{"id":214160,"date":"2016-08-08T16:16:48","date_gmt":"2016-08-08T20:16:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/172.24.32.11\/daily\/2016\/08\/08\/if_bashing_trump_were_an_olympic_event_the_media_would_win_every_medal\/"},"modified":"2016-08-08T16:16:48","modified_gmt":"2016-08-08T20:16:48","slug":"if_bashing_trump_were_an_olympic_event_the_media_would_win_every_medal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2016\/08\/08\/if_bashing_trump_were_an_olympic_event_the_media_would_win_every_medal\/","title":{"rendered":"If Bashing Trump Were an Olympic Event, the Media Would Win Every Medal"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Listen<\/a> <\/p>\n

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RUSH:  No, no, I\u2019m not watching the Olympics.  I haven\u2019t watched one second.  I mean, who wants to watch people swimming in sewage and rowing their boats in gunk and all that?  No.  No, no, no.  In fact, I watched Ray Donovan last night, and I can\u2019t even describe it.  I mean, I couldn\u2019t even get close to approximating it without violating every tenet of good taste that I\u2019ve got here.  Impossible.  And yet it was hilarious.  But I can\u2019t describe it for you. <\/p>\n

Greetings, my friends.  Great to have you here.  Here we are revved and ready to go.  Another big broadcast week from the Excellence in Broadcasting Network.  Telephone number, 800-282-2882. <\/p>\n

Speaking of the Olympics, if bashing Donald Trump were an Olympic event, the news media would be winning every medal, every gold, every silver, every bronze.  It is incredible.  It is so bad, the media bashing, the imbalance. I know we say this every four years, but this is the worst that it has been that I have ever seen. <\/p>\n

Brian came in moments ago to hook me up here for the particular tech I need to do the program, and they flashed a picture on CNN of Trump looking the scariest, most mean, vicious person you\u2019ve ever seen.  I looked up at it, and I said, “Brian, these guys are doing a bigger job on Trump than they\u2019ve ever done on me.” <\/p>\n

<\/a>He says, “Yep.  It\u2019s incredible.”  It\u2019s so bad that the New York Times has written a piece justifying it.  Our old buddy, Jim Rutenberg, who has taken over the media analysis responsibility at the New York Times has a piece: “Balance, Fairness and a Proudly Provocative Presidential Candidate.”<\/a>  What this piece is about — it prints out to like six pages — what this piece is about is how the media has had to abandon all of its known norms. <\/p>\n

The media has had to abandon all of its objectivity.  The media has had to abandon all of its impartiality, because Trump is so bad that the media has nothing else to do; they have no choice but than to try to destroy him.  For the sake of humanity, for the sake of decency, for the sake of saving the planet. <\/p>\n

I\u2019ve never seen a piece like this.  It\u2019s written with ringing hands, “Oh, we feel so bad about this, it\u2019s just horrible, but it\u2019s a necessity.  We\u2019ve never been in a situation — everything we learned in journalism school has had to be thrown out the window.” I\u2019m paraphrasing.  These are not actual quotes.  But we\u2019ll get into it here \u2019cause it sets everything up.  It sets everything up for the — well, the rest of the campaign, the rest of the program today, you name it. <\/p>\n

But before I get to that, just a couple things here about the Olympics.  You know, the TV ratings are in the toilet, as are the Olympics, apparently.  Apparently some of the water sports are actually taking place in the equivalent of a toilet down there.  And it is so bad, get this.  This is a story from The Daily Caller. <\/p>\n

“An NBC Olympic announcer pointed to the negative reaction the US teams have received all over the world during the women\u2019s indoor volleyball team match against Puerto Rico. The United States lost a point to Puerto Rico towards the end of the second game during the match as a result of a challenge regarding a ball out call from the referee. The Brazilian stadium audience cheered when the decision was announced. ‘And you heard the cheers from the pro-Brazilian, pro-Puerto Rican crowd here.'”<\/p>\n

