11 states with are holding primaries on caucuses including wyoming which will choose only some of its delegates. there are 424 total delegates at stake today. the updated nbc delegate count now stands at mitt romney with 119, newt gingrich with 30, rick santorum at 17, and ron paul at eight. >> i keep hearing people tell me they were undecided and now they've decided to join with us. >> it's gut check time. who wants it the most? what do you say? >> we're going to be talking to our chief washington correspondent, john harwood, in just a few minutes. in the meantime, jobs and the economy are obviously key issues pour voters right now. listen to this, the atlanta fed has created a new tool that allows you to estimate the number of jobs that president obama needs to get below 8% unemployment. it does assume the participation rate stays the same. if you take that assumption and you plug in the numbers, you

figure there are eight months left before november and you want to see a target unemployment rate of 8%, the average monthly change in payrolls needs to be about 130,000. a note out on this topic says that if labor force participation stabilizes at the current rate, then the president needs 232,000 jobs per month to get the unemployment rate below 8% so there are some different factors they put into this but it's fun to watch. >> this is a funky little calculator. i was up early. >> i was in, too. this was in morning money. >> the thing about this thing, though, there are so many different numbers you can play with. so it's not -- >> it's not a sure-fire way. and i think the participation rate is the biggest key. do more people come back into the labor force and start working because it's been a historically low level of participation and that's -- the question is, is that because of changing demographics in this nation or is it because people have just gotten disappointed and they haven't found jobs.

>> people come back in. >> still, it's a fun game to play along with if you want to figure out what's going to happen. some peel say that 8% unemployment is the key for the election. >> well, 8% is, you know, we need -- we need 5%. that's what we have historically been able to do and some people think it's changed to the extent to a lot of the low unemployment rates that we saw in the '90s were illusory because of construction or the housing boom. >> you have 14 million people out of work. >> wouldn't you argue this country has done better than europe, not having an 8% sort of structural unemployment rate, that's horrific. and this country has done better than that. >> wouldn't you argue 2004, was alice in wonder land? >> no, not that it was internet alice in wonderland. >> okay. i'll take it.

>> right? >> no -- >> the '90s weren't illusory? >> part of the '90s were and part of the were as well. >> i was thinking about this this morning on my way in. if you can find the middle ground between those areas. you always have something juicing it on the way up and something imploding on the way down. you have to find something in the middle. >> the 7% and 9% gdp growth following a deep recession in '82 is more characteristic of a bounceback than this time around. i like the idea that the president is creating these jobs not sort of standing in the way of having maybe better job creation. so these are all jobs he's creating to get below 8%. they must be government jobs. >> government jobs are declining. >> government jobs are declining. >> right, i know. >> that answers the question. those are the only jobs -- the private sector will create most of the jobs. i don't think the government, whether it's the legislative or executive branch or the people

creating jobs. >> you can't have it both ways. >> what do you mean? don't tell me what i can have. >> no -- >> the president is not creating these jobs. it's the private sector creating these jobs. >> okay 0. >> the only jobs the government can create are government jobs. >> we can't give reagan credit because they were all private sector jobs. >> we can get the government out of the way and keep the government in the way this time. >> i'm not going to give the president credit or not. i'm going to suggest when it happens on their watch whether it's reagan, bush, clinton, obama, you give them credit for what happens or not. >> i'm giving them credit for 8.3% unemployment. i'm doing that. i am! that's the credit that they are getting and for 2% gdp growth. >> i'm so glad you're back and i realize i can never win. >> did you have a lovefest with allen patrick on? >> we didn't talk a lot of politics. >> you got your buddy coming on today from the new republic. >> from the new republic. >> founded by herb crowley.

>> a big book out. "the escape artist." >> they coined the term liberal, the modern usage of liberal. used to be a good thing in the ole days. >> that is true. >> and then freedom. now, okay, so "the escape artist" -- >> only some people consider. i'm suggesting some people who don't. >> okay. but we're going to come on and this guy's thrust is going to be that the obama administration fumbled the recovery. because the stimulus wasn't much, much larger. >> why don't we let him speak for himself. the group representing athens' bondholders is warning of disorderly greek default would probably leave italy and spain needing outside help to stop contagion from spreading. the group suggests such a scenario could end up causing more that $1.3 trillion, with a "t," of damage to the eurozone,

greek private creditors have until thursday night to say whether they will take part in the bond swap. joe, you gave me a look of -- >> david, will you come over here, please, and escort him out of here? david, come on. come in here. >> come over here. >> come over here. >> you guys don't realize that every day -- >> every day we have an officer onboard. >> in the past i've been unable to enforce what i've wanted to do around here. this is -- >> can we get some lights. come a little closer. come closer. there we go. >> i want you to arrest him just for propaganda. >> propaganda? >> and trying to take soviet style -- get him out of here. >> do you have mace on you? come closer. what are you holding? hold it up. come on. you can hold it higher. we need to get it on camera at least. thank you. okay. this is the officer who comes with the book. thank you, officer. what else do you have there?

do you have a weapon? a firearm on you? >> easy. >> no, he's just glad to see you. >> i think he has -- is that a mace canister? what else -- and he has a baton. >> do you have a tazer? >> don't taz me, bro. >> this could be a serious situation. we all have to be careful on the set. >> you know how we met? >> did he give you a speeding ticket? >> no, he did not. >> i think that was mine, what did i do? i went in front of someone who had the ez pass. >> stop the presses. how did you meet? >> never mind. >> just forget it. >> hold it. >> i'm going to tell you how you're going to meet. >> you met him on the highway? are you serious? >> i might have been -- let's move on. >> we have other news, i'm told, back here in the united states. dallas fed president richard fisher says the markets are hooked on, quote, monetary morphing and he sees no reason

for further easing. they said they would consider another round of quantitative easing if the economy needs it. and a headline that's just crossing the wires this morning, chesapeake energy and kkr announcing a new partnership. the two have been in discussions. they will invest in gas fields, initially $250 million in the joint venture and it is another play on shale. we talked about shale and natural gas and what that means. they are buying the royalties from the minerals. >> let's check on the markets. 14, 15 points yesterday. this morning down about 85 points on the session even though from lebeau gasoline prices are back. >> after rising for 27 straight days. the price of natural gasoline is down but only dropped by 0.3%. down to $3.76.

>> where are we? >> on gasoline? oh, the jobs number. the estimate is for 210,000. >> the whole gallup thing is the rate supposed to go up? >> i don't know about the rate. it depends on so many variables. the rates of participation. >> you were on like major news services talking about it. >> chris matthews. >> and you were positive -- >> i talked to the gallup guys that morning. >> you did? >> yeah, and went through some stuff and some numbers with him. they still think unemployment is going to be -- they don't often forecast out that far but ran some numbers and their best guess is above 8% come election day. >> are these the chauvinist pigs that were -- oh, no, those were the -- i've seen you cited everywhere because of your experience trying to buy a

minivan. number one, it's sad you're in the market for a minivan. >> i'm not in the market. i bought one. a sienna. >> that in and of itself. >> it's not the car i drive to work. if you tried to buy a car and you're a woman you probably have a story about a very difficult time trying to go in and get somebody to take you seriously. they didn't know you were the becky quick and boss of the entire family. >> i'm not the boss of the family but they wanted to talk to my husband instead of me and the stranger next to me rather than me. >> and now they're displayed across -- >> i didn't say who they were. i just laid out what a difficult time it was and talked to her on our set here. >> sienna a toyota? >> still the ceo of xerox tried to buy a porsche and when she went to test drive it, said i think i'll take this. the salesman said don't you have to talk to your husband first and she got the same thing in financing. >> it was an automatic?

>> no. >> did she buy a stick? never mind. it was a toyota. >> it was a toyota. >> and you do live in emergenney so we know it's in new jersey. >> stop. i know. i'm not going to try and -- >> where is the nearest one -- is this a hollworth toyota? >> he's trying to bust me for getting pulled over. ross westgate? >> ross has never been pulled over. >> ross westgate standing by. you need to just take your gut -- just like this music is so exciting, something to live up to every day, ross. >> it's tough, isn't it? the pressure is on. and, joe, a lot of red behind me, i'm afraid before we come to the open state side. only 0 around 23 stocks out of 600 right now that are in positive territory. down on the session lows at the moment so translates right now into losses 1% or more for most

of the european stock markets after losseses less than that yesterday. the ftse 100 yesterday, we're down about a percent. the xetra dax, the standout stocks rwe, the german utility which is going to shed less assets than many thought. that's up 3%. the cac down. one of the biggest losers is peug peugeot. an alliance with general motors in the united states and a 42% discount they're pricing that capital hike. the ftse mib is the weaker performer down 1.7%. the key point really is on negative day bond yields in the periphery haven't come up too badly. italian yields are slightly higher but still contain 5% as we still have a lot of money sloshing around from the ltro. gilt 2.14.

bund futures, the bund ten-year cash yielding 1.78%. still extremely low levels. euro/dollar has been weaker today as we head to the u.s. we did see the rba as well out of australia decided not to do anything with interest rates. then the aussie dollar and other currencies are weak against the u.s. dollar and the euro as well. that's where we stand ahead of the u.s. open. back to you. >> ross, thank you very much. we'll see you again tomorrow morning. meantime, let's get back to today's top story here in the u.s. super tuesday's primaries and caucuses. our chief washington correspondent joins us now from new york. john, set this up for us. 10 or 11 states, how does this break out and how important is this tonight? >> well, i will set it up for a second but the first thing itch to set up is to ask joe kernen, you have a problem with minivans? >> do you have a minivan, john, honestly? >> reporter: you bet. i have a 2000 honda odyssey. >> aren't you kids grown?

>> reporter: love it. >> aren't your kids grown? >> reporter: i'm giving it to my oldest kid. but, yes, it's the most functional thing ever. becky, you are going to like it. >> when you have more than two kids, it's impossible to get them in and out. >> you buy a flex. you could buy -- a lot of people -- >> they have to go through the back. why not a flex? get a flex. get a crossover. >> you have to walk through. >> can you walk through the back? does it have captain's chairs in the second row? >> no, it doesn't. >> reporter: yes, it does. mine does. >> not for the flex. that's why i went with the minivan. >> did you get a super tuesday haircut? >> if you have to get all the kids in. >> again worrying about this. it's going to be over. >> reporter: you have massachusetts, of course mitt romney is going to do well. virginia, his other two chief

rivals are not even on the ballot so he will do well in both of those places. ron paul is the only competition in virginia. the key test, i think, is ohio. rick santorum has to find a place to really hurt mitt romney, show that he can break through in a big state. he hasn't been able to do that. this is his shot. if you look at the trend and the polling, ohio seems to be going the same way that michigan went, which was that rick santorum starts out with a big lead. romney narrows it. pounds him on the air. and overwhelms him with superior organization. we'll see whether that happens again but, you know, santorum has paid a price for his relatively thin and small organization because he doesn't have full delegate slates. he's going to count on the fact that he might be able to win the popular vote as a way to demonstrate that he's got real strength going forward if newt gingrich kind of falls away, but right now you have to say that romney is pretty well positioned and i talked to members of his

team yesterday and they were charting the delegate path forward and how difficult it's going to be for santorum to erase the lead that romney will have after tonight. >> not going to miss those sweaters, those vest sweaters, john. i don't know. i don't know. this is just like people get. we go back and forthright all along. it's all this sound and fury signifying nothing, john. we should have stuck to our guns. >> reporter: it's been politically consequential. what happened was the process has taken a toll on mitt romney, whose negatives are up, who is under water in terms of his favorability and under water with independents and on the republican party in general. so it hasn't been of no consequence. that doesn't mean that romney doesn't have time. >> right. >> reporter: if he should break through and be the nominee he

has eight months until the election and that's a lot of wa water to flow under the bridge but it has been significant. it has shown some of the weakness he has as a candidate. it shows the way that the tea party base of the republican party is pretty fired up. fired up enough not to settle and to extend this process and we'll see in ohio whether they want to extend it a while longer. >> someone puts santorum in a box -- did you see that? >> no. >> santorum in a cage on top of the car, on top of the station wagon. >> i heard about that. >> for gail collins, are for the romney dog. was that new york magazine or "the new york times" magazine? >> i think it was new york -- >> hard to believe but it's a new york media -- it may have been new york 0er or new york. >> john, what's the head turning event that could happen tonight to make everybody say, okay, mitt romney is not wrapping all this up? >> reporter: ohio.

