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Jan. 30, 2015 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:23
January 30, 2015, Friday, Hour #1
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Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 24-7 podcast.
No, I can't remember a time, and it's a great game.
Honestly, it's a great game, but I cannot remember a time when I have been less focused on a Super Bowl.
Brian, are you jazzed?
Are you all something?
I mean, I'm going to watch it.
I'm not going to watch it, but I'm not sitting here with bated breath about it.
Man, I don't know what that means.
Let's try to find out Friday, folks.
So let's hit it.
Live from the Southern Command in sunny South Florida.
It's open line Friday.
Maybe, maybe it's, I'm just dying to hear what Marshawn Lynch thinks about something, and he's not talking.
Maybe it's all a talk about inflated and deflated balls, and we can't get to the bottom of it.
I don't know.
But I'm just not that into it.
I mean, I'm going to watch it, but in terms of I don't know.
Anyway, folks, it doesn't matter.
I guess we're going to get into it as time dictates.
The program unfolds right before your very eyes and ears.
Open line Friday.
Rushland Boy at 800-282-2882 and the email address lrushbow at EIBnet.com.
And it is Open Line Friday, which essentially just means whatever you want to talk about is fine.
It doesn't have to be politics.
It doesn't have to be what you think happens every day in the program.
It can be something totally unrelated to the news of the day.
If it's on your mind, a question, comment, something bugging you, whatever, give it a shot.
Mr. Snerdley will determine whether or not you are arable, whether or not you have what it takes to appear on the EIB network.
The only difference is Monday through Thursday, you have to talk about something I care about, otherwise you don't have a prayer.
On Friday, it doesn't matter.
That's the whole deal.
Okay, Mitt Romney with a lot of people are stunned.
Right before the program today, Mitt Romney did a nomas, nomas, and pulled out in a conference call to donors.
And it's fascinating.
When I first saw it, I started getting email from people because, of course, everybody thinks I would not know this.
I get email from people, hey, Rush, you see this?
Romney's pulled out.
No, really?
And then the theories abounded.
And one of the big theories was that Romney had just handed the nomination to Jeb.
And that's the budding conventional wisdom.
But Romney did not hand anything to Jeb.
If anything, Romney jabbed Jeb on the way out of this.
Let me read to you.
This is the money quote, what Romney said to his donors, supporters, or what have you.
By the way, CNN had the tape.
CNN got the whole conference call.
I got the transcript of it right here.
Real clear politics.
CNN airs personal call from Romney telling supporters he'll not run for president.
Wasn't it CNN who had that video of Romney telling his supporters that 47% of the country would never vote for him?
I don't know.
Somebody to Romney camps got an in at CNN.
Anyway, here's a money quote.
This is what Romney said.
I believe that one of our next generation of Republican leaders, one who may not be as well known as I am today.
Well, that eliminates anybody that's currently in the radar, at least Jeb Bush.
It eliminates Chris Christie.
Speaking of which, did I put this?
Do you know Christie's got a new pack?
Have you seen the acronym of Christie's new pack?
Oh, come on.
Why didn't I put this at the top?
This is one of these things.
It's the acronym.
Well, let me find it.
I should have put it at the top.
I just didn't think I was going to be talking about it at the top.
But his new PAC, I don't even know the name of it, but the acronym is LFM.
It's like a laughing out loud, laughing.
I'll find.
I'm sorry, I shouldn't have even brought it up here, folks, because I didn't put it aside and I've just distracted you, not me.
Back to Romney.
It just eliminates, it makes it very clear here that he's looking at somebody who's not thought of in terms of conventional wisdom.
I believe that one of our next generation of Republican leaders, one who may not be as well known as I am today, one who has not yet taken their message across the country, one who is just getting started, may well emerge as being better able to defeat the Democrat nominee.
In fact, I expect and hope that to be the case.
I feel that it's critical that America elect a conservative leader to become our next president.
You know that I wanted to be that president, but I do not want to make it more difficult for someone else to emerge who may have a better chance of becoming that president.
You cannot imagine how hard it is for Ann and me to step aside, especially knowing of your support and the support of so many people across the country.