In other words, this story says that America, the United States is being cheered against everywhere.  No matter what venue, no matter where you go, no matter what event, the hatred for the United States or the dislike is so vicious that people are cheering against the US at every venue. <\/p>\n

Now, why do you think this story is a story?  Who do you think might be responsible for this?  Would you say it would be the last eight years of the Obama administration and the things we\u2019ve done around the world?  No, no, don\u2019t be silly.  Oh, don\u2019t be silly.  It\u2019s gotta be Trump.  The world hates us because of Trump. (laughing)  I mean, there\u2019s no end to this. <\/p>\n

A caller last week asked me if it\u2019s possible this could get so over the top that there\u2019d be a backlash.  Who knows.  This is so new, and it\u2019s so — at least in our lifetimes it\u2019s unprecedented.  Look, some of the stuff that went on in presidential campaigns back in the founding days of this country, the Civil War, it was vicious as well.<\/line><\/p>\n

And it\u2019s safe to say that in all of life that there isn\u2019t anything really new, but within the historical context, most people\u2019s lives history began the day they were born. You know, stuff that happens when they\u2019re alive, that\u2019s the most important, the best, the worst, whatever it is. <\/p>\n

So within that context, I don\u2019t think anybody can remember it ever being this bad, purposely and undisguised.  I mean, this piece in the New York Times today makes it clear that they\u2019re doing it purposely, willingly, knowingly, and here\u2019s an excuse for it.  And we\u2019re gonna be keep doing it, Rutenberg says.  Well, they, the media, he\u2019s an analyst — they\u2019re gonna keep doing it, because it\u2019s the only hope for the country. The only hope for the world is to deny Trump the presidency, this is so bad, this is so over the top, this is so unacceptable. <\/p>\n

Now, meanwhile, Hillary Clinton is an absolute walking disaster.  But not one aspect of her negatives is being touted, is being reported on, and fact-checkers are doing their best to eliminate gaffes and other things that she commits. I mean, it is one-sided like we haven\u2019t seen before.  And I don\u2019t know how to overcome it or if it can be, and I don\u2019t know what the long-term impact of it\u2019s gonna be.  The thing I know is that, whether you want to hear it or not, the Drive-By Media, despite having lost their monopoly, and despite having lost their overall dominance, they are still located in primo places, like Google. <\/p>\n

Google and Google Search are the monopoly that ABC, CBS, NBC had up to 1988<\/a>.  Yahoo News, Google, pop culture, the Drive-Bys still dominate there.  And in entertainment and pop culture, they may as well still have a monopoly, for all intents and purposes.  So the reality is that this stuff affects people. <\/p>\n

<\/a>Just to reiterate the story from last week, when the story of a $400 million bribe, when that story surfaced and the take on that story being a bribe happened, and yet there was no national outcry, there didn\u2019t seem to be any anti-Hillary reaction to it, any anti-Obama reaction to it in any polling data or you just couldn\u2019t find any news stories, couldn\u2019t tune into anything and find people upset about it, so people write to me, “Do people not care?  I can\u2019t believe people don\u2019t care!” <\/p>\n

And I wrote back to my friend, I said, “They don\u2019t know.  The fact that $400 million was paid as a bribe, that hasn\u2019t shown up in the Drive-By Media.  It\u2019s only in our media.”  So the people you\u2019re waiting to blow up over this — and let\u2019s face it, how long is it we\u2019ve been waiting for what we think average, ordinary Americans blow up over things that we routinely know and react?  They don\u2019t react so we think we\u2019re losing the country, but the fact is they don\u2019t know. <\/p>\n

Most of them, if they tune into Yahoo, go to Google or wherever they get their news, Facebook in the news feed, doesn\u2019t matter.  They\u2019re not gonna see anybody\u2019s take on that deal as a $400 million bribe or ransom or any of that, so it\u2019s not that they don\u2019t react to it, it\u2019s not that we\u2019re losing the country per se, it\u2019s that these people just don\u2019t know.  So in that sense it\u2019s hard to calculate just how far can the media go being unfair, unbalanced, and actually programmed and oriented to destroy one of the presidential candidates and candidacies, how far can that go before the low-information crowd says, “Wait a minute, something\u2019s wrong here.  It can\u2019t be that bad.” <\/p>\n

