[Cincinatus' Wife]

EIB: Rush Limbaugh's take on the CNN screw-up and subsequent dodge:

Forces Align to Assault the First Hispanic-American to Win a Presidential Primary

[snip]

"I know campaigns are what they are, and victory is what it's all about, and going after people is how you do it. I understand all that. This is the big leagues. I'm an adult. But this Ben Carson thing, I mean, he started it; CNN propelled it. And Ted Cruz has apologized for it, more so than anybody else. You know, Cruz could have blamed a staffer for this. Cruz didn't do this. Cruz could have gone out there and said, "A staffer did it," and satisfied what Carson wanted and fired somebody. But he didn't. What did he do? He went up there and he took the hit himself.

That's a sign of tremendous character to me.

Have you stopped to think what Ted Cruz overcame to win the Iowa caucuses? He overcame $8.5 million arrayed against him, all of the ad money arrayed against him, all of the so-called, "He's not even a legit candidate 'cause he was born in Canada," all of these "religious revival evangelist nutcase," all of that stuff thrown at him. "Phony Hispanic," all that, and he still wins. And after that victory, Ted Cruz is the first Hispanic-American to ever win the Iowa caucus. He is the first Hispanic-American to win any presidential primary for any party.

It didn't happen in the Democrat side.

The first Hispanic-American to win a presidential primary happens to be Ted Cruz, who happens to be a Republican -- and furthermore, it was the Religious Right that propelled him to victory. And I knew this was gonna happen precisely because the establishment and everybody else anti-Cruz is arraying all of that arsenal and resources against Cruz precisely... Well, not just precisely, not exclusively. But a big reason is because the Religious Right or the evangelicals were the margin of victory.

"We can't have that! No, no, no. We have got to destroy that. We have got to shoot that down. We can't allow that to be the message coming out," say the opponents and enemies of Cruz. "Oh, my God," the Republican Party's out there saying. "These are the people we want to get rid of! These are the people we think are causing us problems, the pro-lifers, the social issues people. Oh, no! They're the reason Cruz won?" He's the first Hispanic to win. What's the Republican Party...?

[snip]

"PPP's "newest national poll finds the race on the Republican side tightening considerably in the wake of Donald Trump's surprise loss in Iowa on Monday night. Trump's lead has fallen to just four points." He's at 25%. Ted Cruz is at 21%. Marco Rubio is at 21%. Ben Carson, who's not there, in New Hampshire is at 11%. Jeb Bush, Kasich, and Rand Paul are at 5%. Chris Christie, Carly Fiorina 3%, and Jim Gilmore still in the race at 1%. Santorum had zero supporters in the Public Policy Polling final poll.

[ObamahatesPACoal]

I thought demanding an apology was a Trump tactic.

[DB]

I agree with Rush. The problem started with Carson particularly his people who told CNN he was leaving the campaign on the eve of the Iowa caucus. When fuzzy/strange information was provided assumptions were made by CNN and others.

[WhiskeyX]

Ted Cruz is destroying himself with his blatant dishonesty and lack of integrity. His supporters are not doing Ted Cruz any favors by compounding his sins.

[montag813]

"You know, Cruz could have blamed a staffer for this. Cruz didn't do this. Cruz could have gone out there and said, "A staffer did it," and satisfied what Carson wanted and fired somebody. But he didn't. What did he do? He went up there and he took the hit himself."

Rush is wrong there. Cruz blamed "my team":

Last night when our political team saw the CNN post saying Dr. Carson was not carrying on to New Hampshire and South Carolina, our campaign updated the grassroots leaders just as we would with any breaking news story. That’s fair game. What the team should have done is send around the follow-up statement from the Carson campaign clarifying that he was indeed staying in the race when that came out. That was a mistake from our end, and for that I apologize to Dr. Carson.

[Fresh Wind]

CNN owes Cruz nothing.

The two CNN people who discussed the subject presented a factual report of what they heard from the Carson campaign, and then started talking about how strange Carson’s plans seemed, and what they thought those plans meant.

But they were judging a non-politician first-time campaigner by what they thought experienced professional politicians would do.

They never said Carson was dropping out, all they said was that it looked like he was on the verge.

If anything, CNN owes Carson an apology.

And Rush, of all people, is now playing the race card. LOL!

[BreezyDog]

And low and behold...the Carson campaign IS unraveling. Didn’t I see that Carson’s NH team quit and went to support Cruz yesterday. What happened to Cruz and Rubio for that matter, is completely the Carson camps’ first and CNN second, fault. As I said all along, they heard the news and ran with it. Who cares...? Everybody whose guy, or gal, isn’t Cruz. Trump’s behavior is embarrassing lately. I’m liking him less and less knowing that he was a flaming liberal 1 year ago.

[MagnoliaB]

Apparently claiming a candidate has dropped out is a tactic Cruz’s mafia style campaign manager, Jeff Roe, has used before. Blaming CNN is ridiculous. So who is Cruz going to nuke based on comments from a couple of political pundits without verifying the facts first?

[dynoman]

Pathetic and lame. Team Cruz made their bed with a lie they unilaterally made up - it’s theirs to sleep in.

[Will88]

Cruz can’t determine the facts after a little media speculation, so how will he deal with Putin and Iran and a world filled with deceivers?

[McGruff]

CNN Lied. I didn't.

[deport]

So now we accept what a news organization puts out as fact
without first checking to be sure.

[mosesdapoet]

Levin on his 2/8/ broadcast replayed the audio and videos of that CNN broadcast.

He also reminded us of the vicious ad hominin (personal) garbagebombs Trump was throwing at Carson when it was announced Carson was leading un the polls during November. Including calling Carson a insane pedophile and replayed those audios and vids as well.

Where was the sanctimonious barrage of rightious behavior complaints about (like they re throwing at Cruz s alledged conduct now) from the Trumpkins then ?

[mosesdapoet]

Levin on his 2/8/ broadcast replayed the audio and videos of that CNN broadcast.

He also reminded us of the vicious ad hominin (personal) garbagebombs Trump was throwing at Carson when it was announced Carson was leading un the polls during November. Including calling Carson a insane pedophile and replayed those audios and vids as well.

Where was the sanctimonious barrage of rightious behavior complaints about (like they re throwing at Cruz s alledged conduct now) from the Trumpkins then ?

[Lakeshark]

Here, post this one. Mark Steyn’s take, not for the faint hearted: http://www.steynonline.com/7445/that-smell-isnt-the-ethanol

[Enlightened1]

[demshateGod]

In the meantime, what is Carson doing today?

[HereInTheHeartland]

Pretty obvious that CNN is simply racist.
They don’t want to see a Hispanic succeed.

[CottonBall]

CNN said Carson was leaving the campaign trail.

Cruz embellished it to Carson is dropping out of the race with no corroboration whatsoever.

When CNN added more information, that Carson was going to Florida for a day, Cruz didn’t change his lie to caucus voters.

Even after Mrs. Carson corrected a Cruz spokesperson at a caucus, Cruz didn’t tell his people to tell the truth.

[getmeouttaPalmBeachCounty_FL]

What about this senior editor for CNN Politics? He was also tweeting about Carson during that time.

[jokemoke]

“Feel sorry for me” Poor Teddy