Analysis: Timing Is Everything

RUSH: Let me do some little analysis here on timing for all of this stuff to have happened to Mrs. Clinton now. We’re into the third week of a slow bleed, and it all started, I think — I can’t prove it — but I think it all started on this program the day of the debate in Philadelphia at Drexel University when I read a story on the Associated Press talking about how radioactive the issue of driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants in New York was for Mrs. Clinton. The reporter said, ‘This is radioactive.’ I said, ‘Well, ask her about it!’ The story was about how nobody is asking her about it because it’s radioactive. I said, ‘Ask her about it.’ That night she was asked about it by Tim Russert, and she flubbed it, she flip-flopped it, she blew it big time in ways that we don’t need to recount. On a conference call later the next day, a bunch of Clinton supporters were discussing all this, how to stratergize around it and what to do about it, and according to the Hill newspaper, one of them even said, ‘Russert should be shot,’ and then said, ‘I shouldn’t say that on a conference call.’

Now, also, in the process of this, folks, we have dealt, perhaps, too soon to say, but we have dealt a damaging, perhaps fatal blow to Governor Eliot Spitzer’s plan to give illegals driver’s licenses. So we have a twofer there. We have Mrs. Clinton off the highway, the guardrails didn’t protect her, she’s in the SUV and it’s rolling over there. She had to get Clinton out to start defending her. Then, of course, came not tipping the waitresses; then comes the planted questions; then Bill Clinton says boys are ganging up on her here; then Mrs. Clinton had to say that she was a woman and they’re attacking her because she’s a woman, and she says no, I can handle it, I’m tough, I’m your girl and blah, blah, blah. You know all this. Now we’ve got this ongoing bleed with the student and planted questions, and the Clinton, Inc., war room today warning Wolf Blitzer that he better not gang up on her, he better not do any personal attack Russert-type questions Thursday night at the debate in Las Vegas, or else. They didn’t say or else, but it was a warning.

I speculated earlier that Wolf may want to beg off the debate because who’s going to take care of his children, just like these diplomats in the State Department don’t want to go to Iraq, because who’s going to take care of their children? Wolf, by the way, get a cup. I don’t know that Wolf’s listening. I know he listens. If he’s not listening, somebody tell Wolf to get a cup. I know people at CNN monitor this show. You people at Media Matters, I know you’re listening, tell Wolf to get a cup. Well, I could send him one but I don’t know if mine would fit him. But nevertheless, let’s look at the timing of this, ladies and gentlemen. Here we are shortly before Thanksgiving, and all of this is happening. Up ’til the past three weeks, it has been smooth sailing. Mrs. Clinton is reporting all this marvelous fundraising superiority, magnified, big leads in the polls, wherever you look. Now, all of a sudden, this little slow bleed is happening, and it shows no signs of abating. Now, it could all abate, if she comes out of the box with a bang, big-time performance Thursday night in the debate, then, you know, these things can turn on a dime, and if she comes out and is forceful, answers these questions, then Hillary has weathered the storm. So that’s a possibility.

But if that doesn’t happen, if the slow bleed continues, we’re going to be at Thanksgiving next week, and the news cycle over Thanksgiving, everybody tones it down, you got football games on the weekend, college and pro, families getting together, the whole mess. The news cycle sort of goes slow. Then, right after that, you get into December, and hello holiday time, and it’s sort of like August and July. Those are interruptions into what I call normalcy. It’s like radio ratings in July and August, you don’t pay much attention to them because people are not living their normal lives. Vacations, kids are out of school, same thing in December. Plus, you know, the Drive-Bys are going to be guaranteed to be pounding us with horrible economic news. So the last thing that people are going to remember is this slow bleed of Mrs. Clinton’s, unless they can do something to make big news in December, to get rid of this. Then the Hawkeye Cauci, January 3rd, right after the Christmas holidays are over!

So my point is, there’s not a whole lot of time to turn this around if it continues, and if she doesn’t have a boffo performance on Thursday night. You can talk all you want about Wolf Blitzer, the Clinton, Inc. can warn Wolf Blitzer all they want, but I tell you if her opponents have any gonads, they’re not going to have to depend on Wolf Blitzer in order to go after her on some of this stuff. In a normal campaign, that’s what would happen. In a normal debate, the moderator is just there to sound the warning bell when your time is over but, if the Breck Girl wants to get into it, roll up the sleeves, same thing with Obama — you know, talking about Obama turning up the heat, I don’t think he’s got the personality right now to turn up the heat on a stove. But we’ll have to see. We’ll just have to watch and see on Thursday night. But the timing of this could not be worse, quote, unquote, for Mrs. Clinton.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: John in Bossier City, Louisiana. Glad you called, sir. Glad to have you with us.

CALLER: Yeah, I was just kind of curious since there’s nothing with the Clintons that’s coincidence, I’m wondering if all this stuff that’s coming out about her here recently isn’t maybe orchestrated to show that she can overcome adversity, like it was with Barack Obama.

RUSH: Well, that’s a possibility. I mentioned that to somebody this morning who said, ‘Do you think the wheels are really coming off the bus here?’ I said, ‘It’s possible that the wheels are really coming off the bus, but I don’t know. This would be a tough one to orchestrate. There are a lot of people involved in this now, but it could well be that this is all being done to show that Hillary can overcome, and that she can strike back, and that she can deal with adversity, and that when the slow bleed starts that she can stanch it, and that she can do it without a Band-Aid.’ It’s possible. But what is it that inspires your question? What inspires your question is a combination of my telling you that nothing that happens with the Clintons is coincidence, combined with your instinct that this is a scheming, conniving bunch of people who plan and orchestrate everything. So even when the wheels appear to be coming off the bus, people think, ‘A-ha! Is this genuine or are they staging this for our benefit?’ We’ll find out. It won’t be long. If there’s a real knockout debate performance on Thursday night, if she really turns this around, then all of this will be forgotten, and the talk will be about how she put it back together, ‘Ah, she really overcame adversity and then we’ll know.’ It’s just a couple days. We will watch and we will learn. We will also find out whether or not CNN and Wolf Blitzer end up being intimidated by being warned by Clinton, Inc., not to be Russert-like in his moderating of the debate.