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Feb. 3, 2016 - Rush Limbaugh Program
37:36
February 3, 2016, Wednesday, Hour #2
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Time Text
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Here we are right.
All right, all right, here we go.
Greetings, my friends.
Welcome back.
Great to have you, Rush Limbaugh here on the cutting edge of societal evolution.
The telephone number if you want to be on the program is 800-282-2882.
And those of you on hold, I would please be patient.
I'll get to you.
Start on the phones as soon as I can in this hour.
You know, I was I was telling Mr. Snerdley yesterday.
This it's it's it's just an observation.
It's not meant to be a comment in anything or anybody else.
And I was just telling Mr. Snerdley that I if I if I did have guests on this show, I don't know where I would squeeze them in.
I can't I can't fathom it.
We never have the I mean I haven't taken a call yet.
And I'm gonna have to make a concerted effort to make time for that.
Because we barely scratched the surface on all the stuff that's that I want to touch on today.
And there's stuff beyond the world of politics, like that Super Bowl story, USA Today trying to guilt trip people into not watching it because you're promoting the concussion culture that has taken over the NFL, and you by watching it and and and uh buying the products of the sponsors and so forth, you are encouraging and promoting the uh the great harm occurring to NFL players.
It's it's it's it's amazing.
And it's exactly the kind of stuff that I knew was coming years ago when this full-fledged assault on football began.
Anyway, there's that, there's other things out there.
It was, by the way, the Illinois Board of Elections that has declared Ted Cruz a natural born citizen.
The state's Board of Elections rule that Cruz met the citizenship criteria to appear on the ballot in Illinois.
Two state residents, William Graham and Lawrence Joyce, had challenged Cruz's uh Cruz's eligibility with the board, claiming his name should not appear on the primary ballot on March 15th because his candidacy did not comply with Article 2 of the Constitution Board of Elections in Illinois, told those two guys to go pound sand.
Is he at that thing now?
He is.
Obama's at the mosque is at he's he he he chose a mosque in Baltimore and of course big deal.
First president ever to visit a mosque in America, and he's saying this mosque, like so many, is an all-American story.
What did I read that it's one of the most extreme mosques in the uh in the country?
If so, doesn't surprise me at all.
I I want to go back to this this allegation of cheating and fraud against Senator Cruz on um this business of trying to take advantage of a confusing tweet from the Carson campaign about leaving Iowa and going back to Florida.
And that tweet, by the way, the original tweet was a CNN tweet.
And the original CNN tweet uh it was it was not a Carson campaign tweet, it was uh it was not a uh Cruz campaign tweet.
The CNN tweet that got everybody going on this happened at 543 on Monday, which is I think it's Central Time.
So it'd be an hour and fifteen minutes before the caucuses began.
And it's a it's a tweet from Chris Moody, CNN Carson won't go to New Hampshire or South Carolina, but instead I'll head home to Florida for some R. And then he'll be in D.C. on Thursday for the national prayer breakfast.
That tweet was then assumed to mean something, or at least somebody sought to take advantage of it and have it mean something.
Now I have a question.
And the question is, how many votes was Dr. Carson denied because of this fraud.
I have here in my formerly nicotine stained fingers.
The vote totals on the Republican side from the Iowa caucuses.
Ted Cruz, more votes than any Republican has ever received in the Iowa caucus.
51,000 666.
Donald Trump, 45,427.
Marco Rubio, 43,165.
Here are the delegates.
Ted Cruz, 51,000 votes, eight delegates.
Donald Trump, 45,000 votes, seven delegates.
Marco Rubio, 43,000 votes, seven delegates.
Ben Carson, 17,395 votes, and three delegates.
Now, my question is, in order for Dr. Carson to have caught Marco Rubio and tied him for third place, there would have had to have been a change of 25,000 votes in both directions.
So Carson would have to win 12 and a half thousand and Rubio would have to lose 12 and a half thousand.
Or any combination thereof equal 25,000 because Carson needed 25,000 votes in order to tie Rubio.
