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March 6, 2008 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:28
March 6, 2008, Thursday, Hour #1
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That's right.
I got it too.
I don't know what's.
I think half the country has this little flu bug that's going around.
I know Rush has been battling this.
Now he's got a couple of days off to recoup, but I'm just getting over it again.
So everybody in this winter of 2007 and 2008 that will never end has the flu bug.
And you know, when you get to be my age and you kind of get this little fever and you get a little bug, you kind of think about mortality.
And every time I think about mortality, my only wish is that I die a peaceful death in my sleep like my grandfather, not howling and screaming like his passengers.
You know, that's my only wish.
Is that too much?
Hi, everybody.
Jason Lewis here in for El Rushbo today, taking a couple of well-deserved days off.
We've got lots to talk about.
Campaign 2008 up and running.
But how about this winter of 07-08?
And if you're hungry down in Nashville, stop by Al Gore's place because he's got so much egg on his face.
He'll feed you breakfast time.
These temperatures, this is amazing.
We'll get into that a little later in the program.
But I judge the severity of a winter by how many times I get sick.
This is my second go-around with this bug.
Hell has officially frozen over.
I do not like winter.
Naturally, I live in Minnesota.
But here, guys, it's so cold.
It is so cold.
Call that girlfriend who would never go out with you in college.
Kept saying no, no, no.
Call her and just say, you know, it's been a few years, but hell has frozen over.
So if you want to rethink that whole dating thing, now might be the time.
1-800-282-2882, Jason Lewis, as I say, Minnesota's Mr. Reichs, Minnesota's real anchorman, in for America's real anchorman, El Rushbow.
He'll be back on Monday.
I'll be in here today and tomorrow.
The campaign rolls on.
This is going to be fascinating.
Everybody's up in arms over these superdelegates in the Democrat Party.
And I've got a little different take on this.
As you know, they are going to play an important role because I don't think either one of these candidates can win, according to my math, without the superdelegates being factored in.
I think Obama would need to win, according to ABC News, 77% of all the remaining pledge delegates to hit the magic number of 2024, 2024.
And Hillary would have to win nearly 60% to overtake Senator Obama's delegate lead right now, which is at what?
It's about 120-something, I think it is.
Yeah, I don't have it right in front of me.
But the point here is Clinton is not going to win 94% of all the remaining pledge delegates to hit the magic number.
And I doubt, obviously, that Obama will either.
So you're going to go into Denver with these pledged delegates, or I should say these superdelegates, not the pledge delegates, superdelegates making the decision.
So what?
That's the way they set it up.
They thought the anointed, the superdelegates, the party insiders who know more, and isn't this typical liberal elitism, who know more than you lowly pledge delegates who are apportioned by the votes in each respective state, they're going to decide it.
Now, I'm being somewhat facetious here because, frankly, it makes for a more exciting convention.
You're going to have the backroom door, the back smoke-filled rooms and the backroom nonsense going on.
Well, so what?
That's the way the party set it up.
They set it up so that essentially their remaining superdelegates have more of a say than anybody else.
What's the problem with that?
The other big issue, I mean, if you don't like it, then quit the Democrat Party, but that is the way they set it up.
And I'm not altogether certain that won't make conventions more exciting once again.
The idea that all of these things are decided by May, and then you go into this coronation known as a convention, frankly, is a bit boring, is it not?
What's wrong with a few party insiders having inordinate sway in all of this?
I mean, I know it's not Democratic, small D, but and, you know, the delicious irony of all of this is, of course, that you've got a situation where Obama ostensibly goes in there, wins the popular vote, and is denied the nomination.
Wasn't this, this was what the Democrats were complaining about in the year 2000, was it not?
Complaining about our Electoral College, which thankfully gives smaller states a disproportionate effect because we are a nation of states.
We don't let New York and L.A. and Miami and Chicago and Houston and Philly and San Francisco decide elections.
Wyoming decides them too.
That's why all the states have two senators.
We are a republic, not a pure democracy, thank the Lord.
