CALLER:  Hey, Rush, nice to speak to you.  Yeah, I’m a 29-year-old from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and I voted for Ted Cruz in the primary recently. And I used to think of myself as a #NeverTrump-er, but I am currently going to vote for Donald Trump in the general election.  I have really been struggling ’cause I have a lot of friends who are Cruz supporters, and even lost friends because of this, actually. And I just have been arguing with them and discussing this with them. And they are really, really strictly #NeverTrump.  I don’t understand it.  They don’t seem to be aware about the SCOTUS picks.  I don’t want Hillary getting the Supreme Court pick.  I don’t want her having another four years of Obama.  Obama’s on senioritis mode right now doing whatever he can.

RUSH:  Tell me something before you go.  How have you lost friends in this?

CALLER:  I’ve lost friends because they think I’ve abandoned them and their values and am a traitor to them.  I went to the rallies with them.

RUSH:  You mean the Cruz rallies?

CALLER:  Yes, Cruz rallies. Cruz rallies all the time.  And they think I’m a traitor.  They don’t think I’m a true conservative anymore.  I am… I learned that I’m #NeverHillary.  I cannot let her get into office.  I just can’t.

RUSH:  Well, see, that’s me, too.

CALLER: Especially being a Rush Baby.

RUSH: Well, yeah, thank goodness.

CALLER:  My parents love me; I love my parents. I know they’re listening, and they raised me listening to you.  I’m #NeverHillary.  And I’m very, very nervous. Especially with Obama getting all this passed, like I said.

RUSH:  You haven’t seen anything yet. I tried to tell people all last year: This last year of Obama, he’s unchecked. The Republicans have promised that there’s nothing they’re gonna do to stop him. They’re not gonna use power of purse. They’ve taken impeachment way off the table.  This is just… You wait ’til the last four months of this year. You wait and see what Obama does.  And I’ll tell you something else: If the Republicans win in November, you’re gonna see a December like you can’t believe.

There are going to be things done that will potentially create all kinds of bigger messes for whoever the Republican president is — Trump — to inherit.  But, look, back to your original premise here about losing friends. You’ve got some Cruz people that just can’t find their way to Trump no matter what and they’re angry at you. They don’t understand because you were you were for Cruz. To understand where a lot of people are in this, you have to go back to before Trump entered the race.

CALLER:  Right.

RUSH:  Ted Cruz, to a lot of people, has been the single greatest conservative opportunity since Ronald Reagan.

CALLER:  Yes.

RUSH:  There’s been nobody that’s come as close.  Now, Cruz is not Reagan in some key areas, not policy. But nevertheless, they were all pretty confident. With the field as it was with 17 people, the conservatives were very much aware the establishment was not gonna succeed with Jeb Bush. I mean, we just instinctively knew that there was no momentum for the establishment. No matter how much money they raised, Cruz was gonna be… Trump coming in, the frustration that conservatives have felt ever since Clinton and ever since the Republicans blew an opportunity in the House..

There have been a series of moves where the Republicans have won and have not tried to advance any sort of conservative agenda. It’s been maddening, it’s been frustrating, and all of this has had practical meaning, that we’re losing the country and we’re losing it fast, and we are falling farther and farther away from our founding principles. Cruz was not only gonna be the break on that but he was gonna reverse it.

Cruz was going to be the instrument by which we reassert and establish what we believe that’s gonna provide the energy that would actually save the country and start creating economic growth and prosperity and renew the concepts of liberty and freedom. There was so much invested in this and conservatives were so intent, so desperate for it, so desirous of it, and so filled with optimistic belief.  And then Trump comes along and blows everything up.  And it’s like this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that’s now gone, and it’s just…

As far as they’re concerned, it causes people to be angry — depressed, even — in certain ways, because the fear they have is that Trump is not conservative, that he’s nowhere near conservative, that he’s got everybody fooled in that regard, that he’s really no different than Hillary. When you get down to brass tacks on the practical application of conservative issues, that the fact that he’s not a conservative… No matter what else he is or isn’t, the fact that he isn’t a conservative is all they need to know.  So I understand the feeling that many of them have.  They feel like they’re there’s no anchor now and —

