when you don't even know where the plane is, is troublesome. [laughter] >> good point. maria: jim grant, do you want to give us a prediction on your expectations for the macro story or the stock market in 2024 in. >> nope. [laughter] wait, wait, i'm supposed to. [laughter] oh, maria, markets will fluctuate, and it is my expectation they good luck if chait in such a way that -- fluctuate in such a way that demonstrates financial value for the investors rather than financial momentum. that that's my hope. maria: great conversation, even. we so appreciate your time, or tomas, congressman dan meuser, jim grant, rebecca walser, todd piro, cheryl casone, thank you so much. thank you so much for joining us, everybody. we will be back at it tomorrow morning, and i hope you'll join us then. have a great tuesday. "varney & company" picks it up. stu, take it away. stuart good morning, everyone. here's the number that affects interest rates, the stock market and your wallet, 0.1%.

that's how much prices went up in the last month. 3.1%, that's how much consumer prices went up in the last 12 months. bottom line, inflation is slowing, prices are still rising but at a slower pace. now, here is the market's reaction. at first stocks took off when that inflation news came out. we've moderated the gains significantly though. the dow may be up 20 points, s&p down 4, nasdaq up 4 points. very different picture from a half hour ago when the numbers came out, stocks went straight up. as for the yield on the 10-year treasury, down just a traction, 4.22. the yield on the 2-year, that's up nearly 3 basis points, 4.73. gas prices, here's the good news, keeps on falling. $3.13 is the average for regular now that we're down 2 cents overnight. texas still has the cheapest gas in the nation, $2.60 a gallon. diesel down one more cent, $4.09

is the price. and bitcoin, where's that this morning? the price is $41,8 to be precise. poll ticks. trump -- politics. trump widening his lead in iowa. the caucuses are only a month if away. he gets 5 51% support from iowa republicans and that's up a very strong from 43% in october. 51% now, 43% in october. what a move. meanwhile, this week the president and his son hundter will be -- hunter will be surrounded by scandal. the house rules committee votes today to authorize an impeachment inquiry. tomorrow hunter's supposed to answer questions about his money from thigh finish china and ukraine. if he refuses to appear, he could be held in contempt of congress. trump surging, biden sliding. the cop28 climate confab is coming to an end. theists wanted a rapid end to all fossil fuel use. theists wanted a continuing -- the realists wanted a continuing

role. the realists won. the greens are mad as a well. one month after san francisco spruced up the city for the visit shi shi skin pipping, we'll update the cleanup and the city counselor who blames capitalism for the homeless mess. how do you get players with a short career to spread out money for their lifetime, and we we will brick you the extraordinary story of tommy cutlets. it is the feel-good story of the day, and we've got it. tuesday, december 12th, 2023. "varney & company" is about to begin. ♪ ♪ rocking around the christmas tree, let the christmas spirit bring ♪ stuart: okay. i suppose we have to play some christmas music. lauren: two more weeks and then you're done. [laughter] stuart: rocking around the christmas -- oh, dear. [laughter] lauren: you know, a lot of

people are in the christmas spirit. stuart: so am i. 9 -- not with this music. we're off to a good start. lauren: i like it. stuart: quiet on the set. we're starting with the latest read on inflation. consumer price report, just got it. see the numbers on the screen. lauren: year with over year, prices up 3.1%. big increase still in the cost of shelter. that rose 6.5% annually. food up nearly 3%. new cars, likely due to the strike, the price of those, there you have it, up 1.3%. surprisingly, black friday, all these sales and deals, clothing prices rose over 1%. and energy prices, as expected, fell because gasoline costs less. i think the bottom line here is the immaculate disinflation story is fake news. there is some progress on inflation, but that last mile for the federal reserve will be very hard to get to. jay powell is up tomorrow. he's got to keep rate hikes,

