RUSH: Audio sound bites, I was gonna get into this a moment ago. You gotta hear this, With All Due Respect, Bloomberg TV. John Heilemann talking to co-host Mark Halperin, says (paraphrasing), “It’s huge potential consequences here if Republicans start to say that this is the kind of rhetoric that justifies them saying ‘I’ll not support Trump if he’s the Republican nominee,’ this could be what the Republicans have been waiting for. This could give ’em the out, Mark. This is what they need to say, ‘I can’t support Trump if he’s our nominee. This makes it impossible.’ What do you think of that, Mark?”
HALPERIN: The other thing that is going to be interesting to see, not just the blogosphere, but talk radio. Talk radio tends to be more sympathetic to positions like this for Donald Trump. Do any prominent talk radio hosts come out? You know, Donald Trump has no history of backing off. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is the first time he backs off. I may be wrong, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t try to modulate this in some way.
RUSH: He meant moderate. So, anyway, it all will depend on talk radio, because talk radio, that’s where you hear this kind of talk anyway, is what these guys say. Which, you know, in a loosely stated fashion is defamation. We don’t speak that way here. But it didn’t stop ’em at the BBC. This is Michael Goldfarb, BBC World News Impact show talking to Yalda Hakim talking about Europe. Here, just listen to the bite.
GOLDFARB: I think the people need to have some context here who were watching. Look, Donald Trump sounds like a right-wing radio talk show host. Now, right-wing radio talk show hosts in America are not a new phenomenon. Rush Limbaugh, whose name might be known by some people who are watching even in Asia, you know, Rush Limbaugh’s been around for more than a quarter of a century saying stuff like this every single day. He’s the most popular radio figure in America. Now if you have 20, 25 years of this kind of propagand
izing running ahead of you, then all you have to do is sort of reiterate what’s being said.
RUSH: You see, it’s not even Trump’s fault; it’s mine, folks. I’m the one that set the table for Trump to just take advantage of it. Meanwhile, I’ve never said anything like it, proving these people never listen.
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RUSH: Rush Limbaugh to blame for everything, responsible for it all. I’m just a guy on the radio.
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RUSH: One more audio sound bite saying the world needs to wait on talk radio before we know really how people are gonna react to Trump. I mean, that’s really what they’re saying. You know, Halperin says, “Well, yeah, yeah. But we gotta wait for talk radio before we know how the people are gonna react.” And then this clown at the BBC, “Well, you know, Limbaugh set the table for Trump with 25 years of this kind of stuff! It’s easy for Trump to come along and just pick up on it.” So, clearly the worldwide Drive-By Media is very, very worried about what happens on this program.
They don’t control that either, by the way. That’s a dirty little secret. It’s frustrating for them. They don’t control what happens here; they don’t control what happens to me. They’ve tried. Even I have tried! I can’t even destroy myself. I’ve tried a couple times myself, and it doesn’t work. I’m literally indestructible here. Here is… (laughing) Here’s Maggie Haberman. She used to be a Politico. Where’s she now? I think she moved over to the New York Times. Anyway, she’s on with Anderson Cooper, who said, “Maggie, do you think this actually hurts Donald Trump, or is this just like every other statement he’s made for his supporters. Just the poll numbers are gonna go up?”
HABERMAN: He is making this comment at a moment of extreme anxiety among Americans about terrorism, and that is colliding with economic anxiety, and that has been fueling him all along. So no, I don’t think this is going to sink him. I will be interested to see how conservative radio hosts react to this in the next couple of days because messing around with the Constitution potentially is not usually something that holds a lot of appeal. I think this makes it harder for Trump to grow his base of support.
RUSH: They still don’t get it. I don’t think they get it. I think Trump supporters are more aware of what Trump is doing and why than them. These people just… They’re unable to. They’re unable to get outside the world in which they live and understand. All they can do is question or condemn, put down or whatever. But actually making an effort to understand something that’s not within your comfort zone and worldview, they just don’t show an ability to do it.
“I will be interested to see how conservative radio hosts react to this in the next couple of days because messing around with the Constitution…” You want to talk about messing around with the Constitution, Maggie? Could you talk about Barack Obama? Donald Trump can’t do diddly-squat right now. He’s a candidate. We have a president who is “messing around with the Constitution” in any number of ways. But Maggie and her friends don’t see it that way because Obama’s just doing what they think should be done anyway.
And however it gets done, it needs to be done. So if you have to go outside the Constitution? Fine. In their world, they are superior beings, and what they believe in is justified. Any opposition is automatically evil, and you’re therefore free to do anything to defeat evil. So if you have to go outside the Constitution now and then, here or there? “Fine and dandy! No problem, ’cause we’re the smart people, and we know that we can go outside the Constitution and not damage it. The Constitution is not afraid.
“The Constitution knows us, and they know that we love it, and they know the Constitution doesn’t get worried when we trickle on it. But these madcap Trump people? We’ve gotta be very vigilant against them.” It’s Barack Hussein O, Maggie, who many people think is “messing around with the Constitution.” I think the Official Program Observer has a question. What…? (interruption) Mmm-hmm. (interruption) The Official Program Observer has raised an interesting point. He says, “Maggie Haberman here says that we are all living in a moment of extreme anxiety.” (interruption)
Yes. There’s a lot of anxiety out there among Americans about terrorism. And the Official Program Observer’s questions. “Well, why? Because it was just last Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving that President Barack Hussein O assured us that we were safe, that there was no imminent attack, that ISIS wasn’t close, that ISIS wasn’t here.