Posted on 02/19/2016 2:19:39 PM PST by Kaslin
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Now, remember when that happened in the Saturday night debate, a lot of people were shocked watching this. I immediately evolved a theory to explain it. Here you have the Republican front-runner -- and let's review. The Republican front-runner defended Planned Parenthood. "A great organization that does great things for women's health." It's almost a cliche!
It's what left-wing, Planned Parenthood defenders say.
They're an abortion mill!
They are an abortion factory!
The lion's share of their so-called "funding," their income, comes from performing abortion. They don't do mammograms, for example. The idea that Planned Parenthood is involved in women's health is largely a PR smokescreen to cover up the fact that they're an abortion factory. Well, Mr. Trump came out and said, "Planned Parenthood, they do great things," and that he didn't want to defund them because they do "great things for women's health." That's the Republican front-runner. I sat up when I heard this.
I said, "Whoa! Not even Romney said that. McCain hasn't even said that. What's this?" Then, as the debate went on, Mr. Trump accused Bush of lying about Iraq. They knew there weren't any WMD in there, and they still went to war anyway. "They knew," Trump said. "They knew." Trump said that he opposed the war in Iraq and that Bush was lying about that and lying about 9/11, that Bush didn't keep us safe, that the Twin Towers fell when Bush was in the White House. And he did that while assaulting Jeb, going after Jeb.
But, nevertheless, I said, "What is this? This is the first time I've heard any of this," and then it hit me. Well, it's an open primary, and in South Carolina, Democrats and independents can cross over and vote. I theorized what Trump was trying to get here was get some of those votes, because we had reports that Cruz was gaining ground. Internal polling data showed Cruz was two points behind. If that internal polling existed in the Bush campaign, Trump campaign knew it, too. So it was one of two things... Either Donald wanted to go get these additional voters one of two reasons.
Either to stave off what was happening with Cruz, or to just amass more and more votes to just hammer that final nail in the coffin and just be done with this and just win with a slam dunk. And then commentators on TV took me to task. They said, "No, Rush! Trump's not that diabolical, he speaks from the heart." I said, "There's nothing 'diabolical' about it. It's political strategy. All I'm saying is Trump is not surrounded by idiots. He's got some political pros in his organization and it could be well they strategized to do this."
Because it's not often that you hear the Republican front-runner anywhere defend Planned Parenthood and destroy a revered former Republican president. Bush is revered in South Carolina with 83% approval. You just don't hear that. So there had to be a reason. And then Trump yesterday -- or maybe two nights ago -- now when he's on MSNBC during that town hall, admitted he's going to get crossover votes. He was going to get Democrats and independents. I said, "A ha! My theory was right on the money! That's exactly what they were doing. That's why Trump said that."
Then there were a couple of additional things, such as Trump saying that he's going to rewrite the electoral map because of so many people -- so many crossovers in other states -- are gonna end up supporting him that Wisconsin is going to be in play, Pennsylvania is going to be in play, Michigan is going to be in play. And then last night, Donald Trump... Well, let me just read to you from the Wall Street Journal: "Donald Trump on Thursday appeared to try to walk back his claims that the administration of former President George W. Bush lied about the presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq to justify the war.
"During a town hall-style event hosted by CNN, when the Republican front-runner was asked about the comments he made during last weekend's GOP debate, Mr. Trump said: 'I'm not talking about lying, I'm not talking about not lying. Nobody really knows why we went into Iraq.' He added. 'Bottom line: there were no weapons of mass destruction. ... Whether he lied or not, he went into Iraq,' Mr. Trump said. 'It was a horrible decision.'" And so the Wall Street Journal and others in the Drive-By Media are now trying to say that Trump is walking it back.
Now, if Trump is walking it back, there goes my theory. Why walk it back if you're trying to attract Democrat crossover votes tomorrow in the South Carolina primary? Maybe you think you've already done it and you've succeeded. You got your message out. You can make a show and play at walking it back here to maintain your Republican vote. I still could be right about this, is the bottom line. Now, they think they have caught Trump in another... I don't know what you'd call it. Flip-flop?
Because apparently Mr. Trump is saying (and you probably heard it) that he opposed the war in Iraq always forever, and people in the media said, "That's great, but we can't find any quotes. We can't find any evidence of you saying that." Trump said, "That's okay, you shouldn't. I wasn't in politics back then. I was in business. I'm a businessman back then. I wasn't being quoted for things I said as a businessman. Of course you wouldn't. But I just want to tell you: I opposed the Iraq war." But somebody found a tape of Trump on Howard Stern back in 2002.
Stern said to Trump, "Are you in favor of invading Iraq?" and Trump said, "Yeah, I guess so. I wish the first time it was done correctly." Which is an excellent point, by the way. If... do you heard what happened in Gulf War One? We won that war in 2-1/2 days. That was the Arnold Schwarzenegger -- I'm sorry, the Norman Schwarzkopf victory. You remember what happened with that? We had the Iraqi Army on the run. They were in full retreat. The Republican Guard and the "elite" troops, they were on their way back to Baghdad.
Schwarzkopf wanted to wipe them out. He just wanted to end it. Go all the way back to Baghdad, get Saddam, and be done with Iraq. Colin Powell said, "No. No, no, Mr. President, Mr. Bush. Don't do it! You will look like you are using excessive force, unnecessary force. The war is over.
The war is won and besides," said General Powell, "Look, the UN mandate authorizing the use of force does not include getting Saddam. It just says get Iraq out of Kuwait and recapture the oil wells for Kuwait that Saddam took," and eventually set on fire.
That happened to be true.
