Rush's comments today about the Malloy/Mosque controversy

This imam business, do you know that this mosque, they've raised nine grand, if that? This mosque is a totally trumped-up story. This mosque is nowhere near being built. The guy building the mosque doesn't have the money. We're totally being manipulated with this. We're being manipulated by this poor little guy down there, this church, burning the Koran. That's silly. It's not worth the energy everybody's expending over it. How many people go to this guy's church, 50? Thirty? And here's Obama weighing in on it. Obama says, "Well, you know, this is creating terrorists faster than --" come on, give me a break. You actually think that a bunch of militant Islamists are minding their own business and they're not militant but all of a sudden watching some Koran burning in Gainesville, Florida, is gonna recruit a bunch of terrorists? That's not why they're gonna become killers. This is all absurd.

Now, the imam did an interview on CNN. This bores me. I gotta report it, but I resent being manipulated into this. But I gotta do it. There's a public service, public duty thing here. There's a new ABC poll on the mosque in Manhattan. "The debate over construction of a Muslim community center --" the vast majority of the American people already oppose this. What's the news? Eighty percent don't want any part of this. A majority of New Yorkers don't even want any part of this. So once again you've got the ruling class against everybody else. The interest of the story is what it represents. It's another illustration of how the ruling class is attempting to force everything down our throats. "The debate over construction of a Muslim community --" it's not a community center, it's a mosque, it's a recruitment location. Let's be upfront and honest about it. "Rush, you're being politically incorrect." I know I'm being politically incorrect.

"The debate over construction of a Muslim community center in Lower Manhattan could carry political risks." Really? Earth-shattering news from ABC. "Four in 10 registered voters -- overwhelmingly opponents of the plan -- say they feel strongly enough about it that it could influence their vote in Congress this fall." That's just 40% feel strong. "At the same time, the complaint is with this particular site: While 66 percent of Americans in this ABC News/Washington Post poll oppose construction of the Cordoba House facility, 82 percent of opponents say they object to its proposed location, not to building mosques in general." Okay, I don't care how you slice and dice the numbers. Nobody wants it there, plain and simple. "There is nonetheless substantial, continued suspicion in this country of Islam, a faith practiced by an estimated 1.5 billion people worldwide, but by fewer than 1 percent of the U.S. population." They go on and on and on to talk about what people think of Islam, as though we don't know what people think of Islam.

Let me go to the next page. Oh, the next page is another story from religionblogs.CNN.com. Soledad O'Brien did an interview with the imam. We have audio sound bites, we'll get to them. "Five big surprises from Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf’s interview with CNN’s Soledad O’Brien on Wednesday night: 1. Rauf regrets locating the Islamic center near ground zero." No, he doesn't. If he did, he'd move it. He says, "If I knew that this would happen, cause this kind of pain, I wouldn’t have done it." Who woulda thought this woulda happened? The imam is surprised by this? You see how we get manipulated and carried into this story? Keep it alive for weeks and weeks? Oh, now all of a sudden after how many weeks the imam finally says, "Gosh, if I'd a known this I'd a never built it there," after how many weeks?

Number two, Five surprises from the imam, according to CNN. "Rauf says the reason he can’t move the [mosque]," now that even though he would never have built it there in the first place, "is because of national security concerns." What? What national security concerns? Well, let's read further. "Parts of the Muslim world would be violently inflamed at the news of the center’s relocation." Oh, you mean the religion of peace would have a dangerous uprising if the imam caved and moved it? If you build it, they'll come. If we don't build it, they'll what? Have a rally? Seriously. The imam says the reason he can't move it now, even though he says if he knew this woulda happened, this kind of pain, he wouldn't a done this, but now that he's done it, it's too late, he can't move it because of national security, parts of the Muslim world would be violently inflamed at the news that the imam is caving and moving it.

I have a surprise here for the imam. Since CNN has five surprises for us, I have a surprise for the imam here. Every time, it seems to me, anyone does not do exactly what they want, they start threatening to take it out on us, the troops, the imam here. This is a threat. The imam said, "Yeah, if I'd a known all this, I wouldn't a done it. But, gosh, if I move it now, why, I don't know what they'll do." So this is the hammer that's held on us, the religion of peace, which is not what everybody thinks it is, is going to have an uprising, much like the Dutch cartoon uprising if we move the mosque. Troops are already under great threat from militant Islamists. That's why our troops have guns and armor. I mean it's not peaceful out there on the battlefield. So therefore I'm pretty sure we can handle whatever comes up here if there is an uprising if the imam decides to cancel the project to move it, which he's going to have to do because he's not going to get the money for it.


Let's see. "The headlines in the Muslim world will be that Islam is under attack," the imam said. "There's the danger of the radicals in the Muslim world to our national security, to the national security of our troops," if we move the mosque. Does this imam know what he's saying? He's contradicting all of the public relations put out there about this being a religion of peace. "The headlines in the Muslim world," not the terrorist world. He said the Muslim world. "The headlines in the Muslim world will be that Islam is under attack. There's the danger of the radicals in the Muslim world to our national security, to the national security of our troops." I think they're already threatened. They're on the battlefield.

"If we do move," Rauf continued, "it will strengthen the argument of the radicals to recruit, their ability to recruit, and their increasing aggression and violence against our country." So, you see now, we can't move it because if we move it that's just going to recruit more terrorists which is what the president said. So we're being told, we're being led to believe that members of the religion of peace will mind their own business, but all of a sudden if we move this mosque, why, they're gonna sign up in droves and become militant terrorists. Is this blackmail, I don't know what this is, it's some kind of a threat. What's the third surprise? Yeah, he said it would be bigger than the Danish cartoon crisis if we move the mosque.

