necessarily panned out in the way of profits. right now they're sticking to their core business and continuing to take market share, it will probably bode well for them in the stock price. kelly: i'm very qweer just to see what happened. i became a formula 1 plan for watching netflix's drive to survive. they have got that down pat. thank you for your time. brooke may, thank you. >> thank you. kelly: make it rain, guys. the dow is heading to the 6th record close of the year. it is up two straight days. s&p 500 and nasdaq close up four days in a row. you know we could have another record close. you're going to have to make sure to tune in tomorrow. i will be back in for liz claman. maybe we'll even get a record for the s&p 500. [closing bell rings] that will do it for "the claman countdown." "kudlow" is next. ♪. david: hello, folks and welcome to a special edition of "kudlow." i'm david asman in for larry

kudlow. well president biden is facing increasing pressure to act with a stronger hand following yet another attack by iran backed houthi rebels in the red sea yesterday. the total number of attacks on commercial shipping vehicles continue to rise as critics are looking to the president to take more action. grady trimble is live in d.c. with all the details. grady. >> reporter: david, after pausing operations in the red sea major shipping companies are starting to resume them but they still face the threat of attacks from houthi rebels as they do that. french shipping company, cma, is the latest to announce it will gradually increase the number of ships going through the red sea. they follow maersk but just yesterday houthi militants claimed responsibility for yet another attack on a container ship bringing the total number of attacks on international vessels to 21 and this one comes after defense secretary lloyd austin announced operation prosperity guardian, aimed at

protecting commercial ships moving through the region. on tuesday, the u.s. navy shot down three houthi-fired iranian provided anti-ship ballistic missiles. republicans say though president biden needs to do more. >> every time you hear the secretary of defense, the secretary of state, jake sullivan, the national security advisor come to the mike and say our number one goal is non-escalation or de-escalation, tehran hears that as opportunity, that the united states is not going to hit back in a way that hurts us and that's why you're seeing these attacks continue. >> reporter: republicans like congressman walls there, senator lindsey graham on fox news earlier they say it is time to hit back whether in the form of a cyberattack, an attack on infrastructure or some other means. they say, david, it is necessary not only to protect the ships moving through the region but also u.s. servicemembers

stationed there. david. david: grady trimble, thanks very much, grady. for more on the biden administration's response if you can call it that on the attacks in the middle east, bring in tim kennedy, former army ranger, sniper, special forces operator and cofounder of save our allies. tim, thank you, for being here. after the october 7th massacre in israel john kirby and general austin came out and they promised americans, they promised americans they would not stand for the attacking americans. that they would deter all attacks. i think by then, a week after october 7th, there are about 15 or 20 attacks. they failed in that promise. they failed to deter those attacks. is it fair to say that their mission has failed? that they have to look at a completely different mission now? >> well, when you talk about deterrents, deterrents is something that comes from a position of strength. david: yes. >> you know 9/11 happened i think the whole entire world

looked at what deterrents looks like. as we bombed people into oblivion and went into war. when you look at world war ii, or even desert storm, world war ii we're talking two nuclear bombs to let them know now this is the end of the war and the original gulf storm, desert storm in the gulf war we destroyed everybody that stood in our way. that send as signal of deterrence. whatever this current foreign policy is this is not deterrents this is kind of status quo, i'm checking a box. it is absolutely not deterrents from a position of strength. david: you know what bothers a lot of folks who worked for the previous administration is that the biden administration was dealt such a good hand. i mean they had the accords, the "abraham accords," donald trump got very tough with all of our enemies to the point where we didn't have to worry as much. jon ratcliff, the former dni was speaking about that last night. i just want to play a clip of that and get your reaction.

roll tape. >> the biden administration's running out of terror cells to get pushed around by in the middle east and of course all those groups that i just mentioned, jason, they're all controlled by, funded by iran and what's so frustrating, when you talk about you know the intelligence that i've seen is, you know at the end of our administration we handed the biden administration peace in the middle east. we handed them the "abraham accords" and we handed them iran that was bankrupt, that was incapable of funding these type of terror activities. david: tim, is that a fair assessment? >> yeah, it's fair and it is deadly accurate. iran has been funding hamas $80 million a year for the past three years. when the end of the last administration, when president biden took office, things immediately changed where they all of sudden have billions of dollars of extra capital that they're able tip vest in interests contrary to ours.