His total was 17,395.
Does anybody believe that Ben Carson was cheated out of 25,000 votes because of this fraud?
Well, we don't know, but but the polling data, remember now the the last poll that everybody trusted, the Des Moines Register poll before the caucuses began, had Trump up by four, Cruz in second place, Rubio in third place, and Carson in fourth place, and then everybody after that didn't matter.
Carson at 9%, Rand Paul at 5, and then 3, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, and 1.
So aside from the position to Cruz and Trump, the poll was accurate.
So would had nobody tweeted that Carson was leaving the race, had nobody tweeted, hey, you don't need to vote for Carson, he's getting out of the race.
Would he have would he have somehow ended up with 25,000 more votes?
Can you see it?
We will never know.
Obviously, the Trump campaign and the Carson campaign are going to try to make the case that it is entirely possible that Ben Carson got shafted out of 25,000 votes.
I mean, they practically have to if they're going to go forward with this and and make it the uh the big cause that it happens to be.
Now, I happen to mention a previous half hour that I happened to be discussed on the Fox News channel last night.
I want to, it's a three soundbites here, and I want to get into them.
The premise was based on a phone call that I received yesterday.
It's one of many, I get, and you've heard them, and countless emails.
And you know, not just emails and phone calls when I'm just out and about.
Uh, people mentioned things like this to me.
But we had a caller yesterday.
You know, Rudd, Fox News just doesn't seem as conservative anymore.
No, no, no.
They're always attacking conservatives.
They're attacking, and suddenly they've got all these liberals on there now, these analysts and their experts or whatever strategists and and just they're always going after conservatives now, and I like that debate.
I just don't understand what does it mean.
So I sought to explain to yesterday's caller what I thought the explanation for this was.
Bill O'Reilly aired that and then began a discussion of it with Katie Pavlich, who is the editor of Townhall.com.
So here is O'Reilly setting it up.
I think Fox is burdened with this belief that everybody in the media thinks they're conservative, and they don't want to be thought of that way.
So they will purposely hit conservatives hard to show that they are not friends and not biased in favor of conservatives.
Now, speaking for myself, I hit everybody hard if that's necessary, and that's the way the media should cover politics.
Okay, so that's O'Reilly playing the soundbite clip of me and then reacting to it.
And the point is, by the way, yesterday's not the First time I've said this.
I'm blue in the face saying it.
I I think it's it's true, not just of Fox.
I mean, hell, it explains half the behavior pattern of the GOP establishment.
They're tired of what people think of them and want to discor they want to correct them or disabuse them of the notion.
Um and you know, you get inside these capitals, the Washingtons, the New York's, inside these places in the culture where the left runs them, the Democrats run both the corporate and social culture in these towns.
And I don't have any doubt that uh being being accused of being conservative is not cool.
To a lot of people.
No, no, no.
And so to demonstrate that they're fair, I don't I don't think it's really trying to demonstrate they're not conservative.
I think the better way of saying it is that there are some people at Fox, and I don't know that it's a corporate thing.
I just think some people think that if they go after conservatives, that they'll be seen as fair and not in the tank for anybody.
No more complicated than that.
And I think it's true of not just of of people in the media, uh, or at Fox, but if you um ever encounter conservative on conservative crime, so to speak, I think one of the explanations is that whoever's doing the criticizing is attempting to curry favor with whoever the power structure where they live is so that they will not be lumped in with all these crazy
wacko pro-life conservative and so forth.
So anyway, O'Reilly said, no, no, no, no.
I uh speaking for myself, I hit everybody if that's necessary.
Katie Pavlich, Town Hall.com brought on.
O'Reilly said, Katie, what do you think about Mr. Limbaugh's statement?
I think that he's wrong.
Fox News is exactly that.
It is a news outlet.
We provide the news.
Megan Kelly, of course, is one of those people who's been in the news a lot for asking a certain candidate a question that their supporters didn't like.
Fox News anchors and reporters aren't purposely going after conservatives.