We don\u2019t know.  We just have to play it out.  So it\u2019s within this context that the usually kinds of stories are now popping up.  And here\u2019s the way this timeline kind of goes.  And it seems this way with Romney.  It happened this way with George W. Bush.  Not so much Reagan, but generally how it goes is that the presidential race starts off, both parties, both candidates in full gear, and then the polling data starts to show that our candidate is losing big, that the Democrat candidate is starting to pull away and just dominate. <\/p>\n

The next thing that happens is we get stories of how the polls are not right. The polls are rigged, the polls are used to make news, not reflect news. The polls at this stage are being used to create public opinion for Hillary, anti-Trump, it\u2019s not really reflecting that.  Then the next version is we hear all of these stories about people who are not being polled because the pollsters can\u2019t reach \u2019em, the hidden supporters in this case of Trump, who are not being polled, who cannot be found.  There\u2019s a special group of people out there, a unique campaign, nobody\u2019s getting to \u2019em. We have no idea who they are for, you gotta throw this campaign out the window because it doesn\u2019t fit the usual mold of what presidential campaigns are because of Trump.<\/line><\/p>\n

Then you get the anecdotal evidence, “See, the polls are wrong, look at the size of Trump\u2019s crowd.”  And then the latest one is this, there are stories around: “Look at the social media Trump has.  Like Trump has two and three times the social media presence, supporters and so forth, than Hillary Clinton does.  See, Rush, that\u2019s another bit of evidence that the polls are not right.  You gotta factor social media in.” <\/p>\n

So, we go to our guy losing, the polls can\u2019t be right, there\u2019s hidden Trump support out there, but it isn\u2019t being found, and then the size of Trump\u2019s crowds versus Hillary\u2019s is pointed out, “See?  See?  She\u2019s not that popular.  She doesn\u2019t have that big a lead.”  And then the social media paradigm is thrown out, “See, Trump is just dominating.  He\u2019s got three times the social media presence.” <\/p>\n

And then the election happens and our guy loses by six or seven.  That was the pattern with Romney, and I see the pattern repeating here.  And if you ever wondered why the pattern is what it is, I mean, you can make book, I could have made a lot of money if I would have made a bet early on that this would be the pattern, and it clearly is. <\/p>\n

Now, still there are major differences, because it\u2019s, better or worse, we have not had a candidate like — oh, by the way, Trump just started his address to the — this is a huge economic address to the Economic Club of Detroit.  We are not going to be JIPping it, joining it in progress.  We just can\u2019t.  I\u2019ve warned them about this. I warned them, don\u2019t start these things at this time of the day.  But I guess they have no choice. <\/p>\n

You know, I\u2019ve spoken to the Economic Club of Detroit. I forget when.  It had to be 1991, 1990.  And I didn\u2019t know what they were.  Some of my partners came to me, “Rush, it\u2019s a big, big important group, businesspeople out the wazoo.  You go in there and you gotta make the sales pitch for your show.  That\u2019s what they want to hear.” <\/p>\n

And I said, “No, no, that can\u2019t be right.” <\/p>\n

“Yes, it is.  They want to hear a sales pitch.  They want to hear you tell \u2019em why buying your show is the only thing they should do.”  So I prepared to do that.  We get into Detroit, we go to the cocktail party, it\u2019s a luncheon thing just like this one is, we go to the little cocktail reception before I\u2019m supposed to speak at lunch, and I run across a guy who\u2019s a big fan, very excited I\u2019m there, and he says he can\u2019t wait to hear what I\u2019m gonna say. <\/line><\/p>\n

I said, “Let me ask you a question. Are you guys waiting for me to deliver a big sales pitch?”  And he\u2019s mouth fell, “God, no.  Don\u2019t you do that.  If you do that, they\u2019re gonna walk out of the room.  They want to be entertained.  They\u2019re not here to have you pitch advertising on your radio show.” <\/p>\n