But we believe it's for the best of the party and the nation.
Now, this came after a big donor of Romney's yanked his support.
I mean, I don't have the guy's name in front of me.
I'd never heard of this guy before.
And I think he's just one of many.
So there's a financial reason here, too.
But I don't know.
I've often said that I don't think you'll find, just in terms of human character, a finer man in politics than Mitt Romney.
Just in terms of his character, manners, all the things that you use in judging and describing just a decent man, a fine man, a good guy.
It's Mitt Romney.
As a politician, not so much.
But as a human being, they don't come much better.
And I don't know if I'm – some people are thinking now that Romney may have just secured the nomination for whoever the Republican nominee is by virtue of him getting out of this.
It's hard not to like Romney on a personal level.
Just talking about normal, well-balanced human beings.
Romney was humble.
He saw his strengths.
He saw his weaknesses.
I think he's a good man, like he's a thoughtful man.
But that doesn't mean that he's the best candidate.
And he has come to the same conclusion.
I think this is why, as a person, Romney appeals to so many people.
When you contrast Mitt Romney with Barack Obama or Mitt Romney with Hillary Clinton, Mitt Romney, the man, stands far above, high above, and way apart from anybody the Democrats would put up.
But the problem is he's already run and lost.
His candidacy saw something like 4 million Republican voters in 2012 stay home.
So one of his big money people pulled out and said, basically, look, I like the guy, but we need to go a different direction.
And I also, ladies and gentlemen, I ran into not long ago a very staunch Romney supporter.
I mean, someone from Boston and someone who had given enough money and worked hard enough that had Romney won in 2012, this guy that I'm talking to or somebody's family might have been an ambassador to some place decent, you know, not a posting to outer Mongolia.
I mean, that's how close and that's how significant the work for Romney was.
And so this was about three months ago, maybe two now.
And I ran into the guy and I said, look, I know everybody's probably bugging you about this.
But what can you tell me?
You think Romney is going to run?
And this guy looked at me and said, I hope not.
So I was totally taken aback.
He said, we need a fighter.
I love the guy.
He's a great guy, but we need a fighter.
And then this guy told me he liked Rick Perry for that reason.
So that was my first indication.
And I've told you this story before.
For those of you listening every day, you've heard this.
That was my first indication that something was not right throughout the Romney operation.
I mean, for this man that I'm talking about to basically essentially have bowed out.
And now we have another who's done so.
So it's clear now that the convention is that it's now Jeb Bush's nomination to lose.
And the reason that they're saying that is because this frees up all the donors in the Republican Party to go into one guy rather than splitting the donations.
If Romney had stayed in and you've got Jeb out there and even Christie, then what's called the donor class of the Republican Party, when they're not conservatives, I mean, some of them are, but for the most part, they're moderate.
They are, they trend liberal.
Geographically, they're Northeastern, but they are not conservative, and they're not conservative because of social issues.
They are actively, adamantly opposed to conservatives because of social issues.
Well, they make up the donor class of the Republican Party, which is a lot of money.
And it was thought that if Romney's in and Jeb's in and Christie's in and that money is going to be divvied up three ways, which then opens it up for a conservative couple or three candidates to make inroads.
Now with Romney out, the donor class money doesn't get divvied up.
Maybe, I mean, Chris Christie's actually going to be very happy about this.
So he can make a move on some of the donor class money.
But as I read what Romney said here, it doesn't sound to me like he's talking about Jeb Bush.
A lot of his money people are going there.
But when he says, I believe that one of our next generation of Republican leaders, one who may not be as well known as I am today, well, Jeb's as well known as Romney is.
And Christie is as well known as Romney is.
I mean, who isn't?
Who isn't?
Well, Scott Walker probably would be in the class not as well known.
We're going to put Cruz in this.
Okay, so Cruz, okay, Cruz, clearly well known.
And among the donor class types that we have been talking about, Cruz is not fancy, put it that way.
He's not, they're a freight crews.
They don't like Cruz.
Cruz is great.
And don't anybody jump in my chili here.
I'm not endorsing anybody.
Let me say this up front.
