RUSH: Let me go back to the phones in Shelby Township in Michigan. This is Paul. I’m glad you waited, sir. Welcome to our program. How are you?

CALLER: Wow, thanks Rush. I’m a Millennial and I feel a lot of compassion for what John McCain’s going through. But what makes it worse is if he’s on Obamacare like the rest of us, first, hopefully they actually cover his procedures. And even if they do, he’s probably gonna get stuck paying part of the hospital bill, part of the surgeries, on top probably months and months of high premiums.

RUSH: All right, now, Paul, you obviously know here that that’s not the case, right?

CALLER: Right. And it’s not fair.

RUSH: You know that Senator McCain is not going to encounter those kinds of problems in his treatment.

CALLER: Right.

RUSH: Because members of Congress are not subject to Obamacare. That’s your point, right?

CALLER: Exactly. And I’ll go a step further and say I hope my generation wakes up to the hypocrisy going on in Washington, because they have one set of rules; we have another set. They have one health insurance, and then they’re dumping whatever they want on us, and we’re gonna end up paying this huge tab started by Obamacare.

RUSH: Well, I’ll tell you, I think people are well aware of that. I think voters are fully up to speed on the fact that members of Congress exempt themselves from many of the laws they pass, particularly health care. In fact, in this latest, it was just last week or two weeks ago, whenever one of the most recent Obamacare bills was presented, it was learned that members of the House and/or Senate had exempted themselves from the very bill they were writing.

And people have known this for quite a while now. It’s been something that’s been frustrating and angering and I think it’s not really news. That factor, in terms of congressional support, popularity, approval rating, it’s well known that Congress does these kinds of things, exempts themselves. As far as Senator McCain is concerned, he’s gonna get the best treatment that there is. And in truth, folks, most Americans do.

This is the frustrating thing about all this health care. You look at the way health care is sold — this is another thing. Look at what Millennials and Generation Z types have been taught about the American health care system growing up. They’ve been lied to about that. They’ve been told that Cuba has the world’s greatest health care and that it’s free. And they’ve been told tall tales about the deficiencies of the American health care system and so forth.

It’s the best health care in the world. It’s where everybody who can afford it comes if they have a serious illness or need serious surgery, from Middle East oil potentates to Russian oligarchs to Asian theocrats, they all come to the United States of America for treatment of the most serious maladies known to exist. And yet this is another area where people have been treated by the media, the American left, Democrat Party, to news story upon news story about how rotten and unfair the American health care system is.

Just about the health care system, just about the doctors and the nurses and the scientists, the innovators, it’s the best in the world. What gums it up is the federal government getting involved trying to regulate it, price it, make cozy deals with insurance companies. The actual health care, the actual quality of the health care in this country, there’s none better, and Senator McCain is going to get the best. Plus he can afford it on his own, whether his policies with the government cover it or not.

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RUSH: It seems to be a universal truth, a universally accepted fact that if the Republicans do not repeal Obamacare — forget replacing it — all they would have to do is repeal it. If they don’t do that, the assumption is that they are going to get creamed at reelection time, is it not? Everybody thinks this. Standard operating procedure. Traditional, theoretical belief. If the Republicans blow this, and they’re through. Even Trump, cracking wise with Senator Heller from Colorado yesterday, said, “Hey, you like being in the Senate. You want to come back, right?”

I mean, the point was if you don’t vote to get rid of this, sayonara. Isn’t it universally believed — do you believe it, Mr. Snerdley? Well, now, no, I’m taking this somewhere. I’m trying to establish, among those of you who think the Republicans are in fact toast, this is it, if they don’t do this, they’re finished. My question for you is, why don’t they think so? Remember what Senator Cruz said. He said it to me every time I’ve talked to him, and he said it again in the last issue of The Limbaugh Letter. It’s coming up soon. I interviewed him.

He said the first thing he noticed, first thing he learned when he first got to the Senate, 95% of the time there is spent on reelection. That reelection is the first, second, third, fourth, and fifth thing on the list of priorities. And these guys run once every six years. Fundraising, fund spending, attending fundraisers, meeting with the bundlers. It’s all about being reelected. And his point was, that’s what they primary care about first, second, third, fourth, and fifth, is being reelected.

Okay, given that, if you had to say today that the vote’s gonna take place, you would know that Obamacare repeal would lose in the Senate. The House has already voted. There may be some cover there. But why aren’t these senators afraid? If the top five most important things to them are being reelected, why aren’t they worried that not voting to repeal Obamacare will doom them?

Let me put it in another way. If repealing Obamacare and fulfilling the seven-year promise, and now with no excuses for not doing it, if that’s guaranteed to lose you your next election, why are they not afraid of losing their next election? Why are they willing to not vote to repeal Obamacare? Why are they not concerned at all that their non-vote will result in their losing their reelection bid? Why are they not concerned about it at all? (interruption) Well, no, no, no. Snerdley says it’s only four that are not too worried.

Wrong! I saw today that if it were put to a vote, it wouldn’t even get 40. Some senator said today that if the vote were today, after the meeting with Trump, it wouldn’t even get 40 votes. So there are 12 Republicans — now, they may not be up in two years, they may not be up in four, some of them may not be for six years. And when you start answering the question, okay, how many of them up are in a year and a half? How many are up in four and a half years, and then how many are not up until 2020 or 2022? You’d have to answer that, and you’d have to compare when their reelection efforts are.

I guarantee you the senators that don’t face reelection in 2022 are not going to be worried about losing reelection at all on this Obamacare, because they think by the time the time comes around you’re gonna have long forgotten this, and your emotion will have been spent and it will be replaced by something else that’s got you all worked up.

