RUSH: So I just got a note, an email. “Hey, Rush, look at this. A couple of Drive-By Media outlets” — the New York Times and Washington Post — “think that Elizabeth Warren won the debate last night. I didn’t see it that way. Did you?”
Folks, there was no way anybody but Elizabeth Warren was gonna win the debate last night in the eyes of the Drive-Bys. Look where they put her. She had center stage, surrounded by the kooks left and right. I mean, that was the attempted positioning. It didn’t matter. She didn’t have the winning performance last night.
If you want to know the truth, just in straight, totally objective, without getting into any deep analysis of what anybody said, the person that looked the most composed, confident, and secure and prepared was Julian Castro, hands down. There was no contest. Elizabeth Warren looked like a jack-in-the-box, plopping up and down. She nowhere came close to meeting the expectations that they have set for her.
This is all bogus. Saying that she was the big winner last night is part of the hocus-pocus of this whole thing. Now, we don’t know yet who the Drive-By Media has decided that they want to be the nominee. Now, remember, I think that they have already decided – at least ABC News has — has already decided it ain’t gonna be Joe Biden.
They did that big hit piece on him. They were joined by Page Six, gossip central in the New York Post. And we might learn a little tonight on Phase II of the big debate. But I guarantee you one of the reasons they didn’t put Elizabeth Warren on tonight was so she would stand out. Look, they’ve got a year of programming they need here. They need this contest to go on for a long time. They don’t want the nominee to be named tonight. They don’t want the nominee to be decided tonight or next week. They want this to go on.
They need something to counterprogram Trump. The Democrat presidential nomination is essentially a television series. It’s a reality show series — that’s how it’s gonna be produced. It’s how it’s gonna be covered. And so last night, Elizabeth Warren is pretty much alone in terms of other frontrunners. There’s nobody else on that stage last night that’s gonna be their nominee. Can we be honest?
Let’s go through the list. We know de Blasio’s not. de Blasio went off to a concentration camp today, as he said, he went to a migrant detention center. (imitating de Blasio) “Yeah, you know what? I got constituents in my city. They’ve got tattoos of numbers on their arm. And you know what I’m talking about. And I thought I was looking at the same thing.” Come on, putz. Just embarrassing.
Let’s see if I can remember. Got de Blasio. Who was next to de Blasio? See, we can’t even remember. The people I remember – (interruption) Tim Ryan. Tim Ryan blew it when he thought it was the Taliban that crashed the planes into the — (interruption) Oh, Tulsi lit him up, everybody lit him up. Plus, he has to be stopped because he’s got a reservoir that surfaces occasionally of what we would call being reasonable. I mean, he’s not a hundred percent gone left-wing radical leftist. Most part he is.
Okay, so Tim Ryan. What’s his name, de Blasio. (interruption) Beto. No, I’m trying to go in order here. Who’s next? He with got de Blasio. We got Tim Ryan. Beto was down on the left side — well, the right side as we were looking at it. Okay. Beto’s finished, after last night, Beto, doesn’t matter where he was, he’s finished. Beto’s done.
Beto was never gonna get the nominee. He’s never been going to be the nominee. People talk like this. He was never gonna be the nominee. In fact, why are so many people up there running? We’ll have to explore that in a second here.
My point, Elizabeth Warren was stuck in the middle of the stage because of that group of people last night, she is presumed to be far and away a more realistic potential winner of the Democrat nomination. I think — (interruption) What, now? Castro, yeah, okay. Oh! Cory Booker. Everybody’s talking about the passion of Cory Booker.
When I saw Cory Booker I really can’t tell you what I saw because it would be to expose somebody I think is an idiot that I don’t want them to know I think of ’em as an idiot. But Cory Booker last night reminded me of somebody. When Cory Booker said, “And I know what it’s like, I know what it’s like to hear gunshots when you –” What are you doing living in a neighborhood with gunshots? And then I said, “Forget it. He lives in Newark. What’s he gonna do?” (interruption) Move?
The surprise for me was Julian Castro. But look, we have to have some limits on honesty here. There’s just certain characteristics that he has no control over that are gonna ensure he’s not the nominee. But last night, in terms of just who looks best on TV, who sounded best, forget what he said. The same thing with Mayor Pete. Forget what he said. Don’t dig deep into what he said. Nobody held a candle to Julian Castro last night.
I don’t care who you name, Elizabeth Warren was a gigantic disappointment in the same measurements. She did not look confident. She didn’t look composed. She didn’t look prepared. She didn’t have any “I’m standing here” kind of presence. There wasn’t any “notice me” other than she was in the center. And they put her there on purpose.