CALLER:  I can feel that, too. I feel like, “Yes, you’re right. Donald Trump came in, and our guy was supposed to be that outsider. He’s the real outsider.” Donald Trump comes in, and he’s viewed as that outsider that we viewed as an outsider all along.  But the real threat is Hillary Clinton. The thing that’s alarming for me is that my friends are willing to let her win. They want four years of Hillary Clinton.  My friends want four years of that because they think that will hit the reset button in four years, and I don’t think we have four years, especially after what’s gonna  go on until November.

RUSH:  See, you’re right. There’s always gonna be an America, but we are in the midst of a promised transformation.  This isn’t stealth anymore.  This is not the Democrats sneaking this stuff by.  They’re doing it right in front of our faces, and our party hasn’t lifted a finger to stop it.  That also adds to the frustration.  Now, Jeff Sessions, who has endorsed Trump and is unquestionably conservative, Senator from Alabama, has written a brief piece today. It’s an op-ed explaining why, and it might be worth your while to find that and share it with these guys.

Because Jeff Sessions might hold some credibility with them. I don’t know, but he might.  Sessions is primarily concerned about the border and immigration and the maintenance of what we’ve all come to know and love and appreciate as the dominant American culture, and there’s no question it’s under assault and it’s under attack.  Sessions, as far as he’s concerned, that’s issue number one — and there isn’t anybody else but Trump.  Trump, in fact, is the preferred candidate for that very reason, as far as Sessions is concerned, being as it’s the most important issue.

And there’s no way Hillary Clinton or any Democrat is acceptable in that area or any other, as far as I’m concerned. And you agree with that.  And these guys at some point probably will, too.  I’m hoping they do, because the objective of this has to be — finally, once and for all — to stop the Democrats.  It just has to be.  They’re the most destructive force working their will on this country each and every day.  And there hasn’t been a serious effort to stop these people in 7-1/2 years.

CALLER:  Yeah, I totally agree. And we need to stop the Democrats now because if they go to four more years, especially with the Supreme Court pick coming up, I don’t know what’s gonna happen.

RUSH:  Yes, you do.  If they —

CALLER: It’s gonna be 5-4 vote.

RUSH: It’s not just one.  It’s not just one.  God’s waiting room is the Supreme Court building.  It’s not just one opening.  There’s a whole bunch of them that are approaching the age, if you will, where they clearly have many fewer years ahead of them than behind them.  And in the next four years, there could be two or three more.  And you let a liberal Democrat president… A liberal Supreme Court is not a court.  It’s a rubber stamp.  The four liberals on the Supreme Court now are not judges.  They’re not judges.  They’re left-wing rubber stamps.

No matter what the issue is, the left-wing liberal interpretation of it — whether it’s constitutional or not — will be how they vote.  It’s a rubber stamp.  There isn’t even any learned considered legal thought or analysis going on among those four.  You get one more of ’em, sayonara.  And don’t forget, the court has become where every political issue is decided once and for all.  It was never intended to be that, by the way.  But yet that’s what it has become.  So that’s a crucial aspect of this, too.  I’ll tell you something else that bothers some #NeverTrumpers, and it’s not so much Trump.

He’s a factor with some of them, but some of the #NeverTrump crowd, the Cruz people, just can’t stand some of Trump’s supporters. They just can’t stand ’em. The trolls, they’re out there on Twitter. They think they’re brain-dead.  A lot of Cruz supporters think, “My God, if this is the sum total of the IQ supporting Trump, we are screwed.”  It’s mean-spirited. It’s vicious. These Twitter trolls, I don’t care what they’re trollingit’s a live sewer out there.  Whether they’re Trumpists tweeting or whether they’re #StopRush or what whoever they are, they’re just the dregs, just a bunch of human debris out there.

