Rush Limbaugh attacks pensions and the American Dream: You should work till you die
By John Amato Wednesday Nov 19, 2008 1:30pmThe anti-union movement is on, and it all is centered around the automotive industry's quest for a rescue package/loan from the government. Limbaugh leads the charge in his Monday, Nov. 17 broadcast.
As the clip unfolds it appears that his own boss was trying to get him to change the topic. A caller who self-identifies as a Republican tries to shoot down some of the myths of the UAW that Limbaugh pushes on his flock on a daily basis. When asked about working past 67, he spins it by saying you shouldn't retire at 55.
It's a long clip, but this is what's being said. His boss even freaks out on him at the end:
Limbaugh: You're a nice guy and I'm sure that you are a salt of the earth guy but since you asked, What I am supposed to do, go back to work at 67? No, you're not supposed to retire when you're 55. You sound to me like you are totally capable of still working. Unless you work for a place that forces you out and says 55 you can no longer do the job, you got no business retiring at 55 IF you can't afford to retire. What's wrong....My boss is having a conniption there. What's wrong? Is that the unpolitick thing to say? I have not ... the American Dream. I have not redefined the American Dream. The American Dream is retire at 65. People are retiring now at 50 and 55 and so forth when they are still capable of working. According to the tables at 55, you've got 22 years left...
I have not redefined the American Dream. I have not redefined it. ... I don't understand what I said that's wrong here.
What planet is this man living in? He keeps digging deeper and deeper. Does he even know what the American Dream is?
h/t to C&Ler Dan for sending in the audio and says:
Rush basically tells auto workers that if their pension plans go bankrupt, they should go back to work.
Limbaugh obviously has no idea what concessions the UAW has already made. "GM, Union Agree on Contract to End Strike"
For General Motors (GM), a new labor contract represents a step forward. For the United Auto Workers, a big step back.
The two sides came to a tentative agreement on a new, four-year labor pact at 3:05 a.m. EDT Sept. 26, ending a two-day strike. If UAW President Ronald Gettelfinger can get the deal ratified by his 74,000 GM workers in the coming days, the contract will pull the automaker much closer to Toyota's (TM) cost structure. But for the UAW, it will roll back contract benefits and wages won over years of collective bargaining.
Many in the progressive movement did not like these concessions, but they happened. We can debate that later, but to gasbags like Limbaugh, if you work for a company for 30 years, you shouldn't get a pension and should work till you die. Does he hate policemen and firemen as well? Should they not be able to retire with a pension after trying to keeping us safe for thirty years on the job?
Login or Register to post comments.
that Rushbo, who never has to worry about a pension.
As much as I can't stand Limbaugh, given the market today and what is happening to peoples 401k's and IRA's he may by physical necessity and and obvious circumstances be right.
Of course he blundered being right with the context in which he put his comments.
close to being right on this issue?
Yet he wants folks who REALLY exert themselves over eight hours to work forever. What a hypocrite and buffoon. The people who expect to retire at 55 are generally cops and firefighters (try passing the physicals for EITHER of those jobs, Rush!) or teachers, who work extra hours after school correcting papers and creating lesson plans and then their seven hours dealing with unruly children. Rush has no idea what any of those folks deal with, as he has sat on his butt his whole career and eaten his fill in every city he's ever "worked." And for this he is paid millions spewing hate.
I like to see how long rash limpball can pay for his Dominican youngs boys and Oxycontin and Viagra without a paycheque.
Good luck job hunting over 45.
We can't all be Wallmart greeters.
no matter what your age...
I love it when these economic elitists forget themselves like that. First we had George HW Bush who didn't know what a supermarket laser scanner was. Then we had the Shrub who's most famous debate line was "I own a TIMBER COMPANY? That's NEWS TO ME!" Then we get McCain who can't even remember how many houses he owns, and says he'll have to check with his staff to find out. And now, as if it's any surprise, we have a fat nazi who parks his ass in a leather chair and spouts party propaganda into a microphone for a couple of hours a day in exchange for a salary of 30 million, who thinks nobody should be retiring at age 55. If I had a job like that, neither would I! I'd like to see how long he lasts on an assembly line, bolting the wheels on trucks for 60 hrs per week at $10/hr.
I'm not surprised his bosses flipped out. He forgot for a moment that, while he may be a plutocrat who serves at the pleasure of the plutocrat aristocracy, his job is actually to keep the angry redneck plebs who keep the plutocrats in power distracted with shiny objects, like incendiary stories about gay marriage and gun control. Pointing out that these pinheads will likely have to go on working for minimum wage until they drop, thanks to conservative economic policies, is sort of like Hulk Hogan musing about professional wrestling being fake.
Bash unions.
if NO ONE paid ANY further attention to Limpbought.
He would disappear.
he would STILL be running a radio show, broadcasting to 200 people, subsidized and paid for by The American Enterprise Institute. The forces of the free market do not apply to wingnut welfare.
It would be terrific to see Rush get exactly what he's worth - minimum wage. It's the only wage owed to someone made with shit for brains.
Just because you receive a pension after a certain amount of years doesn't mean that you can retire and still make it. If your pension doesn't cover your living expenses, and you have saved up nothing else to supplement your retirement, a)you trade down in lifestyle or b) go back to work in some fashion. Although I cannot stand Limbaugh, he's right, but it's always his condescending tone that always seems to make a good point turn bad.
...is living proof that you're wrong. You can be a convicted felon, and still get a six figure retirement pension from Congress.
Congress is the ultimate welfare state. Free medical care, a three day work week, a six month work year, the ability to give yourself a raise every year, and a pension that's equal to or greater than your salary when you were "working." Ironically, all paid for by the taxes of minimum wage workers.
I retired from my day job and my pension doesn't even cover my car payment. I now have my own business and the pension money is nothing more than gas money. The average worker doesn't get a golden parachute when they retire so Limballs doesn't know what he is talking about.
Keep it up, Rush. You have so many blue collar idiots (and they are idiots not because they are blue collar but because they buy into all of Rush's bullshit) who might just wake up at their hero's call for them to work until the day they die.
