re: Everybody Working at CNN Has Lost It: Rush Limbaugh, The Rush Limbaugh Show

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DERSHOWITZ: He could have said to Comey, “Stop this investigation. I am now pardoning Flynn.” That’s what President Bush did. In the beginning of the investigation of Caspar Weinberger — which could have led back to the White House, to the first President Bush — President Bush, on the eve of the trial, pardoned Caspar Weinberger; pardoned six people. And Special Counsel Walsh said, “This is outrageous! He’s stopping the investigation.” Nobody talked about obstruction of justice. You cannot have obstruction of justice when the president exercises his constitutional authority to pardon, his constitutional authority to fire the director of the FBI, or his constitutional authority to tell the director of the FBI who to prosecute, who not to prosecute. So let’s get out of the weeds.

RUSH: Dershowitz is frustrated. I think he used to appreciate going on CNN, but I’m convinced… I don’t want to put words in the professor’s mouth, but he has to be bothered watching this network, especially if he’s lined up as a guest. Because he’s hearing things from these people that are asinine. And that’s why he says something so simple. Nobody talked about obstructing justice because the president cannot obstruct justice when he behaves constitutionally and pardons somebody. There is no obstruction. The president has the constitutional power to pardon — and if he does it, he’s not obstructing justice. And CNN wouldn’t let it go. CNN says he’s obstructing justice when he hasn’t even done anything. The next thing that Dershowitz said: He can fire the director of the FBI. It is his constitutional authority to tell the FBI director who to prosecute. In other words, Dershowitz was saying if Trump had actually told Comey to drop it on Flynn, he could have! There’s no crime. The president is the executive branch. The president runs it. The FBI director works for the executive branch; therefore, the president. If the president wanted to tell Comey to drop the Flynn thing, he could have, and been constitutionally in bounds. But he didn’t. So Dershowitz is watching CNN manufacture things out of clean air, thin air, that have no relationship to the Constitution. That’s why he finished: You gotta get out of the weeds here, you people. You’re making fools of yourselves. So up next to prove it was Jeffrey Toobin. Cooper said, “Jeffrey, what’s your take on Professor Dershowitz’s recent argument here?”

TOOBIN: I could not think Alan is more wrong, and the simple response is: Watergate. I mean, under Alan’s theory —

DERSHOWITZ: (interrupting)

TOOBIN: Let me finish! Under your theory, the president… Since the FBI works for the president, he can tell ’em to do anything they want. Well, in Watergate, the president — Nixon — and his… They conspired. They made an agreement to stop the FBI investigation of Watergate. Was that a constitutional authority?

DERSHOWITZ: Absolutely. Absolutely.

TOOBIN: No! It was a crime. Several people went to jail and the House Judiciary Committee voted to impeach President Nixon over it.

DERSHOWITZ: Impeachment is very different.

TOOBIN: So, yes, he could pardon him but he cannot obstruct justice.

RUSH: All right, so Toobin thinks that he’s just destroyed Dershowitz. Dershowitz sat there patiently waiting for Toobin to make his point. He says that Nixon made an agreement to stop the FBI investigation of Watergate. That’s not… These guys have been so consumed with their hatred, they don’t even remember what Watergate’s about. In fact, I defy nine out of 10 people today to tell you what Watergate was. “Well, yeah, that’s when Nixon was impeached, man! I remember.” No, Nixon wasn’t impeached. “Well, he resigned.” That’s right. But why? Nine out of 10 people cannot tell you, including those that work at CNN. So here’s Dershowitz picking up after Toobin says that the Watergate affair set the precedent for the president being impeached for obstruction of justice for exercising his authority.

DERSHOWITZ: Impeachment is political. There is no judicial review of impeachment. You can impeach a president for jaywalking, and nobody can review that. I’m talking about was there an obstruction of justice. He didn’t commit an obstruction of justice. You, Congress, you can impeach him if you don’t like what he did, if you think obstructionist-ish —

CNN WOMAN: (giggling)

DERSHOWITZ: — or would be an obstruction if he wasn’t the president. But you cannot say it’s a crime. It’s simply not a crime for the president to exercise his constitutional authority to pardon, to direct the FBI. It wasn’t a crime when Thomas Jefferson directed the attorney general what to do. It wasn’t a crime when Lincoln did it.

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