RUSH: “Twelve Months Later, Trump Would Probably Still Win the 2016 Election.” That’s the headline of a piece in the Washington Post today. This is a bombshell story, when you measure this against nearly universal coverage from the Drive-By Media for the past year.
“Trump’s an idiot! Trump’s a buffoon! Trump stole the election! He cheated. He colluded with Russia. Trump is hated. Trump’s approval numbers are down in the toilet. Trump’s this; Trump’s that. People hate Trump. Trump’s a pig.” I’m sure you can add to the list. That has been the basic focus of news in the past 12 months, and here comes the Washington Post: “Twelve Months Later, Trump Would Probably Still Win the 2016 Election.” Now, I’m telling you, you put this out there on Yahoo News or where Millennials and others get their news, I’m gonna tell you this is gonna destroy them.
The left has done an incredible job of convincing people that Trump is about to be thrown out of office, that most people want Trump thrown out of office, that Trump didn’t even really win the election because he cheated and stole by colluding with Russia. So I think the Drive-Bys are gonna hide this, but it’s in the Washington Post. It’s by Aaron Blake. “It has been almost exactly one year since President Trump shocked the world by defeating Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. And he might well do it again today.”
That is the focus of this story. Trump would win today if the election were held today. “Confronted with the events of the past 12 months and even Trump’s unprecedented unpopularity — 59% disapprove of his presidency — a new poll shows that 2016 voters look as though they’d still pick Trump, albeit about as narrowly as they did before.” So what’s wrong with that? How can there be 59% disapproval and yet Trump would still win? Those two things don’t go together, but they are in the same poll.
“The Washington Post-ABC News poll asked respondents how they’d vote in a redo of the 2016 election, and, if anything, Clinton seems to have lost more ground than Trump.” Now, that doesn’t surprise you and doesn’t surprise me. But here at the Washington Post, the Drive-Bys, that blows them away! Remember the world in which they live and the one they construct for themselves. And I just told you what it is. Hillary should have won; everybody now wishes she had. Trump stole the election, colluded with Russia. Trump is a pig, Trump is a barbarian, Trump is massively unpopular! Everyone hates Trump!
That’s the world they’ve created; that’s the world they live in. They get this poll from the ABC News/Washington Post polling unit and shows that Hillary is even less popular? Oh, and you throw in the Brazile book — and there are more developments on that today, which we’ll get into. “Among those who voted, 46% say they picked Clinton last year. Forty-three percent picked Trump. But in a head-to-head rematch, Clinton’s support drops more than Trump’s does, and they wind up at a 40-40 tie. Given that Trump overperformed in key blue-leaning swing states, that means he’s probably win again.”
Now to me, I’m not buying into this ’til Nate Silver says so. (chuckling) Nate Silver. A 93% chance Hillary wins the election tonight, said Nate Silver about 4 o’clock on Election Day. “Interestingly, Clinton actually seems to have lost that ground because of disillusioned Democrats. [J]ust 72% of Democrats said they would vote for Clinton [again] — vs. the 84% who said they did vote for Clinton last year.” She has lost ground because of disillusioned Democrats: 72% of the people voted for her this time in this makeshift poll. That’s down from 84% that did vote for her last year.
“Trump’s share of the Republican Party, meanwhile, dropped just five points from 89% who said they did vote for him to 84% who said they would do it again,” and that’s margin-of-error stuff. Trump has not lost any Republican voters, is the bottom line. I keep trying to tell people this. I keep trying to tell the Drive-Bys: You have spent a year trying to separate Trump from his voters, and you haven’t done it — and you’ve thrown everything you’ve got and then some, and it still hasn’t worked.