I thought — see, I have to be real careful. Folks, everybody hears what I say. I’m not like the rest of you, you can say whatever you want about somebody and nobody will hear it. Everybody hears what I say. I have to be very careful. But that governor from the state of Washington, ho-ho-ho-ho-ho, Inslee is his name? Washington state, Governor Jay Inslee, this is the guy that gets up, has nightmares, has dreams, goes to bed on climate change.
And this guy looked like a palooka to me. I don’t know how else to describe it. Looked punch drunk like a palooka. But no chance. It ain’t happening.
This other guy, this guy from Maryland, the former member of Congress, Delaney, who was on the far right, you could tell that the moderators didn’t even know why he was there. And he was the one, there’s always one, begging for more time. “Hey,” raising hand, “notice me.”
“We’ll get to you, we’ll get to you, Delaney. Hang on. Just be cool. Your turn’s coming up.” And then they go back to Elizabeth Warren. Who was it that got most of the time last night? Do you have any idea who it was? Cory Booker got most of the time. Not good for him. Not good for him.
One of his major competitors is Kamala Harris. They sat next to each other on the Judiciary Committee during the Blasey Ford business, and they were in this little competition to see who could be the most everything, the most empathetic, the most sympathetic, the most hard-hitting. And the IQ combined, you know, wouldn’t equal an ice cream cone. Just tough to watch.
Amy Klobuchar, the binder thrower, the woman that throws things at her staff ’cause she has such high standards? Again, you could barely see her over the podium. And she had to (imitating Klobuchar) “Well, I voted for that! What do you mean, talking about it? I did that legislation. Unlike some of you up here, I actually voted for this. I actually have written legislation, unlike some of you up here. You may not know who I am, but I’ve done big things.” Okay. That’s over.
(interruption) Snerdley asked what did I think about the attacks on the Turtle? That kind of caught me off guard. I had no idea that there was this much animosity toward the Turtle! These people really hate the Turtle! I’m thinking the Turtle’s watching this, he and his wife, Elaine Chao, they’re watching probably at home, and they’re turning to each, “Hey, man. Look at this. They really hate us. This is a good night for us. I mean, we’re getting talked about here.”
I guess, you know, the Turtle really ticked them off with Merrick Garland. I think that’s what that all goes back to. Now the Turtle has said (imitating Mitch McConnell), “Hell, yes, if 2020 and a Supreme Court vacancy comes up, damn right I would move a nominee.”
“Well, you didn’t with Merrick Garland.”
“Well, that’s because it wasn’t my party. What do you expect me to do? Of course I’m gonna move my party nominee forward. Who do you think I am?”
No, they were angry at the Turtle last night. I mean, there was a lot of vituperation aimed at the Turtle. And I was surprised by it. You know why? Because most of us don’t think the Turtle is formidable. We think Republicans in the Senate get rolled. And obviously the Turtle has ticked these people off.
Now, who am I leaving out? We got to Inslee, we got to Delaney, we got to Booker, we got to the binder thrower, we got to the Indian, we got to the putz, the mayor of New York, we got Tulsi. Folks, let me grab the sound bite, because if this was a drinking game last night, I’d a won this one. Hang on just a second. What number is Tulsi Gabbard? I guess number 14.
Remember when I was at the golf tournament, had this guest in, he made me watch the CNN town hall that featured her in one hour and Mayor Pete in the other? And we got to the point where we were starting to predict when she would say the word “serve” or “service,” because that was the sole reason she was running. “I’ve served. I want to serve. I think of this job as being in service. I love service. I have served, I will serve, I want to serve.”
We started rolling on the floor laughing, because being so predictable that she — well, Cookie put together a montage last night. Miami, NBC, night one, Democrat debate. Here’s a montage of Tulsi Gabbard and her comments last night during the debate.
GABBARD: I still serve as a major. I served over 16 years, deployed twice to the Middle East, and in Congress serve on the foreign affairs and armed services committee. I will take your hard-earned taxpayer dollars instead invest those dollars into serving your needs. This president and his chicken hawk cabinet have led us to the brink of war with Iran. I served in the war in Iraq. I serve on the equality caucus. I’ve served with LGBTQ service members. Our nation was founded on the principles of service.
