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April 20, 2016 - Rush Limbaugh Program
32:23
April 20, 2016, Wednesday, Hour #2
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Telephone number if you want to be on the programs 800-282-2882 and the email address LRushbo at EIBnet.com.
Grab audio soundbite number five, Raphael Cruz was on Brighton News Daily today on Sirius satellite radio, Bread New News Daily.
And Raphael Cruz is the father of Ted Cruz.
And of course, they love Trump.
They said Trump's a rich guy.
He's got great kids.
He flies around in the jet.
He's like to be Trump's son for a day.
Could I be Trump son for a day?
Brightman News Daily.
And Raphael Cruz, though, goes on the program.
And he's there.
And I take a shot here at he's not happy with what happened.
A question that a lot of people believe it.
Trump Trump tripped a better shot taking on Clint App Radison yourself.
What do you say?
What's a you?
What's a unit?
We've got to realize Donald Trump really is more of a Democrat than a Republican.
He has been funding Democratic people like Chuck Schumer, like Harry Reid, like Anthony Wiener, like DiBlasio, and many others.
For 40 years, he's been supporting all these ultra-liberal politicians.
He would be worse than Hillary Clinton, but he cannot beat Hillary Clinton.
Now, don't be confused.
Raphael Cruz is not suggesting he would vote for Hillary over Trump.
He is merely pointing out, in his opinion, that Trump is actually a liberal Democrat, and he's much more at home at people like Schumer and Dingy Harry and Anthony Weiner.
There's a reason he got thrown in there, I think.
I think there's a reason Raphael Cruz decided to throw Anthony Weiner in that whole bunch.
And de Blasio, for 40 years, he's been supporting all these ultra-liberal politicians.
So anyway, Ted Cruz's father, not happy with what's been going down.
Here's Trump, by the way, at Trump Tower last night after being declared the winner of the New York State primary.
We don't have much of a race anymore.
Based on what I'm seeing on television, Senator Cruz is just about mathematically eliminated.
Wait a minute.
Stop the tape.
Stop the tape.
See, let me throw one more switch on my little implant here.
I thought things sounded strange.
There, I'm back.
Did you notice that he didn't say Lion Ted?
Senator Cruz.
Yeah, he didn't say Senator Lion Ted.
He said he didn't say Lion Ted.
He said Senator Cruz.
And again, if you're just joining us, I'm bouncing here off of a recue that bite, by the way, and play it again in its entirety.
Chris Salizza, card-carrying certified accredited member of the establishment Drive-By Media, made a point today that last night we saw Trump 2.0, i.e.
Trump as presidential.
He made a point of noticing that Trump called Cruz Senator Cruz, not Lion Ted.
And there are other soundbites from other drive-bys making this observation as well.
Look, I know this is frustrating for those of you in the Cruz camp.
I'm not trying to do that.
I'm just, this is what the news is today.
And it's, I mean, it's what happened.
Well, he was mathematically, Cruz, was mathematically eliminated before last.
Everybody's known that Senator Cruz has been mathematically eliminated from 1237 on the first ballot.
It was, maybe now it's official.
It's certainly going to be official toward the end of the month.
But so what?
Cruz has always been, not always, but the recent Cruz strategy has always been second ballot.
That's what running around and securing the delegates is all about.
And by the way, I'm going to say one more time.
There's not a single illegal thing that Ted Cruz has done in securing delegates at these primaries that have already taken place.
And he states where primaries have taken place.
I know what's happening.
This is one of those things that's so easily demagogued.
So you have a primary.
Let me run through it very quickly.
You have a primary, let's say, South Carolina.
I don't care which one it is.
You have South Carolina primary, and Trump wins it.
But he doesn't win all the delegates.
But the South Carolinians haven't had their state convention yet.
They had the primary, but they have it at the convention.
So the South Carolina primary ends.
Other primaries take place.
The campaign schedule rolls on.
At some point down the road, the South Carolina Republican Party convention is held, at which time the delegates are chosen.
The primary has very rarely does the primary select the delegates.
The delegates happen in an entirely different process at an entirely different time at the state convention.
