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1) “The Obama stimulus package will not be a Christmas tree.” Joe Biden (not an exact quote).

2) “The roll of the Vice President will shrink.” said Joe Biden, when commenting on Cheney’s roll in the Bush administration. Charles Krauthammer pointed out how this was appropriate to the man who will hold the office.

Israel, after hundreds of rocket attacks, day after day after day after day, made a military strike against Gaza, killing nearly 300 people. Hamas threatens to unleashed hell to avenge their dead. Recall that Israel attempted to achieve some semblance of peace by withdrawing Israeli settlements from the Gaza strip back in 2005. The Palestinians gratefully responded by using that area from which to launch dozens of daily rocket attacks on Israel. Do you ever wonder what might happen if the Palestinians just stopped lobbing rockets into Israel? That would be known as peace.

1) So far, I have heard both Obama and Biden say that every economic expert, conservative and liberal, tell them that what our economy needs is a huge infusion of government money. Obviously, their experts are quite limited in scope and opinion. Almost every single conservative economist I have heard suggests lower taxes for businesses and individuals.

2) A $1 trillion dollar stimulus package will rank as the greatest singular government expense in US history, even adjusting for inflation.

Chris Wallace interviews Dick Cheney on FoxNews Sunday. Part 1 was pretty lame, but the rest of the interview was quite good (6 parts; part 2 is below):

According to Gallup’s annual poll, who are the most admired living male and female today? I am sure you can guess: Obama and Clinton. Who came in second? Bush and Palin (Bush did lag far behind Obama, however).

When asked a tax question, the IRS gives a correct answer about 50% of the time.

I have more of a question here, than a prediction. You make the prediction. Will the reporters at the next Obama news fest have the nerve to question him about his internal report? You decide. However, if a reporter has the nerve to ask, then Obama’s answer will be, “We have already released a complete report on that subject. I refer you to that. Now, do you have another question, so that you do not waste your question on material already covered?”

I believe that Caroline is a lock. As a conservative, I would just as soon see her as the Senator from New York as any other liberal. At least, she will probably not use public office in order to increase her wealth.

The newspapers and television stations have read the report and have informed us that Obama and his Chief-of-Staff, Rahm Emanuel, are innocent of any wrongdoing with regards to the Blagojevich scandal.

This is an internal study by lawyers talking with other lawyers about whether Emanuel did anything untoward when speaking to Governor Rob Blagojevich about filling Obama’s old Senate seat. From what I can read, it does not appear as if any of the principals (Obama, Emanuel or Blagojevich) were directly interviewed and, the day this report was released, Obama was in Hawaii and Emanuel was on route to Africa, meaning so that the press could not directly question either man.

Personally, I do not believe that Obama directed Emanuel to purchase Obama’s old Senate seat. Personally, I do not believe that Emanuel offered Blagojevich anything for this seat. However, given what we know about Blagojevich, all conversations and emails ought to be made public. I don’t want Obama’s lawyer, after talking to Emanuel’s lawyer, telling me, “Yep, they are both clean. Neither man did anything wrong.” This is a dangerous precedent, and most of the press seems to accept this report as legitimate and completely accurate.

Some time ago, George Bush or his aides were accused of making Valerie Plame’s secret service status public in order to get back at her husband. Would it have been legitimate for Bush’s counsel, Harriet Miers, to release and internal study saying, “The President and all the President’s men are clean”? That would have been unacceptable then, as this internal report is now.

They are marching in the streets and they aren’t going to let up until they are treated fairly, so why not give gay people the right to marry? Since this is only about 2% of the population, why not let them do it? How will that ruin marriage? And isn’t marriage messed up enough already? Gay marriage is not going to make marriage any worse.

First of all, this is a false premise. Gays can get married. Any gays couple of either gender can gather with their friends, have an elaborate ceremony, and call the union whatever they want to call it. Most states have some sort of domestic partnership arrangement, so all of the legal niceties of marriage are there. That is, your gay partner can come visit you in the hospital while you are dying and mostly unconscious; you can make all the medical decision for your gay partner; you can inherit their money, etc. etc.

What do gays lack? They lack the state stamp of approval. The state has not come in and said, “Your marriage is exactly like every other marriage out there.” The state has not proclaimed that, “Your marriage is exactly the moral and social equivalent of the marriage between a man and a woman.”

There are so many facets to this controversy that it is hard to know where to begin. First of all, gay marriage is not about gay marriage. Californians may recall how medical marijuana was passed, and there were all of these testimonies and sad stories about people suffering from cancer who had no other relief from pain other than medical marijuana, and how could we be so cruel as to keep them from this pain medicine? What happened? Marijuana drug stores popped up all over, and I don’t know what the numbers are, but I doubt that even 5% of the legal marijuana users are those people who were touted as the reason for medical marijuana. Anyone who wants marijuana can get it, all they need is a doctor’s prescription, and these can be had for a price and a 5 minute consultation. My point here, is, don’t think what you see as advertised as the hopes and dreams of gay couples all over the world as what is really at stake here.

The gay community has become a very vocal, in-your-face, yet politically savvy interest group. Once a state ratifies gay marriage as legal, the struggle will not be over. Gay marriage is only step one. They will use every means necessary, although much of it through the courts, as this is the easiest way to get legislative changes without going through the legislature. What do they want? They do not want anyone to tell them that homosexual activity is sin. Saying such things will be branded as hate speech (have you heard how Pastor Rick Warren is being characterized as a hateful homophone?), and such speech will be banned. Such passages from the Bible will no longer be allowed to be taught in churches. Lawsuit after lawsuit after lawsuit will be filed to attacked large and small churches with strained budgets. Many of these lawsuits will involve taxpayer dollars (the ACLU will become involved here), which means, they will have an unlimited budget to attack. Just as many school distracts are afraid to have Christmas pageants and to celebrate Christmas, to avoid nuisance and costly lawsuits, so will churches be caused to back down from teaching what is in the Bible. In case you doubt me, this has already taken place in other more liberal countries. And, in case you did not know, the ACLU is already fully behind hate speech legislation, although they obviously acknowledge the conflict between a hate speech ban and First Amendment Rights.

There are already ACLU lawyers filing suits to make, for instance, Family Day parades include gay groups.

What else? One end is to have gay marriage taugh in the public school as being on a par with heterosexual marriage, and presented at a very early age. Stories involving same-sex couples will become a part of grammar school curriculum (and this has already occurred here and there—one example is that story of the two princes read to grammar school kids).

Sexuality is going to become more of an issue and it will be a part of counseling sessions for children who either participate in a homosexual act or have given that some thought. If sexual experimentation is associated with members of the same sex, and if this occurs in formative years, such actions can lead to more homosexual acts. We all know that boys and girls treat their sexuality differently. If sexual experimentation is encouraged, or not discouraged, and if sexual experimentation becomes accepted, whether same sex or by opposite genders, such actions will have a profound effect upon our young people.

In case you doubt, there are hundreds of gay legal cases pending in schools all over the United States:

The key to this is gay marriage. Once marriage between gays is made equal in the eyes of the state to be equivalent to a traditional marriage, then these other things will all come to pass, probably as the result of lawsuits, and the changes which will occur in our public schools, is going to be profound.

Furthermore, gay couples will fight for and gain, by court mandate, parity when it comes to adoption. If gay marriage is legal, there is nothing which would make a gay couple adopting a child inferior to a straight couple adopting a child. How many gay men might get married if they knew this could result in adopting a young boy?

Women tend to be more sympathetic toward gays, and part of it is, they do not fully comprehend the sexual nature of men. A man who is gay does not have a feminine sexual drive; he has a very male sexual drive. Most of us understand how predatory the man can be; when a man’s sexuality becomes the definition of his very being (i.e., he sees himself as first and foremost a homosexual), his predatory nature, if anything, will become more intense.

Have you been to San Francisco and have you witnessed a gay pride parade? Have you noticed how there is a significant number of participants who are in-you-face gays, no matter who is looking and no matter what their age is. Realize that this in-your-face aspect of gay culture is not going to wain if gay marriage is made legal, it will be encouraged. Expect more gay parades in more cities and expect more gay-related lawsuits and expect more gay involvement in our schools and more gay couples getting more involved in the adoption process and in taking care of foster children. Gay marriage is the first domino. The other dominos all fall easily, as the courts will be forced to give full parity in all respects to gay marriage.

At this point in time, most of the arguments for gay marriage have already been dealt with. The gay partner who wants to be with his dying gay lover in the hospital is able to work this out. Inheritance, medical plans, etc. almost all are open to gay couples. Most states have some sort of a legal coupling for gay couples. If two gays want to have a lavish wedding and call each other “husband and wife,” or whatever, they can. If they want to identify themselves as Mr. and Mr. Smith, they can do that.

There is only one thing which stands between the continued political and social intrusion of gays into our lives, and that is the lack of legal gay marriage.

In the words of the famous western philosopher, Jim Carrey, when speaking of the love of his life, “I love Jenny very much, and we have a great relationship. And we've both been married a couple times. ... I like it the way it is [I believe they are not married], and I think she likes it the way it is. You know? And that's all we need. I really don't, at this point of my life, feel like I need to have the approval of someone in the collar or a judge to tell us that our relationship is sacred...or the state.”

If love and commitment and a forever relationship were the key to this, then every serious and committed gay couple would just simply recognize themselves as being married. They do not need to state to tell them that their relationship is real and sacred, and they do not need a clergy man or a judge to vindicate their feelings.

However, this battle has very little to do with romance; and a whole lot to do with politics.

People are no more born gay than born alcoholics. Identical twins were studied where at least one twin was gay. The findings were, 50% of their siblings were gay, which is far above the national average, but, if being gay was strictly genetic, it would be nearly 100% with one or two in denial. There is a genetic component in some alcoholics, but it is not 100% determinative; not every person with that same genetic disposition goes on to become an alcoholic. Those who do not drink at all, never become alcoholics.

There are definite sociological components in gayness which play just as much, if not a greater role in affecting a person’s sexuality.

