If you receive this and you hate it and you don’t want to ever read it no matter what...that is fine; email me back and you will be deleted from my list (which is almost at the maximum anyway).

I attempt to post a new issue each Sunday by 2 or 3 pm central standard time (I sometimes fail at this attempt).

I try to include factual material only, along with my opinions (it should be clear which is which). I make an attempt to include as much of this week’s news as I possibly can. The first set of columns are intentionally designed for a quick read.

I do not accept any advertising nor do I charge for this publication. I write this principally to blow off steam in a nation where its people seemed have collectively lost their minds.

Several dramatic economic events have come to light, which the Democratic media has ignored: (1) the amount of money in circulation has doubled since Obama has taken office; (2) taxpayers onw find themselves on the hook for 90% of home loans (it used to be around 50%); and (3) Congress is about to nationalize the student loan program a well.

The Senate votes to cut off federal funding to ACORN; these Senators vote to continue funding for ACORN:

President Obama cancels a long-planned missile shield for Eastern Europe (a plan which Russia has vehemently opposed).

Former President Jimmy Carter says that a strong component of opposition to Obama-care is racism.

Denver man, Najibullah Zazi, picked up by the FBI. He appears to have been involved in a potential terror plot against New Yorkers.

President Obama calls Kanye West a jackass for indicating on stage that Beyonce should have gotten the best video award.

7 former CIA heads formally urge President Obama to quash Attorney General Holder’s investigation on the basis of national security.

Andy Richter, comedian, destroys newsman Wolf Blitzer on celebrity jeopardy. Even hot babe Dana Delaney beat Blitzer. Alex Trebek actually had to give Blitzer points at the end because he was so far in the hole.

Obama people ask Yew York Governor David Paterson not to run for governor in the next election.

“I don’t belong to the party of no; I’m with the party of Hell no!” sign at the D.C. TEA party.

George Will, concerning Obama’s guarantees and promises about Obama-care: “Can anyone believe any of this stuff?”

Congresswoman Maxine Waters concerning the TEA party march on Washington: "I want those people talked to; I want them interviewed; I want journalists to be all over those rallies and the marches with the birthers and the teabaggers. Let’s find out what they think." What a novel idea! Have the media interview protesters to find out why they are there! I think that Maxine Waters is on to something here that could revolutionize journalism.

David Axelrod, high Obama muckety muck: “[Conservatives have the right to protest,] but they don't represent a mainstream view."

Maureen Doud, “[Joe] Wilson clearly did not like being lectured and even rebuked by the brainy black president presiding over the majestic chamber...Some people just can't believe a black man is president and will never accept it.”

Raina Kelley (of Newsweek): “Let me say this clearly so there are no misunderstandings: some of the protests against President Obama are howls of rage at the fact that we have an African-American head of state. I'm sick of all the code words used when this subject comes up, so be assured that I am saying exactly what I mean.”

Speaking about the various claims of racism, David Horowitz said, “Blacks are the human shields of the Democratic party.”

Dick Durbin (on Meet the Press), “...a lot of businesses are dropping health insurance.” Oh, really now?

Chris Matthews, while promoting book of liberal historian, Douglas Brinkley, "There's so much right-wing crap on the best seller list these days. It's great to see a book that you might want to put on your shelf and let your respected friends see you actually reading."

Chris Wallace, "[For] These guys [the Obama administration], everything is personal...They are the biggest bunch of crybabies I have dealt with in my 30 years in Washington."

Fox News's ad (referring to the 9/12 march on Washington), which ran in the Washington Post on Friday with one main line: "How did ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC and CNN miss this story?"

Obama capitulates to the Russians about the missile defense system in eastern Europe, and already Russian is demanding more concessions.

Even Jon Stewart paid decent homage to the two kids who did an uncover job on ACORN (and he gave this a lot of air time as well):

ENERGY (& FOOD) = control through rationing, to keep people living a low quality of life.

HEALTHCARE = control through rationing, get rid of older people because they tend to vote Republican because they've wised up.

More from the Onion; the nation’s girlfriends have a solution to overspending:

We got a brother in the White House (watch this to the end; even if you are a liberal, you are going to get at least one big laugh out of this):

1) A majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives voted to de-fund ACORN; this is not the end of it. The bills have to agree and then President Obama has to sign the bill. As has been previously discussed, there are hundreds of organizations inter-mingled with ACORN, and the money flows to and fro in these various organizations. So, money can be designated for one organization, and yet end up in the pockets of ACORN when all is said and done.

2) When a Congressman, or Congresswoman or newscaster calls TEA party and 9/12 marchers tea-baggers, they are calling them homosexuals. When is someone going to ask these public figures if calling someone a homosexual is intended to demean them in any way. Or when is an interviewer going to say, “That was so gay of you to say that” in order to see what their reaction is.

3) Since I have to evaluate people in my work, I have found that what they say about others is often true about them. If our president tells us that doctors will saw off a foot or take out a child’s tonsils unnecessarily in order to make a little more money, that tells us more about Obama than it does about doctors. When Nancy Pelosi accuses TEA party and 9/12 protestors of not being genuine but astroturf, this tells you more about her knowledge of those who are organized to support her and her causes. When someone tells you that TEA party have been clearly instructed to disrupt townhall meetings, this tells you about what they are training their paid protesters to do. When newscasters accused President Bush of faxing talking points to FoxNews, that is actually what was done under Clinton and now under Obama. When several people accuse vast numbers of people whom they have never met of being racists, that tells you what is in their own hearts.

4) Obama is hitting all of the Sunday morning news shows today, except for Fox’s, of course. Is this a smart move on the part of Obama and Co. or is Obama just afraid to face the tough questions of Chris Wallace?

5) It is quite pathetic that Joe Wilson’s you lie remark received more coverage and debate than the substance of Obama health care reform. However, it is possible that more issues about Obama-care were covered because of this outburst.

6) Obama made the statement, “I will own this health care bill; I will be judged on this; and I expect to be here for awhile.” (Not an exact quote). None other than Sam Donaldson made the observation that, if a health care bill is passed, it will not go into effect until after Obama has either won or lost the election for a second term.

7) Wait times to see a doctor in Boston, where government health care is a reality, is double that of anywhere else. Health care insurance is more expensive in Massachusetts as well.

8) There is nothing in the House health care plan which deals with health care insurance portability (one of the problems Obama claims he will fix). However, if we are all moved to a single-payer system, that point become moot.

9) President Obama has virtually taken over the home mortgage market; is about to take over the student loan market; he runs GM, he passed a stimulus bill approximately equal to the amount of money in circulation; he has doubled the amount of money in circulation...in less than one year, President Obama has done more to nationalize and control our economic system than is even imaginable.

$829 billion U.S. dollars in circulation as of December 2007 (most of it outside of the U.S.). In case you don’t recall, this is slightly more than the Obama stimulus package passed earlier this year.

$1.7 trillion in circulation today. Obama has essentially doubled the amount of money in circulation.

50% = approximately the number of home loans guaranteed by the government 2 years ago.

The 9/12 march on Washington could have been as many as 1.8 million, an estimation made by a University of Indiana student. This would have made it the largest gathering/demonstration to ever take place in Washington D.C.

45% of American doctors say that they will consider quitting their profession or retiring if health care reform is passed.

71% of American doctors answered "no" when asked if they believed "the government can cover 47 million more people and that it will cost less money and the quality of care will be better." I must admit to being surprised that 25% of doctors said yes to that question.

12% of voters nationwide believe that most opponents of President Obama's health care reform plan are racist.

Most of the mainstream media ignored the ACORN story; it had been out and well-reported on for nearly a week before mainstream media began to say anything about it. Charles Gibson claimed to know nothing about it.

2 more previously unknown plots were stopped by waterboarding, something revealed the other night on O’Reilly’s The Factor. No follow up by any news media. I must admit, it went right past me. One was a plot to take place in midwestern universities (or in a midwestern university) and the other was ot take place in England.

The president giving a health-care speech, how it is going to be free to those who cannot afford it; cheap for those who can ($24.95/month per family; and you can use your credit card); it will not add to the deficit; and the waiting times will be lessened; and elective surgery will be included in this deal, including sex reassignment surgery (“You can change back and forth up to 10 times on my plan”); and all it will cost is an extra 1% from those who make over $25 million/year. “It won’t cost you a dime; in fact, it will cost you less than you pay right now; I guarantee it.”

No doubt, you have seen Saturday Night Live’s Jeopardy skits; now how much fun could they have spoofing the Andy Richter, Dana Delaney, Wolf Blitzer match?

Obama is going on 5 networks to sell healthcare today. Will they avoid asking him hard questions? Will they let him have a pass when it comes to follow-up questions? In any case, I don’ think that this is going to work for him. Obama has one big asset, and that is himself; and it is working less and less as time goes by.

A shout out to Maxine Waters who suggests to the press that they try interviewing some of the people who are at the 9/12 rallies.

Obama told two sad stories at the beginning of his health care speech of people being dropped by their insurance companies for minor problems, and, as a result, both died. How is it possible for Obama aides to comb through over 1000 pages of sad stories and the only two stories Obama can find to use are those which he distorts?

President Barack Obama, seeking to make a case for health-insurance regulation, told a poignant story to a joint session of Congress last week. An Illinois man getting chemotherapy was dropped from his insurance plan when his insurer discovered an unreported gallstone the patient hadn't known about.

"They delayed his treatment, and he died because of it," the president said in the nationally televised address.

In fact, the man, Otto S. Raddatz, didn't die because the insurance company rescinded his coverage once he became ill, an act known as recission. The efforts of his sister and the office of Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan got Mr. Raddatz's policy reinstated within three weeks of his April 2005 rescission and secured a life-extending stem-cell transplant for him. Mr. Raddatz died this year, nearly four years after the insurance showdown.

Obama aides say the president got the essence of the story correct. Mr. Raddatz was dropped from his insurance plan weeks before a scheduled stem-cell transplant.

Does Obama know that he is lying? Does he care? Is the Wall Street Journal the only media which questions him? Is he or his staff so brazen as to distort these stories, knowing that most of the news will not check it out, or even run a story on it when it turns out that he distorted the truth?

You think a significant portion of the marchers on D.C. were racists or that racism has any major part in opposition to Obama.

I would not be shocked if Israel strikes Iran while Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is in the United States. In any case, Israel will probably make a military strike on Iran within the next 6 months, and Obama will not back Israel, which could lead to a horrific war in the Middle East. Obama will finally nominally back Israel.

It is still too tough for me to call whether any form of Obama care will pass. There are a half-dozen proposals out there which would get 60+% support (already covered many times in CR); but Obama will not propose any of these. Dick Morris suggests that there is going to be a lot of discussion, a lot of fighting, and finally, at the last minute, the public option will be nixed and coops thrown in instead by Obama. He believes that helath care reform will then be passed. I am still skeptical that any health care bill will pass unless it contains 75% Republican ideas.

You might classify me as a crackpot with this next prediction, but I think that Obama is looking for a higher position of power than simply President of the United States. I confess that I do not know what this position would look like or how Obama would get it, but he is enormously popular worldwide, and the news media, for the most part, is very supportive of Obama throughout the world. His push for global financial reforms I think is his first step in this direction.

Since Obama has doubled the amount of currency in circulation, look for at least 50% inflation.

Obama did not back off from any of his stated policies on health care (although he did back off on some unsated policies). He does not seriously consider any Republican ideas (other than suggesting that he might be willing to look at some tort reform in a trial basis in a limited way).

I think what is going on in Fresno is, someone is intentionally driving down the price of farm land there (no water makes the land worthless); then this land will be purchased for a song and sold to Solar Energy Companies to produce solar energy for California (which requires gobs of water, by the way).

Could the dramatic economic changes which Obama is bringing to pass force us to a point where everyone will need to depend upon the government?

What began in the final few months of the Bush administration and is being carried out in the Obama administration is perhaps the greatest theft of wealth this country (or any country) has ever seen. It is as if someone grabbed all of your credit cards, raised the limits, and charged them all to the new limit.

Let me propose a scenario here. There is an inspiring speaker who is promising to fix the airline system. He first tells a couple of sad stories about 2 unfortunate incidents which take place either on an airplane or at an airport; and they are very sad stories, and one person dies (he does not have a proper ticket and is let out of the plane on the runway, and then run over by the plane). However, later on, you find out that he really did not tell you the whole truth about these stories.

This same man proposes to make flying inexpensive for everyone; even for overseas flights. Everyone in America is going to have the chance to fly, and to fly wherever they want and whenever they want.

Then he tells you about dishonest pilots who take you to the wrong destination in order to make more money from the flight. He tells you about flight attendants who sell you alcohol for $5, but it is just colored water.

He assures you that he is working with pilots and airline workers, and that he has a plan that will solve all of these problems. Trust him. He has a plan. It has not been written yet, but there are ideas being kicked around, but he can assure you that, it will not increase the deficit, and the resultant airline system is going to be fair, above board and without waste.

Is it reasonable to doubt him when he makes up sad stories and slants them intentionally to make you think the airlines are at fault?

Is it reasonable to doubt such a man because he demonstrates no personal understanding of how the system works (e.g., suggesting that pilots fly you to the wrong destination in order to fleece you for more money).

Let’s say that he is threatening to run this through Congress and revamp the entire airline system to fix the problems which he has cited? Let’s say you join with others who think he ought not to make these changes, and you march on Washington, and the news media treats you as if you are a fringe element. A former president calls many in your group racists.

