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RUSH: I have this story, ladies and gentlemen, from The Daily Caller on July 2nd. “Media Horrified After Trump Tweets Video Body Slamming CNN — Journalists reacted in horror Sunday…” In horror, folks! Imagine their faces. They “reacted in horror.” They were in terror. Oh, my God! There’s a video, and it’s got Trump body slamming a logo! The fear, the horror. “While many of the president’s supporters online reacted to the video with humor, the consensus among [reporters] seemed to be that Trump was inciting violence against the media.”

These same reporters also reached the consensus that Donald Trump being murdered every night on a stage in Central Park was not an incitement of violence. That was art. Donald Trump as Julius Caesar, Shakespeare in the Park getting murdered every night? “That’s just art. Trump needs to develop a thick skin!” Trump didn’t complain about it. Trump supporters did. CNN and their statement said: “It is a sad day,” a very, very, very sad day, “when the president of the United States encourages violence against reporters.”

Wait a minute. Didn’t CNN’s parent company, Time Warner, proudly announce they’re gonna continue to sponsor the Trump assassination play? See how this one-way street works in the media? They can report things that cause deranged, insane lunatic leftists to pick up guns and start shooting at Republicans — and barely even condemn it, by the way. “ABC News’ chief political analyst Matthew Dowd” former Bush administration official, George W. Bush, said that “Trump is ‘advocating violence against media…'” No, he’s not. He’s laughing at you people! He’s not advocating violence.

How many of you people on the left think wrestling is real, for crying out loud? How many of you really think a logo got body slammed at WrestleMania? How many of you believe that garbage is real? Well, not garbage. It’s actually stellar entertainment. But why in the world…? You people tell me it’s fake every day, and yet here’s a video with an icon, a logo being body slammed, and it’s “advocating violence against the media.” Dowd “demanded Republican leaders ‘put country over party’ in response to the fake video of fake wrestling.” People are awfully upset about “fake,” and yet the “real” that they are inspiring doesn’t seem to bother them.

Here’s a montage of CNN reporters in horror going crazy over the Trump tweet…

DON LEMON: What the president did today was just flat out gross and disgusting.

ANA NAVARRO: It is an incitement to violence. He is going to get somebody killed in the media.

CARL BERNSTEIN: (background noise) It’s not just anti-CNN. It’s anti-freedom of the press. It’s anti-freedom of speech. … Visually it’s very disturbing. There’s nothing lighthearted about it whatsoever.
RUSH: Gee whiz!

BRIAN STELTER: It’s scary, and it’s scary for CNN colleagues who have already faced threats.

ALISYN CAMEROTA: …violence against journalists…

JOHN KIRBY: He’s sending a message that this kind of violence is okay.

SALLY KOHN: …this is how the president of United States behaves and we shouldn’t defend this! At all! It’s not funny! It’s scary!

RUSH: It’s unbelievable. I mean, you hear the hysteria. Here are the names Don Lemon was first up, then Ana Navarro — who is supposedly a Republican strategist. (interruption) Well, I know she’s a Never Trumper. I know that. She shows up at the cigar dinners I attend every April now and then. I know. Carl Bernstein: “It’s not just anti-CNN. It’s anti-freedom of the press. It’s anti…” Anti-freedom of the press? How about anti-freedom of speech that CNN is, tracking down private citizens, bullying them, intimidating them into shutting up and apologizing or else they will dox them. By the way, I’ve run into a lot of people who don’t know what that term means, “dox.” I’ll explain it in a minute.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Yeah, yeah. They’ve got no sense of humor. But it’s beyond that, the modern-day American left. It’s beyond the fact they don’t have any sense of humor. It is this arrogant condescension authoritarianism that they are running around with. Just to illustrate how things have changed — and, by the way, folks, for those of you who weren’t around at the beginning: When this program began and to this day, what it was known for was making fun of liberals. Telling jokes about liberals. Making fun of everything they believe. Making fun of climate change. Making fun of the spotted owl. Making fun of environmentalist wackos.