What studies do show is, a child molester—particularly one who molests children before they reach puberty, is more likely to molest children of the same sex. Similarly, a higher percentage of male homosexuals engage in sexual relations with underage children than do heterosexual males, homosexual females or heterosexual females.

It is not complicated; deviant behavior often results in greater deviant behavior.

One liberal who no longer will speak to me once said, “You religious types just want to regulate what people do in their bedroom.” This is not true. My problem with gay marriage is, it is an irrevocable decision with automatic negative consequences. Once the state recognizes gay marriage as being equivalent to heterosexual marriage, two things will automatically follow: homosexual marriage must, by law, become a part of public school indoctrination. For liberals who vote for gay marriage, this is known as an unintended consequence. For gays who vote for this, this is an automatic result, which will be gained through the courts.

The second automatic result, which will not be something we can stop, will be parity in adoption. Two married men who want to adopt a pre-teen boy will be allowed to do so by law, by court decision; and there will be no voting on this. This is an unintended consequence for many supporters of gay marriage, but one which follows naturally by law. This is why many conservatives have no problem with some sort of a well-defined civil union, but draw the line at homosexual marriage.

The third result is, if homosexual marriages are seen to be the same as heterosexual marriages, there will be more lawsuits—some successful—which will make the teaching of some parts of the Bible a hate crime. How can you call something sinful which the law recognizes as being equal to a heterosexual relationship? It would be like saying, “A Black man is sinful.” It would be a hate crime, and many judges will rule that way. Teaching what the Bible says will become hate speech, in some places, and where it is not, there will always be the threat of lawsuit, which, by itself, will be expensive for a church to be involved in.

A fourth result would be, the end of there are psychiatrists, psychologists and institutions which will help homosexuals turn away from homosexuality. For a homosexual who wants to be rid of this lifestyle, the cure rate is slightly better than the cure rate for alcoholics who want to relief from alcoholism. People do leave homosexuality for good. Those who once practiced homosexual behavior do marry those of the opposite gender and raise good families. Are they tempted by their homosexual tendencies? I am sure that they are, just as a heterosexual husband is tempted by females to whom he is not married; they are tempted just as alcoholics are tempted to take a drink; they are tempted just as reformed drug addicts have a desire to take drugs. If such behavior is determined to be the norm, then groups which help a person escape this lifestyle will be classified as hate groups (just as Pastor Rick Warren has been defamed over and over again in the past week as a person of hate and/or a homophobe).

You will note, none of my arguments have anything to do with what adults to privately in their bedrooms. I could care less. At one point in time, our society understood certain things to be immoral, and we legislated against these things; and, at this point in time, a majority of our society does not see homosexual activity as immoral (or, at least, a majority do not want to regular it with law). There are very few Christians who want to regulate what occurs in the bedroom (I personally don’t know any, myself). We simply do not want an institution which has stood for thousands of years (marriage) polluted with redefining it; and we do not want the logically results which would go with a state recognition of gay marriage.

This is a slogan and, unfortunately, a lot of people think in terms of slogans. All law are the legislation of morality. For the longest time, most of our criminal laws could be traced back to the Ten Commandments. However, as time and society change, the laws change. What is moral in one generation is immoral in another, and laws are put in place to support what society has decided is right and wrong.

A simple illustration: when I was in grammar school, there would be no way that an openly gay person would be able to teach at any public school in the United States. At this point in time, there are laws in place to protect the jobs of gay people, including those employed by the public school system.

Laws are nothing more than a reflection of the norms and standards of a society at any give point in time.

Even the most basic concepts, e.g. killing. If someone can prove they were continually molested and they kill the person molesting them, in many courts, they can get off. Killing someone walking down the street will get you put in jail, but shooting two burlars on your neighbor’s lawn will not (not here in Texas). A doctor can make his profession the killing of unborn fetuses. He is not criminalized; he is very well paid.

It is the morality of the land, and we have been legislating morality since man began making laws.

Upholding a 5000 year institution like marriage as being between a man and a woman, will not prevent homosexual activity nor will it prevent people from having premarital sex. It simply defines the relationship of marriage as it has been defined from time immemorial. This institution has served mankind throughout all recorded history and has clearly provided stability to a society (as can be easily shown by comparing the behavior of children from a traditional family as opposed to children from nontraditional families).

Time and time again, societies of all different faiths have rejected homosexual marriages, bestiality, incest, and plural marriages. Show me one society which wholehearted embraces any of these, and I can show you ten which do not.

Conservatives oppose hate crime legislation because, even though all crime begins in the thinking of a person, we believe that a person should be judge and punished according to what they have done, not according to what they may or may not think.

The crime committed here in Texas where a man was dragged to death behind a vehicle is despicable. I don’t know if there is a punishment great enough to cover this crime. However, I think that the crime itself is sufficiently heinous for a jury to impose the strongest sentence possible, without there being additional hate legislation.

Part of our freedom in American is the freedom of association. If we don’t want to associate with someone because of their race, gender or sexual orientation, that is fine. If we don’t want to like a particular group of people, to me, that is fine. However, when a person commits a crime against someone else, regardless of their feelings and prejudices, let them be judged on the crime they have committed, and not on what they may or may not be thinking.

For many liberals, hate crimes legislation was a feel-good choice. They despise the crime and want to really stick it to the perpetrator. I am all for the punishment of crime. I live in one of the few states which practices capital punishment, and I think that is a good thing.

What I don’t want is for some jury to try to figure out what this or that criminal was thinking. Punish the crime. Passing more legislation may feel good, but it ends up placing additional burdens upon the prosecutor.

There are very few entities in this life more confused than a male entering puberty. I used to be a school teacher and the most difficult thing to teach is a young boy who believes he ought to say anything that he wants and do anything that he wants.

There are several components when it comes to raising a teen male child, and part of this is socialization. At this point in time, what is seen as the norm is a male/female relationship. Women, who are much different sexual creatures, and are far less likely to enter into a casual sexual relationship than a young man is. No matter what the standards are that young women adhere to today, in this realm, they are always going to be more particular and more reserved then a young male.

Now, let’s say that the school, seen as having all of the truth, begins to teach, from the primary grades, that a male/male sexual relationship is equivalent to a male/female relationship. Let’s say further that, any homosexual thought may be suggested as being possibly an indication of one being born homosexual. Do you think that there would be more or less homosexual experimentation? And, as studies have shown, homosexual behavior leads to more homosexual behavior. Even a child who is abused by an adult of the same gender is far more likely to go on to a homosexual lifestyle than one who is not.

Nothing is more politically correct than our public schools and no institution is more vulnerable to suit than our public schools. Again, gay marriage is going to be that first domino, but the results and repercussions are going to continue for many generations.

I watched Arnold Schwarzenegger pontificate last Sunday about global warming and he compared those of us who doubt man-made global warming as similar to those who believe that the earth is flat (and Arnold assured us that there are people out there today who believe the earth was flat). This man is an idiot! Or brainwashed. He blamed the increased California forest fires on global warming. Could an increased population have anything to do with it? Could increased building mean that more people are affected by fires than before? Are the environmental requirements which all for dry foliage to pile up around people’s residences a contributing factor? How many of these fires are man-caused? Nope, according to Arnold, it is all global warming related.

By the way, the Greeks knew somewhere between the 5^th and 3^rd centuries b.c. that the earth was round and they knew the circumference of the earth. The Bible speaks of the earth being round as far back as 800 b.c. The ancient explorers who came to America believed the earth to be round.

When listening the Arnold speak about the greatness of this country and all of its opportunities, he can be inspiring. However, when I watch him talk about global warming, I want to throw things at my television set.

Bush caused the economic meltdown, according to the New York Times. According to this article, although there were other causes, Bush’s home ownership program for everyone was the core problem.

From his earliest days in office, Mr. Bush paired his belief that Americans do best when they own their own home with his conviction that markets do best when let alone.

The sort of regulation done at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were the exact regulations which caused this meltdown. Mortgage companies would not have made easy-credit loans if the government had not (1) encouraged such lending practices and (2) purchased these loans. This practice goes back the the Carter administration with a lot of updating done by the Clinton administration.

Almost every single year, Bush went before Congress to reform FNMA and FHLMC (which institutions are at the root of this whole economic crisis), and the Democrats opposed it all of the way. In previous issues, I have provided YouTube links to Democrat after Democrat testifying as to how sound these multi-trillion dollar companies were and that you do not reform what does not need reforming (in their opinion). These facts are mentioned and dismissed, and manage to paint Bush as the culprit. The NY Times is no longer a newspaper, but a Democratic propaganda sheet. The article listed above was not an editorial; it was news.

I have seen my property taxes more than double over the past 5 or 7 years. The government now makes more profit on my rent houses than I do.

In 2 of the last 3 districts I taught in, they were top-heavy with administrators, all making higher salary than teachers and most of them justifying their positions by holding time-wasting meetings. At one school, we had literally 6 meetings a week, only one of which (the faculty meeting) had anything important. The rest only justified the existence of these non-teachers.

If the private schools can turn out better students at half the price, I know that our public schools could do the same at about 3/4ths the cost.

Another problem is, our schools have to turned into "college prep" schools, with an attempt to raise the standards of those with a high school diploma. That has failed miserably. You do not focus secondary education on 40% of the student population.

Low IQ kids need an appropriate education. When I first began teaching in Texas, I loved it. There were many alternative programs (hands-on programs), low level courses for weaker students (one year of math, often applied math, as a minimum standard), and there was swatting in the schools.

The lack of swatting and the requirement for each school to provide some education alternative has ruined discipline. "Raising the education requirements" results in two things (1) the college prep courses are watered down considerably; and (2) kids who do not need 3 years of college prep math (Alg 1, II and Geom) are highly frustrated and many of them drop out.

Here is what I am asking for: reduced high school grad requirements for some students; a greater variety of types of high school routes; school choice (which can allow for a different emphasis for various students); and lower taxes, which would result from school choice (as private schools can educate students for much less than the public schools can).

A man at the store asks the clerk: 'In what aisle could I find the Polish sausage?'

