“A Widespread Loss of Confidence:” TARP, Presidential Rhetoric, and the Crisis of Neoliberalism Blake Abbott This article analyzes the circulation of the term “confidence” as a prominent signifier for neoliberal logics, taking George W. Bush’s response to the economic crisis in Fall 2008 as a case study. It traces the public circulation of confidence in previous presidential administrations and notes that much like previous administrations, Bush’s response to the crisis was rooted in confidence. Bush identified a loss of confidence as the underlying cause of the economic crisis, and his focus on the need to restore lost confidence allowed him to violate his traditionally conservative principles in order to save the free market. Additionally, Bush’s reliance on the term in the context of the economic crisis articulated the nation-state to the national economy through neoliber- alism as a prevailing economic logic. Keywords: circulation; confidence; neoliberalism; presidential rhetoric; rhetorical criticism In the last major act of his presidency, George W. Bush supported and signed into law the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008. This law created the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), a plan to use $700 billion of taxpayer money to purchase investment products that had lost almost all their value, hurt major financial institutions, and turned an economic slowdown into a full-blown panic. Bush’s support for TARP was notable not only because TARP was one of the largest Blake Abbott (PhD, University of Georgia, 2010) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mass Commu- nication and Communication Studies, Towson University. Correspondence: Blake Abbott, Department of Mass Communication and Communication Studies, Towson University, 8000 York Road, Towson, MD 21252. E-mail: cabbott@towson.edu Communication Quarterly Vol. 66, No. 5, 2018, pp. 463–480 ISSN 0146-3373 print/1746-4102 online © 2018 Eastern Communication Association DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/01463373.2018.1446034