RUSH: As you know, I’m perusing the e-mail from you during the course of the program, and it’s running the gamut. I’m taking my share of heat today, too. Folks, all I can do is come here and speak. I never have asked myself what I think the audience wants to hear and said it. I’ve never done that. And as a result, some days this is very hard. I’m not whining, I’m not complaining, and don’t misunderstand.
I’m just telling you: I always tell you what I really think about things, and I’m never falsely optimistic. I’m a naturally optimistic person. I think we’re gonna win this thing. I think we’re going to win this big. But I think that this election is all about Obama. I’m holding back, too. I have not told you a lot of what I think about this convention, for a host of reasons. Some of it is not necessary, even though people are clamoring to know what I think about things.
But Governor Christie.
There are people who are not jazzed by this convention. They haven’t been jazzed about it since it started on Monday. And a lot of them can’t put their finger on why. Now, when it comes to Governor Christie and the keynote, for people that are old enough to have made a tradition or habit out of watching these things, the keynote is where you go for the other guy’s jugular. That’s traditionally what the keynote speech at a convention has been in recent years.
Rudy Giuliani did a keynote for McCain, and it was a good one last year. That’s the one where he laughed about Obama being a community organizer. I think a lot of people had expectations that’s what’s Governor Christie was gonna do last night. He didn’t do it. And, as such… This is just a wild guess on my point. But for those of you who are disappointed — and there are many of you who aren’t. There are a lot of you who think this is just fabulous and wonderful.
That’s good, too. I’m not trying to talk anybody out of anything, nor into anything. I think the reluctance on the part of the convention to go after Obama equates to a perception that there’s no leadership — and people want leadership. There was a lot of hope that Christie was gonna do that last night. And he chose to go another way. Now, the criticism of Christie, I think, is also a little baseless in this regard. “He didn’t mention Romney’s name for 17 minutes!”
That’s no big deal. One of the best keynotes (by reputation) in the history of keynotes was Mario “The Pious” in 1984, in San Francisco. Mario “The Pious.” Who was the nominee that year, do you remember, in 1984? Walter F. Mondull. Did you know that Mario “The Pious” did not mention Mondale’s name once in that keynote address in 1984? I was there. I got out of there alive to host this show today. Not once did Mario “The Pious” mention Mondull.
In fact, Mario “The Pious” flew in and arrived a couple-or-three hours early and flew out right afterwards. He didn’t even hang around there because they all knew that it didn’t matter, that Mondull was going down in a landslide. Even before Mr. Mondull promised to raise everybody’s taxes (laughing), they knew what was gonna happen. I was there. I’ll never forget. I ran into some delegate from Missouri, my home state.
He actually said to me, “If you spot me 50 electoral votes, we can win this.” I said, “What do you mean, spot you 50 electoral votes?” (laughing) He was trying to tell me how close he thought it was. “You spot me 50 electoral votes, and we can win this thing.” John Kerry (who served in Vietnam), the haughty John Kerry? Obama did the keynote in ’04. And that’s why Obama’s president today, by the way. Obama spoke about 20 minutes, and it took him ten minutes before he mentioned Kerry’s name.
He didn’t mention Kerry’s name all that much. I don’t think that’s a big deal. Everybody knows Romney’s the nominee. If you’re gonna say, “Everybody knows Obama’s record so we’re not gonna talk about that,” who the hell doesn’t know that Romney’s the nominee? So why is it incumbent on Christie to mention Obama’s name all over the place? But I think it’s just a leadership thing, for those people who feel something is amiss.
See, I think this is academic ’cause I don’t think the election is gonna be about this. I think it’s gonna be a referendum on Obama, and I don’t care what anybody else thinks or says. It is going to be a referendum on Obama. The Democrats are doing everything they can to make it not be the case. That’s why they’re doing all this dirty junk on Romney and stuff. But they know what they’re up against.
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RUSH: This is Richard in Arlington, Texas. It’s great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: Hello! I just wanted to report a random act of journalism.
RUSH: Oh. Cool. I love random acts of journalism. They don’t happen much. That’s why they’re “random.”
CALLER: Right. Schieffer on CBS. They were switching from the speakers to the commentators, and they just caught him flat-footed. He couldn’t say anything but “nice” about Mrs. Romney’s speech. He was gushing about her, and I could see he was choking on the words. I’ve watched him for 49 years.
RUSH: He didn’t really want to say nice things?
CALLER: I don’t think so. But he was doing it. He reminded me… The first time I saw him, you know, was 49 years ago. He was sitting in the garage of the Dallas police station reporting on Ruby shooting Oswald.
RUSH: Yeah. Yeah, Bob Schieffer’s the dean of these guys now, that’s true.
CALLER: Yeah. But he was saying nice things about her, and that’s all I could say.
RUSH: I don’t know how you couldn’t. The New York Times, again, editorial today, (chuckling) “The genius of Mrs. Romney’s diva performance was the way she smiled so warmly as she delicately slipped the knife into President Obama.” What? She didn’t have a knife. There wasn’t twisting any knife. She didn’t delicately slip, or any other way, a knife into Obama. Nobody did. And then, of course, there’s Juan Williams (desperately trying to get back to NPR, no doubt) saying, “She came off as a corporate wife to me.”
“Corporate wife.”
There’s that evil word.
Here’s Mark on the road in Indiana. It’s great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: Hey, Rush. I consider you the Ronald Reagan of great talk radio with all of your disciples behind you. So it’s an honor to talk to you.
RUSH: Thank you, sir. I appreciate that. Thank you very much.
CALLER: I come from a liberal family. I’m a dark sheep or black sheep in the family. I don’t know if I can say that or not.
RUSH: You can say that. Just don’t say “birth certificate.”
CALLER: (chuckles) But I want to let you know I have two brothers. My family lives in New Jersey and two of my brothers are unemployed. They all voted for Obama. We’re deep into the politics, and we were talking to each other during the convention last night. My dad’s a 93-year-old Democrat. He did vote for Reagan. That’s the only time he voted Republican. He really did like Ronald Reagan. He just said he feels — as a 93-year-old, he feels — the party’s lost. He said, “What happened to the Kennedys and, you know, John Kennedy’s philosophy?” And I have two sisters that watched last night. And they were reluctantly really impressed with the women, particularly Mrs. Romney.
RUSH: What about your brothers who are out of work? What did you say about them and their reaction to it?
CALLER: Well, one of them’s a GM worker. So I heard that guy talking about GM. I worked for GM 20 years as an engineer. This guy was an assembly line worker in Linden, New Jersey. He got laid off. He’s been out of work a long time. And my other brother works for a valve company. He’s been out of work.
RUSH: But did they watch the convention? Did they have a reaction to it? Is that what you were gonna tell us?
CALLER: Yeah, they’re reluctantly… I think they’re gonna vote for Romney, because they’re really disappointed with Barack and what the condition is. So…
RUSH: It kind of makes sense. I mean, they’re sitting out there without jobs, and it doesn’t sound like they want to have no work. So that’s cool. All right. Mark, I appreciate the call. I wish I had more time. I don’t mean to be abrupt or rude here. I’ve just basically run out of busy broadcast moments.