RUSH: All right. So you’re asking me what I think of Tulsi last night. Well, Tulsi strikes me that she doesn’t expect to be the nominee, but she won the Drudge poll. The Daily Mail has a story, she won the Drudge poll. People that voted on Drudge thought that she outshined or outshone everybody else. And she was composed, and she had her own good, decent quantity of confidence and so forth. And she also has an advantage over many of the others that were on that stage. Well, it’s not an advantage that I really want to mention or talk about.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: There was a quite telling moment last night. F. Chuck Todd kept berating these people on their opinions and stated positions on guns and basically getting rid of them, and Chuck Todd was dissatisfied. Every person he asked about this would not take it on, head on. They answered it running around the edges, trying not to answer it, giving half-baked answers, and he kept boring in on this. Now, I know that the Marjory Stoneman Douglas school is right up the road from where they were. But it was quite… It was interesting.
I mean, F. Chuck, obviously (you know, as a senior member of the Washington establishment media (thinks that he is part of the people that make the narrative every day, and he’s trying to create a narrative that these guys are going after your guns, and they didn’t want to go there. That’s what I found fascinating. Here you have these Democrats running for president; you would think that they’d go all Gabby Gifford on everybody and just join in on the whole concept of taking everybody’s guns away.
And they didn’t go anywhere near it. Quite illustrative, folks. And then! And then! I don’t know about you, but did you know that Miami is burning and is about gone because of climate change? Did you know that our towns and cities are burning and that the sea levels are rising, and that Miami may never be the same again? That’s where they were! You know, Inslee is saying, “Look out the window! Miami’s vanishing before our very eyes!”
I said, “What?”
And nobody questions it! There wasn’t one person on the moderator panel saying, “Are you crazy?” And there wasn’t any other candidate. Here. Grab audio sound bite number 12. Jay Inslee, the former governor of the state of Washington. This is the guy that I thought I was watching a palooka. (Look it up if you don’t know. It’s not a bad thing. It’s a barroom brawler.) Question from Rachel Maddow: “Governor Inslee, we’re here in Miami, which is already experiencing serious flooding on sunny days as a result of sea level rise.”
You know, folks, this isn’t true. They said the same thing about Honolulu, and what they forgot to tell you is it’s king tides that cause this. It’s a regularly scheduled, regularly occurring meteorological phenomena that is not related to human activity in any way, shape, manner, or form. We simply don’t have the ability to control the temperature, the amount of rainfall, the amount of sunlight. None of it! We cannot change anything about the weather! No matter what we do, we cannot!
Therefore, we cannot cause any changes in the weather! All of this is so bogus! And here this guy is literally telling people that Miami is burning and flooding, and her question… Sunny days? She doesn’t mention that we’re in the midst of a humongous rainy season here in south Florida. I live on the beach. I live on the ocean. The shoreline hasn’t changed an iota. This is all absurd! This is the kind of stuff in politics that rubs me raw. This is so obviously infantile insane, and nobody calls ’em on it. Anyway, here’s Inslee talking about it…
INSLEE: Yes. First, by taking away the filibuster from Mitch McConnell to start with.
CROWD: (applause)
INSLEE: We have to do that. Look! Look! We are the first generation to feel the sting of climate change, and we are the last that can do something about it. Our towns are burning! Our fields are flooding! Miami is — is inundated! And we have to understand: This is a climate crisis, an emergency, and it is our last chance in an administration — next one — to do something about it.
RUSH: Now, this is fearmongering and panic-mongering that’s even beyond these people. “We are the first generation to feel the [effects] of climate change”? What about the Eskimos back during the first glacial period? What is this! I’m sorry, folks. My tolerance and patience for this kind of inanity is really, really vanishing. “We are the first generation to feel the sting of climate change”? How about the Little Warming Period in the Medieval Ice Age? Pfft! This guy is just… I’m out of descriptions. “We are the first generation to feel the sting … and we are the last that can do something about it”?
We can’t do anything about it except adapt to it.
The climate and the weather always change. There’s nothing constant about it. If it was constant, then we would not need weather forecasts — which are oftentimes wrong! I wonder how that is? So get everybody all worked up and fundraise off of this. F. Chuck Todd said, “Look, it’s a simple question. What’s the biggest threat? Who is the biggest geopolitical threat to the United States?” He’d been asking these people all night, and not one of them had said, “Trump,” and that’s why he kept asking. He wants just one of these people here to say, “The biggest threat is Trump.”
So the palooka, Jay Inslee, came through…
INSLEE: The biggest threat to the security of the United States is Donald Trump!