And as I've said over and over, the delegate selection process differs from state to state.
Some delegates are chosen by party big wigs as an honor.
Some have to run for election at state party conventions like in Colorado.
Others are automatically delegates if they are elected officials in the state.
Every state does it differently.
But when those states have their conventions, even though they've had their primary, the delegates haven't been chosen.
All that's happened in the primary is that X number of delegates won by the candidates are required to vote for those candidates on the first ballot, but nobody knows who the delegates are.
So all Cruz has been doing brilliantly, strategically, legally, and uber professionally, all Cruz has been doing is going to these state conventions and doing everything he can to secure as many pro-Cruz delegates in the South Carolina delegation as he can get for the second ballot, for the third ballot.
None of this is to deny the first ballot pledge.
Nobody's votes are being uncounted, discounted, ignored.
It's just nobody ever sees this take place like it's being seen this year because we never need to go this deep to get to the nominee.
So in South Carolina, they have their primary and everybody leaves.
And they're on down the road to the next primary.
A couple of weeks or a month later, South Carolina has its convention.
Cruz goes in and goes to the convention and tries to get as many of the total delegates in the state supporting him as he can get.
He would love to get all of them supporting him.
On the first ballot, there are pledged delegates that have to support Trump because he won the South Carolina primary.
Cruz is not tampering with that.
Nobody can tamper with that.
It's the second ballot and the third ballot where the delegates are free agents and can vote however they want, except in Florida, where the delegates are pledged to vote for the state winner, the first three ballots.
But South Carolina is not that way.
Only the first ballot are delegates pledged or bound to vote for who won the state.
This case, Trump.
Well, Cruz is not trying to deny that.
He's not trying to keep anybody from voting for Trump on the first ballot.
He can't.
But the second ballot, if there is one, that's what Trump or Cruz is doing, is trying to get as many pro-Cruz delegates in every state as he can for the second ballot and the third ballot.
Now, if Trump decides not to go to those conventions and doesn't try to get as many delegates on his side, then that's not Cruz's problem.
And it's not anybody cheating.
It's just Cruz deciding to get as many delegates as he can.
And Trump, I'm sure, figuring there isn't going to be a second ballot because he's going to win a slam dunk on the first ballot.
And all the rest of this is just idle waste of time chit-chat.
But it's the only chance Cruz has because Cruz has never, well, not never, but for weeks now, it has been abundantly clear that Ted Cruz can't win 1237 before the convention.
And now after New York, I mean, you could dot that I crossed the T, whatever.
But now the only hope that Cruz has, and Kasich, if you want to include him in this, is second and third ballot voting.
That's all Cruz is doing.
Colorado is, there's no cheating there.
But it's easy when Trump runs around and claims that, well, you know, I won the delegates and then they're not going to be for me.
They are on the first ballot.
There's nothing that can change that.
If he won the state, in a majority of delegates, they're required to vote for him on the first ballot.
There's nothing rigged here.
In fact, you could say, look at New York, and I jokingly opened the program.
How about these rigged rules in New York?
Trump got 60% of the vote, but 95% of the delegates doesn't seem fair, does it, given the way we're discussing everything else?
But how come nobody's worried?
How come nobody's standing up?
Wait a minute.
Wait a minute.
Trump only got 60% of the vote and 95% of the delegates?
Yeah.
Whoa.
But that's rigged, but that's rigged.
But don't care about any of that.
Trump is not getting that specific when he rips into Cruz for this.
The only point that Trump's making, and it's resonating because people have this thing about their vote being denied.
I mean, you tell people that their votes being uncounted, discounted, thrown out, you're going to get their attention.
So if you go out there and say that they're rigging the system, people are going to fall for it and think that's what's happening.
It's not what's happening.
So, see, this is the way it works.
Now they're shouting, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump.
Sorry.
Well, that's just out.
Trump won 60% of the popular vote and gets 95% of the delegates.
Stop.
Death fair?
Doesn't that seem rigged to you?
No, it doesn't seem rigged to me because I understand the process.
But until you talk to some people that don't understand the process and they happen to be for Cruz, you can make the case.