If I had asked for Italian sausage, would you ask me if I was Italian? Or if I had asked for German Bratwurst, would you ask me if I was German? Or if I asked for a kosher hot dog. would you ask me if I was Jewish? Or if I had asked for a Taco,

would you ask if I was Mexican? If I asked for some Irish whiskey, would you ask if I was Irish?'

With deep self-righteous indignation, the guy says, 'Well then, why did you ask me if I'm Polish because I asked for Polish sausage?'

Remember that lame AP release on global warming and that the increased cold proves that global warming is happening. A few scientists beg to differ with that analysis:

RUSH: There's a great column by Nicholas Kristof, published on Saturday in the New York Times. It's entitled, "Bleeding Heart Tightwads," and the essence of Mr. Kristof's column is how shocked researchers have been recently to learn that conservatives and Republicans are far more personally charitable of than liberal Democrats. He says, "We liberals are personally stingy. Liberals show tremendous compassion in pushing for generous government spending to help the neediest people at home and abroad. Yet when it comes to individual contributions to charitable causes, liberals are cheapskates." Now, Mr. Kristof, if I might interject here this is not compassion we're talking about. We're talking about hypocrisy. But, see, liberals cannot ever be called "hypocrites." Democrats will never be called hypocrites, either. He talks about a book by Arthur Brooks: Who Really Cares?

RUSH: Arthur Brooks is referenced by Nicholas Kristof in his Saturday New York Times column, "Bleeding Heart Tightwads." Arthur Brooks, by the way, is a guy that writes a lot of things, scholarly works. He's the guy who has chronicled how conservatives and Republicans are much happier people than liberal Democrats are. "Arthur Brooks, the author of a book on donors to charity, 'Who Really Cares,' cites data that households headed by conservatives give 30 percent more to charity than households headed by liberals. A study by Google found an even greater disproportion: average annual contributions reported by conservatives were almost double those of liberals. Other research has reached similar conclusions. The 'generosity index' from the Catalogue for Philanthropy typically finds that red states are the most likely to give to nonprofits, while Northeastern states are least likely to do so.

"The upshot is that Democrats, who speak passionately about the hungry and homeless, personally fork over less money to charity than Republicans..." Mr. Kristof, I must say, the fact that this surprises anybody is the problem. You guys live in your protected, cocoon-like worlds with all of your templates so that real-world truth is a shock. Conservatives have always known, instinctively, that Republicans and conservatives are far more personally charitable than liberals are. Liberals love to use other people's money to get their credit for compassion. "The upshot is that Democrats, who speak passionately about the hungry and homeless, personally fork over less money to charity than Republicans... 'When I started doing research on charity,' Mr. Brooks wrote, 'I expected to find that political liberals -- who, I believed, genuinely cared more about others than conservatives did -- would turn out to be the most privately charitable people."

Well, bingo! But there he proves our point. This pointy-headed guy, whoever he is, actually thought liberals did care more, because that's the template. That's the public relations. I can't tell you the number of times that people who care for me greatly will come to me and say, talking to me personally and as a conservative, "You've got to do something to change what people think of you, because you're really such a nice guy, and all these people out there think you're the worst thing trodding the earth today." Or, "You conservatives, you've got to get more PR about the good works that you do." I said, "What's the point of doing good works? Is it to get credit for it, or is it to do the good works?" There's a story (I guess it was yesterday, at some point during my show prep cycle) about all of the military people that George Bush and Dick Cheney personally visited, consoled, thanked, and spoke to over the years; both active military and their families.

And everybody is shocked, because they thought that Bush was this cold-hearted, mean-spirited guy who sent other people's kids off to die in battle and didn't care. Now, those of us who know George W. Bush know just the exact opposite. But Bush doesn't do it to get credit for it. Our culture today is largely built on perception, not reality, and this is a great illusion. The reality of personal charitable giving is that Republicans, conservatives, personally contribute twice -- more than double -- what liberals contribute privately, and yet everybody thinks they're the ones who care. Everybody thinks

they're the ones who are the good guys. You know, when people say to me personally, "Rush, why do all these people have these wrong perceptions about you? Why don't you do something about it?" I said, "What could I possibly do? They know. They already know the truth. They're not going to report it. They've got their templates."

Look, I'm hated and despised by these people because I'm effective. They're not interested in making me look good, and I don't do what I do to look good. I'm not in this for public relations. My whole career, what I do privately, charitably, I'm not into it for public relations. You know, the Harry Reid Smear Letter, that was a different thing. That was him trying to smear me and so forth with this "phony soldiers" business, but that was a giant national fundraising effort. It was not done to make me look good. It was done to embarrass Harry Reid and to raise money for the Marine Corps-Law Enforcement Foundation using a Harry Reid written-and-signed letter. Let me expand this, this whole notion that people in this country react to public relations (PR moves, image, and so forth), because we just elected a president on that basis. I hadn't planned on discussing this, so if I tend to stumble while putting my thoughts together, please forgive me.

But I have been watching this Bernie Madoff scandal unrolled before my very eyes, and for those of you who have been following it, you are well aware that lots of people where I live (Palm Beach, Florida) have either been wiped out or severely hurt, and have lost a tremendous amount of their worth. But the story goes even beyond that. This is a community of... There are three or four different Palm Beaches, and there's the Palm Beach of everybody's image, and that is of old blue-bloods who are about 105, who start sipping gin cocktails at 4:30 in the afternoon and still don't know that we won the Gulf War in '91 'cause it doesn't matter. That Palm Beach doesn't exist much anymore because those people have gotten old. Those people resented earned income. These are people that inherited family wealth from long, long, long ago.

They look down on earned income. They're not just here, but anywhere in the country where there's this level of society. There's another Palm Beach that features the sons and daughters of the blue-bloods, who wouldn't know how to work a day in their lives if they had to, so they depend on coupon clipping and this sort of thing. I never see any of these people, by the way. I only read about them, but I don't see them. The other two Palm Beaches are made up of an ever increasing younger demographic who are still working, but because of the prosperity of the US economy, are able to afford to live somewhere either here or near here. This group still works, and those people hang around with each other. Some are semiretired but they're certainly not the blue-bloods of the old past. Now, in the Madoff scandal, what is being highlighted here -- and I've always had a bugaboo about this

This is going to be a tough thing for me to explain, because I've thought about it for decades. I've been suspicious of it for decades, but I have never articulated it to anyone, certainly not publicly like this, 'cause it always seemed to be taboo because we're talking charities. But I've always been amazed at how one climbs the ranks of society by being involved in "charities." Many of these people don't donate a dime to the charity. They go out and raise money for a gigantic party, or series of balls or what have you -- where the women put on their finest clothes and jewelry and the men reluctantly, you know, stuff themselves into tuxedos; and they head to these fabulous places where the cost to put the whole thing on may be a million dollars and the net amount raised is a hundred grand. All of the newspaper society reporters are there. All of the photographers are there; all the phony baloney, plastic banana, good-time rock 'n' roller people who are impressed with people who have wealth.

They might be reprobates. They might be worthless. They might be mean. They might be dull, boring. But because they have a lot of money, they are fascinating and what they do is considered fascinating. So this creates a cycle where these sometimes dull, boring, dry, phony frauds that are not donating a dime but are going out there and asking everybody else to give them a dime, then get their pictures in the society pages and written up. And they massage the reporters and they try to get all this good stuff said about them. They try to get themselves on the boards of directors of a lot of charities. They create boards of directors and put themselves on these things. It's all image. It's all PR. And they get all this credit for caring -- and they are all liberal Democrats, the vast majority of them, and they're all empty suits. At the end of the day, there's nothing there.

The Madoff scandal is illustrating this. All these charities have been wiped out, and you have to ask yourself, "Was the money ever really there?" There was a lot of money running around, but all these people owed it to each other in one way or another. Did anybody ever really have it? And if they had it, did they give it all to Madoff, and did he then redistributed the profits that came in the door out another door? I'm spinning off of this story here about how conservatives are far more personally charitable than liberals, and yet liberals get all the credit. They get all the notice because they're on boards of charities, and they hold parties for charities. Hell, folks, try this. It gets to the point that retail outlets will hold a fundraiser for a zoo or something, and all the swells in town -- it's not just here, a number of places -- will show up to sip champagne, and donate 75 bucks or so, so that the baby jaguar can eat for another day.

It'll show up on the all the society pages and columns of how greatly contributing these people are, how compassionate they all are, when the whole point here is for the retail outlet hosting the thing to sell whatever they've got inside the store and to get publicity. It's all PR. There isn't a whole lot of substance to it, as this Madoff thing is illustrating. Some people -- with the highest of reputations, the most impeccable reputations -- are now toast 'cause they were associated with Madoff. I'll guarantee you: in the privacy of their homes, they're devastated, not just over the money that was swindled, but because of the loss of stature that they feel. I look at this, and I feel a little sad because the people who pursue stature to me are people who will never, ever be happy 'cause it's all external. It's all based on what you can craft as an image, which is what? What people think of you rather than crafting a life of substance and genuineness based on what you do, and who cares who knows about it.

In fact, a lot of people want to live that way. They want to live a little anonymously so as not to be browbeat when their charitable donations are discovered. I look at all the money donated to charity in this country and I look at all the tax revenue that's transferred to the needy, and I really don't understand why we have needy people. All of the charitable giving and all of the taxes and all the transfers... What is it now, seven to $8 trillion in just the Great Society alone has been transferred from producers to non-producers since 1964, and we've still got the same percentages of people in need. Every year a bunch of brand-new charities pop up, competing for the charitable donations, the charitable dollar, and we find that some of those are frauds. It's all about people trying to ingratiate themselves in some social structure someplace, in some social climate somewhere. In those situations, it's not the kind of person you are; it's how much money you have, and that's what's attractive about you, and I just think that's horrible.

