RUSH: We’ll start, San Francisco. Mark, thank you, sir. You’re up. It’s great to have you here.
CALLER: Thank you, sir. A pleasure, and my condolences for your loss of H.R.
RUSH: Thank you.
CALLER: I can’t imagine. Here’s my point: Mitt Romney would probably be the best president we can get. He’s proven himself as a great executive, but he’s not a great politician. And I think what’s really important is, going forward, that we do not declare the Republican candidate too soon because the media’s gonna chew ’em up and spit ’em out. But we need an executive and we’ve got some great executives out there. I don’t think it’s Christie. It certainly ain’t Jeb Bush. You know, Walker, he’s a great guy. That’s my point.
RUSH: What do you mean, “We don’t want declare a candidate too early”? What do you mean by that, because that’s not how it happens. There’s a primary process, so one of these guys is gonna win.
CALLER: If the left gets their hands on any candidate, they’re gonna dig up the dirt. I mean, look how Obama got elected in Illinois. You know, they brought out these files that were supposedly sealed.
RUSH: Yeah, yeah, yeah. They’re gonna do that to everybody in the course of this. They’re not gonna wait for one of these guys to get nominated. They’re gonna destroy everybody beforehand, one of those guys is gonna get nominated, and then they’re gonna move in for the kill.
CALLER: Right, but the future of our country depends on a great executive and not a great politician. I mean, Clinton may be a pretty good executive, but a great politician.
RUSH: Now, that also is a provocative statement to me. That’s interesting that you say that. The reason I want to explore that with you is my belief that politics — as distasteful as it appears to be, and as dishonest and corrupt and all of those things it appears to be — nevertheless is its own business. There are specific things one has to do to climb the ladder of success in politics, and being an executive is not necessarily one of them. Who was the last executive…? I know what you mean by executive. You’re talking about at a company, in the free market economy. Name for me the last one that was elected president.
CALLER: The best president in my mind, the gentleman president of all time is George W. Bush.
RUSH: George W. Bush.
CALLER: He was a gentleman president. He conducted himself as professionally and proficiently as possible. To your question, I don’t know. Who?
RUSH: Well, that’s my point. I can’t name one either. Now, Bush was an executive ran the Texas Rangers for a while, the baseball team, and he was an executive at an oil company now and then. So he may satisfy your requirements.
CALLER: Well, governor of Texas helps, too.
RUSH: Governor of Texas? Well, okay. So by “executive,” you mean he has run a state as well? You’re talking about an executive as opposed to a senator?
CALLER: You know, our friend over there in Minnesota has done a tremendous job; he’d be a great president. The senator from Florida, he’d be a great vice president.
RUSH: Okay. All right. Okay, by “executive,” you didn’t mean a CEO of a widget company. You meant an executive who’s run a state. Okay. Well, compared to a senator, that argument could be made very easily. There’s a reason senators don’t win, usually. It’s rare when they do. There’s a reason senators lose. Obama was a noted exception, but he didn’t win the presidency because he was a senator.
He didn’t win the presidency because of anything he learned in the Senate ’cause he hardly ever showed up. But governors are a different story. Senators, they’re isolated. They’re one guy. They run an office, but they don’t run the Senate. They don’t run anything, and it’s not really good training vis-a-vis or when compared to governors who have to run states. They learn quickly where their ego belongs as a governor, as opposed to a senator, who can lead with his ego and be dominated by his ego.
A governor really can’t, not an effective one.
Anyway, Mark, I appreciate the call.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Let me move in here and head things off before we get too far out of control starting to talk about what we need, who we need, what kind of person we need to be the next president of the United States. There’s only one qualification that interests me, folks. It’s the only chance we have to restore this country. It’s the only chance we have to begin the process of reversing this transformation that Obama has begun. We have got to nominate a conservative Republican. It’s the only way we’re gonna win. Going out and finding a good executive doesn’t matter. That’s not what we need. I’m not trying to be dismissive here. I want to stay focused on what we need to do and what needs to happen.
Conservatism, properly applied, properly understood, brilliantly articulated, all of that, that is what we need, and not only, that’s what will win. Of that I have no doubt. We don’t need people that think that Washington’s not working because Republicans are not cooperative. We don’t need that. We don’t need candidates that think 10% or 20% or 30% of the Democrat agenda will help us win. We don’t need people who are, “Yeah, we can’t be too critical, you know, the voters don’t like conflict. They want us to get along.” That candidate is gonna lose like that candidate always loses. It’s not complicated. We’ve tried it the establishment way year after year, presidential election after presidential election. The evidence is in. We know what wins. We know also what loses.
Related Links