When You're A Liar Who Always Believes The Worst...

[JerseyGuy]

Awesome. Even when he's caught in yet another clueless lie, he's still a mind-reader who knew better anyway.


Limbaugh falls for Obama thesis hoax - but is in no Rush to apologize

BY Michael Saul
DAILY NEWS POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT
Sunday, October 25th 2009, 1:58 PM

And still no apology.

Even when conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh runs with a fabricated story, he doesn't apologize for the error.

Limbaugh, who seizes on every opportunity to blast Obama, ended up with egg on his face when he read an Internet satire piece that claimed President Obama dissed the Constitution in his college thesis at Columbia University.

A transcript of his Friday broadcast remains Sunday at the top of Limbaugh's web page under the headline, "Obama's Disdain for Constitution: We Know He Thinks It, Don't We? When we discover a hoax, we correct it immediately."

But apologize? You betcha there's none.

Limbaugh sounded off Friday on a supposed report that Time magazine reporter Joe Klein had unearthed Obama's college thesis, titled "Aristocracy Reborn," in which he sounded off on the nation's Founding Fathers and the Constitution and the distribution of wealth.

The only problem - the report was pure fiction.

The original post with the fabricated details about Obama's college thesis was written as a satire on a humor blog. An obscure blogger, Michael Leeden, mistakenly picked it BYup, reporting the satirical post as fact, and then Limbaugh ran with it on his national radio show Friday.

Leeden has since apologized.

Limbaugh? Not so much.

In fact, he says, why the President never said what the hoax claimed, "we know he thinks it."

"So here is who we have as our president of the United States: an anti-constitutionalist man who finds it an obstacle and is finding ways around it on purpose, unconstitutionally," Limbaugh said on his show.

"Much of what he's doing is unconstitutional, and I'm waiting for the lawsuits to be filed by some of these people at some point," Limbaugh added. "How is that hope and change working out for ya, folks?"

Later in the same program, when Limbaugh learned the report was a hoax, he corrected the record, alerting listeners that the quotes from the thesis had been fabricated. But he insisted the fabricated thesis was still in line with what the president thinks.

"So I shout from the mountaintops: 'It was satire!'" Limbaugh said on the program. "But we know he (Obama) thinks it. Good comedy, to be comedy, must contain an element of truth, and we know how he feels about distribution of wealth."

Limbaugh said he has license to go with the fabrication because other members of the media have done this to him.

"So, I can say, "I don't care if these quotes are made up," he said. "I know Obama thinks it.

"You know why I know Obama thinks it? Because I've heard him say it."

The fabricated thesis pokes fun at the president's position on economic freedom.

"The so-called Founders did not allow for economic freedom," the satire on Obama's thesis says.

"While political freedom is supposedly a cornerstone of the document, the distribution of wealth is not even mentioned. While many believed that the new Constitution gave them liberty, it instead fitted them with the shackles of hypocrisy."

In a post Friday, Time's Joe Klein says the report is false.

"A report is circulating among the wingnuts that I had a peek at Barack Obama's senior thesis. It is completely false," he wrote. "I've never seen Obama's thesis. I have no idea where this report comes from--but I can assure you that it's complete nonsense."

[Dr. NO]

per usual the press failed to listen to the full comments and that Limbaugh mentioned the report was not verified. He then played a tape of then Senator from Chicago stating that the Supreme Court did not go far enough in its equal rights decisions by pushing for not only civil rights but also Economic rights and equality. It was Obama stating this in an interview. But that is not part of the report.

[JerseyGuy]

per usual the press failed to listen to the full comments and that Limbaugh mentioned the report was not verified. He then played a tape of then Senator from Chicago stating that the Supreme Court did not go far enough in its equal rights decisions by pushing for not only civil rights but also Economic rights and equality. It was Obama stating this in an interview. But that is not part of the report.

Yeah... 'cause THAT changes EVERYTHING.

Here's the transcript from Rush's own website. Why don't you show us where Limbaugh "mentioned the report was not verified", Doc No?

I've already bolded all of Rush's own quotes that make it painfully clear that he fell for this, hook, line and sinker. Now YOU show US where Limbaugh the Responsible Journalist comes into the picture.

RUSH: Michael Ledeen has posted something today that dovetails with this. This has surfaced just today. "Obama and the Constitution: He Has His Doubts."

Michael Ledeen: "I missed this first time around. Brian Lancaster at Jumping in Pools reported on Obama's college thesis, written when he was at Columbia. The paper was called 'Aristocracy Reborn,' and in the first ten pages (which were all that reporter Joe Klein -- who wrote about it for Time -- was permitted to see), the young Obama wrote: '[T]he Constitution allows for many things, but what it does not allow is the most revealing. The so-called Founders did not allow for economic freedom. While political freedom is supposedly a cornerstone of the document, the distribution of wealth is not even mentioned.

