RUSH: Here’s Sam in Durant, Iowa. Great to have you on the program. I’m glad you patiently waited, too. Hello.
CALLER: How you doing Rush? Good to be talking to you. Been listening to you for a long time. My mom used to have you on the radio a long time when I was a kid. Been listening ever since.
RUSH: Well, thank you. Thank you very much, sir. I appreciate that.
CALLER: I actually have two questions. My first one is, in regards to Trump and Carson because they are the front-runners for the Republican candidates, it seems that — and I wanted to get your take on this — that the media and the liberal candidates and even some other Republican candidates really seem to fear them because they’re not just your typical salesman politician. These guys are doers. They’ve achieved. They’ve been to the top of their field, you know what I mean? The only thing that Hillary’s been on top of is Bill, you know, she hasn’t done anything, you know, she hasn’t accomplished anything like these guys have.
RUSH: You know, that’s exactly — no, no. Hold it a minute. You’re exactly right. Are you trying to tell me that an accomplished real estate developer or an accomplishment pediatric surgeon is less qualified than a woman who hasn’t done anything? You are so on the button with this. This is part and parcel of how the political business has succeeded in characterizing itself as a specialized field with specialized talents, specialized qualifications that nobody else has, and yet there’s no evidence they’re qualified to do anything. I must continue. This is a great point you’re making here.
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RUSH: It is an amazing thing. I think there’s so much going on in this campaign that is turning everything upside down, particularly from the standpoint of the political establishment. They are like any other specialized business, and perhaps maybe even more glaring in one way.
Politics has often been said to be its own business with its own ladder of success, its own set of experiences and talents and qualifications that you must master to climb that ladder and succeed, and that is usually by winning elections. Of course, there are a lot of other positions in politics you don’t have to run for office to be involved. Consultant, staff members, any number of things, but for the people that run for office, it is said that there’s a specific skill set that you can’t learn elsewhere, that outside experience is not helpful, and it’s very exclusionary in this regard.
They’re very elite in this regard and they’ve been able to keep it a closed shop. And they have the appropriate language and philosophy. For example, the old saw that senators make lousy presidents. I mean, there’s no science that says that. That’s just analysis. You know why a senator makes a lousy president? ‘Cause you don’t have to work with people. Senator’s a king. Senator’s a one-man show, tells his staff to do this that and the other thing, and it happens, but as president, you can’t do that.
The counter to it, governors, they’re the people that make great presidents because they work with the legislature and they work with the opponents, they work with friends, and they’re not kings. They have to compromise and learn to work with others. I think some of that may be true to some extent, but I think a lot of it is created evolved within that business to keep it exclusionary, much like the financial industry. Everybody wants money. Everybody wants more money. Everybody wants to make more money, and whatever money they keep, they want it to grow. Nobody wants to lose any money, so everybody has a lot in common when it comes to money.
But the people in the money business, they’ve set themselves up as super exclusive, that do things and talk ways that you can’t possibly understand. From the way they talk about their trading business to stock business to their portfolio management, you can’t possibly comprehend it. You’re not qualified, so you have to turn it over to them to handle for you, and people willingly do this. The language that they create for their own business is also exclusive. There’s no way you can follow it or keep track of it. Economics in general is this way. Any number of other specialties, in terms of vocation, attempt to structure themselves this way.
But politics is different because while it structures its own exclusive close-the-ranks, only certain people are qualified, they still have to make it look like they’re all just like the rest of us. That’s part of the appeal. I mean, the rags-to-riches story, “Yeah, I grew up in a one-room shack, had to walk 10 miles a day in the snow without shoes half of those days. I definitely know hardship.” And this is to relate to the voters out there, when in fact none of it may be true, but it’s all part of the list of exclusive qualifications, skill sets, and experience that you must have if you’re going to be in that business. And helping to guard it and helping to build the walls to keep the rabble out, of course, are the media. The Drive-By Media are complicit with government officials because, after all, government is where real power is.
Now, it used to be that media held power accountable. Back in the old days of their monopoly, that was one of the false pretenses under which they operated. They were there to make sure the powerful were kept in check. One of the reasons, or one of the aspects, one of the realities of the monopoly being blown is that the media no longer masks the side they’ve chosen. The media has now chosen power, they have aligned themselves with it. They never hold it accountable when the power holder is Democrat. But a number of things are coming along to upset all of this, particularly in the world of politics. They’re finding it harder and harder and harder to keep the whole business exclusive or exclusionary.