remember, rick santorum after he won those three states a couple of weeks ago, small states, not all that consequential. people said, wait a minute, maybe the republican primary elect will not accept him. santorum had his moment, he surged ahead in michigan and ohio, two really important states, and mitt romney came back to michigan, the state where he was born, and really pounded him and beat him. now if he can do the same thing in ohio, that deflates santorum to a considerable extent but if santorum holds on and can show that he's got enough juice to take on a front-runner with momentum in a big state and beat him, then this thing is going to go on a while longer. >> the new yorker. which is the good one. that's the one with the cartoons, isn't it? >> adam moss, though, new york magazine as well. >> okay. this is the onboard with the

character -- we'll take care of romney this weekend. >> reporter: if you guys are driving the car to canada, which one of you is in the cart on top? >> i have some muscle behind me. >> reporter: you're going to put andrew up there? >> i think i have some muscle that could help me. >> tony writes in, says no -- >> man up. he says man up. >> what does tony say? >> man up. no minivans. >> oh, tony, please. >> i mean, that's obvious, john. if you can't figure this out, this makes me question a lot. >> minivans are the greatest cars ever. they really are. >> reporter: they're the ultimate in practical. >> i love kids, i love families, but when you end up there -- >> i didn't want one until we had one. i love it. >> reporter: are you one of these middle aged adolescent fantasy things with the sports

car? >> driving a sports cars. >> drives a porsche every morning. >> since i was 29 years old i've had a porsche. so how long is that? 26 years. eight different ones. >> reporter: keep all that stuff out, you'll get some closure and peace over that pretty soon. >> all right. john, thank you very much. >> there's something between a porsche and a minivan, i'll tell you that much. there's some middle ground. >> by the way, you can watch john tonight at 8:00 eastern time for cnbc super tuesday coverage. he's going tok on with maria bartiromo. they'll have coverage throughout the night. also tomorrow morning, we're going to be joined live by mitt romney. all right, coming up, a live report from the weather channel. could the forecast impact voter turnout? i guess it depends on where you are. if it's tuesday it must be time for a phone call from the donald, the legendary business leader will join us for our now weekly conversation. never one to disappoint. don't miss mr. trump at 7:30 eastern. plus, the winner of the third

largest powerball jackpot in history today. the single winning ticket of the $336 million jackpot was sold at a rhode island supermarket. the lucky winner will either take the jackpot in 30 yearly payments over 29 years or the lump sum of just $210 million, which is just a decent year for a ceo. first, as we head to break, check out the global market. did i that for you. check out the global market. >> for my people. >> for your people. the new republic. [ male announcer ] if you believe the mayan calendar,

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welcome back. u.s. equity futures this hour down 76 points after about a 14-point loss yesterday. we lost ground last week, too. i thought it was one of the first weeks we actually had a -- >> overnight asia was down. this is the first time in -- the first time since january that asia has been down in consecutive days. >> what's going on? >> you also have to look, there hasn't been a triple digit drop in the dow this year. >> slow and steady, people

pointing to volume and the underlying technicals. >> kernan effect. >> i haven't been as positive. >> you weren't on the show. well, 14 points doesn't really make me feel -- >> how was your speech? >> my speech was great. >> the chamber of commerce. >> we were introduced by the former secretary of education, spelling, and, blake, i'm always holding my breath. she hit it out of the park. >> i don't under why you hold your breath. >> we were talking about the obama, made enough money, i think you should stop and how you view the economy as a zero sum gain where if you make money you're taking it away from someone else instead of creating growth. it's like extra credit in school. the more you apply, the better grades, you learn more.

i don't see why -- people were actually taking notes. it was funny. it was good. it was the chamber of commerce. they want to you come down and talk to them. they want to actually talk to you about a few things. are you available? >> when would that be? >> i don't know. at some point. anyway, making headlines. roach still hopes to succeed in its $5.7 billion hostile cash bid but the chairman says he sees other alternatives if the takeover fails on price. roche extended its offer fo illumina last week. scott williams joins us from the weather channel. what are the most important states we're worried about, ohio and tennessee. can you focus on those? >> absolutely. i'll foe can cuss on those and all of the states at play. of course we're keeping tabs on the delegates as well. now for super tuesday as we move into parts of the northeast and

new england look iing pretty quiet, sunshine out there. temperature wise for you in georgia, atlanta, 61 degrees, sunshine. nashville, 65 degrees for you. and then as we move to oklahoma city, those temperatures will be in the 70s. so really no weather worries here to speak of as far as those delegates in parts of the east. some of the caucuses taking place, in alaska some snow showers around. those temperatures will be in the upper 20s. boise, idaho, low 40s. some snow showers. bismarck, temperatures will be in the 50s. so for the east coast we're looking at sunshine. new york city, temperature wise 44 degrees. cleveland, ohio, of course we have some delegates at play here. temperatures in the low 50s. moving into florida. 75 degrees and sunshine. fairly quiet conditions for you. towards the midwest and the plains, windy conditions expected for today as we track that storm system on the move. so steering wheels, you will want to grip those across parts of the south plains and into the

midwest but look at the temperatures into the 70s here. st. louis and also towards dallas. salt lake city some rainfall on the way. 54 degrees for the high temperature. clouds and showers around san francis francisco. watching that system in the west, san francisco watching out for minor airport delays as we move towards salt lake city likewise but fairly quiet across new york city, atlanta, and also dallas. but we are keeping tabs on some windy conditions across parts of the northeast and new england. guys, back to you. >> thanks so much. coming up, why the new republic says the obama administration fumbled the recovery. but first, the 550 strong british team has been advised by its top doctor to avoid shaking hands -- i try to avoid shaking hands -- with rivals and visiting dignitaries at the london games this summer. why? well, germs. the british olympic association says it's concerned with illness spreading through the camp and

thwarting the country's bid for glory. what do you think of that, guys? >> i get nervous because we have so many people who come through the set. >> you have to go to the fist pump. >> now at the olympics those athletes, it's like an orgy, too. >> really? >> are you kidding? >> do you know what goes on in those dorm rooms. >> exactly. >> think about that at 6:30 in the morning. >> that's what i'm worried about. >> as we take a break, look at yesterday's winners and losers and we're not talking about olympic ones. >> how do you have time for that?

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and you could pay as little as ten dollars a month for androgel 1.62%. what are you waiting for? this is big news. ♪ and i keep this world from dragging me down ♪ ♪ but i stand my ground and i won't back down ♪ welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc. making headlines this morning general motors announcing the china sales rose more than 30% in february compared to a year earlier. gm is the largest overseas

automaker in china and there are places in the world where if you drive a buick you are like happening. >> china. >> yeah. >> china. i remember when i was in china, i remember being in a buick. that was like the car. >> you are -- if you are in a buick, you're going to see some action. you are happening. the jury hearing the allen stanford case will deliberate today. yesterday the jury said it was unable to reach a verdict in the trial of the former texas financier. it's unclear where they are in disagreement. a failure to agree would result in a mistrial. swiss lawmakers have proposed a tax proposal, key to settling the u.s. probe with hidden offshore accounts. the proposal clarifies hoe switzerland would hand over data on americans suspected of dodging taxes back home. >> and it's super tuesday. vo voters taking a closer look at president obama's first term. our next guest 0 out with a new

book detailing the current administration's fumbling of the recovery. joining us now the senior editor of the new republic, author of the book "the escape artist." thank you for coming in. >> thank you for having me. >> of all the things, there's a the lot of arguments about why the administration may have, quote/unquote, fumbled. if you were to name one, put it at the top of the list, it would be what? >> these two go side-by-side. it's undershooting on stimulus the last three years and overshooting on their constant preoccupation with deficit reduction before the recovery was stabilized. >> so we were talking about this. i know you're going to laugh. no, no. >> that's what i've noticed. they've just been too focused on not spending and the stimulus should have been much larger. so it wasn't focusing on health care. it wasn't any of the other things -- it wasn't regulations. it wasn't dodd frank. none of those things affected the recovery. it was not enough stimulus. >> i think what's interesting about the administration's

numbers if you look at what they predicted for 2009 and 2010, they actually got the turn in the economy exactly right. their internal forecast got it right. they got the rebound exactly right except the place where they got it wrong, the things just fizzle out in early 2010. they didn't achieve what they call escape velocity when you start getting this virtues cycle where rising confidence, leads to job creation, leads to rising confidence. they basically got everything right except they didn't get enough umph. >> you are assuming stimulus responsible for the normal recovery that an economy normally has when you need it. one of the things that you have to pause at the beginning if you believe in a change in economics -- if you double the -- >> i make no apologies about that. >> okay. i have a different question. it revolves around the relationship that geithner has with obama. ultimately do you think it's actually a good and healthy relationship and, "b," there is

a sense that obama was always trying to push geithner further to the left and that geithner was always pushing back sometimes in almost passive/aggressive like way. that's my reading of the book. my interpretation. >> yeah, yeah, yeah. they have a good relationship. they have a mind meld. they are both no drama guys. i think they've bonded very early over that. in their first exchange in october of 2008 obama and geithner had this get to know you session at the "w" hotel in new york and one of the first things is don't pick me. pick larry or bob. immediately wins over obama by doing that. from day one they've been on the same page. >> was that a tactic to get the job? >> i actually think it was a tactic. geithner is very good at winning over superiors throughout his career. you know, on the second question you asked, i do think there's a bit of passive/aggressiveness.

it's been written about to some extent. i write about it on the volcker rule. obama, volcker, geithner have this meeting in june of '09. some regulatory reform. and at that point obama expresses interest in the volcker room because he says why aren't you doing anything about trading is this and geithner says, yeah, yeah, i'll look into it. three or four months go by, nothing happens. another meet that go fall. finally the president says what happened with that volcker rule thing. oh, okay, yeah, right. and realizes the president is interested. blows him off for about four months. >> your mike is falling down. if you could pick it up that would help the listeners hear us. when you think about that, was that because tim geithner didn't ultimately believe in the volcker rule because he didn't believe in regulating the banks as harshly as the president wanted? >> geithner did not believe in the volcker rule, did not believe it was something that would prevent crisis in the future. an explicit conversation where he goes to obama in the fall and says, look, i still don't

believe this is necessary but our guys have looked at it. we don't think it will hurt. if you think it will help politic politically, we're willing to do it. >> i just want to go back to one thing you said about how the administration has been too focused on deficit reduction. if you talk to people about the super committee that came up with the ideas that simpson and bowles pushed through that were never followed up on, you can talk to ceos on both sides of the aisles. you can talk to people all across the country and they will tell you that not following up on simpson bowles is the biggest mistake that this administration has made. your idea they are focused too much on this doesn't match up with a lot of people's perceptions. >> one, clearly deficit reduction is necessary. we are going to have to do a lot of long-term consolidation here. we have huge liabilities in the revenue doesn't match up. no question about that. the thing about deficit reduction much easier when the economy is growing at 3% than when it's growing at a percent and a half a year.