So I went and got my partner said, “You know what?  That\u2019s not what they want to hear, and I gotta totally redo this.”  So I had about 10 minutes to rework what I was gonna say.  And that\u2019s my memory.  It turned out to be fine.  Everything was okay.  But the reason I make this point is this club meets at noon.  Whenever they meet, it\u2019s always a noon during the business week.  So I guess Trump didn\u2019t have much of a chance to move it, but we\u2019re rolling tape on it. <\/p>\n

He\u2019s gonna announce major, major economic policies in this speech, tax cuts, a major, major tax cut proposal, three tax rates, the elimination of the estate or death tax, and some other big, big things.  It\u2019s gonna be on par with a Reaganesque tax cut from back in the 1980s.  And there will be other things.  It\u2019s written, it\u2019s on the prompter, he\u2019s delivering it in a serious vein, of course.  So whatever is noteworthy from this speech we will have it for you as soon as we\u2019re able to roll it off and edit it. <\/p>\n

Back to the Olympics, before we go to the first break.  In addition to a story being out there how the US is being booed against, cheered against, at every venue, no matter who, no matter what the event, no matter who the athletes are, here\u2019s the next story, from the Associated Press.<\/a>  “Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti acknowledged Saturday that the results of November\u2019s U.S. presidential election could weigh heavily on his city\u2019s chances of hosting the 2024 Olympics, saying that a victory by Donald Trump could turn off IOC voters.<\/p>\n

“In an exclusive interview with the Associated Press,” the mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti, said that if Trump wins in November, the Olympic committee might not want to have anything to do with the United States.  We might not ever get another Olympics again.  And certainly we would not get the Los Angeles Olympics in 2024.  Garcetti said, “I think for some of the IOC members they would say, ‘Wait a second, can we go to a country like that, where we\u2019ve heard things that we take offense to?'”<\/p>\n

So Trump is so offensive, he\u2019s offending so many people that members of the IOC would reject any chance to go to Los Angeles in 2024 because Trump is saying offensive things.  Well, okay, fine.  If they want to stay in Third World hellholes, fine and dandy.  I think what everybody\u2019s overlooking, though, is that it\u2019s settled science, it\u2019s a consensus out there that by 2024, Los Angeles is gonna be underwater.  Climate change.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: This Jim Rutenberg story from the New York Times yesterday — actually, the Sunday paper.  And it is a story about how Trump is basically so off-the-charts bad.  By the way, you know what\u2019s interesting about this?  Here\u2019s the New York Times actually standing up for America. <\/p>\n

Now, before you start snickering, I can remember a number of occasions George W. Bush, his administration, would ask the New York Times to withhold publishing a story that would put soldiers at risk in Iraq or ask them to delay the publication.  Not to cancel it — you know, not to spike it — but just to delay publishing a story until they can get assets out of the way, and the New York Times generally told Bush to go pound sand. <\/p>\n

Bush\u2019s request was rooted in doing the good thing, the right thing, the safe thing for Americans, and the New York Times ignored him.  Now all of a sudden Trump poses such a grave threat to the great United States that the New York Times is justifying this media behavior unlike any we have ever seen.  And I probably just need to read the first two or three paragraphs to set the tone of this whole thing for you.  Jim Rutenberg…  And we like Jim Rutenberg here. <\/line><\/p>\n

Jim Rutenberg is one of the few that has always quoted me accurately and respectfully at the New York Times, which makes this an even double whammy.  But remember, he\u2019s their media analyst now.  He looks at the media — what they\u2019re doing — excuses it, explains it, and tells it to us plebes that don\u2019t get it.  “If you\u2019re a working journalist and you believe that Donald J. Trump is a demagogue playing to the nation\u2019s worst racist and nationalistic tendencies, that he cozies up to anti-American dictators and that he would be dangerous with control of the United States nuclear codes, how the heck are you supposed to cover him?” <\/p>\n