"'While many believed that the new Constitution gave them liberty, it instead fitted them with the shackles of hypocrisy.'" I don't care that it's just now surfacing, but they kept it suppressed until now, but here it is showing up. So "the so-called Founders..." and how many times have you people sent me e-mails, "Rush, be very careful when you start saying the president of the United States looks at the Constitution as an obstacle"? He doesn't like the Constitution! I've said it over and over again, and now here are his own words. "[T]he Constitution allows for many things, but what it does not allow is the most revealing. The so-called Founders..."

This is his thesis, his college thesis at Columbia: "The so-called Founders did not allow for economic freedom. While political freedom is supposedly a cornerstone of the document..." Supposedly? Political freedom supposedly a cornerstone... "the distribution of wealth is not even mentioned." Now, Ledeen says, "That's quite an indictment, even for an Ivy League undergraduate. I wonder if the prof -- and I'd like to know who the prof was -- made an appropriate marginal comment, something about historical context, about the Constitution's revolutionary status in the history of freedom, and about the separation of powers in order to make the creation of any 'shackles' as difficult as possible." The Constitution is the most liberty-promoting and freedom-acknowledging document in the history of the world, and this little boy in college is writing about it with utter disdain, and he still shares those feelings.

Ledeen writes: "Maybe instead of fuming about words that Rush Limbaugh never uttered, the paladins of the free press might ask the president about words that he did write. Maybe he'd like to parse 'the so-called Founders,' for example. I'd like to know what he thinks of those words today. And what about the rest of the thesis?" This is Michael Ledeen. What's the name of Ledeen's book? Find it. Go on Amazon and find it real quick. I want to plug it because it's a great book. It's about what's going on in Iran and US foreign policy. Now, we have audio of Barack Obama saying much the same thing only about the Supreme Court, not the Constitution. This is from 2001, eight years ago, long after his college thesis, on an FM radio station in Chicago. He was asked this question: "We're joined by Barack Obama, Illinois state senator from the 13th District, senior lecturer in the law school at the University of Chicago." This is what Obama said.

OBAMA 2001: If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court, I think where it succeeded was to vest formal rights in previously dispossessed peoples so that, uh, I would now have the right to vote, I would now be able to sit at a lunch counter and -- and order and as long as I could pay for it I'd be okay. But the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth and sort of more basic issues of political and economic justice in this society.

RUSH: So the court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth. So his college thesis: In the Constitution, the distribution of wealth is not even mentioned. So here is who we have as our president of the United States: an anti-constitutionalist, main who finds it an obstacle and is finding ways around it on purpose, unconstitutionally. Much of what he's doing is unconstitutional, and I'm waiting for the lawsuits to be filed by some of these people at some point. Anyway, how is that hope and change working out for ya, folks?
BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, Barack Obama is seriously dangerous. To say that distribution of wealth is economic freedom is intellectually insane. They are mutually exclusive. Economic freedom means you don't have somebody take your money and give it to somebody else. Distribution of wealth? We've already done it. How many trillions have we transferred from workers to nonworkers in the war on poverty, in the Great Society, and all of LBJ's programs? We are redistributing wealth like crazy. How many Americans don't pay income taxes? It's approaching 47%. Where has this guy been? We're already redistributing wealth whether the Constitution addresses it or not. I don't know if he's read the Federalist Papers, because the Founders talked about this all over the place.

Here is Thomas Jefferson in a letter to Joseph Milligan, April 6th, 1816: "To take from one because it is thought that his own industry and that of his father’s has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers, have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association -- the guarantee to every one of a free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it." So, Mr. President, our Founders were brilliant. They didn't put redistribution of wealth in there 'cause they didn't believe in it! That's why they are "so-called Founders" to him.

Here is Thomas Jefferson's first inaugural address, March 4th, 1801: "A wise and frugal government which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government." Thomas Jefferson, "so-called Founder." Thomas Jefferson: "Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated." So-called Founder. John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of Governments of the United States of America, 1787: "The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence." We're there, folks.

"If 'Thou shalt not covet' and 'Thou shalt not steal' were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free." (interruption) I have to translate this? What I just read about John Adams is not crystal clear? All right. "The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence." The moment what is yours can be taken by someone else, when your stuff is not your stuff anymore, when your stuff becomes somebody else's stuff, anarchy and tyranny commence. When your property is no longer your property, tyranny and anarchy commence. In other words, it's over.

