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RUSH: Folks, look. I have been struggling since last night. I accidentally saw the town hall on the Fox News Channel with Bloomberg. And I’m gonna tell you, I have been struggling for a way to politely describe what I saw last night. And I don’t know that I can do it. I’ve been struggling for polite ways to describe what I think, what I saw last night as a real shortage of IQ and brain power and self-awareness.

I saw a guy who thinks he’s the Beatles who is barely Cyndi Lauper. I saw a guy who thinks the world revolves around him when 95% of the American people have no idea who he is. I saw a guy so disconnected from his own reality that it was jarring to me. And then to confirm that I was right, I’m watching analysis of it this morning on that same network, the Fox News Channel. And they bring out their senior people.

Now, the senior people doing the analysis happen to be card-carrying members of this Washington establishment, and they were saying, “It was Bloomberg’s best appearance yet! Why, he was better in that town hall than he was in any of the debates,” which would not have taken anything other than showing up. But it was not good last night. It was embarrassing in terms of how disconnected Bloomberg is from his own reality. He really does think that he is in Donald Trump’s league.

He thinks he’s as well known. He thinks he’s as respected, as popular, when 95% of the Americans have no idea who the guy is — and, furthermore, don’t care — and the only reason anybody’s interested in him is all the money he’s got and all the money he’s spending. The guy ends up agreeing with Trump on matters of the economy and dealing with foreign countries. I’m saying, “What is your problem?” It became obvious: He’s jealous as he can be of Donald Trump!

He doesn’t disagree with a lot of what Trump’s doing. He’s just jealous Trump’s doing it and he isn’t. I asked Cookie for some sound bites here, but I made a mistake. I didn’t take any notes of this thing last night, so I couldn’t recall any specifics to tell her to go get. I remembered three or four things, and I’ll be able to give you an example of it as the program unfolds. There was a question about (griping), “You fly your private plane! You fly your jets to Bermuda. You fly your jet all over, and yet you’re one of these climate change guys.”

He says, “Well, you know what? The work I do is important. I’m doing a lot of important work trying to save the planet. I’m a controversial person, I’m an important person, and the only way I can get places is to fly my plane. You just gotta get used to that. There’s no hypocrisy about this. I’m controversial. I can’t fly commercial! (sputtering) I — I can’t get on a commercial plane. Nobody would be safe.” I said, “Dude, nobody would know you’re on it if you got on a commercial flight! A, they wouldn’t see you, probably, unless you had a bench you’re sitting on.”

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Cleveland. This is Fred, and it’s great to have you, Fred. Hi.

CALLER: Good day, Rush. I had an observation that I’d like to run by you about Michael Bloomberg. Everything the left claims to hate about Trump, Michael Bloomberg seems to personify. He’s cocky, he’s arrogant, he’s disconnected. (chuckles) He has a problem with women; he buys people off. I think the bottom line is — you hit the nail on the head a few minutes ago — jealousy is what this all comes down to. All of these people with their rabid hatred of Trump, jealousy is the one word that can explain most of it. They can’t —

RUSH: It’s a big part of it because all these people think they’re smarter, think they’re (in Bloomberg’s case, richer) more accomplished, and Trump’s a bumbling buffoon. And they’re jealous that Trump actually tried for it, went for it, and won. So now they gotta go do it too. I think… You say Bloomberg is jealous. I think other Democrats are jealous but for different reasons. They don’t have more money than Trump does, for example. They don’t have…

They’re just jealous that an outsider has come in and run rings around ’em when they were all predicting he wouldn’t get past the first two weeks after his announcement. You know, he came down the escalator and people thought, “This guy, he’s not even serious,” and he goes on to win. So you’re right. Jealousy is a very, very… Jealousy and envy, folks, are two of the most destructive human emotions. In fact, I would say jealousy is one of the two emotions that will make people behave in ways they otherwise wouldn’t.

Love is the other one — or what is called love. I mean, people do some of the stupidest stuff when they think they’re in love but would not do it when they’re sane. It happens to everybody. I think jealousy is the same thing. Maybe lust is the word, maybe not love, because a lot of people think love is a pure thing. So maybe lust. But jealousy is definitely in this category, and envy the same way — and I’ll tell you what.