I mean, we’ve had 92% negative coverage of Trump. We’ve had overwhelmingly positive fawning, licking, you name it, positive coverage of Hillary, and it hasn’t mattered. Hillary will perform worse in a fictional election held today. Does this mean that Americans are becoming media-proof? I think so, in certain ways. ‘Cause this media’s just over the top. This is just… CNN? Tucker Carlson last night, Chatsworth Osborne Jr. on his Fox show…
You know, he used to work at CNN (he did Crossfire) and he’s still got some contacts over there and he’s reported on Fox last night that CNN executives ordered on-air talent to beat up Donna Brazile. CNN reporters and on-air people — the talent — were told to rip Brazile a new one and that Hillary was to be defended, and Chatsworth reported that last night on his Fox show. By the way, Clinton, in this poll, loses 10 points of support from nonwhite voters.
Uh-oh. The breadbasket of the Democrat Party is minority voters. And in a fictional election in this poll that would take place now, she loses 10 points. “The utility of this question,” says the Washington Post, “is limited. Clintons seems to be done with running for office, and there will not be a redo of the 2016 election. The question –” well, all of this is hypothetical. What the hell are we talking about? It’s all hypothetical. So when we get the bad result of the hypothetical, ah, doesn’t matter, she’s not running again.
Tell her she’s not running again. She’s the only one that doesn’t know, apparently. If you ask me you see Hillary in a muumuu and she’s out there in the pantsuits, there’s no question, in her mind she’s running again. Now, a brief time-out. When we come back the Drive-By Media on TV sent some reporters out, they sent some celebrities out, they sent some analysts out there into blue states that voted for Trump.
They were hoping to find a bunch of angry Democrats who had voted for Trump who were fed up with Trump, who hate Trump, who despise Trump, who were embarrassed at the way they voted and they can’t wait to vote for the next Democrat president, except they can’t find any.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Now I want to get back to our look-back at one year ago, the election. We left off with the fact that the Drive-Bys are desperately looking for any sign that Trump would lose the election, that Trump is hated, that Trump’s despised.
That they have successfully separated Trump voters from Trump, that they’ve demonized Trump and so successfully and so badly that Trump voters now hate him and would never vote for him again. And in their alternative universe they’ve created, they believe it. So they sent some people out to blue, Democrat states where Democrats voted for Trump to try to find any evidence that these people hate Trump now and would abandon him. Our first example is from the Today show today. Nicolle Wallace reporting Trump voters continued support for Trump in the country. She talks to some of these people out there, and that’s what you will hear.
JUDY PHELPS: It hasn’t dropped at my house. When I knew that he was gonna go on a 12-day tour of China and Japan, I was just keeping my fingers crossed that he is diplomatic.
DAVE LOCK: I still think he’s too good a good job. I still like him.
WALLACE: Now he’s fighting with members of his own cabinet, former presidents, Republican senators.
DAVE LOCK: I think they’d go away if everyone quit advertising him across the media world. We as a country are making him look like an ass, so he needs to try and defend himself.
WALLACE: Do you think he does anything to make himself look like an ass?
DAVE LOCK: He helps, absolutely. Maybe he’s not doing the most appropriate way or with the most appropriate of words, but leave him alone and let him do his job and see what he can do.
RUSH: She started the report by saying, “In Erie County” — this is Pennsylvania — “Donald Trump’s approval rating has dropped until 10 points since Election Day. Why do you think that is?” And that’s what these people are answering here. Then they cut back to Wallace. After this report she’s a live on the set there with Savannah Guthrie and Matt Lauer, and because she couldn’t find anybody that’s not not gonna vote for Trump, she couldn’t find anybody who abandoned Trump, this is how it sounded.
WALLACE: When we began this project, we met 10 former Democrats, all Obama supporters, who flipped for Trump in four states. All but one said they’d still vote for him today and still approve of the job he’s doing. That one unhappy voter, if he had to do it over, he wouldn’t vote for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. He’d just stay home.
LAUER: I hope you keep this going. I think it’s really informative and educational to follow these people and listen to how their opinions evolve or don’t evolve.
