RUSH: The New York Times has a story… Well, they’ve got two stories on this, but here’s one headline: “Trump the Dealmaker Projects Bravado, But Behind the Scenes, Faces Rare Self-Doubt.” My friends, as you know, I am a powerful and influential member of the media, and I know people. And I can tell you that nobody I know has seen one shred of evidence that would support this, that Trump is sulking around the White House behind closed doors.

Who in the world would know this and leak it? Who in the world would Trump display this self-doubt to? Who would Trump go up to and say, “Yeah, you know, it’s not at all like I thought it was gonna be. Oh, man, this is so hard! Oh, man, I don’t know if I can do this anymore,” blah, blah? Who would he say that to? You would think if that’s true, he would have somebody really, really close that he trusts and he would confide to — and yet that person would go running off to the New York Times say, “You know what? This guy’s really starting to doubt himself in there!”

When a person is having a crisis in confidence, I submit that you can tell without them telling you. In the case of Trump, Trump established a personality during the campaign, established a personality and maintained it during the transition, and it’s his personality as president. Have you seen dramatic changes? Have you found yourself asking, “Gee, why is the president so down in the dumps? Man, the president doesn’t seem like the same guy.” Have you found that? I don’t know. Have you? I haven’t, but have you — any of you — found yourself reacting to Trump that way? This is classic fake news: “Trump the Dealmaker Projects Bravado, but Behind the Scenes, Faces Rare Self-Doubt.”

How about the timing of that?