Let’s say there is no clear and open debate among the members of Congress on this issue? Wouldn’t you begin to get a little frustrated?

Do you now understand why conservatives and independents and even some liberals oppose Obama-care?

I must admit to seeing some positive signs in America’s future as of late. Glenn Beck began examine the background of Van Jones, former Green Jobs [don’t call me] Czar in the Obama administration. Although the mainstream media at least suggested that Beck (among others) distorted and spread vicious lies about Van Jones, and this would have been a reasonable charge, had not Beck played over and over various videos where Van Jones is speaking to a crowd and says some really crazy things. For a week, Beck and company did research on Van Jones, which information was ignored by the NY Times, the Sacramento Bee, along with almost every newspaper in the US; and not a word of this was found on NBC, CBS, ABC, or (If memory serves) on any of the cable news stations, apart from FoxNews. This information spread throughout the internet like wildfire, because it was being ignored by those who are supposed to bring us our news.

Van Jones resigned, and then, suddenly, this became newsworthy (the NY Times later explained that they were short on reporters that week—really!). The articles from the mainstream media appeared to be balanced, and all of them carried Van Jones’ released remarks; but I do not recall any of them questioning what he actually said. They just printed it; and, meanwhile, people who get their news from these sources, were a little surprised, asking themselves, “How can some maniac like Glenn Beck spread lies and distortions about Van Jones and get Van Jones fired?” That is, those who thought about the story at all.

The next item, also ignored by the mainstream media, was a set of independent sting-investigations of ACORN. Remember when 60 Minutes used to do this kind of stuff, and we reveled in it? Now, while 60 Minutes runs informercials for Obama’s programs, there are some real journalists out there doing some real work.

In case you were unaware of what happened, a young man and a young woman posing as a pimp and his whore went into several ACORN offices wanting to buy a house and use their questionable income in order to buy a house. In at least 3 instances, ACORN people got them into a private room and explained exactly how they could defraud the government and get them a house. When these two journalists upped the ante and suggested that they were going to bring in underage girls from El Salvador to be offered up as whores, ACORN people went right along with it. None of these ACORN employees thought to call the police and turn these people in.

On September 14, 2009, there was a vote in the Senate to cut off funding for ACORN.

Now, consider, do you want President Obama to have any sort of control over the alternate media? Don’t think for a moment that this is a not irritant to him. Expect him to go after some control of the 3 arms of alternative media: FoxNews, Talk Radio, and the internet.

An addendum: speaking of the mainstream media, I went to Reuters’ website, and looked for “Washington protesters” “9/12" “TEA parties” and not one story on the 9/11/09 march appeared. Same for the Associated Press. Under photos, they did have one photo of an Oregon TEA party held simultaneous to the Washington D.C. 9/12 march. I found a few more photos on the AP website searching “9/12 Washington march.” Not much of a surprise that there were 2 or 3 photos of the most outrageous signs.

Reform: Millions of Americans finally got to hear the Democrats' pitch on health care reform, made by their top salesman. But they heard nothing new - just a lot of discredited myths recycled as the truth.

For the record, we support improving our health care system. As is, it has too many rules, too much government spending and too few market forces to keep costs low and quality high.

We spend north of $2 trillion every year on health care - 17% of our GDP, the most of any wealthy nation. If that sounds like a lot, remember this: An estimated 47% of that already is spent by the government. And government's share will grow even without "reform."

Look closely at the plans so far to emerge from Congress. What the Democrats have proposed, in essence, is a government takeover of nearly one-fifth of our nation's economy. When brought up in Congress, this idea has been rejected repeatedly. Yet, somehow, the idea never dies.

Rather than a breakthrough that would remove government's stranglehold on a once-healthy market and move us toward true reform, we heard a lot of old bromides and myths - things we just can't let go uncorrected. Too much is at stake.

So following are 15 of the biggest misconceptions - and there are many more, we assure you - that we found in the speech:

• "The uninsured . . . live every day just one accident or illness away from bankruptcy. These are not primarily people on welfare."

Actually, of the 46 million people the census estimates don't have insurance, some 20 million have incomes above average and could afford to buy it, according to a study by former Congressional Budget Office Director June O'Neill.

Of the remaining 26 million uninsured, an estimated 13.7 million are poor. They are eligible for Medicaid - the state health care programs for the poor. But many, too, are illegals - about 8 million.

Though they're eligible, research from the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association suggests as many as 14 million uninsured Americans qualify for public coverage, but don't enroll. And as many as 6 million are enrolled, but don't report it to the government, according to the National Center for Policy Analysis.

By the way, according to the Census Bureau, America now has 37 million people in poverty. But Medicaid enrollment covers 55 million people - at a cost of $350 billion a year.

Based on this, no one should be without care. Which leads us to wonder: Is nationalizing our health care system really necessary to take care of people who already have care available to them?

• "Many other Americans . . . are still denied insurance due to previous illnesses or conditions that insurance companies decide are too risky or expensive to cover."

This statement betrays a profound ignorance of what insurance is. If you can buy insurance after you've gotten sick, it's not really insurance, is it? And why have insurance at all? It's an incentive to simply wait until you get sick, then make someone else pay for it.

To see how absurd this is, let's take the same concept to auto insurance. Why not let people buy insurance after they get in an accident? One reason, of course, is it leads to fiscal and personal recklessness.

• "There are now more than 30 million American citizens who cannot get coverage . . . every day, 14,000 Americans lose their coverage."

As noted above, the bulk of the 30-plus million uninsured actually can get coverage - and in many cases, qualify for existing government programs. But how about 14,000 Americans losing their coverage each day? A little math shows this is just a scare statistic.

Multiply it out, and it comes to 5.1 million people losing coverage in a year. Sound scary? Consider that, according to the census, 46.3 million Americans don't currently have insurance - 600,000 more than last year. That means that, along with 14,000 Americans losing their coverage each day, another 12,400 Americans are signing up for it - even in the middle of a brutal recession.

Those who lose insurance do so usually because they've lost a job. Most are without insurance for a couple of months or so. The best way to boost the number of insured - and one that "costs" nothing - is to cut taxes, ease regulations and slash government spending. Those policies are all proven job creators.

• "We spend one-and-a-half times more per person on health care than any other country, but we aren't any healthier for it."

This is a non sequitur. We spend one and a half times more per person, true. But because our health care here is better. That's right - better. True, our life expectancy of 78.1 years - which is up sharply from just a decade ago - ranks us 30th in the world in longevity. But look a little closer at the data.

The U.S. homicide rate is two to three times higher than in other industrial nations. And we drive a lot more than others, so our auto fatality rate of 14.24 deaths per 100,000 people is higher than in Germany (6.19), France (7.4) or Canada (9.25). Add to this, we eat far more than other countries on average, contributing to higher levels of heart disease, stroke, diabetes and cancer.

When all those factors are figured in, according to a recent study by Robert Ohsfeldt of Texas A&M and John Schneider of the University of Iowa, Americans actually live longer than people in other countries - thanks mainly to our excellent health care.

• Rising health care premiums are "why American businesses that compete internationally - like our automakers - are at a huge disadvantage."

Well, right and wrong. Soaring health care premiums are a problem for some. But who's to blame for this? Government health care programs, which make up 47% of all health care spending, are the biggest drivers of rising insurance premiums.

For example, Medicare forces doctors and hospitals to give patients 20% to 30% discounts on their care and drugs. Sounds great. But who pays for the "discount"? Private insurers, that's who. And they pass it on to businesses. This is yet another case of government causing a problem, then blaming the victim.

Even so, in some industries health care premiums are an enormous problem and competitive liability. This is certainly true of the auto and steel industries. But they have no one to blame but themselves.

They gave gold-plated benefit packages to their unions during the fat times, and now that times are lean, want us - taxpayers - to make good on their extravagant promises.

This is why so many big businesses support nationalized health care. It bails them out of their own bad decisions - and by those imposed by government. Just last week a congressional oversight panel announced that taxpayers were unlikely to recoup much of the $81 billion they spent to bail out GM and Chrysler. That's another indirect health care tax your children and grandchildren will have to pay.

• "Finally, our health care system is placing an unsustainable burden on taxpayers. . . . If we do nothing to slow these skyrocketing costs, we will eventually be spending more on Medicare and Medicaid than every other government program combined."

Are we supposed to believe that adding more government will bring down government costs?

Medicare is already spending more than it is taking in through payroll taxes. Medicare trustees expect the Hospital Insurance Trust Fund part of the program to be insolvent by 2019. From now through 2017, it will need $342 billion of taxpayers' money in order to keep paying hospital insurance benefits alone. Over the next 50 years or so, Medicare's shortfall is expected to hit $37 trillion - an almost unbelievable deficit nearly three times our current GDP.

If Medicare has done one thing, it's proved that government programs always cost more than their original projections. Citing the runaway costs of Medicare is an argument against, not for, further government intervention.

• "On the right, there are those who argue that we should end the employer-based system and leave individuals to buy health insurance on their own. . . . I believe it makes more sense to build on what works and fix what doesn't, rather than try to build an entirely new system from scratch."

Discouraging employer-based coverage and encouraging individuals to buy their own insurance would help. But only if lawmakers make two real reforms, neither requiring a "new system from scratch."

First, Washington must give tax credits for premiums paid on individual policies. That would make them more affordable for more people. Second, Washington has to make it easier for Americans to have health savings accounts. HSAs hold costs down because account holders self-ration treatment. They also give people more control over their health care.

• "Nothing in this plan will require you or your employer to change the coverage or the doctor you have."

Shawn Tully, Fortune editor at large, dug into the legislation and found that for "Americans in large corporations, 'keeping your own plan' has a strict deadline. In five years, like it or not, you'll get dumped into the exchange," a government program in which heavily regulated private companies sell insurance policies.

Workers who buy their own insurance or begin coverage through small businesses will also be forced into the exchange if their plans change in any way, because it's then considered a new plan. Since plans generally change policies every year, Tully says, "it's likely that millions of employees will lose their plans in 12 months."

According to a July study by the Lewin Group and the Heritage Foundation, health reform could cause as many as 88 million Americans to lose their private, employer-based coverage.

• "If you lose your job or change your job, you will be able to get coverage. If you strike out on your own and start a small business, you will be able to get coverage. We will do this by creating a new insurance exchange."

The president says this is "a marketplace where individuals and small businesses will be able to shop for health insurance at competitive prices." But it won't be a real marketplace. Participating insurers will be saddled with a host of mandates. Those that don't like the regulations will be left out. There'll be little room for competition.

The Cato Institute's Michael Tanner has said that "in practice, at least as demonstrated in Massachusetts," an exchange "can quickly devolve into a regulatory body."

• "Some of people's concerns have grown out of bogus claims . . . The best example is . . . that we plan to set up panels of bureaucrats with the power to kill off senior citizens. . . . It is a lie, plain and simple."

As far as we know, there is no provision for a death panel buried in the 1,018-page bill. But we do know how Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, the administration's health care czar, feels about treating those who need the most help.

"When the worse-off can benefit only slightly while better-off people could benefit greatly, allocating (treatment) to the better-off is often justifiable."

So the federal government won't be actively killing the old and the sick. It will just let them die by denying them the care that will supposedly be available to every American.

• "There are those who also claim that our reform effort will insure illegal immigrants. This, too, is false - the reforms I'm proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally."

Tough words are one thing, enforcement is another. As IBD's Sean Higgins reported last week: "Some independent analysis indicates - contrary to Obama's claim - that the House health bill could result in coverage being extended to illegal immigrants."

It starts with the mandate for everyone to buy insurance, including illegals. Their choices will be presumably through the "exchange," and they won't be eligible for subsidies to buy. But the non-partisan Congressional Research Service warns there's no verification mechanism. An amendment by GOP Rep. Dean Heller of Nevada, to use electronic immigration records to verify eligibility for subsidies, was shot down by Democrats.

Enforcement woes are nothing new. The U.K.'s nationalized system treats as many as a million illegal immigrants a year because eligibility verification at the point of service is nearly impossible. It's now giving up the ghost of trying because illegals have won the right to be treated at taxpayer expense as a "human right." That's brought new waves of "health tourism" as word spreads.

Cabinet officials, such as Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, support union demands to give amnesty to 12 million illegals. If so, they will get public health care. And hospitals that continue to treat illegals through emergency rooms, are reimbursed through Medicaid.

• "My health care proposal has also been attacked by some who oppose reform as a 'government takeover' of the entire health care system . . . Unfortunately, in 34 states, 75% of the insurance market is controlled by five or fewer companies. . . Without competition, the price of insurance goes up and the quality goes down."

Obama is right about limited numbers of insurers in states. They're the last ones able to survive the layers of bureaucratic mandates and regulations without going bankrupt.

The fastest way to create choice for consumers isn't by adding a government option, but by breaking down trade barriers across state lines. By letting citizens buy insurance from any state, a truly competitive market can develop, with choices in coverage, service and price. It would be far better if each American could buy health insurance from any of the nation's 1,300 insurers, not just a handful in their own states.

• "Despite all this, some . . . argue that these private (insurance) companies can't fairly compete with the government. And they'd be right if taxpayers were subsidizing this public option. But they won't be. . . . (The public option) would . . . keep pressure on private insurers to keep their policies affordable and treat their customers better . . ."