that optionality, on the table after this report. stuart: well, that'd be something, wouldn't it, if he actually raised interest rates tomorrow. lauren: he has to keep the option open and maybe talk back some is of the rate cut talk. stuart: where are we now on the markets? as i said, they went straight up after the inflation numbers came out, and new we've really moderated. we're up maybe 30 points on the dow,9 on the nasdaq. that's quite a turn around. david nicholas with us. inflation is cooling, interest rates are down. that's got to set the stage for a year-end rally, right? >> yeah, well, we've seen some of that already, stuart. and identify always said we will have a santa claus rally, but the market's been pretty impressive in the last week. i think this market is somewhat delusional. i want the santa claus rally. if but if you look, we haven't seen any progress with inflation. that's up, stuart, from last month at .2%. so inflation is heading higher. i think the market is getting

this wrong, but i don't know if that will impact the santa rally. stuart: when will the fed start cutting rates? >> if you look at what the fed futures did, a week ago the market was looking for rate cuts in march. that, i think, was completely wrong. i don't think we're going to see rate cuts until deep in the year next year, but unemployment, we're at 3.7%, stuart. i know this is an election year, the fed is not supposed to be political. if the fed cuts rates, i don't think it's going to be because there's been any meaningful improvement in inflation, i think it's because they're going to get pressure from the biden white house to cut rates going into the election. that's why i think we see rate cuts, stuart. stuart: the important number for you this morning was the increase in inflation at the core level, and that's why -- >> that's exactly right. stuart: the market didn't hold its gains, it's the core level increase that got to everybody. david, thanks very much for joining us. see you again soon. >> thanks, stu. stuart: we know people are down on the economy, but do they

believe things will get better soon, lauren? lauren: well, i think this is the great dilemma for the. pete: and the re-election campaign. technically, the economy strong and a soft landing is possible, right? but then there's many -- this major disconnect between the data and this overall feeling of anxiety about the economy. bring up the poll. two-thirds of voters, 67%, see no signs of an improving economy. just 29% say they are seeing ed that the worst is over. evidence that the worst is over. it's that disconnect that one democratic pollster is talking about. this is the word she used, it's mystified the pollsters like herself as well as the white house. but why is this so mist iffying for people? -- mystifying for people? if you look at the cumulative effect of higher prices, the extreme cost of housing and a white house that's telling you buy that expensive car and use that electric stove, and you just feel like something's not right. take it all together, that's ooh why you have this sense of

anxiety ab your pocketbook. stuart: i can see that. we've got a new poll, and trump's lead in iowa is growing. this guy's surging. 51% of iowa caucus-goers have him as their first choice, 32 points ahead of second place, governor ron desantis. jason chaffetz with me now. jason, despite all the action in court, trump is surging and seems to be running away with this thing. >> yeah, he is. and the sheer number of polls that are coming up to the same conclusion, it doesn't bode well for those that are trying to canal him. but it really look -- to challenge him, but it really looks bad for joe biden because they think think the devil, and yet doing awfully well in the heartland are, he's doing well nationally. he's beating joe biden in polls across the country. it gives the biden people great pause. and democrats who are scared to death of losing to donald trump. stuart: biden must be frustrated to see his opponent gaining ground, constantly in court gaining ground in the polls.

he's got a basement strategy, and he's sinking in the polls on every issue. he's to got to be one very frustrated guy. [laughter] >> yeah. the problem is he instituted all of his policies. you know? internationally, our it'ses are bombarded -- our it'ses are bombarded were televisions are bombarded with wars and safety issues at home. people are afraid to go out in the streets. immigration's a problem, inflation's a problem. all of these things add up, it's cumulative. and it's because bidenomic e, who i don't think anyone can define what that is, but their policies have been instituted, and they're failing. people don't like it. for me, it's all about safety. safety in your wallet, safety internationally, safety in the streets, and joe biden fails on all three of those. stuart: president zelenskyy from ukraine is in d.c. today. he wants more aid. do you think ukraine gets the money eventually? >> eventually. that's the, that's the big it's a risk here. it's not going to happen right

