RUSH: We’re gonna start with Jase in Virginia Beach. Great to have you on the program. Hello.
CALLER: Hello, Rush. Good to talk to you.
RUSH: Thank you. Thank you very much.
CALLER: All right. Listen, the thing that got me fired up enough to call you and try to overcome my fear of public speaking over national radio here is last night during the debate the thing between Cruz and Trump about “New York values.”
RUSH: Mmm-hmm.
CALLER: That came up.
RUSH: Mmm-hmm.
CALLER: That really stuck in my craw. I think Cruz was right. The way… I don’t know the context that he said that in, but to me, New Yorker values… We know that New York is a deep blue state.
RUSH: It was… Wait, wait, wait. You don’t know the context. The context is that Cruz made the statement some days ago attempting to… It was his way of trying to tell people Trump is not a conservative, and it was, you know, talking about all this stuff for Cruz’s birth and his eligibility and Trump leading the fight on that. Cruz retorts — and there might have been one other thing that did come up. But he was referring to Donald’s “New York values.” People said, “Whadda you mean? What are New York values. What do you mean New York values?”
Well, we all know what New York values are, and you heard him say that last night. Then Trump… You ought to see the Drive-Bys right now. The Drive-Bys have done a 180. They love Trump! Trump is the best guy. I mean, every New York liberal journalist I ever heard of has written today glowing, praising Trump. “He got silent! We saw the real Trump for the first time. We saw that he has a soul. We saw that Trump has a heart. We saw that Trump is a New Yorker, and he just buried Ted Cruz!” That’s the reaction inside the big Apple media.
CALLER: And that’s my concern. That’s my concern that they’re blowing this out, ’cause what I didn’t like what Trump did… To me what Trump threw at Cruz was an emotional red herring and stuff, and I expect that from Obama to throw people off.
RUSH: Wait, wait, wait, now. Wait, wait I’m what’s “the emotional red herring”?
CALLER: Well, how do you correlate conservatism with New York’s reaction to the horror of 9/11? You’d have to be inhuman not to do everything you can and to feel something about what happened, ’cause Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid stood on the Capitol steps singing God bless America after 9/11, but they’re not conservative. Trump’s response to Cruz on that was, “Hey, 9/11? Didn’t you see all us New Yorkers how we got together and what do you mean New Yorker values or whatever?” And to me, Cruz’s comment had to do with political values, not being human, not having to be totally… You’d have to be a rock or a doorknob not to have reacted to 9/11.
RUSH: Or you’d have to be celebrating in New Jersey.
CALLER: Yeah. So… (laughing) There you go.
RUSH: (chuckling)
CALLER: But, so, to me that just doesn’t… Trump’s response missed the point and stuff to what Cruz was probably saying about New Yorker values.
RUSH: Let me address this, because you have a very, very good point. I’ll tell you another thing about this, and I think this is representative of a divide. Now, in New York, as I say, everybody in the media thought this was a big faux pas, that Cruz was actually winning the debate ’til this happened. He threw it away, and that Trump just wiped the floor. “This the best Trump had ever been, this was so good! He just pounded Cruz and kept pounding, and Cruz he was so humiliated didn’t even say anything back.”
But outside New York, the thing that you’re talking about is true: Everybody does know what New York values means. Here’s the thing. Trump is praising the cops and firefighters and the first responders and all that, but who is it that’s under attack in New York? The cops! The mayor is making the cops out to be the absolute worst aspect of the city. It’s nothing new. All of liberalism is out pummeling the police every day. So while, yeah, on 9/11, everybody praised what happened, it’s kind of like the Democrats got on board with Bush for a couple days after 9/11.
But it didn’t take but a week and they were already savaging Bush over not responding soon enough. The other end of this on the birther stuff? Another event like the equivalent of this New York value thing happened, and Cruz, I think, cleaned up on the birther side. So look I think there were a lot of points scored by a lot of people last night. Everybody came off as likable, and I hope that’s not lost in this. The partisans are looking at this and say, “Okay, my guy did good here, but my guy kind of got attacked (sigh) on a leg over here.”
