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Dec. 29, 2005 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:21
December 29, 2005, Thursday, Hour #2
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Welcome back to the Rush Limbaugh program here at the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies, the relentless pursuit of the truth, right up to the last minute here in 2005, the last two broadcast days of the year, Rush is out.
I'm going to do these last two days with your help.
We're going to discover the depths sometimes to which the elite media will go to uh misreport, or in Bush's case, misunderestimate uh the uh the facts and the reality.
In fact, today, today, on the subject of the economy, and a special guest coming up here in a few minutes, uh, on the subject of the economy.
AP economics writer Janine Aversa writes from Washington, D.C., quote, the number of new people signing up for unemployment benefits rose last week.
But even with the pickup in the level of applications, still it pointed to an improving job climate.
Even in other words, we've tried to talk this economy down now for a year, and it just stubbornly gets better.
Gets better.
It's spectacular.
It's absolutely incredible.
When you after war, and and Katrina and Rita and all the rest of them uh in terms of the disruption of the economy because of natural uh uh factors, when you have the gross domestic product, uh that's the economy growing at an annual rate of nearly four percent, which is almost as good as the uh as the nineteen nineties.
When you've got uh uh payroll, when you have these payroll jobs, four and a half million new jobs since May of 2003, since the war.
Four and a half million.
With an unemployment rate, as we discussed in the previous hour, of five percent, lower than the nineteen nineties average of five point seven.
And I'm getting all of this from Robert Samuelson in Newsweek magazine, hardly a conservative economist.
We have a robust economy.
We've just gone through uh MasterCard says that they think that the uh Christmas season was up eight, maybe nine percent in uh spending.
Up?
How can that be?
When we spent all our money on gasoline and home heating oil.
I mean, I remember reading those stories in November.
There'll be no money for Christmas.
What?
Christian Science Monitor projecting 2006 the economy looks solid.
They think that uh disposable incomes will rise in 2006 by 3.2 percent after inflation, more than doubled this year's gain.
They think 2006 will be better.
They're not conservatives either.
They think that 2006 will be better than 2005.
A remarkable economic story that has been uh well, if there had been a Democrat in the White House, my firm belief is this would have been touted as one of the best years in the history of our economy.
What actually happened, let's turn to uh our premier economist, uh Dr. Arthur Laffer, uh, who's had a curve named after him has nothing to do with body parts, has to do with his economic theory.
Dr. Laffer, welcome to the program.
Thank you very much, Roger.
I hope it's not has to do with my body parts.
Let me just put it that way.
How are you today, Roger?
I am just fine.
I'm glad we caught up with you.
I know you're on the road.
I just wanted to get your uh summary, if you would, of this economic story of 2005.
Well, you you know what if I can be really serious here, and you know, I've spent my life on economics and macroeconomics and economies, and uh I have never read about, nor obviously ever experienced an economy that's performing as well as this one is, Roger.
When you look at the unemployment rate today, at about five percent coming down from six percent, six two as it's high.
I mean, we would have given our right arm in the eighties for an unemployment rate ever as low as that.
I mean, France's unemployment rate's over nine percent, Germany is ten, eleven, twelve.
I mean, this is a premier economy on unemployment growth, as you mentioned, Roger.
Growth has been between three and four percent, maybe a little over four percent in some cases, for twelve quarters.
I mean, stayable, solid, steady growth.
I mean, if you look at inflation, there is no inflation in this economy.
It really isn't.
And I don't know if you'll remember back, Roger, to the to the late 70s, early 80s when inflation was going double digit.
I mean, it's just incredible here.
Interest rates.
When you have the long bond yield in the U.S. below four and a half percent, the gods truly love you.
I mean, when we entered office on January 20th, 81, Roger, the the prime Interest rate was twenty-one and a half percent.
I mean, can you imagine what the world would look like?
Tax rates.
Tax rates on the ownership of capital, uh be it dividend tax rates or be it capital gains federally are the lowest in my lifetime, and I'm sixty-five.