now. -- asterisk. republicans and very few democrats are consistently saying secure our own borders before you go out and work on somebody else's borders. and it's not about money, stuart. what the republicans want is for the president to enforce the current law. they're not doing that. the problem's getting worse, not better. and so until the president's willing to actually enforce the borders of the united states, he's not going to go out and spend money, tens of billions o- [no audio] stuart: i believe the video just froes up there the -- froze up there. you simply mile when it happens on television. we talk a lot about the republican primary and a trump-biden rematch, but there are other candidates in the race. how do voters feel about, for example, rfk jr.? lauren: he's getting support. this is a monmouth poll, and it finds 1 in 5 voters consider voting for rfk jr. is, but it's not because they like him or his

policies, it's because they know his name. he's a kennedy. 49% say they do not like the idea of this biden-trump rematch. that's an opening for rfk jr. but, frankly, it doesn't move the needle by taking enough votes away from if east candidate, biden or trump. so that makes rfk jr. a placeholder for general dissatisfaction with the current front-runners. stuart: general dissatisfaction, i think you got that right. check futures, please. we've come back from the lofty heights of 8:30 this morning, but we are up. 50 on the dow and 15 up on the nasdaq. virtually no change, s&p. senate minority leader mitch mcconnell says it's time to get serious on border security. roll tape. >> this is what a crisis looks like, mr. president, when it comes to keeping america safe. border security is not a side show. it's ground zero. stuart: only getting worse. and there's this, hunter biden called to appear behind closed doors tomorrow. he's refusing to appear.

he could be charged with contempt of congress. russell fry is a member of the oversight committee. he bring withs us the latest on hunter. that's next. ♪ ♪ annie, are you okay, are you okay, annie? ♪ you've been hit by, you've been hit by a smooth criminal ♪ as an independent financial advisor, i stand by these promises. as a fiduciary, i promise to be the financial steward that you and your family need. i promise to put your long-term financial well-being above any short term transaction. everyone has a big picture. my job is to help you invest in yours. [announcer] charles schwab is proud to support the independent financial advisors who are passionately dedicated to helping people achieve their financial goals. visit findyourindependentadvisor.com

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i suffer with psoriatic arthritis and psoriasis. i was on a journey for a really long time to find some relief. cosentyx works for me. cosentyx helps real people get real relief from the symptoms of psoriatic arthritis or psoriasis. serious allergic reactions, severe skin reactions that look like eczema, and an increased risk of infections, some fatal, have occurred. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms, had a vaccine or plan to or if ibd symptoms develop or worsen. i move so much better because of cosentyx. ask your rheumatologist about cosentyx. stuart: look at this, down 2 points on the s&p, up 50 on the dow industrials. not that much price change despite some interesting inflation numbers this morning. and then there's this, hunter biden indicted on nine tax charges last week. jonathan hunt's with us this morning. what about if hunter re-- what happens if hunter refuses to

appear behind closed doors tomorrow to answer these tax charges? >> reporter: well, tomorrow's appearance at congress, stuart, is actually about the potential impeachment of his father, not actually related to the tax charges. that's all to do with what he's facing here in a california court. but basically from a her plea deal that would have -- a summer if plea deal that would have ended his troubles to a winter fight on multiple fronts, it's been quite a reversal of fortunes for the president's son is. first, his east coast battles. his legal team arguing in a delaware court yesterday that his federal gun possession case should be dismissed because even if a judge balked at the previous plea agreement, prosecutors and hunter biden had signed it. biden's attorneys arguing, quote, as part of that agreement, he sacrificed valuable rights in exchange for the prosecution's agreement not to prosecute the very sort of indictment that it has brought here. and the lawyers accused prosecutors of bowing to

political pressure to pursue charges against hunter biden which is the same argument they continue to make over his west coast legal fight where he faces those most serious charges, nine tax-related counts including three felonies. >> hunter was linked in file -- late in filing and paying taxes in certain years. that is a given as are millions and millions of americans who do the same thing. the difference is, millions and millions of americans who do the same thing are not then confronted with a 56-page, 9-count indictment. >> reporter: four hunter biden d make his first court appearance here this week with, but as we mentioned, he's got a pretty full calendar already given that republicans in congress are demanding he show up on capitol hill tomorrow for a deposition related to those potential impeachment charges against president biden. it's going to be a very busy week for the younger biden. stuart?

