Levin: Biden and the Democrats are waging a war on capitalism
Fox News host Mark Levin explained why President Joe Biden and the Democratic Party are responsible for destroying the economy and why they want America reliant on foreign power.
This is a rush transcript from "Life, Liberty & Levin," July 17, 2022. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
MARK LEVIN, FOX NEWS HOST: Hello, America. I'm Mark Levin and this is LIFE, LIBERTY & LEVIN.
We have two great guests tonight: Representative Elise Stefanik and Larry Kudlow. We have a lot to go over.
But before we do, ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to prove to you in the next 10 minutes that Joe Biden and the Democratic Party are in fact responsible for sabotaging our economy and sabotaging our energy industry. It has nothing to do with foreign forces and foreign powers or boogeyman, it has something to do with actual policies that have been in the process now for decades.
Now, these policies they put under the nomenclature of climate change, or the Green New Deal. They started in the 1970s in Europe, as I've pointed out in my book, "American Marxism," where professors from all over the world activists, Marxists, left-wing politicians, they all met, and they came up to this notion of climate control, as a venue, as a system through which they would push their economic agenda.
Their economic agenda, if you read the research and scholarship, which I've done is economic degrowth. Degrowth the industrial society.
Marx hated the industrial society and he was relatively shocked when he saw particularly in the latter parts of his life that in the United States, as our industries grew, as our capitalist system expanded economic activity and prosperity, that rather than the proletariat, the workers rising up and overthrowing the bourgeoisie, the owners and the managers, quite the opposite occurred.
That is the lifestyle for most people went up. We created this vast middle class, a vast middle class, which is the heart and soul of America and the American system. It is the opposite of what Marx intended.
And the leftists have been fighting this ever since for the last 100 years, and now it's come to a head. And in the Biden administration, he has the most radical appointees in these department heads, in the bureaucracy, in every unit and office and division in the Federal government in American history and they are abiding by this half century old degrowth movement.
They can call it whatever they want, but that's exactly what it is. It is a war on capitalism, and you know what? It's working. It's not Putin. It's not the world economy, it is Biden and the Biden administration and the Democrats who have embraced every syllable of this propaganda.
Now, let's walk through this. Relax, let's take some steps together here.
As FOX has pointed out, on January 20, 2021. The first day in office, Biden's first actions, well, among them was to revoke approval for the Keystone XL Pipeline, oppose a moratorium on oil and gas leasing on Federal lands, and in Federal waters.
Roughly 25 percent of U.S. production comes from the Federal areas. The Keystone XL cancellation confirmed to many policy watchers, Biden's willingness to use one of climate activist's favorite tactics, blocking midstream pipelines to restrict upstream production.
The moves were part of Biden's broader climate agenda target to reduce greenhouse gases.
Now, what are greenhouse gases? A greenhouse gas is poison. It sounds ominous. No, greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Ever drive by one of these sort of glass buildings, and they create a greenhouse gas environment so they can grow plants during the winter or during a harsh season. Those are greenhouses, right? That's greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide. That's what they focus on.
The vast majority of the greenhouse gases are condensation -- water. Carbon dioxide represents, well, let me give you an example. You have a stadium of 10,000 seats, four seats, four seats, almost no pollution when you really think about it, as a result of carbon dioxide and what else? Without carbon dioxide we die. Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant.
The Federal government doesn't even have regulatory authority to regulate it. It's not a pollutant. What is it? It is oxygen for plants. In essence plants use carbon dioxide to create oxygen for you and me. Remember we used to like the Amazon? We used to like trees, we used to like all those things.
Well, they suck up our carbon dioxide and push out oxygen, but let's go on. February 26, 2021: Biden updates the social cost of greenhouse gas emissions dramatically altering the way the U.S. government calculates the real world costs of climate change.
June 1, 2021: Biden proposed eliminating a slew of tax benefits for oil gas, coal producers in favor of electric vehicles, and other low carbon energy alternatives as part of this $6 trillion budget for the next fiscal year.
If you buy an automobile, a very, very expensive automobile, even a Rolls Royce, and they have electric features to it, you get a $7,500.00 tax break, it's sick.