My God, Ted really got shafted there.
How did Ted get shafted?
He didn't win enough to win a delegate.
I don't care.
You can't give Trump 95% of the delegates.
You only got 60% of the vote.
And that's where we are with some of this.
Look, I don't blame Trump for parlaying this and playing this up.
And by the way, I think Cruz ought to be out there explaining this because you can do it in as little time as I've taken to explain.
It's not complicated.
Nothing illegal about it.
So we had the New York primary.
I don't know if New York has chosen the actual human beings that are going to be the delegates yet.
Now, it probably isn't going to happen here because Cruz, New York values, it's over.
But if he hadn't said, he'd be working the New York State Convention and he'd be trying to get as many delegates as he could to support him chosen as delegate.
What he's actually trying to do is get as many people to support him chosen as delegates in these various conventions so that when we get a second or third ballot, they're loyal to him.
That's all that's been going on.
And he's had some success doing it, which has caused people to get their underwear and a wad and go out and complain about rigged and cheating.
There's nothing rigged.
There's nothing cheating here.
But look, I got into this explanation because it has now, we've now reached the point where it's mathematically impossible for Cruz to get 1237 before the convention can't get there.
There aren't enough delegates left.
There aren't enough primaries left.
So his only hope and prayer is that it goes to a second ballot.
That's why I'm spending so much time telling you that the GOP, the RNC, more and more stories here about that 1237 not being a hard number now.
All of a sudden, it's becoming a soft number.
All of a sudden, more and more RNC people say, yeah, you know, it'd be really tough to take it away from a guy who got all these votes and was the far and away leader in the popular vote and only 100 delegates short.
We can't take it away from that guy.
That way it would be hell to pay.
They're right.
Wouldn't you agree?
You just told me this morning that you thought that there's no way that they will deny Trump if he gets close.
Well, that's all I just said.
That's all they're talking about.
Well, okay, all right.
They can't.
Look, the 1237 is not going to become.
They're not going to give it to Trump at 1,120.
So they're assuming because there's 200 unbound delegates that he's going to be able to arrange enough trips on Trump Air 1 to get half of them to vote for.
Or whatever.
And that's why I talked about the bandwagon effect.
They're all starting to realize here that if Trump shows up 50 or 100 short, that there's enough unbound delegates in the first ballot unpledged that he can go get it.
That's all that's happening here.
And Cruz and the guys are hoping first ballot doesn't produce any winner.
Second, third ballot's the only chance they've got.
That's what they're trying to shore up.
Here's the entire Trump soundbite that I interrupted when I heard something worth pointing out.
We don't have much of a race anymore based on what I'm seeing on television.
Senator Cruz is just about mathematically eliminated.
And we've won another state.
As you know, we have won millions of more votes than Senator Cruz, millions and millions of more votes than Governor Kasich.
We've won, and now, especially after tonight, close to 300 delegates more than Senator Cruz.
We're really, really rocking.
Gone is the lion Ted.
Not even Lions, Senator Cruz.
And the drive-bys have noticed, and the drive-bys are euphoric.
Here's Jake Tapper and Dana Bash.
CNN's coverage last night just dazzled over this.
That Donald Trump you heard this evening, that is the Donald Trump pivoting to become a general election candidate.
I could not agree with you, Mark.
There's no question that this was a fundamentally different Donald Trump candidate Donald Trump.
And I think fair to say maybe less reality TV show, Donald Trump.
We've been hearing those of us who have been covering Donald Trump now for almost a year have been talking to people who know him, and many of them say there are two Donald Trumps, and this is the second one.
This is the second one that many of them predicted he would pivot to.
And it's not just those two folks, not just Jacob Tapper and Dana Bash.
On the Fox News channel last night on a Kelly file, Megan Kelly, Monica Crowley, wowed and dazzled by the new Trump.
You heard Donald Trump tonight sounding, you tell me, more presidential?
Senator Cruz, not Lion Ted.
Did you notice that?
I don't know if I've ever heard Donald Trump call Ted Cruz Senator Cruz.
Yeah, there was definitely a change in his tone and in his rhetoric tonight.
