RUSH: Now, I’m sure a lot of you people are gonna disagree with me on this, but I actually think that I picked a pretty good week to be gone last week. I mean, I was in the middle of it, too, just like you were and I had some initial reactions, especially when that anonymous New York Times piece came out. By the way, I don’t think anybody but somebody at the New York Times wrote that. I don’t think there is somebody in the White House or in the administration that wrote that thing. I think it’s all made up. But we’ll get to that in a minute.

As I look back on it, there wasn’t any real news last week. There’s just a bunch of ginned up hysteria from the media and from the American left, the Democrat Party who want you to focus on what it is that upsets them. They remain obsessed with changing your minds. They remain obsessed with being able to bend, shape, flake, and form public opinion.

You know what? They’re not able to anymore, and this, as much as anything — I don’t mean to denigrate their hatred for Trump because that’s as strong and as high as ever, but their desire to prove to themselves that they can still bend and shape public opinion is what’s driving a lot of this hysteria. And they are readily recognizing that they can’t and it’s new territory for them so they’re getting even more hysterical as each day comes and goes.

And, folks, you watch this, and when you have the Woodward book out there and Bob Woodward’s advising everybody that we need to really get serious about examining the psychology and the mental fitness of Donald Trump. And I’m gonna tell you, it’s just the exact opposite. If anybody is close to a breakdown, it’s people in the media and people on the left. If there’s anybody in desperate need of some psychological help, it’s those people, not Donald Trump. And not you and me.

Greetings. Great to be back. Telephone number is you want to be on the program is 800-282-2882, and the email address, ElRushbo@eibnet.us.

Man, there were lots of things happening last week that I wish I had been here to discuss, but I am here now, and we’re gonna go back and we’re gonna review as many of the things from the past, oh, week or 10 days that I want to offer my two cents on. Just run down the list of things, just to give you an idea of what’s coming up.

That funeral for Senator McCain, whew. I know I’ve gotta be very, very, very, very careful here. But that was a presidential funeral, which is fine except for one thing. John McCain was never president. He tried twice. He lost twice. He never became president. So why, who authorized a presidential funeral for Senator John McCain?

Now, something that I think may not be widely known, that every living president is required to plan his funeral, to lay it all out, to make it known to government officials because presidential funerals are, if ex-presidents want them, big deals. I don’t know how many of you remember the funeral for Ronaldus Magnus, but it was almost an identical funeral to that of John F. Kennedy, complete with the caissons walking and marching through Washington.

I’ll never forget that eerie drumbeat that accompanies the caisson. Reagan had it. It was big. And the Drive-Bys were stunned at how big it was. The Drive-Bys, the media, the left were stunned at how many people came out for it, not just in Washington, all over the country.

So when Senator Kennedy died, they tried the same thing. They didn’t do a funeral that was the size of McCain’s, however. But they attempted to do a presidential funeral in terms of the procession through Washington. And they were stunned at how few people showed up to watch it. I’m not talking about what went on inside churches. I’m talking about the casket parading down streets in Washington, D.C.

So there really isn’t a lot of precedent for a United States senator getting a presidential funeral. Now, don’t infer anything from this. I’m just sharing with you some observations. Then when I saw the eulogies, I mean, I was probably like a lot of people, “Whoa. What is this?” See, my idea of a funeral — and I don’t mean to be imposing this on anyone else — but I happen to believe that funerals are for the living. But to the extent that they are for the deceased, the purpose is to pray for the salvation of the soul of the deceased.

And for that there is a focus on God with an assist from men and women of the cloth whose profession and job it is to assist in this ceremony to give comfort to the family of the deceased. I have to tell you that I was — well, I was gonna say I was taken aback. But, you know, I’m not. I really wasn’t. I was not surprised that at a funeral for a deceased senator, the focus would be the hatred for Donald Trump. I was disappointed to see it, but I wasn’t surprised.

I began to ask, what kind of anger or bitterness must have been festering for however many months or years to produce that funeral. By the way, when I then saw — I’m gonna take a big leap here, but when that anonymous New York Times op-ed was published supposedly by some ranking senior adviser in the Trump administration, I saw at the end of that veneration for Senator McCain, I once again said, “Whoa! The two to me seem to be connected.” Don’t know that they are. Wild guess, using my intelligence guided by experience.

But of all the things and of all the people that could have been venerated in that anonymous op-ed in the New York Times, for whoever wrote it to say, “Gee, couldn’t we have had somebody like Senator McCain?” Senator McCain tried twice, and Senator McCain lost. He was defeated twice. Now, there are a lot of McCain acolytes scattered throughout the Washington establishment (both Republican and Democrat) and in the media — which I know is redundant, to talk about media and the Democrats.

But I then began to wonder, “Is this New York Times op-ed part of the plan of the McCain funeral?” and I said, “It could be. It could be,” and it could also be the New York Times deciding to get in on whatever action they thought was gonna happen because of the Bob Woodward book. Bob Woodward’s writing for the Washington Post. There is a rivalry between the Times and the Post. But in this day they are unified in their gigantic effort to get rid of Donald Trump.

