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April 26, 2016 - Rush Limbaugh Program
31:25
April 26, 2016, Tuesday, Hour #3
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Half my brain tied behind my back, just to make it fair.
Rush Limbaugh meeting and surpassing all audience expectations every day.
Great to have you here.
This is the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
The telephone number is 800-282-2882.
The email address, illrushboard at EIBNet.com.
Did you see, you see, the news story where Trump donated $25,000, or maybe it was $50,000.
It was a lot of money to Terry McAuliffe when he ran for governor of Virginia back in 2007.
Not this.
Does that bother you?
It doesn't.
See, that's what I'm talking about.
I mean, he's the punk.
He's a Clinton confidant.
He was one of the Clinton's enforcers.
Trump donates to his gubernatorial campaign.
No big deal.
Yeah, that's what he had to do.
That's exactly right.
Trump had a hotel business in Virginia something in Virginia.
It needed to support the punk and probably didn't even want to make the donation, but had to do it, right?
That's exactly right.
From the Federalist, parents of a five-year-old trans-questioning child have filed a complaint against a charter school for refusing to teach harmful anti-science beliefs about human biology.
Let me read that.
I don't, you know, some stuff you need to translate.
Parents of a five-year-old trans-questioning child.
I assume that means a child who thinks he might be a different gender or she might be.
Is that what trans questioning is?
Parents of a five-year-old trans-questioning child.
The parents have filed a complaint against a charter school because the school is refusing to teach harmful anti-science beliefs about human biology.
That just doesn't make any sense.
Why would the parents want the school to teach harmful stuff?
That's got to be a typo for refusing to teach harmful anti-science beliefs about.
Maybe the next paragraph will unlock this.
Parents of a five-year-old transgender child have filed a complaint against the St. Paul, Minnesota charter scruple, alleging the scruple failed to protect the child from bullying and refused to teach all the students their preferred transgender awareness.
We're talking five-year-olds.
Five-year-olds choose the curriculum and the parents sue if the school doesn't respond to the five-year-old's chosen gender orientation.
David and Hannah Edwards, you know, we're talking here about 0.03% of the population.
David and Hannah Edwards, whose child was born a boy, but now thinks he is a girl.
David and Hannah Edwards have filed with the city's Department of Human Rights, claiming their child was not able to take full advantage of NOVA's educational opportunities because of her gender identity and expression.
This violated her rights.
So when the boy showed up at Scruel wearing pink tennis shoes, we're talking a five-year-old here.
When the boy showed up at Scruel wearing pink tennis shoes and wanting to wear a jumper like the girls in gym five-year-olds have gym class, other children reportedly pointed and laughed at him.
The parents contacted the Scruel and wanted something done to protect their child from bullying, despite the fact that the Scruel currently has an anti-bullying policy.
The Edwardses, however, wanted more for the Scruel to teach only their views of human sexuality and to be engaged in helping their five-year-old boy transition to a girl.
Hannah Edwards said, my kid's just trying to live and be accepted and be safe.
Five-year-old.
Breitbart News headline.
Transgender and gay groups say federal officials should ban single-sex bathrooms in all K-12 schools.
President Obama may use a new courtroom decision to effectively eliminate single-sex bathrooms in K-12 schools around the nation, say, groups lobbying to increase the social and legal status of transgender people who want to live like people of the opposite sex.
The change is needed, according to transgender groups, because a revolutionary change would comfort the tiny number of kids and utes who wish to change their sex.
Okay.
Mainstream lawyers hope higher courts will stop a presidential or agency mandate against single-sex bathrooms.
And I predicted this.
When the gay marriage fight was won, that was pretty much it.
I mean, the militant gay agenda had been realized, but they didn't want to give up the game because the game is agitation, agitating protests and so forth, basically upheaval.
So the transgenders became the new beneficiaries of the militant gay protest movement.
John Fund, National Review Online.
If Trump will not release his tax returns, his delegates should abstain on the first ballot.
Ronald Reagan famously said that trust but verify was the proper way to deal with somebody who has a record of credibility problems.