When the government acts as both producer and regulator of its own and everyone else's products, the playing field is tilted because there's a basic conflict of interest. It's also a recipe for cronyism and corruption. Witness Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

We looked at the after-tax margins of some big health insurers over the last 12 months. Here's what we found: Among HMOs, Humana, 3.1%. Cigna, 4%. Wellpoint, 5%. United Health Group, 4.4%. Broader health insurers, like Unum (8.6% after-tax margin) and AFLAC (12.3%), do a bit better.

The point is, these are not outrageous profits. And the health care industry's $13 billion in 2008 profits pale in comparison to the $65 billion in annual fraud in Medicare alone.

• "I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits - either now or in the future. Period. And to prove that I'm serious, there will be a provision in this plan that requires us to come forward with more spending cuts if the savings we promised don't materialize."

From the folks who brought us a $10 trillion deficit over the next decade, that's hard to swallow. The White House has assured us the public option would be funded by premiums. So, it's hard to know what he means by savings or spending cuts.

Although Medicare and Medicaid, are slated for $313 billion in cuts, the government has yet to eliminate the $65 billion or so that goes to waste and fraud. They don't need health reform to do that, they can do it now.

• "The only thing this plan would eliminate is the hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud as well as unwarranted subsidies in Medicare that go to insurance companies - subsidies that do everything to pad their profits and nothing to improve your care."

Speaking of waste and fraud, as we said, why can't it be done today instead of waiting for some health care reform bill to pass? The president proposes $313 billion in Medicaid and Medicare cuts, saying $110 billion would come from reducing scheduled increases in Medicare payments.

"That would encourage health care providers to increase productivity," White House budget director Peter Orszag told reporters. $110 billion would come from ending payments to hospitals to treat uninsured patients. But much of that comes from treating illegals, who aren't supposed to be eligible for the public option.

Another $75 billion would come from "better pricing of Medicare drugs," Orszag said.

What he doesn't get is that some $10 billion of Medicare funding goes to dubious expenditures like hospitals padding bills because they are paid too little and must make up lost revenue in volume.

Cutting payments more means more padding, as the Mayo Clinic has warned. That means rationing. The Democrats' plan may not be explicitly mean to ration, but not paying a fair and market-determined price for services will ensure less of it for patients.

President Obama began his speech by noting it's "been nearly a century since Theodore Roosevelt first called for health reform" and that "nearly every president and Congress, whether Democrat or Republican, has attempted to meet this challenge in some way."

"A bill for comprehensive care reform was first introduced by John Dingell Sr. in 1943," he also pointed out. "Sixty-five years later, his son (Rep. John Dingell, Michigan Democrat now in his 28th term) continues to introduce that same bill at the beginning of each session."

Could it be, we wonder, that the reason why health reform of the kind the Dingells and Democrats have been pushing for 100 years has gone nowhere is that Americans want nothing to do with it? What is it about "No!" that they don't understand?

Sometimes an event occurs which is transformative in a way that everyone who sees it or participates in it instantly is aware of. Yesterday's demonstration in Washington DC is one of those rare happenings in my opinion.

The Daily Mail said 2 million Americans participated. My friend Charlie Martin extrapolated from the pictures an attendance figure of 2.3 million. Here is a time lapse of the parade portion of the event so you can get a feel for yourself of the size of the crowd. Whatever the actual number it is sure to be seriously underestimated by the Obama-besotted members of the press corps who are also likely to misrepresent the participants and their views.

But as a participant, I want you to know the attendees were wonderful people, civil and polite. They showed their respect for the Capitol and the event by leaving no mess behind when they were through, in marked contrast to the inauguration and the usual left wing demonstrations here.

The feeling I have is that this is a wretched political class, as full of itself as it is idea-less and talentless and the people know it. They are disgusted enough with the new American elitism to travel on their own dime by any means available to come here to let Congress and the President know that they will use every legal means at their disposal to overthrow them. And overthrowing them is precisely what they intend to do.

Congress is up for election in 2010. They can rely on the grossly inaccurate press accounts if they choose. But I'm telling them it would be a major error to do so.

We are witnessing a very rare phenomenon, the genuine, broad based spontaneous political movement with no visible charismatic leaders.

Right after the stimulus bill passed, I got an e-mail from a woman I had once met at a local Republican event inviting me to participate in a small noontime demonstration in nearby Asheville. A couple dozen people showed up with banners and American flags to protest the spending. The person who had invited me was a concerned housewife. When the local Republican Party showed up with refreshments, they were, for the most part coolly received.

On April 15, I was at a much, much larger demonstration, organized in part by the same housewife, a veterinarian and a former sixties radical. Perhaps as many as 1,500+ people showed up, again with homemade signs, American flags and now a large smattering of Gadsden flags. A few local Republican elected officials showed up, but they were at the side of the crowd, not on the speaker's platform. We the People were the main event.

All around the nation, elected officials and pundits did not quite know what to make of the "Tea Parties" held on April 15. Pajama's Media estimated that the total participation in large metropolitan areas and small county seats all around the nation may have been in the hundreds of thousands.

On the Fourth of July, many of those who had organized the April 15 events, organized a further round of demonstrations. Later in July and throughout the August Congressional recess, further small demonstrations were held outside the local offices of Representatives and Senators. When some Democrats packed their town halls with handpicked supporters, there were often demonstrations being held outside.

I was not able to attend the September 12 rally in Washington, DC. I watched it on TV with several dozen other supporters at a local rally for those who could not make the trip. As I review the accounts and looks at the images several facts are apparent. Estimates as to crowd size vary by so much as to be meaningless, but the attendance certainly exceeded the organizer's expectations of perhaps 50,000. So many people showed up that they had to start marching early. The staging area simply couldn't contain them.

Once again, they brought their own signs, their own flags and their own unique attitude. They came from many states, many as from as far away as Texas and California. The crowd also contained a great many immigrants who are upset that America seems ready to adopt the failed policies they had been trying to escape. At its peak, it was wall to wall people. (Watch time lapse video, here).

Most significantly of all, those in attendance had not relied in any way on members of the current political class to get them there, nor had they showed up because their livelihood would be in jeopardy had they not agreed to demonstrate, as is the union way.

As I read the many reports on the Internet, I think this one, from Mark Hemmingway at NRO, says it best

"I asked one guy, who came up from South Carolina with 160 people on three buses, who put his trip together. He laughed and said, 'My neighbor.'"

The political class often operates on the assumption that only those people who constantly tell other how smart they are actually are have brains. That if you don't relish life in the artificial confines of the District of Columbia and haven't come by to kiss their rings, you therefore must be lacking in the skills needed to govern. Last year a young Governor who had been more concerned with raising her family than polishing her resume with the right schools and the right career path let the political class know that she was not in the least impressed with their inside the beltway criteria for leadership. On Saturday a whole lot of people just like her showed up on their own time and their own dime to say it is time to end business as usual in the fetid, corrupt swamp that is Washington, DC.

Everyone in the political class, journalists, consultants, elected Democrats and Republicans alike, needs to know this: Those countless little-known people who established the local e-mail lists, organized first one, then two, then three or more chartered buses, held sign-making parties and packed box lunches, are not going to go away any time soon. Continue to enact legislation that we cannot afford and they will be back, perhaps in even greater numbers.

The Democrats need to realize these demonstrators are beholden to no one. The Republicans need to realize that they still are not trusted. Why should they be when each day seems to have another story of compromise on core principals and going along to get along with spending their children cannot afford?

While the media is concentrating on the anti-Obama aspects of the demonstration, there was also a message to the Republican establishment: Lead, follow, or get out of our way.

Dr. David Dunch had never been to a political demonstration before. Yet on Saturday Dunch, a surgeon who has practiced for 25 years in Youngstown, Ohio, found himself marching down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, wearing a white medical coat with a small American flag tucked into the breast pocket, explaining what's wrong with President Obama's national health care proposals.

"It's a mistake," Dunch says. "It's going to result in ultimate rationing and limiting care to our elderly. We need universal access of patients with pre-existing illnesses. We need to open up the 50 states to all insurance plans. We need tort reform. We don't have to trash the current system."

Dunch has come here with his wife, who is a nurse, because he believes the president is "telling half-truths" by citing the support of the American Medical Association to suggest that most physicians favor Obamacare -- when in fact the AMA represents a relatively small minority of doctors. The situation is enough to turn a private physician into a protester. "I've never been political before," Dunch says. "This is atypical for me."

Atypical for Washington, too. Hours before Saturday's protest began, it was clear that the crowd of people opposing Obama's big-government policies would be larger than many anticipated. There are no official estimates of how many attended, but there's no doubt that the turnout, from the crush on Pennsylvania Avenue to the crowd at the West Front of the Capitol, was big -- perhaps in the 100,000 range.

No one was more surprised at the show of force than some of the marchers themselves. "We did it!" cried one elated woman as she approached Pennsylvania Avenue. "Look at all these people!" A moment later, the crowd began to chant:

South Carolina Republican Sen. Jim DeMint was standing nearby, finishing a book signing outside a Starbucks. "You can't say these are rich people, or these are insurance executives," DeMint said. "These are family people, business people -- these are real Americans."

The most popular man in the crowd was one who wasn't there: Rep. Joe Wilson, DeMint's colleague in Congress from South Carolina, who blurted out "You lie!" during Obama's address to a joint session of Congress last week. All through the crowd, there were signs -- handmade, not the pre-printed ones handed out by activist groups at other rallies -- saying things like YOU LIE! and JOE WILSON WAS RIGHT and JOE WILSON FOR PRESIDENT and WE'RE WITH WILSON.

"I think he just said the same thing that many Americans were yelling at their TV at about that point," says Jonathan Hill, a tea party organizer from Anderson, S.C. "If it had been me, I don't think I would have apologized for it. I think he was right."

"Joe was smart to apologize in a hurry," DeMint adds, "but the fact is, Joe was telling the truth. I've had hundreds of people today tell me he was speaking for them."

Some people were animated by a single issue -- health care, taxes, the Second Amendment. But in dozens of interviews with marchers, the picture that emerged was of people who believe things are racing out of control along a whole range of fronts in Washington, and that no one is representing their interests. Obama and the Democrats in Congress, they believe, are simply pushing too hard on too many things. It's unlikely that there would have been a rally this size just about the stimulus, or just about cap-and-trade, or just about the takeovers of the auto companies, or even health care. But put them all together, and there is an enormous and growing fear that Obama and his allies are rushing to wreck the system.

So the protesters spent their own money and caught buses and came to Washington. And made their own signs. There were SILENT NO MORE banners. There was DON'T TAX ME, BRO! and WE NEEDED PROBLEM SOLVERS -- WE GOT POWER GRABBERS and NO THANKS, I ALREADY HAVE A MESSIAH and perhaps the favorite, GRANDMA'S NOT SHOVEL-READY.

Some of the protesters had traveled farther than just the distance between their home town and Washington. Dr. David Levine, a psychiatrist from Rockford, Illinois, was Ramsey Clark's volunteer press secretary when the ultra-liberal former U.S. attorney general ran for the Senate from New York in 1976. Now, Levine, wearing a faded NEWT GINGRICH 2008 t-shirt, was on the streets of Washington in a crowd of conservatives. What accounted for the change? "It started when liberals just stopped making sense to me," Levine said. "I was listening to NPR, and nothing was making sense. So I started reading more and more conservative things, and here I am."

For Christy Smith, who handles sales for a shipping company in Houston, this rally, and the tea party she attended in April, were the first time she had been to a protest since the early 1980s, when, as part of the Tulsa Peace Coalition, she tried to stop a U.S. military train carrying nuclear warheads bound for American Pershing II missiles in Europe. "I was a bit radical on the other side," Smith says. "I've had a long journey." Now, she worries about the nation's debt and wants to see tort reform and term limits.

Their attitudes toward Obama himself are complicated. No one I met expressed hatred for the president. A few had voted for him, and others, like Christy Smith, said they were deeply moved when he was elected. Many others opposed him all along. But now, the predominant mood is deep distrust. They believe Obama will raise their taxes, that he will blow up the health care system, that he will weaken America's defenses.

And they wonder who he is as a person. "The company you keep tells a lot about who you are," says Tres Berden, a truck driver from Newark, New Jersey. "With all of those associations of his, from Rev. Wright to Van Jones -- you don't know those kind of people without being one." Berden, one of the few African-Americans in the crowd, is a Democrat who now considers himself a libertarian. He voted for Obama, but quickly became disillusioned. "He isn't the person he sold us," Berden says.

You've probably heard descriptions of the marchers as crazies and haters and fanatics. Perhaps there were some in the crowd. Far more important, though, was the very presence of so many everyday Americans protesting in Washington, just eight months into unified Democratic control of the White House and Congress. What did Barack Obama and his party's leadership on Capitol Hill do to bring doctors and truck drivers together in common cause on the streets of the nation's capital? More than anything, these people are afraid that the new president is running the country off a cliff. They're in no mood to remain silent now.

c) A Candidate that pledges to NOT demean our military while they are fighting for their Country. eg Harry Reid: "the surge has failed", "the war is lost"

d) Candidate that promises to ensure that our veterans can live out their lives in dignity.

a) The party will oppose any and all efforts to negotiate with dictators of the world in places like Iran, Syria, N.Korea, Cuba, and Venezuela without "pre-conditions."

