RUSH: Look, folks, let me just tell you: The Republican establishment learns the wrong lessons from everything. It has become obvious to me. Whatever large or small issues happen, they learn the wrong lessons from it, such as they lose an election and say, “Oh, my God! We better shore up the Hispanic vote. We better agree with the Democrats on amnesty.” Wrong. Just as an example. The Republican establishment, if they’re trying to figure out Donald Trump, they need to stop looking at Donald Trump.

Donald Trump does not explain Donald Trump. They explain Donald Trump. There’s a reason Donald Trump’s doing what he’s doing, and that’s because nobody else in the Republican establishment is. Forget… Political parties have always been responsive to their voters, until now. Now we’ve reached what I think is a real seminal moment. And that is, the Republican Party establishment has joined the Democrat Party establishment in looking down on its own voters.

I know it’s not new, folks. Nothing’s new. I under stand. It’s just different degrees. I know I’m the one that’s told you (and I haven’t forgotten) how the Republican establishment came up, poked me in the chest, asked me what I was gonna do about the Christians ’cause of the pro-life movement and abortion. I understand that. But this? I mean, they’re trying to figure out what explains Trump. “It’s low-information voters!” No. What explains Trump is the Republican establishment. I’ll have more detail if you want as the program unfolds.

I really do want to move on to other things here. But I just… You know, George Will’s talking about James Madison, this separation-of-powers business. That continues to perplex me. The separation of powers isn’t stopping Obama. The separation of powers does not stop the Democrats. But somehow, we seek refuge in it. When we don’t have the desire or the ability or combination of the two to take on the Democrats and Obama and stop them, we take refuge in, “Well, James Madison! Separation of powers!

“We simply don’t have the White House; there’s nothing we can do.” It’s not stopping them! But I wonder what George Will would say about this. James Madison gave us the Treaty Clause in the Constitution. Did you know that, Mr. Snerdley? Well, James Madison is considered to be the father of the Constitution in terms of actually writing it, and he gave us the Treaty Clause. What’d the Republicans give us? The Corker Bill!

James Madison gives us the Treaty Clause, and what Obama has done is actually negotiate a treaty with the Iranians. But here come the Republicans to the rescue! They say, “Nope, we’re gonna do the Corker Bill, which is gonna help Obama get his deal done by reversing the treaty process, by putting the onus on us to stop him rather than the treaty process putting the onus on the president to get support.”

It’s 180 degrees out of phase. The Corker Bill puts the onus on his own party to stop Obama, and Obama says (impression), “Treaty? What treaty? Screw you! Screw the Constitution. There’s no treaty here! This is an executive agreement. I have the rest of the world on my side. I won. (Raspberry) you!” And we’ve got the Corker Bill. And thanks to that, Obama’s gonna get his Iran deal.

And James Madison’s Treaty Clause is just wafting way over there, vaporizing right before our very eyes and ears. I can honestly tell you back when I was 16 years old and I was imagining a career in radio, this was not it. I will guaran-damn-tee you this is not what it was. My dreams were I was gonna be number one and I was gonna reach my goals and I was gonna accomplish my objectives. It was not this.

I’m not complaining.

I’m just making an observation.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: John, Fort Wayne, Indiana. I’m really glad you waited. I appreciate your patience. Hello, sir.

CALLER: Hello. Hello, Rush. My hero. Rush, when I hear good speeches and good talk, I always put your teaching as a grid over it so I can adjudicate between the fluff and the good, and where I’m nowhere a political scientist, you have trained me pretty well. Now, on the Sean Hannity show, I thought Trump was asked important questions, in distinct terms, of what he would do when he was president.

What he said, though, that I found interesting is one of the things that he does so that he can make these good decisions is that he studies contracts. He reads voraciously like you do, but he reads voraciously contracts so that he can get on the stage of politics and his business and make tremendous decisions. I was wondering if you could… There’s two parts to this question: If you could tell me, and your audience, what is it that when you study contracts.

I mean, what’s the motif? I know you can’t go into each one. I mean, each one has its own particulars. But what is the concept of reading contracts? In fact, he said he liked it so much, Rush — and I didn’t understand this ’cause I’m not a golfer. He said he’s a five, like in golf, with contracts. I was thinking a par 5? No. So I didn’t know what he meant by that. And then the second part of the question is, after this tremendous show — the Sean Hannity program — was on during the week, they played it gun on Sunday morning, and I watched it for the second time. Later that afternoon they had Rich Lowry on, who, I’m not positive, but I think he took over the business of William Buckley Jr., which I know is one of your favorite politicians —

RUSH: No, no, no, no. Buckley named him the editor of National Review long before he passed away. He didn’t take over anything.

CALLER: Oh. Well, anyway, Rich Lowry was very, very unkind, and I’m sure he didn’t mean… I mean, he wasn’t doing, you know, cutthroat thing or… But in his… The way he said he saw and hears Trump, it is ridiculous. (paraphrase) “He’s a blowhard, he’s a woman abuser, and he never makes a good point.” I thought, “How could Rich Lowry, after spending any time with William Buckley, say that?” And then the last part of this question is: What would Henry Kissinger do if he was thrown in the middle of this situation? Gosh, in Vietnam he made a tremendous —

RUSH: What would Kissinger do if the thrown in the middle of the what situation? I have lost track of what we’re talking about here.

CALLER: Okay, we’re talking about two things. What happens when Trump reads a contract? What is he reading? What is he looking for?

