RUSH: Local news in Indiana is heating up with Operation Chaos talk. Democrats are planning on challenging Operation Chaos voters, and forcing them to sign affidavits. It is the Votestopo! The Democrat Party Indiana Votestopo is trying to intimidate voters on Tuesday. WISH-TV correspondent Jim Shella, on Operation Chaos. You will also hear from Indiana Democrat Party chairman Dan Parker, Indiana secretary of state Todd Rokita.
SHELLA: Bill Clinton campaigned for his wife Hillary in Carmel, a hotbed of Republicans this morning. It’s a search for crossover voters. But Hillary could benefit from Republican troublemakers, too. Radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh calls it Operation Chaos. He believes that Barack Obama would be tougher to beat in November, so he encourages Republicans to take a Democratic ballot and vote for Hillary.
PARKER: Anyone who’s trying to manipulate our primary, that’s something that we would not look favorably on.
SHELLA: Trouble is, it’s tough to stop.
ROKITA: You don’t register as a Republican or Democrat, and you have a right to go in and — and pull a ballot for the party of your choosing.
PARKER: My own message to Rush Limbaugh is, be careful what you wish for.
SHELLA: Now, if you’re a longtime Republican primary voter and you ask for a Democratic ballot, you can be challenged in Indiana. A precinct official can ask you to sign an affidavit saying that you voted for a majority of Democrats in the last election or plan to do so in November. If you lie, it’s a felony. But the only way you could be caught is if you tell on yourself.
RUSH: Um… (laughter) You can’t testify against yourself! You cannot be made to testify against yourself. Operation Chaos! It couldn’t get any better. They are threatening voters. This is just like what they tried in Ohio, this loyalty oath. You can’t do that! How are they going to police write-in voters, for example? To sit there and say that a precinct official can ask you to sign an affidavit saying that you voted for a majority of Democrats in the last election; you plan to do so in November? They can’t do that! You can go in and vote for whoever you want at any time. You can write in Osama Bin Laden if you wanted to, any time you went in to vote. They can’t do this. And then this clincher line: ‘If you lie it’s a felony, but the only way you can be caught is to tell on yourself,’ because they cannot look and see how you voted! All they can do is tell that you showed up. They are trying to intimidate our volunteers in Indiana. The Democrats, once again, are displaying exactly who they are. I have to laugh at all of this hand-wringing and this whining and moaning of manipulation and all of these other, the mischief that they think we’re engaged in.
Have you Democrats ever heard of Cook County, Illinois; and Mayor Richard Daley in Chicago in 1960? One out of every ten votes is fraudulent! Have you ever heard of the group ACORN? It’s some community organization. This was a voter registration group set up to fraudulently register people. In St. Louis, the last election it was discovered that 1,000 people with no addresses and no Social Security numbers had been registered by ACORN. They worked to register Democrats. It was Democrats crossing over in New Hampshire and other places early on in the primary season this year, that gave us Senator McCain as the Republican nominee. To sit there and say that you have to sign an affidavit that you voted for Democrats in the past; you’re going to do so in the future? There’s no way you can know unless you go tell on yourself?
Ladies and gentlemen, those of you volunteer operatives for Operation Chaos in Indiana: Do not be deterred by this. Besides that, they’re not going to go after you. They will come after me, the commander-in-chief, which they threatened to do in Ohio but never did. There’s nothing they can do here. About the most they can do is what Dan Parker said, ‘Hey, Rush, be careful what you wish for.’ Threatening me. The Democrats in Indiana think they can threaten me, and they think they can threaten you. They do not understand the commitment, the resolve, the purpose, and the passion behind all the volunteers in all the states remaining in Operation Chaos. Last night on NPR’s All Things Considered, the cohost, Michele Norris and Indiana political consultant Brian Howie have this exchange about me and Operation Chaos.
HOWIE: There are two sets of Republican voters that we see. We see, uh, the Obamacans, they’re a little bit upset with their own party because of the, uh, war and the high gas prices and high grocery prices and that kind of thing; and then there are your mischievous, uh, Rush Limbaugh Republicans, who seem to think that, uh, if they vote for Hillary Clinton, it will create an easier environment for John McCain in the fall.
NORRIS: Well, isn’t that interesting, a tight Democratic primary could ultimately be decided by Republicans.
HOWIE: Yes. Isn’t that ironic?
NORRIS: And interesting.
