SECRETARY OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY RICK PERRY: "TIME TO DISCARD THE BURDENS AND COSTS OF OBAMACARE"
"The debate over health care has consumed Washington for over a decade. America can't afford another decade of spiraling costs, political bickering, or inaction. This may be the only window we have to do this. Millions of Americans are depending on their representatives to repeal this crushing law and can benefit from the common-sense solutions being considered in the Senate. We cannot, and must not, fail them any longer."
Time to discard the burdens and costs of Obamacare
By Rick Perry
Cleveland.com
July 25, 2017
On Jan. 25, 2007, then-Sen. Barack Obama delivered a speech declaring that "the time has come for universal health care in America." Two years later, he was president of the United States -- and he told a joint session of Congress that health care was his top priority. Just over a year after that, Obamacare became the law of the land.
America has been staggering under its burdens and failures ever since.
Insurance companies have pulled up stakes in states across the country, leaving consumers few options throughout the country.
Costs have risen dramatically, despite Democratic promises Obamacare would lower insurance costs. Patients have lost choices, doctors and insurance plans, and in some cases, lost access to cancer specialists and other life-saving caregivers.
…
I served as governor of Texas, the second largest state, for 14 years. I know full well that Texans largely have different ideas about health care than well-intentioned Washington bureaucrats.
…
The proposal from Congress contains many positive reforms to Medicaid -- in fact, they are included in the Senate's Better Care Reconciliation Act. These would give states more control to deliver better care at lower costs for those in need.
…
There is an historic opportunity for Congress to finally empower people and states and move control out of Washington. There will not be another opportunity like this for a very long time.
It has never been enough to repeal Obamacare. Repeal is obvious, because its failure is obvious. Replacing it is much harder work. But it must be done, with a focus on returning health care to states, individuals, and the health care professionals that care for them.
The debate over health care has consumed Washington for over a decade. America can't afford another decade of spiraling costs, political bickering, or inaction.
This may be the only window we have to do this. Millions of Americans are depending on their representatives to repeal this crushing law and can benefit from the common-sense solutions being considered in the Senate.
Self-proclaimed provocateur and political strategist, Roger Stone, vehemently denied allegations of collusion between then Presidential Candidate Donald Trump, his family, or his campaign, and Russia to influence the outcome of the 2016 Presidential Election. Stone panned the allegations before a large audience of the D.C. Young Republicans at the Capitol Hill Club on Tuesday night. The crowd erupted with applause as Stone announced, “This is a fairytale. This is a canard. This is a steaming plate of bull***t.”
Stone said that neither the Democrats nor the House and Senate Intelligence committees had produced a scintilla of evidence of collusion between the Trump camp and the Russians. Stone blamed John Podesta, the chairman of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 Presidential Campaign, for the speculations, saying:
I give John Podesta some great credit because he’s the one who created this false narrative. Why? He had to distract from the fact that he and his brother, Tony, and Bill and Hillary Clinton were making millions of dollars from the oligarchs around Putin. What better way to distract from the fact that there was a Presidential candidate in bed with the Russians. There was a presidential candidate blackmail-able by the Russians. There was a Presidential candidate literally taking millions in speaking fees, contributions, and business deals, and that candidate was Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Stone took specific aim at the recent allegations that Donald Trump Jr. had nefarious dealings with Russian actors to advance his father’s political career. Stone called the allegations “despicable,” saying:
Someone credible comes to you and says they have evidence of your opponent’s wrongdoing and that evidence can be documented , then it would be malpractice not to meet with that person and hear what they have to say. In this particular case there was no information that any use and therefore this particular meeting had no result.
After joking with the audience that the next Trump family member to be targeted with allegations of a Russian conspiracy would be the Trump family dog for contact with a Russian Wolf-hound, Stone championed Donald Trump Jr. calling him a “most effective surrogate on behalf of his father and the Trump Pence ticket.” Stone lauded Donald Trump Jr.’s use of twitter to stand against political elites who from the beginning declared that Donald Trump had no chance of winning the Presidency.
Listen to Military Veteran Talk Radio iHeart.SmythRadio.com Facebook.com/SmythRadio
May 26, 2016
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Well, I guess it's all but official now. Trump has reached the magic number to clinch the nomination of the Republican Party. Of course, the magic number, 1,237, and Trump is now at 1,238. Now, according to the AP, which apparently does not see the irony in this, the AP report says that Trump got past the magic number with the support of, one, a female delegate -- and women supposedly hate Trump. And, number two, the delegate that actually put Trump over the top is an unbound delegate from Colorado, which wasn't supposed to happen because Cruz scooped up all the delegates in Colorado.
That wasn't supposed happen, neither of these, women hate Trump, Colorado went for Cruz, and yet a woman and an unbound Colorado delegate put Trump over the top. AP making it official. Unofficial here, it's not official 'til the first ballot, convention of course, but there you go, 1,238 delegates and it's just gonna keep climbing.
Greetings, my friends, El Rushbo behind the Golden EIB Microphone here at the distinguished, the prestigious Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
So there's all kinds of stuff out there today. So we have Obama in Japan saying that Trump is rattling foreign leaders because they're afraid his policies might not be thought through. Frankly, I am ready for foreign leaders to be a little rattled by what's happening in this country -- as opposed to what they have become accustomed to and what they have come to expect out of this country, which is a blank check.
I think it's about time foreign countries -- by the way, if you hear some squeaking, I got some new shoes, and I'm telling you, these things make noise when I -- you hear that? That's my shoes. Leather being broken in. So there's nothing wrong here. Look, it's loud. If I can hear it, it's loud. You know, I go walking through the halls here and at first, "What in the world?" Thought I'm about to fall through the floor here and then I figured out it was the new shoes. Great, great shoes, by the way, best shoes, Trump shoes, brand-new leather. (laughing) Just kidding. They're Tommy Bahamas.
That's not the only one. Obama in Japan saying that world leaders are rattled. And there's another story, same premise, only about global warming, that Trump doesn't seem to be aligned in a right way on global warming. They're very, very, very concerned out there. I even read this on my tech blogs. They're very, very concerned. They're laughing at Trump. They're mocking Trump 'cause Trump thinks that global warming is a hoax sponsored by the ChiComs to impede our economic growth. It is a hoax. It is a leftist hoax and it may indeed involve the ChiComs, but Trump's instincts on this are correct.
But grab sound bite 23. Paul Ryan. This is from his weekly press conference this morning, and it's only at the top of the sound bite roster here because of the AP story, Trump reaching the magic number to clinch the nomination, 1,238. So this is Ryan, the Speaker of the House, weekly press briefing, and during the Q&A, Luke Russert, the NBC congressional correspondent, said, "Speaker Ryan, I wondered how the phone call went with Mr. Trump last night. We heard from your team that it was good. Is there anything more you can share?"