RUSH: Oh, yeah, Trump and contracts. I didn’t hear the interview. I didn’t see the Hannity interview with Trump on Fox. So I’ve just gotta take your word for it that he said. I don’t know the context. Did you hear it, Snerdley? (interruption) You didn’t…? (interruption) All right, so we’re told here that Trump said that the most important thing to him is understanding contracts. I just have to take a wild guess. Man, I don’t know. I mean, all I… (interruption)

No, no, no, no. I mean, I just have to answer this in a generic way, like anybody would about contracts. I mean, why do you have contracts? (interruption) Why do you have ’em? Why do they exist? (interruption) Right, to keep people honest. It’s to have a record of what’s been agreed to because the presumption is that some people are gonna cheat. The presumption is that some people are gonna be dishonest.

The presumption is that some people are gonna take advantage. The presumption is that you have to have something on record to keep people true to their word. I don’t know why Trump said that contracts are the most important thing to him. I wouldn’t even want to try to say without hearing what he said, because he might have been talking about a specific business deal or he might have been talking about a contract and the terms of a treaty or country. I don’t know.

Maybe to him “contracts” are educational in terms you learn what are important to other people when they insist on things, the concept of “throwaway,” as you learn what’s important, what’s not important to people when you do a contract with them. A contract’s there to be enforced. Maybe he’s rigidly tough. Trump’s being called stupid or whatever joke by Lowry? He’s not the only one calling him a joke. So I don’t know. Let me find the quote, the whole quote and get it in context, and I may be able to answer that.

I could give you an answer, but it’d be generic, just entirely generic, and I don’t want to presume things I don’t know about it. Anyway, John, I appreciate the call. I still don’t know what Henry Kissinger…? (sigh) (reading transcript) Henry Kissinger … Trump contract … What would Henry Kissinger do with Rich Lowry? What would Henry Kissinger do with Buckley and Trump and contracts and so forth? I don’t know. We’ll have to find Kissinger. Kissinger is probably at Le Cirque.

Go find him and ask him.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Trump was talking about Iran. He was talking about the Iran deal with Hannity. He said, “I study contracts. You know, in golf I say I’m a plus five at contracts, okay?” Our caller wanted to know what that meant. He’s talking about handicaps. You have an 18 handicap means you’re giving 18 shots per round. If you have a zero handicap you’re scratch. If you’re a plus five, it means you are giving shots away. It means par 72, you have to shoot 67 in order to be your handicap. Pros are plus three, plus four. Trump is saying he is better than anybody at reading contracts, he’s a plus five.

He says, “I study contracts. No matter how bad this contract is, I will make this contract be enforced to such an extent that they will not be able to do it. And then I will do things that you won’t believe.” So he’s merely saying whatever Obama does with this deal, Trump will go in and find out what’s wrong with it and fix it, is what he’s saying, because he’s an expert at contracts.

Now, whatever that means, he knows how people cheat, he knows what the fine print means and where to find the fine print, who knows. He’s just saying nobody’s gonna out-negotiate him. He’s a plus five at negotiating. He is The Art of the Deal. He defines the deal. He’s the one who gets the deal done. And if somebody does a deal that screws us, Trump’s gonna be the guy that turns it around and screws them. That’s what he was saying. This is why I didn’t presume to answer it ’til I found out what it was that he was talking about.

Mary in Greenville, South Carolina, great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello.

CALLER: Hi. Thank you so much for taking my call. What an honor to speak with you.

RUSH: You’re welcome. Thank you.

CALLER: Well, what I wanted to say is what the low-information media needs to understand is Donald Trump already has all the specifics he needs. We have 200 years of American exceptionalism. We don’t need a new plan; we just need to do what has already worked for us. It’s the best country on the planet. We don’t need to make up a bunch of new stuff. They should read your books, study a little bit of history, the media, and then they would know what we need to do to turn this around, just get back to what we’ve been doing so well.

RUSH: So when Trump says he’s gonna make America great again, he’s just gonna take us back to doing what we did that got us where we are?

CALLER: Well, repeal so many of the burdensome regulations and get back to capitalism and secure the border. I mean, all the things the tenets of America, that’s all we need to do is get rid of the other stuff and go back to what we did for so long, so well.

RUSH: Okay, now, don’t get mad at me. Don’t get mad at me. Trump’s never said that. But that’s what you’ve interpreted, which is my point. But the key to what she said here, she said we don’t need any specifics; we already know what those are. We know what made this country great, and she thinks Trump knows, and she thinks Trump stands for that, and she thinks Trump is gonna do that.

So what she’s saying is all of you Beltway media people, take your specifics and stuff it. We don’t need specifics. We already know what makes this country great, and we know who’s been doing it and who’s trying to undermine it. We know who believes in it and who doesn’t. And she’s saying we believe Trump stands for and wants greatness in America. And anybody that does knows what it is. It’s the specifics of policy and legislation that nobody can read that’s getting us in trouble. It’s the specifics of policy and legislation that nobody does read before they vote on it that’s getting us in trouble. That’s my word. She didn’t say that. And Trump hasn’t said that. I’m saying it.

What greater indictment could there be, we got a 2200-page health care bill and we are told by the Democrat leader we have to pass it to find out what’s in it, and people go, “Oh, okay.” Well, screw that. And then the same thing with Obama’s Pacific pan, Pacific whatever this trade deal. That was so secret the people voting on it were not even allowed to read it first unless they went to a secret room in the capital and they weren’t allowed to take any notes that they could leave with.

Specifics? This is not hard to figure out, folks. It’s not hard to figure out why Trump’s resonating with people. It’s not hard to understand why Perot resonated with people. It isn’t hard. The more contemptuous that the Inside-the-Beltway people continue to be about the people I say make this country work, the more support they’re gonna engender for Trump. I mean, Trump exists because of them when you get right down to it.