RUSH: Ironic. Isn’t that ironic? A tight Democrat primary could be decided by Republicans. There is controversy in Indiana. Should Republicans vote in local races or the Democratic primary? Last night WTHR-TV Indianapolis, correspondent Jeremy Brilliant reported on Operation Chaos. You’ll also hear Hamilton County, Indiana, GOP chairman Charlie White.
BRILLIANT: Conservative radio commentator Rush Limbaugh has called on Republicans to vote for either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama in the primary, in an attempt to weaken the Democratic Party. But in Hamilton County, the Republican stronghold of the Fifth District, there are no less than seven races of local significance.
WHITE: As a recommendation to all Republicans, leave the Democrat primary to the Democrats.
BRILLIANT: Hamilton County GOP chair Charlie White is encouraging voters to cast ballots for those they want elected, not in an attempt to spoil someone else’s race.
WHITE: In Hamilton County, for almost all the races, whoever wins the primary ends up winning the general election. So locally, if you want to have a say, you need to vote in the Republican primary.
RUSH: That was GOP chairman of Hamilton County Charlie White, urging people not to cross over and vote in the Democrat primary. He urges people not to participate in Operation Chaos because of down-the-ballot considerations. Now, those are some considerations that we have taken into account here in our strategery planning sessions here at Operation Chaos, same thing in North Carolina. There are a number of instances of down-the-ballot Republicans who do deserve to be elected. So this is something we leave up to individual operatives. We do issue orders here, but we have respect for our operatives that they know the right thing to do based on the district that they live in. We got it all covered. We’re talking here about Hamilton County, but there’s more than Hamilton County in Indiana. There are some counties in Indiana which are not Republican. Republicans down the ballot don’t have a chance. Those operatives know full well to go in and vote in the Democrat side of this and then reregister as Republicans later on afterwards. So those Republicans in Indiana, Hamilton County, or elsewhere; fear not. Operation Chaos has it all under control. Follow your guts.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: We now go to San Francisco. Yesterday morning, KTVU-TV’s Mornings on 2, the host is Ross McGowan, and he talked to the San Francisco Chronicle reporter Carla Marinucci who did the front-page story on Sunday in the Chronicle on Operation Chaos. Ross McGowan said to her, ‘Rush Limbaugh is causing the Democrat Party to be — well, the primary, actually, to be — more chaotic than ever. In fact, Limbaugh’s being called the prince of darkness, you say.’
MARINUCCI: Great Satan.
MCGOWAN: Yeah. Why?
MARINUCCI: Look, he’s helping the Democrats do what he says the Democrats are already doing, which is completely ruin their chances for getting into the White House.
MCGOWAN: How is he ruining them?
MARINUCCI: He’s telling his listeners every day — and he has a password protected website and sends them out there telling them to reregister in these Democratic primaries from Republican to Democratic and — to vote for Hillary Clinton in the last case, at least trying to prolong it. He says that if this goes on and these candidates are beating each other up and giving Hillary Clinton another opportunity, then by the time it comes to August, the Democrats will have no chance whatsoever to get to the White House.
MCGOWAN: It gets to the superdelegates then and if they take it away from whoever wins —
MARINUCCI: That’s exactly what he says. Whoever the superdelegates decide on, the other candidate’s supporters are going to be mad, and there is no chance of unity.
RUSH: Superdelegates will have to commit political murder in choosing one of these two. Just one correction here — and this sort of helps me understand something. Do you hear her refer to my ‘password-protected website’? Operation Chaos is a radio operation, and there is no password required to listen to the program. All you need is a radio and a city. We’re on in every city. Some little small burghs were not there, but every major city in the country, 600 of them. You don’t need a password. You don’t need a secret decoder box. You just turn on the radio. Now, our Rush 24/7 website is password protected because we have members, but we also have a free side. The attempt here was to illustrate the orders are going out under cover of password-protected Internet communications; secret marching orders, only available to Operation Chaos volunteers! It’s not the case at all. Everything about Operation Chaos is wide open. This is the fun of it! We’re telling the Democrats exactly what we’re going to do, and they can’t stop it.
This is like the old days of the Pittsburgh Steelers, back in the seventies. You line up, and you knew that they were going to come right at you, with Franco Harris and Rocky Bleier. You just knew it and you still couldn’t stop ’em. (interruption) Dallas never stopped ’em when it counted, Snerdley, check the Super Bowls. Bottom line is, we’re telegraphing every move not behind a password-protected website. We’re telegraphing every move well in advance. We gave the Democrats in Pennsylvania six weeks of a head start to stop us. Same thing in Indiana, same thing in North Carolina. We’re telling them exactly what we’re going to do, when we’re going to do it well in advance. They still can’t stop Operation Chaos. Ross McGowan then said to Carla Marinucci, ‘Well, has Limbaugh been able, in fact, to get some Republicans to reregister?’
