RUSH: I saw a bunch of friends I haven’t seen in almost a year out on the golf course — both days, Saturday or Sunday — in Los Angeles.  And without exception, they’re all for Trump. They’re all Republicans; they’re all getting worried that Trump’s blowing it, and they wish he weren’t.  I heard once, I heard twice, three times or four times, “Why, Rush?

“When the inspector general report came out pretty much just nailing Hillary to the wall on these emails and stuff, why was Trump off still talking about the Mexican judge?  Why didn’t Trump pounce on that?”  There’s another question: “Why has Trump stopped doing what got him there?  Trump’s not making sense to us anymore.”  But, then inevitably, after all the complaints about Trump came observations about how the media is likewise building Hillary up and trying to destroy Trump and this kind of thing. 

My point here is that pretty much everybody I ran into wants Trump to win. And I’ll tell you something, folks. At least among my circle (which is pretty big), the commonality is not so much that Trump is great.  It’s that we can’t stand Hillary.  Any more of this and we’re done.  And, by the same token, everything I just said, this stuff has got to stop.  And that’s why…  I’ll tell you, I haven’t… (I’m going to get myself in trouble here.)  I was prepared. Whoever the Republican nominee was, was gonna get my full-fledged support. 

I didn’t care who it was, because this has got to stop. Not just the policy implementation that we’re getting.  Don’t think Obama’s a standalone.  The entire Democrat Party and their supporters have become full-fledged radical leftist progressives.  And just like this man-on-the-street stuff from Brooklyn, I’m telling you, it’s common out there.  You know, people say, “I used to know a lot of Democrats, and none of this — none of this — would be acceptable. None.  They would have abandon the Democrats. It’d embarrass ’em.” 

The reason they don’t is because we are the bigger enemy.  Conservatives, Republicans, people running for office opposite Democrats are the bigger enemy.  And I’m here to tell you, they really do. In utter defiance of all logic and common sense, they really do.  I’m talking about your average, ordinary Democrat voter, progressive, liberal, however you want to categorize it. They really do believe that we represent a greater threat to their way of life than any militant terrorist, any military enemy.  We do.  Because of what they’ve been taught. 

Folks, what they have been taught is an absolute corruption and perversion of this country’s history, an absolute perversion and corruption of what the Republican Party and conservative movements are.  They’ve been taught this from their earliest abilities to understand teaching and learning.  And this has all been by design as well.  Millennials are a target here. You know, people are looking at Millennials and don’t understand how… When did we lose them? 

I mean, this is the first 18-to-24 generation that people can remember in a long time who’ve already cashed in the chips ’cause they’ve figured out the country’s best days are behind them, and so they’re willing here to become wards of the state in order eat, have someplace to live, and get public transportation. When did that happen?  When did young people stop desiring to make something of themselves?  I hear this all the time, and I don’t know how universal that is, but economic is clearly a factor here.

The government’s taken more and more of what we call the economy.  The pie that everybody hopes to have a piece of and expand is getting smaller ’cause government keeps taking big chunks of it, like for health care.  They’re trying to usurp the entire energy sector now.  It doesn’t work.  It has never worked.  Socialism, communism, never works but people are willing to invest in it rather than let the Republicans get the White House.  It boils down to, “The Republicans hate people.”  That’s just what I boils down to. “The Republicans don’t like people!

“They don’t like immigrants, they don’t like women, they don’t like the poor.”  And you have a bunch of people believe it.  I have a friend who has a Millennial daughter, so he studies them.  His daughter and their friends.  Let me see.  He sent me a note based on his observations of what’s important to them and how to reach them based on what he just heard them talking about.  And he says that one of the big deals about Millennials… See if this sounds familiar, if you have a Millennial kid, or if you know a bunch of them. He said…

Let me just read his note to you.  “I just had a weekend interacting with dozens of Millennials, Rush.  And after listening to a weekend of it, in my opinion if Trump simply explained how his policies and proposals are sustainable and how Hillary’s are not, I think he’s go a long way to making significant inroads with them.  If you own sustainability, you could end up owning Millennials.” And he sent me a study from Business Insider that buttresses the point made by what he heard, not just this weekend.  His daughter’s been a Millennial for a while. 

