From This Day On: “Mrs. Bill Clinton”
From the Rush Limbaugh program archives of May 19, 2011
May 19, 2011RUSH: From this day forward, ladies and gentlemen — on this program, at least, and I think in the minds of many other people — the woman formally known as Hillary Rodham Clinton will be now known as Mrs. Bill Clinton. If I slip up — Snerdley, anybody here on the support staff, if I slip up — and call her Hillary Clinton, correct me each and every time until it becomes a habit to refer to her as “Mrs. Bill Clinton,” the wife of the former president. There’s a reason for this. It was Obama’s moment. He was going to go down there to Selma. Hillary Clinton decided she had to show up, too. But she couldn’t deal with a mano-a-womano showdown. She had to bring Bill, “the first black president of the United States.” She could not do this on her own. This is not a feminist comment. I don’t want any of you women getting upset out there. This has nothing to do with feminism or male-female. It is a Clinton Inc. reality.
For example, the Arizona Conservative headline: “Hillary Clinton Grabs for Husband’s Coattails.” Senator Hillary — sorry — Senator Mrs. Bill Clinton… See, it’s going to take me a while to get into this but it will happen. “Senator Mrs. [Bill] Clinton sought to boost what some say is a sagging presidential campaign by emphasizing who she is married to.” The correct way to write this for the journalists out there would be, to whom she is married. Coming off a week of bitter exchanges with Senator Barack Obama, Mrs. [Bill] Clinton pointed out that with her in the White House, America would have the benefit of a president who is advised by a former president. “It’s a really unique opportunity for America,” said Mrs. [Bill] Clinton. “Bill would be back in the White House giving the country the benefit of his eight years of previous experience.?”
She’s gotta drag him into it now, folks. Things are not ripe in paradise. “‘Who even knows who Obama is married to’ Hillary asked.” You’ve got the least experienced senator and a nobody spouse as his confidante and advisor. Is that pathetic or what? This is actually a parody, but I had you going, didn’t I? (Laughing.) It’s in the ArizonaConservative.org blog. It’s by a guy named John Semmens, and it’s called Semi-News. (Laughing.) I had you, didn’t I? But that’s why good comedy is good comedy, because it’s gotta have an element of truth in it in order for it to be funny. “Who even knows who Obama is married to? You’ve got the least experienced senator and a nobody spouse as a confidante and advisor. Is that pathetic or what?” She’s probably thinking this. You know, this is the funny thing. She is, from now on, Mrs. Bill Clinton because she did have to drag Bill with her down there to Selma. In fact, there was a blowout — or a potential blowout — with Congressman John Lewis, who was beat up pretty bad during the original Selma march, called Bloody Sunday. He was on the verge of endorsing Obama and got a call from Bill.
Greg Craig — a well-known impeachment lawyer, well-known Clinton backer, the lawyer who secured for Fidel Castro the return rights to Elian Gonzales — has defected from Clinton, Inc. This is big. He has gone over to Camp Obama. But for the hilarious stuff here, let’s just go straight to the audio sound bites. Did any of you happen to see any of the big confab yesterday, the reenactment of the march to Selma with Mrs. Clinton speaking? You didn’t see this? Oh, you are going to appreciate the audio. Mrs. Clinton spoke with a contrived southern twang and accent because she’s down there, and she trying to sound like a black preacherette. (I’m sorry: Mrs. Bill Clinton. You gotta correct me. This is going to become a habit no matter how long it takes. I’m still correcting myself. The staff is lagging.) So let’s just get started. The height of ridiculousness, Mrs. Bill Clinton trying to act religious and talking southern. This is at a church, a portion of her opening remarks.
MRS. BILL CLINTON: This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it. And I want to begin by giving praise to the Almighty for the blessings he has bestowed upon us as a congregation, as a people, and a nation.
RUSH: She then marched right into the threat of climate change. Get this.
MRS. BILL CLINTON: How can we say everything is fine when we have an energy policy whose prices are too high, who make us dependent on foreign governments that do not wish us well, and when we face the real threat of climate change, which is inkering with God’s creation.
