RUSH: Bill in southern West Virginia. It’s great to have you on the program, sir. Hello.
RUSH: Let me tell you my thoughts on this since you asked.
CALLER: Okay.
RUSH: Nothing prohibits me from offering an opinion on Open Line Friday, either. And it’s typical that a caller would call and want to call what I think on Open Line Friday. Everybody does. I think that you’re right that they focused on two or three places with a lot of effort, lotta union people in Pennsylvania 12, residents there. Saw story today that the unions plan on spending $100 million nationwide on Democrat congressional races in November during the campaigns. But I want to focus on Pennsylvania 12 because there appears to be a growing body of thought on our side, including Newt Gingrich. Newt Gingrich said (summarized), ‘You know, I’m going to have to revise downward my predictions on Republican strength in November. If we didn’t take advantage of all this to beat this guy in Pennsylvania 12, we’re in trouble.’
Paul Gigot, the Wall Street Journal, same thing. They’re really bashing the Republicans for being lackadaisical, taking too much for granted, thinking it’s going to be a sweep; they just gotta get out of the way and say, ‘We’re not Democrats’ and so forth. They’re looking at Pennsylvania 12 and they’re saying, ‘You know what…?’ By the way, I have no brief for the Republicans here. Don’t misunderstand. If you wanted to call here and tell me the Republicans are a bunch of incompetent cowards right now, you wouldn’t get an argument from me. But the Republicans being cowardly, or what have you, had nothing to do with what happened in Pennsylvania 12.
What I want to know is: When did the new test for our strength in November become being able to win in 2-1 Democrat-to-Republican districts? When did that start? My friends, the dirty little secret is we don’t have to win 2-1 Democrat districts in order to gain control of the House. I also want to know what we are supposed to do when the Democrat candidate, in a Democrat 2-1 district, runs against Obama and does so more effectively than our guy does. I want to know. The guy that did this, Mr. Critz, had a relationship, an association with Murtha — who, whether you like it or not, was very popular there. He brought home a lot of bacon. This guy, Mr. Critz, ran against health care. He ran against cap and trade. He ran against a number of things.
The thing he said he was going to do was bring home the bacon. Now, I look at things from a conservative-versus-liberal point of view, not so much Republican versus Democrat. I know a lot of people do otherwise. The people analyzing this are not, obviously, looking at it as criticism versus liberalism. They’re looking at it as Republican-versus-Democrat and the Republican lost. Well, what does it tell us — and I’m asking you. What does it tell us when we lose to a Democrat who sounds more like me than the Republican does? And the Republican wasn’t bad. He wasn’t an incompetent candidate. What had to happen there and what obviously didn’t happen is that the Republican candidate did not say what was going on.
He said, ‘Don’t believe Mr. Critz. Mr. Critz is not telling you who he really is. Mr. Critz is not going to vote against Obama if he’s elected to this seat. He’s going to be voting with Obama. He’s going to be voting with Pelosi.’ Now, maybe that’s what everybody’s upset about, that the Republicans didn’t have the gonads or the intelligence to make that part of the campaign. But I really don’t think we’re falling off the cliff. I don’t think the end of the day is near when a Democrat wins an election sounding like me. At the end of the day a Democrat won, and the Democrat is not going to vote like I would vote, and he’s not going to oppose Obama. So he lied to his constituents. Apparently we didn’t call him on the lie. But this was not a test of the Obama agenda versus the anti-Obama agenda. That test was not on the ballot in Pennsylvania 12. And our doomsayers are going to have to change their perspective on this a little bit ’cause they’re missing the boat.
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RUSH: Well, this Pennsylvania 12, the more I think about it, it is crucially important for you to understand what’s going on. I have a foreboding here. I cannot believe how quick so many in the media on our side are to abandon the whole notion that we could have a big November, off of this one race. Now, I know that there are very few Republicans who are as oriented toward being on offense as I am. Perhaps if my business was to be elected as Republican I’d be running scared, too. But that’s not my business. But I can’t imagine myself running scared, period. It’s not my nature. So in the days leading up to the election on Tuesday, we were having essentially a party. Everybody on our side says, ‘It’s going to be big. The polling data in Pennsylvania 12, it’s very neck and neck.
‘November is just looming, and Obama keeps screwing up, and the poll numbers keep plunging for Obama.’ Then this one race comes and so many people start saying, ‘Oh, I have to revise downward my predictions. I don’t think we can win the House. If we can’t win this race…’ I’m asking myself: Did these people pay any attention to this race? This is important so let me walk you through this again. The Democrat candidate, the foreman Murtha associate is a guy named Critz. He tried to out-conservative the Republican, Tim Burns. He succeeded in ‘out-conservating’ Tim Burns. He even accused Tim Burns of not wanting to cut taxes enough. The Democrat accused Burns of not wanting to cut taxes enough! It’s mind-boggling here. The vote proved one thing to the Democrats, and that is the power of unions, which means that they are simply going to kowtow to them even more if that’s possible.