They're simply asking questions about their records and about their positions, and that is called journalism.
It's not about purposely going after them to somehow prove that they're not conservative.
Journalists here are simply doing their job.
O'Reilly says, well, if you ask somebody's candidate, um, that they're supporting a tough question, and they don't like that because on talk radio, the host favors somebody, and they're not skeptical of that person.
Conservative audiences in general have been complaining for years about the mainstream media being biased towards their presidential candidates, Senate candidates.
You can't complain about the media not holding Barack Obama accountable, for example, but then also complain when journalists at Fox News or at other outlets are asking Republicans some similar questions about their positions.
Didn't they just make my point there?
Didn't they sort of in a circuitous way uh make my point?
They want to be known tough on both sides.
They want to be known as being able to be tough on both sides.
But nobody at NBC or CBS or ABC or CNN worries about that.
Does anybody ever get mad at CNN for the way they might go after, say, uh Bill DeBlasio?
Have you ever heard it happen?
Have you ever heard anybody complain at CNN about the way they go after Michael Moore?
Take your pick of whoever.
It doesn't happen, does it?
I missed, I just I don't think it's uh uh complicated thing here at all.
What O'Reilly's point is we're in broadcast news.
We do not have chosen sides, chosen candidates.
We do not have uh uh favorites, but talk radio does.
Talk talk talk radio is uh uh the hosts always favor somebody, and they're never skeptical.
They're not skeptical of that person.
Oh, contraire.
Uh that's I think talk radio holds more people accountable.
And in a in a tougher way than you'll find in a whole host of places.
But anyway, that's what it was.
People were curious about it.
Now we're gonna take a time out.
We'll get to your calls, as I promise, so don't go away.
Folks, also coming up, there are a couple of um what?
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I'm gonna address the Rubio thing.
Of course.
Yes, yes, yes.
Yes, of course it's part of the mix.
But I've got a a couple of really fascinating.
You know, people are still analyzing the the Trump phenomenon.
Victor Davis Hanson National Review has a really, really good piece today on that.
There's also a great piece here from the uh uh News Oklahoma, News Okay website, about a professor at the University of Oklahoma who tackles the subject of explaining why millennials and college students and young people are attracted to Bernie Sanders.
It's it's the age-old question.
What is it about socialism that's so seductive?
It's a demonstrable fraud.
It has never worked.
And the evidence is right in front of everybody's face now.
Seven years of applied concentrated socialism doesn't work.
Why does it still attract people?
This guy is obviously a lone wolf and the faculty in Oklahoma because he's blaming education.
He says that the attraction to socialism and this makes sense, but his points here are unique, and I want to share them with you.
That the attraction to socialism can be found in education.
Now, I know that may seem like well, of course, Rush, no big deal there, but it's it's interesting the way he gets there in this in this piece.
And there's one other thing here that is a um uh besides the Victor Davis Hansen piece.
It's a it's actually it's a David French uh piece in National Review about Rubio and the establishment and so forth.
So that and much else still ahead, but we go to the phones now.
We're gonna start with Jimmy in Tom's River, New Jersey, and as always, I really appreciate your patience in waiting.
How are you?
You you must be kidding with the patience part.
I gotta tell you, your callston uh uh told me to keep the butt kissing at a minimum, but I have to tell you it it's a true honor to speak to you.
It's an inspiration to me through a lot of hard times and a lot about life, and I really do mean that, Rush.
It's not just the uh obligatory uh mega gettos.
Well, thank you very much.
I appreciate it, I really do.
I got a couple of quick points.
Uh first about the poll the Iowa polls, which will lead into my main point.
Um, you know, when you look at it and analyze those polls, Cruz's number was about where most of the polls shows he was going to be.
Anywhere between 24 to 25 to 26, he ended up at 27.
Um where they were off was obviously Trump's number, but that leads me into this.
Um Rubio, I the massive turnout, really, if you look at it, rank to Rubio.
Um, there was a massive turnout.