My point is this. There just doesn’t seem to be all that much concern in the Senate about punishment for not repealing Obamacare. We’re told it’s the most important thing in their lives, the number one, two, three, four, five priority, getting reelected. And yet not repealing Obamacare is guaranteed to lose. They are guaranteed to lose. Why are they not worried about it? I don’t pretend to have the answer. I’m just asking you, why are they not worried about it? The two don’t go together.

If they were scared to death of losing their jobs because of their Obamacare vote, I guarantee you they’d be voting to repeal it. But they’re not scared. Of you. They’re not scared of the voters. They might be scared of somebody else, but it isn’t you. Who else would have the power to frighten them? I can tell you. Donors, lobbyists, any number of people might scare them much more than you do.

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RUSH: I would remind you the Republicans have not lost a special election this year, either. Now, all those elections happened before this latest Obamacare debacle, but it was in the midst of happening. And another thing to keep in mind about the Republican electorate in 2016. Trump brought forth a bunch of people who had not voted in a long time. Pollsters couldn’t find ’em. Nobody knew they were there. Will those people show up and vote again after this debacle? I mean for members of Congress or will they wait and revote for Trump in 2020?

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Here is Jim in Cincinnati. Great to have you, sir. I’m glad you called.

CALLER: Good afternoon, Rush. Pleasure to talk to you.

RUSH: Thank you.

CALLER: The previous caller was concerned about — and you got into would Republicans vote for Republicans. I was a Republican precinct rep, was in Washington down here in the fall or the spring of 2010 with the Tea Party revolution. And I resigned my position last fall because I could not hand out literature and actually campaign for my senator, Portman. No, he won’t care about anything ’cause he’s not up ’til 2022. And I was one of the leaders to dump our previous RINO and got the new guy in who’s turned his back on us. And I’m fed up with it. I won’t vote for Republicans anymore unless they’re an honest man like Mike Lee or Ted Cruz or Paul Massey across the river here.

I’m tired of it. They lie to us. The only care about themselves and supporting their lobbyists. Portman, just today, he’s not gonna even vote for repeal after he promises last year in the primaries and in the fall, oh, no, he’s against Obamacare, he’ll vote to repeal it. And, “Well, I can’t do that now, I’m with Kasich, we gotta give all these welfare people Medicaid in the state of Ohio.” You know, they’re a bunch of liars. What’s the difference? When you talked to Mike Pence the first time after the election there when you said, “What difference does it make if we vote Republican anymore, doesn’t do us any good.” So why?

RUSH: Yeah. I remember. There was a lot of irritation there with the first House failure, and I did, I asked the vice president what difference it make now, why vote Republican if this is what you’re gonna get. I’d have to go back and check my own transcripts but I think that my memory is sufficiently tuned to honestly say that I have issued a number of cautionary warnings that I didn’t think this was going to happen. I didn’t think they were going to do it, because of the reasons I’ve been saying intensely the past week or two: they don’t want to.

It’s a matter of desire. You can tell that they don’t want to do it. When you meet anybody that has a fervent desire to do something, you know it. You spot it. They can’t hide it. It’s what drives them. It’s what drives anybody. You know, I have a philosophy that desire is 80% of achievement. I mean, really, really wanting it. And by the same token, you can see when desire isn’t there.

Now, you have to go further. If you’re gonna say that they really don’t have the desire, then you gotta start asking why, and then you have many different answers, and all or one could be true or a combination of whatever reasons. Such as, “I don’t want the media ripping me. I don’t have a prayer of surviving this. It’s an entitlement, we’ve already got it. It’s been working now, it’s been seven years, seven years, 2010. I’m not gonna take this away from people. Medicare, I’m not here to hurt people.”

You’ve heard Senator Capito say that. I didn’t come here to hurt people, taking Obamacare away. A failing health care system in her life, in her world, is gonna hurt people. And then there is the media criticism that will come, and then there’s a certain number of them who just Republican, Democrat, doesn’t matter, an outsider is just not going to be permitted to triumph here. Just isn’t gonna happen. They’re not gonna let it happen. Any number of reasons why here.

So now the strategizing is leave it alone and let it implode and incur the wrath of Democrats. They’re gonna accuse you of not caring about people by not trying to fix it. Do you not vote on it period, which will result in its implosion? ‘Cause it is going to implode. Maybe you secretly want single payer. Maybe you are one of the cadre of those in the establishment who want single payer and you know the best and only way to get there is if Obamacare fails and repealing it is going to put a big spike in the way of getting to single payer.

Could be any number of reasons why Republicans and/or Democrats don’t want to repeal it. What sound bite is Krauthammer? Krauthammer weighed in on this last night. Grab sound bite number 15. Back to Krauthammer, Fox News, special report, All-Star Panel. Bret Baier. “Congressman Mark Meadows of North Carolina saying that the effort to repeal and replace has reached an impasse. Maybe it’s time to send a clean repeal-only bill to President Trump. What are your thoughts on that, Charles?”

KRAUTHAMMER: I think the chances of a resurrection here are rather small. If it succeeded, it would be the most spectacular since Lazarus. And I’m not sure that these people have divine powers. I think the best thing to do now, ironically, is to walk away. I think it’s gonna be suicidal to go ahead with the vote next week.

RUSH: So suicidal in the sense that if you vote to repeal this thing, and it doesn’t get repealed, not enough, if you don’t vote, whatever, you’re dead come reelection time. The best thing you can do is to not take a position on it. In other words, let it implode because there’s no way, Krauthammer thinks, there’s no way they can bring repeal, replace back to life.