stuart: yes, it is. jonathan, thank you very much, indeed. south carolina congressman russell fry joins me now. congressman, what are you going to ask hunter, assuming he does appear before you tomorrow? >> i think it's important to nail down what we don't know. we don't know the extent -- we know a lot about joe biden's involvement, but we don't know what decisions may have been made under the color of the unite government that affected -- the united states government that affected his family's finances. we know $15 million transferred to members of the biden family, that joe biden sat in on at least 22 meetings and phone calls with his son hunter. so coloring these, what services did you provide, what did you construct? what was, what were the expectations, or was this just a shell game for your family? stuart: if he appears in an open house investigation, he can claim security is the reason why i can't answer these questions. that's why you really want to get him behind closed doors where security is not an excuse.

what will you do if he refuses to appear behind closed doors? >> well, i think if he refuses to appear, look, this is a lawfully-issued subpoena. he's been commanded to appear before the house of representatives. we are an investigative body not only from the impeachment inquiry side of this, but really on how we can reform the disclosure laws in the united states. this is committeesly -- completely within the purview of the house of representatives, and and if he doesn't appear, contempt of congress should be on the table. stuart: jamie raskin is trying to persuade some republicans not to proceed with the inquiry. is he having any luck? >> i don't know that he is. if you lack at jamie raskin's statements, he has constantly moved the goalpost much like the biden administration if. he said all we would find in bank records are papa john's receipts and starbucks. he is acting more like the chief defense counsel for the biden family than as the ranking member of the committee. so i hope it doesn't stick, but we have a very narrow majority, and we just need to make sure

that we do this right way. i'm told that -- [inaudible] was very eloquent and said months ago before we had even more evidence that now the time -- the time to launch an impeachment inquiry. stuart: i'm told republicans are likely the launch e it, and it's quite possible that articles of impeachment, that's the full charges, could be laid next spring which means that you've got a 3 or 4-month period here with all kinds of things coming out right as we're going into the caucuses and the primaries. that's to not good for the bidens. -- that's not good for the bidens. >> no. i mean, in fact, this whole year hasn't been good for the bidens. every single week that has gone by has gotten worse. there's not been a week or shred of evidence that has given them some sort of cover or insulation. it's gotten worse and worse for them. stuart: and yet on the other side of the coin, it's getting better and better for donald trump. the court cases don't seem to be hurting him at all. in fact, he's summering. it's a juxtaposition -- he's

surging. it's a youngs juxtaposition, isn't it? >> it is. look, 70% of americans including 40% of democrats i think that joe biden was involved in his son's business and that he did things that were unethical and illegal. and so that doesn't seem to be sticking for president trump, but it is for president biden. stuart: congressman russell fry, thanks for being with us. big week coming, appreciate it. lauren's back. congressman dean phillips, what he's he saying about impeachment? lawyer lausch he said, here's a quote, i don't see the evidence of it but, yes, when your own son and your own brother are clearly at the very least unethical and at worth doing illegal things, my goodness, of course the country pace attention to it. people -- pays attention to it. people do believe it perhaps makes him unelectable. somehow it conflates him with the trump family's indiscretions. now, the house will likely vote on the impeachment inquire ily tomorrow. they're locking down votes particular particularly by the republican congressmen in the

districts that joe biden won who think that just authorizing this inquiry will help get the evidence against biden through subpoena power. speaker of the house mike johnson wrote in an op-ed in "usa today" that the ed against biden just -- the evidence against biden just cannot be ignored. he's following the facts, and that's why they're doing that. but dean phillips is worried just these accusations even if this goes nowhere, they could be damaging to the president as he runs again for '24. stuart: think of the political environment as we go forward. the president impeached, all kinds of evidence coming out, that's just not good for the biden team. lauren: no. stuart and yet trump surgings. it's a juxtaposition of things here, isn't it? moving on, check futures real fast. the market opens in seven minutes. dow up 40, minor losses for the s&p9 and the nasdaq. the opening bell is next. finish. ♪ come on, baby, give me a little more you ♪