Republicans need to adopt Reagan's approach as Trump moves closer to the Republican nomination.
This is an opinion piece and fund.
A political party that did not demand the public release of Donald Trump's tax returns could be committing electoral suicide.
In his 40-year business career, he's assembled an empire of great complexity along with a serial record of credibility problems.
In other words, he often makes stuff up, writes John Fund.
It's a man who said under oath in a 2008 libel suit that he later lost.
My net worth fluctuates and it goes up and down with the markets and with attitudes and with feelings, even my own feelings.
You know, normally the drive-bys would be clamoring for Trump's tax returns.
Any other average ordinary Republican running, the drive-bys would be clamoring for Trump's tax returns.
But I don't think they're going to do it until Trump's the nominee.
And if you think that you have seen a drive-by meeting feeding frenzy before, you just wait until Trump gets the nomination.
Drive-by.
I'm telling you, they're just laying in wait.
They can't wait to unload.
I don't know that it's going to matter.
That's what I meant in the previous busy broadcast hour about the terrain being all new and all different.
I think some of the old conventional wisdom is out the window and people don't realize it yet.
But we'll know soon enough.
Rachel in Buckeye, Arizona, I'm glad you called.
You're up first.
Great to have you with us on the program today.
Hello.
Good morning, Rush, and thank you for having me.
And you were talking about Cruz this morning about not being an insider.
And I just called to differ with you on that point.
And for me, for one, as an American who has voted her whole life, I see him as an insider.
He's been a lawyer/slash government employee his whole life.
And that's one of the reasons I'm not voting for him.
I mean, if he gets the nominee, I will vote for him.
But I voted for Trump, and I just see him as an insider.
And like you've talked about for a while now.
I know.
And you don't know why I don't see it that way.
Right.
I don't.
I've been really frustrated with you for the last few months because I don't know.
I don't get where you're coming from.
And I've valued your opinion.
Let me ask you, Rachel, just a second here now.
This may be hard to do because you might not have had any opinions here, but what did you think of Cruz before Trump even came along?
You know, a year from, a year ago, before Trump was even toying with him, before Trump's even in the news possibly running.
Well, I liked him.
I liked him.
Did you think of him as no different than Mitch McConnell?
Did you think of him as no different than John Boehner?
No, I thought of him as different.
Yes, sir.
Right.
You thought of him as in opposition to those people.
Yes, sir.
He was speaking out against them.
was publicly calling them out.
He was on that basis that I refer to Cruz as an outsider anti-establishment.
But believe me, Rachel, when you throw Trump in the mix, I can see where Trump qualifies on the surface as a genuine outsider.
I mean, he's not elected.
He's not in the Senate.
He's not a warrior.
He hasn't worked in a regime or any of that.
But before all that happens, my only point, the earlier portions of today's program, was to try to explain what Cruz is doing.
Cruz had a strategy.
He was running against the Republican establishment.
He was the only one in the Republican field running against the establishment.
Everybody else was part of it.
Pick any one of those other 15 people.
Maybe Ben Carson would qualify as an outsider.
But when you're talking Jeff Christie, Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Marco Rubio, all of the others, the Huckabee, they're all part of the Republican establishment.
Cruz was running against all of them.
And he was devising, he did devise a strategy to win that involved delegates because that's the only way he could.
Before Trump gets in, the way to look at Cruz in his campaign was David and Goliath.
Now, you may not want to hear it, and it may not hold up once Trump gets in the race, which is the great irony, but that's who Cruz was.
Cruz never factored Trump.
Nobody did.
Cruz, when he was putting together his game plan to win the nomination, never once factored that Donald Trump or anybody like him would be in the race.
He knew he was up against everything the establishment has in their arsenal.
They run the convention.
They run the primaries.
They run the state parties.
He was the outsider.
The only hope he had was to go to these conventions and tie up as many delegates as he could so that he could withstand the onslaught of the establishment should it come to it at a convention.
Now, Trump gets in and all of that gets blown to smithereens, but it doesn't change who Cruz was.
Now, you might want to say Cruz compared to Trump is establishment or insider because, yeah, he's in the Senate and yeah, he's a lawyer.