Well, to each his own. I would just hate to be trapped in that kind of life. So we have all of these templates, all of these theories that conservatives are mean-spirited, rotten SOBs, cold-hearted and mean. Liberals are the giants of compassion, the giants of tolerance! It's just the exact opposite. Liberals are tightwads. They try to give a lot of money that's not theirs. Conservatives do a lot of things privately. Nobody knows about it because they're focused on the good works. Conservatives don't seek PR because it's very difficult to get it unless you go out and hire a PR firm, and even then that's a waste of time. Hiring a PR firm is an abject, utter waste of time. You know what a PR firm is going to tell you? I'll use myself here. It's easier to do that. Let's say I'm concerned about my public image, and I want it changed. I'm going to go out, and I'm going to hire the best PR firm I can. You know what they're going to tell me to do? They're going to arrange a meeting with the New York Times editorial board. This has happened to me.

Okay, then I fire them, 'cause there's no way that's going to change anything. I'm not gonna go groveling to some editorial board! It is what it is. And if you can't be made happy by the substance in your life -- if you have to rely on what other people think of you and phony baloney, crafted images -- then you are setting yourself up for some type of similar experience to those who got involved with Bernie Madoff. Maybe not on that big scale, but certainly on some scale.

RUSH: If you are a Limbaugh Letter subscriber, ladies and gentlemen, we had this story about how conservatives are far more generous than liberals on a personal level. In the May 2008 issue of the Limbaugh Letter on pages 12 and 13, what is amazing about it is that it's found its way into a New York Times op-ed by Nicholas Kristof, who has written a piece called, "Bleeding Tightwads." Now, Mr. Brooks also, the author of the book entitled Who Really Cares, writes this: "When my early findings led me to the opposite conclusion, I assumed I had made some sort of technical error. I re-ran analyses. I got new data. Nothing worked. In the end, I had no option but to change my views," which are, conservatives are more personally charitable by half, or by two times than liberals are. This guy tried everything he could to massage the facts, and he had to change his views. He also found this: "If liberals and moderates gave blood as often as conservatives, Mr. Brooks said, the American blood supply would increase by 45 percent." But then again we'd have to ask ourselves, do we want liberal blood coursing through the veins of otherwise innocent people?

CALLER: My opinion about why liberals don't give as much as conservatives is because deep in their heart, they believe that it's the government's job.

RUSH: Yeah, there's a lot of truth to that. Remember liberals, too, are people who get by. They really think they're good people just because they tell people they care. Liberals don't have do diddly-squat to fix anything. In fact, liberals can make it worse, but as long as while they're making it worse, they talk about how much they care; it's their good intentions, of course, versus their results. But I think if you look, Donna -- and this will be controversial to some, but that's what you expect when you hire me. I think you'll find religion is a (if not the) dominant key. I can't prove it. It's just my instincts here. I think religion and the notion of private, charitable works is a fundamental reason why there is far more personal charity from conservatives as opposed to liberals.

RUSH: Gail in Sioux Falls, I have one minute, but I wanted to get to you. Welcome to the program.

CALLER: Being one of your students, I hark back to about eight years ago when Dick Cheney divested himself of his holdings and gave I think nearly $7 million to charity, and I believe that Algore, the record that was made public was just a little under $400 dollars.

RUSH: And I think the number for Algore was $256. I might be confusing it, but you're right, it was less than $400. But, see, that's not hypocrisy. No, no, no, in the current realm, see, Algore cares. He spends his life helping other people. Not being cold-hearted. His whole public persona has been to help people. That's how this works.

CALLER: I had a question to the Madoff scandal. They are telling us, the news media and everything, that that money just disappeared. I thought maybe you were the expert that could tell me where in the world it disappeared to.

RUSH: All right, now, where do you think the money went? Let's use the figure $50 billion because that's what Madoff said. Nobody really knows yet how much, but let's use the $50 billion figure -- and it's a Ponzi scheme. You know what that is, obviously?

RUSH: No, it's very answerable. Let's walk through the steps here, because this is -- by the way, I don't blame you for asking. This is the one element of the story that the "exhaustive examinations" by the Drive-Bys have yet to answer. You have a $50 billion Ponzi scheme that starts whatever number of years ago. You go out to your original investors and they give you whatever, a billion dollars. And you have that billion, and you take your share of it as the schemer. You siphon off whatever you want, and then you pay whoever your runners are. The notion he was doing this on his own is difficult to believe. He had to have people hyping the business. And we know, we found out who they are. They were getting a point-and-a-half per investment, gross investment made by clients. And the way they were doing this is going out and telling people about these great returns this guy is getting and then denying them access to the fund.

You tell somebody (especially this crowd that thinks they're a cut above anyway) that there's something super-exclusive, outperforming anything and they can't get in, that just makes 'em want it more, and so you hook 'em. So he had a bunch of runners, he had a bunch of hookers that were getting these people in. The money comes in, and the runners, the rainmakers, they get their take. The schemer takes his and puts it someplace. He buys three yachts. He buys a corporate jet. He buys four homes. Then he buys his brother a home, buys all these things, and that creates the public image that, "Wow, is this thing really growing! Look at Bernie!" And then Bernie starts joining country clubs, starts playing golf with these guys and he starts joining these charities himself, and he starts showing up at all these charitable benefits in a black tie, and he's the toast of the town. He's making everybody rich -- and he's getting rich, understandably so. People don't begrudge him his five houses or four and his airplane, and his three yachts, one in the Med. Oh, four houses. He had one on the Cote d'Azur in the south of France.

RUSH: Well, he's not paying returns. What happens is that the first billion or whatever it is that comes in, Bernie lops off his share, and he does probably invest that money somewhere for a while. He keeps recruiting new money, Andrew, and what happens is these original investors are the ones that do get paid. The first people in the Ponzi people always get paid, but how did they get paid? In this case they got paid by seeing a financial statement that said their investment was growing at 10% a year, no matter what happens. They might have taken some cash out of it now and then, but the odds are they left it there. So the money that went in, Madoff got to do with it whatever he wanted, and this just kept going and going and going.

As new people sent money in the front door, Madoff would send out financial statements to his early investors showing these increased profits. If some of them wanted cash, he had the cash on hand to send to them. The money on paper actually went to the investors. What has happened is, we find out that it was all on paper. It was never actually really invested. What he had to do, what any Ponzi scam artist has to do is to keep taking money coming in the front door and giving a little bit of it away to the people in the backside who were the first in, in order to make it look like things are growing. Now, there was whatever it was, and that $50 billion is somewhere. It has not vanished. It's just not in the investment accounts that the investors put up that Bernie Madoff started for them. It is somewhere. It didn't just vanish. It vanished from those who had it. It was stolen from them. And, you know, Andrew, what brought all this to light was the market plunge.

In fact, the Democrat Party may have brought down Bernie Madoff with this October Surprise plunging market. Because even his robust clients (who thought he could do no wrong, who were seeing 10% increases while the market was down 30%) apparently enough of them got panicked at the same time and they made requests for redemptions, meaning they wanted their cash for these accounts that they thought they had, totaling $7 billion; and he didn't have it, and he couldn't raise it. He was feverishly trying to raise new money from new investors for his scheme, from China and from the Middle East, to cover that $7 billion. He could not get it. So when there was no cash, that's when he gave it up.

The money is somewhere. It's impossible for it to have vanished because it existed. And remember, some of the people who invested got some back early on. This was going on for years. You know that people have cashed out some of these investments and sold them. At some point, this had to be legit. There had to be a small share of it that was legit. There had to be some genuine investment in some genuine market instruments early on. After a while, after the early customers are satisfied, they then sell their reputation to Madoff. "Oh, yeah. When I need it, it's always there. You don't want to take it out, though. It's growing by leaps and bounds." So after a while, nobody wants it. They trust him totally because everybody doing business with him sings a song of his reputation that is just impeccable, unassailable. So the money is somewhere. That's what they're trying to figure out now in The Lipstick Building and the three floors that Madoff occupied.

RUSH: Well, you know, there's this thing called campaign rhetoric and this thing called politics. Sarah Palin was targeted for destruction precisely because she's effective, because she was rallying excited crowds that outdid Obama's. Obama's crowds were showing up just to be there. Sarah Palin's crowds showed up because of what she was saying, not how she was saying it. They showed up because they were genuinely thrilled to have somebody representing their point of view in a national campaign, and this scared a lot of people. It scared Republicans who are of the Rockefeller moderate stripe, the Colin Powell-Bill Weld Republicans. It scared Democrats and liberals. It scared the media. So she had to be destroyed. Folks, we're going to have to understand something. There's no such thing as an incompetent Democrat or liberal. Look, it makes total sense, common sense to compare Sarah Palin and her life with Caroline Schlossberg.

In a case of those two women, there is no question -- cut-and-dried, hands down -- who is the more qualified to serve in an elected position in Washington, DC. It's not even close! Yet Caroline Schlossberg is said to be qualified because of her last name, because of her DNA, because she's "a mother," and because "she cares." Look at this Clinton Massage Parlor Library Foundation. Look at the conflicts of interest! Look, ladies and gentlemen. Practically all of the oil nations and sheiks from the Middle East have thrown gobs of money at the Clintons. His wife is going to be Secretary of State. Talk about a conflict of interest? But it will not be a Clinton because where the Democrats are concerned, there's no possibility of ethics violations, except in the case of Blagojevich, and these are selected cases.

RUSH: You know, for all the talk, ladies and gentlemen, about the Bush administration and George Bush personally trying to manage his legacy with the automobile bailouts and other things, you can see here that the Democrats are already building Obama's legacy before he takes office. Wall Street Journal today: "Democrats Try to Lower Expectations -- Even as they depict a massive stimulus package as indispensable to turning the economy around, U.S. Democratic leaders..." Oh, by the way, speaking of that. Speaking of that, Obama has added to the number of jobs that he is going to "create or save." Remember it was two million. It was two million jobs he was going to "create or save"? Now all of a sudden, the Obama people are out there saying that he is going to save three million jobs. This comes, ladies and gentlemen, after last Friday. It's audio sound bite number one here, Mike. This comes after last Friday after I said this.