RUSH: Oh, isn’t that rich. Here is Mrs. Bill Clinton. When was the last time Mrs. Bill Clinton mentioned God anywhere? Here she is in a black church, and she’s talking about “tinkering with God’s creation.” But, you see the hubris and the arrogance here. We can tinker with it and we can screw it up and we are screwing it up and we’re doing all these things that are destroying the planet. Now she starts the screaming and the screeching here, that together — Mrs. Bill Clinton and the audience in the church — will take back the country.
MRS. BILL CLINTON: Dr. King told us, “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” Well, I’m here to tell you, poverty and growing inequality matters. Health care matters. The people of the Gulf Coast and New Orleans matter. Our soldiers matter. Our standing in the world matters. (screeching) Our future matters, and it is up to us to take it back, put it into our hands, start marching toward a better tomorrow.
RUSH: Whoa! The screeching! I don’t know that I’m going to be able to deal with this. It has too many hurtful memories. She’s trying to rev up the African-Americans in the church. Let’s just keep rolling here. Here’s Mrs. Bill Clinton, about the Voting Rights Act.
MRS. BILL CLINTON: The Voting Rights Act gave more Americans from every corner of our nation the chance to live out their dreams. And it is the gift that keeps on giving. Today it is giving Senator Obama the chance to run for president of the United States. (Applause.) And by its logic and spirit, it is giving the same chance to governor Bill Richardson, a Hispanic — and, yes, it is giving me that chance, too.
RUSH: Oh, man, if there were ever any coded lingo. You have to understand that to civil rights audiences, the Voting Rights Act is one of the big, big push-button topics because it is believed today that there are still efforts being made to discount the votes of minorities, suppress the votes and keep them from getting to the polling place. So Mrs. Bill Clinton here is hitting all of the cliches, and now she fulfills the dream, fulfills the promise by telling them the last two elections were stolen from them.
MRS. BILL CLINTON: In the last two presidential elections we have seen the right to vote tampered with and outright denied to too many of our citizens, especially the poor and people of color. That’s wrong. It is simply unconscionable that today young Americans are putting their lives at risk to protect democracy half a world away when here at home their precious right to vote is under siege!
RUSH: It is not! Maybe a new addition to the name, Mrs. Bill Clinton X. You know, when she’s speaking — (Laughing.) I know she has her supporters and there’s probably nothing you can do about it, but people taking this seriously is a scary thought. Another portion of her remarks, ending up here with religion again. Mrs. Bill Clinton X in her best preacher voice.
MRS. BILL CLINTON: Let us say with one voice the words of James Cleveland’s great freedom hymn: “I don’t feel no ways tired. I come too far from where I started from. Nobody told me that the road would be easy. I don’t believe he brought me this far to leave me, and we know if we finish this march, what awaits us. St. Paul told us in the letter to the Galatians, ‘Let us not grow weary in doing good, for in due seasons we shall reap, if we do not lose heart.’” The brave men and women of Bloody Sunday did not lose heart. We can do no less. We have a march to finish.
RUSH: This is the height of pandering here. What would you call it, if it’s not pandering? (interruption) Yes, she did. She did. You want to hear it? You don’t believe that she actually put on the black preacher dialect? Play the beginning of this again. This is her best black preacher voice, Mrs. Clinton revving it up.
MRS. BILL CLINTON: Let us say with one voice the words of James Cleveland’s great freedom hymn: “I don’t feel no ways tired. I come too far from where I started from. Nobody told me that the road would be easy. I don’t believe he brought me this far to leave me.”
RUSH: All right. All right, that’s enough. You believe it? You hear it the second time? Mrs. Bill Clinton impersonating a typical black preacher. Now, it sounds like they let her get away with it. The thing about this, though, is that it’s just so obviously pandering, so obviously fake and phony. She doesn’t bring this off well. She doesn’t do it. You have to wonder, will she do this to every group to whom she goes and speaks? Some blogger or somebody said, “If she went to speak to a nudist camp to get the nudist vote, would she make her speech in the nude?”
God, we hope not.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: You know, you listen to all this screeching from Mrs. Bill Clinton, and there’s a part of me that reaches out to Bill, that feels a little sorry. Do you realize he’s had to listen to this much more than we have, and probably directed at him personally for years and maybe some lamps have been tossed at him at the same time? It doesn’t excuse anything, but compassion is compassion. We have plenty of compassion here at the EIB Network.
