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RUSH: We'll start in Troy, New York, and say hi to Mike. Nice to have you, sir. Welcome.
CALLER: Hi, Rush. How you doing?
RUSH: Good, sir. Thanks very much. Appreciate your asking.
CALLER: Well, I'm thinking about hiring a housekeeper to clean my apartment, and I know that the Republicans are against the minimum wage increase from 5.15 to 7.15 an hour.
RUSH: Yeah.
CALLER: But, you know, I don't mind paying an extra two bucks an hour to clean my house and I was wondering why the Republicans are such a bunch of cheap bastards they can't see fit to increase the minimum wage.
RUSH: Mike, I can't believe that you're going to hire a maid and only pay her $7.15?
CALLER: Well, I'm only legally required --
RUSH: You know what I pay my maid, you cheap bastard?
CALLER: You're the cheap bastard, because your party does not want to increase the minimum wage because you're a bunch cheap bastards.
RUSH: Mike, I pay my made more than you will make in a lifetime.
CALLER: Well, maybe you can afford to, but I can't.
RUSH: Don't start making these hasty generalizations about cheap bastards.
CALLER: Then let me ask you a question, why doesn't your party want to increase the minimum wage? Do you think it's bad for the economy? Actually, when the minimum wage is highest in constant dollars, the unemployment rate is lowest.
RUSH: You know, are you going to ask me a question?
CALLER: And also GDP is highest when the minimum wage is at its highest levels, the GDP is at its highest rate.
RUSH: You're trying my patience now. I'm trying to be nice to you, I'm establishing it’s not possible --
CALLER: Well, I'm just trying to get an answer out of you.
RUSH: -- with cheap bastards like you.
CALLER: You're the cheap bastard.
RUSH: (Laughing.) We've just established that I'm not.
CALLER: Well, your Republican Party are the cheap bastards because you don't want to increase the minimum wage.
RUSH: Mike, you know, if you would shut up, I'm going to answer all this for you. I don't have but one maid, I have six.
CALLER: Well, of course, you can afford it because you're making $7 million a year.
RUSH: No, don't insult me. I haven't made $7 million a year in 14 years.
CALLER: Okay, make it $6 million a year.
RUSH: No, no, no, I haven't made that little money. You're embarrassing me nationally. Seven million?
CALLER: Three million.
RUSH: You are so uninformed.
CALLER: You mean you're telling me you only make a million dollars a year?
RUSH: Now you're really insulting me.
CALLER: (Laughing.)
RUSH: Now you've got me down to a million a year?
CALLER: Is that all you make?
RUSH: You know, you are amazing. You don't even get my sense of humor.
CALLER: Oh, I'm sorry.
RUSH: That's not my problem. Minimum wage. Mike --
CALLER: It's good for the economy. It puts more money in the economy, all these people --
RUSH: Mike -- Mike --
CALLER: You know what happens to minimum wage jobs when they're listed in the newspaper? Nobody even responds to them.
RUSH: Let me ask you, why do you care about this? Do you earn the minimum wage?
CALLER: I was thinking about hiring somebody to clean my apartment and I'm not going to pay them the minimum wage.
RUSH: Well, good, pay them more than that.
CALLER: I know.
RUSH: Most people don't earn the minimum wage. Most people earning minimum wage are teenagers in their young twenties and they're in the entry-level of the American marketplace and they're not providing income for families of four, sometimes it’s second and third jobs. The minimum wage is for unskilled, inexperienced labor. The minimum wage is simply the government telling private sector businesses what they must pay. Private sector businesses, particularly small businesses, do not have pools of money, stashes of money in the back room that they can just, “Oh, okay, want me to pay another couple bucks?” They're going to have to fire some people. They're going to have to alter their entire payroll structure to accommodate this. Let me ask you, if $7.15 is not enough, would $10 an hour be okay with you?
CALLER: Well, I guess it depends upon where you live.
RUSH: Wait, so there's a limit to it now? You are willing to say that we might have too big an increase in the minimum wage?
CALLER: I bet you in New York City ten bucks an hour wouldn't be enough.
RUSH: Well, that's not the point. We don't do the minimum wage by city, we do it by --
CALLER: Actually they do.
RUSH: -- what Democrats want to try to pass off as compassionate.
CALLER: Actually, I think the minimum wage in Santa Monica is like 12 bucks an hour.
RUSH: Well, why not make it 15?
CALLER: Maybe they should increase it.
RUSH: What about 20?
CALLER: I don't know. It depends upon what the need is.
RUSH: No, no, no. See, you’re putting a limit. You're already agreeing with me that it's an arbitrary figure. With everybody like you, you cheap bastard, that calls here and tries to tell me the minimum wage is about compassion, I can eventually give you a number that even you will think is too high, and once that point is reached, you have lost the argument, because you're willing to say, “Well, that may be too high than what's needed.” So you're into playing compassion games here to make yourself feel better, which is why you call here and call me a cheap bastard, and then you insult me by accusing me of making only $7 million a year. Do you realize how that humiliates me in front of my audience and this country?
RUSH: Mike in Troy, New York, I know you're still out there. Let me try to help you out here. You don't even need to pay this maid of yours that you're going to hire, if that's even a true story, you don't even have to pay the minimum wage. All you've gotta do is go hire an illegal alien like all of your lib buddies in Hollywood do to mow the yard and take care of the baby and all that, and you can pay them two bucks an hour and support illegal immigration at the same time and be a really good liberal. Save three bucks an hour, maybe four bucks an hour, when you hire a maid, just go get an illegal, pay the Social Security on it so you don't get Zoe Bairded and look at it that way. We don't want to increase the minimum wage because we don't want to throw young people out of jobs, we don't want to put small businesses out of work, and we want people to earn far more than minimum wage. This is what you don't understand, Mike.
We conservatives have a greater vision for our fellow citizens than seven dollars an hour. We want people in this country to succeed beyond their wildest dreams and we want to further those dreams, we want to nurture those dreams. We don't want to tell them you're only worth minimum wage. We don't want to tell them you're a subset of our culture, a subset of our society and you're only worth seven dollars an hour. We want people who get in the workforce, work hard, learn what it is they are passionate about, and want to do it more than anything else in the world, get them educated. We don't look at our citizens with arrogant condescension and contempt as people like you do, you cheap bastard. We look at America and we see unlimited great possibilities for the American people. The only obstacle that those people have are dumb idiots like you who have no faith in them.
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