RUSH: This is Catherine in Mobile, Alabama. Hi, Catherine.
CALLER: Hi, Rush! Thank you so much. I really need your help.
RUSH: All right.
CALLER: Because I need to know: What do I say to liberals who tell me that Bush has lost something like 2.4 million jobs?
RUSH: Well, uh… What did I do with this story? I’ve got to find… Ah, here it is! I’m so glad you called because… I’m having trouble grabbing this one out of a stack of a thousand pieces of paper but I found it. Had a story from yesterday — actually, it might have been from two days ago — that didn’t get in there. But it’s a Reuters story, and I want you to listen to this with me here, Catherine.
“If forecasts can be believed, job growth in January will finally return US employment to where it was before the 2001 recession and erase the jobs lost during President Bush’s first term.” The intent of this paragraph is to, once again, reinforce the fallacious notion that jobs were lost in the Bush first term and what is unsaid here is because of the tax cuts. The simple fact of the matter is that a recession that occurs the first year George Bush takes office cannot be George Bush’s recession. A recession requires four quarters — or what is it, two or three quarters of a certain lack of growth. It cannot possibly. In fact, Bush was warning about this and Cheney was warning about this during the 2000 presidential campaign. This was Bill Clinton’s recession. These job losses that took place in the Bush first term were the result of a recession based on economic policies of the Clinton administration and the 
stock market bubble, and what then happened? Bush is the one who revived the economy, Catherine. This is what you have to tell people what’s happening in the economy now. Ask them, “What’s happening in the economy now?” Don’t do that because they’ll lie to you about that or else they won’t know. But the economy is robust. Home starts the last — what is it, the last four years? — have set a record. New home sales and home starts? The job numbers continue to improve. The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index is at a near all-time high. New jobs in the manufacturing sector are being created; all kinds of robust economic activity going on. There was a recession when Bush took office. The real question is: What is it that got us out of the recession? What is it that caused those job losses to be replaced? And the answer is the Bush economic plan, primarily oriented around tax cuts.
CALLER: They twist numbers. Yeah, it’s very confusing to me. They talk about things like “negative job growth,” and I’m like, “What does that mean?” That’s not even a thing. That doesn’t even make sense.
RUSH: Well, negative job growth is just another way of describing the unemployment rate going up. That’s all it is, is the unemployment rate going up and they call it “a negative job gain,” or what have you. It’s just semantics. Catherine, who are these people? Are they friends of yours?
CALLER: I do have a lot of liberal friends and colleagues because I’m involved in the arts although I live in a red state.
RUSH: All right. Catherine, look it, you know something? This is just from my own practical experience with these people. You’re not going to convince them of anything.
CALLER: True.
RUSH: You can give them every fact in the world and they’re going to have a mantra rooted in their emotional hatred for George Bush that they will fire right back at you. You will not permeate. There’s a boundary around their brain that doesn’t allow anything factual in if it concerns Bush and good news, or the country and good news. They simply won’t allow it in. They won’t process it. They won’t think about it. They will simply react by calling you names: A mind-numbed robot or you’re stupid or you’re an idiot or you’re a partisan or whatever. And you’re going to beat your head against the wall. You’re going to be beating your head against the boundary that’s around these people’s brains and it really is only going to frustrate you. But your best way of dealing with this is to just smile at them. If you want to make some comments about you just don’t know what it’s like to be so ignorant and you can’t relate to their ignorance, and then tell them, “It’s pointless to talk to you because you’re not open to facts and you’re not open to discussion,” and then give them the information I just gave you. Do you remember it?
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: All right.
CALLER: The tax cuts, the economy is strong and it’s not —
RUSH: Well, they’re worried about job losses. They’re still living in the past. Even the news is out now: US Job Gains Seen Strong. The job gains are back: 190,000 jobs created last month. We have now got more jobs than we had when Bush took office. That’s the fact that you work with.
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: Now, the second fact you work with is, they say it’s Bush’s recession. The recession started long before Bush took office. The recession of 2001 can’t possibly be his. Bush’s first budget wasn’t passed until October or November of 2001, long after this 
recession already had its heels dug in. There’s no way this recession can be tagged to Bush. The only economic thing that can be attached to Bush is the economic recovery. It was his policies that brought us out of it. It’s his policies that led us to the new job numbers that we have. It’s his policies. And really, what his policies are were getting out of people’s way. The economic rebound is because the American people. Economic activity is you and me and everybody else engaging in commerce and going about our business with as few obstacles in our way as possible, and Bush has done his best to remove them.
CALLER: Right.
RUSH: But the simple way to explain these to these blockheads is to simply say, “The recession can’t possibly be Bush’s.” A recession requires so many months of lackadaisical economic activity. Two quarters of negative economic growth. Bush didn’t submit a budget, there were no Bush policies on the economy until after October of 2001, and those policies are what has led to the recovery. The recession was something he inherited. It’s just that simple. Now, you can tell them this, and they could call me on the phone and I could tell them the same thing. They’re not going to hear it. They’re going to come back at you with these implanted responses that are rooted in their seething rage and hatred, and that’s only going to frustrate you even more because you’re going to think they’re not listening to you. And they’re not.
CALLER: Well, at least I have something to say now (giggles).
RUSH: Yes, you do.
CALLER: Thank you.
RUSH: But don’t expect — this is going to be like trying to convince Peter Jennings.
CALLER: (Giggles.)
RUSH: You wouldn’t expect to persuade him to agree with you, would you?
CALLER: That’s true.
RUSH: Dan Rather, would you? Well, it’s the same thing.
CALLER: Yeah.
RUSH: But what you have to do here, don’t let these people depress you and make you mad. What you need to do is be confident and solidly in the belief that what’s happening in the country is good, what’s happening in the country is right. These people are wrong, and it’s just too bad for them if they don’t get it. It’s not your job to persuade them. You can give it a shot, but don’t let it make you feel bad when you fail.
CALLER: Thank you, Rush.
RUSH: You bet. Just laugh at them.
CALLER: (Giggles.)
RUSH: You know, just really laugh at them. They’re irrelevant.
CALLER: They’re in the dark.
RUSH: They’re in the dark and tell them. You know the best thing if you really want to get them, if you really, really want to get them, is just tell them, “You know, I can’t talk to people with minds as closed as yours are.”
CALLER: Well, thank God for you, Rush.
RUSH: Just tell them — and that’s the truth of it all. I mean, you’re talking to a bunch of close-minded bigots who are not open to anything that doesn’t confirm their pessimistic view of things. You might say, “I don’t know why you want to get up and go to work every day. 
The attitude you have about this country, what in your life do you enjoy? I don’t want to talk about this with you because I’m happy and I’m enjoying my life and you obviously aren’t, and I don’t want you to try to infect me with it.”
CALLER: (Giggles.)
RUSH: There’s any number of things you can say to them. But if you start arguing issues with them, you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing you were right but you’ll never get the satisfaction from them of
CALLER: Thank you.
RUSH: You don’t need validation from these people and you’re never going to get it anyway when it comes to arguing about George W. Bush. A quick time-out. All right. Appreciate that, Kathryn. You know, I’m willing to help anytime I can here at the EIB Network.
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