The Los Angeles Times today has a story: “Obama, Clinton Reach Out to Black Voters.” Obama says in this story his grandfather was an African house boy to British empire families. “Much of Obama’s speech dealt with doubts raised by the Rev. Al Sharpton and others that the candidate’s unusual background was alien to black Americans descended from slaves. The British in Africa, he said, called his grandfather ‘a houseboy.’ They wouldn’t call him by his last name. Sound familiar?” Yes! That-a-way, Obama! Get those I’m-black-enough credentials out there and make sure that everybody understands it. Now, this is what I mean also, ladies and gentlemen, why from now on on this program she will be Mrs. Bill Clinton.
A board member of the Voting Rights Museum by the name of Thomas Muhammad said, “Why do you think Bill Clinton came down here? That’s because Obama is doing so well with these crowds that Mrs. [Bill] Clinton had to bring him. She had to bring her A-game.” Now, this is somebody at the Voting Rights Museum, Thomas Muhammad. The guy is a board member. Mrs. Bill Clinton’s A-game is bringing her husband along? If her husband is not with her, would you call it Mrs. Bill Clinton’s B-game? When she’s by herself she’s got a B-game. The A-game is only when her husband comes along.
“Obama has his own obstacles to overcome with black voters. Some said they didn’t know much about him. Others in the Selma crowd said they were trying to heed King’s advice and make a decision on character, not skin color” especially given their fondness for the Clintons.” So now all of a sudden they’re going to apply what Dr. King said in his famous “I Have a Dream,? speech. Interesting timing on the selective application of that theory, is it not, for some in Selma? The Independent, the UK Independent, “Mrs. [Bill] Clinton Looks on as Obama Gets the Larger Congregation. The congregation at the First Baptist Church in Selma, Alabama, was in full voice yesterday morning when the smiling face of Senator Hillary Clinton peered from a door behind the pulpit and saw she was already a little late. ‘Have a little talk with Jesus,’ the hymn began. ‘Tell him about your troubles.?’
“If sheer numbers matter, the news from Selma was discouraging for Mrs. Clinton. To win her party’s presidential nomination for 2008, she will need as many black votes as possible. It is why she was here yesterday and also why at the last moment her camp announced that she would be joined by her husband Bill Clinton,” so that she could bring her A-game, “because Bill remains beloved by many blacks.” But no one could have stood between the two churches shortly before worship at 11 o’clock yesterday and not noticed the imbalance between the crowds. Mr. Carter and his boys stood in a line of maybe 500, crossing their fingers for a seat in the Brown Chapel. Massive cuts of pork sizzled on barbeque grills by the roadside. The throng for Hillary up the street was meagre by comparison, ladies and gentlemen. Not looking good out there. Here’s John Lewis last night on ABC News.
LEWIS: When I celebrated my 60th birthday in Atlanta, President Clinton came down and spoke. When I celebrated my 65th birthday in Atlanta, Senator Obama came down. They’re friends. They’re like brothers — and Mrs. Clinton is an extension of her husband.
RUSH: Oooooh! That’s not a compliment, ladies and gentlemen. John Lewis there is saying that Mrs. Bill Clinton is an extension of her husband.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Still chuckling here, folks. Not chuckling, we’re laughing. The shamelessness of Mrs. Bill Clinton and Barack Obama speaking to black church audiences in Selma, Alabama, yesterday. By the way, if you’re new to the program or if you have not joined us yet, today is your first time with us today, an executive program decision been made here. From this day forward, the woman formally known as Hillary Rodham Clinton will now be known on this program as Mrs. Bill Clinton, wife of the former president. She obviously cannot run this presidential campaign on her own. In fact, the LA Times referred to Mrs. Clinton, Mrs. Bill Clinton, as taking her A-game to Selma by taking her husband.
She has to go down there and compete for the black vote with Barack Obama and needed her husband alongside in order to do it. This is not a feminist comment. This had nothing to do with women. Don’t misunderstand this. It’s simply the fact that Mrs. Bill Clinton cannot do this on her own. (interruption) What, it could change? Well, she might go back, but she’s going to be Mrs. Bill Clinton on this program.