That area is dependent on the federal government for its existence. The left has those people right where they want them. Now, this guy obviously was lying through his teeth. This guy’s going to get to Washington if he wins — well, he did win. He’s gonna have to run again in November. This is a special election. He’s going to vote for Obama. He’s going to vote for everything on the Obama agenda. He’s going to vote right along with Pelosi. He’s not going to become a DINO, a Democrat in Name Only. If this guy were genuine, we’d have to have a new term for these kinds of people, a Red Dog Democrat, not Blue Dog Democrat.
But for all of you who are worried about this race and for all of you in the media on our side worried about this race, please understand the Obama agenda wasn’t on the ballot. The Democrat Party agenda wasn’t on the ballot. The Pelosi and Reid agenda was not part of the campaign. The Democrat ran to the right of Tim Burns. He out-conservatived the conservative candidate in a district that depends on the federal government for its existence. It’s a 2-1 Democrat district. Where is it written that the only way we can take back the House is winning in 2-1 Democrat districts where the Democrat candidate sounds like me? My point is this: You Democrats run on Obama’s agenda, run on the Pelosi agenda.
You run on it. You run on high taxes, you run on 10% unemployment, you run on the results of the first year and a half of this presidency. You run on the Arizona immigration law. You run on open borders. You run on wanting amnesty for illegals. You run on that and let’s see what happens in even a 2-1 Democrat district. But for the life of me, folks, I don’t understand why the people on our side are turning tail and running here and predicting doom now when the people in Pennsylvania 12 didn’t even vote on the Obama agenda. You’d have to say, by analyzing the results, that the people that voted in that election voted against the Obama agenda. Therefore, how can that be bad? Well, it’s bad if you look at it as Republican versus Democrat. If you look at it as conservative versus liberal, you might have a different attitude about it.
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RUSH: Let’s go to Indiana, Pennsylvania. This is Randy. Thank you for waiting, sir. You’re up next on Open Line Friday. Hi.
CALLER: Hi. How you doing, Rush?
RUSH: Very well. Thank you.
CALLER: It’s an honor and pleasure. I’m a longtime listener, first time getting through, and I’d like to thank Mr. Snerdley for that. One thing: I agree with your analogy on the 2-1 margin, but there was one more aspect to it. Bill Russell was, I feel, the stronger candidate.
RUSH: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. He’s calling here from Pennsylvania 12, because Indiana’s in Pennsylvania 12 or close to it, right?
CALLER: Yeah, we’re in the 12th. Yes, sir.
RUSH: Yeah, the 12th district he’s talking about — and Mr. Russell is the Republican other than Tim Burns?
CALLER: Yes, sir.
RUSH: Right. I’m just bringing the audience up to speed, getting up to your level of understanding.
CALLER: Yeah. He ran a good campaign four years ago and almost beat Murtha, and did it without the backing of the Republican Party. Again this time they did not back in, they went with a guy with deep pockets. He has his own money. Bill Russell just an average man off the street like, you know, the rest of us. He still did a good job. But a lot of people didn’t vote for Tim Burns. I wrote in ‘Bill Russell’ myself, I like the guy, and it’s just… I don’t know.
RUSH: Now, Randy, this is an interesting question I have for you.
CALLER: Yep?
RUSH: You had a chance here to turn the district Republican, but it sounds to me like the candidate that they put up there is not as conservative as you would like.
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: So you made the decision it was more important to keep the wrong Republican outta there than it was to defeat a Democrat. Is that right?
CALLER: No. No. I mean, we still wanted a Republican, but, uh…
RUSH: Then why did you do a write-in?
CALLER: Well, because we felt he was the better candidate. At least I did, anyway.
RUSH: But he wasn’t on the ballot.
CALLER: No.
RUSH: He was on the ballot in the primaries.
CALLER: In the primaries he was.
RUSH: There was a primary, yeah, but for the special election he wasn’t on the ballot.
CALLER: Right. But that’s… uh… You know, you just feel strongly about something, that’s the way I voice my opinion. I felt that was the best way to go, and apparently a lot of people did it, too.
RUSH: Well, yeah. Apparently so.
CALLER: I — I — I —
RUSH: I tell you what (sigh). This is just, ‘Hello, third parties.’ This is… Well, let me ask you this question, Randy. In November, these two guys are going to have to run again. It’s going to Burns versus Critz. What you are going to do again?
CALLER: Oh, well. (chuckles) I know Critz is crookeder than a dog’s hind leg. It’d be for Burns.
RUSH: So you’re going to vote for Burns in November.
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: Okay. Whew!
CALLER: And a lot of people feel the same way.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: That’s not what we wanted, but our Republican committee chairpeople just picked him. And he was basically —
RUSH: I know.
CALLER: — not a (garbled).
RUSH: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. It’s the same old song.
CALLER: Yeah.
RUSH: I hear you. It is. It’s the same old song. But also inherent here is the lesson of third parties. At some point, folks, we’re going to have to stop putting a gun in our mouth and pulling the trigger. At some point we’re just going to have to. (laughs) You know, I don’t like these suicide analogies.