RUSH: Here is Tom in Schaumburg, Illinois, as we head back to the phones. Great to have you on the program, sir. Hi.

CALLER: Good afternoon. Thanks for taking my call. So there’s nothing we can do about this Iranian deal? Hey, here’s a thought. Why don’t we just hire leaders that actually have a pair and don’t bring it up for a vote. Bury this thing in committee and let it rot. When Obama starts crying about it, just say, “Well, you know, we’re still reviewing it. You’re gonna have to make some changes here to please our members. Right now, you know, still in the review process, so you ought to check back with us in 30 or 60 days, maybe we’ll have some better news for you,” and that’s the end of it. My God, what’s going on with our leaders?

RUSH: Well, wait, now, wait, wait, wait just a second. Because it’s not quite that slam dunk. The reason is because the way Obama has characterized this, he has characterized this as an executive agreement or whatever the term is, and he claims that he can make this deal no matter what the Senate does, it doesn’t matter a hill of beans, and, by the same token, it’s not binding.

CALLER: Let him make the deal. The next guy can come in and unmake the deal with his executive privilege. What I’m saying is, our leaders got a national landslide victory from us. They were scared to death to vote against cromnibus. They scared to death to vote against Obama’s illegal amnesty plan. And now they’re scared to death of this. Where did we get these guys?

RUSH: Can I ask you a question?

CALLER: Yes, sir.

RUSH: I’m serious. I’m serious. I’d like to know, what are they afraid of? In all candor now, forget cliches and stuff, you’ve said this three or four times they’re afraid. What is it you think they’re afraid of?

CALLER: They’re scared to death of the media. They’re scared to death of being called racist. They’re scared to death of being called homophobes, this, that, or the other thing. They are just scared to death to do anything. I firmly believe that our leaders came out of the womb with their hands firmly wrapped around their ankles. They cannot stand up for themselves. They will not represent us, and it’s an absolute joke when my congressman votes for cromnibus and then gets on a radio show and says, “Well, you know, sometimes not all votes are easy. Sometimes you get good choices and bad choices –“

RUSH: (sighing) Yeah, I know, frustrating.

CALLER: “Sometimes you get someone that’s even worse.” And they cry about what they do to us. It’s just sickening. And it’s no wonder Trump is pounding everybody else. ‘Cause I’m telling you, Rush, the people that I know, even the people I go to church with that were very, very conservative —

RUSH: Yeah, yeah?

CALLER: — they’re not going to vote for another moderate. They will go out and vote against any Republican —

RUSH: Hey, they’ve demonstrated that. They sat home in 2012, four million of them didn’t vote, going (raspberry) you, so it’s not hard to imagine they might vote for Hillary if they’re really ticked off. I have a little bit of a different theory, not that it matters to anything ’cause the end result is the same. I’m reading these guys, if you listen to some of these Republican candidates, even now they’re out there saying, like Governor Christie, one of his big close-the-deal lines is something along the lines of, “I can work with them. I will welcome their ideas. If their ideas are any good, I will show them that I want to work with them and we can govern.”

Well, I think that is the stumbling block. I think they’re afraid that if they oppose Obama, they’re afraid of the gridlock charge or government shutdown charge or the fact they can’t govern, they won’t cooperate, they’re not bipartisan. And the reason they’re afraid of that is because they’re under the impression that Obama has 100 percent approval. They’re under the impression Obama is loved by 100 percent of the people. They’re under the impression that Obama is protected by 100 percent of the people and the media. They have no idea how unpopular Obama is, they really don’t. They’re in a bubble. They’re in the Beltway bubble and they don’t know.

CALLER: They’re also under the impression that they can win without their base. How stupid are these people?

RUSH: Well, that’s an interesting point too because they really, really want to do that. Oh, the happiest you could make a Republican establishment member would be a nominee who got it despite being opposed by the base. That would be orgasmic nirvana to them.

CALLER: Excuse me, but didn’t they just give Jeb Bush a hundred million dollars to go out and win this thing? And where is he, close to last place?

RUSH: Well, he hasn’t begun spending all of it yet. Jeb Bush and the money is a multi-tiered explanation. But really I’ll tell you what this points up, despite everything else that we’ve talked about here, Tom, what it points up is that the Republican political class is not listening to its constituency, its voters. It’s listening to its donors. The donor class, as it’s now being called, is really running the Republican Party. And it is access to money while campaigning and the control of money in office that is a large determining factor in the policies that the party chooses to support and oppose.

Remember two, three, four years ago, a couple elections ago, the real objective from the establishment point, when a whole bunch of Tea Party Senate candidates were nominated and got all ticked off about it ’cause they’re afraid they’re gonna not get their committee chairmanships. It wasn’t about being able to have power to implement ideas. They wanted the committee chairmanships. They wanted the control of the money. They see how the Democrats use it, they want their turn at it. Buying love, buying support, buying loyalty, whatever. And it is the money and the people that donate it that really are pulling the strings here at this point.