Well, it says Rand Paul, Rand Paul, and I don't know where Romney would come down with Rand Paul.
I don't know personally where Romney would put Rand Paul.
But Rand Paul, this is a really tough thing.
Believe it, one of our next generation Republican leaders, one who may not be as well known as I am today, one who's not yet taken their message across the country.
Well, Rick Paul has.
He's been out there.
He's got his strategy, and he's in California.
He's been everywhere.
Walker is the one that hasn't been outside Wisconsin yet.
He went to Iowa, and that's it in terms of the path that you take.
He didn't name anybody.
Romney didn't.
But it's opened up a big guessing game.
The Denver Post here with a story, the key Romney donors and a longtime staffer moving toward Bush.
As Romney closes in on a decision, this was written before he had decided.
He does so without several donors who supported him in the past and a veteran Iowa staffer of defected all have defected to Jeb Bush.
The donors in interviews with the Associated Press said that they see in Bush what they liked about Romney in 2012 and presumably don't like about him now.
And that is the capacity to serve successfully as president, but also something Romney could not muster over two campaigns, the personality and senior staff needed to win the White House.
These donors all say that Jeb's got the ability to put together a senior staff and combine it with a personality that is needed to win.
Chicago investor Craig Ducheswa, and this is the reputed to be the big donor that announced his pullout, Craig Ducheschwa, whose wife contributed over $250,000 to a pro-Romney super PAC, while he collected tens of thousands of dollars more for Romney's last campaign.
He said, I got great respect for Governor Romney.
I busted my buns for it, but I have turned the page.
Now, this Denver Post story was written, it cleared about 3.30 in the morning Eastern Time today.
And here's this paragraph.
The defections from Romney to Bush do not, as of yet, appear so definitive as to keep Romney from the race.
Well, they turned out to be.
I mean, you can't say that these things, these defections, particularly the money people, were not a factor in the decision.
They have to be.
It's all about money.
So that's where we are with that.
And look, just because Romney said he hopes that he believes one of our next generation Republican leaders has not yet taken the message across the country, will emerge, doesn't mean it's going to happen.
But it is a slap.
It's a swipe at the rest of the field.
Essentially, Romney is saying, look, I'm getting out of this, and we don't have a prayer if the names you know are the only people we have getting the race.
Because the names you know don't have a prayer of beating Hillary or whoever.
That's what the message is.
It better be somebody we don't know yet.
It better be somebody filled with energy, young, ready to get his, make his mark, conservative and so forth, which eliminates all the other people that are currently thought of to be in the race.
Let me take a quick break here.
We'll come back and continue with all of the rest of the program.
Oh, Christie's PAC.
LeadershipMattersForamerica.org, which is L-M-F-A-O, laughing my fat rear end off, is the acronym.
Christie's leadership, the Christie Pack Leadership for Matters, LeadershipMatters for America.org.
You can't see the acronym.
All right, quick timeout.
Back with more after this.
Don't go anywhere.
You know, it's amazing since I guess Monday, yeah, Monday this week.
It's amazing how many blogs and other places are now on the Scott Walker bandwagon.
So you know what I did?
I went back to my website.
I went back and I searched.
I wanted to find the earliest mention of Scott Walker as a man showing the way with the blueprint, how to win, and how long I've been talking about this and how long I was the only one talking about it.
And now to see all the people getting on the bandwagon, which I did, and that's coming up.
Bill Gates worried about artificial intelligence along with Stephen Hawking.
You know, wouldn't it be great if these brilliant wizards of SMART were as worried about artificial compassion and artificial government, artificial caring?
Wouldn't it be great if his wizards had the same?
What is this being afraid of?
Artificial intelligence for crying out loud.
I'll bet being afraid of artificial patriots.
Anyway, a little rant coming on that.
Here's Romney from the phone call, conference call, to his donors.
We've got a couple sound bites.
I'm convinced that we could win the nomination, but I fully realize it would have been a difficult task and a hard fight.
I would have the best chance of beating the eventual Democrat nominee.
But that's before the other contenders have had the opportunity to take their message to the voters.