He’s been studying her and her friends.  He says the underpinning of the Millennials he knows — and he’s careful not to say that this represents all of them. But the underpinning of their philosophy of life stems from their views on the environment and food.  The “mean” versus “nice” narrative will be Hillary’s angle and the media’s gonna play along.  We’re mean; Democrats are nice.  We don’t care about people.  We don’t love.  They do.  He says, “I think Trump can do an end run and talk directly to the Millennial audience.” 

Now, he has his own message, but I think it the dovetails with his core message.  Obamacare’s not sustainable, for example.  They need to be told, because apparently he hears them, that word “sustainable” is apparently something that this group of people he’s been studying has been taught. It’s been drilled into their heads: Sustainability.  The food supply, the environment, what have you.  So the message needs to be transmitted in their terms, such as Obamacare isn’t sustainable; open borders are not sustainable. 

Gun-free zones are not sustainable.  Women and women’s rights and gays and gays rights are simply not sustainable in a country with a strong Sharia population.  An emasculated military can’t sustain a nation in freedom.  It goes on and on.  This is what they care about, Rush, propose as his note to me says.  We’re losing the country because liberalism isn’t sustainable, and these kids don’t know it.  They think it’s the exact opposite.  Now, I don’t know if that reflects similarly with things that you hear from Millennial-age people. 

But the study here, Business Insider: “An Emerging Retail Trend Is Key for Attracting Millennials — ‘The [M]illennial generation has a wider range of choices than any generation before them,’ Steve Easterbrook, Global Chief Brand Officer for McDonalds, told the Wall Street Journal in 2014. ‘They’re promiscuous in their brand loyalty. It makes it harder work for all of us.'” Promiscuous meaning they don’t have single choices.  Like the rule of thumb used to be that if you haven’t gotten to somebody by age 20…

Say you’re selling beer. If you haven’t got ’em hooked on Budweiser by age 20, you’re never gonna get ’em.  Beer advertising has always been aimed at young, just-arriving consumers. You don’t have advertise for people their thirties and forties.  They’ve made their choice. They’re set. This guy is saying that Millennials are not wedded to a single brand like previous generations have been, and that’s what “promiscuous in their brand loyalty” means.  It means that there are so many choices, so many fast food places, so many different kind of cars, so many different, that they don’t just end up choosing one. 

“Many of the world’s most successful consumer product companies freely admit they’re struggling to bond with [M]illennial consumers, the 18-34 year olds now moving into their prime spending years. Today there are roughly 75 million Millennials in the United States.  …  We recently conducted a series of focus groups seeking insights into millennial consumers’ beliefs and priorities. In the course of these sessions, [M]illennials told us they can strongly identify with consumer brands ‘… that have a status, or advertise the lifestyle that I like to live by, or that I would like to live by…’

“Millennials also said they are drawn to brands that reflect their deeply held personal values,” and here is a consensus thought from two different Millennial focus groups. “‘I like to think forward. For me, sustainability trumps convenience.'”  So what this guy’s hearing with his daughter and her friends in the Millennial, sustainability seems to be relevant.  “To delve deeper into the value [M]illennial consumers place on sustainability, A.T. Kearney and The NPD Group conducted an online survey.

“More than 200 hundred [M]illennial told us which (if any) of a company’s sustainability practices are most important to them when purchasing an automobile, food, personal care products, consumer electronics, apparel, and household cleaning products.  Our findings suggest the time may be ripe for consumer companies to take a fresh look at the value propositions they offer [M]illennials. For example, when marketing to young adults, many companies tout their commitment to corporate social responsibility.

“However, the tangible impact of this strategy is limited because while Millennials clearly do want businesses to be a force for good in the world, many seem to view CSR as mere table stakes.” Here’s the pull quote: “Millennials’ demand for sustainable products, not just socially responsible companies, represents an important shift in consumer priorities.” Now, what is this?  What is sustainable product?  Note would you off the top of your head, what are we talking about here?  Millennials’ demand for sustainable products. 

