RUSH: Byron York, National Review Online today posted a story on their website, and this is from the second page of the story: ‘A short time later, I approach a man wearing a blue OPERATION CHAOS T-shirt. His name is James, and it turns out he’s a high-school teacher in nearby Nebo and a big Rush Limbaugh fan. He apologizes for the T-shirt, which looks fine but isn’t the kind one buys on Limbaugh’s website. ‘I did not have the opportunity to buy one in time, so I made myself one,’ he explains. ‘I hope Mr. Limbaugh doesn’t mind.” Of course not, James. I’m a little embarrassed that our soldiers have to outfit themselves, but nevertheless, I appreciate the initiative. Byron York concludes: ‘He probably won’t. And neither will Hillary Clinton. ‘I’m going to vote Democratic, I’m going to vote Hillary, to keep the carnage going until the national election in November,’ James explains. Then, after a brief pause, he adds: ‘McCain all the way!” Operation Chaos, North Carolina. Operation Chaos happening throughout Indiana as well.
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RUSH: Last night the big Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Indianapolis, and the chairman of the Democrat National Committee — (laughing) Operation Chaos has totally hijacked the Democrat Party. Listen to this.
DEAN: We need you to knock on your neighbor’s door. You can overcome anything that Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh said if you show up. I want you to think about this, I want you to think about this for a minute. If you’re in Texas, Mississippi, or Tennessee, and you’re a hardworking guy and drive a pickup truck, maybe the gun rack in the back, you vote Republican, unless you’re a member of a union. And why is that? Because if you’re a member of a union you still believe the things that those hardworking folks in those states believe, but you have a guy talking to you every month about why it’s important to vote for a Democrat.
RUSH: He’s in Indianapolis talking about if you live in Mississippi or Tennessee, if you got a hardworking guy, drive a pickup truck and a gun rack in the back? Gee whiz. This man is off his rocker. Dr. Howard Dean needs to be committed. That was Howard Dean last night in Indianapolis. You know, the two candidates showed up and spoke. Hillary went first and then Obama, and they had Dr. Dean between them and he revved up the crowd a little with this. We have this reference here, ‘You can overcome anything that Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh say if you show up.’ That’s a direct reference to Operation Chaos, a direct reference to it, even though he did not mention it.
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RUSH: More evidence here that Operation Chaos has hijacked the Indiana and North Carolina primaries. We go to the Slay the Nation yesterday: Bob Schieffer talking to Richmond, Virginia mayor Douglas Wilder, and he also talks to Evan Bayh. Senator Evan Bayh is in the second bite. But here is the question to Doug Wilder. He says, ‘Governor, if she should wind up winning out there in Indiana and at least coming close in North Carolina, shouldn’t she hang in there? Shouldn’t she hang in despite what people say, that this is tearing down both of them?’
WILDER: Let’s get real. The bloggers, the right-wing commentators on the radio, who are they supporting? Not Barack Obama! They are literally begging people — these are Republicans — literally begging people, please vote for Hillary Clinton. They have no intention of supporting Hillary Clinton in November! And why are they doing that? Why is it Barack Obama can reach what some call the ‘elite voter’ but you can’t reach the others? That’s poppycock! There is a concentrated effort to drive those voters away from him, and to drive them to Hillary because many of them think that Hillary will be the weaker. So, I think there’s a hidden message here, Bob; and I think the answer comes from those persons who should be saying, ‘Why are they asking everyone to vote for Hillary Clinton in a Democratic primary?’
RUSH: Governor Wilder, you’re 95% there. He understands Operation Chaos 95%. It’s not that we — not that I, the commander-in-chief of Operation Chaos — think that Hillary is more beatable than Obama. I think they’re both beatable. The idea is chaos! The idea is to continue this chaos for as long as possible, beyond the Democrat primary season in early June which wraps up in Puerto Rico. Schieffer now turns to Senator Evan Bayh. He said, ‘One of your fellow Hoosiers, the former head of the DNC Joe Andrew, switched his allegiance from Clinton to Obama last week. He urged other Hoosiers to do the same. He said he thought the primary process had become bad for the Democrat Party and that a vote for Hillary Clinton is a vote to continue the process, and that’s a vote that’s for John McCain,’ and once again, Andrew understanding Operation Chaos. Question: ‘Do you think Hoosiers will listen to Joe Andrew?’
BAYH: Doug was talking about Republicans coming over and that kind of thing. I — I don’t want to — Doug, I agree with you on one thing: We don’t want Rush Limbaugh deciding our primary. But if you look at the polls today — the average of all the polls, not just one here or there. In the state of Ohio, which was the key state last time, Hillary now runs about eight or nine points better than Barack. In Florida, which was the key state in 2000 she runs about ten or eleven points —
RUSH: All right, that’s enough. We don’t need to hear the rest of this psychobabble. So what happens? In the first bite, Doug Wilder says, all these ‘right-wing commentators’ trying to affect our primary; Evan Bayh identifies right-wing commentators as saying, ‘We don’t want Rush Limbaugh deciding our primary.’ Again, your orders from headquarters: If you are Republican and have registered to vote in the Democrat primary, the orders are to vote Hillary Clinton today. The Democrats are expecting it. (laughing) They have lost control. Operation Chaos has successfully hijacked the Indiana primary, perhaps North Carolina, too. Now, the Drive-By Media is circling the wagons around Obama. I mentioned this earlier. New York Times/CBS poll: ‘A majority of American voters say that the furor over the relationship between Senator Obama and his former pastor has not affected their opinion of Obama. However, a substantial number say that it could influence voters this fall, should he be the Democrat presidential nominee.’ So these people in the survey that are saying, ‘Ah, it doesn’t bother us, but we’re worried it will bother other voters.’ It’s sort of like when they take economic surveys.