I. Love. It!
Keep talking there, Rush...you are about to lose your core audience.
... their idiocy is such that they will actually agree with him.
Never underestimate the capacity of some people to proactively defend those who attack their own interests.
They will never wake up...
I know that people consistantly vote against their own interests, but this is so blatant and obvious, it isn't an ideology thing, it is a DO I WANT TO WORK TIL I DIE? thing. People have to be able to see that.
Don't they?
(sigh)
...and (in order for the universe to remain in balance) attack those (liberals) who defend their own interests. It's amazing.
When Joe the (tax evading) plumber was grilling Obama about his tax plan, I was just begging for Obama to turn around and say "So...under my plan people like me and my wife, a politician and an intellectual property lawyer will get a 3% tax increase, while working guys like you will get a 6% tax CUT. But you're STILL going to vote for McCain's plan that will give guys like you jack sh!t, and lawyers like me a 6% tax CUT? Hey, THANKS BUDDY!"
This obese child raping junkie talked for ten minutes concerning working folks issues he neither knows of, or gives a shit about. Rush also said that he worked for major league baseball's Kansas City Royals for five years.....it figures...they're baseball's worst fucking team.
I have to agree with you on all points.
:-)
a microphone all day on your fat ass complaining about unions, you should work until you die...or just die
I'm just askin'
How rich would that be if Rush was a union employee.
Please tell me this is true.
Yes, but they never dare to call it a "union." They call it a "professional association." A professional association is essentially a union for people who never get grease on their shirts. How ironic is it that Ronald Reagan was president of the Screen Actor's Guild, which set guidelines for the minimum amount actors could be paid. But no, it wasn't a union. It CAN'T be a union if none of it's members have beer guts, or carry "lunch buckets" to work. (Well, I guess a few of them DO in Hollywood, but they're usually full of cocaine.)
always gets the short end of the stick. Always. In some other countries labor has 6 weeks paid vacation, 6 months paid maternity/paternity leave, health care and are treated much more humanely.
Whilst management gets bigger and bigger salaries, bonuses and golden parachutes, labor has been forced, in this country to take concessions just to keep their jobs.
I hope to hell we have a decent Labor Secretary in Obama's administration. One that has actually worked for a living and know how hard people have it.
And I hope there is a revival of the union movement and that workers can organize easier.
Seriously. This man creates nothing of value. Oh, perhaps he's a boon to advertisers, but that's about it. He sits on his fat ass all day and bloviates into a gold microphone spewing trash and nonsense. Anyone rational adult who would take this man's advice on anything, especially on matters relating to "working for a living", should seek professional help. This guy hasn't worked a day in his life.
Oh, but if you belive in valuing people who actually BUILD things more than people who just sit in chairs and bloviate, you're a SOCIALIST!
If you want to be a "free market guy" you've got to believe in the principle of paying your bloviators at least 1000 times as much as the average factory worker, which is what's happening here.
Rush is completely ignorant of union contracts. I don't know if they still do, but the auto companies used to have what they called '30 and out' where one could retire with full benefits after 30 years. The idea was to keep new workers coming in. So someone who started @ 25 could retire @ 55 - but what with losing investments and all I'm guessing many people don't have the money they thought they would, or maybe they were planning on selling the house and moving to Florida (for some reason people in Michigan love to retire to Florida) and can't sell the house now and maybe took a variable rate loan a few years back on the advice that since they planned to sell it would be safe and now the rate is about to skyrocket.
Spoiled rich brats like Rush and Bush have no clue about real life - and they don't want to know - they make their money tearing things down and their one virture is they keep me believing in an afterlife since I must believe some punishment awaits them.
Rush may be completely ignorant of union contracts, but the genius of the right wing punditry is that their listeners are ALSO completely ignorant of union contracts. Most of the redneck values voters who vote Republican work non-union jobs, and the conservative propaganda merchants would like for them to go on believing that unionized auto workers are being paid $100/hr, and are being driven to work in limousines. That way when guys like Mitt Romney pen Op/Ed pieces about how great it would be to let Ford, GM and Chrysler go bankrupt because it would essentially allow the plutocrats to buy back the pieces of those companies and start them all over again without any benifits for the retired workers, there will be an army of angry rednecks backing him up with political capital.
At the rate the economy is going, a whole lot of us are going to have to work until we die. The DOW dropped 427 points today. It's below 8000 now.
...and those that are already retired are going to have to GO BACK to work, or starve. My mother's fixed income retirement pension, which relies mostly on mutual funds has already declined by 30% in the last two months. The irony, of course, is that mutual funds that regular people invest their pensions in are not allowed to short sell. While unregulated hedge funds the wealthiest people invest in are allowed to short sell (and sometimes even do naked shorting), and so the wealthiest people can still make money even when the market is dropping like a rock.
Here's a nice little example. if you were SHORTING realestate in the last two months, you'd be making a FORTUNE! Check out one of the short sector funds. Up by 100% in the last month, and up by nearly 30% just today.
http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=SRS&t=3m&l...
It takes a lot of gall for a man who essentially makes his living with his mouth (sometimes around a cheroot) to tell workers who have worked with their backs, and arms and legs that they need to work until they die. Go to hell Limbaugh, you fat pig.
Limbaugh, and his Lies Fly media!
Does Rush sound a bit "elitist" with those comments?
Drug addled anal cyst.
many workers now pay into a 401K which is riskier. It's like privatizing Social Security and letting the wolves on Wall Street manage your money for a cut of their own.
His 401k was in the "low risk" investments and as of the first of the month he had lost 50%. I shudder to think of what the "high risk" folks may have lost.
We're not obsessing about this even though he just turned 59. Musicians never retire - we just 'change career direction' and work elsewhere in the field.
We'll both work until we die. But fuck Rush anyway.
Gee, you guys got it easy blah blah blah etc.
My sympathies.
I supplement my disability as a musician, and it's more work than people think.
I swear if I ever have anyone tell me ever again about how lucky I am to get to "play" instead of "work", y'all will be hearing about me on the evening news.