I believe that one of our next generation of Republican leaders, one who may not be as well known as I am today, one who's not yet taken a message across the country, one who's just getting started, may well emerge as being better able to defeat the Democrat nominee.
In fact, I expect and hope that to be the case.
Well, no, it's obvious.
The conclusion here is that Rom...
Who am I forgetting?
I'm naturally thinking that he's talking about Scott Walker, but there could be others that he means.
I mean, he might think, for example, that Cruz has not taken his message to the country.
What does that mean?
Does that mean you've not been in a primary fight?
Does that mean you've not gone to Iowa?
Does that not mean you have gone around the country as a potential presidential nominee?
He could be talking about more than Scott Walker here.
Time will tell.
But the more important thing is he's clearly slapping at the remaining moderates in the field, Jeb Bush and Chris Christie and your name and all the others.
It's Open Line Friday.
Great to have you with us.
Rush Limbaugh and the Excellence in Broadcasting Network, 800-282-2882.
Well, okay, Romney met with Jeb in City.
I do remember that.
And so people, okay, well, what if Jeb maybe offered Romney the VP if he stayed out?
Do you think here's a guy who ran for president who wants to run again, but his donors are pulling out, which is really probably what this is all about.
Romney clearly thinks he could win again.
Romney clearly wants to win again.
But it's money people are pulling out.
And there are other candidates, those money people want to go to.
I mean, that pretty much spells the doom.
I mean, that seals the fate.
But even if, and thieves abound, even if Jeb Bush had offered Romney the VEEP, I don't know that that's, would that be enough for Romney to get out of the race?
I don't know.
The way these people operate is sometimes hard to understand, difficult to understand when you get into their egos and their own professional self-assessments.
At the same time, I'm just going to share with you thoughts off the top of my head, and it could be proved wrong down the road.
But when we have Romney's statement, I believe that one of our next generation of Republican leaders, one who may not be as well known as I am today, one who has not yet taken their message across the country.
Can you see Romney talking up somebody like Scott Walker?
Can you see that?
I mean, can you envision that down the road?
Can you see them together on the campaign trail?
Can you see Romney talking up Ted Cruz on a campaign trail?
Can you see Romney really working hard for Rand Paul?
I mean, you try to envision these things to try to figure out who he's talking about.
And eventually we will know, of course.
But it really is going to boil down to the money.
And like, for example, did I hear this right that Jeb or Romney, somebody, Romney's supposed to have dinner with Christie tonight?
Well, big whoop now.
If he's talking about Scott Walker, I mean, Chris Christie does not fit this definition.
Here's the second soundbite we have of Romney and the phone call to his supporters, the conference call, just this morning.
I feel that it's critical that America elect a conservative leader to become our next president.
You know that I wanted to be that president, but I do not want to make it more difficult for someone else to emerge who may have a better chance of becoming that president.
You can't imagine how hard it is for Annaby to step aside, especially knowing of your support and the support of so many people across the country.
But we believe it's for the best of the party and the nation.
I've been asked, and will certainly be asked again, if there are any circumstances whatsoever that might develop that could change my mind.
That seems unlikely.
But I'll tell you one thing that could, and that is if the money people change their minds, it all boils down to that.
I don't think we would be here talking about this today, were it not for the news that all of these big donors have decided to go in a different direction.
Now, let me read this to you one more time.
I'm just asking you people what you think here.
Right out front, I believe that one of our next generation of Republican leaders, one who may not be as well known as I am today, one who has not yet taken their message across the country, one who is just getting started.
Could that be in Romney's world, Jeb Bush?
Could Jeb Bush fit that criteria as Romney is talking about it?
Somebody may not be as well known as I am today.
It seemed to us sitting here, and I'm sure you too, that Jeb Bush is as well known as Romney for the last name alone, right?
One who has not yet taken their message across the country?
Well, that's a little stickier proposition.
Because has Jeb taken his message across?
I mean, Jeb, I mean, only recently and even quasi-officially made it the real deal, right?
Well, don't muddy the waters here yet, snurdle Easterner.
Well, what message did Jeb Bush have anyway?
We know what the message is.
We know what the message is.
Win without the base.
Somehow find a way to win by supporting amnesty for illegals and power.