Whether it was a true just absolute I have to vote for Rubio or another reason, which I think it was another reason, and I'm gonna get to now.
I've been a Trump guy from the beginning, Rush.
I'm one of those angry people.
I grew up, I grew up in abject poverty with abusive parents, and and I Ronald Reagan told me I can be different.
That where I came from is not where I can end up, and this country has a four-degree games and and lets me do things that I can only imagine.
And I've also supported the Republican Party, and they slapped me in my face.
I two landslide Senate victories that did nothing but get them to capitulate to all.
Okay, wait a minute.
We're get I'm getting off the road here.
You were you're you're you were a Trump supporter?
Yes, I was.
Okay, and because I'm one of those angry males.
Right, so you were an angry guy and you wanted everybody to know how mad you were the things were going wrong, and you think there's all kinds of stuff, and you like the fact that Trump was a vessel for your anger, is that right?
Exactly, and I was willing to overlook the fact that really any honest person has to say he is not a league and conservative or a traditional conservative.
Okay, so are you overlooked that?
Okay, but you're in New Jersey, so you didn't vote in the Iowa caucus, but you wanted about Rubio and where where his numbers came from.
Well, the re what my overall point is is I think what happened is this.
You the anger can only last so long, okay?
I'm angry about the things that I mentioned, and you know, I'm angry at the fact that I was laid off eight months ago when I'm weeks away from being homeless after raising two kids since I was sixteen and coming from nothing.
You know, but the anger can only last so long, and and hearing him constantly talk about the Canada thing, even after he lost, which anybody of any type of conscience has to look at why you lost and humble you a bit and lead you in a different direction.
He still harps on the canvas.
Now wait a minute.
I just want to make sure that you're Trump has lost you because he won't get off this Canada thing.
It's not the Canada thing overall.
It's it's starting to seem like his anger is disingenuous, and he's angry for anger's sake, not just angry for principles.
He's angry because it sells something.
I don't want to be sold anything anymore.
I was sold something by the by the mainstream Republican Party, but I that obviously was proven to be a lie over and over again.
I don't want to be sold anymore.
And it's starting to think that this this whole anger with him is not for the reasons that he tends to let out.
It's more for us.
This is what they're going to buy.
Are you going to be able to do that?
Jimmy, time is dwindling and our phone system is such that we actually can't have a conversation.
That's why I have to sound like I'm interrupting you.
But are you saying that that Trump's anger, while you think is legitimate, is not he doesn't understand why you're mad uh and and therefore you don't think that he really gets it, and he's just being angry now because he thinks that's what's attracting people to him.
A hundred percent.
Like I say, again, I worked hard all my life, okay?
I I was laid off eight months ago.
I don't want anybody to give me nothing.
But I searched out opportunities for gaze and gaze.
My savings is gone.
Everything is gone.
And there's no opportunities anymore.
Right, right, right.
You've got a chance for me to start work and get somewhere anymore.
Okay, he I have to rot I'm I'm I'm out of time.
I'm I'm frustratedly out of time.
By the way, the NFL story in the uh USA Today, just to tell you, again, it's a story claiming that we all ought to not watch the Super Bowl, because we all have collective guilt over the concussion phenomenon happening to players.
It's our fault, and watching it furthers the uh occurrence of concussions and so forth.
In addition, that accompanies that I don't know if you've heard it yet or not, but they just apparently I don't know if an autopsy, whatever study, but they announced that Kenny Stabler of the Oakland Raid had CTE.
He died of cancer not long ago at a young age.
Stabler was always a renegade, a maverick.
He was uh, well, some might say crazy, like a lot of the Raiders in his era were.
Now that all of a sudden, guess what?
Stabler had CTE.
This is what is resulting from concussions.
The lesions on the brain that explain suicidal behavior, a la junior sayo.
And the latest to be added to this is OJ Simpson.
OJ Simpson had CTE.
So the anti-concussion forces, anti-NFL are gearing up here in Super Bowl week to take advantage of the attention of the game to get their political point of view about football out there.