even the negotiation over deficit reduction gets a lot ease krier. if you are hitting those more impressive gdp numbers because the projections about revenue come in, get a lot larger. second thick on bowles simpson in particular i actually don't think the administration got that one wrong. had they embraced bowles simpson immediately that becomes the left of the debate and the compromise would come several ticks to the right. i think they played that well. >> the longer you put off doing this the bigger and bigger problems you have particularly with the entitlement programs and the more draconian the if fix is going to have to be. >> i disagree. if you do this prematurely and growth just gets in the limbo of 1.52% a year be a you don't exceed that, balancing the budget over the ten-year period, it's really hard. >> but talking about deficit reduction, what deficit reduction steps that the obama administration took are you talking about? >> well, they had this basically

three, three and a half month negotiation that began in late april of 2011, continued on through the final debt ceiling deal in early august 2011. they are preoccupied with deficit reduction, doing a deal with john boehner and the republ republican house -- >> never going to happen. >> yeah. >> and then in september of 2011, obama finally proposes this fairly bold stimulus plan, a jobs act. he should have done that back in april. >> how big should the original stimulus have been? >> how large? >> yep. >> according to the memo i obtained in the book written by obama's chief economist 1.7 t$1 trillion. >> i like it. it's easy to say. >> we have to run but last question, because it has to do with sort of the next four years, do you think the president ultimately likes or really dislikes business in terms of the way he frames his

thinking around the business community, regulation and all of that? >> it's a great question. >> you've been in the room with these guys. >> i think these guys feel the argument is that business held over their heads have been unfair. they don't buy the regulatory argument. the uncertainty is argument in particular. they think that is a pretty egregious case. but having said that, i do think they buy into the basic confidence argument that business does need to see things functioning. the government getting its house in order. so to the extent that has been a criticism is one that's felt within the white house and one that they want to respond to. the broader regulatory uncertainty argument they kind of reject that. >> the book is "the escape artist." >> thank you for having me. >> if you have comments or questions about anything we've been talking about this morning on "squawk" feel free to e-mail us at "squawk"@cnbc.com. when we come back some of the global market headlines and, by the way, "squawk" is just

getting started this morning. our news hakers include donald trump at 7:30 eastern. we have t. boone pickens. americans believe they should be in charge of their own future.

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welcome back to "squawk." red arrows across-the-board. the dow would open up 85 points lower. making headlines this morning, australia's central bank holding interest rates steady for a second straight month today. policymakers say there could be scope for easing but only if the economy were to take a nasty turn. becky? >> andrew, thank you very much. when we come back, oreos celebrating a big birthday

today. guess which one? we'll have the details when "squawk box" comes right back. tomorrow, it's the morning after super tuesday and gop presidential hopeful mitt romney will join us live. also, staples founder, the ceo and the cfo of heineken. plus, don't miss the first read on jobs.

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♪ it is 100 years today, a big birthday, for oreo cookies, willard scott does their thing, we'll do ours with oreos, grocers in hoboken first began selling the cookie, when they started selling them, there were two versions, one with the white cream filling and one with the lemon meringue filling. the lemon meringues were discontinued in the 1920s but they are the best-selling cookie on the planet. there are nearly 500 billion sold over the last 100 years,

when you think back to 1912 this is the same year that fenway park was opened and that the "titanic" sank, so oreo cookies have been around since then, and morton salt. >> you got to dunk it, right? >> absolutely. >> you're early on a lot of things but blake blogged about this, he has a blog, peace, love and profits or something, it's cute. about kids learning about capitalism and things like that to go along with the book. and i think it's 50% twist and take them apart. >> only 50%. do you twist? >> i twist. >> 50% of the time when you twist it breaks. >> it does break. >> you're a bad twister, my friend. >> the double stuff cookies it always twists off easily. >> this is a great example of being first entry in the marketplace because there was a competitor, i can't remember, they just discontinued it

finally. >> they blew them out of the water. >> i forget it's got a weird name and finally i don't think they're even trying them because oreos is a dominant brand, they are so good, but they're so -- i can't -- you know, they're not something you can eat a lot of. >> they are not part of the atkins diet. >> nothing is part of the atkins diet but eggs. >> eggs. >> begs, ba eggs, bacon, meat. you can gorge but you miss carbs. you hit enough meat and dairy stuff, but there's nothing else you can do, there's nothing else acceptable. but you either have as much fruit or crap on the one hand and it's a bad diet or you have as much meat. that's why i'd like to have a pizza. i have a comment a little more serious. i wrote a column today.

>> well, let's -- >> if you haven't got a chance -- forget about the column, go read this opinion by chancellor leo strong in delaware over the kinder morgan el paso deal. it's about goldman's role as the adviser to el paso, meanwhile they owned close to a 20% stake in kinder morgan. the banker working for el paso owned $340,000 stock in kinder morgan and the whole thing sort of reeks because they're playing all the sides. >> it's a conflict. >> they told el paso, look, we have the conflict, you should get a second adviser to make it look cleaner and el paso hires morgan stanley, but the incentive, the way they structured the incentive on the deal you only get paid if the deal is sold, not just sold but sold to kinder morgan, basically it was a circular issue always

coming back to goldman sachs and there's a very interesting scripted phone call that was set up for lloyd blankfein in the beginning of the piece and the judge's opinion. a lot of people on wall street reading this. >> i was a little stunned and i didn't know about anything of it happening until i read your column. >> it's a real phone. >> damning or -- >> no. but basically lloyd says thank you for, you know, thank you for doing this -- working with us, and then -- and then says, you know, we're very sensitive to the appearance of a conflict and yet, of course, the conflicts are on all sides. and it really raises the question if you are goldman, if you're any firm, why don't you take a step out and say we are going to make money, no matter what, we don't need the $20 million feel that el paso's going to give us. >> what is goldman's did etchef? >> their defense is we want them to be our adviser, we stand

behind you and we still want to work for you. the shareholder lawsuit trying to block the deal and all the questions, the fact that we're even talking about it, i'm not sure it's worth -- well, you want to stand by the client, but -- >> right, right. >> you can see it on all sides, but it's a conflict. >> you can. and you present both. i can see it the client said we want you to do it. >> but we are so conflicted, it won't look good for anybody and it won't help you ultimately to be part of this. >> it's not that goldman had problems with previous conflicts. >> exactly. >> people are sensitive to -- >> exactly right. >> people are writing in to us and say why don't we talk about greece anymore. in the meantime it is super tuesday, coming up we're going to be doing it "squawk" style, former reagan chief of staff, former clinton chief of staff, john podesta, and former obama

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this is "squawk" super tuesday, and we've got an all-star line-up ready to handicap the race. >> you are never going to quit but you did think about it. >> billionaire and business guru sounds off on his support for mitt romney and much more. predictions from both sides of the aisle former clinton chief of staff john podesta and ken duberstein share their thoughts. and the plans for the american budget, as the second hour of "squawk box" begins

right now. good morning, everyone. welcome to "squawk box" i'm becky quick along with joe kernen and andrew ross sorkin. let's get to your morning headlines on this super tuesday. president obama holds his first news conference since november. that press conference is scheduled for 1:15 eastern time. we've seen rising tensions in the middle east over iran and ear syria. trading in cotton may be worth watching today. cotton trading up on monday after india announced a surprise ban on cotton exports. it wants to make sure that it has sufficient supplies for its domestic textile industry which accounts for 4% of gdp. cotton up above 92 cents a pound right now. still well below last year's peak of $2.27 a pound. the group representing private greek bond holders says

disorderly defaults could be a mistake. creditors have until thursday to accept the deal. the potential damage to the euro zone is $1.3 trillion. the futures are indicated weaker and you'll see the dow futures down by about 82 points, the s&p is down 10.5. and this comes after weakness in asia for the second day. >> yes. and it is definitely going to be reflected here as we are below 13,000 and headed down maybe 12,900. and joining us is peter orszag and former omb director under. the president, and john podesta, former clinton white house chief of staff and ken duberstein, former chief of staff of ronald reagan, president and ceo of duberstein group. i'll start with our guest host.

is the damage that has been inflicted on romney and some of the other republican hopefuls, is it going to be long lasting or by the time we get a nominee or the republicans get a nominee, it will be -- they will be able to salvage something from that? >> i think it will be a low water mark as far as the republicans coming together, but they're about to start coming together. everybody asks is this inevitable, is romney's nomination today inevitable? the answer is i think he's an inexorable march even if he doesn't wrap it up today. but there's no romney mania. nobody is just excited and enthused but there is growing excitement and enthusiasm for beating barack obama, and so while the republicans already even today is not terribly unified, george w. bush's words, barack obama is the great unifier. he's going to bring people

together and energize people. the energy and enthusiasm i think comes once this nomination starts settling down. it's romney's right now. >> peter orszag, i hate to make you be overtly political as the great budget guy that you were and technocrat, but i remember some great editorials that you wrote from off the reservation, so what's your personal feelings about the question i just asked ken? >> you're asking me, you know, how much enthusiasm there will be for a romney candidacy? look, i think it's early in this cycle, and we will see, but i'm going to stick to the economics, sorry. >> all right. >> good answer. >> good answer. >> as long as you're here, peter, i wonder if you saw nome and read the book. i tried to give it a fair shake but his -- i tried to get him to finish it, but he said that the

faults that the obama administration had made were, number one, the stimulus was way too small, by a factor -- it should have been at least double and that the obama administration did much too much in terms of deficit reduction and that's what messed up the recovery. >> look, i think every single formal macroeconomy model, the administration, the fed, everyone, got the nature of the recovery wrong, assuming it was a "v" shape as opposed to an "l" shape, and there are lots of things that one could have done differently. i think instead of making stimulus bigger, it would have been better to tie it to the state of the economy so that, for example, it remained in full force as long as the economy was weak. and i have -- you know, i think my views have been mischaracterized but the reality of whether anything he was taking about was even feasible and that the right policy approach is to couple that kind

of continued support for the economy today with out-year deficit reduction that you enact today but that takes effect with a lag and that coupled approach i think remains the right policy. >> ken has a follow-up, i think. >> peter, you're talking very much about the past. i wish you would talk about the future. you know, everybody talks about lame duck session coming and nothing's going to get done in washington during the lame duck session. i think you described it as the trifecta is going to happen. >> yeah. >> reality, how much really can get done in the lame duck session on deficit reduction, on tax cuts, on spending, on sequestration? >> i suspect that the lame duck is not going to be when a deal gets done and that about this time next year we're going to have -- it will be great for the new business, by the way. we'll have a lot of drama, because as ken mentioned the debt limit will be back, the tax cuts are expiring, you have some

huge deals that need to get done. 20 or 30 years ago if you had those three pieces of must-pass legislation, the probability that you'd have a big deal would be virtually guaranteed. today, because moderates are disappearing from the congress in a divided government setting, it will be more challenging, so if you thought last summer was exciting around the debt limit, just wait, early next year is going to be enormously more complicated. >> so, in other words, pushing everything down the road three months or six months is what you're suggested, past the lame duck session? >> i would love to be pleasantly surprised, but i think we'll have to go over the cliff of going into early next year before anything happens. >> john podesta, i looked this morning, we were at 60% for the president's re-election, i think 87% romney becomes the nominee which is where we are right now which is quite a bit up from

