RUSH: Politico has a story. What did I tell you last fall? The Republican establishment doesn’t even believe Obama can lose, right? Republican establishment during the arguments, during the primaries, should it be Newt, should it be Santorum, should it be Rick Perry, should it be Michele Bachmann, should it be Romney. Of course, the argument often came down on electability, who has the best chance of beating Obama, was one criteria that primary voters and analysts looked to. And I said all along, the dirty little secret is, in the Republican establishment, they don’t think Obama can lose. They don’t think we can beat him. All they want is the Senate.
I know many of you are new to the program and don’t remember me saying it ’cause you weren’t here. But those of you who were here the last few years remember this discussion going on and on and on about how frustrated we all were. Because you and I are sitting here thinking, “This guy’s not only not unbeatable, he’s landslidable beatable!” Here’s another thing. Unfortunately, I can’t avoid it. Wherever I go, I get asked, “Hey, Rush, what’s really going on with the election? What’s really gonna happen?”
As though everything I say on the radio is a lie or made up. “What’s really going on, Rush? Do we have a chance, Rush? I can’t tell you how many people ask me that. Everybody! “Do we really have a chance? Do we have a chance?” And I say, “Let me tell you something. I think, not only do we have a chance, I think that it’s possible we could blow Obama out in a record landslide.” And you know what they all say? “Whew! Good. That’s what I think, too, but I’m just afraid to say it.”
Everybody thinks it. They all think it but they’re afraid to say it, even to their own friends and to other people. So they’re being cautious. Anyway, The Politico has a story. It’s by Jonathan Martin, our old buddy John Martin. Right There: “GOP Discovers That Mitt Romney Could Win,” and the story is from today. I’m holding it right here in my formerly nicotine-stained fingers. Remember last fall? I told you the GOP, the establishment, was asked, “Why Romney?”
“Well, because Romney will give us the best chance of holding the House and winning the Senate. Romney will do the best job down the ballot. Bachmann’s not gonna help us down the ballot. Perry’s not gonna help us down the ballot. Newt’s not gonna help us. No conservative is!” They said, “No conservative is gonna help us anywhere down the ballot. Can’t have a conservative. Gotta have Mitt. Gotta have a moderate, gotta have a centrist, gotta have a middle-of-the-road guy. That’ll help us win.”
That was the Republican establishment.
Lo and behold, here we are: “Top Republicans, long privately skeptical about their presidential prospects, are coming around to a surprising new view — that Mitt Romney may well win the White House this November.” This is earth-shattering news. It really is! I mean, The Politico makes this a big story. And apparently the Republican establishment has just now been able to get their arms around the idea that Romney might actually win — or, better stated, that Obama could actually lose.
So my question is: “Now that they think Obama can lose, are they gonna want another candidate?” (laughing) I’m just kidding, folks. I’m just trying to stir it up a little bit here. “Margin-of-error polling, fundraising parity last month, conservative consolidation around Romney and a still-sluggish economy has senior GOP officials increasingly bullish about a nominee many winced over during a difficult primary process.” Well, the establishment wasn’t wincing over Romney.
Romney has always been the establishment’s guy, but they never thought he could win; they just thought he would help them take the Senate and hold onto the House. They want their Senate chairpersonships. They want to be able to write the regulations. They want to be in charge of the money. They figured that would be the way to stop Obama. Now all of a sudden… (laughing) Is this not pathetic? Now, all of a sudden, the Republican establishment has gotta totally change the way they’re thinking.
“Oh, my God, we could actually win this? Oh! Now what do we do?”
And who is it, ladies and gentlemen, that’s been confident for months that Obama could be beaten, could lose? And I think that’s only becoming more likely each and every day. I don’t want to cause overconfidence here. Anything can change on a dime, unpredictable things. But as we sit here, the bottom is falling out on the regime.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Last night on Charlie Rose on PBS, Mark Halperin, TIME Magazine, having a discussion about the presidential contest. Charlie Rose looks at Mark Halperin and says, “Mark, I want to know, I get the sense it’s not good out there. How do you see it, Mark?”
HALPERIN: The economic fundamentals are really against the president. The Washington Post poll that was mentioned shows something like, I think itÂ’s 14 percent of the people, think they are better off than they were before the president took office. That is a startling number. I think that Governor Romney is surviving this Bain attack. He may not in the long run, but I think the facts of it and the way they are burning it out, it was an issue earlier, I think that a lot of the attacks theyÂ’re going to make on Governor Romney may burn themselves out before the general election and I think the Obama people may be overestimating the extent to which people are paying attention now. So for the press and some people, I think they are burning him out too quickly, and I think again when the time comes when people start to pay attention if Governor Romney rises to the occasion, I think he has a chance to win much better than I thought before.
RUSH: Everybody’s starting to think this. This is not news. This has been the reality for as long as I’ve been telling you it’s the reality, that Romney could win. Daffy Duck could win, is my point. Daffy Duck coulda gotten the nomination and still beat Obama. And I’m not overly confident. This is not my hopes and dreams finding a voice. I really believe this. It’s common sense to me. But Halperin here, “Surviving this Bain attack. He may not in the long run.” How would that work out? If he survives the initial assault on the attack on Bain — and he wasn’t even there at the time Bain is being criticized — how does the long run catch up with him on this? I don’t understand that. And then Halperin says: We in the press are getting bored with the story. That’s what he means here, when he says people paying attention, not paying attention. We’re getting bored with this, burning it out too quickly. And when the time comes people start to pay attention, if Romney rises to the occasion, it could be all over. And then Charlie Rose says, “Well, he essentially survived the bitter primary process,” Romney did.
HALPERIN: If they don’t disqualify him the way President Bush disqualified John Kerry, I think he’ll be able to win. If Governor Romney looks strong month to month, a lot of conservative millionaires and billionaires are gonna give to these super PACs in a way that may give Governor Romney a huge advantage.
RUSH: That’s right.
HALPERIN: A huge advantage in money in the 9 to 12 states that will decide this.
RUSH: Exactly right.
HALPERIN: And again, that can help him survive. As long as the Democrats don’t knock him out, I think he’ll win.
RUSH: There you have it. Millionaires and billionaires, people who have skin in the game, they’re listening to the president of the United States say something they never heard a president say before. I can’t recall in my lifetime certainly, and that’s what matters here, your lifetime, too, maybe go back to Woodrow Wilson, but in our lifetimes, we’ve not had to listen to a president run against capitalism for reelection or election, and that’s what Obama’s doing. And what Halperin is saying, these guys with skin in the game to whom profit’s everything, they’re not gonna just sit idly by. The rich never do. When their taxes go up, they find a way around it. The rich do not just sit around and let this stuff happen to ’em.
So they’re gonna give to these Romney super PACs. If Obama can’t take Romney out the way Bush did Kerry, that’s a swiftboat reference, by the way. And that’s not why Kerry lost. Kerry lost ’cause he deserved to lose. At any rate, Halperin is unwittingly admitting, the only chance Obama has is to find some piece of dirt on Romney and make it stick. They can’t win this election on issues. They can’t win the election on promises. They can’t win on any of their own ideas. And Obama’s number one idea now is to run against capitalism. Now, the country may be in trouble, and we may be far gone, but we’re not that far gone where a campaign of anti-capitalism wins the White House. Isn’t gonna happen.