‘How are you doing in your personal life?’
‘Oh, I’m great in my personal life. I’m really worried about by neighbors, though.’
‘Why?’
‘Well, because the media says the economy is going to hell in a hand basket.’
The AP writes this up this way: ‘Most voters think that Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama has done a good job of handling the controversy surrounding his pastor, Jeremiah Wright. The CBS/New York Times poll, 60% of voters, 68% of Democrat primary voters, said they approved of the way Obama handled the situation.’ We are not so certain, ladies and gentlemen, that Obama is of the same opinion. He thinks he still may have some problems here.
(playing of Obama parody song)
RUSH: White comedian Paul Shanklin (applauds) as Barack Obama. That is a takeoff on Dr. John’s Right Place, Wrong Time, followed up here by the Ohio Players and Love Rollercoaster. (laughing) Here’s that New York Times story that I referenced from Saturday: ‘Republicans Crossing Over to Vote in Democrat Contests.’ They don’t deny that’s happening. ‘Clouding the picture, however, is a campaign by Rush Limbaugh, the radio talk show host urging his listeners to cast their ballots for Mrs. Clinton if they can stomach it. Republican voters interviewed here said that Mr. Limbaugh was not a factor in their decision to vote in the Democrat primary, and that it was the issues that propelled them,’ and they quote a couple of Republicans here. Why mention this if it we’re not a factor?
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RUSH: We have field reports, ladies and gentlemen, from Indiana, Operation Chaos. Welcome back, Rush Limbaugh, the EIB Network. This morning, WABC radio, our blowtorch affiliate in New York, Curtis Sliwa interviewed Ruth Stanley, managing editor of the Post & Mail newspaper in Indiana. Sliwa said, ‘Are you sensing there’s any impact at all for the call from Rush Limbaugh, America’s number-one political commentator in talk radio, to fellow Republicans to vote in the Democrat primary tomorrow in Indiana?’
STANLEY: Actually, we ran a poll on our website about that, and the results were, amazingly, there’s about 55 percent of them that are registered Republicans that are voting Democrat.
SLIWA: Are they saying specifically which candidate?
STANLEY: No, they’re not saying. We didn’t ask that question, but I’m getting the feeling that a lot of them seem to be voting for the Hillary Clinton campaign.
RUSH: Field reports, Operation Chaos, Indiana. That’s Ruth Stanley, managing editor of the Post & Mail newspaper in Indiana. Sliwa then says, ‘Have you had any personal conversations with those that you know have been registered as Republican and their intentions of voting for which candidate in the Democrat primary in Indiana?’
STANLEY: Yes, I have. I talked to a couple of people who are registered Republicans, and they said they’re going to pull the Democrat ticket and vote for a Democrat candidate.
SLIWA: And out of those, who will it be?
STANLEY: The one in specific is actually running on the Republican ticket for a local race, and he said if he wasn’t running, he would be pulling the Democrat ticket and voting for Hillary.
SLIWA: Wow. So that Operation Chaos, that call from Rush Limbaugh may be well having a big impact in your predominantly Republican area?
STANLEY: Yes, it could very well be.
RUSH: Field reports, Operation Chaos, Curtis Sliwa this morning on WABC with Ruth Stanley, the managing editor of the Post & Mail newspaper in Indiana. Speaking of which, over the weekend, doing Show Prep for today’s program, I stumbled across something called The Environmentalist.org, but it’s a blog on environmentalists. It was posted on Saturday: ‘Hillary Clinton’s ‘Victory’ in Pennsylvania: The Rush Limbaugh Effect.’ And he goes on to analyze what all happened there. He said, ‘Something’s not right.’ He goes on to analyze even more, and then says, ‘I believe that Rush’s Operation Chaos is at play here and authenticity has nothing to do with too may new Democratic registrants in the last contests. This re-registration is, I believe, being undertaken at Rush’s suggestion to cynically stretch this contest out — as long as possible — so that Hillary’s promised kitchen sink theory — will end up driving both candidates’ negatives through the roof so that neither is likely to win against McCain. Voters in upcoming contests will always be swayed by the outcome of preceding contests. It’s human nature to be influenced by the wisdom of those who’ve gone before us. But if I’m right — and the outcome in Pennsylvania, and perhaps Mississippi, Texas, and Ohio were influenced by Rush’s call to Republicans to keep Hillary in the race longer –Democratic voters in Indiana and North Carolina, and the states that follow, deserve to know that we’re being manipulated.’
This is not a friendly blog. It’s all over the blogs. It’s all over the Drive-By Media. In fact, the Baltimore Sun has a blog. Somebody posted to the Baltimore Sun blog over the weekend. ‘Has the Rush Limbaugh strategy helped presidential candidate Hillary Clinton run a tight race in Guam? Republican and independent voters switched teams yesterday, making a predicted caucus blowout for Obama a razor-tight race with Obama only beating Clinton by seven votes.’ And then somebody posts following this. ‘Wait a minute. Rush isn’t on the air in Guam.’ Oh, yes, we are. We are on the air in Guam, with the Armed Forces Radio network. We’ve had a Guam station. We also have the Internet. Our program is streamed. Obama was supposed to clean up in Guam. He wins by seven votes. Everybody is talking about Operation Chaos.