recent, but also on the romney becoming president is up to about 34% which is up from 30% or so, so is you can sort of see how traders are thinking that maybe as it becomes more clear that maybe romney is the nominee, he moved up a little bit, it's not much better than one out of three chances at this point. how do you see things playing out between now and november? >> i basically agree with ken, i think that romney's on the path to get a majority of the delega delegates. he's probably going to get a majority of the delegates that are going to be chosen today. but he's doing it in a way that i think really actually hurts his chances of putting together a coalition that could be successful in november. he's hemorrhaging white working class voters, voters in the midwest. it's kind of a double whammy now. he's losing downscale white voters because of his economic policies. and his economic gaffes and now he's losing independents and women because of this debate we're having about the republican party sort of getting

on the side of being against contraception. so, i mean, i think he's ending up very much the likely nominee as reflected in the in trade number, but very weak going into the general election. >> john, you spent a lot of time obviously with president clinton and sort of the attitude towards the country. are you okay with what henninger in "the journal" wrote the depression era narrative that the president is talking about now, some people call it the politics of envy, the us versus them, you know, i'm here to help the working guy because you haven't had a fair chance recently. it's very divisive. maybe it's good for re-election. are you in favor of it for the country as a whole? >> look, i think the president really needs to put forward a plan for going the economy growing, getting jobs growing, but most importantly getting wages growing and i think that's

what he's talking about, making the economy more competitive. i think if you become, you know -- if you really get into the politics of, you know, class cutting, which i don't think he's done, you know, i think there's some -- i think there's a price to pay. i think people want an optimistic future and right now i think obama is actually winning that fight. you know, romney's really doubled down his economy 2.0 is even more tax cuts for the very wealthiest americans who are doing fine. i think that people are still angry out there, and what they're looking for is some vision and some hope that the economy's going to get better for them. >> what do you think, ken? >> no doubt in my mind that president obama inherited a tough economy. but he owns it now. and i think the american people are looking very much for leadership and the leadership has been abdicated. >> does the class warfare argument, does it play,

ultimately? >> i think ultimately it doesn't play. people are inspirational and aspirational. i think you can demonstrate, as romney i think is going to try to do, of how a rising tide lifts all boats. >> you don't think john's right when he says he thinks there's a remarkable amount of frustration in the country about the divides and the haves and have-nots and certain people are have-nots in this economy? >> i think there's an awful lot of recentment about anti-washington, anti-wall street, anti-the big banks. what obama is doing is very cleverly using what i think is class warfare. anti-business rhetoric. that i think doesn't bring the country together. remember, you run in order to govern. what i focused on with the question with peter orszag was regardless of who wins next november, how do you bring the

country together? not just how do you bring washington together, how do you bring the country together and you are playing off have been, nothing works. >> it was weird, i was down at the chamber giving a speech, universal studios both days, saturday and sunday, i had a 12-year-old and a 9-year-old. i could not move. done what butter beer is at harry potter? it's $11.50, i had to wait 15 minutes in line for something that was $11.50 and had no alcohol in it, something that had butterscotch in it. but it was packed. i want everyone to do well also, but i don't know, the 99% that we have right now, the 99% that we talk about so much, in this country lives better than the 10% in the rest of the world, and i'm not saying let them eat cake, i'm not saying any of that, but the whole narrative that i see where there's, you

know, the aristocrats, the 400 making all this money and everybody else, brother, can you spare a dime, i don't know if that's really the case. i don't know if that's really the case. >> spending is starting to really move. every place i go in america, there are lines. i'm not just talking about restaurants or hairstylists. i'm talking about the malls. >> still have the most vibrant middle-class in the world. >> is peter still with us? >> yes, i'm here. >> am i wrong, peter -- >> joe, if i can get in, i think that's true, but -- and i think that obama's trying to appeal to that sense of hope and inspiration, but romney's put forward a tax plan that raises taxes on 40% of morns making under $100,000 a year, how is that responding to the -- to the current economic circumstances that people feel? >> i don't know, there's some people that put forth, john, that since 50% pay no income tax at all, that even if they paid

$100 a year they would at least have a stake in the government -- if the government says now it's going to be $200, they know what it's like to go from $100 to $200. >> no payroll, i said federal. >> i know you said that. >> it would be a lot easier if you went after the 400 richest americans. >> which would raise $40 billion. >> but it's important to do. it's important to do. >> you can do it when you start talking about the fairness issue. but there's a difference between fairness and parity, and we'll never have -- >> someone that is paying 11% or 12%, versus somebody in the middle paying 25% or 30%. >> or 35%. >> john is talking about hope and optimism and that's what obama is selling right now. the answer is like ruth walker said in "the washington post" it's been replaced by fear and loathing. he's not the hope -- hope and changy thing anymore. >> hey, peter, a question about

simpson/bowles, do you think there's a chance to put it back on the table post-election were either candidate winning? becky was talking about it earlier, and the importance of what it seems like -- the business community seems to say we're all on board with it. i'm not sure they've all read the whole plan and if they did, would they be on board, i'm curious about your thoughts. >> some of the mythology has developed to the point it's divorced from reality. i like a lot of what is in simpson/bowles but we have to be clear, chance that simpson/bowles that could pass the house as currently configured, is the probability that i will pitch for the red sox. it had a significant amount of revenue in it that there's no way the republican caucus would have adopted it. it was bipartisan and could have passed the senate but not the house. >> the entitlement cuts could never have passed with the democrats. >> this is the problem. >> right. >> we are in a -- we're

effectively dark the congress, especially the house, is effective bimodal, and something has to sort of fill in the middle and bring more moderates or we're not going to get those kinds of deals and the problem with that, of course, is we need some deals to not only solve -- or address the legislative issues that are coming up but frankly to get us on a better, longer-term path not only with regard to the deficit but responding to the fact that the global labor supply has doubled or quadrupled in the past -- >> peter, we also know in order to drive the system you need strong presidential leadership and the fact is that president obama for at least four months decides not to meet with erskine bowles or alan simpson when they had the report and sent the signal all over washington that the president was taking a step away from it. it wasn't until much later he decided to get religion. the answer is can you put

together a new congress if he is re-elected or can mitt romney if he's elected put something that will throw in tax reform like simpson/bowles? >> let's sure hope so, because i think there's a real possibility here that unless -- unless we can configure that kind of package we're going to have a rolling set of two- or three- or four-month debt limit extensions through 2013 and that would create anxiety and uncertainty that no one needs. we absolutely need a big deal to come together and, again, with the congress of tw or three decades ago it would have been virtually guaranteed, today given there's no middle, it's much harder but necessary. >> this is what is going to cause the drama early next year. >> i want to pin john down on how high you would like marginal rates to go. 26% is simpson/bowles, let's say

you got rid of the deductions and the 00 we400 were paying 26. will that satisfy the center for american progress or do you have to get to the clinton rates? >> i think you can get lower, 26% is actually too low and i don't think simpson/bowles really concluded you could get to that, but i think getting down to the low 30s, maybe 30%, i think that's doable, but it's going to mean broadening the base and i think that one of the things the three of us i think all agree on is next spring we need a big deal, it's got to include tax reform. it's got to raise revenue and it's got to restrain entitlement costs. >> you won't boycott something that doesn't get us back to the clinton rates -- i've seen 70% put forward as where we need to go. >> in france. >> no, i've seen -- the people that still want on the very rich, the sky's the limit on how

high you go on the part of the rich. >> but i think -- look, i think you could get -- i think you can get serious tax reform done in this country on the personal income tax side, but it's going to mean -- as i said, it will mean getting rid of tax expenditures and broadening the base to do so. we'll get back to the clinton rates on january 1st, 2013 and then we'll work from there. and, by the way, those did pretty well, didn't they, in the economy? >> gets knocked down a little bit which we're all talking about. >> all right. i keep hearing that we got to go. thank you, peter orszag, good to see you and john podesta and ken will be with us for the rest of the show. gop hopeful mitt romney who we heard his name used quite a few types, will be our special guest tomorrow up on "squawk box." we'll turn our attention to the global pictures and the job markets and taking care of

business with the donald, donald trump, donald's deal on super tuesday and oil prices, all that when "squawk" returns. quarterback help us reach o. "squawk box" on twitter. then the world changed... and the common sense of retirement planning became anything but common. fortunately, td ameritrade's investment consultants can help you build a plan that fits your life. take control by opening a new account or rolling over an old 401(k) today, and we'll throw in up to $600. how's that for common sense?

back on this tuesday

morning. take a look at the futures this morning. dow would open up about 81 points off, the s&p 500 about ten points and the nasdaq off 20 points. this comes as last week was a down week and yesterday was also a down day. this comes this morning as the pressure in the asian markets and also renewed fears about what's going on in greece and what that rescue will ultimately look like. our good friend ira harris of practice trading joins us from the cme on all that and more. ira, you know, i thought the train had left the station and now i think the train may have sort of paused and you might have still the chance to get on it if you think it's still going up. >> andrew, you always have a chance to get on it. there will be corrections. this market will correct. as you said we'll be looking forward to friday's data, and friday karl was out here in chicago, the best number that this market could see from the stock -- i think from the equity

market perspective the up ployment rate jumping up with a large nonfarm payroll gain, because that would really exemplify some type of positive that people were returning looking for jobs as we were experiencing growth, and as the kicker to all that, that would really keep the fed on that long pause into 2014 because the higher rate is what will concern the fed. >> are we just treading water into friday? is that the idea here? because i have to tell you, i know the markets are down, but there's not, you know, a huge number of headlines that would necessarily push it in this direction so much as just sort of a fear -- i don't know if it's a fear friday factor we can call it. >> no, you know, what, andrew, i don't think anybody really -- you don't want to get caught chasing momentum and buying into the hop of every reality and get out on the setbacks. i think investors are stepping back and taking a deep breath and saying, let's see where we are going here, this has been

very solid move, you know, let's go over the last five months, this is, what, 25%, 27% reality off of the bottom. that's a very frothy move, let's take a step back and see where we're at. there are still a lot of good stocks out there with some good value, let's also remember it was the dividend stocks which was very unusual. large cap, large dividend stocks that have really led the way here, so i think people are stepping back and going can i find better values if i don't rush in and chase momentum. >> ira, if the jobs numbers are as good as you want them to be on friday, where's the dow go? >> i think then we'll certainly make new highs for this move. i think this market is dying to see that and then we'll get, of course, into the may period into the european elections, that will be the next worry, even more so than the whole greek problem, because once we get past the french election, we'll see what is going on in europe, everybody will be on hold until that.

pumped enough liquidity into that financial system. borrowing any type of political calamity in the world i think then the markets will be very comfortable and going, okay, we've got plenty of liquidity, we've got growth, the united states is getting some traction in its job growth and yet, you know, the best thing is that people are returning to the job market so that will keep the rate high and that's what the markets are really concerned about. >> ira harris, thank you very much for joining us. we'll keep our eyes on friday. >> thanks, andrew. coming up, donald trump sounds off on super tuesday and the markets and much more, and then on wednesday, it's reaction from staples ceo, and a retail update with the ceo of lululemon, i've got a lot of questions for the guy from lululemon, it's underwear, but -- >> you think about these things a lot? >> no, i got those, and you know i tried to wear them with boxers and it was, like -- i felt like i was, you know -- like i had betty in my -- i think you need, do you know what?