Kenny Stabler and OJ Simpson, and there happens to be a special that started last night, not special, it's it's a 10-episode series on the FX Network, American crime story, the OJ Simpson story or whatever, based on a book written about O.J. Simpson and the murder, the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson or Ron Goldman, uh, based on Jeffrey Tubin's book.
That premiered last night on FX.
And now we're finding out, hey, maybe it wasn't OJ's fault.
OJ was sick.
OJ Simpson had C they're speculating that he might have had CTE.
They've announced that Stabler did.
Now, as to our last caller, um it depends.
Folks, the phone system here is weird.
And it happens most of the time when people are on a cell phone.
You ever used a speaker phone where you can't talk to who you're talking to unless until you shut up, and while you're speaking, they can be shouting and you will not hear them.
That's the way the phone system is here for some reason on cell phones.
I was unable to talk to the guy.
I had to just keep shouting at him until he stopped talking and took a breath as when he could hear me.
But what I was able to get out of it, what I was able to put together was he was originally a Trump supporter because he thought Trump's anger was exactly what's needed.
And he was detailing his lot in life, how he started out and lost everything, became a Reaganite and so forth, believes in America, and he's angry at all of the destructions taking place, taking place in the c and taking place in the country.
And he thought Trump was just ideal, and he's a he's he's he's out of the Trump support uh window now.
He has abandoned Trump.
His those are my words, not his, but he he said he's over it.
And the reason is he he doesn't think that Trump's anger is genuine.
That's when he was talking about he thinks Trump's anger is a sales technique, and what convinced him of this, he doesn't understand why after the election, after it's all over in Iowa, why he's still continuing to go after Cruz and the Canada angle.
To him, this is what he was saying.
As a Trump supporter, it doesn't make any sense.
It it to himself nobody would really be mad about that.
There's there's no it doesn't make sense to be that mad about whether somebody might be Canadian or not.
So that was his point.
That's what he was uh uh aiming at, and we were able to dissect it for you uh during the break.
Now back to the phones.
Joel in Coconut Creek, Florida.
It's great to have you with us, sir.
Hello.
Hey, Russ, it's an honor to be with you.
Thank you, sir.
Uh, you know, uh Trump started off his whole campaign with the signature issue of immigration, you know, about the wall and and putting the big beautiful door in the middle of it, and and that's he really got everybody fired up with that.
And uh if you look at at the list of candidates that we have, uh, you know, you'd have to say Rubio's the shakiest on immigration.
Um, you know, since since he's announced, you know, whether it's in the debates or in tweets or you know, whenever he gets a chance, he's gone after everybody, uh, even people that were lower in the polls all along.
Wait, wait, wait, wait.
Who Rubio or or or Cruz is going after or Trump is going after everybody.
Trump Trump.
Uh, you know, and and now it's basically exclusively Cruz.
Uh my question for you, I just I wanted to know what you thought about this, is I was thinking about it, and I don't remember a time that Trump ever has gone after Rubio uh about really anything, and specifically on immigration.
You would think, you know, if that's his number one issue, and he garnered a lot of support that way.
Why hasn't he gone after Rubio one time on immigration?
Well, Rubio has never been the front runner, but don't forget that for a long period of time, uh in practically all of December and much of January, I'd say the first half of January, Trump and Cruz had what looked like a mutual admiration society going.
They were not uh Cruz was pointedly not criticizing Trump.
The theory when that was happening was, this is when everybody said was still of the belief, well, not everybody, the the consultant class, the donor class, the establishment, all thought or hoped, or were praying that Trump would implode.
Cruz was behaving and covering his bases in the event that did happen.
He wanted to get Trump's voters.
There and and Trump's voters are a very passionate lot, and they're intolerant of any criticism of Trump.
And they're not very tolerant of people that don't advocate uh uh uh energetically support Trump.
So Cruz said not a word about Trump, and Trump, by the same token, wasn't saying much about Cruz.