I mean, this was classic Donald Trump in the sense that he's really in his element when he's the victor.
And here's Axelrod.
We have time to squeeze this.
The new team has had an impact, right?
He had a short speech.
Usually he can't clear his throat in eight minutes.
Focused on jobs.
You know, even his hair, you know, is more, he has some of that Manafort moose in his hair.
I think he's really, they've had a real impact on him because he's trying to show that he's not just the outsider, but he can actually be a small person.
He's a smart president.
So people from all sides, right, left, down the middle, dazzled by the new Trumpster.
Even David Axelrod there.
Time to hit the phones, get back to the phones.
This is Jeremy in Mayfield, Kentucky.
Jeremy, great to have you.
Appreciate your patience.
Thank you.
Good afternoon, Rush.
I was wondering what do you think the result would be in a general election, a face-off between the two true outsiders favored by the populace, the Donald versus Bolshevik Bernie, Sanders versus Trump.
How do you think that would turn out?
The Donald versus Bolshevik Bernie.
You know, there's an interesting, if you want to look at New York lesson, I'm going to ask you, I'm going to turn this around and ask you your thought on this.
Because as I ran the numbers last night, both Bernie and Hillary got more votes, popular votes in New York, than Trump did.
Both of them did.
Now, the only reason I point this out is because many have speculated that Trump could actually turn the electoral system upside down by turning Democrat states, guaranteed Democrat states, and putting them into play, like New York, like Illinois, Michigan.
And you would think that New York would be one of those prime states to do that, given that it's its home state.
Now, he is the only Republican to win his home state with 50%.
Kasich didn't get 50% in Ohio.
Cruz did not get 50% in Texas.
But Trump got 60 in New York.
But his popular vote total was lower than both Hillary and Bernie.
What do you think of that?
Well, I think Trump beats Hillary by a landslide because I've met a lot of the Democrats here in our Kentucky caucus who swapped over just because they didn't want to vote for Bernie or Hillary.
But what surprised me about Bernie is the turnout of the Millennials.
I think that would be a close race.
You know, of course, I'm a Trump supporter, but I think it would be a very close race between Sanders and Trump.
What is the latest polling data?
You know, there's so much of this, and I get confused because I've seen it both ways.
I've seen polls that show Hillary or Bernie and or Bernie just trouncing Trump.
I've seen polls that show Kasich is the only guy that beats them, which is irrelevant to me because Kasich isn't going to be the nominee, although the establishment would love to have him, but he's not going to be.
I've seen some polls where Cruz does better than Trump against those two.
And then I've seen polls where Trump beats one of the two of them.
I forget which.
You obviously don't believe those polls if you think Trump would trounce Hillary.
Absolutely trounce.
And I don't consider that.
Why do you think, I mean, the polling data, I mean, it's out there.
People live and die by it.
Why are you discounting the polling game?
Why do you think Trump would clean her clock?
Well, like I said, the individual that I met for myself here in Kentucky, older farmers, self-employed, I'm self-employed myself, they cringe at the thought of a choice between Bernie and Hillary, especially Hillary.
They call her a criminal.
But I think Trump takes them because of the crossover.
Because he's going to get, if Sanders is denied the nomination, there's going to be a lot of upset Sanders fans, and I think they're going to cross over to.
Well, I do think that's a factor.
I really do think the numbers of Democrats who say they will not vote if Bernie's not the nominee is 25%.
Now, I don't expect that number to hold up all the way to November, but some of them might not.
You also mentioned that Crazy Bernie's strong suits millennials.
That happens to be the demographic with the lowest turnout.
It never fails.
Every presidential election, everybody gets all hot and bothered and excited about what the millennials are going to do, what the youth vote's going to do.
And because it always polls very strong leftist.
Young people in polling data always indicate a preference for the most far-left Democrat available.
And then after that, the remaining Democrat.
But they also have the smallest turnout.
They never end up showing up.
So if that's Bernie's number one demographic, then I think he'd have problems.
He's not going to be the nominee, Jeremy.
So this would be a purely hypothetical pretend game, Trump versus Bernie.