Number three. "When news first broke about the proposed Islamic center near ground zero last December, there was no controversy around it." I'm not sure that's the case. The first time I heard about it I couldn't believe it and we so discussed on this program. What the imam said back in December 2009, December 8th, to be precise. The location was precisely a key selling point for the group of Muslims who bought the building in July. "New York's the capital of the world, and this location close to 9/11 is iconic," said the imam. Yet, he wants us to believe that had he known back then all this would have happened he'd have scrubbed it? When he tells us the original idea is the one that survives today. There was plenty of controversy back in December when people heard about this. I was doing an interview with Andy McCarthy on a book he had written, and I asked him about this. We had a long conversation about that. What do you mean there was no controversy when this thing was first learned about? Maybe nobody that reads the New York Times cares about things like this, but there was controversy.

I gotta couple sound bites here. Let's get a couple of them in before we go to the break. Soledad O'Brien, this is Larry King Alive. By the way, they finally got a replacement for Larry King. Well, there's an America's Got Talent show, which is a spin-off of American Idol. This British guy named Piers Morgan is going to sit in for Larry King. And I haven't heard, has anybody complained this guy's not black, he's not a minority? He's not even an American. We're getting a Brit now to sit in for Larry King Alive. I mean, they've trained us to look at things this way. Soledad O'Brien: "When you look at the polls something like 71% of Americans think even though there's a right to build their center," blah, blah, blah, "the wisdom of it may not be there. Is it political or is it just people saying sensitivity-wise it's the wrong thing to do?"

RAUF: If we move from that location, the story will be that the radicals have taken over the discourse.

RUSH: What radicals? [sotto voce over soundbyte]

RAUF: The headlines in the Muslim world will be that Islam is under attack.

RUSH: What? [sotto voce over soundbyte]

RAUF: And I'm less concerned of the radicals in America than I'm concerned with radicals in the Muslim world. The danger from the radicals in the Muslim world to our national security, to the national security of our troops, and if we do move, it will strengthen the -- the -- the argument of the radicals to recruit, their ability to recruit, and their increasing aggression, violence against our country.

RUSH: I'm sorry. I'm not going to accept this anymore. We've been hearing about this ever since Abu Ghraib, we've been hearing about it ever since Club Gitmo, and it's bogus. So we gotta bend over and grab the ankles because otherwise we're just going to be creating a bunch of terrorists. Last I looked the world is filled with them long before we did or did not move or build this recruitment center, public mosque, whatever.


BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: So basically the imam is saying we have to do what he wants. We gotta build this mosque or there's going to be violence. How's that any different from a threat? I mean that's exactly how terrorists negotiate. Can we just be up front and honest about this? Yasser Arafat, you name it, this is how they negotiated. You do what I want to do or we're gonna blow somebody or something up. Now, this is not how interfaith bridge builders build bridges, folks. You know, the next thing we're gonna hear? When the imam is not successful raising money for this thing, we're going to be told if we don't raise the money to fund it, there will be outrage and we'll not be able to predict what the militant Muslims might do because if we refuse to pay for the mosque, they'll be insulted by that. They'll take that personally.

We've heard this ever since those Abu Ghraib pictures, Club Gitmo, the mythical flushing the Koran down the toilet which never happened. Somehow it's our fault these people are raging lunatics and mad, these terrorists, it's our fault they're terrorists. That's what they told us, Bush made 'em, Bush created 'em. Yeah, had to go in there and attack Iraq, created a whole bunch of terrorists, had to go in there and get Afghanistan. And Reverend Wright: "America's chickens have come home to roost." I mean, 9/11, we deserved it, our policies led to the creation of all these people mad as hell at the country and we should understand why. So they continue to hold out these threats here. Namby-pamby politically correct people here like Mayor Bloomberg and Obama, you know, react to it on the basis of defensiveness and fear.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, another brief question here from I, El Rushbo, from me, El Rushbo, your host. They say that we need a mosque at the World Trade Center site to convince the Muslims of our decency, goodness, openness, and so forth. Why? Why do we need a mosque at Ground Zero to convince the Muslims about anything? What don't they know about western culture already? They all have televisions. Television brings America right into their homes every hour of the day. None of it's anti-Muslim. To the contrary. Yet we're supposed to think that a cultural center somehow makes the difference. What are we embarrassed of, what are we feeling defensive about, what in the world's wrong with America that we have to convince them that we're not that bad a bunch of guys? None of this logic makes any sense.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Gibbs, White House press secretary, is now condemning the minister down there in Gainesville, Florida, of burning the Holy Koran as a provocation. The pastor apparently -- I'm trying to follow this up -- is demanding to speak with Mr. Obama about this. And Gibbs says they're thinking about placing the call to the pastor. I'm sure the pastor is curious why he hasn't received his NEA grant. The pastor's probably saying, "Where did I go wrong? I've watched all these other groups get federal money for dressing themselves up nude in chocolate and putting the crucifix in a jar of urine. The NEA is paying for that, how come I can't get paid for burning the Koran?" So he's probably gonna take that up with Obama. (laughing) Well, who knows what the minister's motivations are? Money is a powerful thing.