Well, “[f]or example, when asked specifically about purchasing an automobile, the Baby Boomers we also surveyed most frequently said they would prefer to buy a car that is ‘made in America’ … In contrast, [M]illennials most often said they want a car that ‘uses little to no fuel and is good for the environment…'” I’m just telling you, they have bought climate change through and through.  I read the first couple of chapters of a book that is huge among young people, Ready Player One. (interruption)

Have you heard of it?  It is eye opening.  What we’re up against with Millennials, what they think, what they’ve been taught. They’re not thinking. What they have been taught. This environmental, global warming, destroy the planet. They bought it — they have — hook, line, and sinker.  It’s not a question anymore.  It’s an ontological, certifiable truth full of currents.  It’s happening each and every day, and guess who is seen as not caring about it?  (interruption) The Republicans.  Exactly.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH:  No, I’ll tell you who told me about Ready Player One.  Joel Surnow.  I was playing golf with Joel on Saturday.  He said, “Have you heard of this book?”  I said, “No.”  He said, “Well, let me tell you something, Spielberg…”  He listed off a bunch of names of people getting ready to make the movie version of it, and it’s the creme de la creme of Hollywood producers.  I’ve forgotten some of the names.  And since I have, I don’t want to guess.  But I do remember he said Spielberg. They’re all looking at producing it.  Folks, I bought it on the golf course.

I bought the e-book version on the golf course. It was on the 16th hole when he was telling about it, and I had some time Saturday night.  Yeah.  I started reading it.  I read the first four or five chapters.  I’m gonna… I think I’m gonna read an excerpt to you in the segment next hour before getting full bore into the Trump stuff.  But it’s from 2011.  It’s not a new book.  It’s five years old.  It’s fiction.  It’s dystopian.  It is the opposite of utopia.  It’s… It’s… Let me just tell you.  The guy that wrote the book is Ernest Cline. 

In 2012 it received an Alex Award from the Young Adult Library Services Association division of the American Library Association, which means it’s aimed at kids, Millennials and young people.  Spielberg is doing the movie adaptation.  Production is starting in the fall.  Most people in this novel…  Now, it’s sci-fi, understand all that, but don’t forget the influence here.  Most people live in what are called The Stacks.  This is after global warming has destroyed everything.

All the fossil fuels are gone because we did not start alternative energy soon enough, and so now what people live in are mobile homes stacked on top of each other 20 and 30 feet high in the suburbs of cities that are gone.  They are wastelands.  It’s The Stacks, and these RVs in order to use up less land, these mobile homes.  And the description of life in these things is absolutely horrid.  But it’s… As I say, it’s science fiction, and that’s the thing. Young people are gonna read this, and they’re gonna combine it with everything that they have been taught so far and think:

“This is the natural conclusion of where we’re headed if we don’t get a handle here on climate change and stop using all this fossil fuel, start getting into alternate energy.”  Now, for the longest time they’ve thought all this stuff was so ridiculous that people would be laughing at it like we did.  But no. They’ve been Hoovering it up as though it’s gospel.  So I think I will read just a little. This is what we’re up against, folks.  That’s why this Trump versus Hillary? It’s anybody versus Hillary.  The Democrats have got to lose.  They’ve got to. This stuff has to be stopped, or… Well, there’s always gonna be an America, but it may not look like one that you’ve recognized.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Now, what I’m doing here is trying to keep you up to speed on what younger generations are considering important and who they listen to, what influences them and leads them to vote the way they do.  And it’s always tricky because younger generations, by definition, are not as knowledgeable as their elders.  They haven’t lived as long.  They don’t have as many experiences. But that doesn’t matter ’cause they don’t believe that.  They think they know everything, which we all did when we were their age. 

But never mind that. 

The fact is that they are targeted by advertisers.  They are targeted pretty much by every consumer group — movies, books, newspapers, music, you name it. They are the targets, because it is felt that by the time you get to 45, 40, you pretty much have made your consumer choices in terms of product, even though the vast majority of disposable income is in the 48-to-54-and-up demographic.  There’s far more disposable income there than in the Millennial group.  The choices have been made, in large part, by the quote/unquote adults. 

But the key to this is to remember that Hollywood’s political, and Hollywood is a primary tool that’s used, and the same thing with the entertainment industry wherever you find it. In books, TV shows, it’s part of the whole agenda-advancement apparatus of the American left. It’s the pop culture, where you don’t find conservatism much all.  So I’m on point, is the thrust of my comment.  I’m not veering away from what’s important here.  Quite the contrary.  I’m using this as an opportunity to inform you of things that, otherwise, you wouldn’t even know were going on.