Making fun of practically everything they believed, it was not done. There was no joking about liberalism in American comedy. TV shows didn’t do it. Late-night comics didn’t. And I was hated, I was despised, and you did not do this. They are the serious people. They’re the future. They are everything. You do not laugh at them. You’re not permitted to laugh at them. They can laugh you at all day long. They can destroy you all day long. You cannot laugh at them. They have no sense of humor. To show you how things have changed, I mean, it wasn’t that long ago, take your pick, slapstick comedy, nobody ever associated with violence.

Take the Road Runner and Coyote. You know, it’s one of my all-time favorite cartoons. Did PETA ever complain that the Coyote routinely fell off cliffs and got beat up and bruised? People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals never complained about what happened to Road Runner and Coyote, and nobody ever worried the violence the Road Runner perpetrated on the Coyote. Coyote was running into mountainsides. The Coyote was falling off of 300-foot-tall cliffs. The Coyote was launching himself on a rocket and landing in dirt, living through all of it.

It was slapstick funny.

Everybody laughed at it, and that’s what this was! Did the CNN logo bleed? Did it get a concussion? Did the CNN logo complain and whine and shriek and scream in pain and terror? No. And yet “violence” was perpetrated against the CNN logo! Violence was perpetrated against the logo on a fake (laughing) sporting event! They cannot laugh at themselves. They’ll never be able to. They take themselves way too seriously, folks. I cannot describe to you how much and how serious it is. It’s an affliction. It is a dangerous ego affliction to take oneself as seriously as most of your modern-day members of the media do — and in some cases, both sides of the aisle. But particularly on the left.

Here’s Alisyn Camerota. This is from this morning. CNN’s New Day is the name of the program, talking about the Reddit user who created… Oh, the term “dox.” CNN threatened to dox the guy. What that means… D-O-X is actually a new hip word for what should be spelled D-O-C-S. To “dox” somebody is to reveal everything private about them — their name, address, Social Security number, phone number, all of that kind of stuff. That’s what you are doing if you dox somebody. You publicize their “docs” or documents, and the hipsters just spell it with an X. That’s what CNN threatened to do to this poor guy, and Alisyn Camerota is on CNN today bragging about blackmailing this Reddit user who posted the video that Trump tweeted.

It’s Alisyn Camerota.

CAMEROTA: It was remarkable that CNN found the Reddit user who created the gif of Donald Trump and the wrestling video and where he punches CNN. So the investigative team went back and found the guy who first created this — he took credit for it — and then here comes the remarkable part! He apologized. He has also asked that we not reveal his name or whereabouts — and we at CNN are honoring that because he’s apologized and he thinks that he would then be in danger and at risk if other people knew his name.

RUSH: But they’ve told him that if he does it again, they are gonna dox him. Now, who are they? Is CNN law enforcement? Is CNN in charge of this guy’s constitutional rights? Is CNN this poor guy’s gateway to freedom and the First Amendment? Does CNN have the right to tell this guy what he can and cannot do? Does CNN have the right to bully and demand this guy apologize, and then further hold over his head the threat to publicly humiliate him if he does it again?

And the closest example I can give you to this is this poor guy who got plucked out of total obscurity and blamed for the Benghazi attacks which killed four Americans. This is a guy who might not even know what day it is any day of the week. Let’s go back to the Grooveyard of forgotten sound bites, September between 20th and 28th of 2012. We have a montage of Obama and Hillary and Susan Rice talking about the attacks in Benghazi that left four Americans dead, and this is Obama and Susan Rice and Hillary’s attempt to blame somebody for it.

OBAMA: I don’t care how offensive this video was, and it was terribly offensive, and we should shun it.

RUSH: Nobody saw it!

HILLARY: This video is disgusting and reprehensible.

RUSH: Nobody saw it!

OBAMA: …sort of a shadowy character who has an extremely offensive video.

HILLARY: An offensive video.

OBAMA: I know there’s some we ask, “Why don’t we just ban such a video.”