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stuart: three minutes to the opening of the market, dow up 30, s&p down 5, nasdaq down -- up 4. not much movement despite a very interesting inflation report. mike lee's with us this morning. let's change the subject. give me, please, your top a.i. picks as we head into 2024. what's top of the list? >> stuart, nvidia, marvelle and amd are my top picks not just for a.i., but for the overall market. as we've discussed before, this artificial intelligence is this massive gold mine that nearby's quite found gold in that gold mine yet, but these three companies are sitting right outside and selling pick axes. you cannot begin to figure out how your business can profit with artificial intelligence without the computing power, and you cannot build that computing power without nvidia, out amd and, to a lesser degree, marvelle. stuart nvidia and advanced micro

devices, they make chips. what does marvell technology do? >> same thing. they're just the small est out of the three. what's going on, the overhang on nvidia's stock is large investors are concerned with their basically 1100% market share $1000%. you can't be buying all of your parts from one supplier, so expect mar marvell a and advanced micro devices to get to 1-2%, and in a $100 million market, that is a meaningful amount of revenue especially for a company like marveling l. for them to add an extra $500 million is meaning. these chips, the gpus, general processing units, are expensive, and they are hay margin businesses for all of these -- high margin businesses for all of these company. i think we are just scratching the surface. we're not even in the fist inning. i think next year the spending

on this is going to explode. stuart: quickly on microsoft, they jumped into a.i. have they yet shown us they're making money out of it or that it's increasing revenue from it? >> yeah, absolutely, stuart. because that computing power is done on the cloud. and so microsoft's a azure product, okay, building this infrastructure for these companies, these large corporations that want to integrate artificial intelligence into their business, need to do so on the cloud with chips from the chip makers as well as the cloud if business from not only microsoft, but amazon as well. stuart: okay, got it. thanks very much for joining us, mike lee. see you again soon. now, the backdrop to the market action this morning is the inflation report. consumer prices went up 3.1% over the past year, but big problem today, the core rate of inflation if actually went up, and that's not what investors wanted to see. the market is now open. we've got a very small gain for the dow industrials, probably up about 40, 34 points, something like that.

and we've -- the dow is at 36,4. well, it's a split there. you've got about one-third to, what's the split? about a half down, half up, roughly speaking. that's a mixed market, for sure. the s&p 500, that has opened with a fractional loss, .09% down. lauren: still above 4600 though. stuart: yes, it is, that's right. it closed at the hay of the year, didn't it, on friday? nasdaq come process sit, down just a tiny fraction, .03%. let's have a look at big tech. probably not that much movement. amazon up, meta, up. no big price changes. but you do see a big price change at oracle. they're way down this morning, 10% lower. lauren: wow. stuart: they reported earlier, what's the problem? lauren: growth in their cloud infrastructure business is slowing. growing but slowing, and that industry competes with amazon and microsoft. so is they're competing with the big guys. the second problem isn't really

a problem. look, larry ellison came out and said demand for their data centers because of artificial intelligence demand is, quote, over the moon. but oracle just can't get those data centers up and running fast enough. they've actually teamed up with companies like microsoft to help them out. so overall, and this is why the stock is really getting discounted, those expectations games, their revenue missed expectations, and the stock is getting punished as a result. stuart: i saw this and thought this is a huge problem for the whole electric vehicle market, big trouble for ford's electric f-150. lauren: and that's the one that is actually selling. they cut their 2024 production in half. they are now planning for average volume of around 1600 next year, average sol -- volume from 32000 to 1600 in 2024 -- 3200. that's surprising since lightning sales have increased, but if you look at the numbers sold, it's only about 20,000 of