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welcome back to "squawk box" on tuesday morning among the stories we're following today, there's a new dispute over the safety of some popular soft drinks. the center for science and the public interest says it found unsafe levels of a coloring agent used in coke, pepsi, dr. pepper, and a whole foods sola brand, it wants the fda to ban the substance. the fda is reviewing the request but says the drinks are safe and consumers would have to drink 1,000 cans a day to ingest unsafe levels of the chemical. new york's madison square garden is raising season ticket prices for the nba's knicks by nearly 5%, in the nhl's new york rangers by 9.5% this is as the garden is in the midst of a three-year, $1 million renovation, the knicks have

enjoyed an upswing with jeremy lin and linsanity, and the rangers have the best record in the national hockey league. our guest host is ken duberstein, we haven't gotten a chance to talk to you about the economy and the markets and what is happening right now, and the best way to get into this is how the economy plays into the presidential election. where do you thinks heading and how do you think it will impact how things head towards november? >> i think the best indication is unemployment rate. when obama came to office it was 7.8%, it's been over 8% for 36 consecutive months. a more interesting statistic is that the bureau of labor statistics started in 1949 keeping these unemployment rates. there have been over 750 monthly reports. only 70 of them have been over 8% in 36 of that, half of that

has been under obama. the sensitivity of unemployment, if the trajectory is going down, it obviously helps obama. but it's got to keep going down on a strong trajectory, not bump back and forth. no one knows where this thing is going. >> right. >> you know, manufacturing may be up. boeing may be selling more planes. but consumer confidence right now is still pretty much down. people may be going to malls, and they're looking but they're not shopping. >> the biggest question is probably the participation rate, too. as people come back into the workforce even if more jobs are being created, that could boost the unemployment rate. >> well, in fact, the underemployed and the unemployed total over 16%. that is a huge problem for president obama. it's his economy. you can't just blame it on george w. bush. it's his responsibility because of the policies that he's had to

take. i think the republicans will go very much not only after obama care but some of the stimulus package and obviously the need for more tax cuts. i think the package holds together. because the president has to be on the defense when it comes to whether the unemployment rate is. >> okay. >> how much more can he be doing? he can't spend any more. that's not simply the answer that the american people want. you can't be doing more overregulation. >> okay. we'll have more of this discussion when we come back. >> i am just getting bombarded with minivan -- the funniest things that we talk about. what pique's people's interest. >> oreos. >> minivans. >> there's a commercial if you watch it, a guy that has the stubble, so he's a happening guy that can get into the clubs in new york and he's lusting for this minivan. he's looking for a minivan and

it's supposed to look really cool, and i watch it and i expect will ferrell to pop out. i expect it to be -- it's, like, you are joking, you're really trying to make an ad where this guy is coveting a minivan? it's impossible. it's not -- do you remember "get shorty"? someone said, yeah, i got this new oldsmobile, i forget the name of it, and he really believes this is -- and he goes and gets it and he's driving it and out going to the restaurants in l.a. parking in front for people, and it doesn't work. >> they are practical cars. >> they are. and you shouldn't -- >> and they're selling. >> they are. >> chrysler invented them. >> it was the dodge caravan i think was the very first. >> yeah, exactly. >> i don't know -- >> i wouldn't trade in a helicopter for a minivan. you don't know what you are missing. all right, if you have any comments or questions about anything we've talked about here

this morning on "squawk" e-mail us at squawk@cnbcnews.com. the dow futures are down by about 71 points, wouldn't have seemed like a big deal last year but we've not seen this much volatility this year and that's a drop of 0.056 percent on the dow futures. "squawk box" will be right back. coming up, he's a real estate mogul. >> five is my final offer. >> deal. we would have taken four. >> then i want a do-over! >> he's challenged the manning brothers. >> no way. >> and they're going to be huge. >> he's inspired business executives. >> sadly, one of you will be fired. >> oit's tuesday with trump rigt here on "squawk box." >> all right, go ahead, thank you. >> the legendary billionaire and businessman is coming up next. they've been committed to putting clients first. helping generations through tough times.

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some people think it's super

tuesday, but more importantly it's trump tuesday, hundreds of delegates up for grabs, one of the many topics we'll cover in our segment with the donald joining us on the "squawk" news line is donald trump, president and chairman of the trump organization. good morning, donald, and we have ken duberstein here who says i don't know there's rumblings that maybe romney has a good night. i guess that would mean ohio and tennessee. what do you think? >> well, i agree with ken, i think he's going to have a very good night, a surprisingly good night and he's been surprising a lot of people for a lot of time, so let's see what happens. but i think he'll win ohio and that will be a big, big difference, and at some point they'll be able to focus on president obama. right now this is just going on. it's getting to be too long. i've been a big proponent of let it go long because people are talking about you, but at some point it's getting a little bit too long. >> you think it's good when people talk about you, that's never really been part of your career really? >> sometimes it's good and sometimes it's not so good.

but, you know, they have been doing a lot of talking for a lot of time about each other, not about the president, and it's now really time to focus and, you know, to get everybody in line, the republicans have to show some leadership. they have to get people in line. so, we have to see what happens today. i think ohio's going to be a very pleasant surprise for mitt romney. he's a good man. he gets china. he gets opec. he knows what's going on. i think others don't. and it's time to coalesce behind someone. >> and recently some conservative elements are getting more -- i don't -- i'd like to say that they're just getting more excited about romney and not say that they're getting less worried about his bona fides, his conservative credentials, but whatever is happening there, i don't want to say they're resigned to it, but they are coming around. >> well, i think they are. and he's getting endorsements from lots of different people, some very conservative, or at least known to be very conservative, and i think he's

going to do very well. i think he's going to do really very well. you know what happens, they have the primaries where he's down or somebody else is down and they just rise he top. i've seen polls where he's beating obama, i've seen polls where he's losing to obama. but that race hasn't even come close to starting yet, it's going to be very interesting. and frankly as you discuss every day, if gas prices hit $5 a gallon for the motorists, you're going to see something very interesting happen. and i think they may go a lot higher than that. we have nobody representing us in washington. >> hey, donald, this is ken. >> hi, ken. >> simple question, even chuck todd has said you've had a huge impact on your robocalls and your radio call-in shows in michigan and perhaps in ohio. so, let's jump ahead and let's say that there's a romney administration. how can you help him the way you've been helping him in michigan and in ohio? >> well, we have had a big effect in michigan and ohio i guess from what everybody's saying. i've done robocalls and i've

done some radio shows and some shows really talking about mitt romney and that he really would be, i think, number one, a great candidate, and number two, a great president, because that is phase two after all, but really -- i'm not even thinking about that, ken, what i am thinking about is getting somebody in that would be a really terrific president, that would do a job. you know, i've been long talking about china and other countries how they just take advantage of us like we're a bunch of patsies, and romney will stop that. he's the one person that really, really talks about it. it's high on his agenda. so, i'm not looking for that. i love what i'm doing. i just bought doral country club and a lot of other things, i like to buy real estate -- >> in you are the link. >> i'm only a couple of blocks away from the white house, so at least i got to pennsylvania avenue. the old post office site, i don't know, i think is one of the most highly sought-after jobs ever. and i have to say, the gsa is so

professional the way they handled that. everybody wanted it and we were able to get it through i think a great plan and a great statement. and we'll do a great job with it. but i love real estate in light of what's happening with the world. you look at the dollar going down. you look at $1.6 trillion in debt, and honestly to me, people talk gold, i think the best hedge is real estate, really great. i have hundreds of acres in miami, the largest property owner and, you know, it's -- i like buying great real estate. when i look at what's happening to the world. but really to this country. >> donald, i don't know what happened with george will, low blood sugar, having a bad day. you saw that piece, though, give up on the presidency and just make sure that the republicans keep the senate and try to keep -- or take the senate and keep the house. what do you think got -- is he trying to motivate people by saying it's already too late, or what did you make of his comment?

>> no, i think george will is a loser. i've watched him for years. he actually spoke for me at mar-a-lago a long time ago and i was unimpressed, but that was a long time ago. you take around his round spectacles and his greasy haircut and you realize he's not a very smart guy. the fact is the republicans have a great chance of winning under the auspices of mitt romney. i believe the others can. i think santorum two have zero chance, absolutely zero chance. he wouldn't get the women's vote, you know, minor little segment, but i think mitt romney could win and i think he will win and i think depending on what happens with oil, i mean, you look at what's going on with oil, where, i mean, could this be heading up to $150 a barrel again? which is what i think caused the last depression, because i'll call it a depression, more so than the banks. >> what did he do -- you got to tell me the inside story on how he got you upset.

if i made promos at cnbc, what did you say, the greasy hair and -- that would be -- that would be rolling all day long. >> i don't know, but i don't like when you -- i -- >> the greasy hair. >> i don't like when you have a conservative person essentially saying let's give up on the presidency. >> right. >> let's focus on the house. let's focus on congress. let's give up on the presidency. give me a break. i've seen polls that have mitt romney ahead of obama and he's saying let's give up. certain swing states it looks like obama can't win them. >> right. >> so, i don't know if he's doing it for effect or what he's doing but, you know, i've just watched him over the years, i'm just not impressed with him. >> you sure it is a good idea to be making fun of someone else's hair, donald? >> well, i have a beautiful crop of hair. >> i know. >> it is mine. i get criticized over my hair, i co combed it that way for many years. >> it's not a combover.

i can tell people that. >> it's not a combover. >> it's orange. >> that's the nicest thing you said to me in many years. >> donald, let me ask you a question. is it because of politics or management or leadership or all three? >> i guess you would have to say, ken, all three. but i'm a big proponent of negotiation, and when i look at what china is doing -- because they're going to make $350 billion on us this year and take our jobs and lots of other things. i mean, they make our product, they take our jobs, they manipulate their currency like nobody in history. and, by the way, they do it brilliantly, they just do it brilliantly. but we have nobody to proehltect us but then they come to this country, and they get a state dinner the likes of which you've never seen. i look at other countries and you look at the opec nations and i see paved in gold and i come back to our cities and we have

potholes all over the place. you look at what's going on with the war. we are spending -- we are spending $1.5 trillion as an example in iraq. and that country is going to go probably to iran depending on what's going to happen with iran, but they're going to take over the oil fields. but you look at afghanistan where they don't want us, we're spending billions of billions, and we're building schools and highways over there and we can't build roads in this country, so -- and by the way, there's nobody more conservative than donald trump or into the military than donald trump but we're not spending our money correctly. we have $1.6 trillion -- we're not there yet, but it will be there in seconds, we're $1.6 trillion in debt and yet we're a country in trouble and yet we're a country with tremendous potential, tremendous, unbelievable potential, just in terms of energy potential that we have, but we're not allowed to go get the energy, so it's a tough thing. so, i would really have to say all three elements. >> donald, would you even try to

make the case, i don't know what world that you'd live in, but if someone told you that the problem with the obama administration and the economy was that stimulus needed to be twice as big and the obama -- i'm going to say this. and the obama administration has been too focused on deficit reduction, that has been the problem with why the economy hasn't done better, too much emphasis on deficit reduction and the stimulus was just way too small. >> give me a break. >> well, this is a first when i hear this. i mean, i actually -- i actually listened to the gentleman on the show before that was, you know, discussing that, that as a possibility. no, i'm a believer you're going to have to do something, otherwise you're going to have to buy certain types of assets like i just told you like real estate or other things because we're going to just lose the dollar to inflation. i mean, you're going to see inflation like nobody's ever seen it before, and i always found great -- the best thing to own for me personally has been real estate during inflation and during times actually like this.

so, you know, i have heard this case made. i think it's a ridiculous case, personally. now, some people disagree with me, but i think most people would agree that that is not a good case. >> no. all right. well, we look forward to this segment every week. and we've got -- i would like to see you sometime. it seems like a guy with your -- with your dough could put a camera in trump tower for us, unless you're -- are you not presentable right now? >> could we ever get you to come here to sit on set with us? >> you will. and i would love to every once in a while. i love the super tuesday thing, that's really -- you know, we call it super tuesday but now they are referring to trump tuesday. i really like that. i will have to come there sometimes. >> what if andrew picks you up? >> in my copter. >> in his helicopter on his way out. >> i've been there many times and i will absolutely get there no question.