RUSH: Oh, we didn’t finish that. Obama was at the United Nations. (impression) “Some have suggested why don’t we just ban such a video. Well, we can’t because of our law. Because of our laws, we can’t ban it.” He’s telling the assembled Star Wars bar scene crowd at the United Nations that because of our laws we can’t just ban the video. So instead, we hunt the guy down and put this poor schlub — this shadowy character who may not know what day it is in day of the week — in jail, and it was totally unrelated and this is exactly what CNN’s trying to do to this poor guy who was simply exercising his First Amendment creativity and speech.

But I think there’s another aspect to this. In addition, folks, to this is what it looks like — and I really mean this. If you have been doing for somebody to fight back, if you have been dying for Republicans to stand up and not take it, if you’ve been running around demanding somebody do something about the media? Well, this is what it looks like, and you have to know the targets of this stuff are not just gonna sit back, twiddle their thumbs and let Trump takeover. They’re not just gonna let this happen.

This Washington establishment… This is perhaps the wealthiest, the most exclusive club of human beings in the world. The people permitted admission or membership in this group have the opportunity to influence practically anything and everything happening in the wealthiest and most powerful city in the world, Washington, D.C. You think they’re just gonna sit by and let some outsider come in and totally take over and render their lives meaningless? The media in this included.

This is exactly what it looks like. And I’m gonna tell you, I think Trump is draining the swamp. I think when you look at the people leaving various cabinet secretary departments, the Department of Energy, Department of Justice, there are people leaving in droves. Trump is already I think beginning to drain the swamp. It’s a slow trickle, but it’s beginning to happen. And they are… When you get right down to it, they’re not stopping the Trump agenda. They are not getting rid of Trump.

They haven’t forced him out of office. They haven’t forced his eye off of his target. You put yourselves in their shoes. So here comes Trump constantly haranguing CNN. We have seen the evidence of how seriously they take it and how hurt their feelings are in the actions of Jim Acosta, the guy who loses it in the White House pressroom every day. This is the guy Trump has that red laser pointer, like you do with your cat. He’s got Acosta running into walls, climbing the walls trying to get the red dot, which is Trump, but he can never catch Trump. He’s getting frustrated as all hell that Trump won’t just sit there and be caught.

These people are losing their perspective. They’re losing their minds in public. Trump continually doubles down and triples down on this whole concept of fake news, lying news, now fraudulent news. The thing that really gets CNN, in my humble estimation, the thing that really blew them up is that an average American citizen agreed with Trump, laughed at what Trump said, thought it was hilarious and went out and put together a video parody laughing at CNN.

CNN lives in a cocoon, as do all the major media, in which they tell themselves every day that everybody watching agrees with them and that they represent a majority of the people and the thinking in this country. They lie to themselves daily about who their audience is and how large it is and how loyal.

So when some guy, average, ordinary, anonymous American makes a satire or parody video that the president loves and incorporates in his joke and his tweets and his mocking and laughing at CNN, CNN can’t handle the fact that there’s an average, ordinary American who also sees them the same way. This can’t stand. We can’t allow this. We’re a serious news organization. We can’t allow ourselves to be made fun of by schlubs like this.

The fact that somebody like this exists, the fact that somebody out there agrees with Trump, the fact that somebody admires Trump, the fact that somebody wanted to visualize what Trump was saying and did it so effectively, that’s what bothered them. And all this talk about threatening journalists is a sideshow. Although, I do think many of them actually believe that that’s what this is. They don’t have the ability to be honest with the world around them. I don’t think they have the ability to be honest about who they are at the same time.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Yeah. So there was Alisyn Camerota, CNN, bragging, bragging how they tracked down this poor schlub that had done that video, which is Trump’s biggest and most popular tweet ever, by the way. But CNN, they think because they’re outraged by it that everybody else is outraged by it. This is where they’re missing the boat totally.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Would you like to hear CNN’s heroic account of how they tracked down this vicious 16-year-old who put together the parody? (interruption) You don’t care to hear about it? I do sense… I mean, it happened a while ago, but I wasn’t here when it happened. Some people may be getting bored with this, but I’m not, folks, I have to tell you, because everything contained in this… There is so much here, not just about CNN, and not just about the media. The attitudes of people on the left, how they’ve been raised, how they’ve been educated, how they are wound so tightly and have no sense of humor.