While simultaneously working with private industry to develop the new energy technologies for the future, with the goal being that America becomes completely energy independent within the next 15 years.

The party will look for Free-Market solutions to the problems facing the Healthcare industry, and will vigorously oppose any efforts to "nationalize healthcare".

a) The Candidate will fight for Individual health savings accounts, that includes "catastrophic insurance" for every American, so people can control their own healthcare choices.

a) The Candidate pledges to "save" American children from the failing educational system

b) The Candidate will fight to break the unholy alliance of the Democratic party and teachers unions, which at best has institutionalized mediocrity, and has failed children across the country

b) Options will include "private retirement" funds so people can "control" their own destiny.

a) The Candidate vows to support ONLY judges who recognize that their job is to interpret the Constitution, and NOT legislate from the bench.

The Candidate accepts as their duty and responsibility to educate, inform, and remind people that with the blessings of Freedom comes a Great responsibility. That Government's primary goal is to preserve, protect and defend our God given gift of freedom.

That Governments do not have the ability to solve all of our problems, and to take away all of our fears and concerns. We need their pledge that we will be the candidate that promotes Individual liberty, Capitalism, a strong national defense and will support policies that encourage such...

It is our fundamental belief that limited Government, and Greater individual responsibility will insure the continued prosperity and success for future generations.

We the people who believe in the words of Ronald Reagan, that we are "the best last hope for man on this earth," "a shining city on a hill," and that our best days are before us if our Government will simply trust the American people.

[In this article, the authors agree with President Obama about ridding Medicare and Medicaid of fraud and abuse; but that this ought to be top priority before passing his visionary health care legislation program. By the way, you ought to note that the fraud here dwarfs the fraud of Enron.]

During his recent primetime address, President Obama said health care in America is "a system that is currently full of waste and abuse" where "too much of the hard-earned savings and tax dollars we spend on health care don't make us any healthier... is also true when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid." In fact, he said that there are "hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud" in Medicare that "don't improve the care of seniors." We agree.

We believe that fraud constitutes at least ten percent ($100 billion) of the nearly one trillion in taxpayer dollars that Medicare and Medicaid will spend this year. That is likely a conservative estimate. Harvard's Dr. Malcolm Sparrow, author of the seminal book "License to Steal," estimates that the losses could easily be in the 20 percent or 30 percent range, even as high as 35 percent, but he insists that we ought not to have to guess. He believes the government should measure the losses and report them accurately.

The American people firmly support anti-fraud efforts. Eighty-eight percent in a July 2009 poll by Zogby identified, "eliminate fraud" as their preferred way to pay for modernizing our health care system. "Reduce medical errors" came third on that list with only 72 percent support. Moreover, an Insider Advantage poll also from July found that by a margin of 61-27 Americans believe the issues of fraud and waste in Medicare and Medicaid should be addressed prior to the creation of a new government-run health program.

The story of convicted murderer Guillermo Denis Gonzalez illustrates the vulnerability of government run health programs to fraud. Gonzalez was released from prison in 2004 after serving a twelve year sentence for a murder conviction. Two years later he bought a Medicare-licensed equipment supply company and duly notified Medicare authorities that he was the new owner. In 2007 he submitted $586,953 in false claims to Medicare and got paid for some of them. In 2008 he is alleged to have killed and dismembered a man.

The fact that a convicted murderer with a seventh grade education could so easily become a supplier to our largest health program and begin defrauding it illustrates how pervasive fraud is in America's government-run health care programs. If only the Gonzalez case were an isolated incident.

Miami Dade Country is notorious for health care fraud. There are more licensed home health agencies in Miami Dade County than the entire state of California. In 2005, billing submissions from Miami Dade to Medicare for HIV infusion therapy were 22 times higher than the rest of the country combined. New York also has a serious problem with fraud. A private study of New York's Medicaid in 2006 found that one-quarter of that then-$44 billion program cannot be explained.

In August, Medicaid's internal inspector said Medicaid's current data gathering capabilities are not timely, accurate or comprehensive for detecting waste, fraud and abuse. Essentially, one the largest government-run health programs admits that they have no idea how much fraud occurs as a result of their antiquated computer systems and collection methods.

The Government Accountability Office reported in January of this year that 10 percent of Medicaid payments made in 2007, or $32.7 billion, were improper. Last summer, Senator Charles Grassley and a group of leading Senators estimated that there is $60 billion waste, fraud and abuse in the Medicare program.

For years, Congress has known that the problem of health care fraud, particularly in Medicare and Medicaid, is massive. Yet, instead of targeting the crooks who are stealing from poor and elderly Americans dependent on Medicaid and Medicare, Congress routinely deals with runaway Medicare and Medicaid outlays by slashing payments to honest doctors and hospitals. That is a long term recipe for total collapse of our health care system.

This past May, I (Senator Coburn) introduced a health reform bill, the Patients' Choice Act along with Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) and Representatives Paul Ryan (D-WI) and Devin Nunes (D-CA). Besides increasing patient choice, lowering costs, saving states $960 billion, and putting government health spending on a sustainable course, the Patients' Choice Act would use private sector technologies to significantly reduce waste fraud and abuse. This could save taxpayers about $100 billion a year.

Members of Congress should look to the credit card industry as a model of fraud containment. It processes over $2 trillion in payments every year from 700 million credit cards being used at millions of vendors to buy countless products. Fraud in that industry is one-tenth of one percent while fraud in Medicare and Medicaid at least 100 times higher.

At the very least, Congress should require that authentication of new suppliers to the Medicare program be done by Visa, Mastercard, or American Express. No more proof is needed that the bureaucrats currently in charge of Medicare and Medicaid have failed to combat the fraud that exists in those programs today. Expanding the role of government in health care without combating fraud will only guarantee more of the same.

The U.S. Post Service was established in 1775 - you have had 234 years to get it right; it is broke.

Social Security was established in 1935 - you have had 74 years to get it right;

War on Poverty started in 1964 - you have had 45 years to get it right; $1 trillion of our money is confiscated each year and transferred to "the poor";

Medicare and Medicaid were established in 1965 - you've had 44 years to get it right; they're broke

So with a perfect 100% failure rate and a record that proves that "services" you shove down our throats are failing faster and faster, you want Americans to believe you can be trusted with a government-run health care system?

Truly, the inmates are running the asylum! (Maybe we need to let others in on this brilliant record before 2010 and just vote against incumbents.)

Forward to all your friends and family? especially those that think this is a Democrat versus Republican thing.

In Washington D.C. on Saturday, about 75,000 protesters gathered, loudly criticizing the policies of President Obama. Organizers say the crowd was mostly "fiscal conservatives" who object to Mr. Obama's rapid expansion of the federal government.

As always in a crowd of that size, there were different degrees of protest. More militant folks compared the president to Hitler, to the Mafia, to Muslim Marxists. A few of the signs were vicious, like a reference to Ted Kennedy's death, and one counter-protester even ran into some trouble:

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We are losing our country. We think the Muslims are moving in and taking over.

Now, with the media branding protesters as kooks and racists, what are we supposed to think? If you're not there it is impossible to know exactly who the demonstrators are. So we have to rely on polling to accurately assess how the American people view President Obama.

The latest Rasmussen poll says 51 percent of Americans now have a favorable view of Obamacare, while 46 percent oppose it. That's a small improvement since the president's speech last Wednesday. But 38 percent strongly oppose Obamacare, while just 28 percent strongly favor it, and this is where the militancy sets in. The committed opposition is much larger than the committed support.

However, about half of the country is not crazy, as NBC News would you have believe:

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's put up on that screen again the Joe Wilson sort of picture of him reaching out. You look at the image of the Republican Party: all white males with short haircuts. They look sort of angry. No women, no minorities, and it looks like they've sort of become unhinged.

But what about the "unhinged"? Well, I think they should rethink their presentation. Carrying signs equating Obama to Hitler puts you in the loon category and does your cause no good at all. Hearts and minds are won by reasonable discourse based on facts.

The fact of the matter here is that President Obama believes that a huge federal government can bring relief and prosperity to the American people, but many Americans do not believe that. They think big government will harm them and screw things up so badly everyone will suffer, not just those without health insurance.

And so the battle continues, and "The Factor" is right in the middle of it bringing you the facts.

OBAMA: We invoke provisions of existing agreements. We do so not to be provocative or to promote self-defeating protectionism. We do so because enforcing trade agreements is part and parcel of maintaining an open and free trading system.

CHARLES FREEMAN, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: There is a political gotcha that they've got going here with focusing on auto parts and chicken parts which have been sort of more high-profile U.S,-China trade cases in the last year. So they're really trying to stick the knife in.

BAIER: He's talking about China and is there a new trade war developing here? President Obama leveled steep tariffs on Chinese made tires for passenger and light trucks announced late Friday night, September 11.

The Chinese came back and filed a formal complaint with the World Trade Organization in Geneva. They also announced an investigation into whether U.S.-made auto and chicken products are flooding Chinese markets.

The president in that interview said he is absolutely confident that the United States and China can avoid a trade dispute, a trade war over this Chinese tire imports issue.

KRAUTHAMMER: The way that the president has presented it is really remarkable. He doesn't lie. He is too smart. He deceives.

This is incredibly deceptive. He said, as we just heard, he says all I'm doing here is enforcing trade agreements. That would make you think that the Chinese have done something wrong, that they had dumped a product or they had undercut or subsidized. In fact, not.

This provision in the tariffs on tires are treated entirely by the U.S. Trade Act Section 425 which allows the slapping on of a tariff simply in response to a surge of imports, even if it's not illegal or done underhandedly, simply a surge. We have had a surge of imports. So it is not as if the Chinese are in violation of anything.

What is the effect of this? It is only done in the name of unions. The tire companies are against the tariffs. The unions are trying to protect jobs. The problem is it's not going to protect the jobs. If you cut off the Chinese imports, it will come out of Indonesia and Brazil and Vietnam.

So it's not going to help. It is going to increase the price of the low-end tires - hurt the poor - and, in the end, it could spark a trade war.

It is a dumb policy and it is a payoff to a special interest, nothing more than that.

LIASSON: Enforcing the trade haws is what every country says when they put tariffs on another country.

But there are two theories on this. One is this is the beginning of a series of mini trade wars that will escalate to the detriment of the entire global economy, or that President Obama has seen the light about trade - free trade - and he wants to show he is tough to his domestic base, the unions first, before he does some opening.

It is kind of like doing a lot of border enforcement before you pass an immigration reform bill. And we'll see petty soon which way he is going to go.

LIASSON: I think this means this has to be discussed at the G20. And he will have ample opportunity to talk about this.

But then the question is can he get over Democratic opposition in the Congress to do free trade deals that are currently stalled?

HAYES: You have to wonder if he is deliberately trying to pick a fight. When he says in his speech we're not trying to be provocative and that protectionism is self-defeating, my inclination actually is to read those as saying exactly the opposite. We are trying to pick a fight and in fact, this is protectionism. I think he basically acknowledges that.

I think the problem that he faces - Charles is exactly right in terms of who this benefits. It clearly benefits the unions. They're the ones who actually looked for the safeguard petition in the first place, not any of the producers.

So that, I think, makes it clear where the benefit is going. This is entirely for domestic political consumption.

BAIER: John Sweeney, the AFL-CIO president put out this statement right after it was announced on Friday evening: "It sends a strong message that the U.S. government will take necessary action to ensure that American workers and producers can compete on fair terms in the global economy."

KRAUTHAMMER: Look, I mean, it implies that the Chinese are acting unfairly, and in this particular case, there is no evidence of that. There isn't even a claim of that.

I think the Chinese are upset. If the president of China shows up in Pittsburgh a chicken suit rolling a tire, we will know that it is on his mind. Obviously the Chinese will retaliate one way or another.

And I can't imagine Mara saying that, well, it's a zig in order that he can zag into a free trader. Clinton did that early in his administration, but he was a man who believed in free trade. Obama is not. There is not a shred of evidence he believes in free trade. Obama is not. There is not a shred of evidence he believes in free trade. He believes in one thing, unions and union support - actually, two things.

BAIER: Mara, it does open up the question. During the campaign, he had all of this questioning about the North American Free Trade Agreement and where he stood.

LIASSON: And which he backed away from much to the unions' dismay. He talked about owning it up, renegotiating it, and that's not happening. So he didn't do that. He hasn't gone to the extreme of opening up trade agreement and renegotiating them. Now he hasn't spend spent a lot of his political capital trying to get the South Korean and Panama and there's a couple that are in Congress right now.

HAYES: This has been this debate raging in Washington today about whether this is sort of a typical first term, in effect a brush-back pitch that presidents throw. Reagan did, Bush did it. Clinton did it.

I don't think so. There is nothing in his background that would lead us to believe he is an ardent proponent of free trade at all. And we all know that he certainly owes a lot of his political success to unions.

Fox gave this a lot of coverage; the little coverage I saw at CNN and MSNBC was reasonable—I did not see all that they did, however. Did you see any of the coverage?

This is a fascinating page; it is FoxNews and it follows pretty much everything that Obama has done, under various categories (Stimulus, Homeland Security, etc.); his actions and rhetoric are noted by date, along with a graph which indicates how he is viewed by the general public, by Republicans, by Democrats, etc. on each key issue (according to polls, I assume). This is a remarkable web page which I think will appeal to all people of the political spectrum (assuming you have an interest in politics).