And so why should the delegate process really be any different, where you have this disproportionate waiting for a few super delegates?
Well, the problem with the Democrats, of course, is they don't like the Electoral College.
They don't like small R republicanism.
But now they are, in effect, doing the same thing in their delegate selection process.
So that's going to be interesting.
And of course, Florida and Michigan, whether those delegates should be seated.
And of course, there is no absolutely no rationale to do that.
None.
Zip zero nada.
They violated the DNC rules.
They wanted to jump ahead in the primary caucus system.
So the Democratic Party says, look, we've got to rein in.
And frankly, both parties needed to do this.
We've got to rein in these states.
And they did.
And they said, you're not, your delegates are not going to be seated.
Why should they get a revote?
The credentials committee of the DNC might decide this, but it will be rather fascinating to watch all of that.
And of course, talk of a joint ticket.
I'm not altogether certain this Clinton, Obama, or Obama, Clinton.
Well, obviously, if it's Obama, Hillary Clinton is not going to take the vice presidency.
I'm going out on a limb here, but just trust me, it's not going to happen.
However, if Hillary is the nominee, will Obama take it?
Now, there's going to be such anger in the black community, amongst black Democrats, if Obama is deprived of all of this, that Hillary will engage in some outreach and say, come on board, come on board.
What good would it do for Obama?
If, in fact, the Clinton presidency, if she's elected, is a disaster as we conservatives think it will be.
I mean, just look what she's saying.
I mean, if she does everything she's going to say, those of you that weren't around for Jimmy Carter are going to get a second chance.
21.5% interest rates, 13% inflation, misery index, double digits, and vacillating and weakness on foreign policy.
So why would Obama want to be a part of that?
Would he not be better off standing back in the Senate, making a name for himself, and running again in eight years?
If he's the vice president, he would have to wait eight years, and he might get tarred with the Clinton record.
So I'm not altogether certain the whole joint ticket's going to happen.
On the other hand, on the other hand, New York Post today, Barack Obama is going on the attack.
He's going on the attack.
He's tired of Hillary Clinton talking about his connections to this slum lord.
He's tired of Clinton talking about his inexperience, the 3 a.m. ad.
So he's going to go on the attack.
What?
He's going to say she doesn't have enough hope or change?
Going on the attack, he's got a plethora, a veritable panoply of scandals to point out.
If he really wanted to go on the attack, all he would have to do is say Whitewater, Rose Law Firm, Castle Grandi, Cattlegate, White House Travel Office, Filegate, Webb Hubble in jail, the McDougall's in jail.
I haven't even mentioned Paula Jones, Vernon Jordan.
Why isn't he bringing this stuff up if he really wants to win?
Now, that, as I say, on the other hand, couldn't lend some people to believe or create this impression that he might just be running for the vice presidency as well.
I don't think so, but you've got to wonder if this guy, frankly, this plays into Hillary's point.
You've got to wonder if the guy's tough enough.
Really, that's what it boils down to.
Well, he's got so much ammunition for Hillary.
Where is it?
He's hardly locked and loaded right now.
Did you see Hillary in Ohio?
I just about fell off my, well, I wasn't on a stool.
I was in my lounger asking my wife, hun, get another beer, please.
All right, I didn't say that.
I'm going to bring that up.
I only bring that up because this story, what was this, Boston.com kit?
Yeah, Boston.com.
American men still don't pull their weight when it comes to housework and childcare.
Now, that's not true.
Usually I ask my wife to give me a beer and then move my weights to the attic.
But this time I said, no, you can leave the weights down.
I'll get them later.
Just give me the beer.
So I have no idea what they're talking about here.
How long are we going to beat this drum about the whole poor beleaguered housewife and the rotten dad?
Let's see.
What does this guy say?
Joshua Coleman, San Francisco area psychologist, author of The Lazy Husband.
The lazy husband.
Way to go out on a limb there, Joshua.
The lazy husband.
You're not going to get any kudos for beating up on guys, are you?