Other than that, the question I get most often is "How do you get work?". Answer: "Don't suck".
...the question I've been recently asked most frequently:
"Am I going to have to pay you for this?"
My answer:
"Only if you want me to show up."
The GALL of some people!!!
Aside from frequenting C&L during the day, I also go to cgradio.net where Mr. Lyles picks apart one of Limbaugh's lies each day. The man know his stuff, I'd love to see him go toe-to-toe with that useless lump Limbaugh. C&L and CG are definitely my two favorite librul websites.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27700954/
Folks are deferring retirement. Rush is an idiot.
"What planet is this man living in?" That planet? That's easy. He's living on the planet where he's paid tens of millions a year to bluster on the radio three hours a day. Of course someone with a gig like that would be in no hurry to retire. I just do not understand people who clear less than 30k a year who look up to this poster boy for the system that screws them.
suffer from a condition called idiocy. It is a learned behavior. In most cases the condition is made considerably worse by a parallel learned behavior we know as "ignorance". These conditions feed off each other, causing the individual to gradually deteriorate to a state where they are unable to think for themselves.
It's called "Stockholm syndrome"; people with "UNION MEMBER FOR BUSH" bumper stickers have terminal cases of it.
1.) Not everyone get's to sit on their ass all for a living like Rush. Some people actually work hard for a living. I may not be one of them but both my parents did and I respect them very much for it.
2.)Not everyone has a job as an overpaid racist blowhard and gets paid millions for lying like Rush.
3.)The first comment said it. If you're blue collar and 55 or older, good luck getting a job over a 20 something year old.
Rush has no clue how the middle class lives.
I agree. Whenever I am asked the question, "what is the worst job you ever had?", I always have to preface it with the SECOND worst job I ever had. The second worst job was working as a teenager, in El Paso , TX during the 100+ degree summers, chipping out scale from cement trucks with wrecking bars, because the owner was too cheap to sandblast them. The worst job I ever had. I worked as a waiter at a country club for four months. In that entire time span, I accrued a TOTAL tip count of $12.00 while working for less than minimum wage. The other rewards for that job were humiliating insults. The cement truck job was hellish, but I still had my dignity.
Wow...poor Rush.
I mean, back in the old era of Republican Rule, Rush could say this nonsense under the notion that the American People agree with his opinions and ideas.
But as of the 4th of November, the American People spoke otherwise.
Rush has probably lost his entire feeling of existence and need. He is probably worried about losing his job and his rights.
Shush now Rush, calm down. We Democrats aren't here to hurt you. We want to be RATIONAL human beings who think and function with a good heart and a smart brain. I know you are concerned but you do not need to drive yourself to the point of craziness.
Rush has always had a nut loose, but now that the Democrats proved everything he has had to say in the last 4, 8 years has shown the nut has fallen out and he has gone ape-shit crazy. He knows that his audio recordings of the last decade will collect dust in a vault locked up deep underground with Dick Cheney, while America looks toward a new light.
He wasn't crazy before because he had reason to believe there were people who actually agreed with him. Now he's gone overboard crazy because there is no one listening to those static radio waves that our ears tune out in the new dawn of Hope.
Go to bed Rush. Take a break from radio. Reexamine America and it's values and ideals. When you wakeup from this mess you have created in your mind, we will be there to hold your hand and invite you to our communion table, somewhere where ALL people, even those who once spewed hate and cynicism on the brightest and most talented of us, can sit and receive the same blessings as long as we are all thankful for the bread provided and sorry for the sins we have committed.
I'm not talking about a Christian communion table, I'm talking about a PROGRESSIVE, DON'T LOOK BEHIND US, THE NEW AGE IS HERE Table.
PS: Rush, if you ever decide to come, extend an invite to your friends Bill-O, Coulter, Hannity, Lieberman, Malkin, that cookoo from Minnesota who wants an expose on Anti-Americans in the congress, and yes, even the worst of the worst himself, Cheney.
C'mon guys, let's wake up. Hope and Change will only come if WE BRING IT. Obama is only as a good as his followers who will follow his example.
everyone else can get stuffed. What was his new contract worth? How many millions? For sitting around for 3 hours every day and making stuff up and insulting people? And having his screeners screen out anyone who disagrees with him? Although I don't begrudge Rush the ability to earn what he does and call it "entertainment," I would hardly call what he does for a living "work."
And let's see... even if you make $15 per hour... the cost of gas, food, clothing and the out of pocket health care benefits keeps going up and your wages haven't kept pace... and even if you have a 401 K... with the stock market tanking, you can't retire anyway when you wanted to...
Although the Republicans kept pointing fingers at Obama during the election process, Rush Limbaugh and the CEO's with golden parachutes are much closer to the "elites" in this country and what they think about the workers of this country.
was worth forty million if memory serves.
This obese pedophile makes millions for denigrating people who actually contribute to society.
a Faustian Bargain... he appears to have sold his soul to live like he does.
Thank you, Rush.
You speak the truth. Finally, after 30 years the wolf has shed it's sheep's clothing.
The GOP and conservatives HATE workers. They are the apologists for big bloated bad businesses.
Pay attention, America. See the enemy.
He looks like he can smoke a mean White Owl - he did a good job on Bushes for the last 8 years.
I wonder how he feels about those multi-billion $ retirement packages the top execs get even when they've driven the companies to the verge of bankruptcy?
If the guy is 67 and already on a pension, if GM went under his pension would be guaranteed by the PBGC, right?
I wish I had that kind of defined benefit plan. If PBGC runs into trouble, Congress will bail them out.
All I (and most others) have is a defined contribution plan (401(k)).
So anyone who is already retired and getting a pension is a lot better off than most of us.
This guy is nothing more than a piece of sh*t. He should rot in hell and I find the fact that he's gone deaf as fitting.
Ironic that he's going deaf.
He never listened to anybody.
for today and tomorrow
Of course, Rush would think that people should work until death since his idea of "work" is sitting and talking crap to anyone who'll listen for three hours at a time, every day - which is something most people don't get to do until they retire.