But if anybody is making fools of themselves, it’s them. And it’s paramountly obvious they don’t realize it. If anybody is making themselves look like they are unqualified for leadership, unqualified for positions of power and influence, it is them. They have gone beyond their own ability to cope now. And I’m telling you, it is rooted in the reality that they haven’t been able to make happen what they have in their minds always believed they’ve had the power to make happen.

If they’ve wanted to get rid of a Republican, it’s been pretty easy over the years. There are only a couple of exceptions — Republicans targeted who have survived — and Trump tops the list. They’ve tried every trick in their book. They’ve tried lying, anonymous sources, making things up. The frustration that they are feeling must be incredible. It must be — and we know it is — driving them literally insane and batty.

So now they are reaching, grasping in desperate spasms for anything they believe will make you see Donald Trump the way they do. Imagine. They’ve been waiting, they’ve been praying, they’ve been hoping that Robert Mueller is gonna learn whatever it is that will send Donald Trump to jail immediately from the White House. Don’t pass go. Don’t collect 200 bucks. Right from the Oval Office to prison. They realize now that Mueller doesn’t have diddly-squat. He’s got nothing.

There was not a crime even specified for Mueller to find or to investigate. His investigation has been in search of a crime. They haven’t found one. They still haven’t found one. They’ve tried. They’ve made things up. It’s got to be driving them crazy! So they’re trotting out all of their old traditions, techniques and, in some cases, players. And by that I mean Woodward. Bob Woodward stopped having any weight with me after he claimed that William Casey, who was the CIA director for Ronald Reagan… Casey was comatose, in a bed, in hospital, close to death.

Woodward claims that he woke up and told him things about Iran-Contra! Ever since that — and probably, being honest, prior to that. Woodward, of course, was part of Woodward-Bernstein, Watergate. Bob Woodward has always carried a gigantic question mark with me. I mean, once you’re willing to invent people in a coma waking up to talk to you, I don’t think there’s too much you won’t do. And when the primary name of all of your sources is Anonymous, and when you have people who you’re writing about in the White House now coming out and saying, “That didn’t happen. I didn’t say that. I didn’t do that.”

Mad Dog Mattis and John Kelly are all denying what Woodward had said. I realize that that might be the expected thing. But, look, if there were this gigantic effort inside the White House to get rid of Donald Trump, I think they would have succeeded. They would have had a little bit more success than they have up ’til now. You know this…? How many of you are aware of the controversy happened at the women’s U.S. Open tennis tournament over the weekend with Serena Williams and the new wunderkind, Naomi Osaka?

Are you aware that the controversy in that final is an exact microcosm for the Washington, D.C. establishment and Donald Trump? Folks, it is eerie! And I, of course ,will explain it. If you’re puzzled and scratching your head, “What in the heck can the two have in common?” It’s all identical! You have an outsider, a young — well, in this case young. You have an outsider. You have an established, establishment winner, expected to win every time. A double dose of advantage: She is a minority. She’s an African-American woman.

She was supposed to win. Just like Hillary Clinton was supposed to win. This Osaka babe? Nothing more than fodder, nothing more than a stand-in, nothing more than the latest fall guy. Except everything went wrong. The outsider comes in and smokes Serena Williams, smokes the establishment, and she melts down identically to the way the Washington establishment and the media have melted down over Donald Trump.

The establishment in New York, the tennis elites are circling the wagons around Serena Williams and blaming the official, blaming the referee. Just as the Washington establishment blamed the Russians or blames the elections or blames the Electoral College or blames whatever they blame for Donald Trump winning. It’s uncanny, folks. So we’ll spend a little time; I’ll be more specific as that unfolds.

The circus of the Kavanaugh hearings for his Supreme Court nomination. (sigh) More and more the left being who they are is just embarrassing. I must tell you, I look at this… You know, it’s a different perspective too. I’m out all week, but for most of the time last week I’m paying attention. And when I don’t have to consume that stuff in ways to be able to regurgitate and comment on it — when I’m just consuming it here just reading it but not doing anything else with it, I look at it even more so than I did when I’m doing show prep.

I say, “How can anybody…?” Like at that Kavanaugh hearing. “How can anybody who has a right mind — how can anybody with any kind of decency and common sense — even think about voting for any of the people that those Democrats — Cory Booker and Kamala Harris — are appealing to? How can anybody in their right minds throughout this entire country vote for those people?” I know they do. Don’t misunderstand.

I just refuse to believe that our country has become a majority of the genuine deranged that are represented by the people in the confirmation hearing room and the Democrats who are trying to appeal to ’em. I don’t know if you saw it or not. There’s a photo, a woman… I realize this is lunchtime in two of the time zones in this country and arguably maybe three if you want to include brunch. There is a woman, a picture of a woman bleeding, menstrually. Not a small amount. The picture is taken in that room, and it is all about trying to exemplify the danger that Kavanaugh poses to women who want abortions.

It’s sick! We are surrounded and infiltrated by genuine sickness — physical, mental. And I’ll tell you, folks, I’m just… I’m really grateful, thankful for the opportunity I have to come here and talk about it every day, because that’s one way of dealing with it, having an outlet. ‘Cause, man, some of this stuff is just… It ought to be representative of 2 to 5% of the people in this country in that thinking. But it’s larger than that. But they’re not the majority.