I don't know.
I'm just, I love women.
I married one.
Don't get me wrong.
But I think it's a little bit overdone that guys are these ogres in these houses and that women are saintly.
My wife is saintly because, well, I live with her, so therefore a happy wife is a happy life, but it can be overdone.
Anyway, Hillary in Ohio.
Hillary in Ohio says the other night, after her big win on Tuesday, she's going on the litany of things she would do as president and said, we're going to preserve the Constitution.
I'm not making this up.
This came out of the mouth of Hillary Rodham Clinton.
We're going to preserve the Constitution.
You got to read it first before you preserve it, Hillary.
I mean, I could not believe this.
Think about this for a moment.
If you take a look at what strict constructionism is or originalism, you know, faith of the founding fathers in the document, you take a look at enumerated powers doctrine.
The federal government can't do what's not in the Constitution.
The Constitution defines our rights negatively by defining what the Constitution or what the government may do by enumerating those powers in the Constitution.
If it's not in the text of the Constitution, guess what?
The government can't do that.
How do you reconcile Hillary's Department of Education?
How do you reconcile her S-CHIP health care plans?
How do you reconcile HUD?
How do you reconcile a $3 trillion budget with enumerated powers?
Half of what the federal government does is not in the Constitution.
And she's going to preserve it.
She's going to distort the due process clause so that the federal Supreme Court can overturn state legislation.
She's going to abuse the interstate commerce clause so that literally, literally anything that's done within the confines of one state will somehow affect interstate commerce and therefore the federal government may regulate it.
Remember the 1942 case, Wickard v. It was a Wickard Rickard Fulburn, that's who the guy was.
He was growing homegrown wheat, homegrown wheat.
And the court, based on an earlier decision, Wrightwood Derry, said, well, that might affect interstate commerce.
Therefore, the government can tell him he can't grow his homegrown wheat.
As Clarence Thomas said, if that's how you decide the interstate commerce, then the federal government has no limits and it can regulate anything.
That's what Hillary Clinton thinks of the Interstate Commerce Clause.
I haven't even mentioned the separation of powers doctrine, where she thinks the Supreme Court ought to fight the war on terror, as opposed to Article II, the commander-in-chief, who has plenary powers when it comes to war and peace, when it comes to conducting war, when it comes to spying and military tribunals, and she's going to preserve the Constitution?
That one was a bridge too far for me.
I am Jason Lewis in for Rush Limbaugh today.
We'll get to your calls at 1-800-282-2882 when we come back right here on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Behind the golden EIB Mike in the Attila the Hunt chair at the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies, my pleasure once again to sit in for El Rushbo.
I am Jason Lewis.
Minnesota's missed your right in this winter of 07-08 that will never end.
I just thought I'd let you know if you're in the northern hemisphere, you folks down in the south are enjoying spring right now.
We'll get to it in July, I think.
1-800-282-2882 to the phones we go.
First up today, let's try Tony in Ocean Springs, Mississippi.
You're on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Hi.
Hey, good morning.
How are you doing today?
I'm doing fine, sir.
Okay, well, you sound a little rough.
Your voice is going out on you.
Yeah, I've been sick.
I'm too sick to the club.
Never too sick to fill in for the great one.
Well, I can understand that.
Hey, I was listening to the Limbaugh show just a few minutes ago, and you mentioned the delegate system, and you also mentioned that it gets the smaller states a better opportunity on who they would like to vote for.
No, the Electoral College does that.
Right.
Well, that's not working very well.
Right now, there are only three candidates running for president right now.
And when it first started out, I think we had, what, eight or ten?
And Mississippi is getting ready to vote in its primaries next Tuesday, and we only have three candidates to vote from.
And I don't see how that has given the smaller states a voice in who they would like to have.
Well, no, no.
The individual parties, based on their particular rules, and they are essentially private organizations, end up selecting their nominee.
An independent can run for president, Ale Ross Perot, or anybody else.
So you can have all the choices you want.