November 17, 2021: Biden sent a letter to Federal Trade Commission Chair, Lina Khan, encouraging an investigation of oil, gas companies and retail gasoline prices.
March 12, 2022: Congressional Democrats proposed a tax top U.S. oil producers and importers and direct the collected money to Americans.
March 21, 2022: Biden's SEC proposes landmark climate rules, which it has no authority to propose at all.
And then we have the environmental, social, and governance standards, ESG pushed by the SEC, which has no authority, statutory authority whatsoever to push the leftist agenda on every company in America that reports to the SEC as part of their auditing requirements.
Now, FOX was actually very kind in the way they talked about the Biden administration, in a sense. They had those issues. But here's AFP, they have 25 steps the Biden administration has taken to smother energy production, investment and development.
You can look it up yourself, and that includes everything from adopting new EPA oil and gas rules to restricting or impeding energy projects, rejoining the Paris Agreement, appointing unaccountable energy regulators, forcing states to restrict driving. Raising the price of cars and trucks, instituting a new policy on carbon taxes in organized wholesale electricity markets, raising the prices of common household necessities as a result, stifling energy innovation, altering regulatory cost analyses, imposing new costs on power generation, impeding American exports, raising taxes across the board, and of course, fueling the fire for future regulation and the lack of future investment.
Another expert, U.S. natural gas prices in the Northeast face more upward pressure amid Russia's war on Ukraine because there is insufficient pipeline infrastructure for the northeast to get its natural gas from Pennsylvania of which there is a ton to the northeast, because the pipeline construction has been halted.
So, we're sending oil and gas to China, to India, all over the world, but we can't get it from Pennsylvania to New England in an efficient way.
Even more, the GOP Study Committee, here are 81 things that the Biden administration has done that it proposes in the future or is doing now to sabotage energy production in this country and the price of fuel in this country. It is a disastrous disgrace.
They are sabotaging American industry and stealing from your pocketbooks. But they talk about electricity all the time. What are they doing about electricity? Well, according to another expert, Americans can expect to see electricity shortages this summer as traditional power plants are being retired more quickly than they can be replaced by renewable energy. And the required battery storage, the electric grids Independent System Operators warn, power grids are straining as conventional power plants fueled by coal and nuclear are being retired for intermittent forms of energy, such as wind and solar power.
They need the backup of traditional plants or battery storage. Where does that come from? Wind and solar farms cannot produce electricity 24/7 as Americans demand it and need expensive and large batteries to store their output for later use.
And while some battery storage capacity is being added, independent grid operators have warned that the rate of the additions may not be fast enough to offset the closures.
Further exasperating the problem is the push by the Biden administration in many Blue States to electrify home heating and cooking and electric cars and on and on and on. Biden and other world leaders believe that there is too much fossil fuel generating and not enough wind and solar power, and that one can easily transition to net zero carbon, which is not a pollutant by building wind and solar farms and having them replace existing fossil fuel generators.
Pure fantasy, since these renewable generators need a reliable backup. The belief is that battery storage can do the job. But when no wind is blowing, and no sun is shining, there will be no excess power to put the batteries into the batteries for later use. Plus, the cost of battery storage is extremely expensive.
Alternatives are reaching net zero carbon by expanding nuclear power has been made impracticable by regulatory obstruction and locations for hydroelectric capacity have been mostly developed. The only option that remains a generation from wind and solar facilities.
Now, they've had extensive government subsidies over decades, tax benefits, State mandates, and yet, and yet they represent a total of 12 percent of our energy capacity.
Independent system operators are warning that America can expect electricity shortages. Those shortages are caused by the reckless move of transitioning the country to wind and solar power and retiring existing conventional generating technologies.
We're not ready for this. We're not ready for this at all.
And later in the program, I want to focus in on inflation. Joe Biden says inflation, the economies all over the world are having a problem. Our core inflation rate is higher than almost every core inflation rate in the developed world.
When you spend like drunken Marxists, the consequences are massive inflation. And now what the Fed understands is they have to put the brakes on the economy, you know what that's called? That's not just called a recession, that's called stagflation. That's called you getting poorer, products getting more expensive, more difficult for you to meet your monthly budgets. That is how you destroy a country.