That's Jeb's message.
Does Romney actually think that is a dark horse message going to come out of nowhere and sweep Republican primary voters off their feet?
We just know that.
Believe me, folks, when it comes to these moderate Republicans and how they think, it remains a mystery.
We often make the mistake of attaching our own thought processes to people.
Sometimes that's a huge mistake.
So we'll just have to wait and see.
Are you also kind of amazed at how big a story it is that Romney's not running?
I mean, it's big.
It stopped the presses on the cable news networks.
Oh, my God, Romney's not.
Oh, it threw it wide open.
Of course, to these people that cover it, it's just a game.
It's the sport of things.
And the actual impact of this, that's for much later.
This is just too much fun as far as this is their Super Bowl, you know, the presidential elections, handicapping it, figuring out who's got the best chances, the best tactics, the best strategy, who can run the best ads, who can be the best slime ball artist, who can withstand the most sliming.
It's the kind of stuff that excites the media, but what they really think, issue-wise, and what all that means to the country, that's not even a factor yet.
And don't forget, over here, out of view right now, is Hillary Clinton, because everybody in this world, everybody in the Mitt Romney world, everybody in the media world, everybody in the Republican establishment world thinks that the Democrat nominee is going to be Hillary.
There isn't anybody else.
Elizabeth Warren, yeah.
Howard Dean, yeah.
Joe Biden, yeah.
They have concluded that Hillary is the nominee, like they do every four years, every eight years.
It's just by rote.
Open line Friday, let's go to the phones.
We always try to get to the phones in the first hour on Open Line Friday.
We'll start in San Francisco.
Mark, thank you, sir.
You're up.
It's great to have you here.
Thank you, sir.
Pleasure.
And my condolences for your loss with HR.
Thank you.
But that's my point is that, you know, Nitt Romney would probably be the best president we can get.
He's proven himself as a great executive, but he's not a great politician.
And I think what's really important is going forward that we do not declare the Republican candidate too soon because the media is going to chew up and spit him out.
But we need an executive.
And we've got some great executives out there.
And I don't think it's Christy.
It certainly ain't Jeb Bush.
You know, it's Walker.
He's a great guy.
That's my.
What do you mean we don't want to declare a candidate too early?
What do you mean by because that's not how it happens?
There's a primary process, so one of these guys is going to win.
If the left gets their hands on any candidate, they're going to dig up the dirt.
I mean, look at how Obama got elected in Illinois.
You know, they brought out these files that were supposedly sealed.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So if they're going to be a huge field.
They're going to do that.
No, they're going to do that to everybody in the course of this.
They're not going to wait for one of these guys to get nominated.
They're going to destroy everybody beforehand.
Then one of those guys is going to get nominated.
Then they're going to move in for the kill.
Right.
But the future of our country depends on a great executive and not a great politician.
I mean, Clinton may be a pretty good executive, but a great politician.
Now, that also is a provocative statement to me.
That's interesting that you say that.
And the reason I want to explore that with you is my belief that politics, as distasteful as it appears to be, and as dishonest and corrupt, and all of those things it appears to be, it nevertheless is its own business.
There is, there are specific things one has to do to climb the ladder of success in politics.
And being an executive is not necessarily one of them.
Who was the last executive that you, and I know what you mean by executive.
You're talking about at a company in the free market economy.
Name for me the last one that was elected president.
The best president, in my mind, the gentleman president of all time is George H.W. Bush or W. Bush.
George W. He was a gentleman president.
He conducted himself as professionally and as proficiently as possible.
To your question, I don't know.
Who?
Well, that's my point.
I can't name one either.
I mean, now Bush was an executive and ran the Texas Rangers for a while, the baseball team.
And he was an executive at an oil company now and then.
So he may satisfy your requirements.
Governor of Texas helps too.
Governor.
Well, but it's okay.
So that's executive.
You mean he has run a state as well.
We're talking about an executive as opposed to a senator.
You know, our friend over there in Minnesota has done a tremendous job.
He'd be a great president.
You know, and a senator from Florida, he'd be a great vice president.
Okay.
That's just a lot of fun.
All right.
