No, Rush said he would NOT support John McCrazy, Flip Romney, or the Huckster.
However, he criticises all the candidates, including Thompson.
In Monday's show, where he had his meltdown, he said THIS about Fred Thompson:
Enough said. Wherever you go here in this roster of candidates, you're going to be able to point out "not conservative, what he did there is not conservative." The one guy that has the least of that is Fred Thompson, that's what I've said, but Fred Thompson was right in there supporting McCain on McCain-Feingold. That's a red flag. I make my living with my mouth and what comes out of it, and that was a direct assault on what comes out of certain people's mouths around election times. Once you chip away successfully the First Amendment, it's easy to do it the next time, second time, third time, fourth time, and 50th time.
Here is what Rush said about Mitt Romney directly following that, in response to a question about him:
RUSH: Well, sure, I'd be happy to. People have been asking me to go down every one of these guy's records and do A-B -- that's not what I do here. I don't have Romney's record in front of me. Let me give you this. You mentioned McCain. I don't see the left-wing media propping up Romney like they are propping up McCain. I don't see them calling Romney a maverick, and the definition of a maverick is one who constantly goes against his party. McCain is a maverick, and he is loved and adored for that and he gets away with the straight talk stuff because, to them, the straight talk is ripping his own party, and ripping his own president, and it got him fawning press coverage. I haven't seen any of that said about any of these people. Well, maybe Huckabee to a certain extent but the press and the Drive-Bys are trying to destroy Romney; they're trying to destroy Fred Thompson; they're trying to destroy Rudy. If you look at who they're propping up, absent a list or a record of these guys, there are certain indications that you can get. The press is ignoring Ron Paul. That should also tell you something; they don't consider him to be a serious contender for the ultimate prize.Then Rush said this about Romney, remember this was Monday, and Fred Thompson was still in the race:
RUSH: She accused me of saying Romney is the only true conservative in the race. I haven't said that because there isn't one. But there are some in the race who are trying to destroy conservative while saying they're conservative, and they're trying to redefine it. I'm telling you, I'm not going to sit by and just shut up while that happens. There are other people who are not conservative down the line, but they're not trying to destroy conservatism and they're certainly not trying to redefine it totally to fit them, but there are those in the race who are. So let me speak generally, here. In order to have a change of heart on issues or a real conversion -- because every one of these guys has had a liberal position or more at some point in their past, and they're all out there saying they've changed their minds. Romney's changed his mind. McCain says (impression), "Well, I get it now, Limbaugh. I get it! I gotta do enforcement! (grumbling) I gotta do the borders, and then we'll make 'em legal. How's that?" And then, of course, Huckabee wanted to bring 'em all in and give them health care and welfare and Medicare, and now he wants to kick 'em all out.Then Rush explains what makes Romney different from McCain and Huckabee:
Look, I say this because the best we can do here, folks, is to try to measure the candidate's record and recent comments, and you have to judge whether what they're saying today is expedient or serious. Let's take abortion, for example, shall we? Romney was pro-abortion. He now says he was wrong. Says he was for it when he ran for governor. But he talks about the moment he changed his mind and why he changed his mind. He doesn't claim to have been "misunderstood." He doesn't claim to say that he was pro-life. He doesn't say, "Well, I never was pro-choice. I have always been pro-life." He doesn't try to obfuscate or cloud his record. He comes out and apologizes. You have to judge whether that's a real conversion. It's up to you as a voter, but it's far easier to make that judgment when he says, "I made a mistake. I was wrong. Here's why and how and when I changed my mind," and when he doesn't say, "Look, you're misunderstanding me." He's not saying that.Then Rush makes again the clear distinction between Thompson, Romney, and Giuliani on one hand, and McCain/Huckabee on the other:
Romney, Rudy, Thompson supporters don't talk this way for the most part. Romney, Rudy, and Thompson people are not telling us to shut up. They're not telling us that we're causing problems. They try to argue that their guy is the best when comparing their records and speeches to a true conservative template.Whether they're convincing or not is another thing, but that's what's going on. Rudy, McCain, and Thompson are trying to say, "We are going to continue the conservative tradition." The other two guys are saying, "We need to rewrite it. It's old hat. We need to let go of it. We got new issues."
When you make false claims that Rush said he wouldn't support Romney, you need to be called out on it. Rush has the right to his own views, and you don't have the right to change them to suit your own nefarious purposes. The transcripts are available, next time try to read them before making up what you WISH Rush had said.
you are wrong. He has said good things about Romney. I heard him!!!!!! He said “mccain and huckabee would destroy the republican party”, it is still up on his website.
Did he include Romney? I didn’t hear everything.
Limbaugh has repeatedly said that Romney was acceptable.
Just not McCain or Huckabee.
Rush simply said that NONE of the candidates were 100% conservatives --- but then again, there are very few perfect conservatives since even rock solid conservatives often disagree on what is or isn't an acceptable conservative position.
Where does he say he won’t vote for Romney? I think his concern is that Romney will lose, possibly to McCain. McCain has a chance to win this, and it sorta looks like Romney is the last stop gap. If McCain wins...it’s a big stinking mess. That’s what Rush is saying. Oh yea, or the Huckster. Same goes for him.
“RUSH LIMBAUGH: I like Duncan. I have great admiration for Duncan Hunter.”
snip from: http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_072707/content/01125121.guest.html
So why didn’t Rush support Duncan Hunter when he had the chance? Yeah, yeah, Rush doesn’t endorse anybody (sigh).
So who’s sorry now?