So let me be abundantly clear. This has nothing to do with Russia invading Ukraine. It has nothing to do with Saudi Arabia. It has nothing to do with anything but, Joe Biden, the Democratic Congress and the radicals, and you know what their plan is to fix the energy situation?
They have no plan. How can they? They broke the system and they have no intention of fixing it.
I'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEVIN: I want to welcome Representative Elise Stefanik to the program for the first time. She is not a rising star, she is a star of the Republican Party and she has got courage and she's got smarts.
First of all, Elise Stefanik. May I call you a woman? Is that still okay among Republicans? I think it is, right?
REP. ELISE STEFANIK (R-NY): It is. I am honored and proud to be a woman.
LEVIN: Okay, great.
Now, the January 6 Committee, I want to jump into this with you because I think the longer this goes on, the more they destroy their own credibility. The lies that come out of this Committee, the phony evidence that comes out of this Committee, the witnesses who seem to have been tampered with and prepped and the fact that there are some basic questions that any opposition, any lawyer on the other side would ask that would expose this entire thing for what it is, a Nancy Pelosi, Joseph Stalin rogue operation.
They're not really investigating January 6th, are they? They're investigating the Republican Party, MAGA, and Donald Trump. Isn't that about right?
STEFANIK: That's right. This is an attack on all Trump voters. And really, it's a partisan attempt by Nancy Pelosi for her handpicked Members of Congress to go after President Trump and all Republicans, because they know that they're going to lose at the ballot box this November.
And what's really interesting, Mark, is as I talk to my constituents, which I do every single day, whether I'm in Washington or at home in my district, they're not asking or concerned about the January 6 hearings. What they're concerned about is inflation. They're concerned about the doubling of gas prices. The issues that are actually impacting them on a daily basis.
But the January 6 sham Committee is so egregious, it is way worse than the impeachment witch hunt Parts One and Two. And the reason why it's so egregious is there is no Republican appointed members.
So for the first time in the history of the Congress, you have no ability for the minority party, in this case, the Republicans to appoint those members. Why is that important? It's important because there needs to be cross examination of witnesses. There needs to be a very close eye on all the evidence that is being presented.
We know now that there's edited excerpts, there's been edited text messages of Jim Jordan, there's been statements taken out of context. Witnesses have come forward saying their statements have been taken out of context. And really what this is, is the Trump derangement syndrome of today's Democrats who are losing on every single issue, whether it's border security, the economy, national security. So they're obsessed with continuing to go after President Trump.
The American people are smart, they can see right through this for what it is. It is a partisan witch hunt.
LEVIN: Are you aware of any other civilized democracy or Republic that has ever set up a Committee or Commission like that to go after a former President? I can't think of any.
STEFANIK: No, it's unheard of. It's un-American fundamentally, and again, you have only one office that's off limits to investigation and that office is Nancy Pelosi's office; the Democratic head of the Committee, Bennie Thompson said at the start of this witch hunt that everything is fair game except for the Speaker of the House's office.
And what's important and really telling about that is, I believe, and we know that the Speaker's office was made aware of potential threats, potential violence that day, they failed to do their job to ensure the Capitol Police had the support they needed to secure the Capitol, and they had have not turned over the communication with the Sergeant-at-Arms office. The American people deserve to have that information transparent.
And as you pointed out, this is fundamentally un-American and it is a waste of taxpayer dollars. And most importantly, it is not dealing with the crises that are actually impacting and hurting the American people resulting from Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi's failed policies.
LEVIN: If Nancy Pelosi has nothing to hide about her fantastic leadership on January 6th, why doesn't she make herself available for testimony on the record, under penalty of perjury? Why doesn't she make her text messages available? Her e-mails available? Why does she even have to be asked?
And what about her staff and her family members? I mean, that's the sort of thing they've done with Trump. Shouldn't we know what she did on January 4th, when she was offered 20,000 National Guardsmen? And isn't it interesting that this Committee now is having another public hearing? It's last one, we're told. And there hasn't been not just a single witness, a single video, a single statement that makes it clear that there had been five witnesses who have said that Donald Trump offered the National Guard 48 hours before he spoke.
And doesn't that give to the lie to the entire insurrection nonsense being led by Donald Trump?