If nobody does it, you really can't complain.
But when push comes to shove in November, since the Electoral College is figured by your members of the House plus your two senators, smaller states with lower populations have a, and rightfully so, a disproportionate effect on the outcome.
Because we are a collection of states.
We're not just one big national government.
We are a federal government, a collection of sovereign states, and they choose the president.
Well, yeah, no, we're ⁇ right now we have a two-party system in the United States.
Independent has no chance whatsoever for running for party because they are never invited to any of the debate systems.
Okay.
Well, again, you're talking about the bias of the media.
You're talking about the bias of, if you want to get rid of all public financing for campaigns, I'm with you 100%.
The ridiculous checkoffs, the idea that if you abide by spending limits, you get federal dollars.
That is an outrage.
I would agree with you 100%.
But just because America has not elected a third-party candidate is not evidence of some grand black helicopter conspiracy.
Oh, no, I'm not calling anything a conspiracy, but I'm just saying right now you have two major parties that get all the publicity.
I don't even know if there's an independent running because I haven't heard of anybody.
Well, I mean, I'm sure you have your Green Party and your Libertarian parties out there as well that are running, but you don't hear from them.
Well, you don't think Ross Perot got enough media attention?
Oh, he did, but he also had his own money to push it.
And what Ross Perot is doing.
That's the way it should be.
Well, what Ross Perot was trying to do was prove that the delegate system doesn't work.
He was trying to get the popular vote.
No, no, no.
What Ross Perot was trying to do was elect Bill Clinton, and he did it.
Look, the bottom line.
Yeah, exactly.
The bottom line here, which is why I'm not a huge fan of some of these guys.
Plus, he was no different.
Ross Perot, all these third-party candidates come along.
I'm different than these guys.
Usually they are just liberals.
Usually that's a euphemism for liberalism.
I'm an independent.
Well, give me a break.
You're not an independent.
You're not a moderate on every single issue.
That's an impossibility.
The problem we've got are the campaign finance rules.
Fundamentally, the idea that unless you're a millionaire or a billionaire like Michael Bloomberg, God save the country if he runs and gets elected.
But if you are someone like that, you're right.
You can afford to run.
Now, I don't have a problem with that.
And the Supreme Court has said you can't tell people they can't spend their own money to run.
The problem is these arcane, ridiculous campaign finance rules put forth by these so-called saintly consumer advocates and reformists out there are telling people like you that you couldn't go out and find say five six, seven billionaires.
And let's say you find them Tony, and they're going to fund your campaign, they're going to give you all of the money you could possibly ever want to run a campaign.
All you have to do is disclose it.
You could disclose it immediately on the internet and all of a sudden, because you're not a billionaire, you would have this backing and and if it's disclosed, the people could factor that in whether you're a toady of these people or not and all of a sudden you've got competition that is illegal right now.
You cannot raise that kind of money as a third-party candidate.
There's your problem.
More importantly, remember Eugene Mccarthy.
I mean he said I mean he effectively brought down Johnson in many ways.
A guy had a couple of millionaires backing him in in the pre-1974 reforms.
He had a couple of millionaires backing him and he was able to bring down an incumbent.
That's real campaign finance reform, no limits on campaign contributions full, immediate disclosure and you will have much more competition.
You would have many more people running with a lot of money because a lot of billionaires don't want to run, but they might back somebody, Tony.
Thanks for the call Jeffrey, in Milwaukee Wisconsin, you're up here in the frigid, cold upper Midwest as well.
Welcome to the Rush Limbaugh program.
Hi Jason, actually it's Jerry.
Jerry, i'm sorry, go ahead.
Oh, that's okay.
Um, I have to disagree with um, some of your arguments on the electoral college.
Um for one, when governors campaign in a state, they don't just campaign in the biggest cities, like in Milwaukee, they don't just campaign in Milwaukee, they campaign all over.
So if you have an electoral, have a direct vote.
They would have to campaign all over, just like governors have to campaign all over in uh, in a state.
