{"id":30328,"date":"2008-09-05T01:01:01","date_gmt":"2011-05-19T03:25:05","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-05-19T03:25:05","modified_gmt":"2011-05-19T03:25:05","slug":"rush_s_take_on_mccain_s_speech2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2008\/09\/05\/rush_s_take_on_mccain_s_speech2\/","title":{"rendered":"Rush\u2019s Take on McCain\u2019s Speech"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

RUSH: Now, Mr. Snerdley wanted me to repeat for you what I said on Greta\u2019s show at midnight last night on Fox in analyzing McCain\u2019s speech. I did not have high expectations. McCain\u2019s not a great orator. I was hoping they could do something to keep the momentum from the previous night going, but they didn\u2019t. <\/p>\n

Thank God the moderates that spoke last night were on during the football game. Oh, folks. The three of us are watching this, and during commercial breaks, we\u2019d switch around, and I saw Lindsey Grahamnesty, God love him, and the crowd was talking to itself, the same thing with Tom Ridge. I\u2019m thinking thank goodness these guys are on now. Nothing against them, but I mean in terms of a show and so forth, there was tepid little applause. It was a blessing. As far as Senator McCain\u2019s speech, he is who he is. I only got mad one time. I really only got mad one time when he said, ‘I understand who I work for. I don\u2019t work for a party.\u2019 I almost — well, I did. I shouted at the TV. Can I tell you what I shouted? It\u2019s clean. I said, ‘Then why are you a Republican!\u2019 First time I\u2019ve ever seen a party nominee rip his own party. But that\u2019s who McCain is. Some people think, ‘Rush, he had to do it, Bush isn\u2019t popular, Republican Party isn\u2019t popular,\u2019 and I came to the same conclusion. This is Sarah Palin\u2019s party; it\u2019s Sarah Palin\u2019s future. Sarah Palin is the conservative movement. Sarah Palin is the one who unified the party, unified the convention, she\u2019ll keep that up, she\u2019s the reason there\u2019s energy, we know that, everybody knows it, the McCain camp knows it. So she\u2019s free to do what she\u2019s going to do, free as to what she\u2019s going to say, which frees McCain up to be who he is, go out and free up his precious moderates and so forth, so everything is fine. We\u2019re getting genuine. Nobody is acting in ways that they aren\u2019t. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s insanity, folks, to expect somebody who\u2019s 72 years old to all of a sudden change and be somebody they\u2019re not going to be. So don\u2019t get frustrated over it. I got e-mails, ‘Rush, it was like somebody threw a wet blanket on the fire.\u2019 Yeah, I know, but it wasn\u2019t, believe me. McCain\u2019s audience is higher. McCain was authentic. You may not like some of the things he said, but he was authentic. When he went off prompter and started talking about his experience in that prison cell, that led to the big crescendo ending that finally got the energy of this place back, and it ended on a bright note, it really did. And I\u2019ll tell you this. There are a lot of points that you could make about McCain\u2019s speech. We got the theme, and the theme was consistent throughout this convention, no matter who the speaker was: ‘Country first. I\u2019ll fight for you.\u2019 They kept that theme going, and it resonated. <\/p>\n

Now, one of the points that could be discussed about this is this beautiful explanation of the theme of his campaign, ‘Country First.\u2019 As I said last night on Greta, ‘This could have been a bit of a trap, but only because Obama has not had the same life experiences of McCain.\u2019 The differences in life experiences were laid bare last night. Obama doesn\u2019t have a thimbleful of life experience that he wants to share with us. This whole convention gave us rich, full American lives of meaning, confidence, accomplishment, achievement from both our nominees, McCain and Palin. They let out excerpts of the speech before he gives the speech. It\u2019s traditional. And when his theme of country first became known, this was the brilliant trap. This was the brilliant trap that they set. When the theme of country first became known, some of Obama\u2019s team said it was a slam. They walked right into the quicksand, because they think everything\u2019s about them. And Obama eventually got trapped personally, too. He thought McCain was attacking his patriotism. He was out there last night talking to reporters, saying that, a self-centered guy. This was on full display to me last night. <\/p>\n

Obama\u2019s a typical Messiah, a young guy who really has had a pretty cushy, easy life, compared to McCain. He\u2019s a typical Baby Boomer, although he\u2019s not, he\u2019s a typical Boomer in the sense that everything revolves around him, everything is about him. He didn\u2019t stop for one second to think that John McCain wasn\u2019t even thinking about Obama last night. McCain was describing himself to the nation. McCain was telling us who he is. The contrast was so stark that old little Barry thought he was being attacked again. It was fabulous. This whole McCain speech, it had a story arc to it when the whole thing unfolded. It was about the journey of a man who started out as a me-first, totally focused on himself young guy like Obama, but he said this before. I mean, you could say it was to contrast himself with Obama, but you don\u2019t have to try to do that. When you\u2019re John McCain, the contrast is self-evident. It\u2019s stark. So he starts out as a me-first, hotshot fighter pilot, thought he was smarter, better, and tougher than anybody else, and then he learned how insignificant he is. <\/p>\n