Remember how Obama started the health care speech with two very sad stories, which came from choosing 2 dramatic examples from 116,000 pages? One woman who lost her coverage was a nurse for 3 decades and lied at least twice on her insurance papers. I mention that she is a nurse, so she should have known better. Obviously it is an unfortunate situation, but this woman should know not to lie on an insurance application.

This is what real astroturf is all about (note the enemies and the dirty tricks list):

RUSH: What an event that was on Saturday. In fact, folks, there were more people at that event on Saturday, according to the British press, than there were people who showed up at Obama's immaculation back in January. You will not find that reported anywhere in the State-Controlled Media in this country, but in the UK press, the British press, it's all over the place. There was something else about that event Saturday that is seminal, something that is crucial for me point out, and I'm going to do that because it's show time. Rush Limbaugh, behind the Golden EIB Microphone. Broadcast excellence is all yours for the next three hours. It's great to be with you.

Barack Obama speaking again as this program commences. He flew to New York to commemorate the crash of the Lehman Brothers. He refused to fly to New York for the Twin Towers crash, but they actually used the word celebrate the one year anniversary of the crash of Lehman Brothers. He's out there doing a speech on financial reform, and it's amazing. They ought to rename 60 Minutes to 60 Minutes with Obama. He's been on three times this year alone. Now, for those of you listening to the program right now, I have no idea how many of our affiliate stations, if any, have bumped coverage of us to carry Obama's speech on the financial sector. Well, you never know, there might be some who have done so. I don't know. But the point is, if any have, I'm not going to let Obama get away with this. For those of you listening right now be aware I'm going to repeat the first half hour of this program, not verbatim, I'm just going to do it all again once this stupid speech is over with, I may do it at the top of the next hour or what have you. But the attempts here to supersede the leader of the conservative movement shall not go unanswered by the leader of the conservative movement.

Anyway, a thrill and delight to be with you. Let's go straight to the audio sound bites. We'll start here Sunday morning, Joe Klein on the Chris Matthews Show, and Norah O'Donnell was the fill-in host, and she said to Joe Klein about criticism of Obama, "Why is this being voiced now in this health care debate?"

KLEIN: Because they're being egged on by demagogues in the Republican Party by boss Rush Limbaugh, and I call him the boss because there isn't a single Republican elected official who's willing to call him out on his lies.

RUSH: Let's stay with Sunday morning, CNN's State of the Union, Howard Kurtz talking to Sam Tanenhaus of the New York Times. Kurtz says, "Today's leaders, at least in the media sphere is Rush Limbaugh, and you don't seem to have much respect for him. But look, Rush has got 600 radio stations and 15 million listeners, his message must be resonating with some folks."

TANENHAUS: In the notorious comment Rush Limbaugh made that he hoped President Obama would fail, he was actually alluding in a serious way to the way our two-party system works, which is that we have alternating periods of single party dominance and the in party, the sun party in the famous formulation is going to have most of the debate occur within its own ranks such as we saw with the stimulus package and the health care debate. Now, my concern is that Republicans have essentially vacated the field and conservative intellectuals are not holding their feet to the fire. This issue of Rush Limbaugh having emerged as the most conspicuous spokesperson for the right was actually identified 15 years ago by Michael Lind, great political commentator. This is something that's been with us for a long time.

RUSH: It's not 15 years, it's 21 but, you know, who's counting? Twenty-one years -- Rush Limbaugh's having emerged -- well, what is his point? Look, they're playing the race card right now. They are losing this debate and they're going back to their time-honored cliches and templates and they do not understand how it is that a Republican Party that's being silent for the most part can bring all of this to a screeching halt, can cause this much trouble. So what's causing the problem? They want all this passed, they want Obama to succeed. What's causing the problem? I am, in their view. This is where they're wrong. This is the seminal thing that I have to point out to you, but stick with me on this first because it keeps getting better. Then Saturday morning, C-SPAN's Washington Journal, the host Pedro Echevarria spoke with Perry Bacon of State-Controlled Washington Post. The question: "To what would you attribute the success of this organization, this rally on Saturday and what they've done across the United States?"

BACON: I think that they've tapped into more than the party here as in Washington. They really tapped into this grassroots sort of frustration about the growth in government, bailouts and so on. They've really captured it. There's been a strong desire for more -- a bigger small-government advocate out there. There was a push for that. And the Republicans here in Washington for a while supported Bush and conservatives have supported Bush while he was growing the size of government and versus as now Republicans in Washington have sort of heard the grassroots in some ways, and they're acting more -- they're opposing everything Obama does and calling it sort of government takeover, the same kind of rhetoric you would hear on a Rush Limbaugh show.

RUSH: So, the general theme from the State-Controlled Media is that the people at these rallies on Saturday are there because of 15 to 21 years of conservative leadership by me, nothing to do with the Republican Party, and they are ticked off about it, they are Kanye West drunk disrupting the MTV awards, they're just fit to be tied. This is not how this was supposed to go down. Obama was supposed to sail through. This was supposed to happen by acclamation. We were supposed to be on our hands and feet or on our hands and knees, actually, bowing down and thanking the Great One for fixing this country. This country has never been more divided than it is now, contrary to what everybody thought Obama was going to bring, great unity and everyone getting along and end of the partisan divide. Now, let's go to the piece de resistance -- and, yes, the seminal moment of Saturday still yet to be pointed out by me and it's a key one so stick with me here, but first Saturday night, CNN Newsroom, the anchor Don Lemon talking with the author Tim Wise with about his new book Between Barack and a Hard Place. The anchor says, "Is race a factor? Is that the elephant in this room?"

WISE: It is the background noise of a lot of the opposition. You have Rush Limbaugh yesterday on the air saying first that community service is the first step toward fascism which is bizarre even for him, and then almost immediately after that saying one of the problems with America is too much multiculturalism. You wouldn't say that unless you were trying to stoke white racial resentment and so when you say those things I want to know when are Republican leaders going to condemn that kind of rhetoric because that's where race is being interjected.

RUSH: Race has nothing to do with this. Multiculturalism has nothing to do with race. This has to do with there being two or three completely different Americas now. We are trying to save this country as it was founded for anybody who wants to join us. We don't care what their race, their ethnicity, their religion happens to be. Community service is the first step towards fascism. When you take the event of 9/11 they leave this out. You take the commemorative celebration 9/11 and turn it into a community service day? 9/11 is not about community service. 9/11 is about remembering the dead, remembering who killed the dead, and what we're going to do to make sure it doesn't happen again. It's not about advancing President Obama's political agenda.

Now, the great seminal moment on Saturday, and Clarice Feldman at the American Thinker along with Rosslyn Smith say this better than I could. "We are witnessing a very rare phenomenon, the genuine, broad-based spontaneous political movement with no visible charismatic leaders. . Most significantly of all, those in attendance had not relied in any way on members of the current political class to get them there, nor had they showed up because their livelihood would be in jeopardy had they not agreed to demonstrate, as is the union way." This is exactly right. We are witnessing a conservative ascendancy here and it is happening because the people of this country are scared to death and fed up and see clearly what their future is if they don't try to stop it. We had a call on Friday from a guy who called and said, "I just want to thank you. My wife and I are going to this thing, first time we've ever done anything like this." Most people were doing this for the first time. They'd never done anything like this. And he wanted to thank me. And I said, "Sir, with all due respect, I'd love to accept your thanks, but I haven't told anybody to go to any of these rallies."

I haven't urged anybody to go to this thing Saturday in Washington. I didn't urge anybody to go to the town halls. All I've ever said was that what did happen in the town halls on Saturday is something that's going to have to be kept up for four years. If you're looking for validation from the State-Controlled Media, I say this again, if you're looking for the media to report on what you did fairly and accurately and be moved by it, if you're looking for Obama to be moved by it, it ain't going to happen. I think people know this now. Folks, I cannot tell you how important this is. I mean, look, being very honest, I have all of these sound bites. I've got four sound bites to lead this program. And all these jerks in the State-Controlled Media think you showed up Saturday 'cause of me. You know how easy it would be for me to come here and say, "Yup, I did it"? But I didn't ask one person to go. I didn't urge anybody to go to this thing. You know why? Because I knew I didn't have to. I've never asked you to make phone calls to Congress. Well, I did it once to demo what would happen if I did, I shut down the switchboard. But I don't tell you to write letters, I don't do anything. Maybe during the immigration debate was one noted exception. But I know that I don't have to.

You don't need a leader -- Clarice Feldman is exactly right -- you don't need a charismatic leader to get you out of the house and to spend money to drive or fly to Washington and get a hotel for Friday and Saturday night and show up as part of a two million people crowd on Saturday and then leave the place as clean as you found it, like Dan's Bake Sale. Some of the pictures after the event, there were no messes, just like Dan's Bake Sale. Now, one other thing about this. I was reading in the New York -- well, I had it pointed out to me by Ross Douthat in his -- I hope I'm pronouncing that right. I've never heard his name pronounced. It's D-o-u-t-h-a-t. So I'm just pronouncing it as it looks to me. He had a quote from Frank Luntz. And Frank Luntz said that this is not a Republican or Democrat thing, this protest. People are angry at both parties. Let me tell you something. I know Frank Luntz and sometimes I even like Frank but he couldn't be more wrong about this. I'm here to tell you that when the Republicans under George Bush were spending like never before you didn't have this kind of thing happen.

This is a conservative ascendancy. This most definitely is a Republican versus Democrat thing with Joe Wilson out there taking heat demanding to -- in fact, if I were Joe Wilson what I would say: "I'll apologize as soon as Pelosi apologizes to the CIA. I'll apologize as soon as she apologizes for calling half the country Nazis." He said he's not going to apologize anymore. Good for him. This most definitely is a left-right thing or if you don't like that formulation this most definitely is a capitalist free market economy versus a fascist socialist economy kind of thing or if you want a different formulation you could say this is freedom versus tyranny. This is liberty versus tyranny. That's what's driving this thing. It has nothing to do with people upset with how things are going in Washington on the part of both parties. I know that a lot of people want to look at this as the independents rising up. This is not the independents rising, there are some independents out there, some moderates. These are people who are fed up and want no part of the Barack Obama Democrat Party agenda, pure and simple.

You cannot tell me that people are showing up protesting Republicans because the Republicans aren't doing anything because the Republicans can't do anything, the Republicans don't have any power to do anything. They don't have the votes to stop one thing. Well, maybe in the Senate 'til they replace the swimmer, but nevertheless, nobody's in Washington upset with the Republicans here. You might have a few people they're going just 'cause they're mad at Washington in general but I'm telling you, Washington, as long as I've been alive, has been run by the Democrats. Washington has been run by America's left, and now it's in control of the most radical leftist bunch of people ever in our nation's history, not to mention our lifetimes. And so don't buy this notion that you're a bunch of mind-numbed robots showing up because some leaders got you there, that you wouldn't be doing this without that.

You're doing this on your own, and many millions more of you wanted to be there who for whatever reasons couldn't be. Don't buy the notion that this is a standard, people just upset at incumbents kind of thing, 'cause it has nothing to do with that. This has everything to do with people opposing The One, Barack Obama, and Barney Frank, and Chris Dodd. Now, you find a lot of corruption on the left, there's no question and people are upset with it, but what they're foremost upset with is Obama and what his plans are taking over the government, socializing health care, doing as much as he can to strip freedom from people and liberty. Liberty versus tyranny, that's what was on display Saturday on the part of the American people. It is a Republican-Democrat thing, and don't let anybody tell you that it's not.

RUSH: Now, this is important, folks. There are a lot of phony conservatives out there. They get a lot of print in the New York Times. They got a lot of attention on broadcast TV. Any conservative who dumps on conservatism is going to be loved and focused on by State-Controlled Media. And a lot of these people are more interested in promoting themselves than the cause here, and so it's in their best career interests to keep attacking conservatives, dumping on conservatism -- i.e., the era of Reagan is over and so forth -- to pretend that there's something else going on out there. David Brooks, Ross Douthat, Frank Luntz, they've counted conservatives out there and they've insisted that conservatives change their principles or their message and they're being proven wrong. So they spin.

Others claim that there's not a world's bit of difference between Republicans and Democrats, and that's about as stupid as it gets. I'm not denying the Republican Party's lost its way, no question about that, on spending and other matters. But to say that there is no difference between the radical leadership of the Democrat Party and the Republican Party is just naive. It is irrelevant. These people that showed up Saturday did not show up protesting Republicans. It is not Republicans that have them afraid for their future. It's not Republicans that have them afraid for their children's and grandchildren's future. It's not Republicans that have them afraid for their jobs. It's not Republicans that have them afraid for the economy. It's Obama! It's the Democrat Party today. The Republican Party is irrelevant.

The Republican Party has got two or three people that show up now and then and say something but they don't have the votes to stop anything. The Republican Party is not doing diddly-squat. People don't show up and protest people who aren't doing anything. People show up and protest people who are doing things they consider to be dangerous and destructive. Now, what some of us have been arguing here for a long time is for conservatives to take back the Republican Party from these appeasers and these phony moderates who do not understand -- or maybe they do and wish to ignore -- the radicalism of Obama. And they're not willing or prepared to challenge it. What I'm arguing for here and what we're seeing is for the rise of conservatism, and there is a conservative ascendancy taking place -- and to deny that is to sabotage what is taking place.