them. it's part of this canceling or postponing of the $12 billion in ev investment. it now took the iconic f-a 150 is slowing down. i mean, what gives here? stuart: we're not buying them, are we? we're not buying electric vehicles. lauren: because they're luxury vehicles. if you look at the third quarter, 25 the % of all luxury cars were battery electric. it's 3% for overall cars. because of the high price tag, evs are considered luck -- luxury, and not many americans can afford manager so expensive. stuart: they can't. hasbro, i me they're slashing jobs. i want to know how many -- lauren: such a depressing story. 20% of jobs, 1100 workers will be laid off over the next two years, but the timing, getting this announcement two weeks before christmas? that's when toy makers do almost half of their annual sales. why? i think barbie at mattel, they ate hasbro's lunch. mattel's okay getting through

all of this, but what hasbro toy is going underneath the christmas tree this year? transformers, yeah. i bought some for my son. monopoly. but sales have disappointed, and they expect that their sales this year to fall. toy sales are down, and now you have another round of layoffs at hasbro being announced two weeks before christmas. stuart: old line toys are out of fashion. it's new electronic stuff that kids want. stuart: a lot of the toy merricks try to do the nostalgia. do you remember monopoly? let's do new versions of it to get adults to play again with their kids. it's just not working success any. stuart: the i used to like monopoly. i won. lauren: i'm sure you did. stuart: show me --, please. lauren: to keep an open dialogue about artificial intelligence, how it impacts the work force. they want to ease human worker anxiety about hair jobs being

replaced by artificial intelligence. microsoft is arguably the leading player in a.i., advancing it. so now they're teaming up with the afl-cio to just quell the nerves a little bit. it's a great public relations move if no matter to how you look at it, especially sending a message to the are regular laters who are going to come in and say these are the rules of the road. well, we warned our workers about this, we trained them. we've kept this open dialogue with the union that represents 60 labor unions and 12.5 million workers. stuart: it's a good defensive move in case of future investigation. i know that epic games, i know they've won their antitrust lawsuit against google. until me why this is important. laura: lauren: google will appeal, but if they lose on appeal, they would make less money from app developers that that pay them commissions as high as a 30% to use the google play store. so jurors found that google operates an illegal monopoly, so we could see a flag ifmented market -- fragmented market come out of all of this.

microsoft is planning to launch a new app store for games on both iphone and android smartphones as soon as next year according to the financial times. stuart: is out because of this ruling? lauren: no, that was in the works, but knowing about this ruling, it opens up the markets when it comes to the app stores. stuart: okay. lauren: interesting about this case for google is thaw lost at the games -- they lost to epic games, but in 2021 apple won v. us epic games. so what changed? one lose and one win. i think the bottom line is you'll have more openings in th. stuart: okay. wendy's, fast food operation. how are they using a.i.? if. lauren: you speak to a chat bot when you pull up to the drive-through, not a human. you peek to the -- speak to the computer. it's called fresh a.i. they've been testing it in ohio, and they've found that it improved the speed at the drive-through by 22 seconds. but in fast food, that's a lot. and they got the order right

without the intervention of a human 86% of the time. stuart: that's pretty good. lauren: the humans never remember the straws, the ketchup, extra napkins, will the chat bot? i don't know. stuart: i'm sure it could be programmed. lauren: i always have to say, did you put kevin ketchup in there -- ketchup in there? sue stuart it used to be a human operator -- lauren: but the other side is it frees the how manies up to prepare more orders faster. stuart that's true too. lauren: no matter how you look at it. stuart: change the subject -- [laughter] nearly 5.5 million people have already had the flu this season. everybody i know has a cough. it's not the flu. i want to know what a it is. of -- we have a there here for that. it's been a month since san francisco cleaned up ahead of xi jinping's visit. what's it look like now? many americans are scared for the future and struggling to feed their families. larry kudlow takes on the cost

