RUSH: The Jeb Bush thing. It’s an ABC News story. It says here: “Jeb Bush found himself on defense after his town hall meeting in Reno, Nevada, Wednesday after a young voter told him, ‘Your brother created ISIS.'”
Now, let me establish some givens before I dig deep into the analysis here. Jeb Bush, would we all agree, is an establishment Republican? Okay? Noncontroversial statement. Not a critical statement. Statement of fact. Anybody disagree? Okay, good. Establishment Republicans believe that the way to win elections is to be non-confrontational with Democrats, to engage in cooperation with Democrats, to engage in bipartisanship, and why do they believe this?
Well, there are many reasons. One reason is that they have bought hook, line, and sinker the trick, the idea put forth by the Democrats that voters do not like confrontation, that voters do not like partisanship, that voters want the two parties to cooperate and work together and get things done. Jeb Bush subscribes to all of this. Now, what is the purpose of this? What is the purpose of bipartisanship, working together, cooperation, non-confrontation, don’t disagree, don’t criticize your opponent?
Who’s the target of that? Democrat voters, right? I mean, the theory is you have your base. The Republican establishment believes that its base voters are gonna turnout. Whether they’re right or wrong about it is not the point. They believe it. They believe the old saw that once you get to the general election, that 40% are gonna go Republican, 40% are gonna go Democrat, and in there in the middle is 20%, and that is where the election is won or lost.
That 20% is mainly the independents and some lazy Republicans or Democrats. So essentially the belief system of the Republican establishment is that the election is won or lost in 20% of the population, 20% of the voting population. Now, I think, as I’ve said before, this is a brilliant trick that Democrat consultants have been running or Republican consultants for I don’t know how long. Because what has it accomplished?
It ensures that every Republican presidential candidate seeks the vote of only 20% of the population. How they can possibly win? They take for granted they’re gonna have their base. They take for granted the Democrats are gonna get their base. So they do everything strategy-wise for 20%. The candidate and what he says, the way he acts, all of it is designed to get a majority of that 20%. Meanwhile, the Democrats are out trying to get every vote they can, while the Republican establishment thinks they can win by getting a majority of that 20%.
And they believe that among that 20% you’ve got some Democrats and you’ve got some independents and it’s those people that want us to work together. It’s those people that want bipartisanship. It’s those people who want Washington to work. It’s those people who want cooperation. It’s those people who don’t like criticism of Democrats. No, you’ve heard the old saw, “If you criticize Obama, if you criticize Democrats, the independents don’t like it and they’re gonna run right back to the Democrat Party.”
Never mind the fact that the Democrat Party does nothing but defame Republicans. We’re supposed to believe that the independent voter doesn’t care that the Democrats engage in defamation, but the moment a Republican even begins to criticize policy, man, that’s it! Those independents have had it and they run right back to the Democrats. Well, Jeb Bush and the Republican establishment believe all that, and they also believe one other thing.
They believe the reason — and this is the key to this. They believe that the reason independents and others want bipartisanship and want cooperation and want Washington to work and want no criticism — the reason they think that’s all true — is because they think independents don’t like conservatives. They think independents don’t like religious voters. The Republican establishment believes that its base poses a great problem because reasonable people (i.e., the independents and maybe some wayward Democrats).
They don’t like the Tea Party, and they don’t like criticism, and they don’t like confrontation and they don’t like fighting and they don’t like partisanship. So the establishment Republicans fall for every trick. They believe that their own base is an embarrassment. They believe that to win the election you have to let other people know that you really not a big fan of your own base, that they don’t like the Moral Majority.
You don’t like the evangelicals, and you’re really not crazy about conservatives, ’cause you think of ’em as Barry Goldwater types who lose in landslides. They want you to think that they’re serious and non-confrontational and compassionate and reasonable and all these things. And I firmly believe that that is what enables Jeb Bush to be ambushed. Did you hear his answer to her? He was afraid to offend her, and she’s being as disrespectful, as confrontational, as critical as she can.
A 19-year-old Democrat, ambushes Bush, asks him a question about ISIS, tells him she disagrees with his explanation for the existence of ISIS, and then tells him (paraphrased exchange), “No, your brother created ISIS. Your brother did it, by leaving so many people in Iraq unemployed with no money!” She was mean and she was pointed, and he said, “Well, we just must agree to disagree.” She said, “Don’t be pedantic to me. Just answer my question.” That’s the very type of voter that the Republican establishment thinks they need to win.
Jeb Bush reached out to her in the way the Republican establishment thinks they must in order to get those votes, and they had it rammed right down their throats.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Okay, so there’s Jeb. He’s out there in Reno. He’s got a town hall meeting and a young female voter comes up to him and says, “‘Your brother created ISIS.’ Ivy Ziedrich, a 19-year-old student at University of Nevada who said she was a registered Democrat, approached Bush after the event and told [him] he was wrong about the origins of the terror group: ‘You stated that ISIS was created because we don’t have enough presence and we’ve been pulling out of the Middle East.
“However, the threat of ISIS was created by the Iraqi coalition authority, which ousted the entire government of Iraq. It was when 30,000 individuals who are part of the Iraqi military were forced out. They had no employment, they had no income,” they had no health care, “yet they were left with access to all the same arms and weapons. Your brother created ISIS!’ Bush,” it says here, “unsuccessfully tried to interject. When he reached out, Ziedrich snapped back: ‘You don’t need to be pedantic to me[,] sir. You could just answer my question.’
“‘We respectfully disagree,’ Bush said, explaining his view that more American troops in Iraq would have prevented ISIS from forming. ‘So look, we can rewrite history all you want, but the simple fact is that we’re in a much more unstable place because America pulled back,’ he told Ziedrich.” Now, the lesson here is, Jeb’s performance — whatever it was, I don’t know — should have persuaded her.
According to the Republican establishment theory to be polite and forthcoming and whatever they say — don’t be confrontational, don’t be partisan — he should have had this woman already persuaded. But she couldn’t wait to get up and insult him afterwards. And then, “Your brother did it! Your brother did it!” The fact of the matter is, ISIS started in Syria. They are the “moderate rebels” fighting Bashar Assad.
These are the people that Hillary and Obama wanted to arm, and Obama eventually did.
ISIS has its roots in Syria.
So it doesn’t matter the woman is wrong. Jeb is right; she’s wrong. It doesn’t matter. My point… The teachable moment here is, to me, that the Republican establishment theory or strategy, “If you just treat these people nice and don’t be confrontational and don’t be conservative, then you have a better chance of winning and getting their votes,” I think that’s gonna lead to a whole bunch of people scratching their heads the morning after the election asking, “What happened?”
Not realizing what they’re really up against and, much less not realizing, what has to be done to beat these people.