>> you have a great co-host in ken. >> i'll pick you up. >> very good. i look forward to seeing you over there. so long, ken. >> thanks, donald. >> thank you to you next week. thanks. i'll do this. >> i can pick him up. >> you never thought about this? >> i thought about taking me and going to pick him up. >> is there a west side -- >> there is one on the east side and the west side. >> there's a good trump helicopter. >> that's fine, too. >> you can ride with him. >> you can hitch a ride. >> you can chopper pool. >> because of the footprint and all. checking the futures right now, indicated still down, roughly -- has been almost 100 points down, it's come back a little bit, down 72 points after a selloff yesterday in a down week which is one of the first ones we've had this year. when we come back, a man who knows energy and who has been a very vocal advocate for rethinking the way we use it. boone pickens is our special guest in the next hour. by watt i, don't forget,

tomorrow on "squawk box," mitt romney will join us with reaction for super tuesday and what's next on the campaign trail. "squawk box" will be right back. the equity summary score consolidates the ratings of up to 10 independent research providers into a single score that's weighted based on how accurate they've been in the past. i'm howard spielberg of fidelity investments. the equity summary score is one more innovative reason serious investors are choosing fidelity. get 200 free trades today and explore your next investing idea.

let's turn to our guest host ken duberstein former chief of staff for ronald reagan and chairman and ceo of duberstein group, the question on my mind as we all think that romney is the presumptive nominee, if you will, when the others drop away.

when the others drop away, of course, is when the money drop away, and i start thinking about sheldon adelson and the like. my question is when does it stop? when does the gravy train stop? does someone whisper in sheldon's ear and say, you've got to stop and get on the romney train? >> who knows if he's not already been on the romney train. it's been very important for santorum and gingrich to split the vote. there was a meeting that took place in las vegas during the nevada campaign. >> i like this story. >> exactly. during the primary, where newt gingrich met with sheldon adelson, but it was also reported that so did mitt romney. it is to mitt romney's advantage for sheldon adelson to keep funding newt gingrich, because it splits that vote. >> do you know this or are you -- >> i'm just speculating. i'm totally speculating. but that's how you do bank

shots. and why? because romney in sheldon adelson's mind, again, i am projecting, is better on israel issues where he really cares than he thinks that barack obama is. so, you do the bank shot and you continue to fund speaker gingrich. >> right. is the pain, though, of all of the animosity that's created -- the journal yesterday said it's corrosive, what is happening in the republican party. you call it a bank shot. i see that. but i also wonder whether long term too much damage gets done at the same time. >> are you talking about the damage, the collateral damage -- >> collateral damage. >> super pac. >> no, no. but the collateral damage of gingrich still hanging out there, of santorum splitting that vote and the rhetoric and all of the conversation that comes along with that? >> look, look, i think the republicans learn from the democrats, perhaps the wrong

lesson. in 2008 obama, hillary clinton, it energized the party. this has gone on much too long on the republican side, and you've had seven or eight in the contest. it has become a reality show on tv. you know, 20 debates. whoever thought of that is crazy. somebody is unresponsive by the dnc. >> ken, we'll have to stop it right there. we appreciate it very much. coming up, he's waiting for america to adopt his energy plan, will natural gas crusader boone pickens ever succeed in his quest? he'll join us for the final hour of "squawk" when we return. "squawk box" is shooting for 10,000. follow the show on twitter and help us reach our goal. @squawkcnbc is our handle. that no one notices you?" and i'm like,

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grabs across 11 states, a gingrich campaign insider and longtime romney backer square off on the biggest day yet in the fight for the gop nomination. plus, the latest business headlines and market analysis you won't find anywhere else as the third hour of "squawk box" begins right now. welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc, first in business worldwide, i'm joe kernen along with becky quick and andrew ross sorkin and our guest host ken duberstein this morning and, well, we'll return to ken in a second because -- >> we'll get right to it. >> we're going to get the full story after we do some headlines. in the meantime making headlines, the group representing athens' bondholders is warning that a disorderly

greek default would probably lead italy and spain needing outside help to stop contagion from spreading. the group suggesting that such a scenario could cause more than $1.3 trillion of damage to the euro zone. greek creditors have until thursday night to say whether they'll take part in the bond swap. look at european equities at this hour. you can see red arrows across the board impacting what's going on over here ahead of the open. current u.s. equity futures looks like dow would open up about 79 points lower, s&p 500 would be off about ten points as well, there you see what's going on with the new open. >> and we thought the bond yields in italy indicated that the worst had passed and then you -- and here we are again. >> down 300 points. you think this is noise? >> i don't know. greece the contagion wouldn't stop. i thought we had a fire wall. >> we don't have a fire wall.

it's the election season today and the gop are hoping for a decisive victory for the elections. will we have a nominee by the end of the day? with us is kevin madden, he served as mitt romney's press secretary in his 2008 presidential bid and i was surprised, kevin, because kelly ann came in and said, yeah, it will be romney because he's got -- >> 119. >> out of how many? >> he's 1,000 short, 1,025 short. >> i have told you sarcasm is -- you were being sarcastic? >> some of the same people who have been talking a year about romney's inevitability can do so. we need the voters in the next 27 states to have the same right that the voters in the first 23 have which is to express their voice to choose their nominee. competition is supposed to be the heart and soul of the republican party and it's amazing to me that so many

people want to sweep away competition. i listen to words all the time about romney, resigned, reluctant, that feels like 1996 in 2008 all over again. you nominate a moderate who lost the last time and guess what they lose big to a clinton or obama. we'll not have a gop candidate after today, romney has 119 delegates. santorum has 17, even though he won some contests, there are 17 committed delegates, we'll do well in the biggest prize tonight of georgia and it's never discussed in the gingrich campaign when to drop out. we're still going on. he says he's going to tampa and i'll be there with him. >> assume he gets the vote in the june. >> winner take all. >> will they matter? >> they will matter. they will matter. it's funny you mention that because what's happening in some of the states is the early voting and when people are ahead in the polls even if they start to collapse closer to that particular election day, at early voting really sustains and helps romney tremendously in

florida even though he ended up losing iowa and south carolina, it helps him in early voting and santorum has benefitted from early voting in tennessee, the matter is who has been able to catch up. i don't have to tell you, when you are the inevitable front runner, all of your surprises after a certain point are unpleasant. they're not pleasant. when you're sort of in the trenches all of your surprises are -- >> i say a little too far down in the trenches? >> so many surprises are almost -- you're almost inoculated at this point, kevin. i don't know, that would be my response from you. but what do you say? >> well, look, i've never used the word inevitability and i don't think anybody in boston particularly the candidate has ever thought themselves to be the inevitable candidate. i think we always expected that this was going to be a very competitive primary contest. we always expected that we were going to have to earn this nomination and i think over the contest what we've seen is a campaign and particularly a candidate that's been very focused on the number one issue that matters to voters and

that's the economy. so, i think when you're getting feedback from voters, you know, kelly ann used some disparaging language, but i think voters are saying, look, the one thing i know about governor romney is he's going to turn this country around. the one thing i know about governor romney he's the economy guy. he's the guy out there focused on jobs, so i think that's why you've seen governor romney win the last five contests. i think it's why you are starting to see that many voters are starting to coalesce around governor romney because they do want to turn their attention to the -- our main opponent which is obama and his white house. and i think because of that, that there -- we are seeing governor romney start to get a greater deal of support. some of the opposition that has calcified around candidates like newt gingrich is not serving them well and we'll see movement toward governor romney. >> the rap on newt gingrich is it's not in it to win it and it's personal and he's still

smarting from the hit job in iowa. >> florida. >> in florida. >> both. >> yeah. >> not that he's smarting, i think, speaking of disparaging comments, my god, kevin, your candidate has spent gazillions of dollars on negative ads -- >> newt gingrich didn't spend any money attacking governor romney. >> excuse me. 98.2% of the ads in florida as you know that governor romney ran were negative against newt. you harped on the guy. governor romney doesn't run ads about job creation. be honest for the viewers here, i love you, but what percentage of the ads has governor romney run about the candidates and gingrich and how many ads about jobs and the economy? that's why the clear front runner hasn't sealed the deal and won't after tonight. >> ads are only one part of the campaign and if you remember

down in florida and many of these other contests that governor romney has been successful at, it's been because everywhere he's gone and every time he's engaged voters he's talked about the economy, he's talked about the future, he's talked about jobs and that's why his message has resonated. and, you know, you talk about newt gingrich's, you know, not spending any money, how's he going to convince republican voters he's the right candidate to take on the billion dollar pac machine waiting for us in chicago if he can't put simple things like organization and get on the ballot in his home state of virginia? that is a huge liability as a candidate and i think that's why voters haven't been supporting him. >> kevin, this is ken, would you explain to me the six years mitt romney has been dating the republican party. >> divorced. >> and he can't get them to marry him. now, is today the day that they fall in love and decide to get married? or is it two weeks or is it in a month? because the answer is he's got

to solidify the republican base in order to win, while at the same time opening up the opportunity for independents. >> well, look -- >> when does the marriage get consummated? >> well, look, i think we have had a very spirited contest in this primary and that's what -- it's a good thing about primaries, we've had a number of really good candidates through this entire process and they've all made their pitch to republican voters. and i think there's a reason that governor romney has been at the top of the pile during this entire contest it's because he's been focused on the number one issue that they care about which is the economy, so i think that is really what voters will be looking for in november. republican voters, independent voters, and even many disaffected democrats who are very unhappy with this president's lack of leadership on this economy. and that's his specialty. governor romney has -- everything that he's ever encountered whether it's been the state of massachusetts, a dysfunctional olympics, he's turned them around. right now we have a

dysfunctional economy in america, that mass not lived up to his full potential and he can help turn it around. when they hear him talk about it and see him demonstrate his expertise on that issue, i think they'll continue to move towards had him and support him. >> but, remember, the presidency is not a manager's job. it's not a ceo's job. >> i didn't use the word manager at all. >> it's a leadership job. >> you're absolutely right. >> look, the most important thing that happened last week is governor romney said he won't light his hair on fire to prove his a conservative, and, you know, if you're a conservative, you don't need to talk to a hair man, you can just tell. you see it in your record. you see it in your vision. and his negatives -- >> anytime you are talking about his hair, you are winning. >> i don't want to talk about hair. i've had a bad hair life. i don't want comments about my hair. >> but the fact is even in the latest "wall street journal" poll, his negatives are way up

among independents because people are starting to shift away his gazillion worth of advertising and on to the sponsor. where is the positive growth message? >> if you are talking about candidate negatives, you are working for the wrong candidate. newt gingrich's negatives are pretty high. >> they've been frozen in time for a while. >> i'm a conservative and i think other conservatives like me support governor romney and they look at what he talked about on taxes, a 20% across the board cut, focus on entitlements and job creation and know cussing on putting more power back in the american public versus more power into the government. that's why they'll support him. >> kelly ann, keep your options open. kevin, you are great, too, but with you i feel like it's watching when the jets are taking on the patriots -- or the giants and -- but then when the giants are taking on the patriots, then i want -- you'll come home some day, won't you, if it is romney, won't you? >> of course. i will do whatever i can to help

them. and kevin will be calling me. >> i'm -- open arms, i'm welcoming kelly into the campaign. >> the lights are on. >> but we're not there yet, guys. that's the thing. >> if newt wins georgia, and gets wiped out elsewhere, what does sheldon adelson do for the campaign? >> i don't speak for sheldon aid aid aidleson. >> i know you don't. >> newt will win georgia by three or four times the margin that romney won last week. that's the deal, ken. romney had a near death experience in his home state, the idea that he can pull it out in ohio so he can be the nominee. why is he pulling it out in ohio against rick santorum? he shouldn't be in that position to begin. >> where do you expect newt to do well? >> he'll do well in tennessee and third in ohio and pick up delegates and he's competitive in oklahoma. we don't think we'll win to massachusetts because that belongs to the moderate governor of massachusetts.