But how they then try to weaponize all that against anybody who is enjoying life, anybody who’s laughing, anybody who’s having a good time — especially if it’s thought to be at their expense. The Stalinist, statist, almost totalitarian nature of their presumption that they are entitled to intimidate and to bully and to shut people down. It’s not just these snowflakes on college campus. It’s not just the rioters and protests. It is the mainstream of the American left that believes and acts this way. And I’m telling you, folks: They are not the kind of people on whose backs a great nation is raised. They are not the kind of people on whose backs a cohesive and solid American culture can be built and maintained.

These are the kind of people who tear all of that down, and that’s what’s contained in this. This is simply a microcosm of some of the things we are seriously, seriously facing with people on the left, be they your kids’ teachers, be they so-called journalists, be they elected politicians.

BREAK TRASNCRIPT

RUSH: Try this from Breitbart. The headline: “Legacy Media Freak Out After Trump Tweets They Will Be ‘Forced’ to Cover Booming Economy — When President Donald Trump tweeted on Monday that the legacy media would be ‘forced’ to cover America’s improving economy, reporters in the establishment press freaked out, implying that Trump would strong-arm them into doing so while ushering in an authoritarian regime.

“Trump tweeted: ‘At some point the Fake News will be forced to discuss our great jobs numbers, strong economy, success with ISIS, the border & so much else!’ NBC’s Katy Tur oh-so-seriously and ominously asked on-air what Trump meant by ‘forced.'”

You know what these people really think? Try this, to show you the bridge or the gap here of rationality between us and them. The best example — and you may have a better one — when Trump cracked wise about Russia trying to find Hillary’s missing 33,000 emails. He’s on a campaign stump somewhere, a televised appearance somewhere, and Trump says, “By the way, Russia, if you’re listening, Russia, if you’re listening, maybe you could find Hillary’s 33,000 emails. And if you do would you please turn ’em over to the media. They can’t seem to find ’em.”

A hilarious joke, a hilarious comment on the media attempting to cover-up for Hillary. A hilarious joke on it. The media claims that Trump was asking the Russians to hack Hillary’s server. And this is part of the Robert Mueller special counsel investigation. Trump cracking a joke, just like this tweet body slamming the CNN logo is a joke. To them, Trump is asking people to go beat up reporters. To them, Trump was asking the Russians to hack Hillary’s server.

Now Trump says it ain’t gonna be long before the media’s forced to tell the truth about our great economic success, and an NBC infobabe says, “What does Trump mean by ‘forced?'” And now we get stories about how Trump is an authoritarian-in-waiting. We have nothing in common with these people. They don’t even realize a lighthearted comment. But that’s not even lighthearted.

All Trump was saying is they’re not gonna be able to ignore our success for very long. That’s all he was saying. What did they hear? He’s gonna point a gun at us and he’s gonna make us report the lies about his economy or he’s gonna shoot us. “No Rush, they can’t possibly think that.” They do, folks. They do think a variation of that. They are running around talking about how Trump is on the verge of dictatorship, how Trump is on the verge of authoritarianism, while they actually practice it with some poor 16-year-old who did a funny video that CNN didn’t like.

But my point is, they really, really do believe this stuff, all because they have no interaction with real people. The only people they interact with every day are otherwise like-minded, tightly wound, unfunny, miserable, angry people. That’s their universe, themselves, each and every day. And so they don’t have any idea how real people talk to each other. They don’t know how real people crack wise. They don’t know how real people tease each other. And they clearly have no idea when they are being laughed at.

And yet it is they who support the authoritarians of the world. It is they who love the Castros and the Maos and Soviet Unions of the world. It is they who make pilgrimages to speak and talk with Hugo Chavez in Venezuela as he’s destroying his country. They marvel at the greatest health care system in the world in Cuba. They love authoritarians. They love dictators. They love socialism. They love communism, as long as they are considered to be the “in crowd” with the leadership.