I think Trump would win that easily.
Not denying, by the way, that there is quite a large number of challenged people who would vote for Bernie Sanders.
And those people, we really need to be alarmed about.
We need to be scared of them because they are a sizable number.
They make up protesters, agitators.
They're the kind of people that don't work.
They just bully and join protest marches and try to get what they want that way.
And there are a lot of them, but they're not stable.
And you can't turn the country over to them.
And that's what you'd be doing by electing Crazy Bernie.
I think it really comes down to can Trump beat Hillary.
And the answer to that question is all over the place.
Some people believe exactly what the polling data says on that, and other people just throw it out.
A lot of people look at the energy of the primaries.
They see zero energy for her, uncontrollable energy and momentum for Trump, and they could be a slam dunk.
I'll tell you this: there's some RNC members who are intrigued at the potential of a Trump landslide.
And then I can just as easily point you to other, equally as informed, involved, concerned people who think that Trump would lose in one of the worst landslides in party history.
So there isn't a consensus on this.
And it's a little bit too early to make an informed prediction of how such a turnout, such a matchup would manifest itself.
It would be much easier to predict this a couple of months down the road.
And I'm not scathing on it.
I'm just there's not enough data here yet to make even an informed wild guess.
Fred in Indianapolis, which is where Trump is today, I think, by the way.
Hello, welcome to the program, sir.
Yeah, hi, Rush.
Years ago, you explained political spectrum as a circle, and I think Donald Trump kind of is illustrated in that.
The mainstream has a hard time plotting him on taxes.
Smart enough to stay away from moral issues, debt, and foreign policy.
Your idea of this was years ago.
You said it was a circle and not a straight line, and I tend to agree with you.
It has been, there have been some political scientists just in the last three months who actually stole my idea and wrote a major dissertation on the whole concept that it is a circle and not a straight line.
So I'm flattered that you remember that.
Oh, that was years ago.
That's why I'm flattered you remember it.
You know, here being the pizza shop state in the home of Carrier, where they're moving to Mexico, I think it would be important for Trump to come in here and maybe court Mitch Daniels or somebody that down the road would make a pretty attractive ticket.
You mean Trump?
Yes.
Let me ask you, have you made a preference yet in terms of who you hope the Republican nominee is?
Well, I'm more of a traditionalist.
I'm probably, you know, I'm probably with Cruz on a political spectrum because I'm a conservative.
Right.
But you can't, when you plot that circle over that political spectrum straight line, I find it the fact that Trump is not a politician, and it's really hard for the mainstream media and blue hat Chris Matthews to explain what he is.
Well, you know why?
That's a great point because in their world, everybody can be typed in practically every instance of media that you can think of.
Every media person, they'll typecast somebody ideologically or party reference, and they will plot them somewhere in the political spectrum.
And your point is that Trump is not a politician professionally.
This is his first time running for office.
He's not a well, not his first time, his first serious time, but he's not a politician.
And so it's hard to plot him on the political spectrum.
Let me ask you a question here, Fred, before you go.
Since you mentioned Carrier, it's not about Cruz, it's Trump.
When you hear Trump say that he's going to stop Carrier from moving their factory and relocating it to Mexico, do you think he can do that?
No, I don't think he can.
It's, you know, they're a Fortune 500 company and they have to make decisions.
But his supporters think that they can.
Labor doesn't like that.
His supporters think that he can.
What happens when he doesn't?
What happens when Carrier tells him to take a flyer?
Well, you know, the great unwashed, obviously, they don't understand that, you know, he can't be like Obama and come in and have his, you know, be an emperor.
Why not?
They will understand.
They just put on a political.
If Obama's shown that it can be done, if Obama has shown how you can participate in crony socialism or capitalism and get the insurance companies on his side of Obamacare and get even Walmart on his side on the minimum wage, what's to stop Trump from making a deal with Carrier to keep the factory in Indiana in exchange for exemption, say, from federal taxes?
Would you object if Trump kept that factory by making a deal with them they couldn't get anywhere else with government?
Well, obviously, he's got all these buildings and he buys a lot of air conditioning.