>> wow. wow. >> kevin, was that the disparaging word i used, moderate? you didn't want to bring us back to the reagan/bush years and paul tsongas. >> i know you are talking about a third place finish in ohio and you haven't won in how long. >> those are fighting words. >> so georgia goes, so does the nation. kevin? >> the ratings went down. >> all right. >> they might have gone up actually. >> kevin, thanks. kelly ann, thanks. >> good to be with you, always. >> the minivan coming soon. >> the minivan. newt was on yesterday. >> and mitt romney is going to join us live on "squawk box" tomorrow morning, which will be -- you'll be watching, kelly ann, i know. >> treadmill. >> get some more talking points. when we come back, we'll be talking with t. boone pickens,

no shortage of things to talk about with the legendary oil man. we'll talk gasoline, natural gas, tensions in the middle east and gasoline and seeing how it all plays out. stick around, "squawk box" will be right back.

candidates on the super tuesday campaign trail energized about spiking fuel prices as they count up to $5. and newt gingrich talked about lowering gas prices yesterday on "squawk box." >> the plan i outlined for $2.50 or less gasoline and for national energy independence so that no american president will ever yet bow to a saudi king is really hitting a nerve and is a very strong positive reaction to the idea of having american energy independence, using federal lands offshore to produce enough oil and getting the price of gasoline down below

$2.50. >> joining us right now to talk about energy policy and much more is oil man t. boone pickens he's the founder and ceo of bt capital, and, boone, it's great to see you this morning. >> thank you. >> we have a lot of things to talk about you, but why don't we start off talking about what newt gingrich told us yesterday. obviously people are very concerned as gas prices rise. what do you think of his plan and other plans to try and get gas prices down? >> i didn't hear the plan that he had. the $2.50 is not realistic. but he when asked -- when charlie asked him yesterday about his plan, he said could i contact your office and get a copy of it? he said, i'll put you in touch with experts that told me that. i don't know any expert that thinks you can get $2.50 gasoline. i don't know where that comes from. >> what do you think does need to be done in terms of pushing gas prices down? is there anything that the government can do in the short

term? i know you have longer-term plans, but what about the idea of tapping the spr? >> well, you can get -- open up the spr, but we already have -- united states has the cheapest energy in the world. our natural gas price is $2.35. and beijing's $16. in mideast, $15. europe is $13. you say, well, that's just one resource. well, oil, we are -- we're paying $106 a barrel for it. and brent north sea which is a global price is $123 a barrel. gasoline is cheaper than anyplace else in the world. i don't know what we're complaining about, what we don't do is we don't explain it to the american people. i'm not sure whether the politicians don't understand energy or they don't want to talk about it. maybe you can help me on that one. >> i don't know if i can help you on that one, but you think

these levels are where oil should be at this point, then? >> well, look it, who controls the price of oil? opec does. so, if you want to go to work on the price of oil and eventually get gasoline prices down, you have to attack transportation fuel. 70% of all the oil used every day in the world goes to transportation. nobody mentions that. okay. so, you get -- you put natural gas in there, which is the cheapest energy commodity today, put that in there on a heavy duty trucks, and, yes, you can do something about the price -- bring down the price of diesel, gasoline, they're one in the same and natural gas can do that. you know, it's -- i'm obviously frustrated. and so it's -- it's -- i don't understand why they don't understand. >> frustrated with the pickens plan in terms of getting it through legislation, you know, about a week ago "the wall

street journal" came up with an op-ed that said boondoggle, this idea of getting subsidies for natural gas. you had a response to "the journal" today in a letter to the editor. you want to talk a little bit about what you found, the problems you found with their editorial? >> well, the editorial completely left out the fact that they want to talk about subsidy. there's no subsidy in my plan. it has a pay-for in it. it's paid for by the user, and just like you would if that -- a good example is a toll road. the people pay for the toll road are the people that are using the toll road, same way with the -- if you had the natural gas act, you do give a -- you do give a tax credit, but the tax credit is paid for by the user of the natural gas. and you can -- actually, it's a pretty good place to pick up a few bucks because natural gas is so cheap. it's $2, $1.50 to $2 cheaper than diesel is, so it's an

unbelievable opportunity. but i can tell you there are a lot of truck owners today are switching over on all their new trucks. what they're doing is buying natural gas, because the fuel is so cheap. >> ken? >> boone, this is ken, what's happening -- >> hi, ken. >> what's happening in the marketplace with truck stops and convenience stores, has there been a big conversion? is there a bigger conversion going on to switching to natural gas? how are people going on that? >> well, ken, you know -- oh, it's happening. you look at jimmie haslam's deal, pilot, flying "j," they're putting it in 100 of their truck stops. no, don't worry about the fuel showing up, because it will be, you know, natural gas is -- the only thing that's more widely distributed in the united states is water. and so natural gas, i promise you, will be there. about the you don't want the

government paying for that infrastructure. that's the last thing. don't get them into that act. the fuel is so cheap, it will be delivered. but you can make it happen faster if you do the natural gas act. and you could get -- make the conversion away from diesel, which i consider to be -- i look all of it as opec, which it's not. but a lot of it is. but we're importing 5 million barrels a day from opec. 8 million 18-while eeelers, tha what we have in the united states, you could make that conversion in five years if you had the natural gas act. if you don't, it's going to take longer to accomplish that. but what happens when you do it is that you do those 8 million, 18-wheelers, that's 3 million barrels of oil a day, so you cut opec by 60%. >> is the demand there from the truckers? from the driving public -- >> is the demand -- >> is the demand there for natural gas?

>> oh, it's going to -- sure it is. i mean, natural gas is the only fuel that will replace diesel. you can't do it with a battery. you can't do it with ethanol. it's only natural gas. and here we're the biggest natural gas producers in the world. this is an opportunity unheard of to get the 18-wheelers on natural gas. >> yeah, i think boone is talking about the 18-wheelers can't run on battery. boone, real quickly, you pointed out about how we are still importing 5 million barrels a day from opec. the president has talked about how last year the united states was actually an energy exporter and pointed to that as proof that his energy policies are working. what do you think about where we stand right now in terms of being a national energy exporter and our national energy plan? >> yeah, the energy he's talking about is gasoline and diesel. so, we're bringing in $120 opec oil. we are refining it, and sending it back out. they're getting that back out

into the global market. so, i can tell him one thing that exporting gasoline and diesel out of the united states runs up the price of gasoline and diesel in the united states. so, it's, you know, i don't know whether they understand or not. but it's not difficult to understand if you just spend an afternoon on it you'd be surprised how much you can learn. >> hey, boone, there's news this morning chesapeake energy doing a joint venture with kkr, they're spending $250 million to start buying up mineral and royalty interests in u.s. oil and gas space. you are starting to see this as a trend, black stone group did something similar just a couple weeks ago. what do you make of this? >> it's another way to make money because natural gas is so cheap. you have to know that when you have beijing natural gas $16, mideast $15, you're at $13, the united states is $2.35?

well, that isn't going to continue. you're going to export natural gas out of the united states to get into those markets. but what we need to do is to increase demand in the united states and use the cheap fuel here. is what -- is the way it should work. but you get no encouragement to increase demand in the united states. only from boone. i'm the only one doing it. that isn't exactly right. i can tell you this, richard burr, senator from north carolina, he understands it. he had a letter to the editors this morning in "the wall street journal" that's very clear and to the point. >> when you say "they don't understand," are you talking about the white house? are you talking about the congress? who are you talking about, boone? >> all of them, ken. all of them. i mean, that, you know, you have people get up try to talk about energy, and, you know, you think don't do it because what you're saying is inaccurate, you don't understand what you're talking about. we have resources in america. we have plenty of resources in

america to get off of opec oil. and it's just incredible. you take the last ten years, opec oil has cost us $1 trillion. unnecessary. you go forward ten years and at $100 oil, it will cost you $2.2 trillion, totally unnecessary. we have resources in america that can solve the problem. >> all right, well, boone, we want to thank you very much for being with us today. >> okay. were my remarks positive or negative? >> about who? >> about energy? >> negative about washington, i think. >> negative about washington, positive about natural gas. >> negative about oil. >> is that a fair assessment? >> thank you for hearing my story. >> thank you. >> all right. thanks, boone, we'll talk to you again. >> thanks. still to come on "squawk," citigroup said consumer confidence lags gasoline price move six months, so with prices

at the pump headed towards $5 should we be worried about stocks? we'll get to that question after the break. it confirms your reservation and the location your car is in, the moment you land. it's just another way you'll be traveling at the speed of hertz. not quite knowing what the next phase was going to be, you know, because you been, you know, this is what you had been doing. you know, working, working, working, working, working, working.

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thanks scott. [ scott ] feed your lawn. feed it. despite two down days, the dow, the s&p, and the nasdaq making clear gains year to date, but some indicators actually suggest that the bulls may take a breather. checking the markets with us and the impact of high fuel cost is

tobias levkovich, he's a u.s. equity strategist and you've got real thoughts about the consumer and confidence levels. how much do we have to worry about it as we see gasoline prices tick higher? >> gasoline prices have an inverse relation to consumer confidence. as they go up consumer confidence tends to wane. we've gotten a little bit of a break this year because of the mild winter and natural gas prices and all of these things are helping with the heating costs. but travel costs are moving higher. everybody looks at the pump prices and kind of gasps a little bit, and that will undermine confidence. now, there is one other thing you have to realize, confidence and consumer spending have actually diversed, and that's not particularly the normal pattern. it is if you look at discretionary spend -- confidence has not kept up with consumer confidence. the significance there is significant government support, the money coming in from unemployment and food stamps has kept the confidence there.

and if you look at discretionary spending the relationship with consumer confidence is extremely tight still. >> but there's a lag you say. >> yeah, it takes about six months for high energy prices to really start weighing on confidence which if it doesn't come down soon is actually not very good from some of the discussion i heard driving over here for mr. obama's chances. >> just projecting out, when does that hit the confidence meter if you will? >> around summertime. >> where it is likely to get worse with the driving season or no? >> it should. but a lot has to do with changeover from the refineries from heating fuels to driving fuels. >> there's a six-month lag, you're talking about september, october? >> well, prices have been going up already, so it would probably already start to hit by july, august. it may carry on. >> for the political cycle, that is bad news for president obama. >> it certainly isn't good news for him i think if you were to get the employment gains against it, it would probably be better. one of the other things, because i mentioned the government

support programs, that could be replaced. the best thing you could have is an unemployment check be replaced by a paycheck and that's usually significantly higher than the unemployment check one receives, so as a result you'll have some more disposal income. >> and where will unemployment be? >> i believe our guys are north of 200,000 but i'm speculating. >> where are you? >> oh, i don't try to second-guess our economists. i think they do a better jonathan i'll do. >> if it's 200,000, what happens with the unemployment rate? >> i think that's the big question. i don't like the unemployment rate, i have to admit because you have to think about participation and -- >> you may not like it but that's what everybody measures. >> i'm less convinced of that, ken. i actually think people don't know the unemployment rate. i think the average person doesn't focus on the unemployment rate. i think they focus on what's going on amongst their group of friends, how many of their friends are unemployed and how many of their friends have job and more importantly the national unemployment rate means nothing in north dakota or virginia, the local unemployment rates.

