Background facts on the Carson kerfuffle.

I ran across a website today, first time.  It's named PolitiStick, P-o-l-i-t-i-s-t-i-c-k.  And the write here is Jennifer Burke.  The headline: "Uh-Oh, Was Marco Rubio Guilty in the Ben Carson Dropout Rumor?"  It begins this way:  "Texas Senator Ted Cruz has been the subject of brutal attacks all day by the Dr. Ben Carson campaign...  Prior to the beginning of the Iowa Caucus, CNN reporter Chris Moody tweeted that Dr. Carson was leaving the campaign trail to return to Florida for some R&R.
"He then said that Carson would be in Washington, DC for the National Prayer Breakfast, the event that put the renowned retired pediatric neurosurgeon on the political map in 2013...  The Cruz campaign is accused of intentionally using dirty tricks against Carson during the Iowa Caucus. Dr. Carson finished the night with just over 9% of the vote. Ted Cruz won the Iowa Caucus with 27.6% ...  Carson accuses Cruz of intentionally trying to undermine his campaign due to the actions of a grassroots leader involved with his campaign. ...

"The one thing not being mentioned is the CNN report which stemmed from an unclear statement sent out by the Carson campaign."   This woman, Jennifer Burke, is actually saying (summarized): You know, you want to get to the bottom of this, what started it all?  The Cruz camp didn't start it.  There was a tweet out there.  And her area of focus is the Carson campaign backed up by CNN.  Here's the Chris Moody tweet.  This is exactly what CNN tweeted out at 5:43 p.m. on February 1st.  This is before the caucus even started.

Chris Moody of CNN tweets: "'Carson won't go to New Hampshire or South Carolina but instead will head home to Florida for some R&R.  He'll be in DC Thursday for the National Prayer Breakfast.' The doctor's campaign later clarified that Dr. Carson was not dropping out of the race, but merely returning to Florida to get a change of clothes. FOX News' Dana Perino said earlier on Tuesday that such a decision by a presidential candidate at this state of the game is unheard of.  Still, Cruz handled the accusation with class issuing an apology ...

"That entire apology is being framed as an admission of wrongdoing by Cruz himself... What has not been said much throughout the day is that Florida Senator Marco Rubio's campaign worked actively to spread the message that Carson was leaving the presidential race. These actions were reported on Twitter by Conrad Close who, according to his Twitter profile, is the managing editor of Outset Magazine. Another interesting little tidbit about [Conrad] Close, that he shouts from the rooftops with his Twitter profile picture, is that he is Team Rubio with the statement below his picture, 'I'm voting for Marco Rubio.'"

His tweet at 6:29 p.m. on February 1st, before the caucus had begun: "'Rubio campaign pushing the narrative hard that Carson is dropping out' Obviously looking to pick up votes from Carson.'" That's a tweet from a guy named Conrad Close, who identifies... He's a young guy; he identifies himself as a Rubio supporter and is the managing editor of something called Outset Magazine.  "Conservative journalist and communications guy fighting to make a difference for God and country," is how he describes himself in his Twitter profile, "managing editor Outset, occasionally tries to save the world."
He lives in Georgia, and he tweeted out at 6:29: "Rubio campaign pushing the narrative hard that Carson is dropping out. Obviously looking to pick up votes from Carson."  And that's gone.  They pulled that down, but the screenshot was grabbed of it in time.  And there's more.  So the plot thickens here, ladies and gentlemen.  But it's still politics.  It's not Romper Room.  But that's... You know, we live in a country where many Millennials think it is Romper Room, folks.  That's a problem with our education system, and that's another story.


RUSH: I want to go back to this allegation of cheating and fraud against Senator Cruz on this business of trying to take advantage of a confusing tweet from the Carson campaign about leaving Iowa and going back to Florida.  And that tweet, by the way, the original tweet was a CNN tweet, and the original CNN tweet, it was not a Carson campaign tweet; it was a not a Cruz campaign tweet.  The CNN tweet that got everybody going on this happened at 5:43 on Monday, which  I think it's Central time, so that'd be an hour and 15 minutes before the caucuses began.

And it's a tweet from Chris Moody, CNN:  "Carson won't go to New Hampshire or South Carolina but instead will head home to Florida for some R&R and then he'll be in DC on Thursday for the National Prayer Breakfast."  That tweet was then assumed to mean something, or at least somebody sought to take advantage of it and have it mean something.  Now, I have a question, and the question is, how many votes was Dr. Carson denied because of this "fraud"?  I have here in my formerly nicotine-stained fingers are the vote totals on the Republican side from the Iowa caucuses.
Ted Cruz earned more votes than any Republican has ever received in the Iowa caucus, 51,666.  Donald Trump, 45,427.  Marco Rubio, 43,165.  Here are the delegates.  Ted Cruz, 51,000 votes, eight delegates.  Donald Trump, 45,000 votes, seven delegates.  Marco Rubio, 43,000 votes, seven delegates.  Ben Carson, 17,395 votes and three delegates.  Now, my question is, in order for Dr. Carson to have caught Marco Rubio and tied him for third place, there would have had to have been a change of 25,000 votes in both directions.
 
So Carson would have to win 12,500 and Rubio would have to lose 12,500or any combination thereof equal 25,000, because Carson needed 25,000 votes in order to tie Rubio.  His total was 17,395.  But anybody believe that Ben Carson was cheated out of 25,000 votes because of this fraud?  Well, we don't know.  But the polling data... Remember, now, the last poll that everybody trusted -- the Des Moines Register poll -- before the caucuses began, had Trump up by four.  Cruz in second place.  Rubio in third place, and Carson in fourth place, and then everybody after that didn't matter.
Carson at 9%, Rand Paul at 5%, and three, two, two, two, two, two, two, and one.  So aside from the position to Cruz and Trump, the poll was accurate.  So had nobody tweeted that Carson was leaving the race, had nobody tweeted, "Hey, you don't need to vote for Carson! He's getting out of the race," would he have somehow ended up with 25,000 more votes?  Can you see it?  We will never know.  Obviously the Trump campaign and the Carson campaign are going to try to make the case that it is entirely possible that Ben Carson got shafted out of 25,000 votes.
I mean, they practically have to, if they're gonna go forward with this and make it the big cause that it happens to be.