RUSH: Jim in Houston, Texas. I’m glad you called, sir. Welcome to the program.
CALLER: Thanks for taking my call, Rush. I appreciate it, and I appreciate all that you do.
RUSH: Thank you very much, sir.
CALLER: I’m sitting here with my three grandkids, turning them into Rush Babies.
RUSH: That a way.
CALLER: My question is, if this election in Wisconsin sent a note to the Democrats, what do you think it sends to the Republican National Committee and to Romney? Because you’ve already touched on the fact that the compromise is an out thing, and it always has been, but do you think Romney will get the message that he needs to be —
RUSH: I hope so.
CALLER: — less moderate and more conservative?
RUSH: This is the great unknown. I really would love to tell you that, yeah, they’re gonna get the message. I don’t know how they couldn’t get the message, but this is the big question: Will the Republican establishment figure out here that victory was achieved not by compromise and not by crossing the aisle, but by hanging tough to what you said you were gonna do, staying loyal to your conservative principles. If they’re unwilling to recognize that conservatism and no compromise with liberals was central to this victory, then, no, they won’t learn the lesson from it.
CALLER: Well, I’m one of many people in this country who is not particularly happy that Romney is our candidate, but I will vote for him because he’s obviously considerably better than —
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: — the current president. But if he doesn’t get the message, there’s gonna be people, if you read the blogs, that say that they’re not gonna vote for him. I really can’t believe that because Obama is so bad, but it is a little bit of a concern to me that Romney is not willing to step up to the plate on some issues and be thoroughly conservative.
RUSH: I understand, but are you happy with the way Romney is hitting back? He’s got a rapid response team. They want him to throw Trump overboard. He’s not doing that. He is not giving them what they want, and he’s firing back twice as hard at ’em, and they were not expecting this.
CALLER: I’m very glad of that, and I like what I see so far because McCain would not do that.
RUSH: Huh-uh.
CALLER: I also have a concern about who he’s gonna pick as his running mate because a couple of the names that have been mentioned as potential running mates, like Portman or Mitch Daniels, those names don’t appeal to me. He needs to pick a very strong conservative running mate and I’m fearful that he won’t do that.
RUSH: Well, there are a couple names out there already upsetting. Mike Leavitt, head of transition. The guy loves these health exchanges, has made a lot of money on ’em. That’s alarming to people. Oh, I forgot, I mentioned it yesterday. Not as bad, but there are a lot of people concerned over some of his close top advisers. Yeah, we’ll just have to wait and see on your primary question. Time will tell. This is what’s been frustrating, though, and the question’s legitimate. You would think the Republican establishment would have learned from Reagan and two landslide victories in the eighties. But as recently as six months ago, a year ago, the Republican establishment wanted no part of that. Reagan, conservative nominee, equals a Barry Goldwater landslide defeat. So we’ll see.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Glenn Hubbard was the name I was looking for. The other named Romney adviser who happens to believe that the rich may not be paying their fair share in taxes. We’re talking about sources of new revenue. So it’s Hubbard and Mike Leavitt that have some people nervous on the Romney side, as our caller indicated.