RUSH ARCHIVE: Now, remember, Obama promised to add or save two million jobs, remember? He first said he was going to add two million jobs, his policies would add two million jobs over the course of a couple years or so, and then he started adding the word "save" to the figure, add and save two million. Well, George W. Bush just saved two million jobs for him. The figure they're throwing around is that an auto bankruptcy would cost one to three million jobs. So you round that off, you get two million. Bush just saved 'em before Obama saves them again. So by the time we're finished here, we will have saved four million jobs because Obama will claim his two million.

RUSH: Do I know these people? I know these people like every square inch of my glorious naked body. I know what they're going to do. So Bush saves all these jobs; Obama has to up the ante, otherwise Bush gets the credit for it. So two million jobs are already "saved." Obama has now gotta save or create just a million in order to make himself appear (with Drive-By Media assistance, of course) of having outperformed even Bush. By the way, ladies and gentlemen, Mark Steyn had a brilliant syndicated column from Friday last week. It starts out... Since we're talking about bailouts of the auto industry, listen to some of the numbers that Mark Steyn reports in his column.

"General Motors now has a market valuation about a third of Bed, Bath And Beyond, and no one says your Swash 700 Elongated Biscuit Toilet Seat Bidet is too big to fail. GM has a market capitalization of just over $2.4 billion. For purposes of comparison, Toyota's market cap is $100 billion and change (the change being bigger than the whole of GM). General Motors, like the other [Big] Three, is a vast retirement home with a small loss-making auto subsidiary." What a way to describe the Big Three automakers: "a vast retirement home." He says, "The UAW is AARP in an Edsel: It has 3 times as many retirees and widows as 'workers' ..." Did you hear that, ladies and gentlemen? The United Autoworkers "has 3 times as many retirees and widows as 'workers' ... GM has 96,000 employees but provides health benefits to a million people," and the UAW, of course...

This is one of the things, you know, Barney Frank is trying to stick his finger in the dike for. He's trying to save the unions because the bailout is for the unions. The unions, of course, are going nowhere near anything like a concession. And there's nothing in the Bush plan that bailed them out that mandates that anybody do anything. They just kicked this can down the road to March so that Obama can do with it what he wants. GM has 96,000 employees, and provides health benefits to a million people. I know what some of you are saying, "Yeah, Rush, but GM made the deal." They might have made the deal, but it can't be sustained. That's just it. If you don't think this is one of the primary problems they're having, then you need to take your head out of the sand.

How do you make that math add up? If you've got 96,000 employees and you're providing health benefits to a million people, you're not going to make up the difference by selling cars. Mark Steyn reported: "Honda and Nissan make a pre-tax operating profit per vehicle of around $1,600; Ford, Chrysler and GM make a loss of between $500 and $1,500," per car. "That's to say, they lose money on every vehicle they sell. Like Henry Ford said, you can get it in any color as long as it's red." This is startling, striking information. So now with Obama upping the ante, ladies and gentlemen, on his job saving and job creation now to three million, the headline in the Wall Street Journal is "Democrats Try to Lower Expectations."

"Even as they depict a massive stimulus package as indispensable to turning the economy around, U.S. Democratic leaders are aggressively lowering expectations that the package will yield dramatic accomplishments quickly. Rep. David Obey, who is playing a key role in assembling the stimulus plan, which is expected to approach $800 billion, said recently that an infusion of federal spending is 'the only game in town.' But the Wisconsin Democrat, who is chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, was careful to add: 'The downward momentum appears too strong to end the recession anytime soon.' ... Democrats are facing an especially precarious version of that dilemma. In crafting a package that will sink hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars into the economy, they are apprehensive about the fallout if the economy merely continues sputtering along for several years.

And then they're going to have Joe Biden. Joe Biden is going to chair a middle class task force. This was one of his themes during the campaign. So we're going to have the federal government and a "task force" run by Joe Biden working on improving the middle class. I guess with, what, "targeted spending"? There's only two ways that you bolster members of the middle class, ladies and gentlemen. You either take those who are lower middle class or out of the middle class on the bottom and you elevate them so that they join the middle class. This is what capitalism does. The other way to bolster the middle class is take those who are above it and tax the hell out of 'em and regulate the hell out of 'em and confiscate as much of what they earn as possible so that their wealth declines, and then they end up in the middle class.

This notion that Joe Biden and Obama have a magic formula to help the middle class do something with targeted government spending, is absurd. It's been tried throughout history. It doesn't work. Capitalism is the only thing that's gonna work; unfettered, just-get-out-of-the-way capitalism, allowing the fruits of one's labors to be realized, reinvested, and so forth. Even Fareed Zakaria, wrote in the Washington Post yesterday: "For Obama to be remembered as a great president, he has to do nothing less than rescue capitalism." Tell me something. How in the world...? Fareed Zakaria is supposedly, by reputation, one of the smartest guys ever. Newsweek, CNN, Washington Post columns. He's got a book or something out there about how it's all over, the end of American dominance, because the rest of the world is rising up all around us, something like that.

How in the world do you look at what Obama's stated plans are and some of the wacko extremists in his cabinet... That's another thing. I'm getting a little weary here of the Drive-Bys pronouncing that all of his cabinet members are "moderates." This babe that's going to run the labor department, what's her name, Solis? What is her first name? Solis. The reason I ask is, you know, Patti Doyle Solis who used to work for Hillary. When I pronounce her name that way, I heard from all over the country, "No, no, no. It irritates Patti Doyle Solis." So it's spelled the same way as this babe. It's a Hispanic name. So that's why in today's Morning Update I pronounced it both ways, 'cause I don't know. I haven't heard it pronounced. I do not watch the news with the sound up.

It's bad enough watching the news with closed-captioning. I do not watch it with the sound on. I've never heard her name pronounced. I'm assuming it's Solis. But this woman has got ties to the Communist Workers Party. She's going to do whatever she can to unionize as much of the country. There's nothing moderate about any of these people that Obama has appointed on the domestic side, particularly when it comes to labor and a number of other things. How in the world, if you're one of the smartest guys in the history of journalism, in the history of academia, Fareed Zakaria, how can you look at what Obama is doing and say his number one charge is to rescue capitalism? It may be his number one charge to rescue capitalism, but I'll tell you something, folks. You don't do it with socialism.

RUSH: All right, folks, back to this business of the Democrats trying to lower expectations. No, no, no. That's not how it works. That's not how it works. You don't campaign on a Messiah platform where you're gonna lower the sea levels and you're gonna fix all these problems. You don't do that. You don't run around and make people think the world's going to love us. You don't run around and say all war is going to end and all these problems are going to be solved. You don't run around and do that. You don't campaign to get elected on that basis, "Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, by the way, it's going to be worse than even we thought; it's going to be a big, big problem." "Democrats have begun speaking of the long term, emphasizing their goal isn't merely to end the downturn but to change society and strengthen the economy for generations." They want to lower expectations so that you will go along with every emergency fix they come up with.

So the Democrats want to lower expectations. See, they're already trying to manage Obama's legacy before he even takes office. By the way, isn't this kind of like the guy running as Superman and telling us he's just Clark Kent? "I'm just Clark Kent, don't expect no leaping of tall buildings or nothing, no miracles here, I'm just old Clark Kent, you didn't elect Superman." The dirty little secret here, ladies and gentlemen, is that when you lower expectations, what are you doing? You're telling people it's going to be bad for a long time. I know how they're going to do it and the New York Times got the ball rolling yesterday with one of the most irresponsible pieces of journalism -- and that's saying something -- than I've seen in a long time, blaming Bush for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, blaming Bush for the housing crisis. They didn't touch on who started all this, Jimmy Carter. They didn't mention who elevated or expanded the program, Bill Clinton. They didn't talk about any of ACORN's involvement, shaking down banks. They didn't talk about the community agitators in Illinois, they didn't talk about Barney Frank or Chris Dodd, other than to mostly exonerate them, and of course this gives Barney the chance to go out there now and say, "See? See? It was Bush all along, it was Bush," and the White House to its credit is firing back on this.

They sent Dana Perino out there; they sent Ed Gillespie out there this morning. Gillespie said here's a company that's worth no more than junk bonds having to mortgage its own building to stay afloat, and I guess that's about what their work product is worth these days, junk, because this is classically untrue. So they're shifting all of this now to Bush, which we predicted. Everything that goes wrong is going to be laid at the feet of George W. Bush. When Obama is inaugurated, and when it's time to expand our troop presence in Afghanistan, and when it's time not to get out of Iraq, I can tell you what they're going to say. They're going to say, "Well, you know what, we didn't know all that we now know during the campaign. The Bush administration kept a lot of things from us. The circumstances are far more dire than we knew." Same thing is going to be said about the housing crisis. Same thing is going to be said about the credit crunch. Same thing is going to be said about the economy in general. In fact, that's what this lowering of expectations is really all about. "Well, it's far worse than we knew, we just weren't privy to information they didn't share with us."

But the real secret here is that by proclaiming an ongoing crisis that is going to be a long time to being solved, you keep the people in a crisis mode, you keep 'em depressed, you keep them thirsty and hungry for a fix, which means that Obama and his team will be allowed to do whatever they want in the name of fixing this crisis. And they want to do a lot. They want to spend and spend and spend, and they don't want to do this to rescue the economy. What they're trying to rescue is the Democrat Party. What they're trying to fix is the Democrat Party, and I don't say this lightly, and I'm not trying to be funny with this. FDR got this ball rolling with the New Deal. The New Deal didn't solve anything. It prolonged the Great Depression. Obama is set to follow in his footsteps. What did it do? It cemented Democrats in power for 50 uninterrupted years in the all-important House of Representatives. And it set them up for practically running the show. There were interruptions, but for 54 years they never lost the appropriations power in Washington. And that's what they want to get back to. The loss of the House in 1994, for all those years up through 2006, stung them more than anybody knows. They and their birthright are power. They are not meant to be out of power, and they were for 12 years. They were wandering aimlessly in the deserts.