But when it’s Trump they think is acting as an authoritarian, why, look at how rapidly they turn and oppose what they naturally are drawn to. Well, why? They love statism, authoritarianism, why do they oppose Trump? If they’re fearful that that’s what he’s becoming, why? The answers are self-explanatory.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Yeah, yeah, I was gonna tell you how CNN found the Reddit kid behind the wrestling gif, but I’m gonna get to the phones. We’ll deal with that because CNN’s able to get in gear, investigate Reddit, found the guy in a day, right? And they can’t find what happened with the video, Benghazi; they can’t find what’s wrong about the Russian investigation in six months. I mean, it’s all just abundantly clear that we don’t have media now. We just have the agenda-driven aspect of the American left that is run and controlled by what is called the media.

Here’s Paula, San Antonio, great to have you on the EIB Network. Hi.

CALLER: Hi, Rush.

RUSH: Are you there?

CALLER: I’m here.

RUSH: Great. Keep going.

CALLER: I was watching the news this morning in regards to this gif this kid apparently put out, and I said to my husband, “My gosh, our son would so do something like that,” he’s 16, and, by the way, thinks it was hilarious. And all I thought was, my gosh, this 16-year-old was tracked down and gets inundated. They don’t have that freedom of speech anymore?

RUSH: Exactly. CNN now sets themselves up as the arbiter of who does and who doesn’t have the right to crack jokes on Reddit or Twitter or wherever else. They did bully the kid. They made him apologize, and they have threatened him. They’ve told him they will not dox him, meaning they’ll not go public about who he is and all of the crucial elements of his identity. They will continue to respect his privacy, if he doesn’t do it again.

CALLER: So he’s basically being silenced by a bully media outlet?

RUSH: He’s being silenced by a news organization, right. Which proves it’s not a news organization. It’s an enforcer bunch. This is the consiglieri for the Obama legacy and the Democrat Party, is what they are.

CALLER: Yeah, all I thought was as a parent, I mean, my gosh, 16-year-olds do this kind of stuff, and all of a sudden our family could become a target?

RUSH: Yeah. See, this is why this, folks, is a teachable moment. There are people for the first time in their lives seeing this aspect of the media that you and I have known as part of what they are and who they are for decades. They’re screwing this up, while they pat themselves on the back. They are giving themselves accolades.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Well, Fredo Cuomo has had to delete a tweet. Well, apparently what Fredo had done… Fredo Cuomo is the cohost of CNN’s New Day with the equally threatening and braggadocios Alisyn Camerota, and Fredo Cuomo deleted a tweet today in which he proposed revealing the identity of the Reddit user who posted the CNN video of President Donald Trump body slamming the CNN logo. Fredo Cuomo, in other words, proposed revealing the identity of the user. Even though CNN had promised the kid that his identity would not be doxed, Fredo is out there thinking do it anyway. It is a threat.

CNN’s now denying that they did threaten the kid. But what do you call it? First they go out and they force the kid to apologize. If you read the kid’s apology? It’s the foreword to a book. He apologizes for everything except being born. You pulls up just short of saying he wishes his mother had aborted him. He apologizes for everything else he’s done! CNN has scared the life out of this person, whoever it is. Do you know if it’s a male or female kid? Do you have…? (interruption) His user name is… (interruption) Yeah, his user name is Han[redacted]Solo. (laughing) You can’t say it. Can’t say it.

Well, anyway, Fredo deleted his tweet, which was a threat. Here’s the tweet. “Should CNN reveal the name of Reddit user who made Trump wrestling video?” That’s what his tweet said. “Had a lot of bigoted and hateful material on page and website.” Meaning Fredo says that this kid who put together the video “had a lot of bigoted and hateful material on his page and on his website.” So what? Since when is it CNN’s business? So they’re gonna run around now and find whoever has — and, by the way, what does constitute hate, CNN?