every single one of the terror cells we're fighting whether hamas, hezbollah, houthis, all are being funded by iran. iran is a direct supporter and direct enemy of ours. they're not doing it in a traditional way of state on state conflict but in these new rules of war we are at war with hem but we're not fighting them as a pure adversary and we have. otherwise expect more of this. expect more of our allies be targeted by terrorist organizations or violent extremist organizations. that is how we cut the head off of a snake. that head is iran. be absolutely perfectly clear, they're funding every single one of our enemies that are killing americans right now. david: you know the administration is afraid of this escalation they would see if there was a more direct on iran itself but we haven't seen that we have taken iran on through the years, going way back to ronald reagan 1988, something called operation preying man tis, one of our ships was taken

out by a mine, we took out half the iranian navy. they didn't attack and cowered in the palaces in iran and afraid to attack us for the rest of the reagan administration. donald trump hit back hard, hitting soleimani, making it clear through the maximum pressure campaign they were not going to make any oil money in order to feed terrorists or create something like we saw on october 7th. when we hit them hard directly, they cower more than try to hit back. they're bullies. >> yeah. that is deterrents you're talking about. fighting back from a position of strength. you're very right, they went back to their palaces and cowered like cowards. that is what they are. the current fight we're fighting against them is a war of proxies. their terrorist cells are attacking allies and us indirectly. until we directly attack them,

until they understand when they support these organizations when they attack us we'll hold them accountable. we'll have to continue to endure the exact same out comes like october 7th. david: tim, i'm wondering if it is not too late? they made their clear assessment what the biden administration does or what they don't do? they smell blood in the water. they smell the fear. there is a lot of animal instincts in these engagements and they smell the fear from the biden administration. they're escalating their attacks right now as we speak. >> nonstop. they are pushing every single button diplomatically, information in cyber wars. they are doing it militarily, they're fighting us militarily right now. they're using proxies. they continue to push the envelope as what they can get away with. until it is never too late for them to be reminded what it looks like in america. we have the most powerful military to exist in the existence of human existence. that is how powerful the

american military is. david: right. >> every once in a while the world needs to see what america is capable of and right now i can't think of a better time to remind our adversaries treating us like enemy in a war what it looks like to cross america and to hurt americans. david: tim, there is another problem which they haven't just been spending money on their terrorist friends. they have been spending a lot more money on their nuclear program and they have had tens of billions of dollars to do that. they're ramping it up. apparently they're getting very close. what happens if they get the bomb? before you answer we know, we don't know but we suspect that israel may have their hands on atomic bomb we don't know about. we suspect that saudi arabia may have -- so there could be deterrents from within the middle east but what should we do if they have end up with a bomb and start to experimenting with it? >> i mean when you look at our response, there will never be

the pure like russia is but, surrounding russia are american military bases. david: yes. >> it is so evident, it is so clear that if russia crossed that proverbial line of an arms race and pushed us too far we would obliterate -- there would no longer be the existence of russia. iran keeps knocking on that door and i do not want to be in the same position where we have to subround that country with military bases. we have had many. we've been holding them a very long time. but those bases are currently being attacked by iran proxies, drone strikes, violent organizations, attacking our military bases staged in the region f they get a bomb israel will have to strike first because iran said countless times they will wipe israel off the face of the planet. israel will have to take them at their word. for israel to exist, from the river to the sea, iran will make

that reality of eliminating israel on the face of the planet. we can't allow our allies -- david: israel clearly knows the score. they know what they cannot let their enemies get away with even though people in the white house don't seem to know those red lines as much as israel. i agree with you, that israel would not let it happen. tim kennedy thanks for being here. >> appreciate it. god bless. david: you too. coming up two things are true. the stock market is definitely on a roll to close out the year in a positive note but two, americans think the economy stinks. will the views of wall street and main street somehow converge in 2023? we'll be asking art laffer when "kudlow" continues. ♪

