RUSH: You see the stories on the US economy, the first quarter. I predicted this. I predicted there’d be a revision. What was the original report of the first quarter? Two percent, .2% growth or something. I said it’s not gonna be that when they revise it. They’re gonna revise it three or four months from now when everybody’s forgotten it. Here it goes. The US economy fell. It went backwards. It slowed down, 0.7% growth rate. That’s not growth, folks. That’s a contraction. “The US economy shrank at a 0.7% annual rate in the first three months of the year.” You know why? Yeah, cold weather. That’s what it says right here in the AP, wintertime out there. That’s right, cold weather and a widening trade deficit.

“The government’s revised estimate for last quarter was weaker than its initial estimate –” Here it is, 0.2%, that’s what they originally reported, 0.2%. Obama’s out there hailing economic growth at the same time. Obama’s out there lauding it, applauding it, and how great the economy’s just chugging along, and everybody knows it was BS. You can see, I mean, those of us of a certain age we’ve been alive long enough to know when an economy is really growing, when it’s really percolating, when it’s really humming.

There’s an associated uptick in mood when that happens, and of course there isn’t any perception or actual economic growth going on. It is contracting. It’s shrinking. And there is a complementary mood, which is down in the dumps, depressed, 93 million Americans not working. I don’t know how in the world anybody can talk about economic growth when you got 93 million Americans it is not working.

So, anyway, we’re contracting now. But it’s not a big deal. It’s just the weather. All the Drive-Bys are saying it’s not anything to worry about. It really isn’t, it’s just the weather, it’s climate change, and of course a little problem with the trade deficit in the first quarter. But no big deal. “Steady gains in employment are expected to fuel healthy growth for the rest of this year.” It’s what it says right here in the third paragraph, after reporting we contracted at nearly 1%. Don’t sweat it, gang.

“Steady job gains are expected to fuel modestly healthy growth for the rest of 2015. The harsh winter, which kept many consumers home and businesses closed, and a labor dispute that slowed trade at West Coast ports are both over.” Again, they insult our intelligence. Here’s the truth of the matter, and you find it in the Washington Post: “Americans are starting fewer businesses, new companies are going out of business more quickly, and the new firms that do get off the ground are creating fewer jobs. None of that bodes very well for an economy still trying to find its footing.

In other words, more businesses are closing than starting. And this, just to remind you, this is not a story from today. This is a story from September 17th, 2014. I just wanted to remind you, September 17th, last year, Americans are starting fewer businesses, new companies are going out of business more quickly, and the new firms that do get off the ground are creating fewer jobs.

“None of that bodes very well for an economy still trying to find its footing.” And, lo and behold, about six months later when we got the report for the first quarter, they told us growth was at 0.2%. Today they tell us it’s down 0.7%.

John Dearie, executive vice president of the Financial Services Forum, a trade organization in Washington, D.C., said, again, this is September last year, “AmericaÂ’s entrepreneurs need help.” This is all right here. A truthful story back in September. There isn’t any economic growth, and there’s no indication that there will be any.

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RUSH: You know, checking the economic stories, got the AP, got one from Reuters here, and it says “US Housing Data, Sturdy Jobs Market Buoy Growth Outlook.”

You know, it’s amazing. Every damn economic article in the last six years under Obama could just be summed up as “prosperity just around the corner.” For six years this is what we’ve been told. Six and a half years. The economy’s been tanking. There’s no doubt the economy’s tanking. It couldn’t do anything but tank with all the things that Obama has added to it and taken from it. The tax burdens and the commandeering of the health care industry, there’s no way this economy can be growing.

And the damn media every time, every quarter, when the jobs news or the economic growth news is bad, every damn story is prosperity just around the corner, all the signs are there, all the indicators. We’re just sitting here waiting for a massive explosion that never happens. It’s all journalistic malpractice.