Are you kidding?
Are you kidding?
No, i'm not kidding.
You got to campaign all over.
If you're running Jerry, give me a break.
If you're running for president and the popular vote is going to decide, You're going to stop in Wyoming.
You're going to go to New York.
You're going to go to Chicago.
You're going to go to L.A.
And you are going to get the popular vote.
And if those people want to impose the minimum wage of $100 an hour on the rest of the country, that's going to rule for Wyoming.
The reason of the Electoral College is so that those states would be able to stop those other countries or other states from imposing their will on them.
That's the vision of Republicanism.
That's the vision of the Electoral College, and we ought not abandon it.
Anyway, Jerry, thanks for the call.
We'll squeeze in one more before we have to go to the first break at the bottom.
That will be Bruce Dennis and the rest of the calls when we come back.
Talent on loan from Rush as the great one takes a couple of days off.
I am Jason Lewis.
So welcome back to everybody.
1-800-282-2882 in the frozen tundra of the upper Midwest.
It is still very cold here.
As you all know, you folks in the South, enjoying your spring.
Boy, I get a little jealous when I hear about that.
One more thing on the Electoral College before we get back to the phones.
Let me just tell you flat out.
I mean, you can go back and look at the Connecticut Compromise during the time of the ratification.
You can go back and look how they went over things in 1787.
The bottom line was this.
Smaller states were not going to agree to this massive revision of the Articles of Confederation.
Frankly, they were told when their delegates went to the convention in Philadelphia, they were just going to redo the Articles of Confederation.
They got there and they wrote the Constitution.
It was a big surprise to a lot of people.
They were not going to agree to this if it watered down the power of small states.
Because at that time, you had these sovereign states under the Articles of Confederation.
And that's the way they wanted it.
They didn't want a democracy.
They didn't want a national government.
They wanted federalism.
They wanted a republic.
That's why they got two senators.
Why should Rhode Island have two senators?
This is part of our heritage.
We need to understand this.
And by the way, it works in a practical matter.
And think about this.
If you have a dispute in the outcome of the popular vote, under the Electoral College, you can handle it in one state, like Florida in 2000.
If you merely had a dispute on the national vote and you had no electoral college system, you'd be figuring out every single state.
It would go on and on and on forever.
So you've got to understand the difference between a republic and a democracy here.
We don't have a national government.
We don't allow the most populous areas to rule for the less populous areas.
The people of Wyoming get to have influence on the national debate, even though they don't have very many people there.
And this, you know, this really extends into what it means to be an American, what federalism means.
You talk about originalism or strict constructionism.
And if you could describe that, and people ask me that all the time, they say, what do you guys mean when you talk about strict constructionism?
You don't want judges making the law.
You want them interpreting the law.
You want originalism back to the founders' intent.
What do you mean by that?
Well, fundamentally, originalism means that the federal government ought to be bound by the limits of the Constitution.
That if something they try to do is not specifically enumerated in the body of that Constitution, they can't do it.
They can't do it.
Secondly, originalism means legislative deference.
That if there's a doubt, the court will defer to the will of the people through their legislative branches.
You know, they don't overturn.
Thomas Jefferson was opposed to judicial review.
But the reason was he thought it would undercut the will of the people through their elected.
And again, that's another factor of Republicanism.
We don't have a vote on everything.
We have representatives.
We have a deliberative democracy.
So that's an aspect of it.
Legislative deference, let the will of the people decide in most cases.
And finally, originalism means separation of powers.
Originalism means that we understand that the president fights wars, not the Supreme Court.
That the president and the commander-in-chief conducts military tribunals.
First presidents or future president to do that, by the way, was George Washington.
That the president spies on our enemies.
That the president has the power not to read the Miranda rights before we go after some bad guy in the battlefield, or not to have to get a warrant when you're spying for national security reasons.
That has been the history of this country going back to the founding.