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♪. david: so with the stock market almost too good to be true will our economy begin to look better to voters heading into the election in joining me now is art laffer, former reagan economist, medal of freedom recipient and author of, "taxes have consequences." art laffer, great to see you, my friend. happy new year, close to happy new year. >> great to see you, david. you too.

david: you both love it with markets are up. it is better for everybody. >> yes. david: the s&p to put a fine point on it is up 24% year-to-date. that is a huge rise year to year for the stock market but voters by a big majority think the economy stinks and even 61% of democrats feel that the economy is not doing well, that it is doing badly. 61%. i think it is 93%, yeah, 93% of republicans think it is bad and independents 85%. that has to worry the white house bad enough but when they see 61% of democrats think it is bad, when will those two truths converge if they will at all? that the economy, feels good and that the investors think it feels good? will they converge at all in 2024? >> do remember, david, the a lot of this rally in the stock market has been very recent and the market is telling us what will be, not what has been.

so you've got this forward-looking indicator and then you have people making comments what they think the economy is right now and how they feel right now and let me just give you where the huge disconnect comes here. david: please. >> people care about jobs, not about unemployment rates and so when you look at total jobs it's way down. we have a very low employment rate even though the unemployment rate is low, people left the labor force. so jobs are way down which is what people feel. second thing that's really important is people worry about prices, not about inflation. david: yes. >> now inflation is related to prices over long periods of time but right now prices are up, i think it is 17.7% since biden took office. eastern though the inflation rate is down quite substantially, the prices are not down at all and it is prices that are killing people. so they obviously are upset and the last thing is gdp growth, this last quarter was almost 5%, which is a very nice number,

except gdp is what's really low. it's not kept track with what happened after trump left office. it's not caught back up yet at all and they are looking not at growth rates, people at output, not output growth. david: right. >> all these things there are a disconnect how people report the news as being low inflation, low unemployment and very high gdp growth. no one cares about those. they care about the levels of this. that is why people are feeling bad. they will continue to feel bad for quite sometime to come and they are correct. the reporters are these numbers are not correct. david: i throw another thing in there and that's the rates. because the federal reserve had to cut its inflation on their own. they have not had supply from the legislators and economy, that is the best way to curb inflation we know that, create more things by having a stronger

economy. the administration has not been helping at the supply side so it all has been based on interest rates and result of that the american dream, the mortgage rates have just skyrocketed. i was amazed to see that the monthly payments, the average monthly payments, that is how much the rates have gone up, but average monthly payments to put a fine point on it, $1700 before biden took office. look at it now, $3322 is the average monthly payment on a new home. >> there you go. david: that puts the american dream out of reach. >> it does. that's what people feel and know and what is reported especially on other channels by the way but here too, what is reported is not really what people care about. they care about prices johns, mortgage rates compared to what it was before not whether it is going up or down. the other thing that is important as well, everywhere in the world these same phenomenon are occurring. inflation is coming down

everywhere else. prices are stablizing. all this stuff is global phenomenon. interest rates are the same everywhere, so when you look at it it is not just the u.s., not just the u.s. fed it is the global economy and when you look at the global economy things are not looking good. china is in a freefall, chile is doing badly. europe is terrible. i always joke britain is the such bad shape they don't call it the pound anymore, it is called the ounce. this makes the gestalt of the whole world of negative voters. we'll see the results of that in combing november. we will. look at california, california and michigan. two states, one of the two only states that raised their income tax rates this year. california's tax rate now, highest tax rate is 14.4%, david. david: wow. we're pretty close to it here in new york by the way yeah. new york ain't far away. of course illinois is raising its rates as well. >> there you go. david: let me ask a partisan