Now they've got it back, and they are going to grow it. They're going to cement it, and they're not going to give it up. Like Rahm Emanuel said, "This is too big a crisis to waste. We got a great opportunity here to implement what we want to implement," which is government control over as much of the free-market economy as possible so that whatever you want you have to go somewhere in government to get. Of course the risk they run is overreaching, overreaching too soon and too fast. The American people have very high economic expectations. That's why small recessions make everybody so mad. The American people's economic expectations are very high, and what Obama and his team plan on doing, especially here now by lowering expectations, is going to make people upset and angry because there's still a sizeable number of people in this country who understand that their prosperity does not go through Washington, and they don't want to have to go through Washington in order to become prosperous, and it's going to irritate them. So they probably will overreach. I don't know when or how long it's gonna take, and the problem is they might overreach after a point has been reached that there's not much can we do about it.

The 2010 elections are going to be pretty important in this regard, so we hope that they overreach pretty fast, and it sounds like they're going to. Keep your eyes on out there, folks. Democrats are making the case that it's bad now but our fixes will be in place for years to come. And they mean that. It's bad now, but our fixes are going to be in place for years to come. That's exactly what they're hoping for, just as FDR's fixes were in place for a long time. This is about rescuing the Democrat Party and returning it to power indefinitely. "Officials are casting doubt on an early projection that four million to five --" what, it was six million that were going to show up for the inauguration. They're casting doubt on that now. "Casting doubt that four to five million people could jam downtown DC on Inauguration Day, saying it's more likely that the crowd will be about half that size." Now, keep that in mind. What is half of five to six million? Two and a half to three million, right? Keep that number in mind. I just read you the opening paragraph, okay, and the headline: "Inauguration Day Crowd Estimated Reduced by Half."

"D.C. authorities said the earlier estimates, provided by Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D), were based on speculation surrounding the historic nature of the swearing-in of Barack Obama as the nation's first African American president. After weeks of checking with charter bus companies, airlines and other sources, they're reassessing." Oh, really? They're reassessing. They made bets based on speculation. These guys sound like the same people that deal in the oil markets. "'It's more of an art than a science,' City Administrator Dan Tangherlini said. 'The fact is, earlier it was speculation. Now we're beginning to flesh it out and what the physical capacities of the system are.' The Secret Service has dismissed the high-end estimates of 4 million to 5 million people. But there is universal agreement among security officials and planners that massive numbers of people will flock to the swearing-in of Obama (D), who had drawn huge campaign crowds."

Now, listen to this. This is where it gets interesting. Remember, now, the headline: "Inauguration Day Crowd Estimated Reduced by Half." Officials casting doubt on early projection, four million, five million, six million people jam downtown. Go now to the next paragraph, "Turnout could easily reach two million." Two million is just one-third of what they were speculating. The two million would "far outstrip the 400,000 who attended the 2005 inauguration of President Bush. Although it is possible that 5 million people will descend on the area in the days leading up to the inauguration, it appears unlikely that trains and local roads could get them all to the Mall and parade route Jan. 20, officials said." Yes, we're back to four to 500,000 now, whatever the crowd is. If the crowd is 25, it will be reported at 401,000. The crowd's going to be bigger than Bush '05 no matter what happens. This is classic Drive-By Media, classic, report six million, the sea levels will fall, all of these wonderful magical things are -- uh, uh, uh, maybe two million, tops. We don't have the facilities to get any more than that down there on the parade route on the Mall, but you let this image of a nation that cannot be kept away from Washington on Inauguration Day, and it's all part of the strategy to make this guy Superman when he's telling us he's only Clark Kent.

Dems work to lower Obama expectations (remember, Obama has already promised us that the seas would recede and the planet would begin to heal once he becomes president, so the expectations need to be dialed back big time):

Remember how Peggy Joseph will no longer have to worry about putting gas in her car or paying her mortgage:

CALLER: I have a problem, a very serious problem. I'm a fourth generation American and what's happening to the American automobile companies is, to me, beyond belief. I just can't believe that three companies that made this country what it is -- and certainly have contributed in many, many different ways -- are almost on the path of going down the tube, which really blows my mind. The average American is absolutely madly in love with his American car, and I just can't understand how people will --

RUSH: Or are they just buying them because it's like wearing a ribbon saying, "Hey, look at me! I'm a big, caring person."

CALLER: Well, I don't know about that. I'm not smart enough to know what people buy cars for or what reason, but all I know is --

RUSH: You want the most expensive one you can afford because it's reliable. Depending on how large your family is, you want it big enough to cart them all around.

CALLER: Well, but the point I'm getting at is if the American automobile companies go out of business, I don't think anybody's going to have enough money to buy a car from anybody, quite frankly. It looks to me like the country will go down the tubes. I may be wrong.

RUSH: It's not that. See, this is the problem. General Motors, these companies are not that big anymore. Do you know that in terms of stock price, Bed, Bath and Beyond has a larger market cap than General Motors?

CALLER: Don't you think a lot of that has to do with the media and what's been going on?

RUSH: Yeah, but it is what it is. Whoever's driven down the stock price has given driven down the stock price.

RUSH: Don't worry. The automobile industry is not going to go kaput because the United Auto Workers will not be allowed to go kaput.

RUSH: After the government invests and nationalizes the auto industry, the Obama administration, out of a sense of compassion, will transfer ownership -- free of charge, just transfer the deed -- to the United Auto Workers.

CALLER: Yeah, it's too bad. It's a shame. But however there are a lot of people like myself who are still madly in love with the American automobile companies and what they have given us through the years.

RUSH: I'll tell you something else. By the way, full disclosure here. General Motors is a sponsor, a proud sponsor of this program, and we're proud to have 'em.

RUSH: But I have to tell you something. This notion that General Motors is making cars that nobody wants and is making cars that are worthless is simply absurd.

RUSH: They have revitalized the Cadillac line, and they're getting no credit whatsoever for it. They have remade that whole brand.

RUSH: I wish 'em luck in doing the same thing with other brands. There are some fascinating Chevrolets out there. You wouldn't think they're Chevrolets based on what they looked like ten, 15, 20 years ago. To say that they're making cars that nobody wants is crazy.

RUSH: If people had the money, they would keep buying those SUVs and pickup trucks. There are all kinds of cars General Motors is making that people want.

RUSH: But they're being forced to make cars that people don't want with all these ridiculous CAFE standards. I'm telling you, when you've got... Try this. General Motors has 96,000 direct employees and over a million retired people being paid by General Motors. They're former employees, and GM is paying their health benefits.

RUSH: Now, at some point, it's gonna implode. It doesn't matter how quality your cars are.

CALLER: Well, they are quality, 'cause I just went to the automobile show in Miam'a recently and I tell you, the cars were magnificent. I was impressed.

RUSH: Yeah. The thing about those auto shows... I used to go to 'em when I lived in places where they had 'em, and I always thought every automobile company in the world made the biggest mistake by bringing in the sharpest-looking, sleekest-looking car of the future and never making it. Why show it to us? You know, our memories collect. "Well, they're not going to make that. They're not going to make that. They show us this, and it never happens. Why even show these prototypes?"

"Well, this is to show the advanced techniques the auto companies are working on."

"Make the car! If you're going to show it at the auto show, make the car. Put it in the pipeline."

"Look, Chrysler comes out with the PT Cruiser, and within months, Chevrolet has its version. What is this, 'It takes years to ramp up production of a new model'?"

"Well, Rush, what happened is that General Motors hired away the Chrysler designer who designed the PT Cruiser."

It doesn't matter. You were still able to ramp up production of the Chevrolet version of it and get it out, and people are buying it. It's a mysterious business. I think, basically, General Motors and Ford and Chrysler have become retirement homes; and they have a subsidiary business, which is manufacturing cars. That's how Mark Steyn characterized it in a column on Friday. It makes total sense when you look at it. We've even had Rick Wagoner. He said, "I didn't know when I took the CEO job here that I was gonna become an expert in health care." But it is what it is. All these mandated standards -- requirements, emissions, mileage -- all this crap put on by a bunch of lug heads like Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi who haven't the slightest clue what they're doing, other than to punish successful American corporations. Thanks for the call out there, Bob, I appreciate it.

RUSH: I want to expand my thought process on this whole Madoff thing and take it into the realm of the current economic crisis, because, quite naturally, all this fascinates me. It's about money. Well, it's all of our money here, folks, that's literally being tinkled away, and I've been asking myself, "How in the world did we get to this point when it all seemed to happen so overnight?" Now, I understand that there were foundational problems that we were being told of as far back as last summer and in spring, but if you search your memory bank you will conclude that a lot of this appeared to happen within a month, starting in October. Now, the Madoff thing is larger and more vast than anybody realizes. The New York Times on Saturday had a front-page story. I printed it out, and it was 11 pages, had 11 contributors. It was written by one person, had 11 different reporters around the world digging up data. Money from Abu Dhabi was put into Madoff's fund, from China, from Indonesia, from Singapore. He was in the process of shaking down the Chinese when the thing blew up, Chinese businessmen. It was huge. It was so huge no one person could possibly have done this for all these years. This required a whole team of people, even with false and phony monthly statements to the so-called investors.

But the group of people that were most -- at least in America and in Europe -- the group of people that were most affected by this were these people, sad to say, who structure their lives on a public relations basis. "Look at me. Notice how wonderful I am. Look how charitable I am. Look at the boards I am on, look at how I dress, look at me sitting in my antique car in a picture taken by a newspaper photographer. Look how cool I am. Look how they describe the way I live. I have elegant suits. I have an aristocratic aura about myself, and my wife is just as equally aristocratic, and our children." I've never thought any of it was real. I thought it was all contrived. Some of the money does go to charity and the charities do exist, and some of these charities do good works. But did the people involved really care about the charities? Or was it all about them? I think it's all about them. And when you make it all about you, you are ripe to be ripped off; you are ripe to be swindled.