Productivity growth, unbelievable productivity growth.
It's just amazing.
I mean, you know, anything you look at, it's great.
It is the most underplayed story in America.
And by the way, I think that's why a lot of why Bush's popularity is clicking up again.
People are starting to realize that this is just one wonderful economy.
And and there's no sign of it stopping, as far as I can tell.
Well, and it's true, it's true, and yet you look at the polls, and uh you're absolutely right.
Let's see, I got this poll.
Uh-da-da-da-da.
Um the thirty-seven percent of Americans uh approve of Bush's handling of the economy.
Thirty-seven percent.
Now, how can that at such a I don't know, it's crazy.
I mean, it's crazy.
And maybe they're just letting their thoughts on other issues drift over to the economy because you know, Bush is doing a great job on the economy.
He's phenomenal on the economy.
You may disagree with him on other issues, but I don't see how anyone can second guess him on the economy.
It's just phenomenal what he's done and how it's come out.
He he deserves all the credit for this.
It's just a spectacular economy.
Even those who say it's a spectacular economy are saying that Bush has relatively little to do with it.
I saw a column the other day saying the president never has anything to do with it anyway.
And it's just, of course, these are the same people giving uh Clinton credit for the uh tech boom of the nineties.
Well, you know, uh presidents often have had a lot to do with ruining an economy.
Uh and that's happened a number of times, be it Nixon, be it Johnson, be it I mean Jimmy Carter, I mean, they can really ruin an economy easily.
Bush has gotten out of the way of the economy, he's let it roll.
Clinton did a very good job on the economy, and Reagan did a great job before him, so it's not a partisan issue, and Bush has not done something to screw it up.
He's done a great job of allowing it to continue with the tax rate reductions.
He's just done a great job in this economy, and I mean, Greenspan, you've got to give him huge credit.
Bernanke's coming in.
Great appointment.
I mean, I I I think you've got to for sure say Bush has done a great job by not doing something wrong.
And as far as I can tell, he's done a great job by doing the tax cuts by appointing a great Fed chairman.
I mean, I think he's done a terrific job.
All right, Dr. Art Laffer with us.
Now you mentioned bond rates, however, and the big news of this week was this uh so-called inverted yield curve.
I uh inverted yield rather, and I and I wonder if in in layman's terms you can explain that, is it a sign of coming recession?
And if not, why not?
Because it has been before.
Well, let me let me just say what an inverted yield curve means.
It means that short-term interest rates are higher than long-term interest rates.
That means uh usually the yield curve starts at low rates, and is the further out in maturity you go, the higher the rates are.
And the reason for this is, Roger, is because long rates you have a lot of uncertainties out there, and people require a premium to be able to lend the money for a long period of time.
Now that inverted rate means that short rates are higher than the long rates, and as far as I can tell, uh there is nothing that would indicate anything's wrong with the economy back in the olden days, I mean, way, way back, hundreds year, hundred years, when they had no inflation, you got inverted yield curves because people really like to lock in long-term investments.
If you know there's no inflation, and you're sure of it for a long period of time, what you'd really like to do is have your long-term investments locked in place and take advantage of high real yields.
Today in the U.S. economy, we have very high real yields, which are wonderful because that's a sign of productivity growth and output growth.
And what I think is happening is people want to lock in those real yields and are willing to take a slight reduction in the real yield uh to be able to get long long investments.
And I think it's a sign of health, not of sickness.
Very interesting.
Did that make sense to you, Roger?
It it did make sense to me, and I'm surprised.
No, no, no.
Well, they're gonna take away my PhD if they if it makes too much sense.
So don't do that to me.
Art Laffer on the road uh with us here at the uh Rush Limbaugh Show.
And Dr. Laffer, uh another another thing that is uh often said in the liberal circles, and I why I'd I read all this stuff, is that okay, the rich are getting richer, but the poor are getting poorer, the middle class is getting squeezed out.
This thing is uh it it there may be some benefits in this Bush economy, but they're all for his rich buddies.