question. it is not a partisan question. >> sure. david: if donald trump wins the election and calls up art laffer and says what should i do to get this economy really roaring again in the right direction, what would you tell him? >> i would tell him go back and do what you did before which was great. the tax cuts and jobs act, transparency, all these things are wonderful. there are other things i like him to look to when he does the next one looking forward. he did all the right things back then. would i especially david, want him to continue with this warp speed with this medical development. that is one of the few areas where government spending really had major results. i told you about my daughter rachel who you know from "the wall street journal" days. david: yeah. >> she got metastatic melanoma. if it hadn't been for donald trump she would be dead today. the immunotherapy trump pushed through with the mrna all of that saved my daughter's life. he was just wonderful as president on all the objective issues that i care about and i

just think he should go back and do it again. david: energy independence. >> energy independence, of course. all these things he did was great. david: if biden is elected do you expect to see same of the same, kind ever moseying along? >> i don't know. we had a lot better time that the republicans took the house. before when the democrats controlled the house and senate it was worse and i think that explains a lot of why the stock market is up. david: okay. >> if republicans keep house and senate i think it will be much less damaging biden but the border will still be the same. we'll still have higher prices. we'll still have all the bad stuff. there will be no move towards making things better under biden. but i think the bad, bad, bad biden is behind us unless they win in a landslide, if they do that people deserve the governments they get, david. it is nair fault. the earth they're score scorch

ing. they made it clear. smoot-hawley tear let to depression. david: all it is connected. >> led toe wars on a world scale. david: great to see you, art happy new year. >> just wonderful, david, thank you. david: coming up, austria's top universities severing ties with harvard for its failure to condemn anti-semitism on campus but somehow harvard's president survives. will hear sadder wake up from its bigoted woke ways? we'll ask former harvard law professor alan dershowitz. also crises at home and abroad are piling up. where is president biden? he is on another vacation, this time in the caribbean. really? joe concha, garrett ventry join me next all when "kudlow" returns.af ♪. ti

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♪. david: after a surge of anti-semitism at u.s. colleges students are turning to title six to hold schools accountable, a move legal experts say could significantly impact federal funding for these colleges. lydia hu is here in new york with more on this. lydia. >> reporter: hi, there, david. students are suing the university of pennsylvania, nyu, carnegie mellon and berkeley in separate complaints. they claim the universities violated title six of the civil rights act of 1964 which prohibits programs that receive federal funds from discriminating based on race, color or national origin. lawyers say now some jewish students are scared on these campuses because of the school's response to student protests and reports of anti-semitism. one student we spoke with is suing the university of pennsylvania and described to us a recent on-campus protest.

listen. >> when there is class happening on campus and people are with bullhorns chanting intifada, which means armed uprising throughout campus, that is not allowed. when this happened for eight hours on a monday, it was during midterms. >> reporter: the lawsuit asks the courts to order the universities, enforce their own codes of contact to protect jewish students. they want professors terminated, students kicked out and tuition refunded. the campus protests are often defended as exercises of free speech but the former assistant u.s. secretary of education for civil rights calls that ironic. >> there are universities that have terrible reputation when it comes to free speech. they censor and punish people for saying things that are politically incorrect and yet when it comes to anti-semitism suddenly they discover the first amendment. >> reporter: we contacted the

universities. they have either not gotten back or declined to comment. the student lawsuits come as the department of education is separately investigating dozens of colleges and school districts for possible title six violations since october 7th. legal experts say the information uncovered by the student lawsuits could fuel the federal investigations. that's important because those investigations could result in the loss of federal funding. david? david: wow, lydia, thank you very much. joining me now is alan dershowitz, professor emeritus at harvard law school and author of, war against the jews, how to end hamas barbarism. you wrote that one in a hurry but it is necessary and is necessary. i wonder if the people in harvard running that place actually get it? when you look at the president who had that horrific testimony in front of congress where she essentially said, depended on the context, whether anti-semitism was correct or not. then you had revelations about

her plagiarism and she is still there? >> not only that but she is supported by the vast majority of the harvard faculty including many of the jewish pack faculty so craven and afraid of retaliation and speak their heart and conscience they provide support for a president who will help not only destroy harvard university but she is helping to mainstream anti-semitism. she was the queen of cancel culture or censorship when it came to anybody saying anything slightly negative about privileged minorities, blacks, gays, but when it comes to genocide against the jews suddenly she discovered free speech. you can't have free speech for some and not for others. the worst thing about her testimony is the double standard she applied but i want to go beyond the universities of the mainstreaming of anti-semitism.

