RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, I am calling an operational pause in Operation Chaos. We have a week to figure out now what’s best to do. If your state still allows voter registration, keep that up, continue to register as a Democrat in upcoming Operation Chaos primaries. I think it’s too late in Indiana and North Carolina. Oregon, last day is today. There are other states coming down the pike, and Puerto Rico. But I’m calling an operational pause, and I will tell you why. My first gut reaction, my instinct, in listening to the audio sound bites of Obama today throwing Jeremiah Wright off the planet, he didn’t throw him under the bus, he put him in the space shuttle and he sent him to the space station so he can pal around with the Russians that are up there. Then I watched during the bottom-of-the-hour break here, I decided to watch the Drive-By Media coverage of this, because it became obvious to me — see, I read the stitches on the fastball; I can read between the lines, and I know that most of the Drive-Bys are in the tank for Obama.
What I think I saw an indication of, I watched Chris Matthews and Andrea Mitchell, NBC News, Washington, discussing this, and Matthews was full of praise, and he accepted every theme Obama brought up, and he said Obama was dead right. ‘Why do we have to have this preacher inserting himself in the presidential campaign for the last three days? Obama rightly said he’s not talking to him any more, may talk to him later, but Obama was dead right on, on this.’ Matthews is missing the whole point. Obama coulda done this in church the first time he heard the guy. We all now with common sense realize here that Obama did this out of political expediency today to save a dwindling and plunging campaign. The Drive-Bys, by the time those in the tank for Obama get through spinning this tonight, this is what I need to wait for, ladies and gentlemen, is why I’ve called an operational pause, because I want to find out what we need to do tomorrow based on how effective the Drive-Bys are in spinning what Obama said today and make it look like it was courageous. You watch, ‘It was courageous. This is one of the greatest risks a politician’s ever taken in the United States! This was a risk we have never seen taken before. This is a man with courage and guts and fortitude. This is a man we want to be our president.’ This is the kind of thing I’m expecting tonight from the Drive-Bys.
My gut reaction, after the audio sound bites, was to issue new orders, because I saw, you know, AP/Ipsos poll has Hillary up over McCain by nine points, 50-41. My gut reaction here, after hearing Obama, was to issue orders changing directives, i.e., vote Obama in remaining primaries. But I’m holding back. That’s why I’m calling an operational pause. Because I want to see what the Drive-Bys are going to do and I want to see how the superdelegates are affected by this. You can’t vote in North Carolina and Indiana ’til Tuesday anyway, so there’s really no pause. It’s not as though the election is tomorrow. I just wanted you to know your commanding officers are eagerly, diligently, and effectively planning the next strategy here, based on this speech and the reaction to it
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RUSH: Jay in Memphis, you’re next on the Rush Limbaugh program. Hello.
CALLER: Hey, Rush. It’s great to speak to you.
RUSH: Thank you, sir.
CALLER: You kind of touched on it earlier that I didn’t think this was sort of a scheme, but don’t you find it curious that this is coming after Pennsylvania, where he was trounced; after that North Carolina GOP ad which had the both of them in it together; and a week ahead of the Indiana and North Carolina primaries?
RUSH: This is not a scheme. This is a desperation move. This scheme has come way too late. He hasn’t won a major primary since the 22nd of February.
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: He’s lost seven of the ten largest states.
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: Mrs. Clinton is pulling ahead. The superdelegates out there are where this is all headed. After Wright showed up and made his speech… See, it’s one thing to have these sound bites of Wright out there, and the charge being, ‘Hey, these are doctored! Hey, these are edited! Hey, these are looped!’ Then Wright goes on television for two hours and confirms everything in those sermons, and in those videos. Obama tried to have it both ways, but it’s too late for this to have been a scheme.
CALLER: Do you think, though, that the speech in Philadelphia was an attempt to do that, and it was an enough and this is sort of a second chance to have Wright appear as the terrible guy, create all this distance between them?
RUSH: I don’t know. It could be. I know as far as the Democrats are concerned, the media, the Drive-Bys give Democrats do-overs. I’ll never forget, there was some reporter that asked John Kerry a question in the ’04 campaign, CBS reporter. Kerry muffed it, couldn’t understand what he said, and the reporter said, ‘You want to do that again?’ So Democrats get do-overs. In this case, I think that speech in Philadelphia was an attempt to have it all and not disavow Wright because the black church, black community and so forth. But this is a desperation move. He’s relying on the press to spin it as a courageous move. We’re keeping a sharp eye.