Yeah, I know that that that's a Paul Krugman type of line.
And it and it really irritates me a lot because, you know, Paul always picks fights.
He's not a very he's not a very open minded, clear thinking person on these issues.
He's really biased.
And bottom line is this economy is providing jobs for the poor, for the minorities, for the disenfranchised.
I mean, Roger, if I can say this seriously to to people who have a liberal tint and I and I and I don't mind them.
I I in fact like them a lot, uh the best form of welfare is still a good high paying job.
And you never make the poor rich by trying to make the rich poor.
And these people who are attacking the rich really don't understand that it you really need a dynamic economy to eliminate uh the unemployment rates for the poor and for minorities and for disenfranchised.
That's how you always get it.
That's why Clinton's economy was so great.
That's why Reagan's economy was so great.
It's because the growth itself really eliminates the poverty for the poor and the disenfranchised and and that's what Bush's economy is doing and and it's spectacular and I I just don't understand why Paul says the not nasty things he says.
Art Laffer with us uh uh coming to us from Lashville, Tennessee.
Uh Art can you help hold for a second let me take a break and come back with uh questions and comments from our listening audience at 1 800 28282 right after this Roger Hedgecock in for rush and a special guest on the phone uh Dr. Art Laffer who's uh author of the Laffer Curve back in the Reagan years proving that lowering tax rates uh would actually not only stimulate the private economy but increase the amount of money uh coming into the uh government and it worked uh didn't it Art just about that way?
It it's worked very nicely.
I'm very pleased with the way things worked out.
That the little napkin thing is that napkin in the Smithsonian now that you're not going to be able to No but I've got it at home and I've got it for sale.
No I'm just teasing Roger.
You wrote that out for who?
George Schultz and some other people with Don Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney.
Dick Cheney's my classmate at college and Don Rumsfeld I was working for at the time and uh we had lunch we had dinner out in the reporter from the Wall Street Journal and um they we were talking about Jerry Ford's whip inflation now which was a if you'll remember a five percent tax surcharge and I was trying to explain wh why you weren't going to get five percent more revenue.
You might get three percent more you might get one percent more but you might also lose money by that tax increase because people stop doing higher tax activities.
It's it's just common sense Roger if you if you tax people who work and you pay people who don't work I mean don't be surprised if you get a lot of people choosing not to work.
I mean it's common sense.
Let's take some calls Art here's uh Mark in Sedalia uh Missouri Mark go ahead you're on with Ard Laffer.
Yes uh Roger good talking to you and uh Dr. Lapher.
Uh one to ask what you thought about those people who think that the deficit has so much to do with feelings about how the economy's doing and how Bush is doing on the economy.
I just wondered what you thought about their those people's feelings who feel about that.
Well I I don't know how to express their feelings but let me tell you where where I would come out on this mark is that whenever interest rates fall dramatically and get low it means that it costs you less to borrow money and it means you can borrow more money.
At fifty percent interest rates if you have a modest amount of debt you're in trouble.
At very low interest rates you can afford a lot higher debt level because the interest rates are lower and you know it's very expected that when interest rates get as low as they are now and inflation as low as it is now, the debt levels both public and private would rise substantially and they have and I don't think there's any risk in this whatsoever at least any untoward risk uh on the current circumstances of where we are with debt.
I I just don't see the real problem with debt.
All right in these circumstances the corollary there is of course we have had uh a dramatic increase of wealth producing effect here from housing uh because people can borrow money uh very much cheaper than they used to be able to for mortgage purposes.
Sure.
Do you see the the the much ballyhood bubble in real estate?
Not really, Roger I mean I don't now there obviously real estate is location location location so what may be very reasonable let's say in New York or uh Florida or Tennessee here may be very unreasonable in California let's say but when interest rates fall as low as they have on mortgage rates, people can afford lot more expensive Homes with the same level of income.
And if you look at the percentage of total income after tax earned by a family of four, and the current median price homes, housing prices are right in the normal range.
They are not bubblish like they were in the early 90s or in the early 80s.
