![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/APP-CLearances.jpg\"){kind=spacer}
<\/p>\nRUSH: Folks, I have a got some sound bites I want to get into here that I have kept intending to do but they just got pushed aside as the program evolved before our very eyes and ears. Something actually just happened mere moments ago. This was on the Fox News Channel, the daily briefing with Dana Perino.<\/p>\n
She was speaking with their political editor there, Chris Stirewalt. And she said, “President Trump is apparently –” you know what? Hang on a minute. Cookie went out got the Mooch, Scaramucci. ‘Cause I heard him on Fox about an hour ago expressing his disagreement with Trump on canceling the clearance for Brennan. And I reacted to that. So we\u2019ll hear the bite.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
But Stirewalt — remember, folks, over the years we\u2019ve always talked about how, when you end up being really ripped and criticized, there\u2019s two ways to deal with it. You either ignore it or you react to it. If you react to it, some people are gonna say, “You can\u2019t react to it. You\u2019re just elevating the critics. You\u2019re letting the critics know that they bother you, and that\u2019s what they love, and so they\u2019re gonna just ramp it up.” And there\u2019s no guaranteed, hard, fast way to react or respond to criticism.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s not a single expert that can tell you how to do it. But the conventional wisdom is that you don\u2019t do it, that you don\u2019t elevate your critics. I think this is another area where people totally misunderstand Trump. I think Trump wants critics. Critics to Trump are foils. Critics are the equivalent of me getting phone calls from liberals. I don\u2019t get nearly enough of \u2019em. I love \u2019em, but they don\u2019t call here \u2019cause I know they don\u2019t have a chance.<\/p>\n
These people think Trump doesn\u2019t like criticism. They still have no idea who he is. Anyway, here\u2019s Stirewalt. And again the question: “President Trump is apparently elevating John Brennan so that he became the number one foil in his work to try to convince people that it\u2019s just a rigged witch hunt.”<\/p>\n
STIREWALT: Right. We remember when Barack Obama elevated Rush Limbaugh and said he\u2019s the leader of the Republican Party. Politicians like to pick their enemies. They like to put forward the faces that they want America to see as their enemy. That\u2019s why the president talks Maxine Waters, who has no clout particularly in the Democratic caucus, but she says outlandish things so he wants to elevate her because it inspires his base to new levels of outrage.<\/p>\n
RUSH: Now, I get the point here. He thinks that Obama made a mistake in calling me — The biggest time that I\u2019m aware of that Obama called me out was two weeks after he won, he had a meeting with the congressional leadership in the White House. And he said to the Republican leaders in the House and the Senate (paraphrasing), “By the way, you guys have got to stop listening to Rush Limbaugh. It\u2019s just not how things work in this town. You\u2019ve just gotta stop doing that.” And two weeks later I had a meeting with John Boehner who was the Speaker at the time, and Boehner said to me, “I can\u2019t understand why he would do that. Why bring you up?”<\/p>\n
I said, “Mr. Speaker, if I may, what he was hoping was that one of you would stroll to the microphones outside the White House and agree with him. He wanted to drive a wedge. He was hoping that somebody in the Republican Party leadership would go out there and agree with him and say that outside forces like Rush Limbaugh have been a problem, and we in Washington need to stop paying attention.” That\u2019s what he wanted.<\/p>\n
But Obama didn\u2019t elevate me; I was already who I was before Obama came along. I live rent free in Obama\u2019s head. The same thing with Bill Clinton. But still, see, the argument is you can\u2019t elevate, should not do it. Here\u2019s Scaramucci. Listen to him. He\u2019s talking here with Harris Faulkner. “The president today calling out Bruce Ohr and his wife, saying their clearance might be next to go. You surprised to see this? What do you think?”<\/p>\n