STEFANIK: Yes, you're exactly right. Nancy Pelosi should turn over all documentation. Republicans have requested that. The Committee that actually oversees the House security in terms of making sure that the Capitol Police have the resources they need as the House Administration Committee. This is not being conducted on a bipartisan basis.
We've made those requests, and again, you had the Democrat Chair of this Committee handpicked by Nancy Pelosi saying that her office is off limits. Why? Because they know that she was offered the National Guard from the President of the United States and that they failed to secure the Capitol because of their concern with political optics. There needs to be accountability here.
The other issue that's important, Mark, is Republicans have been consistent, we condemn acts of violence. We condemned any acts of violence or destruction that occurred on January 6th. We also condemned all the acts of violence as cities were torched to the ground during the riots throughout 2020.
Democrats failed to condemn and somehow tried to convince the American people that lighting churches on fire was a form of peaceful protest. That is not peaceful protest, that's violent rioting. It's Republicans that have been consistent.
And if this Committee was focused on securing the capital, they would actually make sure that they are providing Capitol Police with the resources they need, that they are making the updates that were recommended by the independent Inspector General. They have failed.
This Democratic Congress has failed to take those actions to provide the resources that are needed by Capitol Police and actually take action on those recommendations.
LEVIN: When we come back, how many hearings, I would like to know, have been held in the Democratic controlled House on Joe Biden's financial relationships with foreign countries including China, through his son and directly? How many hearings have been held on the failure of Joe Biden to comply with Article II of the Constitution to uphold our immigration laws?
How many hearings have been held on the targeting of parents in School Board meetings? How many hearings had been held on the environmental policies that have led to the current situation of increased gasoline prices and soon to be shortages?
How many hearings have been held on the murder rates and other crime rates that are going up throughout this country as a result of their party controlling these different cities?
And isn't the January 6 hearing really a way to try and effectively and a fail to divert the attention of the American people?
When we come back I'd like you to address that.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BRYAN LLENAS, FOX NEWS CHANNEL CORRESPONDENT: Welcome to "FOX News Live," I'm Brian Llenas.
Shocking new reports of multiple systemic failures by Uvalde Police responding to the tragic school shooting at Robb Elementary. A warning you may find this video disturbing.
A nearly 80-page report reveals that around 400 officers were at the school and waited over an hour to confront the gunman back on May 24th, most of them were State and Federal Police.
The report also states that the gunman fired at least 100 shots before any officer entered the school.
And we are monitoring a situation at a mall in Indiana. Police are investigating a shooting at Greenwood Park Mall that took place around six o'clock Sunday evening. Police say two people are dead and multiple others are injured.
Authorities also say the shooter has died, but are still asking people to avoid the area.
I'm Brian Llenas. Now back to LIFE, LIBERTY & LEVIN.
LEVIN: Welcome back, America.
Representative Stefanik, you know, we have separation of powers not to investigate former Presidents, but to keep existing Presidents, you know, checked and balanced. How many hearings have been held in the House of Representatives to look at the Manchurian candidate's various financial issues, those of his son, those of his brother, and his failures to uphold the Constitution on the border and elsewhere?
Have there been any hearings at all?
STEFANIK: There have been zero hearings. And in fact, Republicans will hold this administration accountable as we work to earn the majority. There have been zero hearings, particularly primetime hearings, when it comes to the border crisis, the crime crisis in America, the skyrocketing gas prices, as well as the inflation crisis caused by Joe Biden's reckless tax and spend policies, of course supported by House Democrats and Democrats in the United States Senate.
And that's one of the reasons why I believe Democrats are going to fail miserably at the ballot box this year because those are all the top issues that the American people that I hear about from my constituents and that people are hurting across this country because of those failed policies that you talked about in your monologue, Mark.
And when it comes to the illegal ties to crime that Joe Biden is directly involved with, with his son, Hunter, the American people deserve to know that. The fact that the media is -- the mainstream media is participate in essentially a cover up of Hunter Biden's illegal relationships with China, his illegal relationships with other foreign adversaries, and entities that he should not be involved with, and Joe Biden profited from that.
So we intend to investigate. We've already made those document requests. And we are not going to hesitate when it comes to utilizing our subpoena power, because again, the American people deserve accountability and deserve an investigation to what I believe is the Biden crime family.