RYAN: It was a productive phone call. Like I said, we've had these conversations, our staffs have been meeting. We had a very good and very productive phone call. So I'll leave it at that. What I'm most concerned about is making sure that we actually have real party unity, not pretend party unity, real party unity because we need to win this election in the fall.
RUSH: I guess he's still waiting for real party unity before endorsing Trump. Let me just tell you Trumpsters something. Trump is making this tougher on Ryan than it needs to be. When he went after Susana Martinez, Ryan has no choice but to be protective of her. I mean, she's chairman of Republican governors. You can frown in there at me all you want and I don't care whether what Trump said about her was true or not. I was asking myself, why in the world, the timing of this, when Trump himself states that he's attempting to unify the party.
By going after Susana Martinez, Trump gave Ryan a reason to hold off a couple more days or week or whatever. I mean, Ryan can't come out and endorse Trump the day after he dumps on a Republican governor. You just can't do it, no matter who's right or wrong. No matter what Trump said about her, right or wrong, it doesn't matter, just the optics. You understand that, right? I know she dumped on him first.
By the way, there's a story here that hasn't gotten a lot of attention. I think it's big, and I think it's important, and I think it is, for those of you who are deeply invested in Donald Trump, it's crucially important, and it's very, very comforting. It's the story about how he fired Rick Wiley. But a lot of people, "What's the big deal about that, Rush?"
Well, I'll tell you why it's a big deal. It's a big deal for what it stands for and what it represents. You know, Rick Wiley is an establishment guy. Manafort hired him. He was also an establishment guy. He ran Scott Walker's campaign in Wisconsin. So he's got establishment bona fides, and Manafort brought this guy in, and they were going to try to, I don't know, overthrow, they were gonna try to take control of campaign from Trump's team that he's had throughout the primaries, led by Lewandowski and whoever else is in that mix.
Now, you might remember, it was either last week or the week before that I issued a warning of sorts that one of the pitfalls Donald Trump is going to face as the weeks and days go by and as he gets closer to and then surpasses the number of delegates -- this is human nature; it happens in many businesses; it has happened to me. One of the reasons I am fully aware of this is because of personal experience with it -- the effort to change Trump is going to be intense from within his own campaign. It'll be well intentioned, but it'll be wrong.
There are people who tell Trump, "You've gotta change, now. You have won the nomination. It's not the primaries. It's the general. You have to change." And what that means is: "You have to tone it down! You have to dial it back. You have to become more presidential." Whatever the advice is, it will consist of people thinking that Trump now has to grow in stature, in office, and drop whatever it is that worked during the primaries because they're over now, and we're on to the general, and it's not a whole slate of opponents. It's one opponent, and there's all kinds of money involved now.
And the biggest mistake Trump could make would be to take any of that advice. The biggest mistake Trump could make would be to listen to anybody who tells him it's time to change. Now, some of the advice is intended to sabotage, even people supposedly in your own circle. Folks, there's envy and there's jealousy within every organization, and in something like Trump's -- which is red hot. It is the focus of attention in the modern world today, and everybody involved wants the light to shine on them, too. It's human nature.
There are people in that organization, in every organization, particularly those that are humming and are hot and have a lot of attention focused on them. There are people within those organizations who want attention themselves. They want to be credited as the advisor, as the confidant, as the guy who has Trump's ear, as the guy who's making Trump be Trump. They're everywhere. Some of them are well-intentioned; some of them are just attention starved.
Others are saboteurs. And the fact that Trump... This is not about Wiley. I don't even know him. What I'm about to say here is not intended personally about Rick Wiley. I don't know him. I'm speaking to you, really, using my own experiences, which are overwhelming in number. Let me just... Folks, let me put it to you this way to set this up. I have been doing this radio program... If you count the 3-1/2 years that I did in Sacramento before I went national 1988, I've been doing this program over 30 years.
And along the way there were consultants at radio stations where I worked. Some of these consultants had never, ever been behind a microphone. Some of these consultants had never, ever run a radio station. In the 30 years that I've been doing this program, I have had two people not try to change me. Everybody else that I've worked with in management or consultants, tried to get me to change. Some of them even threatened to fire me if I didn't change.
And what I mean by that is, "You can't do a show without guests. If you don't start getting guests in here -- 'cause nobody listens to talk show without guests -- you're not gonna last." Ratings would come in, my ratings would be higher than anybody else's on the station, and people would come to me, "This isn't gonna last. You'd better start getting guests," or, "You'd better stop playing all that music or whatever you're doing! It's not talk radio, what you're doing. You can't do it that way." All the ex... Only two people.
If I had been... What's the word? If I had been forced to take the advice of I-can't-tell-you-how-many consultants -- I'm talking, 10, 12 -- I wouldn't be here today. My program would have been a failure, "Because you just can't do it that way." I said, "When have you ever done it?" "Well, I have a track record! I've consulted stations here and there." "Yeah, how are they doing?" "Well, nobody does it like you." "Precisely! It's what I'm trying to achieve here." It got knock-down, drag-out at times.
Some of these consultants even today are quoted in magazine articles about how, "You know what? This Limbaugh thing is a fad! It isn't gonna last. It isn't gonna last. He's not gonna last! He isn't gonna last." Even 28 years later, they're out there saying, "It isn't gonna last!" They're out there saying, "It's over," doom and gloom. So my point is... These are not my friends. I don't have consultants. I have never had a consultant. Since this show started live, there has never been a consultant. I'm talking about when I worked at radio stations that had hired consultants.
Trump is facing the same thing. Everybody who is a powerful personality, who is generating a lot of heat, who is winning at what he's doing and Trump's doing all of that by a multiple factor of 10, Trump just owns it right now. And there are people that don't like that. There are people that want to be part of it. There are people who want you to think they are responsible for it. There are all kinds of people surrounding Trump right now, and I'm guarantee you that he's being advised by... I don't know who they are, but I will guarantee you he's being advised to change.
He's being advised... He's being told by some people, "You can't do it this way! You can't keep doing it the way you're doing it. You've got to change. You've got to become more president. You've got to do," whatever. He's got people on his staff telling him to ignore that, too. Don't... He's got all kinds there. The point is, he ought not listen to anybody except the people he goes to to ask questions. But if somebody comes in and starts giving him advice, let it go in one ear and out the other.
Depending on who the person is, be respectful. But Trump's instincts are just fine, and he had better continue to trust them. He had better not start doubting them. He'd better not let other people make him doubt them. Not to say he's not gonna make mistakes. Not to say he's not gonna wish he could take something back. But the point is, the only stuff that would be fatal to Donald Trump is if for some reason people in his campaign started listening to the media, started listening to critics.