At the end of the day, I tried to watch this thing like a Martian would. I tried to watch this thing like a low-information voter. I’m telling you, it was funny, it was convivial. Even these moments where there was supposed confrontation, you didn’t get the impression that there was hatred or anger or dislike with these people. Whether it be Rubio and Cruz or Cruz and Trump, it came across to me as though everybody on the stage understood that they are a member of a fraternity or a brotherhood and that each of them individually are not the long-term enemy. But they’re all competing against each other at the moment. That was the… I made that note three or four times about how likable everybody came across last night.
Everybody was on last night. Everybody was energetic.
(Well, most everybody.)
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: By the way, this Drive-By Media love affair with Trump is not gonna last. In fact, it’s already starting to break down. There are some in the Drive-By Media who are starting to criticize Trump for even bringing up 9/11 in that response. Honest to gosh, Mr. Snerdley. There are some in the Drive-By Media saying that it was very, very low rent and cheap for Trump to bring up 9/11. Remember the left, they’re the guys that say, “You can’t politicize that!” Remember? It’s the left, the Democrat Party.
They’re the guys who say, “You can’t use any of the footage in campaigns! You can’t politicize 9/11,” ’cause they know they look bad. So Trump used it and elevated himself in the process, and the Drive-Bys are starting to figure it out; they don’t like it. Now, let me give you a little observation about New York and “New York values.” I lived there for eight years. Not a native New Yorker by any stretch. You know what the thing about New York that that I found that amused me the most? New York is this gigantic… You talk about melting pot, whatever?
I mean, veritably every living thing on earth, one of them lives in New York. And yet it’s the most provincial town in this country. What I mean by that is, I remember back during the OJ trial, Marcia Clark, the prosecutor, well, she had once stopped at a rest area on the New York State Thruway, and that made her a New Yorker in the media story. “Marcia Clark, at one time spent time in the Tri-State area. She stopped at a rest area and used the restroom.” She was in the state for about 20 minutes. That made her a New Yorker for the purposes of the story.
There was a New Yorker in that story. They’ll go to any length whatsoever to put a New York angle in every important story in the country. The OJ trial, you name it. I think it’s cute. You generally think this is what happens in small towns. They get proud of people who live in these towns for making big national news, or being part of a national news story. But you think, “New York? Ah, no big deal. It’s so big, so sophisticated, it can’t possibly be a big deal that a New Yorker’d be involved in the OJ story.”
But man, if they can find a link, they’ll publish it and they’ll make it look like the fact that Marcia Clark took a restroom break in New York is what made her the prosecutor. “If she hadn’t stopped there and used a bedroom on the Thruway, she’d have never made it that far in life.” That’s the New York media. I just I find it cute. I found it cute.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Here’s a montage that we put together the Drive-By Media loving Trump because of the “New York values” and the way he dealt with it in the debate last night.
JONATHAN KARL: (b-roll noise) Trump clearly came out on top. His response to the New York values attack from Cruz was so effective that Cruz was actually applauding him.
GLORIA BORGER: It was such a clear win for Trump.
RICH LOWRY: His answer, TrumpÂ’s, on New York values thing was just awesome.
BRET BAIER: He had the upside of the New York values back and forth with Ted Cruz.
CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: That was the moment of the debate. That was a moment where Trump clearly had won.
MEGYN KELLY: We saw the hundreds of firefighters and police officers run into the burning buildings to save others here in New York City. Those are our New York values.
JOHN KING: Trump won that exchange.
NORAH O’DONNELL: The New York Daily News with the deadline, “Drop Dead, Ted.”