You have the entire Joe Biden family profiting personally off of Joe Biden's position when he was a sitting Vice President. That is unacceptable in America. And imagine if the Republicans ever did that. Democrats would be investigating absolutely every aspect of that, and yet, in this case, they look the other way on all these shameful, shameless, and illegal controversies from Hunter Biden.
LEVIN: Of course, you won't have the benefit of the media, which the Democratic Party has, but that said, you make a very important point. They're trying to concoct some relationship when this January 6 Committee and the media are to between Trump and the violence that took place on that day, even though they can't square it. They have to go to social media to look at what some kooks had to say. Or you're right, they have to cherry pick information, or you can't cross examine witnesses or have exculpatory information or anything of that sort. And, by all means, we don't want to talk to Nancy Pelosi.
And yet, in the case of Joe Biden, if you're a lawyer, if you're a litigator, you're a prosecutor, you're a political operative. There are stacks of this stuff in front of you showing conflicts, showing moneys, showing you're dealing with foreign entities and you're not registered, raising serious tax -- stacks and stacks of it and they ignore it.
So are the Republicans ensuring -- you say they've asked that the documents be protected and so forth. Are the Republicans ensuring that these documents will be protected even with this January 6 Committee, what is the response from Nancy Pelosi been?
STEFANIK: The response from Nancy Pelosi for the January 6 Committee has been no response. They have not complied with our request to preserve the documents and turn the documents over. So we intend to pursue that when we earn the majority.
When it comes to the multiple controversies of Joe Biden's illegal entanglements with Hunter Biden's illegal business operations, we have made those requests in terms of document preservation. We have made those requests in terms of turning over the documents, they have stonewalled us.
But again, when the House flips as we work to earn the majority, we're going to ensure that transparency and accountability and the actual role of Congress, which is to have oversight, that's an important role that a Democrat-controlled Congress has absolutely failed on, that we hold them accountable.
And it's not just the Biden crime, family issues, it's issues like the border. They have refused to turn over documents and to make administration officials available when it comes to the border crisis.
Joe Biden is not living by the rule of law. In fact, they're avoiding anything and having wide open amnesty policies that are not according to the rule of law, not according to what is again, what Congress passed and it has been an absolute disaster. It's the most open border and most insecure border in our nation's history.
So we intend to use those oversight tools, which are so important in Congress because it ensures good government, it ensures transparency, and ensures accountability on behalf of hardworking American taxpayers.
LEVIN: I noticed in the context of abortion, Joe Biden mentioned that poor 10-year-old little girl who was raped and received an abortion, went from one state to the other. What Joe Biden didn't mention is she was raped by an illegal alien. And what Joe Biden doesn't mention is how many rapes and molestations are occurring on the Southern border as a result of his refusal to secure the border. How many child molestations are taking place? They're not keeping track of that, maybe we can compel them to do that.
Well, I want to thank you, Congresswoman, and keep up the great work and we pray and we hope and We, the People, have to make it happen that the party is changed in the House of Representatives.
All my best. God bless you.
STEFANIK: Thank you, Mark.
LEVIN: We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEVIN: Welcome back, America.
Well, inflation is rampant. I'm no economist and no expert. Larry Kudlow, my next guest is. He is a good buddy. We both worked in the Reagan administration and he worked in the Trump administration as well.
You know, Larry, they spent $1.9 trillion right out of the box, the Democrats did, without a single Republican vote. They sent $1,400.00 in checks for every person in a family, increased unemployment insurance, a child tax credit like we've never seen before, hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars.
They didn't need to do a lot of that because the economy was coming out from under, and they spend $300 billion to $400 billion handing money to the States, particularly the Blue States. As it turns out, they didn't need it.
It's like the worst way to spend money imaginable, just redistributing wealth, printing and printing and printing. And I would even blame this $1 trillion so-called bipartisan Infrastructure Bill, which now they're going to need $1.5 trillion to build whatever they were going to build on top of that, and the Democrats are talking about spending more money, including Manchin.
What's the situation today and what do you make out of all this?
LARRY KUDLOW, FOX BUSINESS NETWORK HOST, "KUDLOW": Well, look it, if you want to go back at the very beginning, Trump gave them a six and a half percent growth rate with one and a half percent inflation and very low interest rates. So it couldn't have been a better transition, if you will, he passed over a terrific economy.