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♪ stuart: consumer prices rose 3.1% in the last 12 months. edward lawrence joins me, he's at the white house right now. what's the administration saying about these numbers, edward? >> reporter: they're saying that overall, year other year, the overall inflation is ticking down slightly, which is true. but the problem is that it's the rate -- prices are still not coming down. prices are still going up, and it's the rate of increase that is actually slowing. that is something everybody needs to remember re. now, cpi inflation, you mentioned, 3.1%, it has not had a 2 in front of that number

since 2 months into joe biden's term in office. the federal reserve is really catching core inflation. it is now at 4 president. -- 4%. that is double the 2% target that the federal reserve wants to see. that includes the rising cost of labor which is passed on. >> well, here's what's happened in america, everybody has fallen behind. especially if you're par or middle income, you've fallen behind even further. so this situation with bidenomics or whatever you want to call it, i just call it stupid economic policy. >> reporter: so what you need to look at is from the month president biden came into office, from that date overall inflation is up more than 17%. energy is up about 35%. electricity alone is up more than 24% since january 2021 until november 2023. food at the grocery store up about 20% since president biden took office. now, these are the things the president's been saying for 34 months will be cheaper and has gone back to blaming companies for inflation.

>> let me be clear, any corporation that's not brought their prices back down even as inflation's come down, even as supply chains have been rebuilt, it's time to stop the price gouging and giving the american consumer a break. >> reporter: but what we're hearing from other administration officials is they need a little more time to get this forced transition and bring prices down. we've been hearing that for the past 34 months. back to you, stu. stuart: edward lawrence, thank you. larry kudlow 's with us this morning. larry, a 3.1% inflation rate. are wage increases keeping up? >> they -- the answer is, no. real wages have gone down, i think, 3.7% over the course of the biden administration. some months recently there have been some small increases in real wages, but for the point to point, no, heavy gone down

nearly -- they've gone down nearly 4%. you know, i read that article that you sent me or your producers sent me on food prices. food prices, let's see, groceries up 211% -- 21%. this is from february 2021 through november, today's report. groceries, up 211% -- 2 11th. -- 21%. food away from home, up 19.9. call that a restaurant. but even inside those numbers, shopping forked food, cereals and bakery, up 25%. dairy, up 16.4%. fruit and veggies up 13.5%. i want you to eat your veggies, stu. beef is up 22 percent. chicken is up 4. chick -- 24%. chicken is very good, stu, or it's calorie type stuff. [laughter] here's really the killer, fertilizer is up 35.9%.

fertilizer. why is that important? two reasons. number one, biden's war against fossil fuels has raised the price of fertilizer along with the price of all other fuels. they're raised it substantially because we're not producing enough to meet demand. second point, fertilizer is a crucial ingredient in farm and farm products. so in other words, one reason why food is skyrocketing over the past three years is fertilizer is skyrocketing, and that can be traced to the war on fossil fuels -- institute which -- >> so there's one last piece here, one last piece here. in this climate meeting in the uae, cop28, they can't agree on anything. they've thrown out the temperatures. they can't agree with on lowering carbon by 1.5% which is very amusing to me. but the best part was the host, okay, the sultan from the uae

who said if you're going to kill fossil fuels, we're all going to go back to caves. [laughter] and he won't sign on on that. i love this guy. i've never met him, but i love this guy because he speaks the truth. and meanwhile, the biggest carbon emitter in the world is china by far, and they didn't even bather -- bother to show up at the conference. stuart: you're right about this cop28 conference. it's winding down. it's a total fall your. the delegates are divided and angry. the latest deal does not include the phasing out of fossil fuels. the greens are furious about this. my question is, larry, was this summit a message to biden's green new deal, the message being it won't work and voter won't buy it? >> well, they're in the listening to that message. the last point you made, voters don't buy it, okay? stuart: that's right. >> every time donald trump says drill, baby, drill, every time he says that he gets a huge, you

know, applause line. people go berserk. because, because they do not want high gasoline prices, they do not want high energy prices in general. they do not want high food prices. and people realize that they want to keep driving their gas-powered cars. this ev, electric vehicle, mandate is a complete failure with. the consumers don't want it. they're all sitting on lots. you've covered this before, you and i have talked about this before. no, the bidens do not get this message. in fact, camilla maris -- kamala harris went out there and said we're going to spend another trillion dollars, trillion dollars to regulate methane, okay? so what does that mean? according to rick perry, former energy secretary, on our show friday that would close down 300,000, get it, 300,000 oil and gas wells.

