11/14/13, "Bullied Republicans Must Insist on Repeal, Resist Pitfall of Becoming Part of Phony Fix," Rush Limbaugh
"Everybody, I think, is missing that this is already an abject failure. It can't be fixed. It has done irreparable damage, and in order to prevent any more, it just needs to be stripped and repealed. Now, I know Obama's not going to do that....It remains unconstitutional. I mean, even the Wall Street Journal headline: "Obama Will Allow." Obama can't allow anything in this regard.
Obama does not make the law. His oath of office is to uphold it, and he's in violation, folks. He is not upholding the law. He is changing it willy-nilly by waivers, any number of things, promising you can keep your plan and then not letting you and then reinstating the plan but no mention of what the premiums are gonna cost you. None of this is permissible under the Constitution. This is the kind of authoritarianism that our founders stridently feared and tried to do everything they could to prevent. And it's just an absolute disaster.
People have been irreparably harmed by this. They've lost their jobs because of this. Companies have laid people off to stay in compliance with this law. People have been laid off so that the company can stay in business because of the punitive damage this law inflicts on businesses. Insurance companies have pretty much seen their epitaph written for them, years out, but they have just been told that they're not gonna exist. So they're trying to maximize what they can before that day comes. People have been converted from full-time jobs to part-time jobs in order to comply with the law. Some people have been given waivers.
The unions don't have to play ball with this. Self-insured people don't have to play ball with this. It isn't fair, it isn't equitable, and it isn't solving anything. All it is doing is making a real mess that is hurting real people. In every way this law touches people, it harms them. There are no benefits. If there were, the Drive-Bys would have a parade of people on TV day and night singing this law's praises and talking about how their lives were saved by the law or their kid's life was saved by the law or they got a kidney because of the law....
It's an absolute mess. It can't be fixed. And there lies the pitfall for the Republican Party. The Republican Party, I really believe, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder from years and years of bullying and taunting. The Republican Party is Jonathan Martin. The Democrat Party and the media are Richie Incognito. The Republican Party is afraid of itself; it's afraid of what it believes; it's afraid to speak up; it's afraid to oppose; it's afraid to do anything for fear of what's going to be said about it.
You have very few Republicans with the actual courage to stand up and oppose this totalitarianism.
And look what happens to 'em. Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, thankfully they're undaunted by it, but the Republicans, because of this post-traumatic stress disorder, which is just the way I'm characterizing it. I'm trying to be illustrative here. But they clearly are in a state of shock. There's only one other alternative. The other alternative is they want the law to survive. That, of course, may be a reality. Some Republicans may be entrenched enough in the Washington establishment that they want the law to survive, that they want government to have this kind of role in people's lives and in society. Who knows. But I think for many of them they're just scared.
I think there's an abject fear of standing up, particularly to Obama, but Democrats in general. I know there's fear of the media. Republicans have been full-fledged intimidated. So the pitfall for them, I think, is that they want to be seen participating in the fix for Obamacare because they think that there is political gain to be made there. They are under the impression -- and the way I visualize this, or better to say illustrate this, the Democrats propose something, whatever it is. And the Republicans never say no. The Republicans are obsessed, "Well, we gotta have an alternative." They're always on defense. They're always reacting.
There is not proactive Republican policy anymore. They're always reacting, and I think it comes from the assumption, I really do believe that they believe they are a genuine minority, that most people in the country, not just the media and the Democrats, don't like them, think they're unhip, uncool, oddball extremist weirdos, and they don't like that, of course. But as the minority, they feel naturally defensive about things. So Obama proposes this massive health care plan, the media makes it look like everybody in America wants it, but the polling data has been clear on this. The American people, by majority after majority after majority, have never wanted it, have never liked Obamacare.
There's not been a single poll since the early days of this that show a majority of people wanting it.
The 2010 midterms were all about Obamacare. And massive numbers of America showing up to polls to vote against it and the debt that Obama was piling up, called the Tea Party. So there is this at the same that the Republicans have in this posture that they occupy that the Democrats propose something -- in this case, Obama -- who they think is universally loved. And they think he's universally respected because of his race and they feel it's not worth opposing him because of his race. So here's this plan, it's an absolute mess, it's a total failure, and the worst thing the Republicans could do right now is be working in a way that would help fix this. The Republican Party should not be seen as part owners of this....
They ought to be working to repeal this. That's what a majority of the American people want.
I continue to sit here in amazement. As I said for many months now, you have this majority of the American people opposed to it, and it seems to me that that is a large number of Americans the Republican Party could connect with on a fundamental issue and become the champions of the people who oppose this. It seems to me -- from outside the Beltway, of course -- as made to order for a party that wants to come back to life.
You've got an issue that a vast majority of people oppose, and now they really don't like it and are angry at it. They have been personally impacted. They've lost their jobs, they've lost income, they have lost their insurance. I mean, the opportunity to be the white knight and come in and save the day is not the Landrieu bill, which I'm gonna get to in a minute. The Democrats think the white knight here is the Landrieu bill because the Landrieu bill would reinstate your policy forever, not just a year.
That's why I think a lot of Democrats might end up rejecting what Obama proposed today and go with her bill, but I'll tell you about her bill in detail in a minute because it dovetails with Fred Upton's bill that's gonna be voted on this Friday. Of course, what Obama did today might totally upend the Upton bill. But we'll see."...
Image from RushLimbaugh.com, 11/14/13
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