This is a rush transcript from “Hannity,” July 21, 2009. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
SEAN HANNITY, HOST: And tonight in “Your America” it appears that many Americans have seen all the change that they can handle from President Obama. New polls are showing that the electorate has now turned on the anointed one.
In fact, the president’s average approval rating in the second quarter in office is now actually lower than Jimmy Carter’s numbers were at this time in the same time in his presidency.
Another survey from Public Strategies and Politico shows only 54 percent of those polls say they trust Obama, and that is a drop of 12 points in just a few months, and the news for the president’s party is not much better, only 42 percent of those polled now say that they trust the Democratic Party.
Joining us now is the author of the New York Times best seller, “Guilty: Liberals, Victims, and Their Assault on America.”
Ann Coulter, good to see you in New York. How are you?
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ANN COULTER, AUTHOR & COLUMNIST: Fine, thanks. How are you?
HANNITY: You’re going to have to pay taxes for this appearance tonight.
(LAUGHTER)
HANNITY: Well, first of all, this is new ground, eight out of ten issues.
COULTER: Right.
HANNITY: This is a big change. Eight out of ten — the big issues facing this country now, Republicans are in the lead over the Democrats.
COULTER: Right. Right. It’s not that big a change. I mean historically this has been the pattern, certainly in my lifetime, which is to say since the Republican party has been the conservative party and the Democratic Party has been the liberal party, which happens always been the case.
• Great American Blog: Have you lost trust in Obama?
What happens is, Americans are more conservative than liberal, as polls also show they vote in Republicans after eight or 12 years. For one thing, Republicans get sloppy and start doing their own big government stuff, and also Americans think how bad can the Democrats be?
So they put a Democrat in, and they remember how bad the Democrats can be.
HANNITY: Yes. That’s true.
COULTER: You get one term or you get two years with Bill Clinton and then suddenly for the next six years Clinton is, you know, signing everything Newt Gingrich and the Republican Congress was sending to him. A major Republican takeover after that.
And — I mean you’ve seen this pattern going back basically since LBJ. You’ll get eight or 12 years of Republican, one term or even two years of a Democrat government, I’ll say, and that what — of course you’re going to see it here.
HANNITY: He’s running, though — and this is the first time he’s really hit trouble. And.
COULTER: Yes.
(LAUGHTER)
HANNITY: Well, this is the first — Americans are saying he’s spending too much money. Americans now blame him for the economy.
COULTER: Right.
HANNITY: Americans are more conservative than liberal.
COULTER: Don’t trust him.
HANNITY: They don’t trust him.
COULTER: And they shouldn’t. I mean as you keep pointing out.
HANNITY: But he’s becoming is unhinged.
COULTER: Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
HANNITY: Thank you.
COULTER: Look at his press conference today, if you can play that without him even speaking, and we knew this was going to happen. This guy can’t take one punch. No, when he starts talking, not just standing. You can see he is becoming.
HANNITY: But we can’t — you’re talking, Coulter, so we wouldn’t want to interrupt you.
COULTER: Yes, the walking shots aren’t that good.
HANNITY: Yes.
COULTER: You can see he’s becoming unhinged because the media has totally, totally built this guy up, he can’t do anything — the fist bump you just did to me, it was if he had invented the cure for cancer when he did that with his wife. He swats a fly, and they’re all, you know, hyperventilating.
Now, meanwhile, look how he acted to his critics, to you, to Rush Limbaugh. He lashes out at Rush Limbaugh and tells Democrats don’t listen to this guy. You can’t imagine George Bush attacking Dan Rather.
HANNITY: You were very jealous that he wasn’t attacking you anymore.
COULTER: He did attack me in his first book.
HANNITY: Attacked me and you together.
COULTER: That’s right. That’s right. I was very upset, but the point is, if this guy is so upset by criticism from people who are on the opposite side of the spectrum, what’s going to happen as these polls as inevitably will happen start to fall on him as Americans realize that oh, he really is a liberal, it’s not just a charming speech maker.
HANNITY: Why do you think it is that so many Americans put their faith in government? Why would they put their faith in Obama when every promise he made about the economy, about the stimulus, about job creation, every promise has now been broken, and now he is — it’s so bad he wants to hide the numbers from the American people?
COULTER: Right. Right. I mean that was an interesting thing, and one of the polls, one that was in Politico today.
(LAUGHTER)
It was something like 40 percent of Americans think that health care will be more expensive if we have a massive government takeover… 27 percent think it will be less expensive.
HANNITY: Yes. Who are they?
COULTER: Now, that’s who we’ve got to interview.
(LAUGHTER)
Who are these people? Less expensive?
HANNITY: Yes, well, they’re dreaming.
COULTER: But as you keep pointing out with Obama, he said we’ve got to pass this stimulus bill, otherwise unemployment is going to go up.
HANNITY: Yes.
COULTER: It’ll — we’re going to at least keep it, we’ll have it go down again, it could get as high as 8 percent, and now it’s 9.5 percent. Of course he’s losing credibility, and now he’s saying we have to pass this health care bill now. Of course, he’s losing credibility.
HANNITY: Let me ask you on the political front.
COULTER: And he’s saying — sorry, excuse, just let me finish this one point.
HANNITY: Go ahead.
COULTER: He is saying that money will go down.
HANNITY: Right.
COULTER: If you have a national takeover of the government. He is saying it won’t increase the deficit.
HANNITY: True.
COULTER: No one can believe that.
HANNITY: Everybody knows taxes are going to go up, rationing is going to be guaranteed.
COULTER: Right. Right.
HANNITY: Quality is going to decline, you know, we know all of this and most Americans are going to be forcing the government system.
COULTER: That’s right.
HANNITY: Everybody knows that. This is — all right. So the question, I guess, this now becomes political. There’s a poll out that came out this week, in that Mitt Romney.
COULTER: Right.
HANNITY: In a hypothetical matchup would tie Barack Obama and Governor Palin only a few points away.
COULTER: Right. Right.
HANNITY: How do you interpret that?
COULTER: I’ve noticed that in a lot of the polls that Romney is doing quite well. And I think Romney.
HANNITY: Are you supporting him?
COULTER: Possibly. I think we have to wait — or get out there a little bit faster the next time. And not wait until.
HANNITY: How about Governor Palin? You like Governor Palin.
COULTER: . the last minute when Republican primary voters go for the worst possible candidate, and then saying no, no, not him. But
HANNITY: But you voted for Governor Palin in the last election.
COULTER: I did vote for Palin, I loved Palin.
HANNITY: Yes.
COULTER: And I do think with Romney — I think it might — hard to make a prediction now.
HANNITY: And how about Newt Gingrich?
COULTER: It could well be Romney because — primary voters — Republican primary voters seem to vote for any name they’ve heard before which isn’t so good when the name they’ve heard before is McCain. It might be good with Romney.
But what Romney has to do, let me say quickly before you cut me off, he has to get out and explain what was wrong with the health care program he did in Massachusetts, he has to take control of this issue. Now is the time.
HANNITY: Last question. What about Newt?
COULTER: I don’t — I’d take Romney or Palin I think.
HANNITY: What about Jindal?
COULTER: I think Gingrich should be the talker in chief.
HANNITY: Talker because he’s smart. He’s bright.
COULTER: The talker.
HANNITY: All right. We’ll get to the bottom of this one day. All right. Thanks for being with us.
COULTER: Thank you.
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