what was the most highly attended movie, "the color purple," alice walker virulent antisemite said terrible things about jews like kanye west. unlike kanye west whose note apologized. she is one of the wealthiest authors in america. call an imagine somebody anti-black a great book writer, great movie writer, is trying to get a movie produced today. the double standard is rampant just because you're black and a author. just because you're black and a scholar doesn't give you a license to be anti-semitic. we cannot allow this double standard. it is becoming pervasive and mainstream through america. david: excuse me for one second, it is changing, it is changing, there is pushback. i mean we had the university of wisconsin cut back on its dei programing. by the way they had as many dei

programmers, if you can use that phrase than they did members of the history department, so just a huge, it's like an industry now, dei, all these woke people that they have enforcing these principles that they have. so there is pushback but, it just seems like harvard is impenetrable. that the woke crowd has a fortress up that nobody can get through. >> look, harvard has a history of never saying we're wrong, never apologizing. we're harvard. if we say it we must be right. the rest of the universities should follow us. that's been the problem with harvard. that's the problem of the faculty. they follow like little lemmings. they don't come up with independent criticism and independent ideas and harvard is suffering. it is suffering around the world. its reputation is suffering. its students are suffering. its faculty is suffering, its

alumni are suffering and now the faculty have the chutzpah to attack alumni. don't listen the rich rich alumni, which they mean don't listen to the jews mostly. jon huntsman was one of the complainers, he is not jewish. primarily the donors they're complaining about are jewish. don't listen to them, but listen to other rich people on the board because they are the corporation because they're woke and progressive. you can listen to them. don't listen to alumni disfavored and woke. things -- david: things have changed recently dramatically. it is over the past five years that we've seen this, this hypocrisy full steam ahead where you cut out anything that wreaks of conservatism at these universities but is the idea of judging somebody at a campus like harvard or, one of the great universities like stanford in california or university of chicago, is it dead, the idea of just judging somebody on

academic merit as opposed to ideological bias. >> it is dead, dead in a lot of ways. everybody gets as, which nobody gets as. david: that's a good point. >> grading is abolished f president gay, if her acts were done by a 19 or-year-old freshman student he would be booted out of the university without a doubt. i know. i had a case like that. i had to bring it to court on behalf of a dyslexic student who omitted a footnote because the secretary didn't appropriately type it. the school said no excuses. absolute liability. doesn't matter if it is your fault. we're accusing you plagiarism. the double standard is the problem. dei stands for the double standard. david: final question, professor, final question, isn't a case going to come up where a

student says look, yes, i may have made some, may have done a little a plagiarism here and there, and didn't do nothing as bad as president gay did, if she can get away with it so can i, are we going to have a case like that? >> i will defend them pro bono. i will go to court on their behalf to impose a single standard at my own university. i have a stake at this. 50 years at harvard teaching. 10 years retired from harvard. i want to see harvard retain its status as a great university. right now it is going downhill so fast i will do whatever i can to preserve the single standard. you know the motto of harvard, not veritas but double standard. david: i hope you get a case like that. i would pay to come to court to see you argue that case. thank you very much for being here. appreciate it. the great alan dershowitz. switching gears now, joe biden

arrived in the caribbean earlier today for yet another vacation, to ring in the new year as crises pile up for the president and his administration at home. joining me is joe concha, politics and media columnist at "the messenger" and fox news contributor, and garrett ventry, republican strategist, former senior advisor to the senate judiciary commit teach. gentlemen, great to see you. the presidency used to be known as the most challenging job in the world. now it looks like it is a place you go to get a free ride. >> david, thanks for having me on. good to be back with you. joe biden's presidency essentially looks like a french work week meets ferris bueller's day off but for three years here. you're talking about rnc research put out research on this where 40% of his presidency has been either at his delaware home or his vacation. that is unheard of right now. again, let's take a step back here, what are we dealing with right now? we have got high inflation.