This is all about conservatives ascending. This is not about people protesting simply Washington who come at it with no ideological point of view or frame of reference. The problem with this argument that says, "Well, you know, this is the independents rising up. It's not a right-and-left thing. It's not a Republican-Democrat thing," is that it encourages the creation of a third-party movement which is gonna guarantee the reelection of Barack Obama and the Democrat Party across the board. Now, one way we know that Obamacare is in trouble is that they have launched the race card. They have come out with this cliche once again. Obamacare is in trouble. The White House is in panic mode. The State-Controlled Media is in panic mode, and we have the ultimate tea leaf to approve it.

When all else fails, go to page one of the 50-year-old Democrat Party playbook and launch the race card. It's page one of their playbook. They would have us believe that there are no legitimate problems with Obamacare. There are no legitimate concerns. It's just racists who want to stop the first black president. I don't know who pressed the launch button on the race card, but you can see and hear and read those who got the message. Maureen Dowd in the New York Times yesterday, talking about Joe Wilson, said, "Fair or not, what I heard was an unspoken word in the air." You know, Wilson said, "You lie." Maureen Dowd says what she heard was, "You lie, boy." Newsweek, with a cover, "Is Your Baby Racist?" Your baby at six months learns to hate people of different races! This is a sure sign that they are in desperate straits and out of ideas.

RUSH: I kid you not Newsweek magazine's September 14th cover has a little white baby boy with the headline: "Is Your Baby Racist? -- Exploring the Roots of Discrimination." The headline of the actual story: "See Baby Discriminate -- Kids as young as 6 months judge others based on skin color. What's a parent to do?" Now, this is just lies. This is page one of the Democrat Party playbook. They're out of ideas; they're panicking. They cannot debate the ideas with us and so for -- I've been here 21 years -- 21 years they have been trying to besmirch and impugn my casualty and credibility by saying I'm a racist. And it doesn't work because A, I'm not one; and B, you who listen regularly know it. The media didn't make me; they can't break me. Only you can, and that's up to me and you, if that happens, not them. But looking at this cover, it's striking for two reasons.

I thought Obama was going to make all this go away. I thought the election of the first black president... Actually, I didn't. If you'll remember, I predicted that exactly what is happening was going to happen. I predicted that the election -- 'cause I remember we had phone calls from people. "Hey, Rush, don't you think it would be a good idea because then they can never say we're racist again. They can never say America is a racist country." I said, "No, it's only going to get worse." Cookie, go to the archives and dig this up. I don't care where it is. It's last year, late last year. First part of this year, late last year would be better. Dig something out of the archives. I know I've said it a number of times, any criticism of Obama is going to be labeled racist. It's all the left knows to do is to call names and to impugn character. They do not discuss the substance of issues.

They would have us believe there's nothing wrong with Obamacare. There's nothing wrong with cap and trade. There's nothing wrong with bailing out the banks. There's nothing wrong with the government owning General Motors and Chrysler. There's nothing wrong with any of that. The only reason people oppose it is because they're racist? That's laughable. It doesn't fly any longer. Nobody is going to buy into this, and yet they continue to play the card. This story in Newsweek: Apparently being born white automatically makes you a racist -- which, to me, is just another example of what obsessive racists the leftists actually are. It's the left that refuses to let people be who they are. It's the left that looks at people and sees categories first rather than individuals. They see either women or gays or blacks or whites or Hispanics.

It is the left that gave us hyphenated Americans. It is the left that prefers "celebrating diversity" to the glory of the American melting pot. There used to be a distinct American culture that everybody who moved here wanted to be part of. Now that's not happening. This is why I say there are two or three different Americas. And I'll tell you this: If children were not constantly hounded about race it would never occur to them that it was an issue to be considered. Now, I've often said that these accusations I'm racist... I wasn't a racist 'til the media made me one! Was I a racist 'til the Democrat Party started focusing on all this stuff and they called me one. I wasn't a racist. There's a guy writing a book about me, and the last time I sat down and did an interview him, it was down here in Florida and he said, "I don't think you get it about race."

"Well, you know, there are a lot of people in this country whom the Constitution doesn't speak for."

I said, "No, you're using a liberal cliche. How long have you known me? Do you personally think I'm a racist?"

So I told him some stories about growing up. I told him about our maid that came in two or three times a week named Alberta. We called her Bertie. She was like a grandmother to my brother and me, and my mom and dad. My mother took her home and I'd drive in the car. I'm six or seven years old. I saw where Bertie lived and it made me sick. I talked to my parents about it. I said, "Why does this happen?" They sat me down and they talked to me about the circumstances. It was my father that enabled Bertie to buy a house outside of that neighborhood and get her a job at... I think it was at Woolworth's. I'm telling this author all this stuff and I don't know if it's registering at all -- and I'm, frankly, angry I have to tell it. I'm angry that I have to say this stuff.

Here's a guy doing a book on me who I don't know if he thinks so or if he's just asking the question because he thinks readers are going to want to know it. But I didn't become a racist until somebody called me one when I started this radio show. I wasn't a racist up until 1988, and then somebody called me one -- and ever since I was called a racist, I've been one, according to the media. And yet I never was one and I'm not one now. And all of you are racists, simply because you oppose Obama. Every bit of this was predicted.

RUSH: Before we go to the break, February 22, 2008. This is what? It's 16 months ago. Sixteen months ago said I, El Rushbo, behind this (tap, tap, tap) the Golden EIB Microphone.

RUSH ARCHIVE: "If Obama gets elected president, wouldn't it be to just get it done, Rush, and then we could end the civil rights squabbles that we're having." It wouldn't do that. Folks, it wouldn't do that. It might even exacerbate them. Let me explain how. ...

RUSH: And I go on to explain to people how it is that criticism of Obama will result in more charges of racism that the race industry will gin up. Speaking the race industry, the Reverend Jackson in North Charleston, South Carolina, just this morning told a South Carolina audience the federal bailout has failed to create jobs in America. Now, this is only obvious to everybody. But the Reverend Jackson saying it has added impact to his audience.

RUSH: You know those pro-amnesty rallies, immigration, were they called racist? Were those people called racists? I mean La Raza organized and sponsored those rallies. Were they called racist? Of course they weren't.

RUSH: From Boston.com, this is the Boston Globe January 22nd. "The National Park Service says it will rely on a media report that says 1.8 million people attended President Obama's [immaculation]. David Barna, a Park Service spokesman, said ... 'It is a record. ... We believe it is the largest event held in Washington, D.C., ever.'" Again January 22, Boston Globe. Yesterday, September 13th, the UK Daily Mail wrote: "Up to two million people marched to the US capital today, carrying signs with slogans such as 'Obamacare makes me sick.' As they protested the health care plan and what they say is out-of-control spending."

Well, if the Parks Service relied on "a media report" to say the crowd was 1.8 million was a record, I, too, El Rushbo am going to rely on a media report, the UK Daily Mail to say the crowd Saturday was two million people. Audio sound bite time. This was just juicy. Saturday afternoon on CNN's Newsroom, the anchor Fredricka Whitfield spoke with the CNN Radio Capitol Hill correspondent Lisa Desjardins (or Desjardins, I'm not sure how she pronounces it) with Joe Wilson, the Republican from South Carolina. Whitfield says, "You actually have some experience covering Joe Wilson within South Carolina. He's not new to South Carolina. However, he might be new to the national spotlight. Did this display this week seem kind of in concert with the Joe Wilson they know in South Carolina?"

DESJARDINS: They've been talking a lot to me about what they think CNN should air and here you hear them chanting.

DESJARDINS: Let's talk about Joe Wilson. I've covered him for a long time and I'll tell you, he is a man who does care about things like honor, doing the right thing.

DESJARDINS: He's also a man who displays a reactionary tendency, something bothers him, and it builds up, I have seen him get passionate and fiery about it before like this.

DESJARDINS: So, it didn't shock me. I think people who know him, know him as more of a mild-mannered guy...

WHITFIELD: Hey, Lisa, I'm just going to interrupt you for a minute because the crowd is kind of overshadowing your words, so I'm going to ask you to speak a little but louder and give it one more shot.

RUSH: Fredricka Whitfield of CNN. Could you hear the infobabe's report? Could you hear what she said or were you drowned out by the crowd? Somebody tell me, because I could hardly make it out. Well, here's what she said. "Right now they're chanting, 'Tell the truth.' They've been talking a lot to me about what they think CNN should air and here you hear them chanting. Let's talk about Joe Wilson. I've covered him for a long time and I'll tell you, he is a man who does care about things like honor, doing the right thing. He's also a man who displays a reaction reactionary tendency, something bothers him, and it builds up, I have seen him get passionate and fiery about it before like this." What's reactionary about it? Everybody's reactionary using that definition. "So it didn't shock me. I think people that know him know him more of a mild-mannered guy," but the crowd Saturday was shouting at CNN, "Tell the truth." Now, a lot later on the reporter decides to ask the crowd about Wilson. This is the radio correspondent Lisa Desjardins (again I don't know how to pronounce her name). They had this exchange with protesters about Wilson?

DESJARDINS: So there are -- there are people who strongly support Congressman Wilson and many of them are right here.

RUSH: Once again the State-Controlled Media is drumming up this whole notion of reactionary

racism based on Joe Wilson's comment. Wilson, by the way, says he is not going to apologize any more for what he said. It's about time. And if he does apologize anymore, he ought to do it predicated on whether Pelosi apologizes first. You know, Pelosi's got a lot of apologizing to do. She insulted the CIA. Will she apologize to the CIA for what she said? Will she apologize to the half the American people for calling them Nazis? "House Republicans are starting to counterattack in Wilson's war." This is from ThePolitico.com: "Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), who recently observed that 'white men' were being excluded from many Obama initiatives, is circulating a fill-in-your-name e-letter to House Republicans urging them to stiffen their spines and urge Joe Wilson to fight back against the Dem's anticipated motion against him next week" to make him, if he doesn't apologize, officially censor him or whatever. So it's a good sign here. The Republicans might be getting a little backbone here where Wilson is concerned.

RUSH: CNN's Newsroom Saturday afternoon, the anchor Don Lemon speaking with correspondent Jim Spellman about the Freedom Works rally, and Lemon says, "What was the most extreme of what you've heard on Saturday afternoon?"

SPELLMAN: Really running through this whole sort of subculture that's developed around these tea parties is a bit of a dark undercurrent. You have the bulk of the people that are there for low taxes, less government control. But there really is an element that's got these kinds of outlandish conspiracy theories about death camps and about, you know, this takeover, people comparing President Obama to Hitler. It really is a sizable threat. It's not just a couple of people on the edges.

RUSH: Now, the Obama is Hitler signs, those are the Lyndon LaRouche Democrats that are out there carrying around the Obama is Hitler signs. But it's a dark undercurrent. The bulk of the people are there for low taxes, less government control, but there's an element that's got these kind of outlandish conspiracy theories about death camps, this takeover, people comparing Obama to Hitler, there really is a sizeable threat, it's not just a couple of people on the edges. Nobody's talking about death camps. I know nobody is talking about death camps. Look, it's CNN. They are sucking hind teat. They are sucking hind teat on a boar hog. That's how low their audience is, and this is why, this is nothing but a bunch of cliches, a dark undercurrent, low taxes, less government control, conspiracy theories. I got a note from someone who said, "I disagree with you, this is not about Liberty and Tyranny, this is about love and hate. It's about deep love for their country and their hate and fear for where it's going." Ah, liberty and tyranny.

But the point is that love was what got everybody out there, love of country. I'm not disputing that. I think the two go hand in hand. But this passion was genuine, and I got a couple of e-mails, "Rush, Rush, Rush, this was led by them, there were people that led this." You're misunderstanding my point when I say this. I'm quoting from Clarice Feldman, by the way, who said, "We are witnessing a very rare phenomenon, the genuine, broad-based spontaneous political movement with no visible charismatic leaders," that's right on the money. And the contrast here, don't miss it, the contrast is Obama can't get a crowd out like this on the substance of his ideas to save his life. Obama's crowds are directly the result of some charismatic leader and platitudes and a bunch of nothings. And now he can't even get those people out. So the people he has to get out there are drummed up, they're organized from the White House and from the unions and the union thugs are given orders to the union rank-and-file, you better get out there if you know what's good for you. And then when they do get out there they start beating up people that show at the tea parties. In fact, they beat up a black conservative and nobody called that racist. That happened outside St. Louis.

So, no, I'm not trying to deny anybody credit here. It's more than that. Why does every event like this has have to have some sort of credit attached to it? That demeans it. That demeans the people that showed up. They showed up of their own volition. People are not a bunch of mind-numbed robots getting marching orders here. That's the beauty of what happened on Saturday. So, let's see. We just played the sound bite here, the dark undercurrent, low taxes, less government control, conspiracy theories. So then the anchor, Don Lemon, said to their correspondent, Jim Spellman, "What do you mean by much darker thing? Tell me about that."

