Who Won Jeb-Trump 9/11 Fight? Rush Limbaugh Reveals it Was Trump

I mean if you want a bellwether of base sentiment he's probably as good a one as you will find. Tom Brown did a pretty good job of cataloging the two sides-base and establishment.

"I did a little snooping around yesterday and found that the two uber Trumpers in the right wing media-sphere (that I'm aware of) are Laura Ingraham and Ann Coulter: the belligerent blondes. Breitbart (the website) is definitely pro-Trump too as a whole. I don't know about Mark Levin. Michael Savage is in there too supposedly (on Trump's side). I think Palin's a fan as well. Rush and Hannity are not as committed, but are generally pro-Trump. Glenn Beck, Michelle Malkin, Erick Erickson and the a host of others (more establishment types: George Will, WSJ, Jennifer Rubin, etc) are definitely anti-Trump."

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2015/10/trump-is-trolling-jeb-again-i-would.html?showComment=1445270285550#c5834672602577407095

Since then, most of the base has come out strong for Trump-Breitbart, Coulter, etc. You don't need to read Will or Rubin to guess. So Rush is something of a tie-breaker as he likes to be the voice of the base but is careful never to get to far out in front of opinion.

He always checks to see where the base really is before going out on a limb-you see the paradox? Going out on a limb once he's sure this is what the base is already thinking?

Yesterday he was pretty cautious. He defintely didn't criticize Trump-as he must know this is a sure way to turn millions against himself. But he did kind of give a bit of a stern history lesson to show why W deserves no blame for 9/11 with its 3000 deaths but Hillary deserves all kinds of blame for the four deaths in Benghazi.

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2015/10/19/the_9_11_benghazi_analogy_is_bogus

However, today, he's more in tune with the base-who is going to come down on Trump's side in just about any skirmish. I don't buy that there is a smoking gun that's going to change it. certainly not in mocking W.

I largely agree with what Rush said today:

"Trump’s 9/11 Play Beats the Political Insiders at Their Own Game -- Brilliantly"

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2015/10/20/trump_s_9_11_play_beats_the_political_insiders_at_their_own_game_brilliantly

I 100 percent agree with that:

"Grab audio sound bite number one. You know, big kerfuffle, big kerfuffle yesterday over Trump and his comments about George W. Bush. (imitating Trump) "Hey," Trump said, "he was in office when 9/11 happened. I mean, we weren't safe, we weren't safe, 9/11 happened." Trump says, "Jeb's out there saying he kept us safe. Maybe afterward, but we weren't safe before it because it happened." And Trump's saying, "I'm not blaming anybody. I'm not blaming George Bush. I'm just telling you what happened." Well, it turns out Trump has written about this in a book that he wrote. He was very prescient about it early on. "

This is a big part of the punch line. Rush buys into the idea that Trump was a seer and 'predicted the 9/11' attack in a book he wrote in 2000. Ergo he has every right to say that he could have stopped the attack.

"And let's be clear what Trump was doing. And he pulled it off. He succeeded. He's got the Republican establishment, they don't know which way is up anymore. They don't know what's up. They don't know what's down. They don't know what's sideways. They are just totally bamboozled and confused. What Trump was trying to do, what he succeeded in doing was tie Jeb to his brother, Bush to Bush, not in an incompetence way -- maybe Trump meant that; I don't know -- but what he was trying to do politically was to further the thought in people's minds that we don't need another Bush, for crying out loud. We got a Clinton over here, another Bush, we just had a Bush, we don't need another Bush, and he was trying to tie Jeb to Bush, to W in a way that was not positive, and Jeb took the bait."

Correct. This has been my point all along. It's not really about any specific claim. It's just about tricking  Jeb into defending his brother. Rush even quotes Jake Tapper who mentions Rush in passing:

"TAPPER: What Jeb Bush is doing right now, while it might be bringing some support to him, at least rhetorical support from the likes of Rush Limbaugh and other conservative media figures, it still is doing something that I think Trump wanted to achieve, which is it is tying Jeb Bush to the past, to his brother's administration, to the establishment. And elections are about the future and they're about outsiders, especially this election. So even if Jeb Bush ends up winning this debate on its merits -- and I don't know that he will -- he will have been tied even further to yesterday and not tomorrow."

"Well, and the key there is being tied to the establishment and tied to what everybody -- well, not everybody. A lot of people have unpleasant memories, obviously from 9/11, but the media succeeded in tarnishing the Bush administration. There was nothing anybody could do to stop it because the Bush administration was not gonna defend itself, did not defend itself and there were just lies and smears going on, particularly for the second term the last four years. So Trump succeeds in luring Jeb into this little trap."

"'I really am convinced we’re in danger of the sort of terrorist attacks that will make the bombing of the Trade Center [1993] look like kids playing with firecrackers,' wrote Trump in his 2000 book, The America We Deserve. 'No sensible analyst rejects this possibility, and plenty of them, like me, are not wondering if but when it will happen.'" So Trump is on the record 19 months before 9/11 saying, in the book foreword (summarized), "I knew it was coming. To me it was inevitable. Had I been in the White House, it might not have happened."

"That's his whole point today, and he's got the book that he wrote 19 months beforehand to give himself the credibility and credence on this. He's not just blabber-mouthing. He's not just doing his, "I'm the greatest. We'll be the greatest! I got the smartest; I'll get the smartest. It's gonna be fine." He's getting specific and reminding people what he said and what he felt, what he intuited 19 months before 9/11. "

If Trump has won Rush over on the debate then he's pretty much won the base as Rush wouldn't take his side unless certain that is where the base resides. Trump won, He got Jeb into arguing over the past and tying himself to someone not so popular to boot.

Those who defend W are mostly the establishment not the base who see W as part of the decadent establishment.

The more Trump can get Jeb drawn into this rabbit hole the better it is for him and the worst it is for Jeb.

In another bit, Rush highlights how the establishment whiffs again as Trump and Carson continue to dominate the field.

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2015/10/20/latest_polls_show_trump_and_carson_continuing_to_trounce_the_establishment