{"id":32310,"date":"2009-05-01T01:01:01","date_gmt":"2011-05-19T02:30:02","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-05-19T02:30:02","modified_gmt":"2011-05-19T02:30:02","slug":"caller_considers_run_for_office","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2009\/05\/01\/caller_considers_run_for_office\/","title":{"rendered":"Caller Considers Run for Office"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

RUSH: This is Grant in Comfort, Texas. Nice to have you on the program, sir. Hello.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Howdy. Dittos.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Howdy!<\/p>\n

CALLER: I\u2019m just a guy out here in the Texas Hill Country trying to figure out how to best contribute to the un-remaking of my country, and it dawns on me to possibly run for office.<\/p>\n

RUSH: What kind of office?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Oh, well, heh. To be determined, but I\u2019m thinking the House. It looks like we could use some help there. And I\u2019ve been thinking about this for some weeks now. We\u2019ve got a lot of bloggers on our side, we\u2019ve gotta lot of thinkers on our side, we\u2019ve got a lot of support from conservative radio, but in the end, someone…<\/p>\n

RUSH: What do you mean? Hold on. You\u2019ve already floated the idea to people and you\u2019re getting positive feedback on your idea to run for office?<\/p>\n

CALLER: No, actually this would be my maiden voyage.<\/p>\n

RUSH: No, no. You say you\u2019ve got support from bloggers. What do you mean? You\u2019ve told them…?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, I say ‘we\u2019 as a conservatives have.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Oh, oh. You got an army out there, a network of people that would support your candidacy if you theoretically decided to go for it?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, I\u2019m not entirely sure of that. What I know is… The point is, we got a lot of people on the periphery, what I call cheerleaders, and some of us have got to get on the battlefield; and, yeah, you know, I\u2019m thinking about setting aside my private practice and taking a crack at it.<\/p>\n

RUSH: What is your private practice? What do you practice privately?<\/p>\n

CALLER: I\u2019m a lone wolf consulting engineer, and I run projects for a living, among other things.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Hmm. Interesting.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Fifty-two-year-old guy, and, you know, got a wife and a dog and a business. But anyway, I\u2019m listening to your monologue yesterday, and you\u2019re hitting on budget points that mirror my own, all very encouraging to me. So I thought I\u2019d call to get your take on my biggest dilemma about this. Well, the first biggest dilemma is what do I do to make a living if I\u2019m not making a living. But aside from that, if I\u2019m to do this, and if any citizen candidate is to do this, how is running as a Republican not a waste of time? And if it is a waste of time, and if a third party candidacy is even worse for conservatives, how does one proceed?<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, I need to ask you some questions here before I answer you.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Okay.<\/p>\n

RUSH: The first thing, how do you make a living when you\u2019re not working? You mean when you\u2019re doing your campaign?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Exactly. I have two full-time jobs.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, lot of other candidates have figured out how to steal. I think you should investigate that.<\/p>\n

CALLER: (laughing)<\/p>\n

RUSH: (laughing) I\u2019m just kidding. I\u2019m just…<\/p>\n

CALLER: I\u2019m afraid I have a character issue there.<\/p>\n

RUSH: I\u2019m just kidding. I\u2019m just kidding, just kidding. <\/p>\n

CALLER: (laughing)<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, it is a factor. You\u2019re funding raising, you can\u2019t use that for personal expenses until you get elected (laughing) and then you can when nobody\u2019s looking. (laughing) I\u2019m sorry. I\u2019m just in one of these giddy moods here today. Do you have money in the bank on which you could live while you temporarily suspend your consultancy business?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, sure. You know, I\u2019ve done successful hard work in America, much to my discredit.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, does make you a target of this administration. I sympathize with you on that. All right, let\u2019s get to the nub of this. The district that you live in, in the Hill Country of Texas, is that district predominantly Republican, or predominantly Democrat?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, that is another dilemma. I\u2019m covered over with conservatives here — including, you know, the guy that currently holds the office in the 21st District; who I\u2019m going to assume has got a dog and a parakeet and goes to church regularly and I\u2019ve looked at his voting record, and, you know, it looks pretty good.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Okay, so there\u2019s nothing wrong with this guy, then?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, the problem is he\u2019s on his twelfth trip back to Washington, and my way of thinking at this point is he has no way to self-assess his own thought corruption with respect to his actions in Washington. I\u2019m still evaluating this. This is serious. I\u2019m seriously evaluating this, and the question is: You know, as a guy that\u2019s been there 12 times, is he going to have the blood pressure necessary to push over the hump that\u2019s coming our way in the next two years?<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, only you can answer that because you\u2019re in his district. You\u2019re monitoring how he votes and how he behaves. I have to think that if you\u2019re thinking of challenging him in a primary race to run for his seat, you have to think that there\u2019s something wrong with the way he\u2019s doing the job, otherwise you wouldn\u2019t engage it.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, again, it boils down to a sense of how much vigor is there. I don\u2019t see outrage in the Republican Party anywhere in Washington right now.<\/p>\n