It was not the UAW that caused the problems with GM. It was not the cost of retirement, health benefits, or labor costs.
IT WAS, AND IS MANAGEMENT. Case in point ... GM led the way when it totally destroyed all hybrid cars it manufactured in cooperation with the oil companies desires and demands. Further, management is responsible for PRODUCT, labor is responsible to do as management dictates and builds that product. If the product they dictate to be built does not sell, is labor then responsible for the failure of that product? I think not.
People in this country work damn hard, and after 30 years of hard labor (and paying into their retirement account) should be able to retire if they so desire without overpaid blowhards like Limbaugh taking potshots at them. Limbaugh doesn't have to rely on retirement because he is making millions with every contract. He is without a doubt someone who simply put, doesn't deserve to breathe the same air as any UNION employee on the face of this earth!
the managers would be people promoted from within. People who have an idea of how the job is done, what the workers need, how to improve the product.
The current crop of "managers/CEOs" should be fired for malfeasance ( with NO golden parachute --- I mean seriously, never did I know of any worker that got fired and then rewarded for doing a bad job by getting paid to leave...) and someone with some brain from the line should be promoted.
It's been a long time that the Auto Makers listened to what the people wanted in a vehicle... cars that were driver-friendly and would last...instead of just "cool" to look at.
In any corporation, management has to take responsibility for what happens. There is no doubt about that. It is not the UAW who decided to go all in on big trucks. Which is what SUV's are.
But are you fucking kidding me? Don't tell me the UAW has an odor-neutral fecal bolus. Even now, their biggest weakness is that there are so many people who are willing to do their jobs better for less money. The conflict mode that is so characteristic of the Detroit 3 is losing to the Toyota co-prosperity model, where employees are Team Members and empowered to add value, and the OEM works in tandem with the supplier to help both survive.
It's a more enlightened model, and the UAW is obsolete.
Even now, their biggest weakness is that there are so many people who are willing to do their jobs better for less money.
That's true of ANY profession, so are you willing to take a hit on YOUR paycheck to keep your job?
It's a more enlightened model, and the UAW is obsolete.
Blaming the cows for bleeding on the slaughterhouse floor, I see.
Yes, I am willing to take a pay cut to keep my job. In fact, there's a good chance that will happen. I got no raise last year, even.
If one or more of the Detroit 3 go under, we will likely be in a full-blown depression. My company is losing money at a rapid rate, and I would rather keep my job at a lower wage than lose it or drive my company out of business.
I work in the auto industry. We do business with Toyota, Honda, GM and Ford. I am neither a manager nor an hourly worker. I am a translator, so my position is about as neutral as they come.
As I said, management has ultimate responsibility. But your analogy sucks. Beef cattle have no say in their own fate. Unions did.
I don't have space here to go into all the ways that Toyota is superior to GM. Put simply, they treat their employees and suppliers more as partners. They set a high bar, but they don't put lead weights on you before you jump, like GM does.
Detroit 3 suck ass. They treat suppliers like crap, squeezing all the blood out of them with no regard for their long-term viability.
Unfortunately, the UAW also took such a short-term view toward their own workers' compensation. They ignored the external threats to their own employers' viability, and squeezed everything they could get. Yes, they've given back a lot recently, but it's too little, too late.
...than an ill-informed propagandist for the the racist right. When Chuck Hagel did his interview, he made it a point to illustrate Limbaugh's idiocy. The Republican Party is in it deep when Hagel is calling out one of their mouthpieces. I really don't want to know what kind of side effects Rush is experiencing from his cocktail of hillbilly heroin and Viagra, but there will be a reckoning. As far as his ditto-head listeners, I once was listening to the Ed Schultz show and it just so happened to come on at the same time as Limbaugh's program. An idiot co-worker of mine that is an avowed dittohead heard Shultz ranting against the Bush administration's fiasco in Iraq. If anyone has noticed, Limbaugh and Schultz sound VERY much alike. Their voices are similar. The ditto-head I work with was half listening and made this comment, since she thought she was listening to RUSH, although the content was diametrically opposed to anything Limbaught would ever say. She said this, " I love that guy. He is the smartest person I have ever listened to and I would love it if he ran for President someday. I would vote for him in a heartbeat." I didn't have the heart to tell her that it wasn't Rush she was listening to , I just nodded my head with the realization of the mental acuity of the ditto-heads.
Many of us would pay to have Rush retire. He pollutes the airwaves everytime he opens his mouth. At least the world has been spared the future horror of Rush II. Why does the caller vote Republican? He doesn't seem to understnd that Rush is making him out to be a lazy, shiftless loafer. EIB= Excrement in Broadcasting in my book.
votes Republican because he has been duped into thinking that Republican lower taxes on the middle class - nothing could be further from the truth. Republicans hate the middle class. Republicans have and always will be for the corporations and the elites...
to rediscover the 'American Dream'.
I recommend he reads 'Fear and Loathing in Lost Repugland' first.
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/704568...
Thanks, Rush, for letting us Autoworkers know that your contempt for everything democratic and progressive includes the working class. Let me tell you, I worked 31 years for Chrysler. After about 27 years on the line (with 3 years as a union rep), I got a cushy desk job helping Chrysler with its quality assurance, and it's a good thing, cause my bones was about worn out. Both knees and my right shoulder needed surgery after all those years of repetitive labor. Here's a taste from my poetic monologue: "The predominant color of fixtures - asside from the tarnished brass of the welding guns, the oily gray of the unpainted car bodies, and the creosote brown of a woodblock floor - is green. You know the green: unfreedom green, barracks and mental ward green, shit green if shit was green, Soylent Green. Your remember Soylent Green, the Charleton Heston movie where the workers of an overpopulated world are recycled into food call Soylent Green? Soylent Green machines made from bits of bone and drips of sweat and sometimes literally arms and legs rubbed off one job at a time and amortized 30 years to retirement."
For more, see see www.autoplant.info.
but doesn't use the health care- doesn't want to "bother with it" Maybe he was worried about a potential oxycontin paper trail..................
If this guy's Karma ever catches up with him - he'll be in very serious trouble.
