Obama 'personal popularity' a media created myth to scare Republicans--Limbaugh

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"The gonads on our team happen to be wearing skirts."...(Referencing Palin and Bachmann as opposed to the various male hairdos.)

3/8/11, "Obama's 'personal popularity' is a media created myth designed to scare Republicans," Rush Limbaugh, transcript

RUSH: "We've had a number of people say, "You know, Rush, we gotta be very careful. We gotta stick to opposing Obama on the grounds of policy. He's a popular guy. I mean,

• everybody likes him.
• He's a warm guy."

He is not! Everybody doesn't like him. We're tying our hands behind our backs, all kinds of self-imposed limitations when we tell ourselves this. Byron York has a great piece today in the DC Examiner. It's about the Republican presidential field and how "weak" it is, and not only how weak the Republican presidential field is but how timid those in the field are, as though they just don't really think it's even right to campaign against Obama. We gotta tiptoe here, for whatever various reasons.

• He's really unbeatable,
• he's really great.

At this stage Obama's really unbeatable. The economy is gonna come back.

Byron York says, well, let's go back to 1991, shall we? In 1991, George H. W. Bush had a 90% approval number coming out of the Gulf War -- and what happened? It's almost identical. Back in 1991, leading into the '92 presidential year, I could go back and I could probably get sound bites of me from my own program back then saying, looking at the Democrat field, "Man, the lightweights here. None of the Democrat heavyweights want to even take a run at this. The Democrat heavyweights want no part of this. I mean, it's a guaranteed losing proposition." We all thought that. Ninety percent approval coming out of the Gulf War?

It was almost identical to what's happening today. The Democrat field back then was looked at as a bunch of pansies. But there was one guy in that field that was the Energizer Bunny who didn't get the memo. He kept plugging away and plugging away and plugging away, and even after he got shellacked in debates and he got shellacked here and there, and losing here and there -- he's getting all kinds of embarrassing stories about Whitewater in the New York Times -- they just kept plugging away, Bill Clinton and Hillary out there. Then Perot surfaces and all bets are off and we all know what happened.

So the analogy is: We got a guy with a 48% approval rating who is not all that likable. He's not all that warm and cuddly. He's not coming off of any singular policy success anywhere, and our side says he's unbeatable? "And furthermore, he's so unbeatable that we don't dare talk about him. He's so loved and popular, we don't dare talk about him. No, no! We gotta stay focused on policy. That's right! We gotta make sure that we don't offend anybody, being too critical of the beloved Obama! The independents will run away from us." So we're tying our hands behind our backs.

• We got ourselves tagged as losers before the thing even starts,

ignoring histoire as it's plainly viewable. So we'll get into that in detail. What I'm saying is we can't be afraid of who they say Obama is. You know, even the geniuses on our side, they want to keep this as a policy-only disagreement because they think that Obama's personally popular

• in the sense that he polls higher than his policies do.

But even so, he's at 48% approval, but he is personally popular. You know, it's like what came first, the chicken or the egg? Obama is personally popular precisely

• because he's personally off-limits.

There's not a person in the world that's got the guts to tell the truth about Obama, from the media to our side, for whatever reason, either the first black president or we think we're gonna get creamed by being critical. So there isn't any real examination of who Obama is as a guy. Well, there is for me.

You know, this notion he's some warm, nice guy we just happen to disagree with. Wrong. This is a cold man. This is not even cool. This guy is cold. He's arrogant. He's uber-calculating. He's the kind of person most people don't like when they meet him....He's the guy at the country club at the cocktail party standing in the corner with the good-looking girl, the drink, and the cigarette, passing judgment on everybody going by, not deigning to talk to 'em. Good family man, they say. Why would his personal approval ratings go down much

• when there's nobody going after him like they did Bush, like they did Reagan?

Nobody's driving down his negatives like they did Bush. Nobody's driving down his negatives like they do me, like they do Palin. So we sit here, "Oh, he's immensely popular." We don't know that.....It's right out there in the open for one and all to see....It's all about what some people want or don't want to see, no matter what kind of truth they are told. Barack Obama went a couple of years without having a single meeting with Republican leadership. His only early meeting with the Republican caucus, right after he was immaculated, he said,

• "Don't listen to Limbaugh. That's not how things get done here."