Now, isn\u2019t this fascinating?<\/p>\n

We never get a story like this, for example: “If you\u2019re a working journalist and you believe that Barack Hussein Obama has ties to dangerous anti-American organizations and people,” and then lists Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright and all of the things that they have said anti-America, would you then say, “How the heck are we supposed to cover it?”  No!  If you\u2019re a journalist and you know that Barack Obama has relationships with less-than-upstanding characters who are of dubious intent where the US is concerned, you ignore it!<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re a working journalist, you ignore everything about Obama.  You ignore every potential negative.  You ignore every danger point.  You ignore every red flag.  That\u2019s how you do it.  You ignore it if it\u2019s Obama because he\u2019s a liberal Democrat, and that means he\u2019s okay. But “[i]f you\u2019re a working journalist and you believe that Donald J. Trump is a demagogue playing to the nation\u2019s worst racist and nationalistic tendencies … how the heck are you supposed to cover him? <\/p>\n

“Because if you believe all of those things, you have to throw out the textbook American journalism has been using for the better part of” 50 years. So they think it is so bad, they have to throw out everything they\u2019ve been taught — except, folks, what they\u2019re doing to Trump is precisely what they\u2019ve been taught.  What they are doing to Trump is precisely their textbook.  It\u2019s no different in direction than what they did to the Mitt Romney.  It\u2019s no different than what they\u2019ve tried to do — did do — to George W. Bush. No different than what they did to Reagan. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s just that with Trump, it\u2019s even more egregious than ever.  So it\u2019s so bad that journalists now have to just toss out everything they\u2019ve learned about objectivity and fairness.  You have to “approach it in a way you\u2019ve never approached anything in your career,” as Mr. Rutenberg writes.  If you believe all these horrible things about Donald Trump, “throw out the textbook American journalism has been using for the better part of the past half-century, if not longer, and approach it in a way you\u2019ve never approached anything in your career.<\/line><\/p>\n

“If you [a journalist] view a Trump presidency as something that\u2019s potentially dangerous, then your reporting is going to reflect that. You would move closer than you\u2019ve ever been to being oppositional. That\u2019s uncomfortable and uncharted territory for every mainstream, non-opinion journalist I\u2019ve ever known, and by normal standards, untenable.” That\u2019s Jim Rutenberg.  I\u2019m sorry, Jim, I don\u2019t believe this! I mean, I believe you think it, but I don\u2019t believe this is in any way even anywhere near close to the truth. <\/p>\n

That this is the first time you\u2019ve had to become oppositional as journalists? That you\u2019re “uncomfortable” in this “uncharted territory,” and that “every mainstream, non-opinion journalist [you]\u2019ve ever known” finds Trump “untenable”?  You found Bush untenable.  Reagan was untenable. Any other number of Republicans who\u2019ve run for the Senate, run for the House, found them untenable.  A number of Republicans in the primaries who ran for the White House, you found untenable.<\/p>\n

But this is the first time they\u2019ve had to throw out objectivity and become oppositional?  Is he kidding?  No, he\u2019s not, folks.  This is the point.  Rutenberg is not kidding.  He thinks that he and his cadre of associates and comrades in the Drive-By Media are in “uncharted territory” for them, \u2019cause they\u2019re mainstream, non-opinion journalists.  They\u2019ve never, ever had to go where they are going!  But Mr. Rutenberg says, “But the question that everyone is grappling with is: Do normal standards apply? And if they don\u2019t, what should take their place?” <\/p>\n

So Trump is so over the top, Trump is so bad, Trump is so dangerous that we gotta chuck our normal standards out the window.  But what do we replace them with?  Well, “[c]overing Mr. Trump as an abnormal and potentially dangerous candidate is more than just a shock to the journalistic system.” Oh, okay.  So in the middle of this attempt to take Trump out and destroy him, journalists are in shock! (laughing) They don\u2019t believe what they\u2019re doing.  They can\u2019t believe that they have been reduced to this.<\/line><\/p>\n

