RUSH: You know, all these people — and this has been I guess the narrative or the template of the Drive-Bys ever since McCain became the front-runner in Florida during our primary season. They attack people like me or Hannity or Ann Coulter as we’re just doing it for ratings; just doing it to sell books; we just want somebody that we can argue with. It’s the most shortsighted, blind analysis possible. The way we look at it is, whether it’s McCain or Obama or Hillary, we’re going to be opposing somebody! If what they say was true — Ann Coulter’s right about this — if what they say was true we would be supporting McCain like we can’t wait for him to win. We’re criticizing him, right, we succeed on criticism. Here’s a dirty little secret, folks. This is the truth. It ain’t us angling for ratings, book sales, or whatever. The sycophants on our side from the New York Times conservatives, to the Weekly Standard, to some at National Review Online, these are the people that want jobs with the McCain administration. These are the people that want influence with the McCain administration. These are the people who are doing what they’re doing for their careers.
The people who are lambasting us, the people who are challenging our integrity, the people telling us to shut up, to go away, to calm down, are the very ones who are calculating their support for Senator McCain on the basis of the enhancement of their careers. I’m not thinking of career here because my career doesn’t depend on who wins elections. How many times, H.R., must I say this before the Drive-Bys are going to understand — and even some of the loco weeds on our side. Twenty years. How many times am I going to have to say this? How many times am I going to have to demonstrate it? Let’s go through the presidents. 1988, Bush. I start the show in August ’88, 56 stations, after four years of Bush, my buddy, 500 radio stations. How the hell did that happen? I’ll tell you how it happened. Liberals were out there trying to destroy him, and I was criticizing liberals back then. We had the global warming movement getting started. We had the spotted owl. It was a good show, for crying out loud. Then Clinton in ’92. And from ’92 for the next three or four years, we added 112 stations up to 612. The audience grew and stayed constant. Then after Clinton we got George W. Bush. Audience stayed constant.
If my success of my show depended on who wins elections, I’ve lost a couple here that are pretty big, my guys did, I should be pushing up flowers right now, in the career sense. I know my career. I know where I’m headed. I know how to do what I do better than anybody else does, including these people that analyze it. I’m telling you, the people on our side, the conservatives at the New York Times that write conservatism for liberals, some of our magazines, some of our vaunted intellectuals, they’re the ones whose support for McCain is calculated to benefit their careers. And yet they are being ignored in this. In fact, they’re being described and characterized as brilliant intellectuals when they’re nothing but a bunch of sycophants. They either want jobs in the McCain administration, or they want influence in the McCain administration, or they’re just front-runners, whatever the hell it is. I’m telling you, the true independents and intellectual application to the events of the day and the future of our country are being expressed on talk radio today. You’re not going to find them on cable news, chat shows at night. That is vapidity. Those people are rivaling Obama in saying nothing in a compelling way.