He could illustrate to the public how a big mover and shaker as himself, we won't buy from Carrier.
And the guys sitting around at Carrier going, they're going somewhere else, and it might cost us a little bit in labor outlays to stay in Indiana, but in the long run, it's a better PR move for us to stay.
That's about the only thing that's going to be.
See, this is what people are afraid of.
People that oppose Trump are afraid of this, that Obama has willfully engaged in all this cronyism by getting various corporations, by hook or by crook, on his political side to help him further his agenda in exchange for subsidies or tax breaks or whatever kind of benefit you can get with a close government relationship.
And conservatives and free marketers are very much worried that since the die is cast and it's been demonstrated by Obama how you do it and that nobody made a serious effort to stop any of it, that maybe Trump would do it too.
So Trump's part of his campaign, he's going to stop Ford from relocating.
He's going to stop Nabisco from making Oreos somewhere else.
And now Carrier.
Well, what if he goes out and makes, if he gets elected, makes deals with them to get them to stay?
The free market much will say, well, that, yeah, his supporters will love it, but that's not good for U.S. economics because it's playing favorites, it's picking winners and losers from the White House.
But Trump's supporters would love it.
They'd be running around saying, he promised Carrier's going to say, see, in their state.
And that's what they would see.
So, anyway, I've taken a break here.
I really appreciate your calling, Fred.
Thanks much.
We'll be back after this.
Here's Eric in Cornelius, Georgia.
Hey, Eric, it's great to have you with us.
Hi.
Thanks.
It's Cornelius, North Carolina, by the way.
Sorry, Megaditto.
No problem.
Megaditto's rush from a black conservative who loves you.
Thank you, sir.
Thanks for setting my call.
But I sincerely request you to indulge me for a moment and hopefully even engage me because I have a very deep concern, and I want you to tell me if my concerns are unfounded, but it's of grave importance here.
I'm actually originally a Carson supporter, moved on to Cruz, supporting Cruz, love the guy.
But I'm actually going to support Trump.
I'm pulling for Trump through this because I'm actually terrified of the prospects of a brokered convention.
And part of the reason why is I don't like the Republican establishment.
Can't stand liberals and Hillary.
But I'm even more so afraid of a brokered convention or contested convention because it's going to give the Republican establishment and Hillary exactly what they want.
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
Which is what?
Which is a guaranteed loss.
The Republicans are hoping they can pull out a rabbit out the hat and pull out a miracle win because of the brokerage convention.
Obviously, it's going to split the party big time, but they're hoping they can win.
But they'd rather have Hillary rather than someone like a Trump for stupid reasons.
But the Democrats want this because they know it's going to kill us in the general election.
They know that.
So they are in a disjointed kind of way, in collusion, the Democratic Party and the Republican establishment.
That is, they're in a weird kind of disjointed collusion that hoping and praying for this brokered convention.
Now, Ted Cruz, whom I do love, of course, when Kasich, when it was mathematically impossible for him to win this thing, you know, Cruz, Trump, they were saying, get out.
You're just faggots now.
Now, Cruz is facing the very dilemma, and he's saying, okay, he's going to probably stay in because he wants to, for whatever reason, obviously he wants to win the election, but he is being unwittingly or semi-wittingly duped by the establishment because they're supporting that he last through and force this thing to a broken convention.
Now, there's a question with Kasich of who's duping who.
Look, Eric, look, I want to explore this with you, but I'm out of time for this segment.
No, no, no, no.
Can you hang on?
Yes, I can.
Thanks.
Because I want to talk to you about this brokered convention.
You think it would be deadly for Republicans' chances in November.
And I just want to run some things by saying there are a lot of people who think it would not be from a television standpoint, a drama standpoint, and a focusing of attention on a Republican standpoint.
So you hang on, and we will chat about this in many few moments here.
Don't go away.
It's a good point there that Eric brought up about the last thing he wants to see is a brokered convention play right into Hillary's hands.
Some other people have a completely different thought process on that.
So we'll be back with him shortly and all the rest of the exciting, busy broadcast in than mere moments.
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