It wasn’t that long ago that somebody like Dr. Ben Carson or even Donald Trump wouldn’t have gotten to first base with the voters because the voters used to believe that you had to have people experienced in politics, who had experience in bringing home the bacon. A local congressman, a state senator, a United States Senator, these people knew how to get their state’s percentage of the federal budget and bring it home to build the old folks’ home or to build a bridge or to build a juvenile job center, whatever. And so the voters were very compliant in keeping all of this distant and far off. You could talk about it, you could vote, determine who goes, but you were not really qualified to participate.
But now look what’s happened. Now we have in the lead in the Republican Party two people that have had literally no experience in politics other than making donations. And that’s it, and they are leading the pack. So what do the gatekeepers of the elite political establishment do? They circle the wagons, and they immediately start talking about how these people are not qualified and their willing accomplices in the media then begin to do stories, provide news coverage focusing on these rubes. Trump, Carson, totally unqualified. Who do they think they are?
And yet when you get right down and look at it, we’re talking about the world’s most brilliant pediatric neurosurgeon who came from nothing in Detroit, Michigan, raised not by the government, rather, by his mother. And then one of the world’s great real estate developers, are being portrayed as idiots who are not competent and not qualified to comprehend how government works. And so they are immediately made suspects. They are tarred and feathered as pretenders and dangerous, because they don’t know what they’re talking about, and they don’t know what they’re doing.
On the other hand, we are told that somebody like Hillary Clinton, who hasn’t accomplished anything, and I mean really hasn’t accomplished anything, certainly in comparison to Trump and Ben Carson, we’re told that is the ideal in American politics. Hillary Clinton comes from a family dynasty that is unequaled in American politics. Unequal at what? Lying. Distorting. Corrupting. Leaving the White House broke and not worth multiple millions of dollars without having jobs. How does that happen? What are they experts at? Selling influence? Peddling false stories about terror attacks in Benghazi? Are they really experts at escaping responsibility for their deadly screw ups?
Do you realize what an insult it is to have to sit here and be told that someone like Ben Carson, Donald Trump, or anybody else like them that might seek public office, is dumb and unqualified, inexperienced, not worthy, not capable of entering the political arena? At the same time we have to be sit here and be told that Hillary Clinton’s at the pinnacle? Well, isn’t that what’s wrong with it? If Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton are the pinnacle of the American political system, that, to us, is all the evidence we need to know that it’s terribly wrong and there’s something terribly wrong with it. What is it she knows best how to do? Wield the power of the executive branch? Raise taxes? Destroy economies?
The American people have been asked in public opinion polls and they have said over and over again in shockingly large numbers that she’s dishonest and untrustworthy. And yet she is far more qualified than Ben Carson? I can hear some people, “But, Rush, but, Rush, we’re talking about the presidency.” See, this is the trap. It’s easy to maybe think, yeah, Trump may not be cut out to be president. He’s just a one-man show. I understand how people can concoct reasons to be afraid. But when we’re talking about qualifications and competence and getting things done, I don’t think it’s anything but an indictment of politics for us to have to sit here and be told that people that can’t accomplish anything in the real world are the real accomplished people in politics. I think that’s something that’s wrong with it.
The Democrat Party can’t find anybody better than Hillary Clinton? Are you kidding? Every walk of life that’s represented by the Democrat Party, they can’t find anybody any more qualified than Hillary Clinton? I just want to know how is it possible that the most accomplished nonpoliticians are less qualified than a politician who has known for decades gross negligence, deceit, failure, how does that person end up being labeled the expert and the most qualified? Now, how’s it happening? How in the world is all this happening? What has turned everything upside down? Well, it’s actually good, the things that have caused this to be turned upside down, and that is the American people are actually not the idiots that liberals want them to be thought of as.
The American people these last seven years have seen that the current crop of people running this government are in the process of destroying it and doing, perhaps, uncorrectable damage to the country. They have been voting for years, believing promises that have been made by both parties. People get elected, the promises are ignored. They’re never kept. In the case of the Republicans, you know the drill. They campaign to stop Obama and then they go to Washington, end up joining him and helping him accomplish his agenda.
I think the tipping point has been reached.
The American people aren’t gonna be fooled anymore.