The United Nations resolution that George H.W. Bush put together did not include regime change in Iraq, did not include taking Saddam out. But Schwarzkopf said, a la Patton, "What the hell are we stopping for? Let's just keep going! Rroot the guy out and let's be done with this forever." Colin Powell said, 'Nope, nope. The optics won't look good." And they weren't. The optics were the Iraqi Army were on the run, surrendering every day on TV, weaving white flags. They were shoeless, they were shirtless and they were on the road back to Baghdad and Colin Powell said, "You can't continue this!
"You have to just end this and let them get back home," and that's what we did. And Saddam survived to once again start threatening and bellowing about weapons of mass destruction and gave us reason to go back in. Ancient history. But nevertheless, Trump is right when he says, "I wish the first time it was done correctly." What he means by that is that we'd just kept going and taken Saddam out. But the point is that in 2002 he did say he was for invading Iraq. So there's... I don't know if it's a flip-flop, but people found evidence contrary to what he's been saying.
END TRANSCRIPT
In a state made for cruz, 70% evangelical, Cruz is providing a very weak showing. If he can’t win here....
that doesn’t mean it isn’t a result that will be disastrous. Stay on topic won’t you?
Cruz 3rd place at the moment
which still doesn’t make you any more correct......or Donald any less of an unreliable liberal.
Go donate to Planned Parenthood and really own your man.
You’re just trying to get your thoughts together, CEW. Help unite this party and come join the winning team.
Hillary's campaign is going to be based solely on "Bush Lied" and the DNC is going to capitalize on Trump's alleged support of the Iraq war.
This was evident on Friday mornings GMA segment when Georgie Stephanopolous aired an interview he had with Trump and challenged Trump on his comments relevant to the Iraq war. When Trump backed off and said he did not support the war and he was on record in stating that, Georgie told him to prove it.....
That's not the type of comment one would expect from an interviewer. But everyone knows that the midget is not a GMA friendly face but rather a hard core DNC operative working for ABC.
As a reminder to all, it was the midget Georgie who set the 2012 narrative that the Republican party was against women's reproductive rights when he blindsided Romney with the question that implied that the Republicans were against women's rights to contraception...........
If I had any advice to give to our party it would be to refuse any interviews with Stephanopolous and boycott ABC completely.........
Rush is onto something here.
Trump was courting the dem vote with the odd statements he’s made lately.
It’s kinda sad that he wasn’t afraid to make them.
He wasn’t afraid of alienating his base.
His base is mostly filled with cultists now and I think he knows it.
An old line but true that he could blow up the WTC and kick a puppy on the way and they would still love him.
So, he’s got that going for him which frees him to reach out to the dems in this open primary.
They’re (dems) not afraid to cross over because their own primary is a sham.
Open primaries should go and the whole primary system should be re-evaluated.
But I’m very encouraged. Trump won but he didn’t walk away with it. Cruz just needs to pick up a few votes here and there from the also-rans and he will beat Trump easily.
What does having ethanol in gasoline have to do with whether the government should subsidize it or not?
Try to think. I know it’s hard for Trump supporters.
That’s exactly the point Ted Cruz made on CNN.
The U.S. should explore all energy alternatives, including ethanol.
But none should be subsidized by the government.
All these people here posting about how they like or don’t like ethanol seem to have forgotten the main point.
We were talking about engine performance
The whole point of the Trump flake out over Iraq was to hurt Jeb Bush by attacking George W. Bush.
It only hurt our party.
So many posts wasted on this site re-fighting that war.
And to no good point.
There will always be people who disagree with its being fought or how it was fought.
The fact is most people agreed at the time.
But what’s the point in even discussing it?
Trumpsters don’t want us to go back even to 2011 to discuss Trump’s policies then.
“Sorry, I was engaged in two different thoughtful, mature discussions with two other Trump supporters in other threads.”
Oh, my gosh. I’m so excited. Stop the presses.
I have never seen that phenomenon. Thoughtful mature discussions from Trump supporters.
Hey, I’ve been here most of this primary cycle and this is big news to me.
I don’t agree. Trump started out in landslide mode.
He’s not there anymore.
He’s still leading but he’s slipping. Ted Cruz has an excellent chance to catch him when the last 3 also-rans drop out.
He won today but he hardly dominated.
If he does win I will vote for him but we still have a chance for a better man.
Good post about free enterprise. It’s been the most successful road to prosperity for all people for many years.
I would reply to you but,unfortunately, you are on my ‘do not reply’ list.
that’s my point exactly.
What does that have to do with subsidizing ethanol.
Never mind. I know thinking is hard.
We were talking about engine performance and plastic. Even mentioned boats and marinas
Put simply, if something makes economic sense you don’t have to force it on people by mandate. They’ll do all by themselves. Unfortunately Trump tends to like forcing people to do things. He’s for expanding the ethanol mandate. He likes the health care mandate. He also was for higher taxes on the wealthy to force them to “invest” in what he thinks is best.
I'd call that pretty dominating. Winning by ten per cent is big. He also won all but three counties, and won with all demographics, including evangelicals and self identified conservatives.
Domination. Like it or not, it's his to win or lose.
Unfortunately, I think the only candidate that could beat him now is not Cruz, but Rubio. His finish tonight was not good for Cruz. Rubio's going to get oodles of cash from the GOPe, he's the only one of them left standing, the only one with standing on the cheap labor express.
You're also understating what a business executive has to do, and what he's accomplished. In that regard, I thought you'd know better. Your own personal business experience should have guided you more.
I get it, you don't like him. There are parts of him I don't like either, but it's not preventing me from seeing his strengths. It's still his to win or lose, and quite honestly, Rubio may be the only contender that could knock him off, not Cruz. Rubio is the last man standing from the cheap labor express, and is going to get muchos dinero from the donors now.
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