They're quite reasonably priced today on a national scale.
That doesn't mean, Roger, that there aren't some places that may be a little high or a little low, but on balance, housing prices seem to me be fairly fairly priced.
Hi, thank you for taking my call.
I totally disagree with uh Hard Laugh, but I'll tell you why.
Because if one looks at the CPI it calculated in the early nineteen eighties, inflation is actually running at six to seven percent.
And I would argue that most people in this country have seen their incomes diminished and squeezed by the cost of virtually everything.
And I understand why he wants to be optimistic, because he's a consultant to many of the same people who employ his tactics.
But the problem is is that the average person, the reason why the president's ratings are so weak, and the reason why there is concern in the stock market, if he's so right about inflation and all these other things that he brags about, then why hasn't the stock market moved in seven years?
Why is the stock market flat this year?
The fact is is the market's a lot smarter than odd laffer is.
And and the problem that we face is that uh we're a we're a detonation and we're being surrounded by by economic enemies who are hollowing out uh through low wages uh the wages of American workers.
All right, Ed, let me get let me get a response from Art before I run out of time.
Go ahead, Art.
Well, you know, I I I I I one thing I do agree with Ed on is the stock market is far smarter than I am.
That's for sure.
But but he's totally wrong in his inflation numbers and his uh real income numbers.
I mean, when you have four percent real growth per year, you have a growth in income per capita in this country, which has been growing dramatically over the last twelve quarters, three years worth, uh, with interest rates where they are.
This is a beautiful sign that that things are moving very well in the debt markets.
You have the unemployment rate coming down, all that, and that belies what Ed was saying.
Uh but he is right.
Stock prices appear to me to be very low.
They have not caught up with the profits in this economy or with interest rates or with tax rates.
And I would expect over the next year or two that you'd see a very, very smart increase in the stock prices.
But uh Ed could well be right that the stock market won't respond.
I I I can't tell that.
But this economy is beautiful and real incomes are rising, and foreigners are not hollowing out America.
They are providing us with high quality products at low cost.
I mean, without China, Roger, there would be no Walmart.
And without Walmart, American prices and Americans' level of standard of living would be much lower.
It's a great thing that's happening.
It's very tough to swallow all that about uh China just because I don't like them.
But this is you know the government.
But I I think this uh I can understand your position on the government.
I mean, that's a different story.
That's a different story.
But if you look at the economy, aren't they in fact flooding us with cheaper qual uh uh quality and priced goods that are driving out jobs of people who used to make the broom handles or whatever it is uh that or the electronics that uh that uh Walmart is uh is uh now pedaling from China.
Not really true, Roger.
I mean, they are providing us with high quality, low-cost products that we are buying, and they are taking our dollars and they're putting them back, either investing them back in America or buying U.S. products.
So what we are really doing is we're selling them products that we make a lot better than they do in exchange for products they make a lot better than we do.
I mean, they are holding, Roger, investment terms in non-interest bearing, almost non-interest bearing assets, over seven hundred billion dollars.
I mean, they have outsourced their monetary policy to Alan Greenspan at a very, very high price, something like fifty billion dollars a year.
So I mean, when they're paying that much for Alan Greenspan, we can afford to buy a lot of broom handles.
All right now I think it's great stuff for both uh sides of the equation, or great for us.
And I do worry about China's government, by the way.
Let me tell you.
I do too now.
Both uh both uh times that we've changed uh in recent history, changed the Fed chairman uh from Volcker to uh to uh Greenspan is my example, I guess.
Uh uh we've had economic troubles in the following months of that transfer.
Yep.
What do you think about this one?
Bernaki may be a good guy, but we've got a problem in the transition.
Yeah, when when when when Paul Volker came in in seventy-nine, we had a very tough transition period, as you know.
Uh 8182 was a very tough period.
And when Greenspan came in almost within months, we had the October 87 market crash, and then we had the the very slow period from there until 91 or whatever it was, 9192 before it started up again.
Now with thirty seconds to go, you don't see it this time.