And then when one of them said, "Why don't you think about tax cuts?" "Well, fine, but I won, you lost, deal with it." This is not a nice guy. Reagan, O'Neill, after work go have a beer? Does anybody want to go have a beer with Obama after work? They had to drag that cop from Cambridge down to the beer summit with good old Skipper Gates. But Obama's not a nice guy. The media painted Reagan as this nut job while he was president. Obama's portrayed as personally popular. It's remarkable. And it's worked. It's worked. Our guys, "Rush, we gotta keep it on policy.

• Obama's a likable guy, very much loved." I said no. No, no, no.

They attacked Palin. They attacked her kids. That's why it's so grates on me when I hear Republicans echo what these people say about Palin. I can't tell you how angry that makes me. People on my team echo this nonsense that they say about Sarah Palin.

• She's got more courage and more bravery in her little finger than our presidential field has.

And yet they talk about her as an idiot. The same thing with poor Michele Bachmann. The gonads on our team happen to be wearing skirts. Anyway, Obama's immune from all this. Don't ask about his past; don't ask about his grades; don't ask about his medical history; don't ask about his drug use. Don't ask about anything.

• All of that's irrelevant....The sad thing is the geniuses on our side fall right in line with all that.

Look what they did to Clarence Thomas. Look what they're doing even now to Clarence Thomas. Look, it never ends. Whoever the left perceives to be at the top rank on our side it's full speed ahead in the politics of personal destruction. Fine and dandy, we know they do that. It just infuriates me when people on our side sign onto it when it suits 'em.

So Obama's personal life is none of our business. Obama's past is none of our business. Obama's promises don't matter; Obama's policies don't matter

• (unless they could be spun in his favor).

All the focus, all the attacks must be on whomever his opponent is. It's not just the terms of the debate and the premise that the left and a lot of the fools on our side accept -- Obama personally off-limits, Republicans personally fair game -- but it's the same thing when it comes to the issues. Liberal media do the same thing.

• We got a rotten economy? Blame it on Bush!

Rising gas prices? Blame it on Khadafy!

• Poor old Obama can't close Gitmo? Blame it on the Republican Congress! ...

Yes, siree Bob, Obama's so popular we have this story from Roll Call: "'Fears Grow as Obama Hits Trail' -- On the same day that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) was taking steps to jump-start bipartisan talks to avert a government shutdown, President Barack Obama was in Florida trying to jump-start something else: his 2012 re-election campaign. While there may be 609 days to go until the presidential election, Obama has already begun reverting to campaign mode -- and some Democrats are starting to worry that their most important ally won’t be there when they need him the most on Capitol Hill." Hey, he's never been there. It's always been about him....

• Some people, though, people on our side think he might be unbeatable, personally popular.

And yet: "West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin is planning to rip President Barack Obama on his budget proposals in a Senate floor speech Tuesday, a rare rebuke from a freshman Democrat who clearly is worried about the politics of deficit spending ... Manchin says the president has failed to lead the way in reducing spending, but he’s also criticizing Republicans for 'partisan' and 'unrealistic' budget proposals as well," yada yada yada. But still ripping into Obama. So loved and so popular, so unbeatable. Forty-eight percent approval rating.

• If he's so popular, how come five Democrats are quitting? Might be more,

five Democrat senators are splitting the scene, flying the coop. And they got a lot of seats they have to defend in 2012 to boot. So again, it's just more conventional wisdom that isn't true. Universally popular, universally loved, unbeatable. Our side seems to be believing this.

• Their side doesn't. "...

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Obama has enacted 132 new regulations in the past 2 years (page 2)

Reference: Michele Bachmann speech in response to Obama's State of the Union", 1/25/11, transcript from CNN

"The president could agree to an energy policy that increases American energy production and reduces our dependence on foreign oil.

The president could also turn back some of the 132 regulations put in place in the last two years, many of which will cost our economy $100 million or more. And the president should repeal Obamacare and support free-market solutions, like medical malpractice reform and allowing all Americans to buy any health care policy they like anywhere in the United States."...

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