"If 'Thou shalt not covet' and 'Thou shalt not steal' --" those are two of the Ten Commandments, and do I need to translate that? Thou shalt not covet, that means you shall not also want Monica Lewinsky because she is Bill Clinton's. Thou shalt not steal, meaning Barack Obama shall not be able to get away with what he is doing, and that is stealing people's worth, their work, and their industry, or their money. If those two commandments were not commandments of Heaven -- i.e, God-d -- they must be made inviolable precepts in every society, meaning they must be part of any society's culture and morality before that society can be civilized or made free. Founder, so-called founder John Adams. Barack Obama said these guys didn't talk about wealth distribution. They most certainly did. He just doesn't know, wasn't taught, or knows about it and is lying about it. How is that hope and change working for you?

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: By the way, Michael Ledeen's book is Accomplice to Evil: Iran and the War Against the West. It is a superb read on what is actually going on and what we actually face in the Middle East, particularly with Iran. We'll put it up at RushLimbaugh.com so you can link to it, too. Accomplice to Evil: Iran and the War Against the West.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: So Joe Klein at TIME Magazine has known for a long time about Obama's college thesis when he was at Columbia. Why didn't this come out a year ago at this time? Why didn't this come out before the election in November? If you're just joining us, here is what Barack Obama wrote in his college thesis at Columbia University: "… the Constitution allows for many things, but what it does not allow is the most revealing. The so-called Founders did not allow for economic freedom. While political freedom is supposedly a cornerstone of the document, the distribution of wealth is not even mentioned. While many believed that the new Constitution gave them liberty, it instead fitted them with the shackles of hypocrisy."

Economic freedom and distribution of wealth are mutually exclusive. You cannot have economic freedom and the redistribution of your wealth! You can't have economic freedom if somebody like Obama can come grab your stuff and give it to somebody else. When that happens then you have the beginnings of anarchy and tyranny. The Founding Fathers -- and I'm not going to go through the quotes again -- the Founding Fathers discussed the whole concept of distribution of wealth. They wrote letters to each other about it. The "so-called Founders," I'm sorry, the "so-called Founders." They knew all about it, they knew that it was incompatible with the Constitution of the United States that they wrote. Now, this is relevant in another way, ladies and gentlemen. In the Virginia governor's race, Republican candidate Robert McDonnell wrote a graduate thesis 20 years ago that could be politically damaging to his campaign. This has been in the Washington Post.

That decades-old thesis has been covered by the Washington Post on August 30th and again on September 1st. It has been reported on in some depth across the spectrum of media outlets, from NPR, to US News, to the Christian Science Monitor to Fox and on and on. Now, maybe a decades-old claim that the US Constitution didn't give early Americans liberty but fitted them with the shackles of hypocrisy doesn't deserve some questions like, "What do you mean by that, and when and how did your thoughts change, if they have?" So the Washington Post is trying to drum McDonnell out of governor's race in Virginia by talking about his college thesis, but where the hell is any exposure to Obama's? And the appropriate question, "Do you still believe it Barack? The "so-called Founders"? We know he believes it because he said it again about the Supreme Court in 2001.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT

Hmmm. Nothing yet. Just Rush screaming his fool head off, thinking he's found Obama's own Watergate. Let's proceed:

RUSH: In the first hour of this program, I cited a statement that Michael Ledeen found on the blog Jumping in Pools reporting on Obama's college thesis written when he was at Columbia. The paper was called "Aristocracy Reborn," and in the first ten pages Obama wrote the following: "[T]he Constitution allows for many things but what it does not allow is the most revealing. The so-called Founders did not allow for economic freedom. While political freedom is supposedly a cornerstone of the document, the distribution of wealth is not even mentioned. While many believe the new Constitution gave them liberty, it instead fitted them with the shackles of hypocrisy." Now, I got a note from a researcher who has been scouring the Internet, and the note says this:

"Rush Limbaugh: Mini-warning on these quotes." Because the paper that Obama wrote, "Aristocracy Reborn," the first ten pages were all that reporter Joe Klein was permitted to see; and it says here that Klein did write about it for TIME Magazine. A researcher has been scouring the Internet and can't find any sources for the quote. "The blog that Ledeen cites doesn't have supporting info," supposedly. The source post that was from August, says it's going to be in an upcoming report from Joe Klein, but the researcher can't find anything that has come out since, and nothing in Klein's blog. There have been no matches found on the Internet for any of the info or quotes other than the source posting. So I now say that the blog from which this came has no sourcing data other than Joe Klein upcoming report and Joe Klein hasn't written his upcoming report.

Ah! One of Rush's dittoheads contacted him to say, dude -- you've been pranked, and there's no evidence that any of this is actually true.

My, my, my. I bet the old fat drug addict is feeling mighty silly right now. How on Earth will he back out of this?

