RUSH: Okay, let me start on the phones here. I may not be able to squeeze everything in here in the remaining time. We’ll get started. This is Gerald in Worcester, Massachusetts, a liberal watching the Cohen hearings. Great to have you on the program, sir. I’m glad you called. Hi.
CALLER: Uh, yes, uh, Mr. Limbaugh. Uh, I know that you’re a strong supporter of Mr. Trump. But, uh, uh, my reaction to the Cohen hearings, uh, uh, is it reflects very poorly, uh, on Mr. Trump that he allowed this convicted liar to be his personal lawyer for 10 years.
RUSH: You know something, Gerald, I —
CALLER: Just a second!
RUSH: Well, no, I —
CALLER: Just a second!
RUSH: I agree with you! I made this observation yesterday. Mr. Snerdley jumped down my throat.
CALLER: Yeah! Yeah!
RUSH: I said, “The conclusion people gonna have when this is over is, ‘How in the hell did Trump hire this guy?'”
CALLER: Yeah! Yeah! That’s right. And — and — and this is a man you’re supporting. This is the man you’re supporting. I — I — I —
RUSH: Well, you want to turn this on me now?
CALLER: Absolutely. Absolutely! You’re supporting this very, very poor administrator.
RUSH: Oh, no, he’s a great administrator.
CALLER: Oh? Yeah. A personal lawyer who’s… who’s going to jail, uh, for three years? He was his personal lawyer for 10 years. If that’s —
RUSH: Hang on, Gerald. Don’t hang up, whatever you do.
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RUSH: We have Gerald here in Worcester, Massachusetts, who is asking me to explain how in the hell can I continue to support Donald Trump when he had such a thug as his personal fixer for 10 years. Is that basically what your question to me is?
CALLER: Yeah, absolutely. For 10 years.
RUSH: Right. Well, many of those years that you’re talking about, Trump was in one of the most vicious, cutthroat businesses in New York, and that’s real estate. But, you know, he’s not alone here. Take a look at all the sleaze it turns out was in the FBI looking for Trump, the people that have been fired, the people that have been demoted, the people that have been exposed. Look at all of the questionable, dubious characters that have been surrounding the Clintons ever since their Arkansas days. Trump is by no means alone in having questionable people on his staff, nowhere near alone.
CALLER: No, but that doesn’t exonerate Trump. I mean, he’s your hero.
RUSH: I don’t have heroes, except for myself. He’s not my hero. I admire him. Look. You know what Donald Trump is to me? Gerald, I’m just gonna be flat-out — Donald Trump is the only thing standing between your side getting power and destroying the country as I know it. So I don’t care who he hires. I don’t care what he’s got going on as his personal fixer. The guy has to succeed, as far as I’m concerned. I don’t mean this at you personally. I mean liberalism and the extremism that has happened to the American left, I’m scared to death what they’re gonna do to this great country if they get unchecked power. And Trump right now is the only guy standing in their way.
CALLER: Yeah. So he’s amoral, he lies —
RUSH: You know, you don’t have this exclusive claim on morality, for crying out loud. You guys have done more to blow up the American moral code than Trump could ever try to!
CALLER: Yeah. You know —
RUSH: Come on now, Gerald! This is crazy! Comey and McCabe and these guys lying to FISA judges using a phony political opposition document as legitimate intelligence? You want to talk about morality to me?
CALLER: You’re just casting about trying to say, “Well, everybody else does it.” But you aren’t willing to exonerate — to point out Trump’s difficulties. You just aren’t willing to do it because, as I say, he’s your savior.
RUSH: Yeah. Well, you know, is the objective here — you want me to condemn my team, you want me to condemn my side and somehow I have to do that in order to be acceptable to you? I don’t see you guys condemning your side. You guys — race riots start and you’re right in there blowing ’em up and helping to amplify them. You encourage this stuff. You encourage the breakdown of modern American society and civility. And then you come to me and claim that I refuse to be critical of Donald Trump because he’s my savior? No, it’s not because he’s my savior. He’s the last line of defense against a movement I think doing great damage to the country. Everything’s a value judgment.
CALLER: Well, you know, I don’t think we’re going to come to any agreement on this. But I think you will have to admit that he is a very, very poor administrator.
RUSH: No. I think it’s just the exact opposite. But I don’t fall for that technique, either, where somebody says I think you’ll have to agree. No, I don’t have to agree. I don’t think he’s a bad administrator. I think he’s a phenomenal administrator. And I think he’s got a track record of success his whole life to prove it. He may not be a great bureaucrat in the way we define great government bureaucrats. Find that book in the library, by the way, Great Government Bureaucrats. Great Administrators in American History. Find me the book.