If, like, you’re dying to succeed because you want to show a bunch of people in your life that thought you were never gonna amount to a hill of beans? Fine. But that better not be your only motivation or you’re never gonna be happy, ’cause they’re never gonna acknowledge it. You’re never gonna know. Showing people up should never be the primary motivation, just like jealousy and envy. (Snort!) You’re never gonna be happy when you’re experiencing either of those.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Let’s go to the Bloomberg sound bites. I was trying to figure out how to do this. I mentioned I accidentally saw Bloomberg last night on a town hall of the Fox News network.

I literally was talking back to the TV, and I was talking… Kathryn and I were watching this, and we accidentally stumbled into it. So I thought, “Oh, you know, I may as well watch this,” and I was… I don’t know. What’s the word? Dumbfounded? I kept struggling for ways in which I could politely describe today my reactions to what I saw last night. I don’t know that I can do it, folks. I saw somebody who has absolutely no accurate self-awareness.

This man thinks… Like I said in the first hour, he thinks that he is — (sigh) I don’t know — Elon Musk or the Beatles, and he’s barely Cyndi Lauper. Nothing against Cyndi Lauper, but her day has come and gone. You get my drift here. But don’t… He believes that he is the focus of everybody’s attention and that everybody’s watching him at every moment of the day, when most people wouldn’t recognize him if he did get on a commercial flight. It’s delusional!

But it’s more than that. You know, I was trying to think of a polite way to describe… You know, I’ve always told you that I’ve never thought Mike Bloomberg was that bright, and that attitude was really cemented some short weeks ago when I heard him talking about Xi Jinping, the dictator of Communist China, and Bloomberg’s talking about, “Well, he’s got his constituents he’s gotta answer to. He’s gotta keep his voters happy! He’s gotta keep the people happy like any other politician.”

I said, “No, he’s not! He’s a dictator! It’s they who have to keep him happy, and if they don’t, they get shot. They get sent to a reeducation camp. What do you mean they have constituents?” And then I thought, this is the guy who literally was telling New Yorkers that they can’t eat more butter than he thinks, or they can’t have a larger soft drink than he thinks, or they can’t have hot dogs anymore.

I’m thinking, “Who is this, and why did people in New York put up with it? It’s a city where anything goes!” It used to be a very livable and fun city, and they’ve turned the town into a prison, a liberal prison of things you cannot do, and this guy was at the top of the list making that list of things you can’t do. I just… But it was when I heard him talking about Xi Jinping and communism.

I know that he’s got a lot of business in China. I know he’s gotta keep Xi Jinping happy, but for crying out loud, at some point you have to admit that the guy is a dictator, a communist dictator and doesn’t have constituencies and doesn’t have people that he has to keep happy. He has eliminated all of his rivals. What that man has done, what Xi Jinping has done in China is astounding.

He’s become Mao Tse-tung and he set out to do it and he has. He has eliminated all rivals. He is the most powerful ChiCom leader since Mao by design. He has eliminated any rivals. That’s why if anything goes wrong over there, he can’t blame it on anybody else. He’s got nothing but a bunch of sycophant underlings. There’s nobody to challenge him. “How’d he do that, Rush?” They kill people! It’s what communists do. They kill their opposition.

Did you see the first known case of coronavirus in North Korea, see the headline? “North Korea’s First Confirmed Coronavirus Patient Shot Dead.” That’s how they deal with it. “Oh, you have coronavirus?” Bang. You’re dead. Burn the body, don’t even bury it.

So, anyway, I’ve been trying — how can I sound charitable. And then I got up today and I fully expected that anybody doing analysis of this town hall last night would more or less have seen what I saw. But, no. I saw senior political analysts thinking that Bloomberg was the best he’s been, better than in any of the debates. And I thought, “What? It’s not possible. You can’t seriously think that.” And then I realized the establishment types hang together.

So here are some sound bites to give you an example. And sadly, I don’t have all of them. I was so absorbed, I should have taken some notes or made audio notes at what time he said something that I really reacted to, and I didn’t do that and I didn’t have time to watch the whole town hall again today. So I just had to go cherry-pick some things that I remembered.

Up first, question. “Several people out there wanted to know, Mayor Bloomberg, how you can fly around on private jets and take your jet to Bermuda to play golf and still be such a strong proponent of climate change. Isn’t that hypocrisy?”

BLOOMBERG: The answer is that I spend an awful lot of time flying around the country, flying around the world working on climate change.

RUSH: Stop the tape. That’s the question. That’s the point. How in the world can you do that? You spend an awful lot of time flying around working on climate change. You’re defeating the whole point. Your carbon footprint is so out of whack, if you believe this stuff, which I don’t happen to believe, but he does. He’s out there talking about how this is so big a problem. And he’s creating it. He’s making it.