And most importantly, when it comes to separation of powers, is the vertical separation of powers that says federalism is the way we decide things, that the federal government's powers are few and defined, according to Mr. Madison, but that states will govern the internal order between citizens of the same state.
Issues like the death penalty, medicinal marijuana, assisted suicide, term limits, abortion, crime and punishment, family law, marriage, the criminal code.
That's decided by the Texas legislature.
It's not for the Supreme Court to come in, as they did in the Lawrence case, and say, gee, we don't like what Austin did.
I think we'll strike down your ban on sodomy, whether you like the law or not.
That is a total abuse of the due process clause.
It's a total abuse of the document.
We've been doing it for a century now under something called incorporation doctrine, and it's a joke.
And that part of our governance, what Justice Brandeis called laboratories of democracy, our states, is reflected in the Electoral College to close the loop on all of this.
That we are still.
Now, there are some things states can't do.
It's clear in Article 1.
The 14th Amendment says you have to apply the law equally to black and white alike.
But other than that, the states have wide latitude in making the laws under which we live.
And it's not for the federal government to second-guess those.
The states are the preeminent force in our internal order.
And therefore, they're the preeminent force in electing a president.
So do your homework.
And the more you look into this, trust me, the more you'll see the wisdom of the founders and the Electoral College.
Now, back to the phones we go.
Bruce in Fresno, California.
You're on the Rush Limbaugh program with me, Jason Lewis.
Hi.
Thank you, Jason, for taking my call.
I appreciate it.
My best to rush, and hopefully it's well and back soon.
But hey, I just want to say, I used to teach political science, and I think it would be fun for the Republican Party if the Democrats have a brokered convention because if Clinton or Obama Hussein were selected and not elected, that could be a comical response to their complaints about Bush being selected and not elected according to their interpretation of the Florida events.
Yeah, look, let me put on my defense of the Democrats here.
It's kind of odd.
Republicans are having some fun with this, and we should, because of their ridiculous ranting and raving over Florida.
The system worked just like it should, pretty much.
Not in every aspect, but nevertheless, pretty much, as you know.
But look, the Democrat process, the way they set it up with these superdelegates having inordinate power, is working the way they wanted it to work.
I think so, and I think it's wonderful.
I love the process.
I enjoy this.
I think it's great.
I think it's done exactly what the founding fathers wanted it to be exactly how it is.
But I think their complaint is going to be moot when it comes down to it when one of them is going to be selected and not elected.
Right.
The irony of it all is too delicious.
These are the same people that are saying we ought to abide by the popular vote in 2000.
If all of a sudden they're going to take away Barack's coronation if he wins the popular vote and Hillary gets the superdelegates, you're right.
That is not lost.
I'm just saying that supposedly, putatively, these superdelegates have more wisdom than the average rank-and-file Democrat caucus goer.
And that's why they gave him this power.
I think that's why I love the Representative Republic, and that's why I'm a Republican.
Amen to that.
Bruce, thanks for checking in today.
Let's go to Dennis in Dayton, Ohio.
You're next up on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
Hi, Dennis.
Hey, Jason, doing an outstanding job filling those large shoes of Rush.
Thank you, sir.
I appreciate that.
A quick side note about Minnesota.
I visited there one time with my brother, and we did the boundary waters.
We put our canoe into the water on September 11, 2001, did not speak to another human being for 10 days, was not aware of what happened for almost, well, 10 days after it happened.
That's a great idea for Al Franken.
Oh, yeah.
And he's running for Senate up here.
Wouldn't it be wonderful if he put his canoe in the water on September 11th and did not speak to another human for six months?
Well, only if he put a lot of rocks into the canoe as well.
Minnesota, Minnesota, come for the weather, stay for the taxes.
Beautiful state.
Beautiful state.
Boundary waters love it.
We'll love to go back.
It is pretty, you bet.
Quick point I'm making is I am from Ohio, and myself, actually, one of my co-workers, Jimmy Out of Akron, we jumped over and voted for Hillary.
Have you been listening to Rush?
Yeah.
Well, no, but I'm not a pup.