So the anti-Cruz people are out there trolling just literally rub the pro-Cruz people raw and make seem like, “My God, not only is Trump winning, but the people supporting him have a combined IQ of three.”  So I understand all that.  Where it’s gonna end up, I wish I could tell you, and my guess is that’s all they are.  But my problem is… And it’s a problem. All of them… You say you’ve lost friends.  I haven’t lost any friends over any of this, but I bet if I applied myself I could.  I haven’t lost any friends, but the biggest challenge I get is my optimism.

That makes other people think I don’t get it.  When I’m not wringing my hands and as worried as they are, and if I do not echo the… One of the most popular refrains in the #NeverTrump crowd is that it’s over. “Trump is gonna get crushed! It’s gonna be the biggest landslide. Oh, my God, we’re in the wilderness for 30 more years!”  I shared with you some of this apocalyptic reasoning last Friday on this program, and I don’t have the capacity for that.  I mean, personally, I just can’t live being that obsessed with doom and gloom and apocalyptic thinking and so forth.

But a lot of people relish it.  It inspires and motivates ’em. It fires ’em up.  I can find myself in situations where I’ve had people say, “You don’t really care, do you? You don’t really care! I mean, for some reason yu’re not, ’cause how can you how can you not be pessimistic about all this?”  I don’t know.  My natural… Believe me, I’m pessimistic about a lot of things.  I have my moments like anybody else does.  But overall I… Folks, look, be honest, I’ve been optimistic. I’ve been optimistic, and many times what I’ve been optimistic about has not happened.

So I’m tempered by realism as well. You know, I’m the mayor of Realville.  But I understand losing friends.  I could see how that can happen, ’cause it’s very, very tense out there.  And it’s it’s… (interruption) Especially in what?  Yeah, by the same token, there’s some there’s some Trumpsters out there who think the Cruzers on Twitter are just smug and arrogant.  It works both ways.  There’s nobody singularly guilty or innocent here.  Anyway, I’m just standing back and observing it, commenting on it, telling you what I think about it, which is what you should think about it.  Everything’s fine.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH:  Just call me an optimistic pessimist, folks, and you’ll get closer to it — or pessimistic optimist, if you will.  Our old buddy Pete Wehner has a piece today in which… (interruption) What did he say Mr. Snerdley? His piece says… (interruption) Oh, yeah. “Trump supporters are wrong, not evil.”  What is Pete admonishing some who are maybe being a bit extreme describing Trump supporters as evil and Pete’s trying to… (interruption) Well, I think what Pete’s trying to do is apply a little grace to the entire campaign. So you…? (interruption)

He’s not defending Trump supporters, ’cause he’s not one, right?  (interruption) He’s not one.  In the Bill Kristol sound bites, you can you can hear the disappointment.  Look, everything’s upside down here, and there are a lot of people having a lot of trouble dealing with all of it, personally, professionally, ideologically, politically, the whole ball game.  And some people still haven’t come to grips with what’s happened and have just terrible fatalistic attitudes about what the future holds.  And I do, too. But I have no doubt all that’s gonna happen if Hillary wins.  That’s it for me.  I don’t have any question.

There’s to me there’s no either/or.  There is simply no way, in my world, you vote for a Democrat.  There is no way Hillary Clinton gets supported.  There is no way Elizabeth Warren is empowered.  There is no way anybody having anything to do with the Obama administration is continually empowered.  There is no way.  You want to talk apocalypse? You want to talk fatalism and pessimism? You surround me with that stuff and you’ve got it. My optimism is rooted in the belief that they can be stopped, that I hope they can be stopped.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Now, Senator Sessions, I mentioned his column.  I want to give you some excerpts from this today.  Jeff Sessions’ op-ed.  It’s short.  It’s USA Today.  “Election Offers a Simple choice — In Donald Trump, we have a forceful advocate for America.”  And just some cherry-picked pull quotes here.  “For the first time in a long time, this November will give Americans a clear choice on perhaps the most important issue facing our country and our civilization,” and that is “whether we remain a nation-state that serves its own people, or whether we slide irrevocably toward a soulless globalism that treats humans as interchangeable widgets in the world market.