Or some of the people within the campaign got scared, "Oh, my God, I don't think Trump can keep this up! You can't keep talking this way. He's not gonna win," and tries to change him. He's got to have a steel spine. I think he does. I think he loves himself enough to remain who he is, and that was my advice last week. Whoever he is, is what's gotten him where he is. He's got to stay who he is. He must not let anybody, well-intentioned or otherwise, talk him out of being who he is.
Don't put a teleprompter up there unless it's an official policy speech to some group of people where even the slightest mistake cannot occur. Otherwise, leave the teleprompter. I'll give you a classic example: Last night in Anaheim or yesterday in Anaheim. By the way, kudos. They waited 'til after this program was over to start the rally in Anaheim. Did you notice that? And even it was late at that. Because it was late, the organizers of the event -- the people that Trump had hired to put on the event wherever it was, the convention center -- went to Trump.
And they said, "Look, sir, we're running behind and we're gonna have to scrub the National Anthem. We just don't have to time, we're so far behind schedule." Trump said, "What do you mean? We're not canceling the National Anthem," and he called the singer up on the stage right then and right there and made her sing the National Anthem right after he'd been told they had to cancel it. He took a step or two away, gave her the stage, gave her the microphone, put his hand over his heart, and mouthed the words as she was singing.
It was a great rendition. That act is worth more votes and more loyalty and deepens the bond of connection. You know, stop and I think of it. Something you and I would think is as innocuous as the National Anthem, the Star-Spangled Banner can mean something to Donald Trump. Because there are people in this country who don't like it. Democrats, leftists, anti-Americans, what have you. Something as simple as what is considered to be noncontroversial, tradition -- the singing of the National Anthem -- can become provocative.
Because there's some who don't like it. But whatever. Trump instinctively knew not to have the National Anthem ripped. He didn't want it canceled, and he took care of it. A lot of people would have listened to the organizers. A lot of others would say, "Okay, okay, okay." He's got to continue this. The pressure to change, the pressure from all these so-called know-it-all consultants who've never done what he's doing -- in business or in politics -- who have never done what he's doing, will be trying to tell him.
So the fact that he got rid of this guy... I don't know Rick Wiley. It's not a comment about him. But the fact that Trump got rid of the guy, to me, is a good sign that he's holding on to his identity and is confident in who he is and has realized he doesn't need the kind of advice if it's, "Mr. Trump, you have to change. Mr. Trump, you can't keep doing this." "Oh, yeah? Fine. Well, find another candidate. You're gone."
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: No, no. Folks, my point is simply: I've been there. I have been where Trump is, and I know what kind of things are happening. I know the efforts to change him. I know the fear. As I say, some of it's well-intentioned. Others are saboteurs and so forth. It's why I can relate to so much of what's happening with Trump and his campaign. It's precisely because I've been there. I just... I've not spent any time telling you about this stuff. It's all inside baseball. I mean, I'm not gonna come here every day and explain, "Guess what happened to me when the show...
"I had a meeting and they told me..." I'm not bother you with it. But just trust me. For the first couple years of this program, you would not believe. I mean, and these guys were all out there telling me, "You can't do it the way you do! You're gonna fail. I don't want you on my station. You better change! You want to be big in Latrobe or you want to be big in New York?" I heard that twice at WABC. Those guys that told me that are not working, and yet they're quoted in every story about how I'm about to end.
So I know what's happening with Trump in the campaign. I know the kind of people that are out there trying to sabotage it and also trying to nose in on it and to get some of the attention for themselves. There are all kinds of personalities out there. In every organization that's somewhat large, you're gonna have a mix of those people. Now, the real backstory, what happened with Rick Wiley happens to be in Politico, but I don't think they realize their own lead here.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: ere's what happened with this Rick Wiley story. It's in The Politico. I'm gonna read The Politico verbiage first, and then I'm gonna translate it for you. "On Thursday, word leaked back to Trump. He phoned Giorno, concerned, sources said. 'Tell me what’s wrong?' Trump asked her, according to one person familiar with the call. 'Karen unloaded on Wiley,' the source said. 'Mr. Trump is loyal. He believed her. … Rick picked a fight with the wrong person.' At that point, Trump ordered Wiley to stay away from Giorno and to neither call nor email her. 'Donald is loyal. And she’s loyal,' a source said."
Let me translate this for you. Rick Wiley -- and I'm just picking this up from Politico -- tried a power play, and these are common in these organizations. So much of this stuff, I feel like I'm reliving it in a sense, when I hear about these things. This guy, Wiley, tried a power play, on Trump's female manager, Karen Giorno. She's the Florida campaign chairwoman. And Wiley, an associate of Paul Manafort's, who Trump had hired, attempted a power play to get her out and to take over her job as he was attempting to amass power within the Trump organization. And Trump, when hearing about this, sided with the woman, in no uncertain terms, and so Rick Wiley is out.
Trump did not care about gender. He only cared about competence and loyalty. But in this story, so far, no reporters have mentioned that the reason Rick Wiley was let go was because Trump is remaining loyal to and standing by his Florida female campaign manager over the guy. So we have a female delegate and a delegate from Colorado who are the two that put Trump over the top. We have Trump siding with his female campaign manager in Florida, Karen Giorno, and Rick Wiley, the relatively new hire brought in by Manafort, is gone.
The irony is totally lost on the press because the press has this narrative that Trump hate's women and women hate Trump. You know, one of the silliest narratives that's out there is Donald Trump hates women. Donald Trump loves women. He happens to really like beautiful women. That's being portrayed as kooky and abnormal and strange and weird and something we must investigate. But it is the most natural thing since God created Adam and Eve, that a man is attracted to women he finds attractive, and all men have different definitions of attractive. That is manifestly obvious. There's nothing unnatural about it.
What is unnatural, what makes no sense whatsoever -- ladies in this audience, when you hear all these news reports about how Trump hates women, stop and think what kind of sense that has. They've said that about every conservative in the context of feminism. "Well, he's anti-female." No. There's no anti-female. Anti-liberal, maybe, anti-feminist ideology. Trump doesn't hate women. That's one of the stupidest allegations I've ever heard.
I know it works. There are a lot of women, we had one call yesterday not particularly crazy about Trump because of what she thinks Trump thinks of women. But he loves them. He loves being around them; he loves being surrounded by them. He stands by them. He hires them. He pays them as much or more as he pays the men. A woman was in charge of getting Trump Tower built. That's his home, in addition to his building. He stood by this woman, Karen Giorno, who is his Florida campaign manager, over this so-called highly touted professional and also, must be stated, GOP Establishment consultant type guy.
