RUSH: Sherman, Texas.  This is David.  Greetings.  Welcome to the EIB Network.  Hello.

CALLER:  Hi, Rush.  I’m gonna apologize for that guy.  I’m worried that House Democrats are gonna now pass legislation that will limit President Trump’s ability to defend us and engage preemptively, and we cannot wait on Congress to declare war because, you know, a supersonic ICBM could reach us in 10 minutes delivering nuclear warheads.

RUSH:  Okay, this is another great example. When I come up and say that there’s no difference in the Iranians and the Democrats, “Oh, that’s going a little too far.” Who is it that’s trying to handcuff the president in a potential situation you just described as defending the country?  It’s the Democrats.

CALLER:  Yeah, and they’re threatening now to limit his power, and that could just spell the end of everything.  It’s unbelievable.

RUSH:  It is totally believable.  This is the… It shouldn’t surprise you.  I made the point yesterday. I made a prediction yesterday.  All of this stuff is eventually gonna get folded into their impeachment effort, and, lo and behold, let me grab the bite. Let’s see here. Grab number 41.  I predicted this.  I predicted this yesterday that they were gonna open up impeachment hearings in the House. They’re gonna fold this whole Iranian stuff into it.  And this afternoon on PMSNBC, Pencil Neck showed up with Andrea Mitchell, NBC News, Washington.

This is all about John Bolton has said that he will testify if subpoenaed by the Senate.  So, that’s its own separate story. This has ignited the Democrats once again, ’cause they think what Bolton is saying is, “Hey, I’ll come in and I’ll unload on Trump if you subpoena me.  I can’t wait!”  That’s what they think Bolton is saying.  They are so excited.  They think Bolton is ready to turn tail.  They think Bolton is ready to come in and unload on Trump and tell ’em everything about Russian collusion and the Ukrainian phone call and whatever else — the Steele dossier — that’s true.

Whatever they dream about being true, they think Bolton is signaling that he’s ready to come in and turn on Trump.  So Andrea Mitchell is asking Pencil Neck about this, and this is what he said…

SCHIFF:  We haven’t taken that off the table.  Uh, I think what — what makes the most sense, though, frankly, uh, Andrea, is for him to testify in the Senate trial.  I do think that the pause in sending the articles has had a very salutary effect in flushing out McConnell and making it clear that he is working in cahoots with the president as part of this cover-up, uh, and fleshing out, uh, where the moderate Republican senators are.  The only thing that was clear from John Bolton up ’til now was that if we subpoenaed him, he would sue us and it would take ultimately years in court before we could secure his testimony.  So I think the pause has had a (sputters) very important impact.  It’d be up to the speaker when the time is right to transmit those articles.

RUSH: Will you subpoena Bolton? We haven’t taken that off the table. This is about a number of things, but they want to fold this Iranian stuff into the impeachment on the basis that Trump is unfit, that he is engaging in misconduct. And of course now they’re saying, “Well, he didn’t get our permission. He didn’t come in and use the War Powers Act, and we want to limit what he can do in the future.”

You know, I have a different view of people who are worried about this. Let them do this stuff. They are in the process, folks, of finally telling everybody who they are. And I don’t mind them doing it. The common sense reaction right now is when Schiff or any of these guys come out and says — or anybody else, Pelosi, “We need to limit what Trump can do.” Trump is only acting to defend the United States. Everybody in the world knows this. Everybody in this country knows this. They want to limit this president’s ability.

I think a lot of people lose track because we get caught up in all this and we go moment to moment to moment. But the cumulative effect of the Democrats and their efforts, unending, to get Trump, that are now into their fourth year, has not been lost on people. I’m talking about average, ordinary Americans who are watching this, and I still think that there are millions of them that just continue to seethe in various stages of anger over this.

Now, substantively, yeah, this is dire consequences and serious if they actually would succeed in being able to limit. But there’s this thing called the Constitution. They’re not gonna be able to pull this off. They can huff and puff about it, they can talk about it, I can give you examples in history. Thomas Jefferson. Let’s go back. Thomas Jefferson waged war against the Barbary pirates in Africa the early days of Islamic terrorists, and Jefferson did this without any consent from Congress whatsoever, and there are countless other examples of this.

So it’s just more huffing and puffing. And it is ultimately an admission by the Democrats that they are impotent. There’s not a thing they have been able to do to stop Trump. Why do you think this is gonna work? They haven’t been able to stop him. They haven’t been able to stop his agenda.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH:  By the way, folks, I’ve had a story here in the Stack of stuff that McConnell says that he is ready to go with… Here it is.  “McConnell Has the Votes to Block Democrats’ Witness Demands in Trump Impeachment Trial.”  It is a story from TheHill.com.  Now there are a couple of tweets that back this up. One of them from a Washington Post White House reporter, Seung Min Kim: “McConnell tells GOP senators inside the lunch that he has the votes to proceed with impeachment trial without witness deal…”

Now Mike Debonis, who is a Washington Post congressional reporter, tweets, “Meanwhile, multiple Senate Dems saying now that it’s clear GOP is dug in against witness deal, it’s time to send the articles and start the trial. ‘I think the time has past. [sic] She should send the articles over,’ said” Chris Murphy, Democrat from Connecticut.  Now, the interpretation here is that McConnell is basically telling the Democrats who want to call witnesses, including Bolton, to go pound sand, and that the Democrats — these two media people think — that that’s it.

“So okay, Nancy. May as well send the articles over ’cause this is all there is.”  Nancy is not gonna send the articles over, folks. Not yet.  I wouldn’t be surprised if she never does.  But I don’t want to get any hard, fast predictions that I’m locked into here ’cause we’re starting a new year, and there are the opinion audits from the Sullivan Group. You know, we’re at 99.8% almost always right, and I don’t want to put that at risk.