CROWD: (cheers)
RUSH: F. Chuck Todd says, “Okay, finally, you bird brains! I’ve been asking every one of you this and finally one of you gets it.” Do you know it’s amazing how little Trump came up last night? I mean, he got some mentions. But you know what’s even more amazing? Do you know who did not even get a mention last night? (interruption) Tell me. Take a stab. (interruption) That’s right. The former vice president, Joe Biden, did not get a mention last night. Now, neither did Crazy Bernie. There were some ancillary, “Well, like Crazy Bernie said… Uh, like Senator Sanders has said…” But there wasn’t one person that even felt it necessary to go after Plugs, ’cause it’s obvious none of them think he’s going to be around long.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Here’s Paula in Vero Beach, Florida, barely hanging on amongst rising sea levels. Great to have you on the EIB Network. Hi.
CALLER: How are you, Rush?
RUSH: I’m good.
CALLER: I want to ask you a question.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: And thank you very much for taking my call. God bless you and I hope you continue on for many years. I want to get your opinion on something I was thinking about with all these Democrats running for the presidency. They have 22 people lined up there and they’re going all over the country. I believe this is a setup from the Democratic Party to have their message be sent out to more constituents throughout the country. Rather than having one or two people that are going to run, have 22 and have them flood the entire country with their message. They’re all talking about the same thing. They’re all talking about the same issues. And they’re just way more people than an average election year.
RUSH: Well, there may be an element of truth in that, although you’re describing a conspiracy, and that conspiracy is that somebody at the upper levels of the media and the Democrat Party have decreed that we will have 20 candidates, we’ll have crowded debate scenarios so that we will have candidates fanning out across the country, spreading our message and flooding the zone with it.
Well, I don’t actually think that’s what’s going on, although, you know, they were expecting — and this could have been a sandbag, too — but the Democrat grand pooh-bahs were expecting a television audience of nine million last night. You know what they got? Seventeen million I think is what the projection is gonna be.
There’s a link at the Drudge Report that says it could reach 17. The original, the overnights said 10 million, which is right near the expectations. But then there’s a link that I haven’t had time to click on that says it might be as high as 17 million. Now, granted, they’re not gonna get 17 million tuning in with a debate of two people. But this crowded field is not gonna last that long either.
There may be an element of this. I have no doubt that the media will work with Democrats to flood the zone with the Democrat message no matter who it is saying it. But there’s another reason for this in addition. Every one of these people, and especially those who have no intention of being the nominee — and I don’t know what percentage that is.
I’m gonna tell you the vast majority of people running know flat-out they don’t have a prayer of being the nominee, so why do it? Well, there is, first and foremost, the fund-raising. You wonder how people can make $150,000 a year and end up leaving Congress millionaires? Here you go.
Each of these people have, I think the floor is they’ve each raised at least a million, and some of them much more than that. And the way the election law is written, there are provisions for unspent campaign money to be converted in certain ways for so-called personal use after certain circumstances have been met. And then you can also transfer that money or donate it to other candidates and have leverage in that way.
But in many ways it’s simply a publicity stunt. It’s get yourself on TV, get yourself widely known, collecting a bunch of money, and then once you do this, once you run, forever on your resume, “Former presidential candidate,” which means CNN might hire you as an analyst or MSNBC might ask you to come on as a contributor, or Fox.
It’s a way of getting a high-paid media gig and bringing experience to the table. “Well, yeah, Shep, when I was running for president back in 2020, part of that crowded Democrat field, one of the things” — and you become an instant expert in the whole process of running for president.
So there’s all kinds of personal enrichment, career planning reasons to do something like this that would have nothing to do with winning. Look, half these people have to know, if not more, that they’re not gonna get the nomination. Yet they are doing this.
It could be to set up their next campaign, somebody in the House wants to go for the Senate. Somebody in the Senate wants to set themselves up as a potential vice presidential nominee. There could be any number of career advancement reasons or explanations for this.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: So I’m getting a few emails. “Rush, what do you mean, you didn’t hear the Democrats talk about wanting to get rid of guns? They sure did.” Yeah, yeah, yeah. I misspoke. It took Chuck Todd three times to get ’em to open up on it. What I’m saying is that it was not the top tier issue that it has been in the past.
And, for example, one person, Tim Ryan, said, “Oh, I agree with what everybody has said here.” And they were all saying, “I want the guns off the street. I’m tired of hearing guns in my neighborhood. Let’s do gun buyback.”
I mean, it was not something on which any of these people were staking their campaigns. That’s all I mean. I mean, of course they’re gonna come out against guns, but I’m just saying that Chuck Todd had to work at it to get ’em to that position.