RUSH: The left is waiting for and the media, too… Don’t doubt me on this. The media is waiting for the first signs that Trump is ready to surrender for peace.
All of these news organizations acting like Tarzan, standing up there, beating their chests (impression), “We’re not going to the White House Correspondents’ Dinner! Screw Trump! Trump’s mean! Trump’s a bigot! Trump’s this and that! We’re not… Trump calls us fake news! We’re not going! We’re not gonna do the parties! Take that! Take that!” Trump says (paraphrased), “You know what? I’m not going either, and I really hope you have a great time. I hope you have a wonderful time, but I got better things to do,” and they’re offended.
They have the total freedom to abandon their own party if they want to — which is a fake scholarship event, actually. That’s what the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is all about. The White House Correspondents’ Association, the WHCA, is all about supposed scholarships for budding young journalists. But it’s just another organization — a charity, if you will — that advances liberalism under the guise of having to do with journalism. But now Trump’s saying he’s not gonna go. Why, they’re indignant and they’re offended!
“How dare he!”
Even after they’ve all made big deals some of them about not going! This White House Correspondents’ Dinner… I’ve been, I think, to two. I may have only been to one, and I haven’t been back since. The whole premise of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, to me, has been fake; it’s been fraudulent. Here’s the premise of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner: The president shows up one night to have dinner with members of the fourth estate, the Drive-By Media, where — for one night — they put aside the differences and have a mutual admiration society for three or four hours and they tell jokes on themselves.
In fact, that’s the duty of the president, to be self-deprecating at these things. And then the media stands up and they tell jokes and they have an entertainer whose job it is to entertain the room. But that’s not what it is. I’ve always looked at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner as… I get invited… I don’t get invited anymore, but for the first 10 or 12 years I’d get invited by a news organization to come sit at their table. And I would say, “Why would I want to go there? Why would I want to be in a room with 1200 people who really don’t like me and they’re gonna be trying to fake through the night that they do? Why would I want to do this?”
The whole premise of this thing — and it’s the way this White House Correspondents’ Dinner has evolved. It’s nothing than the left-wing political establishment beating up on the Republicans and conservatives, be he a president or a speaker of the House or whatever. There’s nothing congenial about it. There’s nothing collegial about it. There’s nothing of kind spirit about it. It’s gotten worse and worse, and now it’s acquired the name “nerd prom” to describe that politics is showbiz for the ugly. Which is what it is.
So ugly politician people would invite Hollywood types to show up, and then they started a red carpet for the thing, and it quickly became something totally unlike what its original purpose or intent was. I just have never seen any reason to go there. I mean, 364 days a year they hate me, they hate a Republican president, they hate Republicans. Why believe that they’re gonna put all that on the shelf for one night? They’re not, and they don’t. I think one of the reasons Trump ran for president is the way Obama skewered him at one of these White House Correspondents’ Dinners. I mean, it was brutal how they made fun of Trump.
Admittedly, Trump had been on this birther thing, so it was tit-for-tat.
But it lit a fire under Trump.
Nobody ever thought the guy would run, and nobody ever thought if he ran he’d really mean it, and nobody really thought if he ever ran, he would win. And then after he won, nobody really thought it happened, the Russians had to make it happen. Then after that, nobody really thinks he’s knows what he’s doing, nobody really thinks he’s gonna be able to get anything done, nobody. And he just keeps setting the agenda and keeps determining the pace, and does so in an undaunted, non-defensive fashion. He knows the long knives are out for him from all over the place.