SPELLMAN: One of the things that we heard over and over again is that it's sort of the death panels thing taken to several degrees past that where the president's going to set up these death camps, where they're going to do forced sterilization and that the government is taking over the Internet to stifle, you know, speech and that there's going to be forced vaccinations. There's just so much sort of disinformation or misinformation out there that it really creates a significant part. You did you not see as much of it today here in Washington but in these towns across America that we went --

RUSH: Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait, hold it a minute, wait a minute, CNN, this is why you are the hind teat on a boar hog, you go through all this dark undercurrent conspiracy theories, low taxes -- well, what do you mean by a darker thing? Well, you know, these people believe in government taking over the internet, you didn't so much see it here today. Well, then what the hell is this report about? This is absolute journalistic malpractice. You see this at these town parties in individual cities, not so much here today. By the way, it was Jay Rockefeller who has written a bill that would allow Obama to take control of private Internet networks in event of a cyber-emergency, with them left to define what cyber-emergency is. There are two Americas. There may be three, and the State-Controlled Media definitely part of it. Sunday morning, here is a montage of ABC's Yunji de Nies, CNN's John King, and CBS' Bob Schieffer talking about a sign at the Freedom Works rally.

KING: I'm going to show you one right here that I found particularly distasteful, "Bury Obamacare with Kennedy."

RUSH: I'll say them for you, John King, "Bury health care with Kennedy." That upsets them. We got a liberal feminist columnist saying maybe Mary Jo Kopechne would think it was worth it to pass away in order to further the career of the Kennedy family. It is okay for these people to say horrible, rotten things about George W. Bush. It's okay for them to do movies and books on assassinating George W. Bush and they have no problem, in fact, when they report on that they tell us, "Yeah, it may be hard to take, but there is a cultural lesson here. We must learn from this. We must learn to appreciate the art in this." But "Bury Obamacare with Kennedy" is beyond the pale to these people. Now, Bob Schieffer has written a piece about this and I know I had it in the stack and now I can't seem to find it. It's about this very type of thing. He's never seen anything like this before about how the American people are divided.

Here it is. Bob Schieffer: "'Not America's Proudest Moment' -- Forget Bipartisanship, Comity or Civility -- Schieffer Says Mindless Meanness Has Invaded the Public Commons. That was not a State of the Union speech we heard the other night, but it had all the trappings -- and when that Congressman hollered 'You lie!' at the President, we did get a snapshot of the nation's state. It was not a pretty picture. The country is in an angry mood -- people are frustrated, tempers are short, congressmen are being shouted down at town hall meetings (where constituents sometimes show up with guns), and at rallies like the one yesterday in Washington where people carried signs such as 'Bury Health Care with Kennedy.' The irony of a congressman trying to heckle a president in the midst of a speech that was, among other things, about the need for civility is just one ugly sign of the mindless meanness that has settled over our politics.

"How different it was in the aftermath of a far more difficult time, those days after 9/11, whose anniversary we marked on Friday. I remember watching then, not far from where that congressman hurled his insult, as Senate Republican Leader Trent Lott put his hand on the shoulder of his Democratic counterpart Tom Daschle to announce the Senate had passed a $40 billion emergency appropriations bill, and passed it unanimously. That day the country came together as it had not done since World War II. It made us proud to know what we could do when we had to. It brought out our best. Put aside for the moment who is right and who is wrong in the current debate, and ask yourself: Can anyone really be proud of the side of America this argument is bringing out?"

Bob, putting aside who's right and wrong. see, this is the trick. Put aside who's right or wrong. You know, Bob, I gotta tell you something. For one person, I am overwhelmingly proud of what I saw on Saturday. I'm busting-buttons proud. In fact, Bob, I'm really proud that for once somebody is willing to stand up to Obama and to Pelosi and to Reid and all the horrible things they're trying to do to the American people via their agenda. Mr. Schieffer, I am proud of the tea parties and the protesters at town hall meetings. I am proud people are trying to save this country from fascism. What is it, Bob, are you shocked that conservatism has a backbone? Are you shocked that people are finally showing up? See the inside-the-beltway mentality is it doesn't matter, doesn't matter what gets done. It just matters that we all like each other as it gets done. And, of course, in Schieffer's mind what gets done is the advancement of liberalism and statism and big government. And, gee, wouldn't it be nice if Republicans just agree with us on this? Wouldn't it be nice if there were no opposition? There was no meanness, Bob, in Joe Wilson's words to Obama at Congress on Wednesday night. Obama was lying. There was no meanness in Washington on Saturday.

You know when the meanness started, Bob? You want to know when it really started? Your buddy Ted Kennedy savaging Robert Bork, that's when the meanness started. And they continued trying to destroy Clarence Thomas, and then George H. W. Bush. Throw me in there, blaming me for the Oklahoma City bombing and anything else they don't like. Calling half the Americans Nazis, Bob, Nancy Pelosi. Harry Reid calling the president a loser and a liar. You didn't worry about the meanness of any of this, and I mean these examples are legion. I could go on. You didn't worry about the movie that won an award in Canada on how to assassinate Bush? You didn't worry about the book that came out, how to assassinate Bush. You weren't bothered when Dick Durbin called interrogators at Guantanamo Bay the equivalent of Pol Pot's guys and Soviet gulag types, Nazi thugs, that didn't bother you, Bob, you didn't think things were mean there?

You weren't bothered, Mr. Schieffer, when Jack Murtha accused Marines at Haditha of rape and murder, later exonerated and equated? You weren't bothered when John Kerry equated our troops to terrorists storming the homes of Iraqi women at night? That didn't bother you, Bob? You didn't think that was mean? You didn't think that it was mean for the left to be calling George W. Bush Hitler? All Joe Wilson did was say, "You lie." He was lying! And Obama's admitted it by coming out and trying to tell us now, oh, by the way, there's only 30 million uninsured and we're going to have a provision in there that the illegals are not covered by health care. Well, Bob, doesn't that tell you that Wilson was right?

CALLER: Hello, Rush. Mega dittos from rain-soaked north Texas. Listen, when Joe Wilson yelled "You lie," he only yelled it once; I must have yelled it more. But let me tell you something I heard. Obama is slick. He said he's going to leave this illegal alien out of this health bill. Well, Judge Napolitano on Fox News made the comment that California passed a measure on their ballot to eliminate illegals from receiving medical care out there. Two courts turned it down, reversed it, and the Supreme Court refused to hear it. So he knows what he's doing. He's going to leave it out of there and they're going to say, "You can't do that."

RUSH: Exactly right. Obama is going to try to get credit. In fact, they had a big document dump on Friday afternoon at the White House, and when one of the things that they dumped was verification is needed to ensure that illegals don't receive health care benefits. It's not in the bill; they need to put it in there. I mean, they were admitting that Joe Wilson was right. But Joe here in Grand Prairie, Texas, is also right. Illegals were left out in California, the Supreme Court said, "No, no, no, you gotta cover 'em," and this is what Obama knows as well.

RUSH: You know, Colleen from Virginia Beach was our last caller, and she said she was at the rally on Saturday. She ran into a liberal, young 25-year-old guy arguing with her about the health care bill, and he was insistent -- 'cause he'd worked for Ted Kennedy and because he's heard Obama say so -- that abortions were not covered with taxpayer dollars in the current health care bill, and she said, "Oh, it's there. Sure," and supposedly he went online on his BlackBerry and found out, "Oh, they are covered. I'm sorry," and apologized, which I've never heard of that happening before. But here's the thing: "All you need to know proof-wise any time you hear a claim from the Obamacare crowd such as, "Abortions are not covered in my health care bill," if that is so, why wasn't the pro-choice crowd storming the gates of the White House?

"Federally funded, federally funded abortions are not part of my health care bill and never will be and they haven't been." Then why aren't the feminazis showing up with tanks and bulldozers at the White House? By the same token, "My health care bill, Joe Wilson said I lied? He lied! My health care bill does not cover illegals." If that's so, how come La Raza was not storming the gates of the White House? How come the pro-amnesty crowd was not up in arms? They all know the truth. They all know that abortions are covered and will be covered in any Obama health care plan, and the same thing with medical coverage for illegals. Now, ladies and gentlemen, we've gone through the sound bites today here on the EIB Network and the leftist State-Run Media is talking about "the dark mood," the conspiracy theories, the dark undercurrent. "Death camps! People comparing Obama to Hitler." Of course that was the LaRouche Democrats doing that.

The point is they're always out there talking about the nut ball fringe of the right. Think the whacked-out birthers or the wing nuts. And, you know, we got some people on the edge on our side. I'd be a fool to deny that. We got some wackos on our side. But here's the difference: The left's wackos now hold office. The left's wackos are making the nation's laws. The left's wackos populate the White House. You want to talk about fringes, you have to mention the leftists. They've got their "truthers," their 9/11 nutcases, but they've got Pelosi. They've got Harry Reid. They've got Maxine Waters. They've got... What's this woman that replaced Mickey Leland? I'm having a mental block. Well, Barbara Lee is from California. She's a nutcase. But... Yeah, and they hired Van Jones. So, we have our wackos and they're safely out on the fringe. The left's wackos are in Congress and in the White House, and they are writing the nation's laws. That is the big difference. You want to hear from one of these leftist wackos? Face the Nation yesterday morning, Bob Schieffer talking to White House advisor David Axelrod. "What do you make of the big protest out there on Saturday?" What's the message?" Number ten.

AXELROD: I don't think it's indicative of the nation's mood. In fact, I don't believe that some of the angriest, most strident voices we saw during the summer, uhhh, were representative of the thousands of town hall meetings that went on around the country that came off peacefully, that were constructive, people, uhh, voicing their, uhhh, points of view. One of the great things about our country is people can express themselves, even if they're not representative of the majority. Your own poll, which was taken after the president's speech, suggests that they don't represent, uhhh, a mainstream view, uhhh, of this health care plan, and so, uhhh, you know, I -- I don't think we ought to be, uhh, distracted, uhhh, by that.

RUSH: What? What poll? The only "polls," plural, I've seen show a majority disapproval with the Obama health care plan. Now, he did get a bump after the speech in Rasmussen. He did get a bump, but he got the bump personally, not health care-wise. But what poll is he talking about here? The opposition to Obama health care is in fact mainstream. Then Bob Schieffer said, "Well, why doesn't the president just say, 'We don't have the votes to pass this? We have the votes, perhaps, to pass a lot of other things'? Just put that aside and say..." These guys are just so obsessed with the process. You know, that's Bob Schieffer and all these Beltway types, they're just obsessed with the process. They think the greatest thing in the world is when somebody proposes "a bill." Then there's "a bill" out there to talk about. The piece of legislation. And what's the process? "Is the president going to win? Are we gonna get the bill?" We don't need the friggin' bill! We don't need this friggin' bill! We don't need the cap in cap-and-trade bill! We don't need half the bills or any of the bills Obama's proposed. Screw the bills. This is the bottom line. These guys all get caught up in the process, "is Obama going to get the bill passed?" It's a rotten bill! It stinks, Mr. Schieffer. It's stupid. This is not a game. It's not a horse race. We're talking about the future of the country. That's why people are out there in droves. So anyway he asks Axelrod, "He said the public option wasn't crucial to the plan. He said he still liked it, why didn't he go for something that will pass?

AXELROD: He continues to believe it's a good idea, continues to advocate it. And I'm not willing to accept that it's not going to be in the final package.

RUSH: Bottom line is: "Screw all of you who don't want the government running health care! It doesn't matter what you want. You're not representative of a majority of America anyway." But here's Olympia Snowe on CBS Face the Nation yesterday morning. Bob Schieffer: "Did the president take the public option off the table the other night or should he be more specific about it?"

SNOWE: He should be more specific. In fact, now I urge the president to take the public option off the table because it's universally opposed by our Republicans in the Senate and therefore there's no way to pass a plan that includes the public option.

RUSH: Remember they were reporting Olympia Snowe was all for the public option up until last week when she came out and said: Wait a minute, I'm not for the public option! She says it's "universally opposed by the Republicans in the Senate." Well, that's a problem. But, no, it's not. No, it's not. They'll replace Ted Kennedy soon enough. They get back to 60 votes, but they're not going to go the 60 votes route. They're going to go 61 votes. They're going to go reconciliation. "Screw you" is their motto.

RUSH: As promised, it's now time to go to the phones. We'll start in Chicago. This is Patricia and nice to have you here, Patricia. Welcome to the EIB Network.

CALLER: Hi, Rush. Been a longtime listener, first-time caller, public school teacher, back from Washington, DC, the most electrifyingly exciting experience of my life.

RUSH: I have gotten tons of e-mails over the weekend from people saying the same thing.

CALLER: Yes. I went with my brother, who is a retired firefighter, assistant fire chief. My first observation is the numbers. I could not see the end of the sea of people. It was a tsunami. It was like watching an erupting volcano.

RUSH: Yeah. And it was peaceful. And there were some of the funniest signs I've ever seen. One guy had a sign that said: "Doesn't matter what this sign says, they'll say it's racist anyway." Just an absolutely fabulous sign and people were making some of the most creative signs out there. There was a picture of George Washington with a bubble like in a cartoon, with George Washington saying, "WTF?" (laughing) "What the... is happening to our country?" (laughing) It was fabulous. And when it was all over it was clean, just like Dan's Bake Sale. Now, the UK press, you talk about the numbers, folks, I saw the Drive-Bys, they said "tens of thousands of people." Eventually somebody got the number pretty close to being right but the UK media saying two million. Others on the conservative side, "You know, it's tough to estimate." You do the best you can with previous crowds and what they have said, but you look at the pictures and you try to estimate the grid, the number of people. It doesn't matter. The place was teeming and it makes no surprise State-Controlled Media would try to diminish it.