CALLER: Yeah. Just don’t doubt me.
RUSH: Gerald, I pointed this out yesterday. I acknowledged that there will be a lot of people that would have this reaction. And you did. Now, I don’t hide from these things, and I’m not in denial about them.
CALLER: So you’re willing to put up anybody, you know, anybody to fend off this terrible —
RUSH: Well, in the first place, I don’t accept your definition of Trump as riffraff or as reprobate as some people accept it. I think you guys have gone so far overboard in your personal hatred for this guy that you are the ones that have to explain yourselves as to how you can possibly think all that you think about this guy. It’s irrational. It’s unreasonable.
CALLER: Well, you yourself have said that Michael Cohen is a reprobate. And this man —
RUSH: He’s a thug.
CALLER: — Trump has had him as his personal lawyer for 10 years. How in the world can you defend a man like this? I mean, Michael Cohen, I happen to agree with a lot of what he says.
RUSH: I can defend a guy like this because Hillary Clinton represents the absolute destruction of the United States of America as founded. Ditto Barack Obama. So on a big scale of things, Gerald, as to who’s worse and who’s the bigger problem and who represents what can best be fixed if need be, it’s Donald Trump by a long shot here who has the least problems presented to me as an American citizen, compared to the people on the left, from Joe Biden to every one of these wackos seeking the Democrat Party nomination.
\These are scary, scary people who don’t know very much at the same time. But that’s my answer to you. And I say that unabashedly and with no shame, with no guilt, with absolutely no fear, no apology, no regrets. I firmly stand with Donald Trump and those he is attempting to defeat, which would include you. But it’s nothing personal. You sound like a nice guy. I think you’d actually like Trump if you met him, Gerald. I don’t know about Cohen, but I think you’d like Trump if you met him.
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RUSH: In addition to every other grievance about the left that I mentioned to our good friend Gerald there from Worcester, Mass, let’s not forgot that the Democrat Party today is giving a standing ovation to new laws allowing the killing of babies born alive. I don’t know how you want to start talking to people about morality and ethics and behavior when you can applaud that or give that a standing ovation, which is clearly the direction today’s left is moving.
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RUSH: This is Tina in San Antonio. Tina, great to have you. Hi.
CALLER: Hi, Rush. I love your show, but I was livid after hearing that liberal leftist call in and give you a hard time for supporting our president just because of the lawyer that he had, which, yes, is a scum bucket. But let me guess who he supported? Oh, Hillary? Hillary that got Americans killed over in Benghazi and flat-out lied about it? Or is it Obama he supported that dropped off tons of money to people chanting “Death to Americans!” And that means yes, to liberals and leftists as well. If you’re an American, they meant you, too, by the way. Oh, and let’s talk about Hillary’s personal assistant, her husband that was sending porn over the computer which had, you know, stuff on it that shouldn’t have been on it. So, you know, scum buckets on both sides.
RUSH: Well, I understand your pique and your anger, but you gotta understand. I love it when those people call. They don’t call here enough, as far as I’m concerned. This guy was especially worthwhile because most of them when they call, Tina, within 30 seconds they start calling me names and they get mad and then they throw things and hang up. And this guy, this guy hung in there. And it’s always an opportunity to make your point when you’re talking to somebody that doesn’t understand what you’re thinking and gives you a chance to tell them.
CALLER: I agree with you —
RUSH: It’s much better than somebody calling, “I think Hillary Clinton sucks and I think Barack Obama –” And what do I say? “You’re right! Great point!”
CALLER: Yes. I agree it’s good to hear their points so you can make your point back to them, but I don’t think there’s any changing their minds. Just like there’s no changing my mind. I would vote for Trump 10 times over.
RUSH: No. That’s true. Not his, but you never know the people listening whose minds might be changed. You never know. That’s the potential there. There’s always — it’s just a nice change of pace. I don’t take it personally. That’s the one thing you can’t. You can’t take any of these people personally. They attack everybody personally. Don’t take it that way. I’ve just learned to laugh at it in circumstances like that. I don’t laugh at them all the time, don’t misunderstand, but that particular circumstance was — I enjoyed it. I’m sorry it got you so exercised, but never fear, never fear, these people are not going to have any impact on the overall program and how it appears. I’m glad you called, Tina. I need to go because there’s a lot of people on hold. John in Topeka, Kansas. Great to have you. How you doing, sir?
CALLER: Mega dittos, Maha Rushie. I’m doing pretty good.
RUSH: Good!