And yet after today it's still gonna be out there that Trump hates women. It's one of the silliest things. Not just about Trump. They say it about every conservative. They say it about every Republican. Anti-female, anti-gay, anti-this. If you ever stop to think about it, it literally makes no sense. You're gonna hate half the population? It's absurd. But particularly in Trump's case. It's just the exact opposite.
Now, grab audio sound bite 15, maybe through 20 here. Let me illustrate Trump being who he is. Whether you like it or not, whether people on his staff, "Oh, oh," when they shudder when he says, "We gotta get him to change. We gotta get him to tone down. Oh, my God, he's gotta become more presidential." As long Trump stays who he is. I mean, what's the old phrase, "You dance with who brung you." I mean, he's where he is for a specific set of reasons, and it's not because of any consultant advice he got. It's not because of any polling or focus groups that he did.
Donald Trump is following his instincts, and he has a deeper bond and connection with his voters than any candidate in this race, including Bernie. And it's self-evident why. And, by the way, that threatens traditionalists, too. "Well, we've gotta bust that up. We can't have that deep a connection, it's not healthy. We'll call it a cult, that's what we'll do, we'll call Trump's supporters a cult," as the attempt to impugn them ratchets up.
But it's not a cult at all. Trump supporters are there for specific reasons, specific, substantive reasons. And that's why every effort that's been made to separate Trump from his supporters has bombed. 'Cause the people trying to separate Trump from his supporters don't even know why the bond exists. They probably never experienced one themselves.
So this is late yesterday in Anaheim at the campaign event, and here's Trump speaking about Kristol, Bill Kristol. I've been waiting for him to get around -- you know, Kristol is the face of this highly touted effort in establishment circles to come up with a third party candidate, because Trump is so unacceptable, Trump is just, yuk, ew, we can't be associated with that. Even if we lose we've gotta find a third party. And Kristol is noted as leading that movement.
TRUMP: I just happened to see this guy in one of the shows the other day. Bill Kristol, he's got some magazine, I don't even know what the hell it is, and he's saying "oh, we're looking for another candidate. We're looking. We're looking." He's sweating, he's sweating. "We're still looking for a third-party candidate." He's been doing this for like nine months. He can't find anybody. What a loser. What a loser.
RUSH: Now, people inside the Trump campaign shudder, "Oh no, he didn't say that, not about Bill Kristol, we gotta walk it back, we gotta walk it back, we gotta get Mr. Trump to walk it back." No, you don't. That's who he is. He's got to remain who he is. However far it takes him. If he starts abandoning who he is, if he tries to become somebody he's not, that's how he breaks the bond with his own supporters. Only he can do it. If he starts taking advice to tone it down or to take it in a different direction -- (interruption) no, no, no. I'm not saying that there isn't room for improvement.
The point is his instincts have guided him this far, and we're in a business where people don't trust instincts. They trust consultants. They trust research. They trust focus groups. They trust polls. They trust everything but their own brains. Trump is relying on his own brain and his own heart. What do you think Bill Buckley meant when he said, "I would rather be governed by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phone book than the faculty at Harvard"? It's exactly what he meant. And then, as you know, one of the names Bill Kristol continues to tout as this potential third-party candidate savior is Mitt Romney.
TRUMP: Poor Mitt Romney. Poor Mitt. I have a store that's worth more money than he is. I helped him. I raised for him. I endorsed him. He wanted my endorsement -- he begged for my endorsement -- and now all he does is bad mouth. I understand losers. You can make a lot of money with losers. I said, "Mitt cannot run. He choked like a dog. He's a choker. Once a choker, always a choker." So now, as retribution, "Donald Trump shouldn't run, blah, blah, blah," and he walks like a penguin onto the stage. You ever seen?
CROWD: (laughter)
TRUMP Like a penguin!
RUSH: "He walks like a penguin," and the people in the Trump camp say, "Oh, no, he didn't! Gotta back it off. We gotta back it off! Get back to the issues, Donald. Please talk about the wall. Please talk about the Mexicans. Please talk the Muslims. Please talk foreign policy. Don't say Romney walks like a penguin! Oh, no." And Donald Trump is gonna keep doing what he does. Did you hear the crowd? The crowd doesn't want Mitt Romney to be president. They don't want Bill Kristol choosing the president, and that's all you need to know. Here's Kristol. This is yesterday, Bloomberg Politics website, Masters in Politics blog. Betsy Fischer Martin, I guess, is the cohost here, and she said, "How's it going in terms of finding that third-party candidate to run out there against Trump?"
KRISTOL: I think the leading possibility -- the real maybe the last chance here -- is with Mitt Romney, who has said "no," but I think is thinking seriously about it. I think he thinks that maybe he is the right person to do it. I think we might have a shot at Mitt Romney doing it.
RUSH: "Might have you a shot at Mitt Romney, third-party candidate, to upset Donald Trump campaign." The GOP Establishment still hasn't given up, folks.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Here's that National Anthem bit at the Anaheim. What would...? I guess the Anaheim convention center is where Trump did the rally yesterday afternoon after this program. This is when the organizer said, "Mr. Trump, we're running so far behind, we just don't have time National Anthem. We're gonna have to cancel the National Anthem."
TRUMP: I got here, and they all said, "We have a great crowd. We don't have time for the National Anthem." I said, "Yes, we do."
CROWD: (cheers)
TRUMP: We have time for the National Anthem, right? And we have a young lady that is going to sing it. I said, "What are you doing?" She said, "Well, I was supposed to sing but they had time because of the television cameras. They couldn't do it." I said, "Guess what? We're gonna do the National Anthem." Okay? So Sherry Wilkins, come up. Sherry, come on.
CROWD: U! S! A! U! S! A!
RUSH: Now, I don't know if that's unique. I mean, I don't know if you had any other candidate who would have reacted the same way. You might have. But the point is there are candidates who would have agreed to cancel the National Anthem and nothing would have been said about it. Just do the event. There's no anthem. Nobody would have said anything about it. But Trump... "Life is show prep" has been my phrase. "Life is show prep." And apparently be careful what you say to Trump, 'cause he's gonna use it. He's gonna use it and he's gonna turn it to his advantage if he can.
New poll results released on Sunday for the big March 15 primary elections show Donald Trump on top in Florida and home-state Senator Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) struggling for second place.
Ohio’s Gov. John Kasich is just ahead of Trump in his midwestern home state.
In Florida, Rubio sits almost tied with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) for second place in the new Wall Street Journal/NBC News/Marist poll. The establishment pick trails GOP frontrunner Trump by more than 20 per cent in Florida.
Rubio sits in last place in Illinois and Ohio, according to the survey conducted March 4-10.
Kasich is winning his home state of Ohio with 39 per cent support to Trump’s 33 percent. Cruz comes in with 19 per cent there and Rubio with a mere 6.