CALLER: Hello, Rush. I was not only in the march, I was part of the contingent that actually led it up Pennsylvania Avenue. And anyone who sees the YouTube video will see a group of, it looks like Continental soldier reenactors with a fife and drum corps. I was one of the people that helped organize that to lead the parade, and we were supposed to meet up there at eight, but what a lot of people don't know is that the crowd for the march were supposed to meet at Freedom Plaza at nine o'clock in the morning. The reenactors were supposed to be there at eight o'clock. I got there at 7:30. When I got there at 7:30 there was over a thousand people in the plaza.

RUSH: You mean to tell me a thousand racists showed up an hour-and-a-half early?

CALLER: I like to think of them as a thousand patriots and they just kept pouring in. Now, the parade itself, the march itself wasn't scheduled to begin until 11:30. But by ten o'clock, there were several thousand people, and they were still pouring in. I could see them coming in from every avenue leading to Freedom Plaza, and the district police were going crazy, they didn't know what to do, traffic was being blocked, Pennsylvania Avenue was being blocked, and --

RUSH: I know a lot of people on the ground in Washington were stunned by the size. You weren't, and I wasn't. I know the rage that's bubbling up out there, and it's real, and it's not going away.

RUSH: I can understand things are probably depressed in Philadelphia today what with the injury to the quarterback Donovan McNabb.

CALLER: Well, we'll see. It's always a first game and we won. What I'm calling --

RUSH: I find it interesting the guy's got a cracked rib. A cracked rib! Have you ever tried to walk with a cracked rib much less broken rib? Have you ever tried to walk? Have you ever tried to breathe with a broken or cracked rib?

CALLER: That's right. Well, we'll see. You know, we're always the bridesmaid, never the bride, so we'll see what happens this year.

RUSH: I didn't mean to introduce a downer into what was obviously a very upbeat call.

CALLER: What I was calling about is this was any first protest march in Washington and I want to say I was just so uplifted by the entire experience. I was dead center on the lawn. I never heard one foul language. I never saw anything of the kind. I just saw good protesting going on. One of the signs that caught my attention, and there were numerous ones, was: "I am here representing people that could not make it," and I thought to myself: "There is one difference here between this protest and others. These people all vote and they are serious."

RUSH: Well, but there's another bigger difference. There's another bigger difference. These kind of rallies, like the big pro-amnesty rally back in 2007 or any other Obama rally, they have to actually send out marching orders and instructions to get their people out. It's same thing for pro-Obama health care rallies. They are staged and organized. People of their own passion do not show up. This is important to mention, I think. I think this is the most important thing to mention about Saturday, the most important thing -- and that is: There was no leader who organized this. There was no charismatic leader who was speaking. There was no person out there telling you to get your tail in gear and get to Washington.

Yeah, there were some e-mails and websites you could go to to find details and so forth. But people went of their own volition. They went because of their own passion. (interruption) Yes, the program observer with a question. Well, if I had given out marching orders, the event would be discredited as being illegitimate, which is why I didn't. You think more people would show up? There's no question, but I purposely did not stay a word about this. We had a guy call on Friday. Snerdley, you were still out sick. We had a guy call here Friday thanking me for this whole thing. I said, "Look, sir, you're going on your own. I've never asked people to go to this thing. I haven't even talked about it."

I didn't talk about it on purpose. I didn't talk about it on purpose because I didn't want State-Controlled Media using me to denigrate the whole thing. If I had urged people to go, then the whole process would have been called illegitimate. (interruption) Well, I know they're -- no, they're not. They're not saying the event was illegitimate. They're trying to say it wasn't as loud as it was. I know they're trying to blame me. They're blaming me anyway. I knew this was going to happen, but if I had actually done it -- if they had tape of me, is my point. If they had tape of me actually urging people to show up, then all weekend long they'd say, "Well, this didn't mean anything. This is Limbaugh's mind-numbed robots." I knew I didn't have to say anything. Look, my friends. I am a powerful, influential member of the media. If I wanted to, you know, first three sound bites of the program today in our first hour were the Drive-Bys ripping me for inspiring this thing.

One of them ripped me for being the inspiration for "15 years." I am the leader and spokesman for the last 15 years. Actually it's the last 21, but who's counting? So I knew that was going to happen anyway. If I wanted to, I could have opened this program, taken all the credit. I could have made this about me. But this is the seminal point. It wasn't about anybody. It wasn't about any charismatic leader. This is so distinguishing us from the left and their mobs which are cult-like blind to Obama. You understand? You did this. It's in your heart. This passion is genuine, bubbling up from the grassroots. It is a conservative ascendancy based on the substance and the premise: liberty versus tyranny. People don't want tyranny. So don't let anybody tell you this thing was not legit. It is so legit, it embarrasses everybody else.

CALLER: Hi, Rush. My husband and I went to the rally in DC and on our way home in the Metro station this young liberal guy was standing next to us, and he kept looking at this sticker I had on that said, "Abortion is not health care;" and he got really angry and started arguing with me, insisting that abortion services were not going to be in any health care bill because Obama said so. He was just really adamant about it and so I finally, very calmly -- I stayed very calm -- and I said, "Well, if that's true, why did the Democrats in the House vote against every amendment the Republicans tried to put in the bill that would specifically prohibit abortion services?" And he told me I was being overly paranoid. So finally he just got so upset he turned away and started I guess doing research on his BlackBerry because a few minutes later he turned around and apologized and said that I was right, that it was in the House bill. He just hadn't known that. And after that was very pleasant and actually spent the rest of the time talking about basketball with my husband. So he wanted to fight and argue and I just stayed calm and actually I just gave him some factual information.

RUSH: I wonder where this guy went on his BlackBerry to find out what was in there.

CALLER: I don't know. It was like five minutes and I kind of glanced over and I could see what it was and there was a lot of wording and he was going through it and going through it and going through it and he finally just turned around and apologized, and I thanked him, and said it was nice of him to apologize, and after that he was very pleasant.

RUSH: That just doesn't happen. I was worried you might be shot like this abortion guy was.

RUSH: My gosh, I mean, that guy decided to get on the Internet via his BlackBerry and researched it and found it and said, "I'm sorry, it is in the House bill"?

RUSH: Well, he couldn't have called one of his buddies because his buddies the same thing. I mean, they all believe whatever Obama says. I wonder who he called. Did you ask him?

CALLER: I didn't. He looked like he was just researching something online, but once we talked -- and then after that he was willing to talk a little more and he said he had worked on health care legislation, and I said, "Well, did you work on the House side or the Senate side?" And he said he had been a fellow in Senator Kennedy's office when he was an undergraduate and then he had gone on to get his masters at NYU. And I thought, "Well, golly, no wonder. He's been programmed to think government is good," and that the president said it's not going to be in there and Senator Kennedy thought this was all wonderful, well, he did, too. He was 20-something, you know. Maybe 24, 25 years old.

RUSH: I'm still stammering into near speechlessness here. You were talking to a former Kennedy staffer who believed that abortion services were not covered because everybody had told him that, and then on the spur of the moment he decides to look it up and apologizes to you. I believe it happened; I just don't believe it.

RUSH: Folks, Snerdley asked me a question during the top-of-the-hour break. Maybe some of you were asking the same question. If you are, I am stunned. Snerdley said -- and he was quite passionate about this. "I want to know something! I want to know something!" What is it? "Why, if one year ago the financial collapse was going to lead us to the collapse of the world economy, the end of the United States as we've known it -- why, why, why, why -- are we even doing health care?" I said, "Don't you understand? The purpose of Obama's speech today was to say he fixed it. It was to clear the way for adding another trillion dollars to the deficit via health care. You know, Obama traveled to New York today to commemorate the crash of Lehman Brothers. But he did not go to New York to commemorate the Twin Towers attack.

So he's up there taking all this credit for saving the world economy and saving the United States. That's what he was doing up there. I've got the sound bites. I just don't want to play 'em. 60 Minutes has become "60 Minutes with Barack Obama." It's his third appearance this year. The guy's on television every day, and every day it seems he starts whatever remarks he's going to make at the same time I start this program. If this guy's trying to ace me out then I'm going to, you know, hit back twice as hard. I'll just stop playing Obama sound bites. People are fed up hearing them anyway. There's nothing new in them -- and, you know, hearing somebody lie to you repeatedly is a grating thing.

RUSH: The New York Times has done an ACORN story, and it's by Scott Shane. I'll tell you more about Scott Shane in mere moments. The headline: "Conservatives Draw Blood from ACORN," favored foe. "For months during last year's presidential race, conservatives sought to tar the Obama campaign with accusations of voter fraud and other transgressions. But it took amateur actors, posing as a prostitute and a pimp and recorded on hidden cameras in visits to Acorn offices, to send government officials scrambling in recent days to sever ties with the organization." Charlie Gibson now knows 'cause it's in the New York Times. I don't believe he didn't know. Look, this is a guy that gave Sarah Palin grief for not knowing what the Bush doctrine was. He knows about this, don't be silly.

"Conservative advocates and broadcasters were gleeful about the success of the tactics in exposing Acorn workers, who appeared to blithely encourage prostitution and tax evasion. It was, in effect, the latest scalp claimed by those on the right who have made no secret of their hope to weaken the Obama administration by attacking allies and appointees they view as leftist. The Acorn controversy came a week after the resignation of Van Jones, a White House environmental official attacked by conservatives, led by Glenn Beck of Fox News Channel, for once signing a petition suggesting that Bush administration officials might have deliberately permitted the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Even before Mr. Jones stepped down, Mr. Beck had sent a message to supporters on Twitter urging them to 'find everything you can' on three other Obama appointees.

"Conservatives believe that they have hit upon a winning formula for such attacks: mobilizing people to dig up dirt, trumpeting it on talk radio and television, prompting Congress to weigh in and demanding action from the Obama administration." So they think there's a formula out there. Now, this story is all about how ACORN was brought to its knees. Not a word about what ACORN's doing other than blithely suggesting and so forth and so on. Now, this is a perfect example of what passes for journalism at the New York Times. I mean, did you know that Van Jones was only attacked by conservatives led by Glenn Beck of Fox News Channel for once signing a petition suggesting that Bush administration officials might have deliberately -- as though that's no big deal? Did you realize it's a fact that conservatives believe they have hit upon a winning formula? Do you realize that ACORN has just become a punching bag for the right and its echo chamber?

Let me tell you about the guy who wrote the piece. Scott Shane. Mr. Shane is the intrepid New York Times reporter who released the name of a CIA interrogator who questioned Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other high level Al-Qaeda prisoners. Never mind the interrogator did nothing illegal. By publishing his name, Mr. Shane was putting him at personal risk of retaliation from terrorists who have a long history of as such retaliation and never mind that there was absolutely no news value whatsoever in releasing the interrogator's name. No, no, no, that was journalism, at least as the New York Times practices it. So they finally have done their story in the New York Times on what is happening with ACORN.

RUSH: This is from the San Francisco Chronicle. "Travelers passing through San Francisco International Airport can now..." Listen to the way this is written. "Travelers flying out of San Francisco International Airport can be the first in the nation to wipe away some of the damage their flights wreak on the planet by swiping their credit cards." Talk about being in the tank for a hoax. This is Michael Cabanatuan. I don't know how to pronounce it. But he's a Chronicle staff writer. "On Thursday, the Bay Area's largest airport unveiled three Climate Passport kiosks with touch screens that determine how many pounds of carbon dioxide a trip will produce, calculate the sum an environmentally conscious traveler should contribute to projects in San Francisco and California that help reduce greenhouse gases, then allow fliers to purchase certified carbon offsets.

"'We realize people are going to fly,' said Steve McDougal, executive vice president of 3Degrees, a San Francisco company that helped SFO develop the program. 'This gives them something they can do to reduce their impact. This is just one of many small things people need to do.'" This is a scam! They're running a scam on these guilty liberals in San Francisco, and my official climatologist of this program, Roy Spencer -- Dr. Roy Spencer from the University of Alabama at Huntsville -- writes to say that the values that they are charging for this carbon offsets are 60 times the going market rate out there. That's the price for San Francisco liberals to assuage their guilt over living.

The 9/12 protesters did not just protest Obama’s economic policies; they protested the media as well outside of the Newseum (video included):

This is quite fascinating: 2 photos taken after the inauguration and 1 after the 9/12 march:

Jesse Jackson tells crowd that Stimulus Bill has not provided jobs in South Carolina.

Several days into the ACORN story, it was being ignored by almost every traditional media outlet:

80% rate the economy poor (not too big of a surprise. A lot of interesting numbers in this poll; still, 54% blame George W. Bush:

42 states post job loss numbers in August (as opposed to 29 in July). But, imagine just how bad it would be without the jobs Obama and created and saved.

Since there are some links you may want to go back to from time-to-time, I am going to begin a list of them here. This will be a list to which I will add links each week.

This is an outstanding website which tells the truth about Obama-care and about what the mainstream media is hiding from you:

Politico.com is a fairly neutral site (or, at the very worst, just a little left of center). They have very good informative videos at:

On Obama (if you have not visited this site, you need to check it out). He is selling a DVD on this site as well called Media Malpractice; I have not viewed it yet, except pieces which I have seen played on tv and on the internet. It looks pretty good to me.

Conservative Review
Issue #93	Kukis Digests and Opines on this Week’s News and Views	September 20, 2009