But now see, the answer, “I spend an awful lot of time flying Andrew the country, flying around working on it.” It’s the same thing Prince Charles says. Well, I’m so important, my work on this is so important that my carbon footprint doesn’t matter. And you shouldn’t even be worried about it. Here’s the rest of the answer.

BLOOMBERG: And we have closed an awful lot of coal-fired power plants and worked to try to train coal miners to get other jobs, but at least to get the pollutants from coal out of the air. And I probably couldn’t do it without an airplane. And I just — the security you’d have to have if I go on a commercial jet, the airlines just don’t want to take you because there’s just too much — too many risks, I’m just too controversial.

RUSH: I am not kidding. Self-absorption out the wazoo. The commercial airlines, they wouldn’t take you. They don’t want to take you because there’s too much, too many risks, I’m just too controversial. In your dreams you’re too controversial. You may be controversial in Manhattan, but you’re not known in Oshkosh. You’re not known in Oklahoma City. You’re not known in half of these Super Tuesday states even after spending, what, $400 million.

But see, I’m trying to be polite. I don’t know the guy. I’ve never met the guy. I’ve been behind him on the golf course. I didn’t know it, they told me. That little speck up in front of us was him. But I’ve never met him, and I’m not trying to be mean, but, folks, I recognize self-absorption. And it’s one thing to be self-absorbed if you’re really a big kahuna. But to live this delusional life. “I go flying around the world, we’ve closed an awful lot of coal-fired power plants. We work to try to train coal miners to get other jobs.”

They don’t want other jobs. They want the coal industry saved. I would submit that you could educate coal miners via teleconference and not have to take your airplane anywhere. You don’t have to fly your airplane to lecture a bunch of coal miners about the evils and the pollutants that they are putting in while you’re flying around on your gigantic fleet of private airplanes, you dare to lecture coal miners, who are, I put coal miners in this group of people who make the country work. They are taken for granted. It’s just assumed that they’re there.

It’s like when your electricity goes off in the middle of a rainstorm, you just assume somebody’s gonna be climbing the pole to fix it. You assume when your toilet doesn’t flush that somebody is gonna get down in the sewer and fix it, you just assume it’s gonna happen, but you never see it. Those are the people that make the country work.

People are digging coal out of the ground, people are trying to find alternative sources of fuel, these are the people that make the country work. Not the guys flying around on their own jets lecturing everybody about the pollutants they’re causing. And then excusing it by saying, “Well, it’s a security issue. You know, if I go on a commercial jet, the airlines just don’t want to take you. It’s too many risks. I’m just too controversial.”

He would get on board a commercial flight with who knows how many armed guards, or he would try to. This is the kind of thing that when you’re too controversial to fly, you don’t say it. Everybody already knows it. When you offer it up as an excuse, it’s like you want people to think you’re too controversial who already don’t. You want people to think you’re bigger than you are. You want people to think that you cause a stir wherever you go, when you don’t.

I gotta take a break. I just saw the — yep, yep, yep I know, I know, hang on.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: I don’t know, folks. There’s no charisma. There’s no ability to tell a joke. There’s no ability at any self-deprecating humor. You know what he should have said? Ah, never mind. I’m not gonna go there. I’m too controversial. If you’re gonna say that, try to make people laugh when you say it. But, no, oh, no, there’s nothing funny about that. It’s dead serious. He is too controversial. Yeah, for what? What’s he done that’s controversial, outside of New York City, that anybody knows about?

Let’s see what else we have here. We actually had a question from the audience last night on his hypocrisy in wanting to take everybody’s guns away from them while he runs around with an armed security detail. Now, the audience member was kind of a little bit of a Looney Tune himself. And the show broke down. There was a protest as Bloomberg was in the middle of his answer.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Now we get back to the Mike Bloomberg sound bites. We’re not through with these from the town hall last night on the Fox News Channel. They had a lot of questions from the audience last night, which I always think is a risky thing to do. But they did it, and here was a guy in the audience asking Bloomberg about gun control…

MAN: How do you justify pushing for more gun control when you have an armed security detail that is likely equipped with the same firearms and magazines that you seek to ban the common citizen from owning? Does your life matter more than mine or my family’s or these people’s?

BLOOMBERG: (sputters)

CROWD: (cheers and applause)

RUSH: Now, listen to this answer.

BLOOMBERG: Look —

CROWD: (cheers and applause)

RUSH: Listen.

