The Last Man Standing

"The Last Man Standing" is a nickname Rush Limbaugh has given himself for being the only prominent public figure still preaching true conservative principles. He's half right; very few of our elected representatives are willing to be a voice for conservatism, since they've all become addicted to the positive media attention they get when they break party lines. The best example of this is John McCain, who loves the praise he gets from the media for his eagerness to criticize fellow Republicans. Rush isn't quite the last man, though; we still have a few conservatives such as Sarah Palin and Bobby Jindal, and there are other conservatives in the media such as Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity. What Limbaugh is, however, is the most eloquent, persistent proponent of conservatism, and now more than ever the true leader of the conservative movement. He criticizes Republicans, too; he won't get any praise from the media, though, since he criticizes spineless and traitorous Republicans who undermine conservatism, claiming it must be redefined to embrace Big Government, since they think that's what America wants and that's how we'll win elections. Limbaugh is such a threat to the Left and the mainstream media, that more and more the Left campaigns against Rush rather than the Republican on the ballot. There's even an effort to get an anti-Rush billboard put up near Rush's home in Florida. They're taking suggestions for the slogan, you can submit yours at www.democrats.org.

I can't think of a gesture more symbolic and futile, or one that could be any more successful at achieving the opposite of its intended effect. I hope they come up with a good one, so Rush and the Florida Dittoheads can have a good laugh as they drive past it every day.

Recently Rush has created quite a stir with a speech he gave at the Conservative Political Action Conference. It made the liberals in the mainstream media really mad, so it must have been a great speech. I finally got around to watching it on YouTube a couple days ago, and it was awesome. I've embedded the YouTube videos of the entire speech at the end of this post, and I highly recommend it to everybody. If you are a conservative Republican, this will be a breath of fresh air for you, and some good ammo. If you're a McCain "Republican", you need this more than anyone. If you're a Democrat, I can't think of a better way to understand your opponents than to listen to this speech. I don't expect it to convert you, but I do think it is important to understand the other side if you expect to be effective in debating the issues.

The speech was supposed to last about twenty minutes, and Mr. Limbaugh went an hour overtime. Every minute overtime was worth it, and I wish he'd talked longer. Of course, he talks for three hours every day, and there's never a minute wasted, so this is par for the course. Again, please listen to his speech; but if you really don't want to or don't have time, I'll cover a few things here.

The biggest thing everyone is talking about is how Rush Limbaugh in his speech "redefined bipartisanship". I saw the quote of his definition a couple times on the news, and never once did anyone put the quote into context. All they quote is "To us, bipartisanship is them being forced to agree with us after we politically have cleaned their clocks and beaten them." That sounds pretty inflammatory, and doesn't sound very bipartisan, does it? Well, it was supposed to be inflammatory, and of course it isn't bipartisan, and that's the point. The point Rush is making is that bipartisanship is a false premise. It doesn't exist. Here's the full quote:

"Bipartisanship occurs only after one other result, and that is victory. In other words, let's say as conservatives that we be bipartisan with them in Congress. What they mean is: We check our core principles at the door, come in, let them run the show and agree with them. That's bipartisanship to them. To us, bipartisanship is them being forced to agree with us after we politically have cleaned their clocks and beaten them."

The "us" in this quote is true conservatives, the ones who are tired of the McCain-types "compromising" their conservative principles and signing on to Big Government bills in the name of bipartisanship. Where is the compromise there? Who really wins? Not conservatives. If the compromise between growing government and reducing the government's role in our lives is growing government less, the government still grows and becomes more intrusive. That is not compromise; the Big Government liberals win every time. What Limbaugh is saying with this, the most controversial quote of the speech, is that it's about time the scales tipped the other way, and the conservatives won for once.

Rush goes on, and it's even more profound as he asks "Where is the compromise between good and evil?" I'm not going to say liberals are in general evil, because I believe that for the most part, (with the exception of our elected officials, many of which I do believe are evil) liberals are well-intentioned but misguided. But if I truly believe I am right and you are wrong, how principled would I be to compromise? There are many conservatives like myself who are sick and tired of those we elect to represent us compromising our beliefs for a bit of positive media attention, and for many of us the nomination of John McCain was the last straw. If a true conservative isn't nominated for 2012, many people, including myself, will likely leave the Republican Party. I joined the Republican Party because at the time it was the most powerful proponent of conservatism. It still is, but if those at the top keep ignoring us who elect them, it won't be for long. Obama's presidency is a direct result of the lack of conservative leadership in the Republican Party.