I don't think it's going to happen this time.
I think the transition has already taken place.
But you know, I I'm wrong a lot.
I try not to be, but I don't think we're going to have the test.
We're relying on you.
Art Laffer.
Hey, thanks, Art, for being with us.
I appreciate it.
Dr. Art Laffer has been with us on the Rush program.
I'm Roger Hedgecock.
What we're going to do now is transition.
I want to get to the stories about the economy that you think have been underreported or overreported or misreported in this economy.
Good, bad, or indifferent after this.
So the economy of the United States.
Only thirty-seven percent, according to a recent poll of Americans approve of the direction of the economy.
And yet, you've just heard Art Laffer, and I tend to agree with most of what he said, uh this uh economy is the best economy I've ever experienced.
Now is it just me, or is it the actual economy that is do I mean I know I'm doing well, but is uh is the economy doing well every time I look around at my friends.
They're all doing well.
Are we just living in a bubble here?
Uh I don't know.
Because I read the uh left wing uh blogs.
Let's see, here's uh which one is this.
This is Alternet.
And uh Alternate says this.
Uh among other lists of things, of course, that is going uh the United States is just going to hell in a handbasket, the whole list of things, of course.
That's the left these days anyway.
But here's what they say about the economy.
Quote the economy is balanced on a knife edge.
The Bush administration would like you to forget that the U.S. has a record trade deficit, a record budget deficit, and that the housing market, the one thing that's kept the U.S. economy afloat for the past three years, is beginning to cool a little too quickly for comfort.
Republican attempts to balance the budget on the backs of poor people while trying to make Bush's tax cuts permanent, have garnered little attention from the press.
And so has the fact that China and Japan own most of our public debt.
While Bush's approval ratings rise and fall with the price of oil, a very cold winter is hitting Americans in the pocketbooks, and the press can only talk about the economy steaming full speed ahead, uh-huh.
Unquote.
That's the left's version of what's happening in the United States economy.
What's yours?
Let's go to Steve in Dayton.
Steve, welcome to the Rush Limbaugh program.
Thank you for taking my call, Roger.
Yes, sir.
Um I guess I'd I'd like to start out saying that uh I don't feel this uh economy is all that great, especially when you look at the ag sector in this country.
Uh I have neighbors that are really suffering, and in one more year like this, and uh and uh there's gonna be a mass exodus from the farm.
Why do you think they're suffering?
I think they're suffering because of low prices and commodities.
You look at uh the people of this country don't seem to have an appreciation for the uh the time it takes to bring a product to market.
Uh how much tell me how much uh how much wheat is in a loaf of bread?
What's the cost of a of uh the flour to put in a loaf of bread?
I'm sure it's very cheap.
Yeah, less than five cents, depending upon the market.
And and you th and most people in this country think that uh uh they go in that bread's made in the supermarket.
You know, uh uh they don't have that appreciation.
Why are the Europeans subsidizing their agriculture so much?
Well, we are too.
Now, Steve uh nothing compared to what they are.
Bush is well, that may be true, but Bush's uh uh uh farm bill as far as a lot of people were concerned was a uh an incre a dramatic increase in subsidies to farmers, and it might have been different kinds of farmers.
Uh I dispute that.
I don't I don't see that at all.
Well, we we've seen billions of dollars go into farmers of some kind, Steve.
Well, not not uh it it's it's a whole lot about half of what it used to be, which is that's that's fine.
I don't I don't this I don't nobody likes a handout from this economy, Roger.
We'd like to be able to make it on our own in the market, but I'll guarantee you that uh if this thing keeps going the way it is, uh you're gonna see uh a mass exodus from from the ag community, and you're gonna see the rural rural communities failing.
Let me let me uh let me ask you a couple of questions, though, Steve, because it doesn't make sense.
You've got six billion, seven billion people on the planet.
Uh more and more of them are capable of of getting to food, buying food.
Uh more and more places are importing food.
In fact, the United States has become an importer of food of various kinds, uh that we're not growing here.
