RUSH: So, yesterday, Bolton comes out, does his thing. You know, one of his former chiefs of staff — Fred Fleitz, I think is his name — has called on Bolton to withdraw the book, says that it’s shameful, dangerous and inexplicable. Fred Fleitz, John Bolton’s former chief of staff.

Fred Fleitz “wrote an op-ed calling for Bolton to withdraw the book from circulation. Fleitz said, ‘I don’t understand the need for a former national security adviser to publish a tell-all book critical of a president he served during a presidential election campaign that’s gonna determine the fate of the country. There will be a time for Bolton to speak out without appearing to try to tip a presidential election.’

“Fred Fleitz also said, ‘Presidents have to be able to candidly consult with their advisers without worrying they’re gonna leak these discussions for the media or get high dollar book contracts to publish them. This book may set a dangerous precedent since it could discourage future presidents from seeking advice from expert advisers on sensitive national security matters.'” You know, as I have shared with you over the course of the many years that I’ve hosted this program, this whole notion of advisers has really been a big bugaboo with me.

The whole notion of advisers and strategists on the premise the candidate has no idea what he thinks, the candidate has no idea what his policy is, so he needs some advisers? Of course, there’s a big push from the establishment class to get advisers in there. This is what happened to Trump during his campaign. He didn’t have a foreign policy team. He was running the campaign, it’s early on, and everybody says, “You need some foreign policy advisers!”

Trump said, “Why? I know what I want my foreign policy to be.”

“Well, you just… You need advisers. Every campaign needs advisers!”

So he went out and hired a bunch of people. One of them was Papadopoulos — and he never met him, didn’t know what Papadopoulos was. Papadopoulos ended up being chosen by the FBI and the deep state to run a scam to try to implicate Trump in the Russia collusion story. Bolton was put in there. Bolton was there because people convinced Trump, “Hey, for your credibility you need somebody that your voters like.

“You need somebody in there that’s really tough, really pro-America, really isn’t gonna take any guff. He’s really gonna do your bidding for us.” So he goes out and gets Bolton. And then for whatever reason I think, Bolton… The story I got is that Bolton wanted to expand our military presence in various places, which goes counter to Trump policy — and then the usual allegations that Bolton was leaking. I think everybody in the Trump White House leaks or has at one point or another.

So Bolton gets fired, doesn’t like getting fired, says he didn’t get fired, says he resigned. Trump says, “No, I fired him. He wasn’t doing what I wanted him to do.” So now here we will with a tell-all book timed… I mean, the timing of this release, this anonymously sourced release? Nobody that’s reported on this has even seen the manuscript yet. There’s a second edition to the Bolton story now.

It’s that Bill Barr, the attorney general, reportedly told Bolton he was really worried, really worried that Trump’s out there giving aid and comfort to dictators in Turkey and I forget the other country. Trump’s out there; he’s making it easy for these dictators to be dictators. Trump adviser these dictators. Trump likes dictators. Trump is very friendly with dictators, loves Xi Jinping in China, loves the dictators.

So now the story is that Trump himself is a wannabe dictator and that Bolton’s book establishes this. Bill Barr is out there saying, “This didn’t happen. That conversation never happened.” There’s also an alleged conversation with Mulvaney about something similar; Mulvaney’s denying that that conversation ever happened. So yesterday when the Bolton thing hit, of course, I compared it to Kavanaugh and the timing.

Here comes the Drive-By Media — who hate Bolton! Any day of the week, they have hated Bolton. They have accused Bolton of being a misogynist. They’ve accused him of being mean-spirited to women. They’ve attacked him for having a mustache. They’ve attacked him for being an autocrat. They’ve said Bolton is an out-of-control military hawk, can’t wait to blow up the world. They hate guy!

But now? Now they love the guy. So this morning on CNN’s Newsroom. There’s a little report about the blowback against or Bolton that occurred yesterday.

SARA MURRAY: “It’s certainly safe to say that his stock has fallen with the Republican Party. Here is just a look at some of those attacks. Senator Rand Paul called him “a disgruntled employee.” Uh, Senator Josh Hawley called him, “not a firsthand witness,” which is confusing because, actually, he is a firsthand witness. Uh, Senator John Barrasso had to say, “There’s nothing new here; he’s just trying to sell books.” Rush Limbaugh, of course, weighed in, calling Bolton “disloyal.”

RUSH: That last name in: “Rush Limbaugh, of course, weighed in, calling Bolton ‘disloyal.'” Well, what would you call it? And now there are stories everywhere that people that end up working for Trump all hate his guts, and people that work for Trump realize how dangerous Trump is, and people that work for Trump realize how out-of-control and unsophisticated and ignorant that Donald Trump is — and so they have to go out and leak to protect the country.

They have to go out and leak. They have to let everybody know how dangerous things are for the United States right now in the world because Donald Trump is president. Meanwhile, everywhere you look and in any measure of United States strength, United States ability to project power, we are at a peak high. Our economy is stronger and more resilient than it has been in 50 years.