Unless you are parents and you stay closely involved with your kids to understand what they believe and why, particularly if it differs from the way you raised them.  They are being bombarded by every potential industry that wants their business.  And the Democrat Party is an industry that wants their business.  Their “business” equals “vote.”  And they have many avenues to reach them, and entertainment and pop culture is near the top of the list, if not the top.  Education is another area that has been corrupted by the left for the express purpose of demonizing and destroying Republicans, conservatives, anybody that’s not a leftist. 

So I was told about this book on Saturday and that Spielberg is producing the movie adaptation/production starting in the fall.  Now, normally people would be saying, “Come on, Rush, you gotta be…”  They all liked the Beatles at one point; then they grow out of it and so forth.  I don’t look at that.  I think it’s important. This stuff’s important.  You want to figure out why they vote, why they think what they think.  More importantly, you want to know what they think.  So when I was reading this book, I had no idea what it was. 

When it was told to me, it was, “Rush, I can’t explain it.  You’ve just gotta read it. But you’ll be dazzled by the writing and so forth.”  Okay.  So Ready Player One is from 2011.  It’s science fiction.  It’s dystopian.  The author is Ernest Cline.  It’s gotten all kinds of awards.  Let me just read to you an excerpt, because the book, I think, is a representation of what people already think — and to people who don’t already think this way, it is going to be a huge influence or probably has been.  I don’t know how many young people have read it. 

I think it’s popular enough that Spielberg is making a movie out it.  So here’s the excerpt. This is Chapter 4, I think, if I recall.  See?  Did it mention that when I printed it out?  No.  Chapter’s not mentioned.  But it’s early on.  It’s as far as I’ve gotten.  The lead character and narrator is named Wade, and he’s a nerd and a geek and an outcast.  He has been laughed at and made fun of his whole life.  He doesn’t have any friends except fellow geeks, and really only one or two.  Virtual reality is how they live.  They never leave their homes. 

They go to school in virtual reality.  Nothing is real.  Everything is a VR headset.  That’s how they travel.  It’s how they go to school.  It’s how they date it happen they don’t leave home.  Everything is a VR headset.  Because the real world is so bad, they have had to create fantasy lives and fantasy worlds.  And this guy is… At this point in the book, he’s lamenting that nobody told him the truth earlier in his life, the real truth about humanity and life and America. “I wish somebody had just told me…”

Now, imagine your 16, 17, 18, 25, 30 year old reading this, is the point.  And imagine watching a movie made of this.  “I wish someone had just told me the truth right up front, as soon as I was old enough to understand it. I wish someone had just said: ‘Here’s the deal, Wade. You’re something called a ‘human being.’ That’s a really smart kind of animal. Like every other animal on this planet, we’re descended from a single-celled organism that lived millions of years ago. This happened by a process called evolution, and you’ll learn more about it later. … That story you heard?

“‘About how we were all created by a super-powerful dude named God who lives up in the sky? Total [BS]. The whole God thing is actually an ancient fairy tale that people have been telling to one another for thousands of years. We made it all up. Like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. Oh, and by the way[,] there’s no Santa Claus or Easter Bunny. Also [BS]. Sorry, kid. Deal with it. You’re probably wondering what happened before you got here. An awful lot of stuff, actually. Once we evolved into humans, things got pretty interesting.

“‘We figured out how to grow food and domesticate animals so we didn’t have to spend all of our time hunting. Our tribes got much bigger, and we spread across the entire planet like an unstoppable virus. Then, after fighting a bunch of wars with each other over land, resources, and our made-up gods, we eventually got all of our tribes organized into a ‘global civilization. But, honestly, it wasn’t all that organized, or civilized, and we continued to fight a lot of wars with each other. But we also figured out how to do science, which …

“‘But that’s where the bad news comes in. Our global civilization came at a huge cost. We needed a whole bunch of energy to build it, and we got that energy by burning fossil fuels, which came from dead plants and animals buried deep in the ground. We used up most of this fuel before you [were born, Wade], and now it’s pretty much all gone. This means that we no longer have enough energy to keep our civilization running like it was before. So we’ve had to cut back. Big-time.