So by executive, you didn't mean a CEO of a widget company.
You meant an executive who's run a state.
Okay.
Well, that compared to a senator, that argument could be made very easily.
There's a reason senators don't win, usually.
It's rare when they do.
There's a reason Senator Obama was a noted exception, but he didn't win the presidency because he was a senator.
He didn't win the presidency because of anything he learned in the Senate because he hardly ever showed up.
But governors are a different story.
Senators, they're isolated.
They're one guy.
They run an office, but they don't run the Senate.
They don't run anything.
And it's not really good training, Civi, or when compared to governors who have to run states.
And they learn quickly where their ego belongs.
A governor as opposed to a senator who can lead with his ego and be dominated by, though, a governor really can't, not an effective one.
Anyway, Mark, I appreciate the call.
We've got to take another time out.
My friends, time rolls on faster than anywhere else here on the EIB network.
Let me move in here and head things off before we get too far out of control.
Starting to talk about what we need, who we need, what kind of person we need to be the next president of the United States.
There's only one qualification that interests me, folks.
It's the only chance we have to restore this country.
It's the only chance we have to begin the process of reversing this transformation that Obama has begun.
We have got to nominate a conservative Republican.
It's the only way we're going to win.
Going out and finding an executive doesn't matter.
That's not what we need.
And it would help.
I'm not trying to be dismissive here.
I want to stay focused on what we need to do and what needs to happen.
Conservatism, properly applied, properly understood, brilliantly articulated, all of that.
That is what we need.
And not only, that's what will win.
Of that, I have no doubt.
We don't need people that think that Washington's not working, but Republicans are not cooperative.
We don't need that.
We don't need candidates that think 10% or 20% or 30% of the Democrat agenda will help us win.
We don't need people who are, yeah, we can't be too critical.
You know, the voters don't like conflict.
They want us to get along.
That candidate's going to lose like that candidate always loses.
It's not complicated.
We've tried it the establishment way, year after year, presidential election after presidential election.
The evidence is in.
We know what wins.
We know also what loses.
Now, let me play a little game here for you.
One of Obama's big talking points right now is the gap between the wealthy and the poor and the wealthy and the middle class.
Income inequality, whatever you want to call it, Obama believes that the reason his agenda is called for here is because the distribution of wealth in this country is too concentrated in the hands of a few, and that's because capitalism doesn't work.
That's what he believes.
Obama thinks he can make the case that capitalism has failed because look at all of the wealth held by so few, so comparatively few people.
And those few people keep getting richer and richer, and the middle class stagnates.
And Obama thinks that six years of his policies have nothing to do with it.
It's all because of capitalism.
And that's what he's out to transform us out of.
If I were to ask you, what do you think is the primary reason for this gap or this, and we'll call it a gap between the wealthy and the middle class that seems to be getting wider?
Why do you think the wealth of this country is not fairly distributed?
And by that, I don't mean why isn't government fair with distribution?
I'm not talking about government distributing.
I'm talking about a capitalist system.
You've got money flowing in and out, back and forth, up and down.
Why is it ending up, if you want to accept this notion, why is too much of it ending up in the hands of people who already have enough?
As the Democrats would say.
There is an answer to the question.
And it isn't capitalism, folks.
Capitalism is not to blame here.
Capitalism's fingerprints are not on this gap.
Capitalism is nowhere near the answer to the question, why do the rich keep getting richer?
And the middle class keeps stagnating.
Capitalism is not a factor.
So what is?
Well, I'll give you two words, but I will then have to explain why.
The reason why, I'll give you four words.
The reason why The distribution of money, wealth in this country, is so skewed, is because it's been intended.
The first two words, Federal Reserve.
The alternate two words, although they go together, stock market.
I will explain as the program unfolds.
Don't go away.
Yeah, just think about it.
The Federal Reserve has been printing money.
It's called quantitative easing.
And where have they been putting it?
They've been putting in the stock market.
It really isn't much more complicated than that, folks, in terms of the wealth gap.
There are more details to it, but that's pretty much the sum total of it.
In the meantime, let's collect ourselves here.
Brief break at the time of the hour.
Back with much more.
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