There are more people working. There are fewer people unemployed, both in real-term numbers and statistically percentage-wise, than in 50 years. There has been simply a massive reversal of fortunes for the United States of America in areas that make a difference for the general population of this country, and these people just for some reason cannot stand it, and it shows no signs of ending.

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RUSH: Here’s Greg in Atlanta. Great to have you, sir. I’m glad you called, and I’m glad you held on and be patient. Hello.

CALLER: Oh, thanks, Rush. Longtime listener, first-time caller. So I wanted your take on this Bolton business, because nobody on the left or the right has really talked about it, and that is we’re gonna find out real quick what Bolton knows (chuckles), either through his testimony or his book. If it’s not corroborated through any other witnesses or people or evidence, it’s a he said/he said thing. And what will happen, at the Kavanaugh trial or thousand years (chuckling) of due process has taught us anything, you can’t give Trump a parking tickets for that never mind impeach a president. We’re gonna impeach a president because John Bolton said so or anyone else, for that matter?

RUSH: Let me… Wait a minute. Let me see if I understand what you’re saying. So all we have right now is an anonymous source claiming to have seen the manuscript in which John Bolton says that President Trump told him that he wanted to withhold the aid until Ukraine did an investigation. So your question is, “Okay. When the book comes out, and if that is verified, if that’s what Bolton actually says, but then over here Trump is denying, then it’s he said/he said. If there’s nobody around to corroborate Bolton’s claim, then you’re asking how the hell can we impeach or convict the president because of that?”

CALLER: That is absolutely correct. He’s already been… Bill Barr has already refuted in the Justice Department what he said between those two. And, you know, selling a book doesn’t lend any kind of credibility to him on top of that. But I’m just saying, you need more than just, “Hey, believe me, folks. It’s just because I said so.”

RUSH: Well —

CALLER: I mean, isn’t that Kavanaugh all over again?

RUSH: — you gotta look at the objective of the people that made this happen, and this would be whoever leaked it and the New York Times. So what is their objective here? The objective… We must say — we have to — the objective has never been truth, because they’ve never been right about anything. They lied to us about Blasey Ford story, Kavanaugh.

The whole Trump-Russia collusion thing was one lie after another, never anything substantiated. There was no crime, there wasn’t any collusion, none of it. So there’s no truth here, either that can be firmly established. Dershowitz said yesterday, “Even if what Bolton said happened, happened, there’s nothing in it that is impeachable!” So what is the objective that’s behind this? That’s the real question.

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RUSH: All right. So let me answer my own question, ’cause I don’t want to leave you hanging. What’s the objective here? Remember when this all started, I was asking everybody, “What is the real point here. They know they’re not going to get a conviction, so what are they doing? What’s the purpose?” Remember when Pelosi delayed sending the articles of impeachment over to the Senate, I asked, “What’s she trying to do?”

I think now it’s obvious. Let’s stick with the idea that they’re not gonna get a conviction, although I think, as days go by, there are those on the anti-Trump side who are beginning to dream about it. But the objective… What was the purpose when the Kavanaugh thing happened? It’s exactly what’s happening here. This is the same playbook. It’s the same thing that the Comey book attempted to do with Trump.

It is the timing of this Bolton release is identical to out of the blue comes Christine Blasey Ford. When did that happen? It happened on the verge of Kavanaugh’s confirmation, and it was designed to do what? Stop it, and expand the investigation, quote-unquote. Remember all the talk about bringing the FBI back in? They got to Jeff Flake, and so the FBI was brought back in, and the point of all that was to just delay the confirmation so that they could bring up a bunch of smack.

Just make up a bunch of crap, throw it up against the wall, and hope and pray that it would get the guy’s nomination pulled by Donald Trump — and in that instance, it was about stopping Kavanaugh. He was on the verge of being confirmed and so they had to stop it. They had the Blasey Ford story waiting to drop if needed, and it was. This is an exact the replay. The Bolton leak is the Blasey Ford letter to her member of Congress. So what’s the objective? The objective is to prevent the acquittal.

The objective is to prolong this trial by demanding witnesses. Now, if there is a vote for witnesses — and, of course, you’re Pierre Delecto — “I think we need to hear from witnesses!” If you’re Susan Collins, “I think we need to hear from witnesses,” all because of this phony Bolton leak. Well, guess what? That’s gonna have to be litigated in court. The president’s gonna try to stop Bolton from testifying, and he’s gonna be legitimate in his effort to assert executive privilege.

“Well, Bolton doesn’t work there anymore!” But he did at the time all of this is relevant — and so, anyway, that’s a court fight. That prolongs the time, and during the prolonging of the trial, guess what window opens? “Let’s dirty Trump up some more! Let’s bring up…” What’s gonna be behind Bolton? What’s the next leak when the Bolton thing bombs, when it doesn’t work? What’s next? There’s always gonna be something next the Democrats are gonna do. There’s always gonna be the next Christine Blasey Ford.

