America's Six Months of 'Hope and Change'

This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," July 20, 2009. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: It's time move beyond the politics of yesterday because we are the party of tomorrow. We're going forward.

But I can promise you this. I will always tell you what I think. I will always tell you where I stand. I will be honest with you about the challenges we face as a nation.

We will win this general election and then you and I together we can change the country and change the world.

Starting today we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

GRAPHICS: Six months later.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM, R-S.C.: If this is the change we all can believe in, America's best days are behind her.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN, R-ARIZ.: You voted for change, but they're not getting any change today.

(PEOPLE CHEERING)

OBAMA: I hereby order Guantanamo will be closed.

GOV. BILL RICHARDSON, D-N.M.: It was my idea to withdraw. I withdrew.

SEN. TOM DASCHLE, D-S.D.: When I realized the mistake, I paid the tax in full.

OBAMA: Tom made the decision. I take responsibility for this mistake.

TIMOTHY GEITHNER, TREASURY SECRETARY: These were careless mistakes. They were avoidable mistakes.

OBAMA: Our economic crisis could become a national catastrophe.

VICE PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: If we do everything right, there's still a 30 percent chance we're going to get it wrong.

RICK SANTELLI, CNBC CORRESPONDENT: How many of you people want to pay for your neighbors' mortgage that has an extra bathroom and can't pay their bills? Raise their hand. How about we all — President Obama, are you listening?

GRAHAM: Look at this bill. This bill has got to be done by tonight.

OBAMA: Then you get the argument, well, this is not a stimulus bill, this is a spending bill. What do you think a stimulus is?

JOHN BOEHNER, HOUSE MINORITY LEADER: What happened to the promise that we're going to let the American people see what's in this bill for 48 hours? But nope. We don't have time to do that.

OBAMA: This bill is done.

RUSH LIMBAUGH, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: So I shamelessly say no, I want him to fail if his agenda is a far left collectivism.

ERIC HOLDER, ATTORNEY GENERAL: We have always been, and I believe continue to be, a nation of cowards.

OBAMA: The United States government will stand behind your warranty. There have been times when America has shown arrogance and been dismissive. Even derisive.

We do not consider ourselves a Christian nation.

(PEOPLE CHEERING "USA! USA!")

ROBERT GIBBS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I've not made the guacamole yet, but if somebody can get me a relatively sharp knife.

OBAMA: We are going to pass health care reform.

REP. CHARLES RANGEL, D-N.Y.: For our country, we have to do it for our citizens.

MCCAIN: Well here we are with a bill that is going to top over $1 trillion with no way of paying for it.

NANCY PELOSI, SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Those briefings made in 2002 gave me inaccurate and incomplete information.

RICHARD CHENEY, FORMER VICE PRESIDENT: I would advise the administration to think very carefully about the course ahead.

SONIA SOTOMAYOR, SUPREME COURT JUSTICE NOMINEE: The Court of Appeals is where policy is made, and I know and I know this is on tape, and I should never say that, because we don't make law.

OBAMA: It's not productive given the history of U.S.-Iranian relations to be seen as meddling.

REP. MIKE PENCE, R-IND.: I respectfully disagree with the position that the administration has taken.

WARREN BUFFET, CHAIRMAN & CEO, BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY: Our first stimulus bill, seemed to me, was sort of like taking like half a tablet of Viagra.

BOEHNER: Now if anybody thinks that all of this bureaucracy is need to fix our health care system I would politely disagree.

BIDEN: You're telling me we've got to go spend money to keep from going bankrupt? Here's the answer, I'm telling you.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEAN HANNITY, HOST: And there you have it, six months of hope and change, a soaring deficit, a failed stimulus, and a foreign policy ashamed of everything this country stands for and, folks, he's just getting warmed up.

And joining me tonight is the author of the brand new book, "Catastrophe," former Clinton adviser, Dick Morris. For his latest columns and videos you can sign up for free at DickMorris.com.

• Video: Watch Sean's interview

Dick, welcome back. You're on vacation. Thanks for being with us. Well, let's start in the broader view. Six months of Barack Obama. Your assessment. "Catastrophe."

DICK MORRIS, FORMER CLINTON ADVISER: I wonder where that guy was, the one we heard in the video of that hope and change and all of that stuff. Never a word about ideology and radicalism and government takeover and socialism.

Obama's administration was doomed to fail the first week when he gave away the money in that stimulus package. As we point out in "Catastrophe," this was not a means to end the recession. The recession was an excuse to get the spending.

And socialism is not an epithet, it's a statistic. The percentage of the economy controlled by the government. When Obama took office it was 33. When he passed his stimulus package it got to be 40. And if he gets health care it will be 45. Germany is 47. France is 49.

And he really has laid out this program to make America socialist. And the problem is that he's borrowing the money which means he's elbowing out everybody else who wants to create jobs with the money because the federal government has to get there first.