“In Donald Trump, we have a forceful advocate for America. Trump has said that our trade, immigration and foreign policies must be changed to protect the interests of American workers and our nation.  In Hillary Clinton, we have a committed globalist. Clinton was an ardent supporter of the Trans-Pacific Partnership — which surrenders American sovereignty to an international union of 12 countries — and has clearly left the door wide open to enacting the pact if elected.  There is only one sure way to defeat the TPP, and that is to defeat Hillary Clinton.”  By the way TPP is not to be confused with the TPA.

Do you know what the TPA is versus TPP? (interruption)  Well, if it comes up, I’ll explain it, but just don’t confuse the two.  The TPP is the bad one.  The TPA, you could may case for it.  But it’s not a deal.  TPA simply grants president fast-track authority to negotiate these kinds of things. (interruption) I know, but wait… (interruption) But wait. (interruption) You can’t you can’t have 535 negotiators on a deal.  So it’s a tricky thing.  A lot of people oppose the TPA, too, because we’ve got a guy like Obama who you don’t want to have the fast track to do anything.

But in the generic sense, having a president with fast-track negotiating authority for the most part is something you would prefer rather than letting every member of Congress dip their hand in this well to try to have some say so with it, but that… I wouldn’t want that. (interruption) I know, it’s a tough thing to argue TPA when Obama is the president we’re talking about.  But there’s a difference.  It’s not the TPP, and opposing the TPP is a slam dunk.  There ought to be nobody reasonable, responsible in favor of this.

And Hillary is.

Ted Cruz was not, despite what people tried to say.  Ted Cruz was for TPA.  He did voted with Ryan to grant fast track authority, but he was never for the TPP.  Anyway, more from Sessions.  “Meanwhile, Clinton’s immigration platform is the most radical in our history. Freezing deportations. Ending detentions. Halting enforcement. She’d expand President Obama’s illegal amnesty decree, effectively creating open borders.  Clinton’s extremist proposal economically targets our poor African-American and Hispanic communities whose wages and job prospects are being steadily eroded by the huge influx of new foreign workers.

“Yet some Republicans persist in saying that they don’t know whether Mr. Trump is a ‘real conservative.'” As far as Jeff Sessions is concerned, he is a real American.  And as he states in his open, “In Donald Trump we have a forceful advocate for America.”  Has it really not come down to that?  I mean, is that not the Democrats…? Many people question it. They don’t like America.  That’s why they want to transform it.  They don’t like America as founded. They don’t like America as is.

They don’t like American foreign policy, don’t like the American military, don’t like American corporations, don’t like American capitalism, don’t like America period.  To them, America’s flawed, gotta be fixed, gotta be transformed, gotta be reversed.  And how do they fix it?  “Well, we gotta let more people from all over the world who are better people than us! We gotta let the disadvantaged in. We gotta let the people that we have made poor, we’ve gotta let the people that we’ve mistreated, we’ve gotta let the people whose resources we have stolen — we need to let them into our country.

“It’s the only way they can be paid back for what we took.” That’s their thinking.  They never, the Democrats… Hillary, she never worries about her geopolitical location.  Wherever she is, she never worries about any of that upsetting her way of life, her standard of living.  No Democrat ever does.  They can wall themselves off.  They don’t care about anybody else.  But they will damn well… Like Mr. Snerdley was asking me earlier, “Do you think the Obamas’ kids are gonna be going into these nongender specified bathrooms any day soon?”  No way.  But yours? Well, your school is gonna be mandated to make such room available.  Hmm.  Standard operating procedure.

Two sets of rules: One for the elite, and one everybody else.