“‘We call this the Global Energy Crisis, and it’s been going on for a while now. Also, it turns out that burning all of those fossil fuels had some nasty side effects, like raising the temperature of our planet and screwing up the environment. So now the polar ice caps are melting, sea levels are rising, and the weather is all messed up. Plants and animals are dying off in record numbers, and lots of people are starving and homeless. And we’re still fighting wars with each other, mostly over the few resources we have left.

“‘Basically, kid, what this all means is that life is a lot tougher than it used to be, in the Good Old Days, back before you were born. Things used to be awesome, but now they’re kinda terrifying. To be honest, the future doesn’t look too bright. You were born at a pretty crappy time in history. And it looks like things are only gonna get worse from here on out. Human civilization is in “decline.” Some people even say it’s “collapsing.” You’re probably wondering what’s going to happen to you. That’s easy.

“‘The same thing is going to happen to you that has happened to every other human being who has ever lived. You’re going to die. We all die. That’s just how it is. What happens when you die? Well, we’re not completely sure. But the evidence seems to suggest that nothing happens. You’re just dead, your brain stops working, and then you’re not around to ask annoying questions anymore. Those stories you heard? About going to a wonderful place called “heaven” where there is no more pain or death and you live forever in a state of perpetual happiness?

“‘Also total [BS]. Just like all that God stuff. There’s no evidence of a heaven and there never was. We made that up too. Wishful thinking. So now you have to live the rest of your life knowing you’re going to die someday and disappear forever. Sorry.’ OK, on second thought, maybe honesty isn’t the best policy after all. Maybe it isn’t a good idea to tell a newly arrived human being that he’s been born into a world of chaos, pain, and poverty just in time to watch everything fall to pieces. I discovered all of that gradually over several years, and it still made me feel like jumping off a bridge.

“Luckily, I had access to the OASIS, which” is the virtual reality video game that everyone lives in in this book.  The book’s about the guy who created it and who died and left a giant game.  Anybody who figured out the answer to his game would get his $240 billion fortune.  So the book is about people that try to figure out the game, which is a… I haven’t got far enough to know exactly what it is, but it’s like deciphering a bunch of computer code to get to the end of the giant puzzle, and the story of the book is it’s so hard, it’s impossible to do.  

But, anyway, “The kept me sane.” (summarized) “The video game allowed me to think I was living life.  The video game allowed me, by virtual reality, to go to school, to learn history and so forth.”  Anyway, it’s just pessimism and it’s dystopia, all rooted in the fact that global warming destroyed everything.  And, of course, all of the traditions and beliefs that propelled and guided humanity were all a bunch of lies.  Now, I know it’s entertainment.  I know it’s a book.  I understand all of that. 

But how many people already believe this stuff?  You know as well as I do it’s a huge number.  How many people are already being taught this stuff in their classrooms?  One of the most puzzling things for me is, when you have this contest between liberalism and conservatism, liberalism is doom.  It’s pessimism.  It is the end of everything.  It’s how you’ve been lied to; it’s how you have no chance.  The only prayer you have is voting for Democrats and relying on the government, because everything else is a fraud that will use you, eat you up, chew you up, and spit you out. 

Liberalism is the most pessimistic thing I have ever seen successfully sold.  Now, admittedly, it’s not sold purely as pessimism, but it’s filled with doom and gloom.  Liberalism is nothing but doom and gloom.  Liberalism is a way to justify never amounting to anything.  Liberalism is a way to justify never accomplishing anything.  Liberalism is what you invest in if you want to end up a schlub and have an excuse for it.  There isn’t any optimism in it.  When you dig down, drill down really deep, there isn’t any optimism.  Everything’s on the come. 

“Do this, do that, and we’re gonna end up in this glorious utopia!” You talk about heaven not existing? Let me tell you what doesn’t exist.  Utopia doesn’t exist.  There is no socialism, communism, or anywhere -ism that’s ever gotten close to it.  The closest we’ve ever gotten to utopia is capitalism, and of course it has been summarily destroyed in the minds of many via the public education system and the university system as well.  So that’s that.  A movie is coming with this theme. 

Not enough to impact this election, but it’s just… You know, add it to all the other stimuli out there that has created this sense of, “It’s over. We missed it. The best days in life are behind us. So all we can hope for is sustainability, to maybe maintain what we got, that’s why we gotta buy the right products and go for the right things, and not overdo this…” It’s just a life of denial.  I’ve never seen pessimism so successfully sold as liberalism has been.