I think it's a great suggestion.
I thought of it myself, actually.
Sure.
And, you know, the thought of Rodham, President Rodham, is almost as scary of a thought as me, the first time I had my high definition TV and saw Al Gore on high death.
Ooh, that is scary.
So then why would you cross over and vote for Hillary?
Well, there are two reasons.
One, President Barack is even more scary to me.
It is.
But I do believe, you know, I'm going to fight or grip my teeth and vote for Mr. McCain, Senator McCain, in November.
But I think he has a much better chance of beating Hillary.
And keep this thing going.
I love it.
I love the keep the fight going.
Stir the water.
I've been saying something provocative locally here.
And since I'm filling in for the provocateur-in-chief today, let me continue that tradition.
I think that this country, obviously, has made great strides, and we are ready for a female president.
We are ready for a black president.
We're ready for an Hispanic president.
We're ready for any particular president, no matter their ethnicity.
However, let me qualify this.
I'm not altogether certain we're ready for the first female president being a stereotypical left-wing feminist.
I'm not altogether certain we're ready for the first black president to be a clone of Jesse Jackson, albeit more articulate, according to some Democrats.
I think, you know, the first black president, the first female president, might have to be a conservative because as long as there are secret ballots, the stereotype, and I'm not talking about the feminist stereotypes or racial stereotypes.
I'm talking about political stereotypes.
Here we go with just another feminist, just another liberal black.
And, you know, there's the greatest untold story in the American media is the rise of conservative black folks out there.
But still, predominantly in the community, I believe it's fair to say that most are liberal, and that constituency is a part of the Democrat Party.
And I think that's not going to redound favorably to those folks.
I think we've still got a secret ballot.
And a lot of people might tell pollsters one thing, but when they go in the booth, vote a different way.
Well, what do you think of Mr. McCain selecting Condoleezza Rice?
I think that'd be great.
I mean, McCain's task here, and this is where it's going to be crucial to get the conservative base back, because let's be blunt about this.
He's done nothing so far to get the conservatives back.
And the fear is that once the general campaign goes forward, he's going to veer once again portside to get all those independents the media tell him he needs to get.
The worst thing he could do was to select another moderate governor as his running mate.
And Condoleezza Rice certainly would not be that.
I don't know her views on all of the domestic issues.
That needs to be vetted.
This governor of Alaska, everybody's talking about, young woman, very conservative, I'm told.
I don't know enough about her.
Might be an interesting choice.
But frankly, he's going to need the South.
He's going to need a conservative.
And everybody being mentioned right now.
I mean, from Huckabee to Charlie Christ to Tim Poleny, hate to break it.
They don't fit the bill.
I'm Jason Lewis in for Rush Limbaugh.
You're on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
What's this I hear about an explosion hitting a military recruiting station at the New York Times or New York Times or Times Square, I should say?
Apparently, explosive device caused some minor damage to a recruiting station in Times Square early today, shaking guests in hotel rooms all around.
Wow, we'll get into that maybe a little next hour.
Also, the Democrats stand on the war.
There's more here than they're telling us.
That's all coming up next hour on the Rush Limbaugh program.
I'm Jason Lewis in Roseburg, Oregon.
Here's Donna.
You're on EIB.
Hi, Donna.
Hi, Jason.
How are you this morning?
I hear you're cold.
I hope you get better.
I am struggling on, yes.
Okay, my comment, Jason, is here in Oregon, I'm 74, so I've been voting a long time.
Been Republican since Carter.
Before that, I was Democrat, but since then, Republican.
If you weren't a Republican before Carter, you were afterwards.
That's true.
That's true.
Well, anyway, our problem here and for years in Oregon, we are going to be voting in May.
And I think this is the first time that we've ever got to have any kind of a choice.
We don't have a choice on the Republicans.
Yeah, May 20th, I believe, right?
Right, right.
And so anyway, about 50%, maybe 40% vote.
And this is all we get out in the primaries here.
