McCain’s Biggest Asset: Rush?

RUSH: Let’s go right to the audio sound bites. In fact, let’s start with number two. No, let’s go ahead and start with number one. This is PMSNBC, the Morning Joe show today, with Joe Scarborough. Mika Brzezinski, who is the daughter of Zbigniew Brzezinski, the former national security advisor during the disastrous Carter years, she is talking with the correspondent David Gregory about how an endorsement of McCain by me would sink McCain.

BRZEZINSKI: I’m reading Richard Cohen this morning. He says that ‘nothing commends McCain more than his enemies. The fact that Rush Limbaugh hates him is a pretty good reason by itself to vote for McCain. It’s not always possible to judge a man by his friends, but his enemies will always tell you something.’ So the question I guess for John McCain moving forward, is how does he sort of bridge that divide with the base, and does he really need to when it’s these kind of blabbermouths who are leading the way. Give me some insight as to why this is so important.

GREGORY: He needs the conservative base behind him, particularly because of the enthusiasm you see on the Democratic side. So come November, he’s gotta get conservatives to come out and vote, and, yeah, the argument goes that as long — you know, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, they’re against McCain. It’s only going to help him with his own base of those independent voters that will be so important in November. No question about that; that he’s gotta maintain that core of independent voters for him.

RUSH: One of the things that has amazed me throughout all of this, ladies and gentlemen, is the narrow mindedness, the narrow focus of people in the Drive-Bys. Mika Brzezinski was reading from Richard Cohen today in the Washington Post. Now, Cohen said, look, the worst thing that could happen to McCain is if Limbaugh endorsed him because then the independents would run for the hills and the Democrats who are going to vote for McCain would run for the hills. It’s too late, Cohen. I said that myself yesterday. If I really wanted to torpedo McCain, I would endorse him, because that would send the independents and liberals that are going to vote for him running away faster than anything. What people don’t realize is I’m doing McCain the biggest favor that could be done for him by staying out of this. If I endorsed him thoroughly, with passion, that would end the independents and moderates, because they so despise me, and they so hate me.

Now, if I were a member of the Drive-By Media, I would dig deeper than the surface here. They’re all obsessed — and, by the way, they all want to talk to me — TIME Magazine, New York Times, New York Times magazine, you would think I’m running for office. We’ve got a list of requests of people that want to talk to me, and they all want to talk about the same thing: Why do you not like McCain? What in the world is it with McCain? How come you don’t like McCain? That’s basically the theme. Now, if I were one of these guys, I would go a little bit further. Now, this may be where they have their problem. If I were a Drive-By looking at all this, the first thing I’d say is, ‘Limbaugh is not stupid.’ But they may not go there. They may think I am. But, do you think it might intrigue them — look at what Cohen wrote. They think I’m against McCain. They think I’m trying to torpedo McCain. They think I’m trying to savage McCain. They think I have an animus toward McCain. And yet, am I not doing the best thing in the world for his candidacy based on the way he structured it? He wants independents; he wants Democrats; he wants people from across the aisle joining our party to give him his electoral majority, correct? Who is helping him accomplish that? Me.

It is I, El Rushbo, the all-knowing, all-caring, all-feeling, all-sensing, all-concerned, all-everything El Rushbo. So couldn’t it be said, if somebody wanted to in an enterprising way, go there, couldn’t it be said that I am secretly supporting Senator McCain because I secretly do want him to win, but I know full well that if I come out and endorse him, he’s cooked, because I’m going to tell you this, if I were to endorse McCain, the conservatives in this audience who are opposed to him are not going to join him because I say so. This is another area where the Drive-Bys totally don’t get it. They think everybody out there is receiving marching orders. If I endorsed McCain today, next week, August, if I came out and actually endorsed McCain, that’s when my audience would have trouble with me. So I’m sitting here, I’m covering two bases at the same time, both beneficial to me, and the Drive-Bys are stuck on this, and even after explaining this to them — Kit, they’re going to call you now, ‘Does Limbaugh say, does he really mean that this is how he’s supporting McCain?’ And your answer is going to be, ‘I don’t know. You heard him say what I said. He put it out there as something for you guys to think about. You guys are enterprising journalists. He’s encouraging you to get away from the one track mind that you’re on and write something different from all of your other so-called colleagues.’

Look, we all know that McCain wants to win. He’s very proud of this. Richard Cohen, independents, moderates, no wonder the left is excited for McCain. They want to vote for him. Some of them do, and McCain wants to win that way. And if McCain wins, who loses? Obama or Hillary. Is that not good for our side for those guys to lose? So who may be, in this whole kit and caboodle, in this whole shebang, who may be the most valuable asset McCain has? Me.