In San Diego County, our own growers, we've got uh agriculture here, it's actually pretty big, and we've got uh uh in value-wise, particularly.
We have, for instance, avocado growers.
The avocado growers were deathly afraid of uh imports from Mexico when NAFTA was fully implemented in terms of uh driving down the cost and and driving them out of business.
Well, they're doing more business than ever because they got on the internet and they've been selling avocados all over the world, I guess, and they're selling avocados to every place.
They're selling our avocados in Mexico, Mexico's selling their avocados in the United States.
It's turned out that there's more avocados than ever and more people are eating them.
Well, avocados is one thing, but but bread is the the food of life and you grow do you grow wheat?
Yeah, absolutely.
Yes.
And you don't think there's a demand for wheat in this world?
Oh, there is demand.
We've got the lowest wheat stocks in the world right now.
And uh we've also got some of the lowest prices in the world.
Now explain that one to me.
Well, I I'm asking you.
You're the farmer.
Yeah.
You explain that to me.
Well, I I I don't know.
I I can't understand it myself.
I I don't understand why the price you know, we don't mind paying high fertilizer costs and high fuel costs if we can get a decent return on our on our product.
But if we can't, then uh then how do how do we compensate for that?
We can't pass that cost on.
We hate that.
We're the bottom of the food chain on all these things.
Our freight costs, we pay the the fuel surcharge on our freight, we pay the high fertilizer cost.
It's it's unending, and we don't have any recourse at all to recapture any of that.
Well, Steve, let me just say that from a guy who's not in farming and I haven't been since my grandfather was a dirt farmer in Colorado.
I'm you know, this is uh in our family, but this is uh it seems to me as I'm listening to you, I get the same feeling as when I'm listening to the chairman of GM account for all the reasons why GM can't be as successful as Toyota.
It tells me that some people are going to be successful producing wheat, some people are going to be successful uh building cars, some people aren't, but you better tell g you know, find out the difference.
You better find out why you can't get more for your product and uh pay less for the inputs that go into it, uh like fuel and so forth, or else you are going to be out of business.
That's just the way the world works, isn't it?
Well yeah, well, explain that.
You know, if they have a major drought in one sector of the world this summer, what's gonna happen to the food supply then?
And and if you take if you take uh uh production out of uh the United States, who is a major exporter of uh coarse grains.
What what's gonna happen to those people that uh start to go hungry then?
You know, you think that they're gonna immediately be able to go to the supermarket and uh buy their bread?
No, they're gonna they're gonna be uh there's gonna be a period of time before that production comes back on.
And the same thing.
If you take if you take this ground out of production, uh w what's gonna happen then?
Uh we've got we've got more total production in this country, Steve, than we've ever had in agriculture, don't we?
I don't believe that's so.
What look how many millions of acres they've put into CRP.
Well, the government has taken out of production, I understand that, to try to give you guys a a living by reducing the the output.
That's what some of this uh not only subsidies, but some of this regulation has meant.
Well, it's it's mostly an environmental uh push.
It's not uh it already because we haven't become a li reliable supply supplier in some of the in some of the uh classes.
You know what you know what it sounds like to me, Steve, you're you're ready for a new career.
Well, I won't I won't deny that.
I you're right.
Uh yeah.
Uh the you you would you wouldn't believe the stress that that uh Well, you know, I got my personal advice would be Steve, take some correspondence courses and get into electronics.
I don't know, get into something to make some money, Steve, because you're not you're not you sound don't sound well.
Up for my industry here, and because of that, uh you know, there's it's not just me, you know.
Uh you you need to uh you this country has a blinders on when it comes to looking at the ag sector and and uh I I think that uh that uh you know, although I don't agree with the Europeans, those people know what it's like to starve to death after World War II.
And uh uh I can see why they want a a strong local agriculture.
Oh they didn't start.
Steve, wait a minute, Steve.
They didn't they didn't starve because you and the other farmers of the United States were producing so much that we could afford to give them enough food to live on for four or five years to so they got on their feet after World War II.