MARINUCCI: You know, in the Pennsylvania primary alone, a hundred thousand Republicans reregistered Democrat, and about half of them did vote for Hillary Clinton. Many of the Republicans who have reregistered said, ‘Yeah, we voted for Hillary but we don’t think she’d be a good president.’ That suggests that maybe he is moving, uh, some of these people, uh, over and causing chaos.
MCGOWAN: And the thing about it, a lot of people are shocked by this and believe it’s unfair, but Rush Limbaugh is doing this in the light of day.
MARINUCCI: He is. Absolutely.
MCGOWAN: I mean, it’s not like clandestine or anything. And there’s a lot going on in the backroom that is, in fact, like the whole superdelegate thing.
RUSH: Excellent point by the anchor. That was in San Francisco, Ross McGowan. He makes a great point there. Everything that is being done is open. Operation Chaos is not a clandestine operation. It’s not covert. But the Democrat Party operation is. The stuff going on in the backrooms that nobody can see, is with the superdelegates; and stuff that will go on in the backrooms that nobody will ever see, is the superdelegates. We won’t know the deals that have been cut among the superdelegates to determine which way they go. Operation Chaos has nothing to hide. Operation Chaos… We’ve got hats and T-shirts. Some of our operatives wear uniforms when they go to the polls. Some of them do try to blend in with the locals and stink; and don’t shower, don’t wash their hair; wear flip-flops, this sort of thing. We got it all covered. We’ve got everything covered. But the superdelegates in the Democrat Party, they’re the ones that have the clandestine operation going on here. Finally, Ross McGowan says, ‘I didn’t actually hear Rush Limbaugh’s comments, but it’s said — and you mention in the article — you also say it was probably tongue-in-cheek. He said the Democrat convention riots might be a nice finish to the Democrat contest.’ (laughter)
MARINUCCI: Yeah, I listened — I listened to the tape. I know we’ve had a lot of e-mails on this. I think — I think he was talking tongue-in-cheek.
MCGOWAN: He’s an entertainer.
MARINUCCI: Yeah, he — he absolutely is, and ratings is a big deal with him, but I — I think the bottom line is the Republicans are sitting back and watching this with a lot of glee, and, uh, the Democrats are going to have to figure out a way out of this maze.
MCGOWAN: I’ve been saying that this morning so far that Rush Limbaugh reacted to your article.
MARINUCCI: He e-mailed me, said he thought it was ‘fair and balanced’ (laughs) —
MCGOWAN: (unintelligible)
MARINUCCI: — which for a guy (laughing) who doesn’t like the Drive-By Media.
MCGOWAN: We’re not Fox News.
MARINUCCI: I guess that’s a compliment.
MCGOWAN: A lot of people think we’re Fox News. We’re a fox affiliate. We are not…Fox News.
MARINUCCI: (heavy laughing)
MCGOWAN: We do not use that particular phrase —
MARINUCCI: I — (uncontrolled laughing)
MCGOWAN: — but it’s scary if he thinks it’s fair and balanced, right?
MARINUCCI: That’s right. (laughs) And then — (laughing) But Obama was on Fox News yesterday. (laughing)
RUSH: The Drive-Bys’ world is crumbling. He has to go out of his way to point out, ‘We’re a Fox affiliate but we’re not Fox News. We’re not narrow and balanced! We’re not Fox News. Don’t confuse us. We’re not Fox News.’ (laughter)
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Back to the phones now to Walnut, California, this is Pat, and I’m glad you called. Hi.
CALLER: Hi. Yes, this is Pat.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: Oh. I just want to say, I’m a liberal Democrat, and I would like to endorse Operation Chaos, because I think that an open primary will produce more qualified candidates.
RUSH: Interesting thought, Pat.
CALLER: Hm-hm.
RUSH: So you would say that the Operation Chaos here, by keeping this going, has actually helped Obama in the sense that he’s now being tested, he had a cakewalk for a while, but now he’s —
CALLER: I have no idea what it did for Obama or against Obama. I think that personally I would rather see no political party — like we have local elections are nonpartisan.
RUSH: Oh. Oh. You don’t like either party.
CALLER: The reason I don’t like parties is I think they get in the way of — they tend to cloud issues.