Cruz was not the front runner while all this was going on.
Trump was.
Then when Cruz all of a sudden began to move and then ended up being tied and ahead of Trump, then here came Trump going after Cruz, starting out on Canada.
Now I think if I'm right, you're gonna see everybody in this race going after Rubio this week.
Everybody.
Christie, Jeb Bush, Rand Paul would have if he would have stayed in.
Kasich, they are gonna dump on Rubio like Rubio has not been dumped on before.
And I think Trump is going to do so as well.
But Trump is also going to focus on Cruz because Cruz won Iowa.
And in Trump's world, that's illegitimate.
That wasn't supposed to happen, even though the particularly the last poll going into Iowa said Trump was going to win by four points.
This is a this is a matter of honor.
And so Trump is is always going to focus on Cruz, or whoever happens to win a primary or be leading the pack in the polls should something like it happen.
Now, just to reiterate, uh the first poll taken in New Hampshire, TV station poll, since the Iowa caucus has Trump up plus 24, which is pretty much consistent with where he was before Iowa.
This is, again, folks, it's it's depending on where you go in the media.
You can find people probably already have, speculating that.
Well, I'll tell you what you're gonna see, because I've seen it now.
There are stories out there already asking, has Trump's support never really been as high as the polls say it is.
And this question's being asked because of the Iowa result.
Uh it's being asked by people who work at networks that put out these polls.
You have expert analysts at blogs, network websites, uh, wherever, that are now asking the question maybe these polls have always been overstating Trump support.
Could that possibly be?
You've got other stories that, well, this loss changes everything.
Now this takes the momentum away from Trump.
He's not the winner that he wins.
I'm sure you've heard this and been watching TV.
You probably, in fact, I bet you've seen that in every network has people just I mean, the Schaden Freude is incredible.
They're so happy Trump lost, and they're snarky about it.
They're out there saying, yeah, Trump, yeah, Trump, winner, winner, winner, never lose, right?
Gonna win, win, win.
Well, you lost Trump, you lied.
You can you just feel the anger dripping off the TV screen when these people get going.
Because they have been so frustrated, they couldn't explain it, they didn't understand it, and they're so gleeful, and they hope this means that none of these Trump numbers are real.
Except here comes the New Hampshire TV station today, basically confirming that he's plus 24 after Iowa.
So he's gonna continue to go after Cruz because Cruz is the front runner.
Cruz has committed a crime.
He won.
Nobody's supposed to do that when Trump's involved.
Somebody does that, there has to be some illegitimate explanation, like he's from Canada.
Or he cheated with Dr. Carson or what have you.
And as our previous caller said, he's losing me on this.
I don't understand anger at Canada.
I don't understand.
The anger ought to be at what's happening to the country.
It's kind of a variation of what I said.
Ted Cruz is nobody's enemy right now.
The enemy, everybody's enemy, ought to be Barack Hussein Obama and Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders and anybody in the Democrat Party.
They are responsible for this.
And those in the Republican Party who've made no serious effort to stop it.
But Ted Cruz is not one of those.
But I know these campaigns, this is a primary, and technically it's not about the Democrats.
I think it should be.
I think it's a winning strateger to go after the Democrats.
The Democrats are the reason we're in this mess.
The Democrats are the reason why the Republican primary shaping up the way it is.
But I short short answer to question.
I I think Trump is going to be hitting on Rubio at some point.
Christie has already started.
So I think Rubio, you know what Rubio should do?
Change his name to Bush.
Or change his name to Obama, and Christie would love him.
Go in there going to name change right now and just change his name to Marco Obama.
And Christie might want a photo op, you never know.
Um I'm being facetious.
Ladies and gentlemen.
But I think Trump's going to be hitting everybody that's close.
Rubio's n Rubio's got the momentum now, as as defined by the media.
Rubio's where all the interest is right now.
It always happens.
You have this winner, and the winner was a surprise because Trump was supposed to be the winner.