It was United States grain that fit that fed the Europeans, not their grain.
That That's right.
But they they also know what it's like to not not have food in their bellies.
And that's that's uh that's an issue that this country has never had to face.
True, because of farmers.
Steve, thanks.
I appreciate the call.
Uh Roger in North Dakota.
Roger, welcome to Roger.
Go ahead.
Hello.
Hi.
How's it going out there?
Well, you know what?
It's uh it's a tough it's a tough day for us.
It dropped below seventy.
Uh listen, uh I'm calling uh I'm in the construction industry here in North Dakota, and I've been here for 41 years.
And it's the best I've seen.
In forty-one years.
Forty-one years in the construction industry, yes.
What are you what are you building out there now that's been so good?
Uh we're building everything.
Schools, church, a lot of churches, schools, uh apartment buildings, office buildings, uh, you name it, we're building them.
What part of North Dakota is the hottest right now?
Fargo and Bismarck are very hot.
Uh I live in Minet.
Uh minute is good, but not as uh as hot as Fargo and Bismarck.
And why are they hot?
What's going on in Dakota that causes people to uh to to want to invest and live and I mean is is it just because Dashville is gone?
Uh this is North Dakota, not South Dakota.
Oh, South Dakota, okay.
Well, I've I've you know, we're out here in California, it all looks like the same dust.
But go ahead, Roger.
What makes it quota territory out here?
What makes anyway what we've got here is we've got a lot of oil, we've got a lot of coal, we've got a lot of agriculture.
Yeah.
Now wait a minute.
Is your agriculture doing well?
We just talked to a farmer who said it's not doing well.
Well, I know a lot of them were doing pretty well.
Yeah.
What what are they what are they uh farming?
Uh in the Red River Valley in the eastern part of the state, we've got uh they've got sugar beets uh and so on.
And uh out here we've got uh cattle and a lot of wheat.
Yeah.
So the wheat is doing well because he wasn't doing well in in Oregon.
Yeah, well, it's uh appears to be doing okay here.
Yeah.
All right.
Well, Roger, thanks for the report.
Report there from North Dakota.
I'm Roger Hedgecock, uh sitting here in San Diego, and want to know from you again, here on the Rush Show in these last two days, the kinds of issues that you uh saw reported that were at variance with what your experience was.
And we're talking about the economy particularly.
I think there was so much doom and gloom in the reporting on the economy in 2005 that was absolutely opposite of what people were experiencing in their own lives.
Am I wrong about that?
Let's come back with your calls at 1-800-282-2882 after this.
In the next hour, Franklin Roosevelt, in his own words, every Democrat you ever heard of, and then some in their own words, talking about war.
That's right.
But for now, and then that other uh strangely reported story, the war in Iraq and the war on terror in 2005.
This uh this hour we've been talking about the economy and how it's been reported and what you think about the economy of the United States.
Here's Annie in Las Vegas next on the Rush Show.
Hi, Annie.
Good morning, Roger.
How are you?
I'm just fine.
How are you?
I'm great, thanks.
Roger, um via as a university here, I was uh talking to a friend of mine who uh before he retired was the head of the economics department, and I was voicing my concern about the the the country's debt.
And uh he's he he made it very clear.
He says there's no such thing as debt.
He said, that's just a political ping-pong ball.
He said, if a if a in we you I use my company, I have a company that um went through embezzlement a couple of years ago, a few years ago.
During the time that I was paying off the embezzlement, I was not able to invest in my company.
In other words, my infrastructure.
I couldn't buy no equipment or supplies because I was paying down the debt.
Once I was the debt was paid down, and I was given the opportunity to bid on bigger contracts, the promise to pay the contract enabled me to go out and do exactly what I had just spent two years doing, which was to incur more debt.
But I was able to incur the debt because of the of the promise to pay.
It was like an exchange.
So when Bush lowered the taxes and got rid of our simple embezzlement payoff, or i when when Clinton was in charge, we we uh we did pay the debt down, that's true.