we just had the most border crossings recorded last month at the southern border. on top of that you have war in israel, war in ukraine, all these things are happening right now. where is joe biden? he is on vacation. this is why more and more voters, you have a majority of republicans, majority of independents, even a majority of dem contracts are questioning joe biden's age, his fitness, his mental sharpness to do the job right now and that is because every crisis is happening he had to be bullied by the media to end his vacation early in hawaii when all those wildfires were happening. and he still hasn't visited ohio with the train derailment that happened in february. that will continue to be a lingering question going into 2024. david: the other lingering question, joe, who is in charge? that is a legitimate question. if this guy can be on vacation every other week chances are somebody else is pulling the levers, right? >> absolutely, david. i have some numbers around it i will share in a second. i have to one-up garrett on this

one. this is more like misery meets weekend at bernie's using movie analogies. thank you. seriously, we have joe biden going on vacation one day after returning from another vacation. this time as you showed he is off to st. croix. yet another opulent beachfront home this stat is unbelievable. as president joe biden spent 40% of his time in office on vacation. put that in context for a moment. american workers on average take 14 days of vacation per year. president biden has taken an average of more than 140 days per year of vacation. that is nearly 10 times as much obviously. americans are frustrated, scared and angry right now. about prices just you talked about art laffer, still too high for their taste. see rampant violent crime, fear for family safety. protests engulfing americans screen screens on their night, things are completely out of

control going into election year, the u.s. southern border that is truly a national security threat the president should be addressing instead of ignoring while literally putting his head in the sand, david. david: garrett, that is fear of conflict, this summarizes problems with this administration but not just this administration but the blue side all over the place, democrats running a city, governors running a state, fear of conflict. fear of conflict with criminals. you don't want to hurt the criminals you keep letting them out. we had an incident in new york, horrific incident where this madman, this very violent madman stabbed two tourists in the back. luckily i think they're both still alive. their lives were in jeopardy. he had 17 arrests that he had been let out on. again it fit this is pattern, whether appeasing iran or appeasing violent criminals or appeasing illegal immigrant by the millions. it is a fear of conflict. you never had any fear of

conflict with donald trump. >> absolutely, david, that's right, under president trump here. he is secured the border. he was tough on crime. he dealt with peace through strength with our adversaries, people like iran and russia feared and respected us, you have again here, you've got again, there is war, russia invading ukraine. that didn't happen under president trump. you have the wide open border here. record number of people pouring in but it is also these very far left politicians capitulating to the worst instincts of their voters and their base. you're talking about anti-cop, defunding the police. talking about cashless bail. letting ruthless, violent criminals right back on the street toe commit crimes this is something that the left continues to do here. i think smart republican members of congress, whether it's the house, senate even all the way up to the presidency running will run on law and order, run on secure border just like richard nixon did many years ago it worked effectively.

i think that is very smart thing to do. david: the other thing that got richard nixon elected the convention in 1968. joe, that is the thing. i think all of this compromise around no consequences attitude of these democrats is going to come back to bite them because you see the very far left, the people out in the streets right now making life miserable for people that i don't know how they claimed to want to prove their point if they clog up the roadways. we just saw in new york today the entrance and exits to jfk were all jammed up. people had to grab their suitcases and drag them across the lawns in order to get through. the same thing happened at lax. i mean, what's going to happen if in the summer of 2024 in chicago we see a repeat what we saw in 1968 in chicago with a conventions that was totally out of control by the lefties taken over? >> you get the feeling we're headed towards a violent year

here, david. nobody wants this the new york airports are already a mess without protesters. here during one of busiest times of the year they feel he have this the right to shut it down. they're not looking to win hearts and minds. they're bullying people into submission to take their side on things. the problem for the left now, the rhetoric that they talked about in 2020 as far as defunding police for example, or surging the border and allowing everybody to come in, that rhetoric is meeting reality. americans don't like this real think. if this presidency, this election comes down to a choice between who do you think will do better in terms of steering the economy and handling things like this we're seeing on our screen, obviously the border, it is hard to see donald trump or whoever the gop nominee is losing to joe biden. he is not wine. he will not get better with age. david: comes down to no consequences foreactions. i can't help but thinking like you're dealing with a spoiled kid. instead of say you cannot have that, run out in the street or