RUSH: You heard Megyn Kelly there: “We saw the hundreds of firefighters and police officers run into the burning buildings to save others here in New York City. Those are our New York values.” Well, that happens in other places, too, doesn’t it, Mr. Snerdley? Yes, it does. (interruption) There’s no “however” to that. That’s our caller’s point. “Wait, anybody would have run into the burning. The firefighters and the first responders all over the country step into the middle of emergencies like this.”
Those are not the kind of “New York values” that Cruz was highlighting, anyway. But I’m not denying that I wanted to play you the sound bite. There’s the Drive-Bys going nuts on Trump. You heard it. (interruption) Yeah, yeah, yeah. (interruption) I know! I heard it! But those are not the kind of “New York values” that Cruz was talking about. Cruz was not… Anybody in their right mind knows that, “Okay, they walked the smell of death, the stench of death, and they braved it and they climbed those steps not knowing a second plane was headed right foir them…”
Yeah, and they should be cited for bravery, as they have been. Not a single person in the world disparages that. That’s the point. Cruz was not disparaging that. But I’m not… Look, I’m not gonna sit here be denial. Trump clearly scored big time with that, there’s no question, as far as the media’s concerned. But I’m just telling you: You sit here and talk about the cops. The New York mayor hates ’em! The New York mayor maybe not hates them, but he paints them as the problem.
The cops are the problem. Ever Democrats run the show, the police are a problem, are they not? There you have liberal values, which is all he meant. (interruption) Well, well… I know. He should have said Northeastern or something, should have said Boston; then Trump would have started launch at Tom Brady. You know, it would have been. It would have been. Here’s other examples here, folks, of the Drive-Bys starting to figure out here that the Republicans are starting to figure out that Trump can win. Dana Bash at CNN…
BASH: Talking to Republican sources, particularly in Washington, there was a sense of denial that Donald Trump could ever be their nominee. That is starting to melt away as they see the same polls that we do. They hear the same things from Republicans out in the country that we see, and that is that Donald Trump is doing extremely well and could very well be the man at the top of their ticket.
RUSH: Go back to that montage. It was Dr. Krauthammer who proclaimed Trump the hands-down winner. I mean, that’s the same thing as George Will doing it. You want you to go from point A to point B, point over here? “Trump, yuk! Can’t even say the name.” Now, “Trump, hero! Defends New York! Wins debate.” (interruption) “Provincial.” That’s exactly right. Here’s Stephen Hayes. Stephen Hayes of the Weekly Standard, just last night on a special edition of Hannity, was talking about Trump and so forth. Hayes never… Just to put this in context so you understand this, Hayes has never liked Trump.
HAYES: I think Trump is the least electable, but I’m willing to be… Look, I didn’t think Donald Trump was gonna be a competitor for the Republican nomination. He’s clearly a competitor for the Republican nomination. So maybe what I thought I understood before, I’m not understanding. 
Maybe he would be more electable than I would think. I don’t think he’d have the kind of enduring, cross-party appeal after 11 months. You put Donald Trump opposite Hillary Clinton for 11 months.
RUSH: Yeah. See, this is what they all think. New York values? You want some New York values? Everybody in New York thinks that Trump had no prayer against Hillary. New York values. I guarantee you they all think that. Everybody in the New York media, the energetic political establishment? (interruption) Yeah, it’s almost a status quo that you have to accept. (interruption) Oh, you just heard. I’m not telling you anything you don’t know. It’s universal that Trump can’t beat Hillary.
I think they’re dead wrong, but you know that that is an axiomatic belief they all have. They must have it. Remember, they’re a little jaundiced in their opinions. They never get outside these boundaries much, and when they do, they don’t believe what they see, or they made fun of it. They crack jokes about it. But I guarantee you, outside New York City or the Tri-State Area, the great Northeast or whatever, there are a whole bunch of people who think any Republican could beat Hillary Clinton. The fear of Hillary Clinton is to be found in elite circles and establishment circles. But you go out there where people who make the country working live and operate, and they think not only would it be a piece of cake. It’d be fun to swat the woman back to Arkansas.