Thursday on Fox News Channel’s “Hannity,” conservative talker Mark Levin gave a wide-ranging monologue on different aspects of the coronavirus outbreak.
Levin hammered Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) and Democrats for launching an investigation into the Trump administration coronavirus response.
He also decried the handling of the government’s handling of the economy. Levin’s solution was to call on less government response and more work to open up parts of the economy.
Partial transcript as follows:
LEVIN: You know, with respect to the Democrats investigating the coronavirus, that would be like Jack the Ripper investigating the failures of the London police force. The fact is that Adam Schiff, who is chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, was running an impeachment coup for months.
He should have been on top of the China matter. He should have been on top of the virus matter. And so, I want to know what Adam Schiff knew and when he knew it, and when he started to hold hearings.
This guy is a disgrace. He is a reprobate and he should stop giving aid and comfort to the enemy. First, it was Russia, now, it’s China.
But I want to move to another topic here and that’s our economy and I’m hoping people in Washington are listening. You cannot deficit-spend your way into prosperity. If you could, Venezuela would be the richest nation on the face of the earth.
And the media and the Democrats and some of his advisors, I fear, are boxing the president in. If the president a few weeks ago, I thought it a very good idea. Let’s look at the areas of the economy that we can open up, and I’m going to tell them I think there is.
You need to ask these businesses if they can adjust to this — I’ll give you a perfect example. We have food, we have heat, we have clean water. Who you think is giving that to us? Other citizens.
Electricity, gasoline for our cars. We have truckers, we have a mail service. We have UPS, FedEx, grocery stores, fast food drive-thrus, all open, all functioning. We get soap and diapers and toilet paper, prescription drugs. 7-Elevens are open.
We have doctors, nurses, cops, firefighters, more, going into these hot zones despite the fact that they are exposed. I’m not saying drop all the conditions. I’m saying let’s get a little smarter about this. We don’t ask these businesses and industries — and by the way, the president hasn’t shed a single one of them. It’s the governors and the mayors.
We don’t ask these businesses, can you adjust to this virus? Are there things you can do?
I’ll give your perfect example. I was at my local supermarket the other day. The people are filling those grocery shelves. They are working harder than ever before.
They are hiring people. They have the protective gloves. They have the masks on.
They are so smart, the companies, they built these plastic shields that the cashier — at the register. I go to the post office, same thing. There are things that people and businesses can do in some of these areas where they adhere to the requirements, where people are safe, but they still work. They still work.
So we have parts of the economy that are working, that are more than 10 people want to go to the supermarket, there may be 50, 60, 70 people there, parts of the economy that are working the parts of the economy that have been shut down because somebody has deigned its essential or nonessential.
Small restaurants, there is no reason a small restaurant can’t be asked how would you adjust to this? Maybe they say will take a few people, separate them out. There are certain things we can do.
The American people and the American entrepreneur — and by the way, that includes small company’s, not just GM and 3M. They are innovative. They are not asked what can you do to stay open but to ensure that their health care measures that are taken. We don’t do that.
And who is looking into this? Is there a single governor? No.
So, the president raises this as a possibility a few weeks ago and what happens? They cream him. They say you’re going to pick — the Governor Cuomo, you’re going to pick a human life or a dollar bill? Of course, we’re going to pick a dollar bill.
Governor, if this economy tanks, there are no hospitals. There’s no ventilators, there’s no vaccines, there’s no doctors, nobody’s working.
Now, this next round of spending is a disaster. You can’t push this kind of money into an economy and then say that we’re going to put people to work when you’re telling people not to work. That is the federal budget, $4.7 trillion. That is what they just spent last week, $2.2 trillion. That is what the fed can loan, $4.5 trillion and basically they’ve nationalized the private capital market.
Now, they want to spend another $2 trillion, believe me, with the Democrats is going to get worse than that. What’s a trillion dollars? A trillion dollars — does anybody know? Right now, that’s $13.4 trillion.
I have to put it in writing it’s so big. That’s 11 zeros. OK, $13.4 trillion — what is a trillion dollars? One trillion dollars is a million millions. $1 trillion is a thousand billions.
Washington, stop. You’re going to destroy the economy, what’s left of it. You’re going to create massive inflation.
If you’re right, if you’re right and I’m wrong, then we will have Venezuela — that is, if you do what you say you’re going to do, you’re going to be pouring money into industries that are not open. You’re going to be creating jobs that don’t exist and most of what you’re spending money on, by the way, does not create jobs. It tells employers you can get a loan if you continue to employ those people.
If I’m a restaurant, why would I take a loan to employ people who aren’t servicing guests? That doesn’t even make any sense.
If I’m a worker, why would I work for months when I can get 100 percent of what I was paid for not working? There’s a lot of real stupidity in these bills. Don’t pass another bill.
Open up parts of the economy. Ask these businesses what they got to do and tell these governors to cut it out.
Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor
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