And yeah, he was in the Texas state government.
And yeah, his wife worked for W. And yeah, he's got all these connections.
But it's only in comparison to Trump can you say that Cruz is an insider, but he's not.
I mean, you know, Rachel, you know as well as I do.
Cruz was despised by these people precisely because he was exposing them, trying to expose them.
He was doing everything he could.
He called him the Washington cartel.
He was running for the presidency from the Senate, from his elected position.
Don't look at this as me choosing sides over who's the outsider.
I see clearly everything happening here.
But it simply isn't true to say that Ted Cruz is establishment.
He never has been.
He never wanted to be.
And if Trump were not in the race, he would be the only guy running against the establishment right now.
And thus you would have no choice but then to conclude that you might not trust it.
I don't know about that, but that's the way it was.
I'm not ignoring anything.
I'm not willfully blind here.
I'm simply recounting things as they were.
I'm really glad you called.
I have to take a break.
We've got some audio soundbites I want you to hear, plus more of your phone calls, of course, all next when we get back.
Now, that fun story, that's from back in March, March the 16th.
It hadn't got any traction at all.
I just came across it, and it's kind of out of nowhere.
So I thought I'd bring it up.
I'm not advocating Trump releases tax returns.
You know what, folks?
I'll tell you what we're going to do on this.
One day this week, maybe do it on Open Line Friday.
I'm going to ask Trumpists to call the program, and I'm going to ask you to tell me what one or two things Trump does that you wish he would stop doing, that worry you going forward.
And I don't mean this in anything other than a helpful, productive exercise.
What gave me the idea of it is a call.
Up here.
Let's see what is it.
Uh here, grab line two.
This one gave me the idea.
This is Lee Uh in in College Station.
Welcome Lee, great to have you on the program.
It says here that what you want to talk about, now that Trump's in the driver's seat gonna get the nomination, what does he have to steer clear of in order to beat Hillary?
What do you?
What do you mean by that?
Well, that's right.
Well, first of all, finger of Friendship, puppy stew Dittos to you, sir.
All right, thank you sir, very much.
And my uh premise to my question is, um, I think he first of all has it in the bag.
I voted for the Master Debater in the Uh primary here in Texas, but i'll, i'll vote for Satan if he wins the nomination.
So, of course, we're talking about Trump and I think he's got it locked up.
He's he's rewrote the art of the deal, so he should uh, he should, sail through the convention right, right.
But you say, what does he need to steer clear of in order?
In other words, you think that he's got some propensities that could hurt him right well, I don't, I don't know.
I, you're a smart guy, so I called you.
I thought, you know, Rush will know what.
What does Trump?
What does he have to not do in order to win the general in november and i'm talking about, of course, going up looks like against Hillary what does he have to not do in order to win it, to win it all?
Well um, this would require some considered uh, thought though that's why I called you right, but I mean off top, my head might be risky, because I guess, right now, just give you generics and, and the first thing I would say is, whatever he does, whatever he, he's got to stay who he is.
He cannot try to become somebody.
He's not, and he's got to resist efforts on the part of whoever surrounds him to turn him into something he's not based on what they think is necessary, because they're not the one running.
He's the guy.
His instincts are solid obviously, he knows himself, so I think he's just got to trust himself.
Okay, all right, but i've had, you know, I know people are worried.
For example, I know Trumpists who are worried.
You know they they love it when he insults people, but they're worried that it's gonna backfire, that it doesn't come across as um stately or presidential or what have you.
Uh, and so I thought I would give Trumpists an opportunity to uh express what their fears are.
This because, like you, most of them think Trump's got it in the bag.
Most of you Trumpists think that it's over and you're on, you've moved on.
The primaries are a perfunctory thing now they are a formality, and so you're you're, you're hoping that whatever happens next does not blow it, and so you've got obviously in your mind there are things maybe you haven't nailed them, maybe you haven't identified them that could blow it.
And so your question to me, what do I think Trump should avoid?
Uh, in order to beat Hillary?
Let me grab some sound bites here quickly.
We got time to squeeze this, and here's Hillary last night in Philadelphia on PMS NBC.