They’re fed up with this inside, elite, political, exclusionary bunch of people that are perceived to be doing great damage to the country for everybody else but not for themselves. They somehow remain unaffected by all the damage they’re causing. But everybody else is in real pain, is suffering real fear. And they have legitimate fright over the future of the country. So alternative people are being turned to. And this has got the entire political establishment bent out of whack to the point that the objective now is to destroy these outsiders.
And so the focus is now on Ben Carson. CNN and a number of other places are now focusing their full attention on Ben Carson to destroy him and disqualify him, much as they tried with Trump and failed. They’re going after Carson and the fact he’s deeply religious, a Seventh-Day Adventist. “That means he’s a kook! He’s automatically a kook, untrustworthy, dangerous.” These people are so contradictory. When the pope comes out and says something they like, they become the biggest pro-religion people you’ve ever seen.
On a normal day, they hate the pope. On a normal day in America, they hate the Catholic Church. Let the pope come out and criticize capitalism? All of a sudden he’s the best religious leader they’ve ever had and they glom on and they love him. Then the next day the pope still says abortion’s bad and they say, “Screw you, Pope! We thought you were on our side, but you’re not. Go back to talking about how bad capitalism is.”
Bring Ben Carson along, or some other Republican. No tolerance for religion, religious views, religiously informed views whatsoever. And the center of this is the end of the mainstream media monopoly where all of this used to be able to controlled. It’d be controlled. They used to be able to control every upstart by never covering them. Nobody ever knew they were upstarts. If the upstart did occasionally escape and get noticed, it was easy to destroy them. But it’s not as easy to destroy people today. It’s not as easy not to report news today.
The advent of the New Media and Facebook and Twitter, and what do you have here? Ben Carson doesn’t need the media to reach his audience. He doesn’t need the media to reach people. He’s answering questions every night on Facebook. Trump and Carson’s Facebook numbers are off the charts. They’re reaching people directly. They’re asking questions and the candidates are answering them, and they don’t need the media at all. So the media’s panicking, too. The media’s trying to set out to destroy Carson for one reason: Just to prove they still can do that.
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RUSH: Look at this. The latest Breitbart: “Abdul-Jabbar: Ben Carson Presidency Would Be ‘Unmitigated Disaster’ for Black Americans.” It’d be terrible, an unmitigated disaster. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. So they’re bringing the guns out on Ben Carson now. You know, nobody told you about NBC/Wall Street Journal poll. Ben Carson beats Hillary by nine points. Nobody’s telling you that, but the panic is beginning to set in. It’s shifting from Trump to Carson now, at least on the Drive-By Media Democrat side.
Here’s Bill in Southampton in New York. Great to have you on the program, sir. Appreciate you calling. Hi.
CALLER: Rush, you just set me up so perfectly. You are amazing. My point is that if Jeb is the nominee, I will not vote at all because Trump and Carson have brought me out of the depths of despair about our country. Jeb is not the answer.
RUSH: My guess is that as far as you’re concerned, there are very few people that are currently professional politicians that you would get excited about.
CALLER: Well, I have to say, Rush, that… You know, like Rubio and Cruz, I’m okay with. And Rubio I get more impressed all of the time.
RUSH: Okay, you know, touche. Those are good points, good points. You’re right.
CALLER: Trump and Carson motivate me out of the despair that I’ve been in about our country. Because I love this country so much, Rush, like you do and so many of your listeners, and I’m just like, “Oh, my God, it’s just awful where we are.”
RUSH: You sound a lot like Trump. Has anybody ever told you that?
CALLER: No, sir.
RUSH: Well, you do. At least during the audo processing here you have similar vocal inflections to Trump. I’m not saying that you’re Trump. Don’t misunderstand.
CALLER: I wouldn’t mind being Trump. (laughing)
RUSH: (laughing) Yeah. I hear you.
CALLER: He’s got a lot going for him, you know what I’m saying? Rush, I love this country so much.
RUSH: You know, we all do.
CALLER: Where the heck are we going?
RUSH: I understand. Look, I’m glad I set you up well because you really came through. You’ve been a great call.
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RUSH: Now, sticking with Dr. Carson and his mechanism that he uses to reach people — and that’s Facebook — you know, social media is like any other. It has many aspects, facets. Much of Twitter, for example, is a sewer. But there’s some entertaining, legit stuff that goes on, and the same thing with Facebook. It’s clear that Ben Carson is using Facebook as a tool to actually directly reach people. At the end of every day he sits down at his computer and takes questions. People can submit questions all day long to his Facebook account, and he chooses some to respond to every night, sometimes late at night.