Rubio indicated on Friday that his Ohio supporters could vote for Kasich in an attempt to block Trump’s bid for the Republican nomination. The effectiveness of that play has yet to be seen, but it came at such a late hour it may have little to no effect. UPI reported that some 84,000 Ohioans have already marked their choice in early voting.
In Florida, Trump polls at 43 percent, while Rubio at 22 percent is only 1 point ahead of Cruz at 21 percent. Kasich is last with just 9 per cent.
In Illinois, Trump leads at 34 percent of likely Republican primary voters while Cruz is favored by 25 percent.
Cruz will campaign aggressively in Illinois on Monday holding five campaign events in the course of the day. Kasich trails Cruz in the state at 21 percent and Rubio sits in last at 16 percent.
On Sunday Rubio promoter Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) took to Fox News on Saturday tolobby for Rubio to remain in the race even if he doesn’t win Florida. Issa and his allies hope Rubio can enough delegates to deny Trump the nomination.
On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton leads Sanders in the three states polled, but in Illinois that margin is slim at 51 percent to Sanders’ 45 percent.
Clinton’s margin is the greatest in Florida, where she is shown beating Sanders 61 percent to 34 percent. In Ohio, she leads 58 percent to 38 percent over Sanders.
While Kasich and Rubio are battling in their respective home states Cruz won his home state of Texas in a definitive Super Tuesday victory. That contest delivered Cruz a significant chunk of his delegate count.
Missouri and North Carolina will also hold primary contests on Tuesday in the second largest one-day delegate haul of the primary election cycle. In the Republcan vote, Florida will award 99 delegates, Illinois will give up 69, Missouri will give 52, North Carolina has 72 and Ohio will award 66 delegates. o
After Saturday’s primary contests in Washington, D.C. and Wyoming, Trump has won 460 delegates, Cruz has 370, Rubio trails at 163 and Kasich sits in last with 63.
DES MOINES — Well, that’s settled. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) will not be the 2016 Republican nominee for president.
At least not if recent history is any guide. It has been 16 years since Republican caucus-goers here have accurately picked the eventual GOP nominee for president. In other words, not once in this entire century has Iowa picked the winner for Republicans.
Ted Cruz joins former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and ex-Sen. Rick Santorum, who won the caucuses in 2008 and 2012, respectively.
Neither Mr. Huckabee nor Mr. Santorum were able to convert those Iowa victories into any kind of groundswell of support outside the frozen cornfields of Iowa.
Mr. Cruz carefully followed the same playbook deployed in the caucuses won by his predecessors.
First, he built a massive and highly organized grassroots ground game. It was impressive. Also, Mr. Cruz spend significant money and a huge amount of time and energy courting Iowa voters.
Mr. Cruz was handsomely rewarded with the highest number of caucus votes of any Republican in history. Which means he is really popular — in Iowa.
Similarly, Mr. Huckabee and Mr. Santorum bet their entire presidential campaigns on Iowa, and it paid off for them as well. At least, in terms of winning Iowa. In the end, of course, those victories turned out to be meaningless.
Mr. Cruz also followed in the footsteps of previous Iowa winners in that he shamelessly and overtly deployed his religious faith as a guiding — perhaps overriding — reason for electing him. The man was literally quoting scripture during his campaign events. This preaching culminated in the creepy footage of Mr. Cruz directing his supporters to “awaken the body of Christ.” Ick.
Obviously, it is a strategy that works in Iowa. But I am also pretty sure that God is not so hot about somebody awakening the body of Christ for personal political purposes. Sounds, well, a little self-centered and diabolical.
And, unfortunately for Mr. Cruz, it doesn’t usually work so well going forward. Even in a place like South Carolina where they love their Christian politicians, Mr. Trump is beating Mr. Cruz by 15 points, according to the polls.
The problem for Mr. Cruz is that it is undeniable that Mr. Trump has at least broken through to Christian voters. Many of them trust him and believe that he is serious about fighting for them and protecting religious liberty.
Mr. Cruz’s impressive win Monday night, of course, sparked a wildfire of giddy gloating among the Great Punditocracy who find Donald Trump so vulgar and repellent. It is like the only thing that matters to them is winning.
But Donald Trump had the last laugh when he walked out on the stage to deliver his concession speech.
For weeks and months we have been told that Mr. Trump cannot handle losing. His entire campaign is built around winning every time. And if he loses Iowa, we were told again and again and again, Mr. Trump would fall apart. The first chink in his armor would utterly crumple him to the ground.
Only, instead, Mr. Trump came out with his family and delivered a wonderfully gracious and funny and hopeful concession speech and told his supporters how honored he was to come in second place in Iowa.
Alas, the Great Punditocracy keeps alive their perfect streak of being wrong about everything when it comes to Donald J. Trump.
Charles Hurt can be reached at charleshurt@live.com. Follow him on Twitter at @charleshurt.
A new CNN poll of New Hampshire finds Donald Trump still dominating the crowded Republican field, with the support of 36 percent of Republicans in the Granite State, up somewhat from his position last month.
In December, Trump had 32 percent support, four points less than his January score — but well within the 4.8 percent margin of error in the polls.
The real activity, however, is in the race for second. Six candidates are locked in a cage match to secure place and show out of New Hampshire. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) is currently second, with 14 percent support, followed closely by Florida Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Jeb Bush each with 10 percent.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) are tied with 6 percent each. Considering the margin of error, all six candidates are within striking distance of finishing second, with Cruz have a slight edge for runner-up.
Rubio, Bush, Kasich and Christie are all pouring millions of dollars into paid advertising in New Hampshire. With the exception of Rubio, all have conducted dozens of campaign events in the state, whose voters put a premium on direct contact with candidates. Cruz has campaigned in the state little, and hasn’t advertised there, but his stronger showing is likely a result of his consistent second place showing in national polls.
Although almost half of Republicans, 43 percent, say they are still deciding whom to support, Trump is widely expected to win New Hampshire, the first primary state to vote this year. The real battle is for the limited number of candidates who can realistically continue their campaign beyond New Hampshire.
Bush, Kasich and Christie has each staked much of their campaign on a strong showing in New Hampshire. Bush can likely continue his campaign, even if he finishes far behind the leader, because of his fundraising edge and perceived strong ties in South Carolina.
If Kasich and Christie fail to finish in the top three, it is hard to imagine their campaigns will have the resources or momentum to continue. After New Hampshire, the Republican primary calendar features a swathe of contests in the South, where neither is expected to poll well.
Marco Rubio faces perhaps the biggest challenge. Rubio is trying to consolidate the support of more mainstream Republicans as the most serious challenger to Donald Trump and Ted Cruz. If he doesn’t finish in the top three however, he will have a difficult time arguing that he has the fortitude for a long campaign.