RUSH: Tend to cloud issues, did you say?
CALLER: Yes. Yes.
RUSH: Well, you know, you would have a lot of people agree with you on that, particularly during election years where parties tend to take action in their best interests rather than the country’s, which is what I think Schumer and the Democrats are doing today in this whole gasoline price, oil price thing. We talked about it in the first hour. It’s just abject irresponsibility on the part of Democrats in the United States Senate. And, look, Republicans have engaged in some of this down the road, but their irresponsibility is betraying their voters. The Democrats betray the country now and then. Republicans betray their own voters. So I kind of see what you’re talking about. Thanks for the call, appreciate it.
Dean, Portland, Oregon, great to have you here on the EIB Network.
CALLER: Mega dittos from a loyal operative, slash, recruiter here in Oregon.
RUSH: A recruiter, terrific! Taking on your own initiative.
CALLER: It’s been very exciting, very fun. I can’t think of a more exciting time to be an operative for the EIB. We have two things going on here in Oregon. One is today is the last day of registration, and with the shenanigans known for in this state, if you put your change of party in at the DMV, you risk not having it picked up by the election office, so you should bring it in to the election office to be serious.
RUSH: This is an excellent point.
CALLER: Also, in this state, they now have a ballot initiative to try and thwart any future Operation Chaos.
RUSH: You gotta be kidding me! Operation Chaos has spawned a ballot initiative in Oregon to prevent this kind of thing from happening in future primaries?
CALLER: They have, they have. They want to eliminate all abilities of party separation. They want to make it so that the top two get to be on the ballot, not the top Republican, not the top Democrat, not the top whoever, but only the top two. So if you are the top two vote-getters and you’re both Democrats, there is no Republican.
RUSH: Wait a second, in the presidential race?
CALLER: They say that with the presidential race, it won’t be effective until after perhaps —
RUSH: Wait a second. Wait, wait, wait a minute, now. If what you’re telling me is true, and if you’re accurate —
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: — Operation Chaos is inspiring Democrats to take illegal action which would deny people voting rights. If you’ve got a presidential race and you got a Republican primary and a Democrat primary, but the state of Oregon’s got this ballot initiative that says screw parties —
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: — whoever the top two vote-getters are in our primary end up as who we can vote for in a presidential ballot?
CALLER: Well, at least on the statewide level they’re talking about, but they’re also talking about that in the primary process, not being effective until after, not this presidential election, not next presidential election, but the one following. That’s in the ballot initiative.
RUSH: You have stymied me on this.
CALLER: Well, I’m stymied, too. My wife read me the article, and I was —
RUSH: This doesn’t sound right. You sure you’re interpreting this — look, Democrats I know that they’re Democrats, if they could get the Republicans off the ballot they’d do it, but this —
CALLER: They’re talking about doing it on the statewide process, but what they’re suggesting is that if they can get it on the statewide process, it wouldn’t be effective for the presidential process until not the next election, but the following one.
RUSH: They can’t do it.
CALLER: I don’t think so, either, but that’s the proposal.
RUSH: Well, and all of this sponsored and spawned by Operation Chaos.
CALLER: Much loved in this state. It was Hillary territory until after you blew it and talked about Spitzer. (laughing)
RUSH: (laughing) That’s right. (laughing) And the driver’s licenses for illegal aliens. Well, that’s a good piece of advice from our recruiter in Oregon. Don’t reregister at the DMV. It might not get picked up in time. Actually go to the election office if you are a Republican wanting to reregister Democrat to vote in the Oregon primary as part of Operation Chaos.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: This Top Two primary business, we got a story here from March: ‘Washington voters might again enjoy free-for-all primary election ballots, thanks to a Supreme Court decision that struck a blow to political parties’ long-running battle to control the rules of such elections. The high court voted 7-2 Tuesday to uphold the state’s ‘Top Two’ primary, which allows voters to select freely among political parties for various contests without pledging even temporary allegiance to a party. Still, the political parties might renew their legal challenge before voters cast a single such ballot.’
This is a state issue right now, and I’m not sure that this applies to the presidential race in federal elections, have to double-check it. I know a lot of places have elections where no party affiliation is mentioned, you know, town council, city councils, smaller elections, you don’t run as a member of a political party. Washington State’s a Democrat state, Oregon is a Democrat state, it’s obvious what’s going on here. Make sure that a Democrat wins no matter what. We’ll keep a sharp eye on this. It’s all part of Operation Chaos and the fallout from it.