And, of course, we have a bigger one in the general.
But how can we, your advice, how can we go about getting either one half of the country voting one week, I'm sorry, one week and the next week, the other half to vote the country so that we can all get open at the same time.
Well, look, I'm not an expert on this, but what the hell I play one on the radio.
You know, I think that the primaries in the caucuses start way too early and end too early.
Right.
What you could do to make Oregon more important, your race on the Republican side obviously decided last Tuesday, but decided long before that, is to compress them, is to wait until March or April, maybe even May, and then have them all in a row.
So no one, you know, you're campaigning on a constant basis for a few months, and no one state is going to have an inordinate impact.
Now, there's another angle to this, Donna, that I think most people disagree with me on this, but I kind of missed the old days when the smoke-filled rooms at the conventions decided the outcome.
Because now the conventions are coronations.
Right, right.
Well, see, my problem is, too, we started in 2006, right after the mid-elections.
started out campaigning already, and if they can't get their message across in six months or seven months on the television and go around and hop around one state at a time instead of spending two weeks in one state and millions and millions of dollars, get their message out and have...
See, we wanted Fred Thompson, and then he dropped out.
Then we went to Romney or Huckabee.
Well, now we don't have any choice.
By the way, there's a very active Republican group in Roseburg, isn't there?
Yes.
I think I remember them.
Anyway, look, I'm up against the clock here, but I understand your angst.
And what I'm saying is you're right.
It starts way too early.
I mean, the Iowa caucuses this year, first part of January for crying out loud, and it ends too early.
Now, in the Democrat situation, it's not going to end too early.
But that, frankly, is an anomaly.
I think you push everything back.
You compress the states a little bit so one doesn't get out ahead of the other.
Now, the other aspect of this is you remove all of the pledge delegates, or maybe the bulk of them.
So, for instance, in the caucus system, we are estimating who's going to go to the national convention and vote one way.
But they may switch along the way.
If you had, say, if you didn't have these pledge delegates that were locked in, where you were trying to estimate where these delegates were going to go, say, through a caucus system, and you wouldn't really know until you got to the convention, and there was arm twisting, and there would be some drama there.
Frankly, I think that would be a more interesting system.
But I'm in the minority on that, I do believe.
Donna, good to hear you.
Voice, be well out there in Oregon.
I'm Jason Lewis, in for Rush Limbaugh on the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.
All right, coming next hour on the Rush Limbaugh program with me, Jason Lewis, today, in for the great one.
We've got to talk about what the Democrats' real plans are on troop withdrawals.
Also, we'll talk about the military recruiting station at Times Square.
Bomb hit it today.
And I've got to get to this foreclosure crisis again.
This is amazing.
This is a symptom of the entitlement society.
How, oh, well, we can't have one foreclosure.
We're going to have to bail them out.
The Fed needs to keep inflating to keep the banks afloat.
All of this.
We'll get into that next hour.
But right now, in Flat Rock, North Carolina, Bruce, you're on the Rush Limbaugh program.
Hi, Jason.
How you doing?
I'm doing fine.
Hey, you were talking about the Democrats and the Electoral College and what they want to do in Florida and Michigan.
Hillary said she wouldn't take the delegates, and now she's changing her mind.
She will take the delegates because she's in a rough place.
The Democrats, ever since 2000, I call it dial-a-issue.
They just turn the dial and they're always right.
Well, they get a little cover from the mainstream media for this.
If we really had journalists out there these days, they would be holding both parties and both accusations to the same standard.
They don't with Democrats, as you well know.
Right.
And that's a big problem.
I watch Bill O'Reilly.
He's got both sides all the time.
Well, the point, but even Fox News has been wayward on some of these issues during this primary season on the Republican side.
They've kind of circled the wagons around McCain when there are legitimate conservative criticisms, such as Rush's, on the Republican standard bearer.
I'm talking about a medium or the news media reflecting the grassroots conservatives out there, and I still don't think it's being done.
I'm Jason Lewis in for Rush.
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