I'm getting off-topic. Oops.

After some jokes, Limbaugh opened his speech by explaining how conservatives view the world.

"When we look out over the United States of America [...] we see Americans. We see human beings. We don't see groups. We don't see victims. We don't see people we want to exploit. [...] We believe that [a] person can be the best he or she wants to be if certain things are just removed from their path like onerous taxes, regulations and too much government. [...] We don't want to tell anybody how to live. [...] We look over the country as it is today, we see so much waste, human potential that's been destroyed by 50 years of a welfare state."

For all the accusations of racism during the 2008 election campaigns, the only racism I saw was on the left. Limbaugh talks about that, too, how no conservative questioned whether Obama was "authentically" black, whether he had slave blood in him. Liberals are fighting battles that were won 40 years ago. It is conservatives that live in a truly post-racial world, but if a black man gets ahead and happens to be a conservative, he is accused of selling out. I talked about this when I ranted about the inauguration ceremonies. Conservatives, especially Rush, are accused of being hate-mongers, but the hatred I see is on the Left.

Limbaugh takes a swipe at Obama's insane spending as well:

"President Obama is so busy trying to foment and create anger in a created atmosphere of crisis, the is so busy fueling the emotions of class envy that he's forgotten it's not his money that he's spending. In fact, the money he's spending is not ours. He's spending wealth that has yet to be created. And that is not sustainable. It will not work. This has been tried around the world. And every time it's been tried, it's a failed disaster."

It could be worse, we could live in Zimbabwe, where inflation is estimated at 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000% (not kidding! it's at the end of this article, and here are some photos you have to see to believe), but anyone who thinks we can save our economy by spending money that doesn't exist is delusional at best. Of course, Zimbabwe's problem is different from ours, but I wanted an excuse to link to those photos. They're seriously crazy.

But here's the dirty secret. Obama knows this isn't going to work, and it's not his intention for this to rebound the economy. It's about acquiring control. More from Rush's brilliant speech:

"George Will once asked Dr. Friedrich Von Hayek, tremendous classical economist, great man, 1975, George Will, 'Dr. Von Hayek, why is it that intellectuals, supposed smartest people in the room, why is it that intellectuals can look right out their windows, their own homes and cars and look at their universities and not see the bounties and the growth and the greatness of capitalism?' And Von Hayek said: 'I've troubled over this for years and I've finally concluded that for intellectuals, pseudo-intellectuals, and all liberals, it's about control.' It's not about raising revenue. You think Obama has any intention of paying for all this spending? Folks, if he had any intention of paying for it, he wouldn't do 90% of it because we don't have the money."

Reagan's tax cuts in the 80s clearly demonstrated that lower taxes on the rich result in higher tax revenues for the government, as well as increased charitable giving, yet still Democrats insist on raising taxes. It's not about raising revenue, it's about "fairness", and the only way the government can achieve fairness is by cutting down those who are successful. It's about controlling the money they earned. In order for Obama's power grab to succeed, in order for this "bailout" to succeed, he needs an economic crisis so bad that everyone looks to the government to fix it, even though the government created the crisis in the first place. This is why Obama keeps claiming this is the worst economy since the '30s, even though that is an outright lie. Limbaugh covers this in detail near the end of his speech.

I think that covers the highlights in more detail than anyone ever asked me for. I'll leave it at that, and invite comments from the liberals who read my blog. I have to be nice, though, because most of those liberals are in my family and are pretty cool people; you guys just happen to be cool people I disagree with. Speaking of which, I think there might be nearly a dozen people now who regularly read my blog. I even have a reader/sister-in-law who lives overseas, so I have a truly international audience. The scope of my influence knows no boundaries!

Enough of my analysis, watch the speech! Seriously, watch it.