So what you say is quite right. They jam down a $2 trillion spending bill, against the advice, by the way, of even some leading Democratic economists who warned them about the inflationary impact, not just conservatives like us.
The other thing is, I want to mention, I want to add to that, to that witch's brew you describe, they removed Workfare. They removed work requirements from the Federal Assistance Plans. So, now you have a position where people are getting paid not to work with no penalties, and that they destroyed the welfare reform of 25 years ago, which was so successful.
Right now, we find ourselves in an impossible position, a year and a half later, just 18 months later. This economy is running double digit inflation, and I might add the recent inflation report, CPI and PPI, that came out last week, those reports show inflation is more deeply embedded, and is actually increasing, particularly away from the energy situation.
So inflation is deeply embedded, and I think Mark, we are already in the frontend of a recession, but as the Federal Reserve attempts to lower the inflation rate, the recession will deepen. It is inevitable. There is no way out.
But and I will add to this your last point, even Joe Manchin who helped us kill the bill the first time around, he seems to have jumped ship. HE is dancing cheek to cheek with Chuck Schumer, and that's always a bad idea. $400 billion tax hike on small businesses, other assorted taxes could come to a trillion dollars. There may be a trillion dollars in spending, even more Green New Deal tax credits, which are decimating the economy. This whole radical climate activism has been so destructive.
So I can't imagine, if that bill passed, it will increase the inflation rate and it'll deepen the recession. I don't know that it'll pass. I think even some Democrats may have cold feet.
But the sheer gall, the sheer stupidity of that bill, given our situation today is, you know, it's really -- it's hard to believe, absolutely hard to believe.
LEVIN: In 20 months or so, 18 months, this party, this President, this administration have destroyed energy independence, and I don't mean just for today, as you well know, the research, the development, the capital expenditures necessary for energy production, they've stopped it in its tracks.
And now, we are another net importer of energy, where we were a net exporter of energy. It didn't matter what Russia did. We got five percent of our oil from them, we could have handled that. But no.
So we're not only not expanding, we're retracting. And then they attack the victims of their policies. You look at the money, the Federal Reserve, the job of the Federal Reserve, as you know, is to create and ensure sound money, not to be the drug dealer to the drug addicts on the fiscal side, which is what it's been for years now, particularly now.
And the Democrats are economic illiterates. They are completely out of control. You don't spend more money, more debt in the face of inflation, unless you want to ultimately create a depression. What's going on here?
Ideology, I guess.
KUDLOW: Yes. That's the key point. So, you know, from day one, actually, from the Biden campaign, when he pledged to end fossil fuels, this radical climate activism has been an incredibly destructive force. I mean, right now, or this past week, I should say, Biden is over there begging Saudi Arabia for oil.
You know, there's nothing wrong with American oil and gas. In fact, America has the cleanest oil and the cleanest gas. And I might add, America also has the cleanest air and the cleanest water of any of the large industrial countries, but they have attacked this fossil fuel. They have attacked business, Mark.
The credo here is to use Newt Gingrich's phrase, "big government socialism." They want to transform the economy again, from day one, they want to transform the economy away from the principles of free market capitalism and institute a kind of regulatory government planning socialist state, which emphasizes redistribution, and income leveling, not growth, not prosperity. They have no interest in growth.
This is the left, this is the crazy left. This is the Bernie Sanders left that has dominated Biden's presidency up to now. And I don't see any reason why it's going to change.
So you can go every step of the way, okay, big spending, big deficits. As you noted, the Federal Reserve comes in. They print money by buying the bonds and financing the deficits. The inflation rate shoots up from under two, now to double digits and there is no end in sight. And again, it will end in recession, ironically.
And when you listen to them talk, when you listen to them talk, they are in complete denial about the impact of this on the long run range of the economy. That's really the biggest problem here. They don't get it. They don't understand why they're wrong, why modern monetary theory is a failure and why socialist planning is a failure.
These experts are wrong and they are tearing our country apart. They're just tearing our country down.
LEVIN: When we come back, a recession. It could be stagflation. Either case, what does that mean for the average American?
