I think these Republicans are afraid of Obama. I think they’re afraid of the media. These guys have their authority attacked, they have their humanity attacked 15,000 times a day.

They have had their humanity attacked, and everything about them has been attacked by the media, by Obama, by Democrats for years. So Obama challenging Boehner’s authority? I don’t think that’s what this is, and I don’t think Boehner is worried… (sigh) Well, he may be worried about the base. You may have a point about that. But I don’t think he feels threatened by the base. He does want to mollify them to get them off his back while he makes an end run on things, maybe.

We’ll just have to play this out.

But if the learned opinions of people following this are true, none of us are gonna be surprised. It’s gonna be more of the same. The only thing being different is that for a short interval of two or three days Boehner — and, who knows, maybe others in the Republican leadership — will actually start attacking and ripping Obama. Legitimately! As they should have been doing for the last six years. Okay, so they’re gonna give us two or three days of it, hoping that’ll buy us off and then revert back.

Because, remember: The people who donate to the Republican Party haven’t changed. They still want amnesty. The Republican donor class still wants amnesty. So Boehner, there’s a juggling acts going on here. He does have to juggle voters and the money guys, and I think that’s what we’re seeing here. But the money guys are gonna win, folks. The Chamber’s gonna win, the donor class. The best we can hope for… Well, that’s for another time.

Michael in San Diego. You’re next. Great to have you, sir. Hi.

CALLER: Hi, Rush. How you doing?

RUSH: Very well, sir. Thank you, as always.

CALLER: Rush, I believe it’s all about the money. I believe Boehner has sold out to the lobbyists on Obamacare, and he’s just throwing us a bone with this immigration thing, and it really sickens me that that’s what runs those guys in Washington is just money.

RUSH: Well, yeah, in this case donations. If I were Boehner… This is what I don’t understand. Honestly, folks. I ought to spend some time on this. We had a caller — weeks ago, now, maybe a couple months ago — ask me one of the greatest questions I’ve ever been asked, and I have been thinking about it ever since. This is really… Barack Hussein O is the first president (certainly in our lifetimes, but maybe ever) who has actively, fearlessly looked at the Constitution and ignored it.

He’s the first president who has no reverence for it, no respect for it whatsoever. The caller that called said, “Well, what’s kept it going all this time? Is it the honor system?” And essentially, yeah. I mean, that’s a simplistic explanation, but, yeah. No matter what political party came into office, there was always respect for it. The left has always had problems (and if they could, they’d broom it and rewrite it), but there was always a reverence for it.

The point where I’m headed with this is separation of powers is the number one safeguard built into the Constitution by the framers. Separation of powers. Another way of describing separation of powers is the founders set up battles for power. They knew human nature. They knew Congress would be trying to get as much power as it could. They knew the president was gonna try to get as much power as he could. They knew the judges were gonna try to get as much power as they could.

That’s why they built in separation of powers. That separation of powers — believe it — is the number one safeguard they built into the Constitution. Number two, if you read the Federalist Papers, the character of elected leaders was paramount. Well, the separation of powers, folks, is evaporating. If I were Boehner, what I would be most livid about is this president just seizing legislative power left and right. I’d be so mad at the Democrats for letting it happen. The Congress has sat by on their hands while Obama has literally stolen legislative power, and they haven’t done anything about it.

That is just one of many things that would have me livid if I were Boehner.