BLOOMBERG: Look, I probably get 40 or 50 threats every week, okay? And some of them are real. That just happens when you’re the mayor of New York City or you’re very wealthy — and — and — and if you’re campaigning for, uh, president of the United States. You get lots of threats. So I… I have a security detail. I pay for it all myself.

RUSH: “Look, guy, it’s none of your business whether I got guns or not. I am a big person! I am an important person. People threaten my life. Nobody cares whether you’re alive or dead, you schlub, but people threaten my life, because I was mayor of New York and because I am rich and because I am running for president. So you can’t even put me in your league, you schlub. How dare you think that you have any need to own a gun! Nobody cares whether you’re alive or dead, but I am Michael Bloomberg, and they want to kill me.”

This is the world this guy’s living in. This is what I say is delusional. This is what he’s telling himself… He’s pretending that he is as big a deal as he wishes he was. Who answers…? You know, everybody running for president can answer the question this way. “Well, I’m an important guy. I’m running for president. I’m very rich. I — I– I get a lot of threats every day. Do you know that? I get a lot of threats every day.” Like nobody else does.

“I’m Michael Bloomberg! I get… I get 40 to 50 threats a day and — and some of them are real! Yeah, I’m Mike Bloomberg. People want to kill me. Nobody wants to kill you because nobody knows who you are! You’re just a schlub and a guest in an audience at a TV show. But I am Mike Bloomberg! I’m running for president! I’m a big person. I’m an important person. I got my own airplanes. I got four of ’em — you don’t have one — and they want to kill me. Nobody cares what happens to you. That’s why I have guns.”

I could go on. Folks, I know these people, and I watch this (sigh), and there’s no humility about it. There’s no joking about. He’s dead serious here. “Well, okay, I — I probably get 40, 50 threats a day.” Trump probably gets 40 to 50 a minute. It’s probably more than that. “It just happens! You know, people threaten you when you’re mayor of New York. It just happens. When you’re a schlub in an audience at a TV show like you are, nobody’s gonna threaten you.”

I mean, that’s what he’s saying to this guy. He’s saying, “I’m more important than you are. I’m bigger than you are. I’m more famous than you are. People care more about me than they care about you. That’s why I need guns and you don’t.” That’s his answer to the question. (interruption) He’s got consultants, but he doesn’t listen to ’em. I’m sure he’s got people telling him what he sounds like, but he doesn’t listen to ’em. I guarantee you he’s got people trying to tell him that this is not the right way to answer this.

Instead, by now he’s probably got people that are saying, “Yeah, you killed it tonight, Mike! You killed it. You keep that attitude,” ’cause if you’re a consultant for Bloomberg, you learn that he already knows what you’re advising him. So whatever he says, you agree with it, and that’s how you keep the paycheck coming. Do you agree with me that this sounds arrogant as…? (interruption) “Unrealistically arrogant.”

Let’s see here. Now, the protests erupted at some point here. The next question that Bloomberg got: “The Trump administration is talking about considering tax cuts, some sort of stimulus. He has also talked about the Federal Reserve possible action…” I guess this is about… I don’t know what this about. He said, “What about you? You’ve called for rolling back the Trump tax cuts even in this crisis.” I guess this is about coronavirus?

What is this about? Hang on, folks. Bah, bah, bah… Yeah, it’s coronavirus. That’s it. Wait ’til you hear this answer. (chuckles) So the subject matter that Bret Baier’s asking is the coronavirus. He says, “The Trump administration is talking about tax cuts, some sort of stimulus. He has also talked about the Federal Reserve possible action. What about you, Mayor Bloomberg? You’ve called for rolling back the Trump tax cuts even in this crisis.”

Bloomberg: Let’s assume you lower interest rates, and I’m going to say, “Hmm, okay, feds lowered interest rates, maybe I’ll take my kids to Disney World.” I don’t think so. A lot of the stuff people — it’s not the economics, it’s the people that are afraid to go out. Go to Chinese restaurants all across the country here in America where there’s no reason to think whatsoever that you’re going to catch a flu, but people aren’t patronizing them. And I thought to myself, tonight I’m going to go to a Chinese restaurant, actually it turns out I can’t, but I will do it tomorrow night just to show the flag and to help them. People have stopped flying. They’ve stopped going out. They don’t go to the stores anymore.