you will get killed, it's ox honey. they're saying that to iran they're saying that to the criminals, saying that to the illegal immigrants. it is that no consequences attitude. i don't see it changing before the election. americans will have to choose if they want it or not. joe, garrett, great to see you, my friends. happy new year to beat of you. coming up democrats are going full throttle in their push for electric vehicles even as consumer demand continues to stall. alex epstein is here to weigh in when "kudlow" returns. ♪.

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♪. david: you might think with all the government payouts to automakers and consumers that electric vehicles would be flying off the lots but they're not. dealers continue to be plagued with unsold evs clogging up their lots and now we're told evs are failing to hold their resale value. consumers just don't want to buy them no matter how hard the government keeps trying to push them. joining me alex epstein, founder, ceo of center for industrial progress and author of, fossil fuels. okay, alex, why aren't the evs selling? >> well they're not selling because they're usually not the

most cost effective thing for consumers both when they're new, but also in particular when they're used because the batteries degrade over time. the batteries are just this huge, huge cost. if you're buying something, if you buy an old car that is 10 years old, the engine, fuel container, these things will be preserved indefinitely but if you're talking about a tesla, you have to pay whatever, $16,000 to replace the battery, that is a very significant kind of expense but the bottom line the government is trying to pressure us into buying things that aren't cost effective that just harms us as drivers. i think the worst thing is, they're putting pressure on us to increase demand for reliable electricity at the same time reducing the supply of reliable electricity forcing solar and wind on us and shutting down coal plants this is just a disaster that will get much worse. david: there is one phrase that defines it, you talked about it before, government dictated green energy. when americans hear that the government dictates you have to buy this or you can't buy that,

americans still, thank god, they still have that rebel instinct to be against what the government is directing us to do in the market. >> for sure and that's a really good impulse that we have. david: yes. >> it becomes even stronger if you realize that the green energy movement is not for energy. it is really an anti-energy movement. their whole thing impacting the earth is bad which means energy is bad because energy allow us to impact the earth through industry and prosperity. the green energy movement opposes fossil fuels, nuclear hydro. they pretend to support solar and wind but stop mining and transmission of it. they pretend to be against fossil fuels but pretend to be for something. when you have a combination of dictated energy which is totally not cost effective in the first place by people that hate energy that is double-whammy that you don't want to be subjected to. david: by the way the proof is

the marketplace. we do have a marketplace of stocks that represent companies. they did very well in general, the s&p we talked with art laffer, up 24%. look at the clean energy index, that is all the stuff that the biden administration loves and wants us to take and buy, it's down 22%. so the vast majority of the market was up 24%. global clean energy index down 22%. what does that tell you? >> that is really scary. think about the amount of corporate welfare being taken from our pockets and gifted through the inflation reduction act and other kinds of subsidies and these guys still can't make money? what it means the plans are so ill conceived. one thing we see the supply chain stuff. none of the pains of scale all these different things involve all the different minerals most controlled by china none of this stuff was thought through. even with huge government preferences they're still failing financially. they should say let's stop

dictating energy and let's get rid of this green idea that development rand energy are bad. we can have free market in energy and we can have prosperity again. david: we will need more energy in the future unless people stop having babies entirely. we'll need more energy. the only way you get against it you go against the grain that forces stuff down our throats we don't want. >> globally this is obviously true. i often repeat the stat we have three billion people using less electricity than a typical american refrigerator. the world is underpowered. we need much more energy right now. think about it is so cruel and so inhumane to talk about reducing or dramatically reducing the world's leading source of cost effective energy in a world that needs far more energy. these guys love flying private jets and having lavish congresses telling everyone else you can barely live in a tent. david: the life of a dictator. they all do it. alex epstein, great to see you

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