When somebody comes along that's got this super exclusive club that's closed and you can't get into it but you think you're something special, and the big allure is being in something so exclusive that nobody else can get in it yet you can brag about being in it. All these phony baloney, plastic banana, good-time rock 'n' roller reasons for doing things. And the first people that go belly up, unfortunately, are these people that live not on substance but on symbolism and image. We just, by the way, elected a guy who does this. But that's for another day. Madoff is what it is. When I got old enough to start reading all of the newspaper besides the sports section, when I started reading society pages, none of it made any sense to me. I said, "Who are these people?" The stories about them made them sound like from the moment they got up 'til the moment they went to bed, everything they did was charitable. It didn't seem real, but I couldn't put my finger on why 'cause I didn't know anybody like this where I grew up.

When I started this program in 1988, up 'til that time nobody who knew me personally hated me. But a month after I started this program I was hated by half the country. I was totally taken aback. What is this? Nobody thinks I'm what the press says I am. I started noticing the people who got universal love and appreciation and respect. I noticed that they were all involved in charity, they were all very wealthy, or thought to be, they all had structured lives where their lives were really not about them, but their devotion to others. Even their lines of work were oriented to help others. It took me awhile to become educated and informed enough 'cause I was so naive about all this, to understand the game, and now I live amongst whole bunch of people who play the game. I don't know them, but I read about them every damn day and I see all their pictures at all these stupid events that are organized just for pictures in the paper. The secondary purpose is to generate some money for the charity. Now a lot of them have been wiped out and I feel horrible for them. I don't have any schadenfreude about this. There are a lot of people, you go to websites that run Bernie Madoff details, and you'll find some of the meanest -- I mean some people are happy these people are wiped out, just ecstatic. "Good, let 'em find out what it's like to live like the rest of us." A lot of these people did earn their money legitimately. They just threw it away with this scam artist.

Now, remember, the root of this is this Nicholas Kristof column that got all this started today, Saturday in the New York Times. Arthur Brooks and a book that he wrote about how stunned he was to learn that the most personally charitable people in America are conservatives. Who don't do it for show. It's a stunning bit of news because they wouldn't get credit for it anyway if they tried to, credit being accolades in the Drive-By Media. So it expanded on that to a discussion of what's real? Look at all of these empty suits, all these institutions and traditions that we have all this faith in, now we all have nothing but doubts about them. And we're wondering, no matter where we put our money, however small or large our nest egg is, is it going to be safe? Is it safe in the bank? Is it safe with a hedge fund? Is it safe with a money manager? All these questions arise. That got me to thinking about the overall financial collapse. You know, I've said on this program -- you might have thought I was joking, and I wasn't -- that this financial collapse, the stock market plunge, the housing crisis, this may be the best October Surprise that has ever come down the pike.

I don't know that there can ever be a better one. Yeah, the stock market started precipitously falling, and it went wacko real soon. Then the bottom seemed to fall out of the housing market, and then the banks had nothing, and there were runs on banks, and then there were people that were getting worried about -- we had a couple, like Lehman Brothers was not bailed out, AIG was. And then the first $700 billion bailout, the TARP money, the build up to that was "it's a crisis." I mean even educated, informed media people, not on the left, were going on television imploring people to support this. "Do what you can. We don't have a moment to waste to save America." And I remembered back to something that a lot of people have forgotten. I'm operating under the premise here that a lot of this is an October Surprise.

By the way, I have a little story here. Do you know that the Treasury secretary, Hank Paulson, was giving Bernie Madoff and his associates personal briefings on the market as it was plunging through a political action committee? So the regulators were telling Madoff in advance where we're heading, what's happening. I'll give you details on it in just a second. And then Mr. Snerdley reminded me, it was Chuck Schumer -- when was this, in September? Early October? It was sometime in the fall. We'll double-check it. Chuck Schumer started a run on a California bank. Schumer said, (paraphrasing) "It's my responsibility, people have to know the health of our financial institutions." And so whatever this bank was in California, people started a run on it because a United States Senator on high-ranking committees had told 'em their bank was worthless. And I'm just wondering -- of course, this cannot be proven. It was IndyMac in late June. All right, so it was preconvention, and that's when all of this started, when people started losing faith in their own bank, "Oh, my God, Indy bank in California, Indy bank?" And there was a run with people standing in line, started by Chuck Schumer, and he was asked about it, and he denied it, "No, we're just trying to protect the solvency and the safety of Americans' assets out there."

Within days of Chuck Schumer starting this run on IndyMac, $1.3 billion had been taken from the bank, people had taken that much out, the Feds, the FDIC had to step in there and stop it to save the bank, because there was such a run. It was started by Chuck Schumer. Now, just cut to the chase here. Back to this October Surprise. I am just wondering -- as I say, it can't be proven -- I'm just wondering if a lot of this was by design, to create economic panic, remember now, the Iraq war had dominated everything, and the economy was said to no longer be an issue in the campaign, for the first time. Corruption, other things were, ethics, when the Republicans had those problems, but the economy wasn't. They wanted to create economic crisis, a mind-set of this. So Chuck Schumer goes out, starts a run, a $1.3 billion run on IndyMac, and then all of us, look what we learned, all these mortgages are worthless, all the mortgage derivatives and the mortgage backed assets, they are worthless, everything was worthless, there was no "there" there. Every institution, every guy in the institution was an empty suit, and we had to bail out this and bail out that and it didn't help.

I just wonder if what was a planned attempt to scare people economically, start a little run on a bank and do this, that, and the other thing, has now spun so far out of control, it's gone so far beyond what the intention was, just to win an election, that nobody knows what to do about it now. The only mitigating argument against that is that the number one, the primary beneficiary of this -- and you have to look, even in an economic collapse like ours, there are beneficiaries. Who's benefiting? Who is benefiting? Aside from the people being bailed out, the Democrat Party and Barack Obama are benefiting. They got elected, they increased their numbers in the House, they increased their numbers in the Senate, they got the White House now, and they've got a crisis that people think can only be fixed with the almighty and powerful government interceding to save this or to save that or to do whatever when in fact the government is going to nationalize the automobile industry, gonna nationalize some banks, is gonna nationalize the mortgage industry, and may end up nationalizing the automobile industry. And everybody is sitting around arguing on the merits, "Oh, God, glad they did it, oh, I'm glad they did it, oh, thank goodness, they saved the UAW, they saved the auto companies."

Everything has been presented to us, "We can't let this fail; it's the end of America." We recently learned also that the Treasury secretary, Hank Paulson was cited talking about how bad the economic conditions were, was wrong. The numbers that he was given to cite how rotten the economy, they were wrong just before we did the $700 billion TARP bailout. But doesn't matter, we've done it, and now TARP has become United Auto Workers bailout. People are sitting by letting this happen with great hope, by the way, that it will fix what's wrong. Miraculously the stock market will rebound. So the Obama team and the Democrat Party are benefiting tremendously from this, even if it has spun outta control. If it's spun outta control they'll make due with the new crisis they've created a la Rahm Emanuel. But the reason I think it has spun a little bit out of control and gone a little further than they intended is that even the Obama people are saying, "Hey, it's going to be really bad for a really long time."

RUSH: Here are the details: "Pasadena-based IndyMac, with $32 billion in assets, was seized by the government Friday." This is an LA Times story, July 13th. "The loss-ridden mortgage lender had faced an outflow of deposits since Schumer on June 26 made public a letter he sent to the Office of Thrift Supervision and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., saying he was 'concerned that IndyMac's financial deterioration poses significant risks to both taxpayers and borrowers.'" Now, here's Chuck Schumer, Senator from New York, who sends this letter and then makes the letter public, and this causes a run on IndyMac.

"Schumer's decision to go public with those comments," I'm reading from the LA Times, "triggered a firestorm in Washington. Regulators on July 2 said he was contributing to 'rumors and innuendo' about the bank that could hasten its demise. On Friday, regulators specifically fingered Schumer for IndyMac's failure." So regulators say that a Democrat Senator caused a bank failure in late June that transpired into July, into the conventions and into the campaign. So I'm thinking October Surprise, and I'm thinking it has spun outta control. It's gotten worse than any of these people thought it was going to get and they don't know what to do now. Well, they do know what to do. Spend, spend, spend, spend! "Heeeey, look what we've got here. Crisis! We can maximize it."

RUSH: I was talking to Snerdley during the break. Snerdley was rubbing his hands together, he's sort of excited about the inauguration, and he asked me this question, he said, "How long do you think it's going to be before these Obama voters realize that it was all smoke and mirrors?" I said, "What do you mean?" "Well, I mean, Rush, I've talked to some of these Obama people. They really think the world is gonna change; they think everything's magically going to change." I said, "And they will continue to think so." "No, it won't change!" He said to me, "Things are going to get worse, even Obama is saying they're going to get worse. They're not going to get better. None of what he said is going to happen is going to happen." I said, "You're missing the point. The people you're talking about who voted for Obama are delusional in the first place. Once you're delusional, you're always delusional." I said, "Why do you expect these people to become rational about 30 minutes after noon on January 20th?" "Because they're going to see that their lives aren't any better." No, wrong. They're going to continue to delude themselves into thinking their lives are better. But they won't be. It doesn't matter. He's going to be there. It's a cult.

If he told them they were all going to go to the Hale-Bopp comet, they'd jostle to be first in line. As long as he's there, this group of Obama voters, as long as he's there, they could lose everything and still think the world's getting better because he's there, and he's telling them, and it's just his air, it is his manner of speaking, plus they know what a beefcake he is underneath the shirt and tie now. Even though he might lose the Drudge poll, it's just going to make them love him even more. I mean, dueling socialists here on the Drudge page, it's hard to figure out on what basis people are voting. Putin does look a little flabbier to me. Both are in shape, but Putin has the pasty white skin of the KGB that never sees the sunlight living in Russia. You know, vodka stretch marks down there, but still, Putin pulling away, what is the vote now? Twenty-six nine to sixteen eight, in terms of thousands, 43, almost 44,000 votes. I think Drudge only put this thing up at ten o'clock or 11, so people are pouring in madly to vote on this. But seriously, as long as he's there doing press conferences appearing in public these people are going to think just because he's there, everything is getting better, even if it isn't for them.