I’ll tell you, I addressed this last week. You know what hate is? You know what bullying is to CNN? Disagreeing with them. That’s the modern American liberal definition of bullying, is you disagree with them and argue. You’re bullying them. You refuse to acquiesce. That’s also hate. If you disagree with what Fredo Cuomo thinks or Wolf Blitzed or any of the others over there. If you disagree, you are hateful, and that’s how they silence people. That’s how they intimidate people to shutting up or apologizing.

So Fredo “deleted the tweet, but a Twitter user tweeted a screenshot of it and accused [Fredo] of trying to intimidate a teenager in order to suppress negative coverage of his home network.” The tweet says, “‘Why did [Fredo] delete this tweet? Possibly because they found out it was 15 year old kid they are trying to extort.’ [Fredo] characterized Trump’s attempts to hit back at CNN via social media as an attack on the press and said that Trump was trying to make the media an ‘enemy of the state.'” No, no, no, no, no. CNN, that’s what you do to people.

CNN, Washington Post, New York Times were stayed controlled media when Obama was in the White House — and anybody disagreed was an enemy of the state. I love how the worm has turned on this, so to speak. Now, there is a story here: “How CNN found the Reddit User Behind the Trump Wrestling Gif — The Reddit user who initially claimed credit for President Donald Trump’s tweet … issued an apology Tuesday for the video and other offensive content he posted — one day after CNN identified the man behind the account and attempted to make contact with him.

“On Reddit, ‘Han[Butt]holeSolo’ took credit for inspiring the tweet.” (laughing) That’s the kid’s name: “Han[Butt]holeSolo.” Of course, he didn’t say “butt.” “Soon after, [the kid]’s other posts on Reddit, some of which included racist and anti-Semitic imagery, quickly circulated on social media. Now the user is apologizing, writing in a lengthy post on Reddit that he does not advocate violence against the press and expressing remorse there and in an interview with CNN for other posts he made that were racist and anti-Semitic.”

I haven’t seen these other posts. I don’t know what CNN’s talking about. But I will wager you that they are not nearly as racist or anti-Semitic as CNN’s making them out to be. I’ll just make you a bet. I haven’t seen ’em, but I think I’m on pretty safe ground. (interruption) Well, if they’ve redefined “bullying” the way they have and “hate” the way they have.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: This is Bill in Wilmington, North Carolina. Great to have you, sir. How are you?

CALLER: Oh, doing just great, Rush. How are you?

RUSH: Fine and dandy, sir. Thank you.

CALLER: Wonderful. So, anyway, regarding the CNN debacle. So we all know how Trump apparently slammed CNN’s logo, which was McMahon, so anyways, last night I was browsing internet, and in some threads apparently we’re going — Not “we.” I was looking at a bunch of pictures and stuff that people have been Photoshopping regarding CNN. They’re putting their logos on a lot of like famous things in like movies and stuff.

RUSH: Right.

CALLER: And they’re plastering’s Trump’s face onto them where he’s beating the living crap out of them. It’s absolutely hilarious.

RUSH: I have seen this myself, too. I’ve seen some actually funny ones. The CNN logo is hopping along, and it runs into some sort of a weapon that’s got Trump’s face on it and just blows the CNN logo to smithereens. And these creations are all over social media.

CNN has become a big joke. People are making short little vignette videos or gifs that depict CNN being blown to smithereens, the CNN logo is crying, the CNN logo is falling off the wall and breaking into a bunch of pieces, as in Humpty-Dumpty. I mean, these memes, if you will, are all over the place out there.

Once this starts — you know, some of them are bots, admittedly, some of it’s not real, but some of it is, creative types out there. Once CNN let it be known that they were righteously indignant over this and this is considered a threat to all journalists, well, all kinds of people wanted to get in on it and taunt CNN, and they’re doing so. And it’s much more than CNN can bat down or deal with. And it is hilarious, some of these things.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: It’s amazing how time flies. Do you remember Clock Boy? Remember Clock Boy? This is the kid in Texas that made a science project that was actually a timer or a terrorist bomb is what it looked like. It was just a timer. And he was feted and he was celebrated. He was loved and admired by the Drive-Bys and Obama. A kid that makes a gif mocking CNN and the media gets blackmailed, bullied, and harassed.

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