So we have to hold out the possibility that this is not accurate. However, I have had this happen to me recently. I have had quotes attributed to me that were made up, and when it was pointed out to the media that the quotes were made up, they said, "It doesn't matter! We know Limbaugh thinks it anyway." Sort of like Dan Rather said, "I don't care if these documents are forged. I know that Bush did what he did at the National Guard. I don't care if the documents are forged." I don't care if the Limbaugh quotes are made up. So, I can say, "I don't care if these quotes are made up. I know Obama thinks it. You know why I know Obama thinks it? Because I've heard him say it." Not about the Constitution, but about the Supreme Court. Again, 2001, FM radio station interview in Chicago when he was a state senator in Illinois

.

Got it! Turns out it's all a big giant steaming pile o' shite, but hey -- it's the kind of thing Rush thinks Obama WOULD say, so that still counts in RushWorld. And it turns out that Obama NEVER wrote about the Constitution "with utter disdain", as Rush just asserted, but -- hey, look over there for a second while I switch these three shells on the table in front of me!

OBAMA 2001: If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court, I think where it succeeded was to vest formal rights in previously dispossessed peoples so that, uh, I would now have the right to vote, I would now be able to sit at a lunch counter and -- and order and as long as I could pay for it I'd be okay. But the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth and sort of more basic issues of political and economic justice in this society.

OK, so he already played this clip, and it doesn't have a damn thing to do with the Constitution OR Obama's fake thesis, but give him a break -- unlike Howard Stern, he can't hit the "fart noise" button to get his audience going.

RUSH: Now, he's talking about the Warren Court "never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth." So we've got a supposed piece from his college thesis at Columbia where he complains that the Constitution didn't talk about the distribution of wealth. So we know that it's on his mind. So even if he didn't say it, I know he thinks it. That's how it works now in the media. And I do know he thinks it because I just heard what I heard, and so did you. Let's see.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT

So...

1. He's STILL trying to pretend he didn't just hear what he heard, and this might really be Obama's thesis...

2. He can read minds, which is a little-known side effect of heavy OxyContin use...

3. And that's how things now work "in the media", so shut up and stop questioning El Rushbo.

RUSH: I'm also told that the blog containing the passage on Obama's thesis is a satire blog. So it's one of these sites like ScrappleFace or The Onion or some such thing. So I shout from the mountaintops: "It was satire!" But we know he thinks it. Good comedy, to be comedy, must contain an element of truth, and we know how he feels about distribution of wealth. He's mad at the courts for not going far enough on it. So we stand by the fabricated quote because we know Obama thinks it anyway. That's how it works in the media today.

Amazing. There's nothing more I can add to that last bolded comment, really.

[Bart]

Hey JG, let's say I agree w/ you (I think ? i.e. limbaugh, hannity et al, are best case: comedic satirists, worst case: fascists)...but...their getting advertising dollars and they have a forum, no laws against this...what's the problem ?

how do you deal w/ "intentional" bias , limbaugh doesn't check the facts and doesn't pretend to present both sides of a story...

how do you deal w/a segment of media openly disguising fear-mongering and conservative propaganda as fact ?

if thats what's happening..........

[JerseyGuy]

how do you deal w/a segment of media openly disguising fear-mongering and conservative propaganda as fact ?

Good question. I'd say f-ck 'em, ignore 'em, and ignore the mouthbreathers who believe them... but if you do that, as Obama's kinda-sorta started to do, those same openly hostile right-wing conservative "media sources" will start to claim to be on an "enemies list", and their GOP waterboys on Capitol Hill will soon pick up the same talking points.

[Bart]

yeah right....but having smoked my fair share of dope...and probably having a lot in common w/ oliver stone...

I think these guys (limbaugh, beck and the rest) are a unique phenomena in our country, they probably would never get a foothold in a different era

apparently mccarthyism died out as prosperity increased in the 1960's.... well before my time but similar in that mccarthy apparently seized on the fear of "commies" after WWII to advance his own career and/or political aspirations

or maybe it was inevitable in our society where pursuit of money and/or personal gain at any cost leads to a lot of whacked stuff happening (skews the old moral compass?), e.g. enron, madoff, hedge funds , successive stock market crashes and wild gyrations, o'reilley.........

I better stop...need to fire one up.........

[icedtea]

yeah right....but having smoked my fair share of dope...and probably having a lot in common w/ oliver stone...

(limbaugh, beck and the rest)
maybe it was inevitable in our society where pursuit of money and/or personal gain at any cost leads to a lot of whacked stuff happening.

it's all about the money...if there was not a demand for their venom, the wouldn't have a soapbox to spew it.