And everybody’s curious, “Okay, why all of a sudden has Carson begun to move past Trump?” Not just in Iowa, but in a couple of national polls Carson’s moving up. I think Carson, to a lot of people, is much more of a surprise than Trump ever was. When Carson announced, I don’t think there was anybody who thought that he had any kind of a serious chance at all. They were not putting him down. Nobody was dismissive. He just hadn’t been around long, he’s on the public consciousness, really, since that prayer breakfast moment where he took it to Obama on Obamacare, and it was a big launch, but still, it was I think considered by a lot of people to be a long shot. That’s why there’s so many people that are a combination of shocked and surprised and curious as to how he’s done it.
Now, here’s his latest Facebook post last night.
“Tonight, going through all of your questions, I wanted to touch on a few issues that seem to be asked by many people. I would like to deal with one question tonight in some detail. The issue is experience. Several people ask what they should tell their friends when people say ‘I like Carson but he has no political experience’. You are absolutely right — I have no political experience. The current Members of Congress have a combined 8,700 years of political experience. Are we sure political experience is what we need.
“Every signer of the Declaration of Independence had no elected office experience. What they had was a deep belief that freedom is a gift from God. They had a determination to rise up against a tyrannical King. They were willing to risk all they had, even their lives, to be free. Today we find ourselves with an entire class of politicians. No one in Philadelphia, during that summer our nation was born, dreamed that service was a career with a pension. America was the land of the Citizen Statesmen. They were merchants, lawyers, farmers — and yes, even doctors. They were willing to stand for freedom.
“Today, the political class stands in the way, not for the people. They demand pensions and perks. This is not what our Founders envisioned for America. I spent my life treating very ill children. Over 15,000 times I gave my all to prolong their lives. I was blessed to do it. But when it came time for me to retire, I simply could not sit back any longer. These children became my family. What our government is doing to them is outrageous. I am prepared to risk all that I have to try and make a difference in their future. I built one of the nationÂ’s best medical centers. I served for two decades on the boards of Costco and Kellogg. I built a national scholarship program.
“My experience is very different than what we have come to expect. I grew up poor. I know what it is like to be homeless and hungry. I know the pain of poverty. I also know that education and a motherÂ’s love can be the path out of dire poverty. I know what it is like to see water fountains you are not allowed to drink out of because of your skin color. I also know that once you peel back the skin, the brain is the same no matter what your skin color or continent you live on. I know that victimhood is a trap. I know that it is our Christian responsibility to offer those less fortunate a hand up. I know my faith is strong and my ego is small.
“I know that my path to the White House is different than most. But I also know I bring all of the pain and joy, the success and failure, the lessons learned through love and sorrow in my lifeÂ’s journey. Bill Clinton was famous for saying ‘I feel your pain’ — well, I have walked in your shoes. I do not have political experience, I have a life journey. A journey that not only made it possible for me to relate to so many different people, but also one where time and time again I was told I would fail, only to succeed.
“My candidacy is different, that I grant you. I have neither Donald TrumpÂ’s money or Jeb BushÂ’s political network. However, I wouldn’t trade a single child I treated for all of TrumpÂ’s money. While I admire the Bush familyÂ’s dedication to service, I too served — nights, weekends, holidays, birthdays and anniversaries with severely injured patients were my public service.
I didnÂ’t go to embassy cocktail parties or beg lobbyists for money. I spent night after night in a quiet, sterile room trying to save the life of a small child. That was my lifeÂ’s service. This is my lifeÂ’s experience.
“What I have is a lifetime of caring, integrity and honesty. I have experienced the American Dream. No where in the world, other than America, could a man whose ancestors were slaves, rise to become a leading brain surgeon and one day seek the Office of President. The very fact that I am running is testament to the greatness of America. If all you want is political experience then I cannot be your candidate.”
So that’s how Dr. Carson’s dealing with it. It’s perfectly sensible. In addition to being inspiring, Hillary Clinton couldn’t write very much of it herself. Hillary Clinton doesn’t have anywhere near this and neither does Bill Clinton. All they’ve got is a lifetime of saying they care and using other people’s money, ostensibly, to grow the government, to provide relief or help or assistance, but what can they actually say they’ve laid their hands on and repaired and fixed? The left has succeeded profoundly convincing people they care, and the rest of us don’t.
So here you have someone like Ben Carson with his life and his resume, and they’re trying to destroy him.