• Great American Blog: Grade Obama's first six months

HANNITY: Dick, there is — the Treasury Department's watchdog group literally thinks that all the Obama bailouts, and folks, this is with a T, can add up to $23 trillion at the end of the day.

Now one of the statistics, his spending shatters the record during World War II. He's out there purposely hiding back economic news because they have to reforecast based on their assumptions have been wrong.

MORRIS: You just take the simple fact when he took office spending was $3 trillion, now it's $4 trillion. When he took office the economy was $14 trillion, now it's $13 trillion. Do the math.

And you know, you're on me a lot about that I worked for Bill Clinton and it's not the most popular thing I've ever done in my whole life. But Bill Clinton's solution to the economic crisis was to balance the budget and eliminate the deficit because he knew the crucial thing was not government spending, but interest rates. And he knew the key thing was to bring them down.

Obama has doubled them since he took office. And the only reason they're not up anymore is that the Fed keeps printing money fueling inflation ahead.

HANNITY: Yes. I guess the question that we've got to ask ourselves with all of this spending and as reckless as it is, unemployment now tops 10 percent in 15 states, we know that. Home foreclosures now set a new record. They promised us unemployment if we passed the stimulus, wouldn't go above 8 percent.

It's a disaster for state revenues on top of federal revenues going down. There's a question here. If now that his poll numbers are coming down, has that been the reason for the big push for health care?

MORRIS: Yes. Yes.

HANNITY: To get it out of the way because there's no chance later?

MORRIS: Yes. I wrote a book that I think he read. The first chapter was called — is called "The New Prince," and the first chapter was the need for daily majority. And it said when the president of the United States drops below the 50s in job approval into the low 40s, he's functionally out of office. It's as if he's a prime minister in Britain who just lost a vote of confidence.

He's at 51 now according to Rasmussen, 59 in the Washington Post, 56 in Gallup. When those — and everybody agrees he's dropped 10 to 15 in the last three months. When those numbers go into the 40s, he won't be able to pass anything, so he's desperate to get cap-and-trade and health care reform as fast as he can until he becomes too politically impotent to do it.

HANNITY: But he's pretty much gotten everything that he's wanted. I think this is a very important point. He's got the stimulus. He's got his earmarks. He got his omnibus. He's got cap-and-trade in the House. Working its way through the Senate.

He's pushing now for health care. But it's interesting. Now we've got Democratic senators, Democratic governors, Blue Dog Democrats in the House.

MORRIS: Right.

HANNITY: Now they're the ones standing up to him. Why is that happening?

MORRIS: Well, because he's not in the 60s anymore, he's in the low 50s, and they see he's going down, and they have to run without him, and they have to survive the day after, and I believe he has met — he is meeting his Waterloo as we speak.

Part of it was when he lost the check off provision which we in "Catastrophe" say is part of his plan for political domination. Had to give that up. First thing he's lost on. Now, it looks like he's backing off that August deadline for health care reform.

HANNITY: Yes. He just said earlier tonight. He just backed off. Yes.

MORRIS: The second thing he's lost on. And I think that — you know, Winston Churchill once said that between the El Alamein and Stalingrad in the Battle of Midway, which happened within a few months of each other. Before then, we never lost — never won a battle, after that we never lost a battle.

I think that may be true of Obama. Until now he's never lost a battle. After this he may never win one.

HANNITY: From here going forward. So do you think politically now, this is the opportunity? How bad are things going to get before the 2010 elections?

MORRIS: Horrible. You're going to have unemployment continuing to go up. When it begins to come down, inflation is going to go completely crazy, and I think the Republicans will win the '10 election, whether they get power or they just got a lot, I don't know.

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: One thing that I thought — Bill Clinton, he did go along with the Republicans to end welfare, the era of big government did end. He...

MORRIS: Right.

HANNITY: In other words, Clinton was more politically pragmatic.

MORRIS: Yes.

HANNITY: It seems like he's so stuck into his ideology.

MORRIS: Ideological.

HANNITY: All right. So the question then becomes, you know, does he see that what's happening before his eye, will we see that it's so obvious to us?

MORRIS: He does. Absolutely. He's not delusional, but he doesn't care. His attitude is, I want to complete a socialist takeover of the United States before my popularity runs out.

HANNITY: And then we're stuck.

MORRIS: I'm a one-term president. I don't care. I accomplished my objective. And we are stuck. Everybody has to understand, when he talks about lowering the cost of health care, he's talking about denying health care to the elderly. His bill repeals Medicare. The concept of a guaranteed access to health care for the elderly ends when...

HANNITY: Guaranteed rationing. Guaranteed no choices. Promise.

MORRIS: And rationing means you cut the elderly. You don't cut health care for a 40-year-old. You cut it for a 70 or an 80-year-old.

HANNITY: Sounds like a "Catastrophe."

MORRIS: It is.

HANNITY: All right. Dick Morris. Thank you, Dick.

MORRIS: Who could write a book like that.

(LAUGHTER)

HANNITY: Thank you, Dick.

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