*
I wouldn't want to be in the same room . . . maybe not even in the same city.
*
He's a member of the Communications Workers of America.
All media persons are.
As for "not using the healthcare"...why...does he get it paid somewhere else...is an employee of Bob Jones University? He ain't payin' it out of his pocket...I'd bet MY whole salary on it.
He's a lying capitalist, and the first rule of capitalists is "use other people's money".
Who does Limbaugh think he is making judgmental statements regarding the caller's right to retirement. He complains about the cost of retirement benefits and is mum about the CEO pay and CEO bonuses. This caller could live a comfortable retirement on just one year of the CEO's salary and Limbaugh bitches about retirement benefits. What a jerk. Please, god, can't we get Limbaugh off the radio? His days are over.
A lot of supposed progressives are singing that same anti-union song on some other sites.
First, let me say that I can't stand Rush. Secondly, I'm aware that this financial crisis has taken a big bite out of the world's ability to remain in retirement due to significant drops in 401K value and so on. This was done at no fault of the participant, but poor hedge management by those that run these investment companies.
With that said, I believe that there is a big problem with people retiring without taking into consideration what they will need to retire and live out the remainder of their lives on the resources they have. This could be caused by many things, but the education of the general public is so poor that people don't know any better. Why should I or anyone else rely on the word of self-serving investment advisors, and lose everything. American in particular need to learn to think for ourselves. With technology, we can research and manage our own investments.
I firmly believe that if you look into your resources and you confirm what you need to get you to at least 90, you have thought things through. If you find that you are going to be unable to take care of you and your wife (or family), then you've gotta make the tough choice of staying at work, or finding other avenues of raising revenues.
What kind of Planet John?
I'd say Planet Limbaugh,where a fat know-nothing bigot can squat ensconced in his own mottled Lard,popping Oxycontin and dispensing daily diatribes composed of smelly factoids,garnering millions and millions of bucks far and away completely disproportionate to his real productive worth which is with out doubt precisely zero.
In the interests of the fair distribution of wealth and Democratic justice,he should probably be force fed and eaten.
None of the these posts above adresses reality.
What's reality...the UAW has made ALL the concessions over the last 15 years...to save their companies.
In return, the auto companies did not become more efficient, did not put out products that the U.S. consumer wanted (hybrids in abundance), fought the government tooth and nail on EPA standards while the foreign builders put out fuel efficient high mileage models for DECADES...they've always exceeded US products, management NEVER took pay cuts even though THEY are responsible for running these companies into the ground.
And the fact that these SAME executives are looking for government bailouts with no consequences...such as quitting and turning the companies over to new management...just sshows that they are not interested in the company...only saving their own necks.
Join the real world.
My father suffered and died of complication from diabetes at the age of 60. He worked until he was fifty five. Fifty-fucking-five. Not because he wanted to, because his disease wouldn't let him work any longer. He lost his both feet before this disease took over his organs. It was a non-union job with little benefits. My mother had to work until she she was 70 to get a pension that would keep her family above water. We had to go to court to prove to the Social Security administration that my father was unable to work and he did not have the education to take an office position. Only to get a small portion of monthly benefits because he stopped working before the age of 65. Watching my father cry on the stand was the hardest thing I ever had to witness. My father was a tough Italian man, son of immigrants. To him it was shameful to have his wife provide for his family but he had no choice. My mother finally was able to retire only to be diagnosed with Alzheimer's a year later. She went quickly and never enjoyed her retirement. She's still alive but doesn't know me or my siblings and is in a nursing home having people change her diapers and feed her.
If my father had a UNION to back him up and protect what was rightfully his, he would have died a proud man in his eyes and my mother would have had a chance to enjoy some of those "Golden Years" we all hear about. In my eyes he did what what he could as long as he could and I'm proud of him. And I miss him very much. I miss who my mother was and her chance to enjoy any retirement that was hers.
I wont get into health insurance or lack of part of this....
Limbaugh's comments are an insult to my father and my family. I wish I had a chance to get on air with that sack a shit to tell him that old age and retirement is is not a guarantee. We all deserve better for the work we have done and taxes we pay into.
It's pretty fucking easy for a man making 18 million and sitting in a comfortable chair for 4 hours a day to tell us how hard, how long and for what benefits we should work for. Fuck Limbaugh. doesn't he have some third world 17 year old male prostitute to exploit.
And I feel disgusted on your behalf.
Piss and moan or do everything you can to remove this POS from the airwaves?
How much does Rush make?
If he's so "right", why is he afraid to run for office?
He woundnt have a hope in heck of being elected anywhere.
that and his many holiday excursions to the Dominican Republic (supposed sex tourism hotspot) for whatever reason...
The auto companies problems are not a result of the financial crash.
Their sales have been declining for decades. GM is no longer the largest auto company in the world. Their problems are exacerbated by the recession because their POS product is too expensive for the quality you receive. People are buying cars...just not American cars.
The auto companies are using this crisis to destroy the strongest union in the country.
"The auto companies are using this crisis to destroy the strongest union in the country."
Bingo.
...taking place in the financial and monetary systems is totally engineered by these right-wing creeps.
They've taken away health benefits causing untold suffering; scammed people out of their homes with the mortgage crisis; they've destroyed most of the average person's wealth because housing prices have crashed, pension funds are shrinking, and 401(k)s are disappearing; etc.
Now they've happened upon a "special" way to destroy the last remaining unions at the last remaining major manufacturing jobs.
Don't blink! I think the "final shock" of the neo-con Shock Doctrine will be happening in the near future...
Limbaugh is a bloated bastard who's time has passed.
Soon, he will be purged from the airwaves, just as FOX is purging the nutcases from their staff.
Why do people elevate the stature of Limbaugh other than to create debate, hate and opposition? Limbaugh ain't squat and everytime i see his name on a progressive blog or site I feel pity. Limbaugh should be relegated to the same wingnutosphere as any other lunatic that preaches hate, intolerance and devision. We must unite and not be sidelined by the shiny turds that only exist to lay waste and destroy the ideas that empower and sustain us.
