Ground Zero Terrorist Recruitment Center Imam: Build Mosque or Else

Transcript Rush Limbaugh Show
September 10,2010

Note: Put aside your emotions and read please

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 Religion.blogs.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 have 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 have 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 have 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?

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

RUSH: What?

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.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Stan in Rochester, New York. Great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello, sir. Testing one, two, three, four. Stan?

CALLER: Hello.

RUSH: Yeah, hi, Stan, how are you?

CALLER: Good. How are you doing?

RUSH: Very well, sir. Thank you.

CALLER: I'm not a fan of right-wing Republican, but I am a reasonable man. I don't hate anybody. But, you know, I think all this mosque stuff that the right-wingers been stirring up about the mosque, which is, you know, constitutional, I don't agree with but it is constitutional, all this has led to the Koran burning and that's going to endanger our troops. This guy's a nutcase. You know those people over there --

RUSH: You know what, I happen to agree with you out there over this.

CALLER: Huh?

RUSH: I do, I agree. Our troops are fine and dandy, in no danger whatsoever right now either in Afghanistan or Iraq. But we build this mosque, you're right, Stan, there's no telling what could happen.

CALLER: I'm talking about the burning of the Koran.

RUSH: Okay, the same thing. If we burn the Koran our troops in Afghanistan, I mean they're over there planting poppies or harvesting whatever the crops are, trying to put together democracies over there, fine and dandy, but if we burn the Koran, you're right, our troops, they might actually be fired on.

CALLER: No, I'm talking about the mutilations that we had seen in the past, you know, televised mutilations, dragging bodies through the streets, chopping heads off. I mean these people are nuts. You know that. You've said it over and over.

RUSH: I know. And it's our fault. We're just going to compound it here if we burn some Korans.

CALLER: If you're going to do something, do it right, drop a nuke on them. If that's the way you feel about it and you want to end it all --

RUSH: Well, no, who's talking about dropping a nuke on them, now?

CALLER: I'm just saying --

RUSH: Stan --

CALLER: -- that's what your position is --

RUSH: That's not my position. What do you mean? Who's talking about nuking anybody?

CALLER: I'm talking about if you want to fight a war, fight a war, otherwise get the hell out of there and stop all this nonsense of creating animosity and agitating -- (crosstalk)

RUSH: Stan, why the hell should we get out of there? Our troops aren't in any danger until we start burning Korans. That's what you just said.

CALLER: Our troops are in danger, but the escalation -- (crosstalk)

RUSH: Well, no, they can't be in danger because we haven't started burning any Korans yet.

CALLER: They were in danger when we started the surge. What happened when we started the surge? A lot of people died.

RUSH: So it doesn't matter if we burn Korans because they're already mad at us.

CALLER: Yeah, but they -- the level of -- (crosstalk)

RUSH: So the Koran burning can go on now.

CALLER: They're gonna start mutilating bodies when they capture a soldier. They ain't going to just take 'em -- they're going to mutilate 'em like they did before -- (crosstalk)

RUSH: Well then wait a minute, wait a minute, if they mutilated bodies before, they can't start mutilating bodies now after we burn a Koran.

CALLER: It seems to have calmed down. (crosstalk)

RUSH: Mutilations calmed down?

CALLER: -- and TV with them cutting their head off like that --

RUSH: Yeah.

CALLER: -- journalist.

RUSH: Right.

CALLER: You know, and that's what you're going to see more of that --

RUSH: Well --

CALLER: -- you know, you just agitate these people --

RUSH: You think maybe Israel should just leave?

CALLER: If Israel wants to bomb 'em, let 'em go bomb 'em.

RUSH: No, I'm not talking about that. Should the Jews leave Israel? Because I mean the Jews being over there that's agitated these people, a lot of mutilations going on 'cause the Jews are in Israel. Maybe the Jews ought to go back to Poland.

CALLER: No, I don't think they should of, but I've often wondered because I was too young to understand it, how you can go in and give somebody a piece of somebody else's land. That's like coming over here, saying, "Okay, we're going to give the Croatians California," and then nobody -- (crosstalk)

RUSH: That actually may not be a bad idea, but you're talking about, for example, when the Supreme Court said this woman's house in Connecticut could be taken by the developers to build a mall?

CALLER: Yeah. I don't agree with that, either.

RUSH: Yeah, me either, I don't agree with it.
CALLER: But I do agree with some other things, but like I said, I don't know how Israel got that piece of land over there that was Palestinians. I wasn't around at that time.

RUSH: Really?

CALLER: Never understood it. How do you just take a hunk of land off and give it to somebody else and expect the residents there not to be angry?

RUSH: Yeah, that's an excellent point.

CALLER: You know? So you're going to have war forever.

RUSH: Well, but not until we burn the Korans. If we start burning the Korans then it's all over, it's really bad. And if we don't build a mosque that's gonna compound burning the Korans.

CALLER: The mosque has nothing to do with the Koran. Like I said, I don't agree with building the mosque there. But they have the constitutional right. Either we're gonna uphold the Constitution or we're gonna burn it, one or the other. Throw it in with the Korans.

RUSH: Now, wait a minute, there are all kinds of zoning laws that people have to -- the Constitution wouldn't be violated if the mosque is not built there.

CALLER: Well, you just said you didn't agree with the way they took that woman's property away by zoning laws.

RUSH: Yeah. I don't believe the government coming and taking away -- especially since they haven't built the mall there that they were gonna build.

CALLER: Yeah. I mean you didn't agree with that. Well, that's the same thing here.

RUSH: Property rights.

CALLER: You can't have federal regulations coming in telling people what to do with their private property, especially when it's all within code.

RUSH: Damn right. Stan, I've had it.

CALLER: (crosstalk)

RUSH: You know, I've had it, you know, there's a guy out in California, a kangaroo rat was on his land, and he had to give up his land to save the kangaroo rat. It was in Bakersfield, it was a farmer. It was outrageous. He wasn't even burning Korans.

CALLER: Well, that stuff is ridiculous, too. Like I said, I'm reasonable, you know, I'm not unreasonable about things. I think I'm different. I got a whole new party here, I'm called the logic, the down to earth party, see you on the ground.

RUSH: The down to earth party.

CALLER: The down to earth party. Let's get down to earth, the real issues, instead of fabricating all this crap.

RUSH: What is a real issue?

CALLER: The real issue is jobs, the economy, get our kids out of harm's way, if they're not fighting for anything.

RUSH: Who's causing jobs to be lost?

CALLER: Well -- now -- tariffs, companies shipping jobs overseas.

RUSH: Tariffs, right.

CALLER: You know, you gotta look at jobs the same way as we look at the border of Mexico.

RUSH: So it doesn't matter if we burn the Korans because companies are shifting jobs overseas, in Mexico, it's over. Kangaroo rat wins.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: All right, now, for those of you who are in a panic out there over the last call, let me just explain some things to you. There was never a country called Palestine. I know this. You don't have to send me e-mails. There's not only a constitutional right to build a mosque, there's a constitutional right to burn Korans. Britain gave Israel the land. It was Britain's land to give. Israel was established via the British mandate. British governed the Transjordan. This is what we now call Palestine-Israel. It was theirs to do what they wanted with. It's not as though people came along and took it.