His campaign has recently been criticized for its light campaigning schedule and use of campaign resources. To date, his campaign’s spending has been second only to Jeb Bush’s campaign. If he can’t translate that spending into a strong finish in either Iowa or New Hampshire, mainstream Republicans will likely look to a different candidate.
In terms of favorability rating, though, Rubio does still have an edge. His net favorable rating, the difference between favorable and unfavorable opinions, among Republicans is +26. Ted Cruz’s rating is almost the same, at +25. Donald Trump’s is +14.
Jeb Bush, by comparison, is upside down, with a net favorable rating of -11.
The poll also asked voters who their second choice would be. Combining the first and second choice results are interesting. Trump still leads with 42 percent, followed by Cruz with 34 percent. Rubio is third with 29 percent, followed by Bush with 20 percent.
The second choice question is important because so many Republican voters say they are still trying to make up their mind. How they make their decision over the next three weeks will determine who gets to live to campaign another day.
Tuesday following President Barack Obama’s final State of the Union address to Congress, a panel on CNN that included former Rep. Mike Rogers (R-AL) (R-MI) and Democratic strategist Paul Begala discussed what appeared to be Obama reacting to Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump’s rhetoric during his address.
According to Rogers, Trump resonates with Democrats because he espouses sentiments about the economy and about the state of the federal government and warned Trump’s critics not to dismiss that.
“I think we’re missing one important point here,” Rogers said. “Donald Trump is appealing as much to Democrats as he is to Republicans. And anybody who misses this point by missing the folks on the street who are drawn to his campaign – he’s got this whole group of Democrats for Trump. It’s an economic issue. There will be a Republican candidate who can speak to these economic issues in a way that doesn’t offend average Americans. I think Nikki Haley proved that point tonight. That’s where you’re going to see the strength of this Republican Party. But the notion that this is the Republican Party imploding on itself — this is a Republican Party attracting Democrats, independents, Reagan Democrats to a message that says this town is broken. The institutions of government are broken. The economy is broken.”
Later in the segment, Begala responded to Rogers’ remarks and dismissed the notion there were Democrats coming over to the Republican side to support Trump.
“The notion that Trump is appealing to Democrats is myth, not math, tested the better part of today going through polls” Begala said. “Trump – he has a higher negative among Democrats than various forms of syphilis. I hate the guy. That’s why I want him to be the Republican nominee.”
A Marist/Wall Street Journal/NBC poll out this week, however, showed a very different snapshot, with Clinton leading Sanders among voters who are Democrats by 18 points.
Among independents and new voters likely to take part in the primary, the Monmouth poll shows Sanders with a 58 percent - 34 percent advantage, similar to his 59 percent - 35 percent lead in November.
Fifty-two percent of these voters say they've settled on their choices, up from 35 percent two months ago. Sanders' supporters (55 percent) are a little more decisive than Clinton's (49 percent).
Sanders (50 percent) now leads Clinton (44 percent) among women voters, and he's holding his lead among men, 57 percent - 32 percent, similar to previous months. And voters under the age of 50 prefer Sanders, 58 percent - 30 percent. Older voters said in this survey they would support Sanders over Clinton by 50 percent to 44 percent. Two months ago, Clinton led this group 56 percent - 38 percent.
www.washingtonpost.com
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton challenged Bernie Sanders's
(The tightened race between Mrs. Clinton and Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont is revealing a sharp generational divide within the Democratic Party, with primary voters under 45 favoring Mr. Sanders by a roughly 2-to-1 ratio.)
stance on gun control during a campaign event in Amers, Iowa on Jan. 12. (Reuters)AMES, Iowa – With her lead in the Democratic presidential race in Iowa effectively vanished, Hillary Clinton tore into insurgent rival Bernie Sanders here Tuesday over a litany of issues from health care to gun control. [As Clinton says only she can win, Sanders points to the polls]
Clinton charged that Sanders’s policy proposals were unrealistic, that the Vermont senator would raise taxes on middle-class families and that he could not be trusted to fight special interests and protect President Obama’s achievements, including his signature health-care law.
On health care, she argued that Sanders’s “Medicare-for-all” plan would jeopardize the Affordable Care Act and effectively turn over health coverage programs to the states, many of them led by Republican governors. [Clinton in Iowa attacks Sanders health-care plan as a ‘risky deal’]
“If that’s the kind of ‘revolution’ he’s talking about, I’m worried, folks,” Clinton said, a reference to Sanders's call for "a political revolution." Stump speeches by GOP presidential candidates reveal that they're already planning for a race against Hillary Clinton in the general election. (Peter Stevenson/The Washington Post)Clinton’s speech to a few hundred supporters on the campus of Iowa State University was striking in its sharp tone and the breadth of her attacks against Sanders. Her intensified assault came as a new Quinnipiac poll Tuesday showed Sanders overtaking her in Iowa, 49 percent to 44 percent.
Clinton accepted the endorsement here of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and used the occasion to tear into Sanders for his 2005 Senate vote that gave immunity to gun manufacturers. That bill was a major priority for the National Rifle Association.
Clinton mocked Sanders for claiming that he was voting in line with the interests of his rural state with a deep hunting tradition.
“He says, ‘Well, I’m from Vermont,’” Clinton said. “Pat Leahy, the other senator from Vermont, voted against immunity for the gun lobby. So, no, that’s not an explanation.” [Clinton camp sees gun control issue as a way to get to Sanders’s left]
Sanders has vowed to break up the big banks, but Clinton asserted here that she has stood up to special interests throughout her career, including on Wall Street. She said she went after derivatives and corporate executive compensation, and that she helped influence the Dodd-Frank financial regulation bill, which passed after she left the Senate to become secretary of state.
“Don't talk to me about standing up to corporate interests and big powers," Clinton said. "I’ve got the scars to show for it, and I’m proud of every single one of them.” [Bernie Sanders vows to fight the ‘fraud’ of Wall Street, provide relief to bank consumers]
Speaking more broadly about the challenges of the presidency, Clinton said she was the only candidate prepared to do all the duties of the office. She spoke movingly about her role in the White House Situation Room during the Osama bin Laden raid, calling it “one of the most tense days of my life.”
Without mentioning Sanders by name, Clinton implicitly suggested he was naïve to think he would be able to implement his ideas, especially with a Republican-controlled Congress. During a speech on economic reform, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who is running for the Democratic nomination for president, drew applause when he said his campaign is about a movement unifying people of many different backgrounds. (Reuters)“This is hard work,” she said. “I wish we could have a Democratic president who could wave a magic wand and say, ‘We shall do this, and we shall do that.’ That ain't the real world we're living in!"