There’s always gonna be the next Comey, and now there’s always gonna be the next Bolton. What is it gonna be? The objective is to keep this going is that more dirt can be thrown so that some of it might stick to Trump so that it might eventually harm his reelection chances in 2020. So that it might lead to some of these weak-kneed Republicans actually voting to convict. If they can keep this going for more months, they’ve got a 2020 campaign issue: “The president’s unfitness to serve in office.”

And you know how it’s gonna go. The media and everybody will say, “The Democrats and the House managers are proving their case and the president knows it and they’re just stalling and they’re stalling, and they’re trying to keep you from learning the truth.” And their crescendo that this man’s unqualified because he cheated in 2016 and colluded with Russia gonna come back to life, and this whole thing is gonna just be on a Groundhog Day kind of repeat. The objective is to stall the acquittal.

Remember, that’s always been the puzzling thing. Why in the world do this when you know, at the end of it, the president’s gonna be effectively said to be not guilty? So they’re trying to dirty up the verdict. They’re trying to make people doubt, and they’re gonna say, “The Republicans are partisan, the Republicans are racist, the Republicans are bigots,” whatever the usual cliches are. Now, every one of these has blown up in their face.

Kavanaugh blew up.

Mueller blew up.

Every one of them has blown up.

The whistleblower? The whistleblower has blown up. This talk, “How about we trade one witness for your witness”? Well, that’s not… Dawn, you’re a court reporter. Have you ever seen in court lawyers agree to trade witnesses? (interruption) Okay. “You want that witness? I’ll give you that witness if you give me mine.” “Okay. So we’ll have two witnesses. You get one. I get one.” That’s not how this works, but that’s what’s being proposed — and that’s what these fools like Romney are thinking makes sense?

That it’s fairness? They’re trying to prolong and prevent the acquittal and then ultimately dirty it up. Because they’ve got one objective, and that one objective hasn’t changed: Trump is illegitimate. Trump didn’t really win. Trump shouldn’t be president. Trump stole it, Trump cheated, Trump’s unqualified, Trump’s a creep, Trump’s an ogre, Trump’s whatever. He shouldn’t be there. That’s why this needs to just be shut down! Declare it over, summary judgment.

After the Republicans have presented their case, the president’s lawyers presented their case, take a vote. Screw this witnesses business and end this! Who cares what the media says about you? Look, I’m just gonna repeat myself on one thing. For the longest time Republicans have believed that it was their death knell to make a big deal about being pro-life. Republican women told Republican men, “You better get rid of this issue.

“I’m tired of it. You can’t tell me what I can and can’t do with my body! I don’t want to go to the convention with these pro-life hayseeds. I’m tired of it. You get rid of it.” Now guess what? The pro-choice part of the Republican Party is gone, and the only part of the Republican Party is pro-life. It’s a major political victory.

And the president, Donald Trump, is the first sitting president to ever attend a pro-life rally in person, and he’s still alive, and he’s still climbing in the polls. So all of this conventional wisdom that says Republicans will die or get killed politically if they do this or do that? None of it’s true. Trump’s showing the way. He’s demonstrating this, issue after issue.

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RUSH: This is Tim. Tim’s in Idaho. Great to have you on the program today, Tim. Hello.

CALLER: Hi, Rush. Mega Rush Baby dittos. It is a huge honor to be on the air with you.

RUSH: I understand. Thank you very much.

CALLER: (chuckles) My question was thinking about Bolton and testifying and everything the last few days is I wanted to get your opinion as the genius host, on the likelihood that he turns out to be another Colonel Oliver North, that after all this hubbub they maybe end up doing a deal. They allow him to testify so it doesn’t drag on impeachment, and he gets up there, and it’s a giant nothing burger. There’s nothing about —

RUSH: Well, you know, you are not alone in speculating this, but I think this is mostly wishful thinking.

CALLER: It is?

RUSH: Because Bolton has been making it known in recent weeks that he wants to testify. Whenever the subject of witnesses against Trump has been brought up, Bolton has raised his hand. “I’ll do it! I want to testify.” So the assumption has been that Bolton wants to come in and drop the hammer on the Trumpster. So here comes this leak from his book that the New York Times hasn’t seen.

It’s just an anonymously sourced leak. We know who the leak is from. It’s from the National Security Council, ’cause they’re the only ones that vet books like this. It has to be somebody there — and we do know that the brother of Lieutenant Colonel Vindman — O say can you see — is on the Security Council and does do this. So there have been some people saying, “Yeah, what you know what?

“Bolton, he’s a smart guy. He wants to come and he wants to drop the hammer on the Democrats, Rush!” So your theory is that they go through all this and they get to testimony and they get the witness and Bolton comes in and starts praising Trump to the hilt, and starts contradicting everything in the leak. I actually think it’s wishful thinking more than it is reality. But time may tell on this. Have to see.