Well, I am going to have a cabinet that looks like America and 50 percent of America is women right, all right.
Here's how Trump reacted to it.
I call her Crooked Hillary because she's crooked and you know, the only thing she's got is the woman card.
And that's all she's got.
And it is pandering.
And, you know, it's a weak card in her hand.
In another person's hands, it could be a very powerful card.
I'd love to see a woman president, but she's the wrong person.
She's a disaster.
Remember the famous call at 3 o'clock in the morning?
She was sleeping.
She's got nothing else to play.
She's guilty as hell in the emails.
You got Whitewater.
Her whole life has been crooked.
And you look at the foundation, the whole life.
And the only card she's got is to play the woman card.
Now, very few Republicans ever go after Hillary at all, period.
They don't go after Obama.
They hands off Trump, not afraid to.
But is that effective or not?
I'm asking you: is that going to persuade people?
Is that going to warn people off of Hillary and so forth?
You ponder that because we have taken an obscene profit break.
Abby in Gainesville, Florida.
It's great to have you.
You're next.
Hi.
Hi.
I'm a first-time voter.
I'm actually a college student.
And I'm voting for Cruz.
And my main reason why I'm not voting for Trump is because he encourages people to break the law.
Like, encouraging violence-sized rallies, I just think it's very immature and kind of thuggish.
So that's my main thing against him: is that he's encouraging people to be violent.
And I don't agree with that.
Okay, let me.
I'm going to take the occasion of your call to say something here about both men because it's not good for people on our side of the aisle to start harboring opinions of our two frontrunners here that may not be entirely accurate.
I understand the nature of the competition.
And the Cruz people want to desperately win, and the Trump people desperately want to win.
And within the framework of this competition, obviously critical things are going to be said.
I know both these guys, and I know both of them very well.
And folks, I just want to tell you from the bottom of my heart.
First off, for those of you Cruz people who think that Trump is some thug, he's not.
This encouraging violence thing is a little bit of an exaggeration of a couple of things that happened at some of the early Trump rallies that were largely symbolic.
You have to understand this is one of the things that put Trump on the map.
People on our side are fed up with having life dictated to us by public agitators and protesters who are not legitimate.
They come in purposely for one purpose, and that's to interrupt, disrupt.
They don't have a legitimate grievance.
They're faking it.
They're nothing but a bunch of bullies themselves.
And Trump was not going to surrender his events to them.
He simply wasn't in some faux sense of politeness or tolerance.
He was not going to surrender his event to these people.
Donald Trump is a you would love him living in your neighborhood.
You would love him if he were one of your friends.
He is a nice guy, but he's committed.
And he's driven and he's confident.
And many people assume from that that he is arrogant.
Some people assume that people like that are intolerant, that they're know-it-alls or what have you.
But if you would spend any time around Trump, you would enjoy yourself.
You'd be laughing and you'd have a good time.
You might think some things are beyond the pale or what have you, but he's not a bad guy.
And by the same token on the other side, I really am uncomfortable with what some of the Trump people think of Ted Cruz.
Ted Cruz is, I don't know how else to do it.
He's wholesome.
He is solid.
He is an excellent citizen.
He is possessed of incredible dignity and integrity.
He's not a cheater.
And by the same token, if Cruz lived in your neighborhood, it'd be a great neighborhood.
And you'd be happy to have him in your neighborhood.
You'd be happy to have Cruz as One of your friends.
He may seem stiff to some people because of the way he appears on the campaign trail, but both of these people are okay people.
They're nice people.
They're nice guys.
They're driven in their own ways.
And both of them are profoundly preferable to Hillary Clinton.
You want to talk about negative characteristics and personality traits, gaming, cheating, this kind of thing.
I mean, that is the name of the game for the entire Clinton machine.
What they have is a political machine.
And it takes no prisoners.
And they are in it for the express purpose of maximizing as much personal gain as they can out of it, while at the same time altering the status quo in this country in a negative way for the most people.
They are elitists, and they're just not – you wouldn't, I don't think, fully trust them or their organizations.