CALLER: I had a question for you.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: When President Trump chose Vietnam as his place to meet with Chairman Kim, was it not only because he wanted to show how Vietnam’s prospering after they were an adversary and how they’re doing so well now economically, but also to put pressure on the Chinese to make a deal with trade because knowing that North Korea’s going to look at Vietnam and see how well they’re doing, but also because China and the South China Sea and what they’ve been doing militarily out there with their military base and expansionism in the South China Sea —
RUSH: You know, that’s a good point actually, that Trump might have wanted Kim Jong-un to get a load. I mean, here’s a former American enemy, devastating war, and look how they have rebounded and look what’s possible for the Norks. Cooperation with America. It could be that. It could also be that maybe Kim thinks the world headquarters of the Orchids of Asia spa is somewhere there. We know it’s not in North Korea. He might have wanted to go.
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RUSH: Here’s Bobby in Wilson, North Carolina. Great to have you. I’m glad you waited, sir. Hi.
CALLER: Thank you, sir. I just wanted to make sure I heard you correctly. You are in agreement with the dirty word “diplomacy” now when it comes to Trump and the dictator of North Korea? It’s okay for Trump to use diplomacy but Barack Obama was destroyed by you and the Republican Party when it came to diplomacy? I’m trying to figure out what is the difference.
RUSH: Oh, the big difference is — no, no, no. It’s a very simple question. I’m very glad to get the question. Obama was giving away the United States! Obama was making deals to benefit our enemies, like Iran. Trump’s not doing that. Are you people really this dense? I don’t mean to be insulting here. But I may be giving you all more credit — you may not be the hard-core anti-American leftists that I think you are. You may just be ignorant. Barack Obama was enabling the Islamic Republic of Iran to secure nuclear weapons and gave them $150 billion in cash flown in on the tarmac!
For crying out loud, that’d be the equivalent of Ronald Reagan giving Soviet Union Star Wars. Donald Trump is not palling around with dictators. He’s trying to tame them and defeat them and limit their damage and potential danger to the United States. Barack Obama was becoming friends with ’em. I do not understand. I think I’ve been giving a lot of people way too much credit.
Well, let’s move on here. Massapequa, New York, Long Island. His name’s not Jackass, why did you put that up there? Whoever you are, greetings and welcome to the EIB Network.
CALLER: Greetings. It’s Jonathan from Massapequa.
RUSH: Jonathan from Mass — Jonathan, I’m glad you called, sir. Thank you.
CALLER: Yeah, I mean, after getting through your very rude guy that answered the phone. But, anyway, so, Rush, I know there’s a lot of mudslinging with Benghazi. I mean, now the Republicans are doing the same thing with Russia collusion. But, I mean, do you honestly think in your heart that the meeting at Trump Tower, it was a change of story three or four times, was about adoption, a new president coming in all the sudden wants to adopt kids from Russia?
RUSH: No. No. I don’t think Trump — no. I think that the Russians secured a meeting with a Republican presidential nominee under the guise of having dirt on Hillary Clinton when what they wanted was action on an adoption policy they disagreed with.
CALLER: So you really think that was about adoption, that he hasn’t even been in office a couple of weeks, I mean not even a week and it’s about adoption —
RUSH: He wasn’t in office. This happened when he was a candidate.
CALLER: Okay. Or a candidate.
RUSH: Well, no. I don’t think the Trump Tower meeting had anything to do with Trump being an agent of Russia. That’s such a stretch. I can’t believe that you really believe that’s what that was. Do you honestly think that Trump is a Russian agent? Do you actually think that?
CALLER: I didn’t say I believe it, but I’m saying that they changed the story three or four times. But it ended up being, they said they were discussing adoptions from Russia.
RUSH: No. It was a Russian act of deceit. The meeting was put together under the guise — and I’ll tell you who put it together. Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS, who has links to the dossier, arranged the meeting! And the meeting ostensibly was, “Hey, hey, Donald Trump Jr., we’ve got dirt on Hillary.” And Donald Trump Jr. said, “Wow, cool. Okay. We’ll take the meeting.” They get there and they want to talk about the Magnitsky Act, which has to do with adoption and the Russian honeypot, Veselnitskaya.
It wasn’t about dirt with Hillary. They didn’t have any. It wasn’t about facilitating Trump being a Russian agent. It was a meeting that was meant to make people like you think that Trump was a Russian agent. But it wasn’t. There isn’t any evidence that Trump was a Russian agent. There isn’t any evidence that the Russians had anything to do with the election results. There’s none! Not even Rosenstein says there is!
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: All right?
CALLER: Okay. All right. Thanks.
RUSH: I know he hasn’t changed his mind…