WALLACE: And I love that Dave said it’s not that he doesn’t act like an ass, it’s that we hope that you wouldn’t show that. It’s a real insight into their feelings about the media and I know what we all grapple with every day.
RUSH: So they’re upset. She couldn’t find anybody to abandon Trump, and that’s what they hoped to do. I’m surprised this bit aired, frankly. I mean, it’s kind of like if Trump and Putin are gonna have a summit and before the summit you announce you hope you get an agreement that the next time the Russians steal the election, they don’t make it so obvious, well, you don’t have the summit with that agreement until you get it! If you don’t get the agreement, you don’t do summit! If Putin will not agree to make the cheating less obvious, then you don’t do the summit, you cancel it.
Same thing here. Nicolle Wallace and the NBC crew, if they didn’t find anybody to abandon Trump, they should not have run the segment. (laughing) Do you have yesterday’s Morning Update handy, Mister Broadcast Engineer? The one that aired today, can you put your hands on that? I mean, that’s what you’re laughing at, right? Snerdley is laughing at my faux summit and what it would be about. ‘Cause we just love to tweak these Drive-Bys about media collusion and cheating and so forth.
But seriously, if they’re gonna do a story on how Trump’s voters are abandoning him, and they don’t find that, then why air it? I mean, they’re practically in tears on this set after this report. Matt Lauer (imitating Lauer), “Well, I hope you keep digging. I really hope you keep looking. I hope you keep this going.” And Nicolle says (imitating Wallace), “Yeah. Yeah. He thinks we’re the problem. It’s a real insight into their feelings about the media.”
So it was a double whammy for them out there. They’re expecting Trump voters to abandon Trump, and not only did that not happen, they’re finding out that they, the media, are totally ineffective in causing Trump supporters to abandon him. Here is the Morning Update that ran. You gotta listen to the whole thing. The very end of this is the money payoff. You ready? Here you go. Hit it.
RUSH MORNING UPDATE: On the morning of November 8th – one year ago – liberals were giddy with anticipation. Everything pointed toward victory. The polls and the Big Data showed Hillary Clinton winning in a big landslide. The day began with predictions that Trump’s presidential aspirations were doomed. His chances of reaching the Oval Office were said to be between seven and 29 percent.
In addition to breaking the so-called glass-ceiling, Hillary Clinton’s election meant Barack Obama’s legacy was safe. President Hillary would keep her promise to protect it. Yes, the morning of November 8th – one year ago – was a good one for liberal Democrats.
On the evening of November 8th – one year ago – there was an air of happy confidence throughout the Drive-By Media. As the polls began to close it was obvious the stories were already written; the coverage had been mapped out in advance.
Media liberals were thrilled. Their unrelenting pounding of Donald Trump was about to pay off. Some establishment Republicans were also giddy. The Never Trumpers, their hatred of the outsider would be vindicated, and even if it meant an election loss, their hold on the party would remain intact.
At 2:40 a.m. the morning of November 9th – one year ago – it was all over. The giddiness collapsed into waves of despondency, tears, gloom, and anger. A year later the fury remains. The rest of the country, however, was celebrating. A year later, we still are. Thank you, Russians.
END RUSH MORNING UPDATE
RUSH: So I ad-libbed that at the end of that update, “Thank you, Russians,” and I asked the staff, “Do you think we should pull that out before it airs?” “Oh, no. You gotta leave that in. You gotta tweak ’em, tweak ’em, leave it in.” So we left it in. “Thank you, Russians.” And now a summit between Trump and Putin to determine if there’s gonna be cheating again, that Putin make it less obvious next time, as a summit example.
I just love tweaking ’em. I just do. And I know that even though they’re not gonna react to it, they’re gonna see it, they’re gonna hear about it, and they’re just gonna fume. I mean, this is one of their sacred — I mean, this would be sort of like laughing at one of the 12 disciples. You don’t make fun of the Trump-Russian collusion. That’s just too serious because they’ve got everything they know hanging on that, so I just love ramming it down their orifices.