>> it means a lot to the media. >> i will step back from that. >> let's talk about what it means for the market, if we do see a number around 200,000 that comes in, and the unemployment number is probably going to be the one that really dictates where the market heads, right? >> no, i think the job number itself, how many jobs you get. for example, let's argue 150,000 was the number that for some odd reason the unemployment rate went down. >> right. >> you have less participation in the workforce, i think people would really much focus on the 150,000 and not -- >> the market would trade down on that. if unemployment went to 8.1% and the jobs to 150,000. >> yes. i think you need the jobs to be the critical dynamic. >> is 200 enough for the market when the expectations are 200,000 to 210,000. >> the unemployment number itself is what people watch but

we've seen over several numbers, durable goods orders showing disappointment relative to the heightened expectation, one thing we track is the surprise index and it's put together by our guys looking at various consensus numbers of big issues in the economy, if it's gep number, the ism, whatever statistic it is and we've hit kind of a peak and we seem to be rolling over. we're missing the heightened expectations, that's not good for markets. >> the rule of thumb always has been 3% gdp growth gives you over 200,000. is that where we are? right below that? >> we're just below that. we were in the fourth quarter. i think a lot of people are looking at mixed numbers, some suggesting we'd be at 1% gdp and some saying we'd be at a 3% gdp number this quarter, the biggest problem we'll have in this quarter is we started off with kind of a weak number relative to the fourth quarter. in other words, use that as your baseline the prior quarter to kind of start building and it was at a very heightened level.

the really good news, if you want to call it in, but there's a payback for it, is the mild winter has given the seasonals a bounce, so you'll not get that bounce as we move into april, may, and that means you could see a perceived tailing off of the data. it isn't necessarily good or bad. and it really doesn't matter if it's good or bad. i know that sounds crazy, but from aspectperspective, we care about relative to the expectations and not the exact form. >> tobias, thank you for coming in. >> my pleasure. >> hydrox. >> i saw it. >> are they made or not made? >> they were discontinued and they're back now. i think they were invented before. >> 1912 is when oreos were. >> it sounds like you are eating chemicals, what is a hydrox? >> i think it stands for hydroxide. >> stick with oreos.

coming up, super tuesday odds, we'll talk to well-known pollster charlie cook. first, though, check out the shares of dix, the company quarterly results matching estimates. as a result, the stock, you can't tell, the bid is $45. the ask $44. it looks like it could be down a little on the news. >> dick's are down or up? >> let's check the stock at this point, it looks like it will be -- now the ask is above. anyway. >> "squawk box" will be right back.

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♪ coming up, it is super tuesday. a busy day from the nation's top pollsters, but one of the best is taking the time to join us next, charlie cook on issues driving decisions past the voting booth. it's your money, your vote, when "squawk" returns after this. [ male announcer ] we know you don't wait

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it is super tuesday, there are 424 total delegates at stake today. the updated msnbc delegate counts stands at mitt romney 119, newt gingrich, 30. rick santorum, susta17, ron pau. joining us is charlie cook, an nbc analyst, and it's great to have you here on super tuesday, charlie. just handicap it for us. is there any chance that romney doesn't take this and moves

higher and the game's over? today's not a game-over, or is today a game-over? >> well, first of all, after everything that happened here, any chance, i'm not sure i want to go there. but the numbers you went through, you see, romney has as many votes -- as many delegates, excuse me, as santorum, gingr h gingrich, ron paul combined, if that happens again today, and i think it will happen again today, you can say, okay, we're in the mopping-up phase. that when you get to this point in march, this is a delegate fight, not a momentum fight. and it looks like romney is pretty much rolling it up at this point. >> if he mops it up, the next question is, what does he need to do and can he do it to energize his base and energize the party to really rally around him? you saw "the wall street journal" article on the front page yesterday saying that the republican party, all this bickering, all of this negative campaigning has been,

quote-unquote, corrosive. >> i think it's two different problems. i don't think motivating the base, the republican base, the tea party folks, against president obama in november, i don't think that's going to be much of a challenge. the problem is that the republican party has moved so far to the right and the dialogue of these debates has moved so far to the right that independent voters is where they've hurt themselves. and if you look, there's a new poll out this morning, the abc/"washington post" that shows that among independents romney has a favorable of 60 and an unfavorable of 29. but among independents, it's 32 favorable, 48 unfavorable. the damage is among the independents and not the base. >> but, charlie, i've always been betting that eventually romney gets the nomination and then he comes -- he tries to come back to the middle. but then i would imagine the calculus, the political anxiety becomes, does that only add to the sort of flip-flopping rhetoric that you hear around him?

>> well, there is the danger of that, but the thing is i don't think a lot of us counted on romney having to run this far this long to the right, go that distance, which means that getting back over to the middle takes a lot longer time, a lot more effort. i mean, the republican party has sort of damaged their brand pretty badly in the last couple months, and some of it is in terms of the debate rhetoric that's been sort of obsessive on the base. but part of it is some of the things that have happened in congress, governors, state legislatures have done. and, you know, it's the -- it's the independents in the middle that make the decision, i mean, that are going to decide this election and he's got to just scramble back. and, sure, it opens him up to flip-flopping, but the thing about it is the alternative is to have sort of a goldwater result. he's got quite a challenge of getting back over to the middle and getting back to where he needs to be where he can be competitive and have a good chance of getting 270 electoral

votes. >> charlie, it's ken. first of all, thanks for getting up so early in phoenix. >> only for you, ken. >> divided government, what are the likelihood come november? >> well, i think -- >> look at your crystal ball. what about the house and the senate? >> what we're saying right now is a 75% chance that republicans will hold on to the house. and that's down a little bit from where we were, and then the senate is 50/50. so, you know, add that together, we are going to have -- it's almost certain that we're going to have some form of divided government, and the question is do republicans only have the house or do they have -- or do they have the house and the senate? i mean, the senate's probably going to be 50/50, give or take 1 or 2 seats. >> and then how does whoever is president govern? >> well, i think it's going to be very hard, but when i think when you look at the bush tax cuts expiring at the end of this

year, budget sequestration kicking in, i think there are a lot of people pushed to -- pushed, shoved to the table and having to negotiate on a good faith basis far more than you saw during the debt ceiling debacle last summer or during the supercommittee. everybody said that these members of congress had guns aimed at their heads, but the members thought at least four or five of the cylinders were empty. this time there are six cylinders with six bullets in it, they know they have to act come the end of this year, so there's an opening here i think almost regardless of who wins this election. i think we're going to have -- we're going to have some big things happening in the first six months of the year. >> what happens to the tea party representation in the congress? >> i think they're -- i think they're ranks won't be thinned by that much, but i think they're -- you know, i think somebody's going to end up writing a book called "the education of the tea party freshmen" and where these folks

are coming along and kind of reefflei realizing, you know, everything looked clear and easier back from the cheap seats, you know, back in the upper deck. and once they get on the field, things look real, real, real different. and things work differently. and i think they're sort of gradually adapting to sort of the realities of politics in congress as opposed to how easy everything looked from, you know, on the, you know, sitting in the tea party rallies. >> so, what's your big prediction even this early on what's the big upset coming up? >> well, i am -- to me it's just how -- i think one of the problems that romney's had is you've got a guy that's basically a mainstream guy who has tried to pretend that's he's a real, real, real archconservative, and the thing is he's not a good actor. he's not good at pretending it. it looks fake. now, presumably in a general election after he wraps up the

nomination, he will be more like who i suspect he really is, and maybe be able to pull that off. and so i think right now the republican stock it's clearly at a low point, but the thing is, i think it's probably a little underpriced. i mean, i think right now we're at a point where democrats look better than they've looked in a long time. republicans look worse. but i think there's an ebb and flow to this, and my guess is we're sort of at one extreme. that we're still going to look at a close, close, close race. i mean, the economy, unemployment, gasoline prices, that's what this election's going to be about. >> all right, charlie cook, we'll leave it there. thank you for your time on this super tuesday and look forward to seeing you soon. >> thank you. coming up we'll check in on the nyse and see what's buzzing on the big board this morning. "squawk box" coming right back. choose control.

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futures have taken a turn for the worse. let's get down to the new york stock exchange. melissa and dave joining us.

we have not seen a lot of volatility and big downside. so it's something to pay attention to? >> yes. there are concerns that not enough creditors will participate in the greek bond swap and there is not going to be enough growth. >> it may be an opec versus apec situation. did obama give israel a green light, a red light, or a yellow light. i think that's an undercurrent that is very, very frightening. frightening to people. and i don't want to mince words. that's my feeling about what is happening. >> and hard to get a grasp of what is happening. so many different variables involved in trying to decide what really will happen, in terms of what iran is really up to. we all know the cia actually says they are not trying to create a weapon at this point.

we all know that they are enriching uranium crazily and there are a lot of questions, including whether the israelis could successfully attack. >> we've added a million barrels. oil keeps going up. i keep coming back to this missile crisis and it has to end like the cuban crisis, with a resolution that is peaceful and not warful. because war is not in this stock market. >> not in the stock market. jim, we're going to leave it there. in the meantime, coming up, squawk super sus is coming to a close. casting the final vote, that's coming up next after the break. >> announcer: tomorrow, it's the morning after super tuesday and gop presidential hopeful mitt romney will join us live.

also, staples founder, john stanberg, and the cfo of hine kin. plus, the 8:00 p.m. employment report. that's on "squawk box." don't miss it. nice morning, scott? aye, or...a mornin' of tiny voices crying out, "feed us -- we've awakened from our long winter's nap and we're peckish to the point of starvin'"!! i don't understand... your grass, man! it's a living, breathing thing. it's hungry, and you've got to feed it with scotts turf builder. that a boy, mikey! two feedings now...in the springtime strengthens and helps protect your lawn from future problems. [ scott ] get scotts turf builder lawn food. it's guaranteed. feed your lawn. feed it!

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we've been spending the morning with the former chief of staff for reagan. did you know leap year is always election year? >> but lately -- >> ronald reagan would say, but i wasn't there. >> but lately, that extra day, we try to make the most of it. obviously, this is cnbc, the futures are down, but you can't ignore super tuesday when the economy is front and certain. >> because it's uncertainty. >> it is uncertainty that the market doesn't like. >> but it seems that this is the end of the beginning but it's

the beginning of the end for the republican primary field and romney is getting the nomination and then things will start solidifying and unifying around romney and obama being the strong president that he is will unify the republican party that much more. the whole question, as charlie said, was can romney pivot to reassure the strong conservatives but in the same time start becoming more acceptable to the independents when the race is decided. that's the big question. >> i mean, you could look in hindsight and that say there was a method to some of the madness, being a little hesitant to embrace the far right because he knew a general election was coming and he was willing to take some knocks and not lock the nomination up that quickly knowing that he wouldn't have as