He learned how insignificant he was, and it was those five-and-a-half years in the prison that insignificance slapped him upside the head and when he really began to appreciate and love what his country was all about. He changed while he was a prisoner of war. He evolved. He went to the Hanoi Hilton as a McCain-first pilot, came out as an American-first man. I don\u2019t care how he delivered it, and I don\u2019t care, the performance aspect might have been low, but the words were penetrating, and they were from the heart and they were from the soul. And I guarantee you, they penetrated a lot of people, and it\u2019s something that just by virtue of fact, the contrast with McCain\u2019s story, as told by him, with Obama, and the story of himself he cannot tell, contrasted with Obama\u2019s selfish orientation, thinking everything is about him. McCain said for him that it started when he refused to go home before more senior prisoners when they offered him up as a PR ploy \u2019cause his dad was an admiral. So when he refused to play the game, he said, ‘That\u2019s when they broke me.\u2019 <\/p>\n

Now, forgive me for being ignorant on this, I didn\u2019t know he broke. I thought he held tough for five-and-a-half years. He admitted last night they broke him. He went back to his hut afterwards broken, ashamed, and humbled, and that\u2019s when his fellow prisoners saved his life, he said. They fed him \u2019cause he couldn\u2019t feed himself. He was no longer McCain-first after that. He was an American first. As the result of his experiences he was humbled, he evolved. His life was changed forever. Now it\u2019s country-first. And this is not a slogan with him. Sometimes the way he puts country first infuriates us, but he puts country first. Obama made the typical, predictable, we\u2019re going to snare you in our little trap here. He made the mistake of a young, immature and arrogant man. Like McCain might have done before his experiences in the war, Obama thought country first was about him. Now, I can understand it because I understand the personality type of Barack Obama. (doing Obama impression) ‘There they go, they\u2019re challenging my patriotism again. I\u2019m Barack Obama, they\u2019re challenging my patriotism.\u2019 Why does he think that? <\/p>\n

Let me ask you this. Why does he have to go to VFW conventions and tell them and assure them he loves the country? There must be some doubt. There must be some problem he\u2019s got here. Could it be that he goes to Berlin and criticizes the United States? Could it be that when a seven-year-old little girl asks him why he wants to be president, he criticizes his own country? Could it be he knows damn well he doesn\u2019t like the country as it is? Saul Alinsky didn\u2019t like it, Jeremiah Wright didn\u2019t like it, Bill Ayers didn\u2019t like it, they still don\u2019t like it, and that\u2019s who mentored this guy. So of course he\u2019s on the defensive because he was nailed even when he wasn\u2019t being talked about. He shoulda shut up. He shoulda not said a word. I think he also goofed up going on O\u2019Reilly last night and calling a press conference after. Remember how they just tarred McCain, that would be a sign of such disrespect if he named his running mate before Obama gave his acceptance speech. And there\u2019s Obama last night. We know who this guy is. This whole McCain acceptance speech wasn\u2019t even directed at Obama, except when McCain lavished him with praise. But it does help to bring the differences of these two guys into focus. <\/p>\n

When Obama\u2019s people, after they got wind of what McCain was gonna say, when Obama\u2019s people accused McCain of calling Obama\u2019s patriotism into question, using that theme they proved that Obama\u2019s personal journey isn\u2019t complete. He hasn\u2019t done anything. He\u2019s done diddly-squat really. He\u2019s forced now to defend community agitation. (doing Obama impression) ‘I taught law. I taught law at University of Chicago law school, taught law.\u2019 What did you teach? We haven\u2019t heard many of your students come and up say how much they loved you. He still sees himself as first. Not a fatal flaw. McCain found it through important life experience. You can grow beyond that, but I don\u2019t think Obama thinks he needs to grow. See, I think Obama\u2019s it in his mind and in the eyes of his supporters, it\u2019s why he\u2019s it. So it was pretty powerful to me last night in a lot of ways, frustrating in some others. I\u2019m sure it was frustrating to you in obvious ways. The performance was not what you were hoping for. But, again, expectations should have managed that. The words, the sincerity, the genuineness, the authenticity last night, the contrast was just stark, both of our candidates versus these nothing but traditional political hacks on the left. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: Now, Mr. Snerdley wanted me to repeat for you what I said on Greta\u2019s show at midnight last night on Fox in analyzing McCain\u2019s speech. I did not have high expectations. McCain\u2019s not a great orator. I was hoping they could do something to keep the momentum from the previous night going, but they […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nRush's Take on McCain's Speech - The Rush Limbaugh Show<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2008\/09\/05\/rush_s_take_on_mccain_s_speech2\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Rush's Take on McCain's Speech - The Rush Limbaugh Show\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"RUSH: Now, Mr. Snerdley wanted me to repeat for you what I said on Greta\u2019s show at midnight last night on Fox in analyzing McCain\u2019s speech. 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