close them down. all right? and that will drive up prices even more, and that will throw people out of work. so, no, the bidens have no common sense whatsoever. stuart: interesting stuff. larry, great. we'll see you this afternoon, 4 p.m. eastern right here on fox business. larry kudlow. thanks so much, see you soon. of. coming up, we were just speaking with larry about cop28, and as we said, it ended in division and anger. you'll hear my editorial on the conference failure at the top of the hour. and ukraine's president zelenskyy, he's in washington today. he's making his case for more wartime funding. that report after this. ♪ more, more, more. ♪ how do you like it, how do you like it? ♪ ♪ meet the traveling trio. each helping to protect their money with chase. wooo! tools that help protect.

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i suffer with psoriatic arthritis and psoriasis. i was on a journey for a really long time to find some relief. cosentyx works for me. cosentyx helps real people get real relief from the symptoms of psoriatic arthritis or psoriasis. serious allergic reactions, severe skin reactions that look like eczema, and an increased risk of infections, some fatal, have occurred. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms, had a vaccine or plan to or if ibd symptoms develop or worsen. i move so much better because of cosentyx. ask your rheumatologist about cosentyx. stuart: ukraine's president certificate hen sky is in washington today. he's trying the make his case for billions in wartime aid that's being held up in congress. hillary vaughn on capitol hill. hillary, is there any hope for a ukraine aid deal before the holidays? >> reporter: stuart, honestly, it's not looking good for ukraine president zelenskyy. this is a tough sell, to convince people on

capitol hill to give ukraine more money after they've already shelled out $118 billion of taxpayer cash to the country. president biden has not had any luck convincing congress to get the aid through, so he invited zelenskyy here in person to give it a go. but not everyone is excited to see him. >> zelenskyy comes to town and demands that you give him, the american taxpayer gives him another $61 billion and, oh, by the way, if you want to secure your border first, you are actually a putin puppet. he said this publicly today. if he was smart, he would apply pressure to biden to come to the negotiating table on the border. >> reporter: so for many republican lawmakers, this really isn't about ukraine, it's about the border and getting democrats and biden item board to do what it takes to secure it. the white house is negotiating a deal on the border but also trying to persuade republicans to go ahead and green light the ukraine aid separately, pitching it as a way to get back at that has

maas -- hamas. >> if congressional republicans want to be serious about joining president biden in countering iran, there is no better way to do so than to vote for this supplemental. iran has been critical to putin's war effort, and they also have assisting hamas. they sponsored hamas. >> reporter: so it's unlikely congress passes anything on ukraine or the border before they leave for the holidays at the end of the week. and it's also interesting to note that the lead republican negotiator on the border deal, senator james lankford, says the white house has been busy talking the democrats about the deal but has not talked to republicans about it in four days. stuart? stuart: not great. hillary, thank you very much, indeed. quick check of the markets, please. dow's up 5, nasdaq's down 24. still ahead, overland college ousted its professor of peace over alleged war crimes, anti-semitism and sexual

misconduct. brian are brenberg reacts to that. elise stefanik's office blasted snl for, quote, spewing anti-semitic trash mocking the congresswoman. brian kilmeade is liz about it. what will an impeachment inquiry to for jim jordan's case e against the bidens? i'll ask the congressman himself. and border towns, the mayors thereof, are fed up i. they say the administration is ignoring them. brandon judd will deal with that. the 10:00 hour is next. ♪ finish have a holly, jolly christmas, and in case you didn't hear -- ♪ oh, by golly, have a holly jolly christmas this year. ♪ as an independent financial advisor,

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