You know why?  Get this next sentence.  This is unbelievable.  “Covering Mr. Trump as an abnormal and potentially dangerous candidate is more than just a shock to the journalistic system. It threatens to throw the advantage to his … opponent, Hillary Clinton…” No kidding!  You mean to tell me that if Trump were a normal candidate, you guys wouldn\u2019t be pulling for Hillary, but Trump is so bad that you\u2019re now — for the first time in many of your careers — actually pulling for the Democrat to win the race?<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s a dangerous precedent, Mr. Rutenberg says.  “Covering Mr. Trump … is more than just a shock to the journalistic system. It threatens to throw the advantage to his news conference-averse opponent, Hillary Clinton, who should draw plenty more tough-minded coverage herself.” Well, why isn\u2019t she?  If you in the Drive-Bys think that Hillary should be getting tougher coverage, why isn\u2019t she?  Oh, I know!  Because Trump is so dangerous and so bad, it\u2019s taking everything you\u2019ve got to take him out. <\/p>\n

Mr. Rutenberg writes, Hillary “proved that again last week with her assertion on Fox News Sunday that James Comey, director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, had declared her to be truthful in her answers about her decision to use a private email server for official State Department business — a grossly misleading interpretation…” Okay, why can\u2019t you just report that?  Why can\u2019t just report that she lied? <\/a> Why can\u2019t you? Maybe… It\u2019s like when Hillary supposedly made a Freudian slip when she promised to do raise taxes on the middle class.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Maybe she didn\u2019t make a mistake.  Maybe Hillary Clinton accidentally told the truth!  But, no, when Hillary Clinton makes “a faux pas” like that, the Drive-Bys run in and make sure everybody knows she didn\u2019t mean it. And she really didn\u2019t mean when she said that Comey said that she had pretty much told the truth.  But if we\u2019re to believe this, mainstream journalists have never before been oppositional. They\u2019ve never been in this precarious, dangerous situation.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ve never had to become for a particular candidate.  They have now been forced to do that by virtue of having to be oppositional to Donald Trump.  “But let\u2019s face it,” Mr. Rutenberg continues, “Balance has been on vacation since Mr. Trump stepped onto his golden Trump Tower escalator last year to announce his candidacy. For the primaries and caucuses, the imbalance played to his advantage, captured by the killer statistic of the season: His nearly $2 billion in free media was more than six times as much as that of his closest Republican rival.”<\/p>\n

Anyway, the story goes on with examples and quotes from media people like MSNBC anchors and infobabes about their shock at what they\u2019re hearing, their shock at what they\u2019re saying, and they can\u2019t believe that Trump should be allowed anywhere near the nuclear arsenal, the nuclear codes, the nuclear football.  So they know.  Of course they know!  So what we\u2019re getting is an explanation for why — and it\u2019s so, so dangerous.  They\u2019ve never before had to go to these lengths to destroy a candidate.<\/p>\n

But they have to, here! They have to throw every standard of fairness and objectivity, and just standing around and watching what\u2019s happening and telling people… They have to throw all that out.  They have to destroy Trump.  And in the process, they\u2019re helping Hillary, and they don\u2019t like doing that. And it\u2019s Trump\u2019s fault, \u2019cause he\u2019s so bad, he demands all this coverage. He demands that the media destroy him.  I mean, his candidacy is such that the media\u2019s got no choice, and then Hillary\u2019s end up getting a free pass. (groans) Oh, it\u2019s gotta be so tough to be a member of the Drive-By Media.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH:  The truth is, folks, the New York Times never even covered Hillary\u2019s appearance last Sunday on Fox News Sunday where she lied and said that everything Comey said was truthful.  She said Comey said that what I said was truthful.  The New York Times never even covered it.  Their ombudsman actually wrote a column in the New York Times that said if you — what did he say?  I can\u2019t find it right now.  But if you didn\u2019t know that Hillary Clinton — whatever he said, he made it clear that you\u2019re hearing it for the first time if you read the New York Times in my ombudsman column what Hillary Clinton said, \u2019cause the Times did not report it. <\/p>\n