Yeah...like "trickle down economics", "tax cuts for the rich raise all boats", "proactively bringing democracy to other countries", "anti ballistic systems are stabilizing...not destabilizing".
Got news for you, genius. Your views are in the solid minority.
The main problem is a bloated corporation, waste everywhere, overpaid workers for what they produce, and so on and so on. How fast do vehicles come off the assembly line? Every 2 minutes? Is a new vehicle sold every 2 minutes? NO. And at the big 3 plants in Canada, workers get overpaid greatly to screw in bolt number 13 over and over. Top that off with a bloated management where nobody takes responsible for crap vehicles, but gets multi-million dollar bonuses. And voila. Crap company that shouldn't be bailed out.
Overpaid workers? Really?
Dude, you are really starting to piss me off. You do nothing but bitch and moan about Obama. You do nothing but bitch and moan about everything American.
Your overpaid workers don't have to pay for fucking insurance. Your overpaid workers get decent pensions from your government.
Fuck you for saying that OUR workers are overpaid when they have done nothing but take concessions for years and still had to pay everything with rising costs.
Fuck you. Fuck your attitude. Fuck everything about you.
Like we have a choice when the GOLDMANS and FEINSTEINS are asking er demanding a bailout from their failed policies
First of all, I despise this Blowhard! I mean really, really hate this giant-headed, hateful, right-wing nut job.
Secondly, I'm a Democrat. Have been for a long time.
But, while I don't think it's anyone's business when you choose to retire, I do agree with Rush on one thing. Having a pension is not some God-given right in this country. It's a luxury!
I personally don't care if workers hired by GM today are not able to participate in a pension plan. Big deal.
I've never worked for a company that offered a pension plan. In fact, I don't know anyone who has worked for a company that offered a pension plan. When I retire, I will have to live off of my savings and Social Security -- just like a lot of other people in this country.
Unions were started in an attempt to gain better and safer working conditions for steel workers, coal miners, etc. But unions have morphed into out-of-control groups that threaten to strike if they don't get their way and have virtually ruined GM and a lot of other companies.
In these grim economic times, if you have a job and draw a reasonable wage, I think you should consider yourself lucky.
If you have a job, draw a reasonable wage and have a pension plan ... well, I think you should consider yourself blessed. And shut up.
I think that's what that conservative fathead was trying to say as he somehow remarkably stumbled over a sliver of truth during his daily sermon.
"Unions were started in an attempt to gain better and safer working conditions for steel workers, coal miners, etc. But unions have morphed into out-of-control groups that threaten to strike if they don't get their way and have virtually ruined GM and a lot of other companies."
I worked for a union for 13 years. What you write is totally alien to my experience. Every 4 years our contract would come up and we would have to fight just to keep what we already had. Every contract we would generally lose some rights, or have wages frozen just to keep health care for ourselves and families. We weren't 'out of control'. Our company ended up being ruined by a CEO who made a moronic decision to merge with another company and then said CEO proceeded to retire with a 'Golden Parachute' when things went to shit.
I don't know who's been feeding you that kool-aid, friend, but what you write is simply Conservative propaganda.
Don't resent your fellow American workers because they have union jobs, pensions, health care, living wages, etc.: rather understand that those are all things that you SHOULD HAVE. They are not 'lucky' or 'blessed' - no, the truth is that YOU have been SCREWED. Rush is just lying for his corporate masters: propagandizing to the American people to eat shit and LIKE IT. Fostering resentment over unions is no different than fostering resentment over race, gay marriage or any other 'wedge issue.' Don't drink Rush's kool-aid on unions and don't carry his water.
because it's crap. It's management's view of unions. 100%. All lies and bullshit.
And thank you for saying that, Joe (good to see ya, btw).
Miss_kitty, I hope your comment was aimed at Liberal and not Joe. If not, I think it is you whose screed is mistaken.
Neither are golden parachutes...which are NEGOTIATED by rich guys with agents.
Unions were formed to protect workers who individually don't have rights or protections from management.
Pensions are a negotiated fact of life, and to even imply that somehow the attitude should be "welll...it was fun while it lasted" is pure...unmitigated bullshit...and so conceited a view as to make me wonder what planet a person that speaks that way comes from.
... to remind him that he's still the Vulgar Pigboy, but he didn't get back to me.
Baby Jesus Hannity just loves "El Rushbo." Babwa Wahwah finds the bilious gasbag "fascinating."
God, I hate these radio reich-wingers and their enablers and apologists in the "mainstream media." They're nothing more than desperate, despicable filth-mongers.
BID
or have paid vacation or sick days...remember...those weren't gifts from business...those rights and privileges were EARNED by unions.
Now they are as overbloated as the companies they attempt to bargain with. They are now a corporate entity looking out for themselves, not the worker. As far as I'm concerned, unions AND poor management are the reason the big 3 are bankrupt. Both are equally responsible.
To 'Liberal and Proud': Tell it them, brother. (Or sister.)
to make decisions, NEGOTIATE contracts and set strategy.
No one held a gun to management's head to sign the UAW contracts.
The owners gave away the store because strikes would have impacted THEIR pay plans.
Workers WORK, they make no decisions on product, strategy, etc.
Do some homework on the history of the auto company contracts and their negotiation for the last 40 years before you make statements about responsibility. Also, have an understanding of how business works.
Workers don't have any responsibility in the running of the company beyond putting in an honest days work.
And before you tell me to do my homework..I have...and I also lived it. I am the son of a union worker.
As a human resources professional with 25 years experience in both union and non-union manufacturing plants here are a few observations.
Manufacturing in the United States currently employs under 14M workers.
http://www.wnyalf.org/?zone=/unionactive/priv...
Union employees make up only 12% of manufacturing workers.
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/data-bytes/unio...
2004 weekly manufacturing wages were 6% higher for union $694 to $654 USD compared to non-union workers. Non-union workers do not pay $30 monthly dues.
Annual hourly rate increases are fairly equal at 2.5-3.5%. COLA's are basically nonexistent in today's labor agreements replaced by productivity bonus.