But – But when it comes to Cruz, I mean, you have a deeply religious, committed family man.
He believes in God.
He lives his life accordingly.
And these are not bad guys.
These are not bad people.
And it's kind of part and parcel of campaigns that you have these kind of negative attacks and critical things said about people.
But you can rely on the fact that when all this is done, these are people that you would not mind being around at all, and you wouldn't mind them having some role in your life, be it friendship, member of your church, or what have you.
But they're both in a pretty heated competition here for the most powerful job in the world.
And there are certain things that you have to do, certain requirements that you have to do to achieve this job, to win what it takes to win this job.
And it's something most people wouldn't even subject themselves to.
Most people wouldn't even enter this arena.
Most people wouldn't be able to take one-tenth of the criticism that you get and remain smiling and have an upbeat and positive attitude.
Most people wouldn't want to get anywhere near it.
And so you have to make, I don't know, allowances for various things that might happen that seem to be extreme in the heat of a campaign.
But you can, I think, rest assured that we're not talking about bad people here.
Not in my estimation, anyway.
Brief timeout will continue in a second.
Don't go away.
Scott in Ohio.
Great to have you with us.
Hello, sir.
Mr. Limo, thank you for taking my call today.
It's a privilege to talk to you.
I had a question.
I'm a little curious as to it seems like your attitude towards Trump and his supporters has changed as of late.
And a prime example yesterday to me was you had callers calling in, you know, many of which are complaining about the whining of Trumpists, if you want to call them that, and Trump himself about delegates.
And in the next breath, seemingly, you praised Trump for exposing what is a corrupt delegate system.
So I sent a bit of- No, wait, wait.
I don't think that the delegate system is corrupt.
My opinion of Trump and Trump voters has never changed.
I like Donald Trump.
I'm fascinated by his campaign.
I have studied it.
I think I've spent more time than anybody, seriously, that's not a professional sociologist trying to understand it.
It fascinates me.
I hope it's huge.
I wonder how big it is.
I wonder how much bigger it can get.
There are a lot of things about the Trump campaign that intrigue me, And I'm sure they intrigue everybody else.
And one of them is this, he's not a professional politician outsider.
This stuff's not supposed to be possible.
The insiders are telling you this is not supposed to be possible.
The consultants, the professional consultants, both parties, they're chewing their fingernails down to the quick over this because this is not supposed to be possible.
This isn't supposed to happen.
Guys, not supposed to be able to self-fund.
You're not supposed to be able to do this without donors.
You're not supposed to be able to do this without advisors and TV ads and consultants running the campaign and so forth.
And Trump voters and what they represent.
Look, I think the future of this country rests with the people.
And I have great faith in the people of this country.
I still think a majority of the people in this country are appalled at so much of what is happening to our culture.
I think they're fed up with it, but they have been not represented.
And whenever they do speak up, they're shouted down and they're mocked and they're made fun of and they're ridiculed into silence.
So somebody's come along and speaks up for them who refuses to be silenced.
That they applaud.
I understand it all, but I don't think the delegate selection process is corrupt.
Not as it's being used here.
Now, look, I'm not saying politics isn't corrupt.
I'm not saying there's not vote fraud that takes place on Election Day.
But what we're talking about here in the way these delegates are being chosen, the way they're selected and the way they're signed, there isn't any corruption.
There's just a contest.
And Trump has had his own way of going about getting these delegates.
Cruz has had his.
Cruz is at a look, you're going to misunderstand this, but I'm going to say he's at a disadvantage.
He's losing.
He's only got one option open to him.
And that's winning on a second or third ballot.
That's all he can do right now.
And so he's doing what's necessary to win, should that eventuate.
Trump wants to win it without ever there being a second ballot.
And he's trying to pull that off now.
And he's going about it in his own way.
They're competing for the same thing, but not in the same way, because Trump can win it in ways that Cruz can't.
Trump can win it in both ways, but Cruz only has one way.
And that's the best I can do at explaining it with no time left.
The conclusion of today's program, which is right now, dedicated to Kelly Rippa.
We're sorry.
It will get better.
And we will see you tomorrow.
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