RUSH: They don’t go to Chinese restaurants because of the coronavirus. So people are being inherently racist, they’re not going into Chinese restaurants, not ordering general Chao’s chicken and not ordering pork fried rice or whatever because of the coronavirus. So I’m gonna go plant the flag, I’m gonna go have some Chinese food and I’m gonna go to Disney World. I’m gonna take my kids even though they’re 55 years old. I’m gonna take my kids to Disney World in defiance of all of this bigotry and homophobia that’s out there.

Like, yeah, you better not go to Italian residents because coronavirus is really big in Italy now too. No, no, you don’t dare – (interruption) This is what Bloomberg is worried about. People are stopping patronizing Iranian restaurants, they’re not supporting Iranian nuclear deal, they’re not going to Italian restaurants, not going to Chinese restaurants, and they’re not going to Disney World because so many Chinese people go to ’em and that’s not good so he’s gonna go to all these places and show people how safe it is. Go there and plant the flag.

People have stopped flying. Well, you have, too, you don’t fly commercial because you’re too controversial and they wouldn’t let you on the plane, you said. I swear. And this stuff just goes by, and nobody commented on it. I don’t know how you watch this and listen to this and not have some kind of reaction here that — well, as I say, I was trying to think of polite ways, I really was, to characterize this today, to describe it.

Let’s see. Yeah, we got two more, the protesters came out. So the next question. ” You have said that President Xi is not a dictator, but you have talked about human rights violations that are so egregious, so how can you say that he’s not a dictator?”

MARTHA MACCALLUM: President Xi is not a dictator you said, but you just listed a bunch of human rights violations that are so egregious. So how can you say…

BLOOMBERG: The technical definition…

MARTHA MACCALLUM: … that he’s not a dictator?

BLOOMBERG: …of a dictator was what we were talking about that day. He is a very powerful person there. They do not have a democratic system. They don’t have democratic elections. That’s what they don’t have. And the human rights record is terrible.

RUSH: Now, he’s changed his tune on that because he used to talk about how Xi Jinping had to respond and had to answer to his constituents. He had to keep his constituents happy. He got called out on that, so he said he’s got the Politburo. He’s gotta keep the Politburo happy. No, he doesn’t. He owns the Politburo. The Politburo is just a bunch of yes-men sycophants now. He’s gotten rid of all of his rivals.

Okay. So it was at this point now that there was an organized protest. It was just lurking there in the Fox News town hall audience. Now, I couldn’t hear what they were saying ’cause of my hearing. It was just gigantic blob of noise. But the Fox anchors decided to pull out of it pretty quickly and restore order in the audience. But after Bloomberg’s answer on the human rights record and Chinese and so forth and how they don’t have a democratic system, here came the protests.

BLOOMBERG: That’s what I think.

(woman yelling)

BAIER: All right, let’s…

MACCALLUM: All right.

BAIER: We’re gonna move, all right, all right, hold on, hold on.

BLOOMBERG: Okay.

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: Sir, can you tell me…

BAIER We’re gonna keep this…

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: …are those liberties available, I’m sorry to interrupt you guys. Are those liberties available in New York?

BAIER: Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: (protestors stand and walk around the stage) No, you guys, we don’t protest. We don’t do that.

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: Yes, we do.

BLOOMBERG: Oh, sure they do.

MACCALLUM: All right.

BAIER: Hold on.

FEMALE PROTESTOR: Stop and Frisk is wrong!

BAIER: No, no. All right.

FEMALE PROTESTOR: Stop and Frisk is wrong!

BAIER: All right, we’re gonna get these guys.

MACCALLUM: We’re gonna take a quick break.

BAIER: Tell you what, we’re gonna take a quick break.

RUSH: Stop and Frisk is what that was about. Stop and Frisk. Stop and Frisk in New York.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: One thing I forgot from the Bloomberg town hall last night. And this is one of the most indicative, instructive things he said. One of the hosts said to him, “You know, in the beginning of your answer here, Mayor Bloomberg, it sounded like you agree with President Trump in pressuring China in terms of getting a new trade deal.”

And Doomberg said, “Well, yeah, a lot of my criticisms of Donald Trump are not his policies, it’s the way he’s doing it.” I’m not upset with Trump’s policies. I just don’t like his style. He could be speaking for this arrogant James Comey, for the stupid idiots like James Clapper and John Brennan and the whole of the hoity toity, phony baloney, plastic banana, good-time rock ‘n’ roller elitist establishment.

“We just don’t like his style. We just don’t like the way he talks. We don’t have a problem with what he’s doing. He’s actually doing things we agree with,” but they can’t even come out and say it, but Bloomberg did last night. It’s kind of the death knell if you ask me.

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