But Rubio was thought maybe, if lucky, to barely finish in third place, but he wasn't supposed to end up within a thousand votes of the Trumpster.
So you stay right here, folks, and we will sort all of this stuff out for you happily, minute by minute and day by day.
Sticking with the phones, this is Bob in Waldorf, Maryland.
Hey Bob, great to have you, sir.
Hi.
Hello, Rush.
How are you hitting them?
Very well.
Very well.
Well, actually, I finished with three birds and a net bird Saturday, last four holes.
It was a fabulous round.
Oh, stop it, man.
You're killing me.
Snowing up here.
I look, I wanted to talk to you about about uh Trump.
I've heard him talk about how for every reason, making every excuse he could possibly make for why he lost, but I haven't heard him say anything about the comment I heard him make, how he was going to make deals with uh Pelosi and Reed and you know get along with the Democrats and I mean we already have enough liberal Republicans making deals with the with the Democrats.
Uh I I sort of think and hope that that hurt him.
I mean, to me, the more he talks, the more he exposes himself as a as a liberal Republican.
Who are you for now?
I'm for Cruz.
Okay, and you've been for Cruz from the outset?
Uh yeah, pretty pretty much.
I've enjoyed watching Trump poke him in the eye and give him the business and everything, but I mean he's not saying anything, right?
Your your first caller, I think pretty much nailed it.
He's it's he reminds me of a used car salesman.
Wow, that's a this is uh uh different tone that we're hearing here.
Well, I mean it's just it just when he said that, I mean that the the problem from what I see, you know, it's Republicans making deals with Democrats.
They're you know, they're they're selling out the American worker rush.
They're they're killing us out here.
Well, I look let me say when he said that, I thought it was a problem, and I mentioned it again yesterday.
You know, everybody's figuring out what happened to Trump.
He was leading by four in a respected poll in Iowa, and the you can't find a poll where he wasn't finishing first.
There were two or three maybe uh showing Cruz winning in uh in Iowa during the month of January, but it's been Trump's race.
And everybody's not at rush of the debate, not showing up at the debate, that's what did it.
And I said, Well, maybe I know everybody thinks that, but I don't.
I I think it was his health care statements that he made on TV Sunday, which might have confused people, and I I remember that was part of his criticism of Cruz.
I think you chalk it up to what I call ideological awareness.
And he's out making the point that he's great at negotiating deals.
He wins.
America is gonna win.
We've got idiots doing our deals now, idiots doing deals with the Chicoms, idiots doing deals with the Iranians.
I'm gonna do great deals because that's what I do.
Nobody does deals better than me.
So he has that as a foundation.
Then it's time to criticize Cruz.
And what does he know about Cruz?
He knows that the Senate hates Cruz because Cruz is not cooperative with the leadership.
Cruz has made a name for himself by calling out his own leadership.
So in Trump's world, doing deals, winning negotiations, stomping people, that's the measure of success.
He's going after Cruz as unable to do that.
And he happens to glom onto the fact look, Cruz could never make a deal with those guys.
They hate him.
They despise him in the Senate.
And it is, I think the the ideological uh lack of awareness that that doesn't inform Trump that that criticism of Ted Cruz that he won't do deals with the Democrats, that's his his supporters do not want deals done with Democrats.
His supporters are with him because they are tired of doing deals with Democrats.
Trump's supporters want the Democrats and everybody else responsible for this mess defeated.
Not negotiated with.
But he thought in saying that he was ripping Cruz because that was the objective to discredit Cruz, particularly in an area where he, Trump, thinks there's nobody better.
And if he were more aware of why the Republican base is ticked off at its own party, then he would probably not have talked about how accomplished and successful he would be with Schumer and Pelosi and so forth.
My take.
My take.
Take it or leave it.
We have to run out of time, be back after this.
Don't go away.
Well, it really is the fastest three hours in media.
It really I can't believe we only have one to go.
I'm already getting worried, I can't squeeze everything in that I want to do.
How does anybody have time for guests?
I will never understand it.
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