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEVIN: Welcome back.
Larry Kudlow, American people are already suffering, particularly the middle class, lower middle class, as Marx would say. My question to you is, what else can happen to the American people if we have stagflation or a full blown recession?
KUDLOW: Well, you know, already real wages have fallen by, I don't know, five or six percent, and that's really a killer. So you've got high prices, falling real wages. They are making more money from employment, but the money is buying less.
Look, unfortunately, it's the middle class, it is the working folks who are going to get hurt the most by this recession. That's always the case. It's the working folks who get hurt the most by high inflation. That's always the case. And interest rates, by the way, are just starting to go up and that's going to be another big factor.
So, it will be difficult. I mean, look, I believe in America and I believe that this crazy socialist interlude is going to come to an end, Mark. The cavalry is coming in November, I believe that, and I think that this will be thrown out the window.
But between now and then, it is going to be very difficult. I think people should just do what they always do. Americans should do what they always do. They should work hard. They should stick to their own values, disregard the craziness going on in Washington, DC. They should try to take advantage of whatever opportunities are still available.
I don't think they should get so down in the dumps. I mean, you look at these polls, right way, wrong way, right direction, wrong direction, there's an utter rejection of Joe Biden, an utter rejection of Joe Biden. But that's good.
But there's no rejection of American values. There's no rejection of American free market capitalism. There is no rejection of American businesses. A hundred and sixty million people work in business. They know business is a force for good, not bad, and they will disregard what they're hearing from the Biden White House, and from the current Washington, DC. Just work hard, do the best you can to get through this.
You could protect yourself, by the way, in some sense. If you're in the market, I would not sell. I don't think stocks have bottomed yet, but don't sell, keep buying on weakness, because better times are coming.
In the long run, the stock market is still a great place for your IRA and your 401 (k). And if you want to buy some government savings bonds, you should take a look at what's called the I-bonds, which are inflation indexed. They currently yield over 10 percent. That's a good way to protect yourself.
Do things, you know, think about the longer term think about the greatness of the country. We'd been through difficult times before. You and I worked for Reagan. All looked hopeless in 1979 and 1980 and then all of a sudden, he changed policies, you know, cutting taxes, cutting regulations, deregulating energy, and so forth and we wound up with about a three-decade boom.
We will get back to pro-growth policies. We'll just put our shoulder through this, and we're going to be okay. We'll come out on the other side.
People should stay optimistic. I believe that because you're going to bet on America. But don't bet on Joe Biden. He is a loser, and his crowd will be defeated.
LEVIN: Well, you're very positive. I need to have you around more often. I- bonds, I just wrote that down. I would say this to you, my friend. Part of the problem is the government is so centralized and so many decisions are being made by the unelected parts of the government, much of this economy is run by executive orders and regulations and so forth.
So this election is just the beginning. We're going to have to do a lot more in order to get our country back and a lot more culturally, too, because I don't just view this as an economic socialism problem, I view this as a broader ideological problem whether it's in our classrooms or on the border or whether it's the economy or anything else.
This hate America stuff by these American Marxists is killing this country and the sooner we're aware of it and push back, the better.
You have a great show, FOX Business, "Kudlow." You know there's not a lot of people who can get away with that, Kudlow, Hannity, Ruth --
KUDLOW: Levin.
LEVIN: Newt. Yes, well, I don't know about that.
All right, brother. You take care of yourself. Thank you.
KUDLOW: Thank you, Mark.
LEVIN: We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEVIN: Welcome back, America.
I'm concerned, I keep hearing about this landslide for Republicans as if it has already occurred. You have to go out and get the landslide. We need to comprehend once and for all that the Democrats don't play fair. We need to comprehend once and for all that the media hate us. We need to comprehend once and for all that there's all kinds of dark money being spent by billionaires who like what's going on in this country.
We, the People to quote a not so great President, from the bottom up and the middle out, that is the grassroots, as in Virginia and other parts of the country in the past year. We need to rise up and take our country back or we're going to lose it because we're already losing it.
It's up to us and the question is whether there's enough of us left and whether there's enough of us who are going to vote and enough of us who are going to be activists.
I'm counting on you, Levinites out there.
See you next time on LIFE, LIBERTY & LEVIN.
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