This hour of the Limbaugh Wire brought to you by the “defense welfare queens”
By Simon Maloy

We've always found it interesting that there is no specific aircraft known as “Air Force One.” That designation belongs to any aircraft carrying the president of the United States -- be it the modified 747 that typically shuttles the president around or Calvin Coolidge's custom-built autogyro. Unfortunately, that principle does not apply to The Rush Limbaugh Show -- it continues to be The Rush Limbaugh Show even when Rush decides to take the day off and National Review's Mark Steyn fills in, which means we still have to listen to it.

Steyn kicked off the program expressing his gratitude at being an “exchange student” at the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies. Simultaneously, according to Steyn, President Obama is taking an “immersion course” at the Jacques Chirac school for -- it's not worth repeating, but you know where it's going: the French are weak, and Obama wants to be like the French because he's “apologizing” for America. Anyway, Steyn said he preferred Obama when he was “bowing” to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, because when he's in that position, at least he's not giving another speech, “unless his butt has learned to read the teleprompter.”

From that witty little barb, Steyn moved on to North Korea's missile launch this weekend, claiming that the satellite the North Koreans say is playing patriotic songs in space right now is good news for Queen Elizabeth, who's grown weary of listening to Obama's speeches on her new iPod. Steyn also attacked Obama for calling for economic sanctions against North Korea, saying that the North Korean economy is based solely on exporting nuclear secrets and “knock-off Viagra,” which is what the United States will get under “socialized medicine.”

Then Steyn made the totally original joke that the UN's response to the North Korean launch will be a “strongly worded letter” and attacked The New York Times for reporting that experts said the launch was a “failure” that was “consistent with past North Korean fumbles and suggesting it might reveal a significant quality control problem in one of the world's most isolated nations.” Steyn says that's the whole point -- Kim Jong Il is “dangerous” just because he is “an incompetent with nuclear weapons.” According to Steyn, he's a “self-taught nuclear madman,” and that's worse than a competent nuclear madman. So... a lunatic who is capable of launching a nuclear missile is less dangerous than a lunatic who isn't. To ram this “point” home, Steyn compared it to a 93-year-old woman crossing the median of the New Jersey Turnpike. If she's driving a Toyota Corolla, then it's her problem. But if she's driving an 18-wheeler, then it's your problem. We don't quite know what to make of that, but we're of the opinion that any vehicle crossing the median is generally a bad thing.

Anyway, Steyn's “point,” he said, in bringing up the Times article was that back during the Cold War, the “left” was obsessed with nuclear war, but now that Kim Jong Il and “the ayatollahs” have them, the “left” doesn't care.

After a quick break, Steyn returned to highlight a sign of the recession's “bite” -- an AP report on a funding cut for the Plains Visitor Information Center in Georgia, which “pays tribute to” former President Carter. Information centers, according to Steyn, are nothing more than highway rest stops -- toilets. Steyn found it very funny that this is “the least-visited of Georgia's 11 state-run visitor's centers.” This went on for several minutes, with Steyn extolling listeners driving through Georgia to use the toilet at the Jimmy Carter information center. Thankfully, he was cut off by a hard break.

Coming back from the commercial, Steyn took a call from a man who wanted to talk about North Korea, Russia, and Obama. Steyn said Obama is wrong on missile defense, and that this is all about credibility -- what must the Russians think when we show “weakness” toward a “nothing state” like North Korea? The caller then said that Obama backs down every time, and it's just like Neville Chamberlain appeasing Hitler. Steyn disagreed, saying that you couldn't really fault politicians like Chamberlain because Hitler quite convincingly presented himself to the world as a relatively normal world leader, and that Hitler wasn't “off-the-charts kooky” like Kim Jong Il is.

From there it was a smooth segue to stories from last week about the British home secretary's husband charging adult movies to the government. Steyn said this is evidence that there's always room for big government to get even bigger.

One more break and one more caller, this one asking why the United States always has to be the one to respond to provocative events like the North Korean missile launch. Steyn's explanation? “The civilized world” can't project power beyond its own borders because America “has chosen, essentially, to make the rest of the rich world defense welfare queens, since 1945 -- defense welfare queens.”

Highlights from Hour 1

Outrageous comments

STEYN: What is this country coming to? You know, you go over to West Virginia to -- is it still called West Virginia? Everything else there is named just Robert C. -- after Robert C. Byrd. I don't know why they don't just name the state -- rename the state Robert C. Byrdistan and be done with it, and then you can have the whole thing named after him. But they can -- they've got -- they can build everything. They can spend a fortune on things for Robert C. Byrd, but they cannot keep the Jimmy Carter Memorial toilet open. This is a tragedy, ladies and gentlemen.

[...]

STEYN: The reality is that America has chosen, essentially, to make the rest of the rich world defense welfare queens, since 1945 -- defense welfare queens. People complain about the Europeans' behavior, and they're right to do so, but when you maintain essentially -- a nation, by the way, that doesn't -- can't defend itself, isn't a nation in any meaningful sense. It simply isn't. It simply isn't.

And what do you do, in effect, is maintain them in the geopolitical equivalent of permanent adolescence. And NATO is like one daddy and then a bunch of bratty teenagers who won't move over -- won't move out of the bedroom above the garage, because they've been on defense welfare since 1945.

Who do you think pays for this terrific European health care that Obama wants to introduce here? American taxpayers do, because if you remove the need for a military budget from nations from the public treasury, you'd be surprised at all the other stuff they can afford to fund instead. That's the thing. That's the point here.