Benefits, other than pension are roughly equal. Non-union workers in most cases have 401k, ESOP and service bonus in place of guaranteed retirement. Medical benefits are the same across the board.
Work environment, participation by hourly workers (Training & Advancement, Kaizen, Lean, Safety, QC, Activities, Facilities) is the same. Both environments have bid jobs.
Productivity expectations and progressive discipline of non-performers is the same. It is just as easy to counsel and terminate a union as it is a non-union worker. Poor attendance the most common grounds for termination in both environments.
Union plants typically have higher skilled trade workers with long seniority and less turnover than non-union counterparts but, work ethic as shown by ever increasing US productivity is equal.
As a manager my preference is to work in Union plants as labor agreements are cut & dry but, in comparing the two environments I believe they are a wash.
The problem is that US manufacturing is dying replaced by the fundamentally unsound services industry as our economic base. Poor management/greed, inferior products/R&D, foreign competition, government ineptitude/trade policy and the sorry state of technical education is central to US manufacturing's demise not unionization of our workforces.
I have always heard that union wages and benefits set the competitive standards that determine non-union wages and benefits. Companies are able to stop employees from unionizing by telling them that they get essentially the same compensation as union workers. Get rid of the unions and all workers in an industry will then see their compensation drop. Is that still the case?
Non-union plants target union shops though annual wage surveys and smartly play the card 'No need to unionize because you make as much if, not more than, the union plant down the street. Plus we provide 401k, tuition reimbursement, better medical and life insurance benefits and you do not have to pay dues to protect your job. If you have any issues we have an OPEN DOOR policy to listen to YOU.'
During annual wage reviews in non-union plants where I have faced upwards of 500 employees a little stagecraft and magic with numbers goes a long way in diffusing angst over a 2% raise while pushing a 10% increase in weekly out-of-pocket employee portion of medical cost. Annual wage review presentations are highly scripted and vetted by corporate legal then, practiced in dry run with managers who postulate hourly worker questions to help formulate quick response for the HR guy. Throw in a few hundred dollars out in a bonus plan and voila... no union.
Initially, to escape unionization during the 1950-70's companies fled from the Northeast to the Southeast. Cheap labor, new plants, few state regs but, as the South became inundated with 'Yankees' and became more conscience of being taken advantage of Unions began to take root. Hence, the move by manufacturers overseas in the 1980-2000's. Foreign companies, notably Japan, set up shop in the US, particularly in the South and Midwest because of home government taxation, high wages/costs, rates of exchange/tariffs, logistics costs and that the USG and states offered little to no strings attached grant money and tax breaks.
Non-union plants utilize workplace surveys to gage worker satisfaction. I have provided free uniforms, quarterly catered lunches (BBQ in the South...yum!), holiday gifts, raffle incentives, sport team activities (bowling, golf, softball), health club memberships, wellness events, picnics, monogrammed clothing giveaways and always kept nice facilities and jump the minute SAFETY is even so much as whispered.
Whether union or non-union (union v. non-union is a strawman argument) the problems with US manufacturing are too numerous to list. The only way I see to right ship is through technical education in engineering science and trades. The US is unable to graduate the 60,000 engineers it needs annually and forget about young people becoming machinists or electricians. Korea, Germany, India, japan, China... these are engineering/ trade built economies.
Just ask Mr. Limbaugh if US manufacturing is key to national defense and after he responds yes, ask him to name one US bearing manufacturer?
I work in a non-union company, and I think it's true that fear of unions keeps management from straying too far from the "standard" union conditions. As such, I am happy to see unions survive.
But there is also a global pattern at work, where all U.S. companies and workers are competing with companies and workers in other countries. So unless we can unionize everywhere at once, to the extent that unionization makes U.S. businesses less competitive, jobs will flow elsewhere.
There is a counter-trend, which is that the above model makes Energy(TM) want to get high, and in fact he (Energy) is only pretending to lie low because he sees how depressed we get when he gets high. This real cost of energy will push back against globalization and, at least to some degree, help promote locavores and sustainability.
In response to the following comment: "Pensions are a negotiated fact of life, and to even imply that somehow the attitude should be "well...it was fun while it lasted" is pure...unmitigated bullshit...and so conceited a view as to make me wonder what planet a person that speaks that way comes from."
Well, it WAS fun while it lasted. And now it's over. Whether you feel it's BS or not, that's a fact. Today's auto workers are never going to have it as good as workers in the '80s and '90s.
And you don't have to wonder what planet I come from. I'm from Texas. Where we don't have very many unions.
If I grew up between the twin ass-cheeks of Mexico and Oklahoma, I'd probably think that living my whole life in shit was as good as it gets, too: but it isn't. Buy yourself a plane ticket and visit the U.S.A. some day. Learn what it's like living in the First World.
Z. I. N. G. :-D
I love it when you get like that!
Good to hear from you.
apparently not too many brain cells either....
Here's the key to stopping Rush and his ilk, radio talk show hosts, etc. These guys are all of a kind, dedicated criminals. It would not be idly said that they will stop at nothing. And their criminality did not start with their ascension to talk-show hosts. They have been busy with unethical activities far beyond what we protest about. What is needed is a coordinated effort to hire detectives to discover their crimes and then document and expose them for the criminals that they are.
It can be done. It will take money contributions and an organizer. But believe it, their crimes are there, waiting to be found out.
And in the meanwhile, searching for their crimes will surely send them over the edge, because these guys are cowards if nothing else.
emphysema, glaucoma, how about spinal deformities that with age increase to the point of constant intractable pain, numbness and inability to walk. and on and on. but you only have the answers that fit your own pathetic reality. go play golf and let the country alone.
OH Rushy, Rushy, Rushy. Tsk tsk tsk. Welcome to the 21st century.
I think it's really sad that some people are so excluded from the American base that they can't even comprehend how bad things have gotten for a lot of people.
I saw a politician today (R) from Tennessee interviewed about the big three crisis.
His stand of course was to let the big three file for Chapter 11 to get rid of their union contracts. Well go figure! Toyota is produced in Tennessee and Tennessee is a "right to work" state of course.