He did pay the debt down, but at the expense of our infrastructure and our military and and so forth.
And so when the time came to say, okay, we we have this new contract coming up.
We need we we need to to look at our military again, there was nothing there.
So George Bush said, let me lower the taxes, which is a promise to pay, and and I'm going to incur more debt, but it's based on a promise to pay because the it's going to make the economy stronger.
So when they say that there's debt, well without that debt we would not have a company.
We would not have a business.
We would not have a military or an infrastructure.
So when they give this diatribe, and that's what I'm going to call it, saying that, oh, look what George Bush, he's run our economy to the ground because we've incurred this huge debt.
Well, that's just a bunch of baloney.
He incurred that debt based on the promise of the American people to be able to pay.
Annie, what a great story.
In other words, you're relating your personal experience of needing to borrow more money in order to get to the next level and be able to pay.
be competitive on these contracts with the national experience.
Well of course and in government after all is just that it's a business and if all I'm doing is paying straight taxes or paying off my embezzlement then I'm not able to put money back into the very resource that allows me to survive, which is my company or my government.
The only way I see that this analogy doesn't hold though Annie is when the government does uh crazy things that that don't build the infrastructure that don't build the safety of the uh the of the economy that don't make it easier for people like you to be in business and make a profit uh because they do so many things with that money that uh that are destructive well that and that's true at the time that the debt was going down when Clinton was in charge also the government was getting bigger.
When Reagan brought uh uh w well we had such a great economy under Reagan the government was smaller.
With Clinton the government just ballooned.
And so of course not only am I paying off the embezzlement or the debt but I'm also I'm also paying more money in the form of taxes to support that big government.
And when the government is reduced and the taxes are reduced, I'm able to take a deep breath and say okay I can go out and buy a new truck.
I can go out and buy this piece of equipment.
I c I can I can expand my company because I have that money that money that resource to pay.
I have that promise that contract that resources how's the Andy House before we run out of time how's the business going now?
Business is great.
I mean I I well Las Vegas is a booming economy anyway.
I mean it's kind of not i you're really unable to define the rest of the country by Las Vegas because it's one of the fastest has been for years the fastest growing economy.
Anybody who doesn't make it in this economy I'm gonna tell you and not just Vegas, but anybody who's not making it right now in this economy, it's his own damn fault.
excuse me for swearing on national radio.
I think you've made your point eloquently, Annie, and I've got to run.
Thanks for the call, and God bless you.
Thanks for being who you are and where you are.
I'm Roger Hedgecock, filling in for Rush Limbaugh.
This is where I am and taking your calls at 1-800-282-2882 after this.
Tell you another low point in 2005, gloating on the left, the reaction of just being totally appalled on the conservative side, and that's not, in the wake of all of the rhetoric about being too dependent on imported oil liberals, not drilling in some little tiny corner of
Anwar in Alaska on a pool of oil that every expert says is as much as uh Saudi Arabia has in terms of uh our our our our use in the United States about twenty percent of our oil comes from Saudi Arabia and about twenty percent uh as this field would come up in Anwar would be taken care of by Alaskan oil and you don't want to do it.
I mean I don't think there can be a rational argument against that.
So I'm still grinding my teeth about that one.
I got about a minute can Mark in New Orleans make his point.
Mark go ahead for a minute.
I'm doing best um I wanted to talk about the economy.
My uh my company is on a micro level I run a label a record label out of the call basement street record.
I was able after Katrina to take my family on a on a variety of to a variety of cities landed in Austin.
My three children are in Austin.
I've made eleven trips back and forth between the cities.
What a la what has allowed me to do that and the productivity of the American people today is things like a trio you know a a PDA a contact manager uh internet you know to be able to communicate with all of our the tens tens of thousands of people on our newsletter list.
Mark we're gonna run out of time.
What you're saying is you're you're back on your feet.
My what's that my point is that the economy and the the productivity of people and the liability on a micro level but the ability of people to do a tremendous amount of work in a very short amount of time.
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