Obama giving convention speech at stadium named by bailed-out Bank of America
This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," January 18, 2012. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
SEAN HANNITY, HOST: The Democratic National Committee has just announced that "The Anointed One" will now be delivering his grand presidential nomination acceptance speech from none other than the Bank of America stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Now, if this decision sounds well, a little convenient, well maybe that is because it's well, let's not forget -- the deeply troubled Bank of America which is headquartered in Charlotte was the proud recipient of a taxpayer funded $45 billion bailout during the financial crisis.
And as my next guest Michelle Malkin points out, holding the event at the 74,000-seat stadium will open the doors for DNC fundraisers to reward big donors with perks like fancy sky boxes, special access, VIP packages. Wait, I thought this was supposed to be the people's convention hosted by the party of the 99 percent.?
Joining me now with reaction, the author of the number one, New York Times best-seller "Culture of Corruption," fellow Twitter contributor Michelle Malkin. How are you? You've noticed I've gotten on my Twitter account @seanhannity. And I'm trying to keep up with you. It's very hard.
MICHELLE MALKIN, AUTHOR, "CULTURE OF CORRUPTION": I know. We're becoming Twitter-holics.
HANNITY: It's addicting. I will agree with that. All right. Well, let's start with the big announcement here. And by the way, this is the president of course has to take -- shutdown main street in Disney, that's very important, one of his lavish vacations. But this is an important issue. When you look at the extravagance that is going on, the big money people behind the scenes, the appointment of this guy by the administration at Bain, and I'm like, how do they get off saying that they can make this argument anymore?
MALKIN: Yes, it's really rich, isn't it? And I mean, literally really rich. You've got the DNC, the host committee down there in Charlotte drumming up some $37 million to put this big coronation celebration together. And what the White House and what team Obama is counting on is that people will not compare their rhetoric to their record. You've got first lady Michelle Obama, DNC Chief Debbie Wasserman Schultz going around with their populist rhetoric calling this the people's convention, when it's clear that the so-called party, the 99 percent is out there catering to the one percent to bail them out for these bills. It's $1 million presidential suites that they're selling, the sky boxes, anything they can do to money grub. And here basically the message is, optics be damned, the coughers must be filled.
HANNITY: Yes. All right. You know, I'm looking at all of this. You know, they are calling the White House on Governor Romney to release his tax records. Now, I would still would like to see Obama's called transcripts. What did he do at Columbia? What did he right back in that time? How radical is it? What are they hiding? They are supposed to be so transparent. Or in the case of, you know, Democrats, people on the left making fun of the fact that Newt said, hey, it would be a good idea to get a job as a janitor and learn a work ethic. That's come under huge fire. I don't know what kind of jobs you did as a kid. I did, you know, dishwashing and every job imaginable in restaurant and construction. So, when you look at it through that prism, what do you see?
MALKIN: Well, I think what see is the Republican Party always under fire as the party of the rich, conservatives always being attacked as greedy capitalists and panderers of Wall Street when we've got the man of the people who is going to be delivering his coronation speech at a stadium that is named after one of the biggest bailed out banks that should have failed years and years ago, Bank of America. Let's not call this the people's convention anymore, let's call it what it should be, truth in advertising. The fat cat convention.
I mean, we're talking about a corporation that has gotten not just $45 billion in Tarp funds but nearly a trillion dollars in secret federal emergency funds, that has forked over some $421,000 in PAC money to Obama, to get him elected. And you see the culture of corruption and crony businesses as usual at work here. Hey, where is the outrage of all those progressives and occupiers? I think this is such a perfect symbol of the cognitive dissonance of progressives.
HANNITY: That's good point.
MALKIN: Where are they?
HANNITY: Good point. All right. What do you think of the narratives? They're sort of laying a foundation, the Democrats are for attacks vote against Romney and against Gingrich. And the wrap against Romney is wait a minute, he only paid a 15 percent rate. The problem is it's likely -- first of all, that is the law. And I assume he has obeyed the law. And if they don't like the law, that is their problem. They should have changed it a long time ago.
In the case of Newt Gingrich, they've got The New York Times, during their bidding. And when he says, Obama is the food stamp president which by the way, he is. There's more people on food stamps than any other point in history. More people dependent on poverty and help from the government that are poverty than ever before. You know, somehow The New York Times says, this is racial politics in play and a lot of Democrats are echoing that sentiment. Do any of these arguments in your mind work?
MALKIN: Well, they don't as long as the electorate is armed with information about the hypocrisy of this information. And what conservatives and Republicans need to do more of, no matter what our differences might be about the candidates and whatever disagreements we might have intra party. I think we have to unite and perform political jujitsu on this class warfare hypocrites, and we have to say, wait a minute. Didn't the Obama administration just break its own anti-lobbyist rules and appoint a lobbyist as the Domestic Policy Chief Cecilia Munoz? How about the guy who used to work for Bain who is now in charge of the Obama OMB? How about all of those Goldman Sachs men and all of the financial people who helped usher in all of the subprime crisis in the first place, recycled through the Bush administration and still in place in the Obama administration. People need to know the truth about the culture of corruption that has dominated this administration from day one.
HANNITY: All right. Michelle Malkin, thanks for being with us. As always, I appreciate it.
MALKIN: You bet.
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