When the big three go bankrupt, and the UAW is gone, it won't be long and all auto manufacturing in this country will go south to Mexico where they will be able to pay 35 cents an hour instead of the $15.00 that Toyota pays the miserable scabs in Tennessee. It will be poetic justice of sorts, as the American people will finally see what the scum sucking pigs in the republican party have been after all along.
This is my biggest bitch about the Clintons, as Bill was the one who signed Nafta, and Hillary is right in there with big business too if the truth was actually told.
It is time people started really analysing what the republicans are really all about, and who they really represent, and what the consequences to this country really are!
This whole issue makes me physically sick. I wouldn't be a bit surprised to discover that GM, Ford, and Chrysler are intentionally losing money to break their union contracts with the long term goal of moving their operations to Mexico once they accomplish their Union Busting tactic.
Right to work = let the corporations undercut and screw their workers.
The people have had enough of these corporate assholes. We are beginning a path that will take us back to a nation where work is valued again, and pushing junk paper will not be what it used to be.
To bad for druggo the imbecile and his trust fund enablers.
Poor Rush is bouncing off the walls now that Obama has won and the Democrats put the Repugnants in the back seat . He is no longer relevant , we should ignore this friggin pig from here on out , don't give him any press . It's all the unions fault , this is and will be the right wing mantra concerning the auto industry . Reaganite union busters . Couldn't have anything to do with inept management and corruption could it ? Nothing new .
This guys is such a useless, American-hating, filthy stinking peice of shit! And those are his good points.
33 million or there abouts is how much this slimy piece of shit 'makes' per year? He has zero credibility to speak about pensions people get while doing blue collar jobs. It is like have the shit in the toilet comment on the gas mileage of automobiles because both emit nauseous gases, useless.
Why exactly does a Radio talk show host make so much money?
So companies that look to advertising have to pay more to advertise their products that drive up the costs?
Lets face it, Glenn Beck is just as ridiculous as Rush and could handle his time frame.
Their are others that beat Rush on listeners in many mradio markets but Rush is piped in at the corporate level. Besides if anyone does not believe that Rush's show is not subsidized by the Right wing in this country, they must be Ditto headed.
Unions are the problem. As the Employee Free Choice Act is nearing approval. Coincidence?
Rush, How many companies are in dire financial stress that have NO union(s) ????
How about AIG, Goldman-Sacks, etc. Actually, How many Wall Street banks/lenders/mortgage companies have unions?
How many Wall Street firms that recieved taxpayer bailout money had or have union employees?
How more profitable would Clear Channel (Rush's radio employer) be if Rush recieved a more meager salary?
Rush may find out when noone can purchase what is advertised on his show. They will stop advertising when they do not sell. The GOP may not be able to subsidize Rush via business transfers because K street is not paying as well either.
Lets race to the bottom Rush. Mexico is a great example how Rush percieves America.
Rush's gated community is to keep the likes of him in. It cannot hold out the masses of poor, hungry, that become desperate.
Rush is not much of an American. He wouldn't serve it, defend it, risk himself for it, stand up for it, help it or its people.
With Rush's contracted salary of wealth, how many jobs did he create or how productive to society is he?
Rush is the burdonous parisite he attempts to portray the Auto Workers Union members as. Not the union workers. Add up all the executive pay, bonus, expense accounts, stock options, health care of the auto industries managment. Come on Rush, if your smart enough and honest enough and able to put yourself in managments position. Because Rush has never been a real manager. Rush has an imaginary view of what is a manager.
Think Lee Iacooca when he took over Crysler after it bellied up.
There again, Conservative free trade, where America allows a 3 percent tarriff on forign auto makers importing their cars here verses American auto makers getting tarriffed at 14 percent(or more) exporting to another country.
It is about reducing Americas living standard of the middle class.
Next, only the wealthy can vote.............then?
Someone should retire Limbaugh.
Completely typical right-wing loony, greedy, multi-multi-millionaire fat fuck cold-hearted motherfucker.
You can never get a word in edgewise with that fat junkie bigot.
And I work 6 days a week. I don't get any overtime pay. I don't have a union. Or a retirement pension. Or medical insurance. Or paid vacations. Or even paid holidays. And I will probably never be able to retire. That's a fact of life, not some pie in the sky "American Dream", where people think they have a "Right" to retire. . And there are thousands of Americans like me. So what the fuck are y'all bitching about?
deserves what they get. you can listen to him, follow him, agree with him and thereby continue to support him. and, no doubt, many listeners will because he somehow delivers for them. it says a lot about the person who is a limbaugh listener. as long as he gets support he won't have to ever worry about things like a pension. he's already taken care of for the rest of his life. too bad. too bad he will never have to worry and play on the same field that most Americans do. and if his listeners think that he is like them, they are dead wrong.
The percent of American who live and work below the poverty level has increased over the eight years of George Bush being in office. It's not even a momentary thought in people like Limbaugh minds, or any compassion in their hearts. The reason why is because neocon's are more than comfortable that poverty exists in America, they realize that it is necessary for the wealthy to be able to live as they do.
If the Republicans want to know why Mark Begich a Democrat could win a US Senate seat to represent Alaska, it's because of growing numbers of working poor in America. Neocons are learning that they can no longer keep impoverished Americans docile with scare tactics of Al-qaeda, or Communists trying to kill us. When a person understands that they will not have a chance to escape the government assisted, corporate imposed life of poverty... then dying loses it's grip of fear. In the process corporations, and governments loose their grip of fear also. Barack Obama knows the working poor, and he feels our pain. He speaks a message of hope, not of fear. That is why America elected a Democratic majority, because we are not afraid. We have hope, Barack's message to us all, that real hope is a necessity of life.
So as far as i'm concerned, Limbaugh's words have no meaning for me. They only give me more cause to raise my fist in the air in support of leaders who care for the working poor here in America. Leaders like Barak Obama, and Mark Begich.
Aren't you yourself a member of a Union or two??? To be on radio you have to be a memeber of AFTRA and I'm guessing he's also part of SAG.
Login or Register to post comments.