RUSH: I know. I spoke about that at length yesterday. The golden opportunity that exists, especially now, to contrast our views with theirs with this joke of a search for a Supreme Court nominee. I mean, this is even more ammo for our side. Look, I applaud you wanting to run. I have so many people e-mail me and call me saying, ‘You keep it up! You keep it up! What are we going to do about this?\u2019 and, ‘What are we going to do?\u2019 and I keep writing back, ‘What are ‘we\u2019 gonna do? What are you doing about it?\u2019 <\/p>\n

CALLER: Exactly.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, you actually want to grab something in your hands here, go do something about it. So if you do this, and you\u2019re going to do this as a conservative, it\u2019s going to matter what party that you\u2019re a member of. But if you\u2019re going to do this, do not hire a consultant or a campaign advisor or anybody who is going to talk you out of your conservatism as a means of ‘appealing to a broader segment\u2019 of the electorate. <\/p>\n

This is something famous going on in the Republican Party right now. ‘You\u2019ve gotta reach out, gotta get some moderates, gotta get some…\u2019 That\u2019s not why you\u2019re running. You\u2019re running to stop Obama. You want to help the effort to stop Obama. You\u2019ve gotta be who you are after you\u2019re elected, too. You campaign as a conservative, I guarantee you you\u2019ll have much more success turning out a fired-up base that wants to vote for you if you remain true to what\u2019s in your heart and mind. And then if you do happen to get elected, when you get up there, keep it up. Don\u2019t waver and don\u2019t change. The pressure will be tremendous on you to ‘moderate your views\u2019 and so forth, but, look, I really admire you wanting to actually get in the game and, quote, unquote, ‘make a difference\u2019 because you\u2019re so fed up.<\/p>\n

But I\u2019ve never run for office. I\u2019ve never looked at seriously what that would take. I\u2019m just a philosopher here on this kind of thing, that some might call me a strategerist in a way. But it\u2019s like I said at this Milken forum the other night, there were three guys up there, Gillespie — and I like them all, Willie Brown and Harold Ford. They\u2019re all politicians. They look at politics differently than I do. When you look at politics as getting votes, when you look at politics as a matter of getting policy passed, you have to have a totally different view of it than I do — and you have to pander to certain people and groups. Sometimes you have to say things you don\u2019t really believe. I couldn\u2019t do it. I couldn\u2019t do it the way it\u2019s apparently done by most people. <\/p>\n

And if you\u2019re going to do it and you\u2019ve got a fired-up reason to do it, then just follow your heart and mind as to where your motivation comes from. You\u2019d be surprised at the success that you have. You can play up the fact you\u2019re an average guy all you want but it\u2019s going to be your issues. It\u2019s going to be your opinions on things and what you claim you want to do with the power you will have when you get there that will really affect who votes for you. You can overplay, I think, this ‘average Joe\u2019 thing, because every politician does it. They all came from wrong side of the tracks; they all came from poverty. They\u2019ve all seen misery. They all say, ‘My daddy spanked me I can\u2019t tell you how many times when I was growing up!\u2019 It\u2019s all part of the formula. Be genuine. Be genuine, and you\u2019ll win in a landslide. <\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Now, a guy asked me just a moment ago — and I forgot, in advising him, if he\u2019s going to run for office, I forgot the most important thing, sadly. It just goes to show you how my instincts are still naive on this. That is, ladies and gentlemen, the whole notion of money. <\/p>\n

What was the man\u2019s name, what was the man\u2019s name? Grant in Comfort, Texas. Grant, you got to out-raise, you got to have more money than everybody else. I mean, the mayor of Indianapolis won with no money. It\u2019s very rare, though, when that happens. But you do have to go out and raise money, and that\u2019s another reason I couldn\u2019t be in politics. To this day, I don\u2019t like asking people for a ride because then they\u2019re going to go ask me for a ride somewhere down the road. I can\u2019t stick my hand out and ask people for money. I just would never, ever be able to do it \u2019cause they\u2019re all gonna want to get paid back somehow. But that\u2019s one of the requirements. He called the right person, nevertheless. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: This is Grant in Comfort, Texas. Nice to have you on the program, sir. Hello. CALLER: Howdy. Dittos. RUSH: Howdy! 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