RUSH: We go to Mary in Cincinnati. Thank you for waiting and welcome to the program.
CALLER: Thank you, Rush. Thanks for taking my call.
RUSH: You bet.
CALLER: I wanted to make a couple points. I’m a conservative. I did vote for Ted Cruz today. What I wanted to say was why, because Ted Cruz is what this country needs, I feel. But also Kasich, you have Kasich, and to me I’ve seen what he’s done with Ohio, and I’m not really happy about it. He is like a Democrat in disguise.
RUSH: I don’t know how much in disguise he is.
CALLER: Yeah. Really. Right. Also with Trump, I have been perplexed about why people would vote for this man who has been all words and has never proven anything, you know, has not shown any history, what he’s saying. He reminds me, it’s like the Obamacare. Well, when he gets in, we’ll find out what it’s about.
RUSH: Right.
CALLER: He’s also like a used car salesman selling lemons to desperate people. That’s the way I see it. I know that’s strong, but that’s the way I see it.
RUSH: Man, these poor used car salesmen, they get maligned every day of the year by somebody.
CALLER: Say what?
RUSH: Well, no. No, no. No, no. I understand, Mary, exactly where you’re coming from. And there’s nothing wrong with voting for Cruz. That’s great. I think I’ve said it I don’t know how many times that Ted Cruz is the antidote to what Obama has done, the left has done. I mean, there’s no question, you don’t have to worry that Ted Cruz is gonna be somebody different after he’s elected. You don’t have to worry that he’s lying to you about being conservative just to get your vote. It really is who he is.
But at the same time I can tell you I’m not gonna go through it again, Mary, ’cause it will take me awhile, but I know exactly why people are gravitating to Trump, the people who are. I know exactly why. I can explain it to anybody. And I can do it in five minutes. I could do it in an hour and a half. I could spend an hour and a half, if anybody wanted to listen, explaining why some people are gravitating to Trump. There’s all kinds of different reasons for it. Or I could give you the CliffsNotes version and in probably even less than five minutes. But I’ve done that I don’t know how many times. So I’m not gonna be repetitive and go through it again here.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: I just got a sound bite. I have no idea what this is except it is about me and Operation Chaos. It was on CNN Legal View, Ashleigh Banfield talking to Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker. She says, “I want to talk to you about what the secretary of state just said in Ohio.
“He said the Democrats are crossing over in that primary two reasons. They might want to vote for the governor ’cause they like him, they might want to stop Trump because they don’t like him, or they may like Trump; they may be voting for him. All sounds logical. What’s going on here, Ryan?” Because apparently a big crossover happening in Ohio. And here’s what Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker said…
LIZZA: I’m a little skeptical that people voting strategically like that can have a big influence. We have seen previous primaries. If you remember, in 2008 Rush Limbaugh announced Operation Chaos, and he encouraged conservatives to go vote in the Democratic primaries to make the Obama-Hillary Clinton race go on a little bit longer. The evidence was it really didn’t have much of an impact. So I take it with a grain of salt–
BANFIELD: But you know —
RUSH: “But you know… But you… But…” She’s worried. They’re worried something’s happened here that they didn’t factor. They didn’t factor knowing about all the Democrat crossovers in Ohio. So they’re hoping that they’re voting for Kasich. “Oh, please, Ryan, tell us they’re voting for Kasich!” They’re worried that some of these Democrats are crossing over and voting for Trump.
I’m just… Folks, look, taking personalities aside, what needs to happen today if you want Ted Cruz to win this nomination, is Kasich and Rubio have to lose. Trump has to win Ohio and Florida today. As much as that might sound like it’s counterintuitive, if that doesn’t happen — if Kasich wins Ohio — then you better get ready for the establishment to come in here and try to own the rest of it.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: “Strategic voting.” They are paranoid. They can’t get Operation Chaos out of their heads, folks. When they say no evidence it was successful, BS. There was all kinds of evidence it was successful. That’s why they can’t forget it. Operation Chaos was strategic voting, not passion voting, and they’re worried it’s happening in Ohio now.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
Now, back to the audio sound bites. I haven’t forgot this female anti-Trump commercial.
I know you people have been out there yelling, “Don’t forget it, Rush!” I haven’t. But I want to set it up again. Grab sound 23. We had to do this in a hurry at the end of the previous hour. It happened on CNN recently, within the last hour and a half. The name of the show is, what? Legal View. It’s hosted by Ashleigh Banfield. She’s the one, by the way, who worried that… Well, she was called to school. That’s right. She was called to school by the parent-teacher group or whatever ’cause her daughter — no, her son.
Her fifth grade son was going to school calling everybody “loser.” And she was worried this is what Trump is doing to our culture. She didn’t know what to do about it. So it’s maybe turn the TV off if you don’t want your son seeing Trump. But, anyway, she’s talking to Ryan Lizza of The New Yorker, and something’s going on in Ohio today. It has ’em very worried. Apparently the secretary of state in Ohio says that they are seeing a lot of Democrats show up and vote in the Republican primary today, and they’re very worried what that means.
They’re worried about it being “strategic voting,” meaning this is not people voting for a candidate ’cause they really like the candidate. It’s voting for some other reason, as in Operation Chaos. So she brings in Ryan Lizza to ask about it. “I want to talk to you about what the secretary of state just said in Ohio. Democrats are crossing over in that open primary to vote Republican. The secretary of state said there are two reasons they might want to do that. They might to want vote for Kasich ’cause they like him, they might want to stop Trump because they don’t like him, or maybe they do like Trump and they’re voting for him. So Ryan, tell us, what does this mean?”
LIZZA: I’m a little skeptical that people voting strategically like that can have a big influence. We have seen previous primaries. If you remember, in 2008 Rush Limbaugh announced Operation Chaos, and he encouraged conservatives to go vote in the Democratic primaries to make the Obama-Hillary Clinton race go on a little bit longer. The evidence was it really didn’t have much of an impact. So I take it with a grain of salt —
BANFIELD: But you know —
RUSH: “But you know…” She’s not convinced. She’s worried this is not something they factored. Looking for reassurance this is not gonna upset the applecart, whatever the applecart. I think everybody in the establishment, Democrat or Republican, wants Kasich to win this today. And what this means is they’re worried that a bunch of Democrats are defecting to vote for Trump. I think that’s what they’re really worried about, ’cause that has happened in previous primaries. And when Lizza says, “The evidence was it wasn’t really that much of an impact.” They wouldn’t still be worried about it. They wouldn’t still have it at the front of their minds if it didn’t have much of an impact.
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