Clinton appeared to relish laying into Sanders. “We’re getting into that period before the caucus that I kind of call the ‘Let’s get real period,’” she said. “Everybody’s been out there, lots of good energy, I love it. I love the spirited debate on our side.” [Clinton, Sanders make competing cases for electability in Nevada]
In recent days, Clinton has been highlighting her perceived electability, something her campaign is trumpeting in a television advertisement airing here. Pointing to her longevity in the public eye, she suggested that she was the only Democratic candidate who could withstand the Republican attacks in a general election.
“You’ve got to know what you stand for, you’ve got to be able to defend it, and you have to withstand the barrage of attacks that will come against our Democratic nominee,” she said. “I am still standing.”
Chelsea Clinton Takes on Bernie Sanders
abcnews.go.com
Chelsea Clinton made her way around New Hampshire today in attempt to convince voters that they should support her mother, Hillary Clinton, as the next president.
Bernie Sanders, Clinton's chief rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, is practically tied with Clinton in voter polls. He now leads Clinton by a slim margin in Iowa for the first time.
Until now, Chelsea Clinton has shied away from directly naming Sanders in her speeches. She took a shot at the Vermont senator when asked by a young voter how to best galvanize young Americans, who are excited about Sanders' candidacy.
The youngest Clinton was on the defensive. “I never thought that I would be arguing about the Affordable Care Act or Obamacare in the Democratic primary,” Clinton said at an event in Manchester. “Senator Sanders wants to dismantle Obamacare, dismantle the CHIP program, dismantle Medicare and private insurance.”
She then went on to say that she believes her mother has a “more robust" record on health care than anyone else in the race.
The Clinton campaign has said that Chelsea Clinton will continue stumping for her mother on the campaign trail. She will join her father, former President Bill Clinton, in Iowa for a joint campaign event this weekend.
Washington (CNN)Donald Trump seems set to end 2015 as the dominant force in the race for next year's Republican nomination for president, with Texas Sen.Ted Cruz now a clear -- yet distant -- second after a strong debate performance, a new CNN/ORC poll released on Wednesday has found.
Trump tops the field with 39%, according to the poll of Republican and Republican-leaning registered voters. That's more than double the share backing Cruz, who, at 18%, has inched up 2 points since the last CNN/ORC poll, which was taken in late November.
Trump has been a constant atop the polls since his ascent to the lead in July, and this new poll marks the first time Cruz stands significantly apart from the other candidates vying for the nomination. Behind those two, Ben Carson and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio have each slipped a few points and now stand tied at 10%.
A Quinnipiac University poll released Tuesday found a tighter race between Trump and Cruz, a finding that clashes with most other recent polling on the national race. It is one of only two live interviewer national polls released since Thanksgiving that found Trump with a lead smaller than 10 points. Across the 10 polls released during that time, Trump's lead over Cruz averages 16 points.
The CNN/ORC poll was conducted after the Republican debate hosted by CNN and Facebook in Las Vegas on December 15. Among those Republicans who say they watched, 33% say Trump did the best job in the debate, 28% Cruz, 13% Rubio. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie follows with 6%. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, widely seen as needing a strong debate performance to boost his standing in the polls, was rated best by just 1% of debate watchers.
Six in 10 Republican voters in the poll now say there are one or two candidates they'd prefer to see win over the rest of the field, up from 48% who had identified favorites in July. That consolidation is reflected in voters' overall preferences. This marks the second CNN/ORC poll in a row in which more than three-quarters of Republicans now support one of the top four candidates (77% choose one of Trump, Cruz, Carson or Rubio), and 57% now support one of the top two candidates. That latter figure marks the highest share for any two candidates combined this cycle.
Trump's standing in the race for the nomination is bolstered by widely held trust that he can best handle the top issues facing the nation. Trump holds massive advantages over the rest of the field as the candidate best able to handle the economy (57% Trump, his next closest competitors are Cruz at 8%, Rubio at 7%, Carson at 6% and Bush at 5%), illegal immigration (55% trust Trump, followed by Cruz at 15%, Rubio at 10%), and ISIS (47% prefer Trump, 21% Cruz, 7% Bush and 6% Christie).
And Republicans are coming around to the idea that the Republican Party has its best shot at winning the presidency by nominating the New York real estate mogul. Overall, 46% of GOP voters say the Republicans have a better chance to win in 2016 with Trump as the party's nominee, while 50% say the GOP has a better shot with someone else at the top of the ticket. In August, just 38% said Trump brought the Republicans their best chances.
Perhaps obviously, Trump's supporters are most likely to think the GOP has its best shot with Trump as its nominee (85% say so), but even among those who aren't current supporters, 21% think Trump would be better than the alternative.
Among those who say the party has a better shot with someone other than Trump, Cruz is the preferred candidate, 25% would like to see him win the nomination, 16% Rubio, 13% Carson, 9% are Trump backers, 8% Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, 7% Christie and 4% each Bush and Kasich.
There are signs in the poll that Cruz's debate performance may have helped improve his appeal. Though he remains well behind Trump, Cruz gained ground on the front-runner on handling illegal immigration and ISIS, both a central focus of the debate's questions, while Rubio and Carson faded on both issues. Cruz's favorability rating has jumped 22 points among Republican voters since September, and he now holds the highest favorability rating among Republican voters of any of the seven candidates tested. He's also posted the largest increase in favorability rating among all adults since September, climbing from 27% favorable in September to 45% now, an 18-point gain. Trump (+8) and Rubio (+14) posted smaller increases.
More Republican voters (62%) say Cruz has the right experience to be president than say so about Trump (57%) or Rubio (53%), and two-thirds say Cruz shares their values and is someone they would be proud to have as president (66% each). Slightly fewer say either sentiment applies to Trump (63% values, 60% proud) or Rubio (64% values, 62% proud).
Education remains a stark dividing line among Republicans, but since last month Trump has gained ground with the party's college graduates. In the new poll, 27% of GOP voters with degrees back Trump, up from 18% in the late-November poll. Among those without degrees, 46% back Trump, the same share as in November. Non-college voters could prove to be an Achilles heel for Rubio, who holds just 6% support among that group compared with 19% among those who hold degrees.
The CNN/ORC poll was conducted by telephone December 17-21 among a random national sample of 1,018 adults. Results for the full sample have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points. For results among the 438 registered voters who are Republicans or independents who lean toward the Republican Party, the margin of sampling error is plus or minus 4.5 percentage points.
Donald Trump leads the GOP presidential field in polls of Republican voters nationally and in most early-voting states, but some surveys may actually be understating his support, a new study suggests.
The analysis, by Morning Consult, a polling and market research company, looked at an odd occurrence that has cropped up repeatedly this year: Trump generally has done better in online polls than in surveys done by phone.
The firm conducted an experiment aimed at understanding why that happens and which polls are more accurate -- online surveys that have tended to show Trump with support of nearly four-in-10 GOP voters or the telephone surveys that have typically shown him with the backing of one-third or fewer.