I don't know what percentage of Obama voters those are but there's quite a few of them. If you're expecting those people to wake up one day -- this is like expecting the media to change their mind, Snerdley. When do you think that's going to happen? You think the media wants to drum this guy into trouble and have no more trips to Hawaii? Is this going to be the getaway White House? You know how far Hawaii is? It's a ten-hour trip out there from the Right Coast. Depending on winds, it could even be longer.

RUSH: This is a Kathleen, a cell call from Miami at the airport there. Hey, Kathleen, nice to have you here.

CALLER: Hi, Rush. Thanks for taking my call. Well, I just think that, you know, Obama must wake up every morning and think, wow, I'm about to be the most powerful man in the world.

CALLER: Well, yeah. But he tips toward the arrogance, and I don't know, he's got four years, so I think he might become a little overwhelmed by his female followers.

RUSH: Just talking to Snerdley about that, there's nothing he's going to be able to do to disappoint the cult followers that he has. Their lives could hit the sewer, and as long as he's still president, they will think that America and the world and their lives are better just because he's there.

RUSH: Barney Frank, ladies and gentlemen, still fit to be tied over Rick Warren being nominated to say the prayer at the inauguration.

FRANK: Singling someone out for the honor of giving the inaugural prayer I think is inappropriate. I think Rick Warren's comments comparing same sex relationships to incest is deeply offensive, wildly inaccurate, and very socially disruptive. And I'm glad he is talking to the Muslims, I'm glad everybody is talking to everybody. We're not here talking about not having conversations, we're talking about singling somebody out for a great honor, and I think the president-elect made a serious mistake in doing that.

RUSH: Barney, this is the second time he's had a problem with Obama. What was the first time? It's not Rick Warren. What was the first time? Something about the bailouts or some such thing, oh yeah, he wanted Obama to step in now, he wanted Obama to step in now and start doing things, rather than wait. Andrea Mitchell, NBC News, Washington, was talking to Congressman Frank, and after this answer that you just heard, even though you might not have understood the words, she did. She said, "Well, why do you think Obama invited Pastor Warren?"

FRANK: Oh, I believe that he overestimates his ability to get people to put aside fundamental differences. I'm a great admirer of the president-elect. I'm delighted he is elected. I think this is going to be the best time in American public policy since the New Deal with Mr. Obama in the lead. But my one question is, I think he overestimates his ability to take people, particularly our colleagues on the right and sort of charm them into being nice, when he talks about being post-partisan, having seen these people and knowing what they would do in that situation, I suffer from post-partisan depression.

RUSH: I have to say, Barney's worried about Obama's own new tone. But Barney, don't, it's just PR. Rick Warren will never see the steps of the Capitol again during the Obama administration. After the prayer he'll go back to Saddleback Church and do what he does. This is PR. This is setting the table for getting as many people to sit back and let him make as much socialism as he can. You guys on the left are going to have to temper this and calm down. You're going to get more than you expect to get. (interruption) Who's Barney Frank talking about? (Barney Frank impression) "I love these people, (unintelligible) best time in my life (unintelligible) public policy (unintelligible)." I don't know who he's talking about, doesn't matter. He's a little upset here. Rick Warren, by the way, had a message last Saturday night at the eighth annual Muslim Public Affairs Council convention. Are there gay Muslims? Because, you know, Ahmadinejad said there aren't any in Iran. Here's what he said.

WARREN: Now, this one will shock you. I happen to love Democrats and Republicans, and for the media's purpose, I happen to love gays and straights.

RUSH: Oh, there you have it. That was Rick Warren Saturday night, Long Beach, eight annual Muslim Public Affairs Council convention. Barney Frank, these guys, they just literally cannot wait to get their greedy little hands on this money. Barney Frank, who should be in the process of being investigated, is demanding and preparing legislation to require that some of the money in the TARP fund, unspent so far, be spent for specific purposes, like stemming foreclosures and reducing mortgage rates. He wants all the money released. He wants it to go to affordable housing and he's fit to be tied out there.

CALLER: I had to first start out: in 1992 I had a friend that turned me on to your talk program, and I hated you. I hated you with a passion. I didn't like the way you talked and all that.

RUSH: I know what it was. I know what it was. What you found abrasive was that I was so damn sure of myself. The confidence, that can rub people the wrong way sometimes, 'cause they hear that as arrogance and braggadocio.

CALLER: But in 1997 I took on to being an over-the-road truck driver. One day I came on your program and ever since then, I'm hooked on you. A couple months ago you had that lady that had to take heart pressure medicine. Remember that?

RUSH: Oh, yeah. (laughing) Yes. She needed blood pressure medicine because of this program, and yet she could not stop listening to it.

CALLER: Yes, sir, and I'm the opposite. I need my heart medicine because I can't find you on a radio station. E'heh.

CALLER: There are a lot of dead spots. But I like to wish you a very Merry Christmas and --

RUSH: I appreciate that, sir, but you did it on your own. Don't forget to credit yourself here in this homecoming.

CALLER: Yes, sir. Thank you. The reason I called is since I'm a truck driver, "Flying J..." I just printed a thing off the Internet. "Flying J Files Chapter 11 Bankruptcy; Truck Stops Remain Open." According to Bloomberg, they made $16 billion in 2007. All these companies that are filing for Chapter 11 are complaining they're running out of money. Why, all of a sudden, are they broke? This truck stop... You know, you go into a truck stop now, and you're spending almost $2 for a glass of tea. Why can't they get their heads together and figure out to lower the prices on what they sell?

RUSH: At some point they may end up doing that. I personally have never filed for bankruptcy, even though it's becoming a status symbol. I haven't done so. Now, there's two kinds. Well, there's more than two kinds, but the two in question are Chapter 11 -- and if that's what these truck stops you're talking about are doing, Chapter 11 means you don't go out of business; you just reorganize. And Chapter 11 means that some of the people you owe are not going to get paid all of what they owe. You do a reorganization, and a priority list of who of your vendors needs to get paid and so forth. It is a reorganization and a restructuring that puts the business back together on a sound footing. Chapter 7 is liquidation. That's when they shut you down. Chapter 11, you keep operating. The whole point is to stay in business. But all these Chapters Elevens... The line of people with their hands out trying to get their money from the TARP fund is increasing. It's becoming disheartening. But it's human nature, and it's understandable.

Conservative Review
Issue #55	Kukis Digests and Opines on this Week’s News and Views	December 28, 2008

Date	Country	City	Deaths	Injuries	Details
12/25/2008	Iraq	Bishkan	1	1	A 13-year-old is murdered in her home by Jihadi invaders.
12/25/2008	Iraq	Baghdad	4	24	Sunni extremists bomb a restaurant, killing four patrons.
12/25/2008	Iraq	Muqdadiyah	3	12	A Fedayeen suicide bomber takes out three other people.
12/24/2008	Pakistan	Lahore	1	4	Muslim bombers take out a woman along a city street.
12/24/2008	Philippines	Kalamansig	1	0	Moro Islamists fire at a motorboat, killing a passenger.
12/24/2008	Iraq	Fallujah	3	4	Three children are killed in a suspected al-Qaeda roadside attack.
12/23/2008	Thailand	Pattani	1	7	An Islamist shooting and bombing leave one dead and seven injured.
12/23/2008	Iraq	Kifl	1	0	A man is kidnapped and tortured to death by Religion of Peace militants.
12/23/2008	Iraq	Mosul	2	6	A child and doctor are murdered by Islamic terrorists.
12/23/2008	Philippines	Sultan Kudarat	9	8	Moro Islamists storm two villages and shoot nine civilians to death.
12/23/2008	Philippines	Isabela	0	26	Abu Sayyaf members toss two grenades into a group of people enjoying a musical performance.
12/23/2008	Pakistan	Swat	4	0	A man and his wife are among four people murdered by Mujahideen in three attacks.
12/23/2008	Pakistan	Mingora	2	0	A beggar woman and her daughter are gunned down at point-blank range by Holy Warriors.
12/23/2008	Iraq	Tarmiyah	5	4	A man and his wife are among two people blasted to death by Jihad bombers.
12/22/2008	India	Baramulla	2	0	Two local soldiers are shot to death at close range by Muslim assassins at a market.
12/22/2008	Somalia	Mogadishu	7	22	Seven civilians are killed during an attack by Islamic guerrillas
12/22/2008	Pakistan	Swat	6	8	Two women are among six civilians killed by Mujahideen in three incidents.
12/22/2008	Afghanistan	Ghazni	3	4	A suicide bomber takes out three civilians.
12/21/2008	Pakistan	Swat	3	0	Mujahideen drag three people out of their home and shoot them in cold blood. The victims include a man and his son.
12/21/2008	Pakistan	Bannu	2	0	Islamic militants rocket a government building, killing two people.
12/21/2008	Pakistan	North Waziristan	2	0	Two brothers are brutally kidnapped and murdered by Sunni extremists.
12/21/2008	Thailand	Pattani	1	0	A 50-year-old civilian is murdered by Muslim gunmen on his way home.
12/20/2008	Thailand	Yala	1	0	A 49-year-old security guard is shot to death by Muslim radicals as he leaves his home.
12/20/2008	Thailand	Pattani	1	7	A woman standing outside a convenience store is murdered by Islamic bombers. Children are injured as well.
12/19/2008	Somalia	Mogadishu	1	10	A civilian is shot to death during an attack by Jabalu Islamiya terrorists.
12/19/2008	Pakistan	Khyber	3	0	Three civilians are killed when Sunni militants open fire on an empty fuel tanker.
12/19/2008	Iraq	Baghdad	7	0	Islamists behead seven Iraqis.
12/18/2008	Iraq	Diyala	2	17	Two Iraqis are taken out by roadside bombers.
12/18/2008	Philippines	Iligan	3	47	Islamists detonate nail-packed bombs at two shopping malls in Christian areas, killing at least three people.
12/18/2008	Pakistan	Hangu	4	1	A child is among four peope shot to death by Islamists in three attacks.
12/18/2008	Iraq	Kirkuk	1	0	A female women's rights activist is beheaded in her home by Islamic terrorists.