Their results suggest that the higher figure probably provides the more accurate measure. Some significant number of Trump supporters, especially those with college educations, are "less likely to say that they support him when they’re talking to a live human” than when they are in the “anonymous environment” of an online survey, said the firm's polling director, Kyle Dropp.
With Trump dominating political debates in both parties, gauging his level of support has become a crucial puzzle. The Morning Consult study provides one piece of the solution, although many other uncertainties remain.
Among the complicating factors is this: The gap between online and telephone surveys has narrowed significantly in surveys taken in the last few weeks. That could suggest that Republicans who were reluctant to admit to backing Trump in the past have become more willing to do so recently.
Another issue is that not only can polls change over time, but Trump's support in pre-election surveys might not fully translate into actual votes. He has not invested as heavily as some of his GOP rivals in building the kind of get-out-the-vote operation that candidates typically rely on, particularly in early voting states.
Some of the polls that show heavy support for Trump have also shown him doing better among self-identified independents who lean Republican than among regular GOP voters. At least some of those independents may not be in the habit of voting in primaries and caucuses, which could make a robust turnout operation even more necessary.
On the other hand, a candidate of Trump's level of celebrity may simply not need much of a get-out-the-vote operation. No one really knows.
Another complication is that most polls made public this year have been of people nationwide, not of voters in the states that actually hold the first primaries. In Iowa, which will kick off the election season with party caucuses on Feb. 1, Trump has slipped into second place, trailing Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas in the majority of recent polls.
In New Hampshire, which holds the first primary, on Feb. 9, Trump leads, but less dramatically than in national polls. In recent weeks, he has averaged a bit more than one-quarter of the vote there.
Still, the Morning Consult experiment sheds considerable light on an issue that has puzzled pollsters for months.
The firm polled 2,397 potential Republican voters earlier this month, randomly assigning them to one of three different methods -- a traditional telephone survey with live interviewers calling landlines and cellphones, an online survey and an interactive dialing technique that calls people by telephone and asks them to respond to recorded questions by hitting buttons on their phone.
By randomly assigning people to the three different approaches and running all at the same time, the researchers hoped to eliminate factors that might cause results to vary from one poll to another.
The experiment confirmed that "voters are about six points more likely to support Trump when they’re taking the poll online then when they’re talking to a live interviewer,” said Dropp.
The most telling part of the experiment, however, was that not all types of people responded the same way. Among blue-collar Republicans, who have formed the core of Trump's support, the polls were about the same regardless of method. But among college-educated Republicans, a significant difference appeared, with Trump scoring 9 points better in the online poll.
The most likely explanation for that education gap, Dropp and his colleagues believe, is a well-known problem known as social-desirability bias -- the tendency of people to not want to confess unpopular views to a pollster.
Blue-collar voters don't feel embarrassed about supporting Trump, who is very popular in their communities, the pollsters suggested. But many college-educated Republicans may hesitate to admit their attraction to Trump, the experiment indicates.
In a public setting such as the Iowa caucuses, where people identify their candidate preference in front of friends and neighbors, that same social-desirability bias may hold sway.
But in most primaries, where voters cast a secret ballot, the study's finding suggests that anonymous online surveys -- the ones that typically show Trump with a larger lead -- provide the more accurate measure of his backing.
"It’s our sense that a lot of polls are under-reporting Trump’s overall support," Dropp said.
Greetings, my friends, El Rushbo behind the Golden EIB Microphone here at the distinguished, the prestigious Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies. 
RYAN: It was a productive phone call. Like I said, we've had these conversations, our staffs have been meeting. We had a very good and very productive phone call. So I'll leave it at that. What I'm most concerned about is making sure that we actually have real party unity, not pretend party unity, real party unity because we need to win this election in the fall.
There are people who tell Trump, "You've gotta change, now. You have won the nomination. It's not the primaries. It's the general. You have to change." And what that means is: "You have to tone it down! You have to dial it back. You have to become more presidential." Whatever the advice is, it will consist of people thinking that Trump now has to grow in stature, in office, and drop whatever it is that worked during the primaries because they're over now, and we're on to the general, and it's not a whole slate of opponents. It's one opponent, and there's all kinds of money involved now. 
Others are saboteurs. And the fact that Trump... This is not about Wiley. I don't even know him. What I'm about to say here is not intended personally about Rick Wiley. I don't know him. I'm speaking to you, really, using my own experiences, which are overwhelming in number. Let me just... Folks, let me put it to you this way to set this up. I have been doing this radio program... If you count the 3-1/2 years that I did in Sacramento before I went national 1988, I've been doing this program over 30 years. 
Let me translate this for you. Rick Wiley -- and I'm just picking this up from Politico -- tried a power play, and these are common in these organizations. So much of this stuff, I feel like I'm reliving it in a sense, when I hear about these things. This guy, Wiley, tried a power play, on Trump's female manager, Karen Giorno. She's the Florida campaign chairwoman. And Wiley, an associate of Paul Manafort's, who Trump had hired, attempted a power play to get her out and to take over her job as he was attempting to amass power within the Trump organization. And Trump, when hearing about this, sided with the woman, in no uncertain terms, and so Rick Wiley is out. 
What is unnatural, what makes no sense whatsoever -- ladies in this audience, when you hear all these news reports about how Trump hates women, stop and think what kind of sense that has. They've said that about every conservative in the context of feminism. "Well, he's anti-female." No. There's no anti-female. Anti-liberal, maybe, anti-feminist ideology. Trump doesn't hate women. That's one of the stupidest allegations I've ever heard. 
Donald Trump is following his instincts, and he has a deeper bond and connection with his voters than any candidate in this race, including Bernie. And it's self-evident why. And, by the way, that threatens traditionalists, too. "Well, we've gotta bust that up. We can't have that deep a connection, it's not healthy. We'll call it a cult, that's what we'll do, we'll call Trump's supporters a cult," as the attempt to impugn them ratchets up. 
TRUMP: Poor Mitt Romney. Poor Mitt. I have a store that's worth more money than he is. I helped him. I raised for him. I endorsed him. He wanted my endorsement -- he begged for my endorsement -- and now all he does is bad mouth. I understand losers. You can make a lot of money with losers. I said, "Mitt cannot run. He choked like a dog. He's a choker. Once a choker, always a choker." So now, as retribution, "Donald Trump shouldn't run, blah, blah, blah," and he walks like a penguin onto the stage. You ever seen?
KRISTOL: I think the leading possibility -- the real maybe the last chance here -- is with Mitt Romney, who has said "no," but I think is thinking seriously about it. I think he thinks that maybe he is the right person to do it. I think we might have a shot at Mitt Romney doing it.
CROWD: U! S! A! U! S! A!
