of. i am telling larry which one next. stick around. and tomorrow, don't miss cnbc's first ever "street signs." i will be there with bells on, making calls, trashing picks. after the bell, great numbers from a couple of cloud plays. eq equinix. sirrus logic. i like the tone of tech coming into tomorrow's session. i like to say there always a bull market somewhere. i try to find it just for you. "mad money." i am jim cramer, i had see you tomorrow. hey, larry, what do you have for us? >> jimmy, i hope stocks are a hedge for inflation, because ben bernanke mighty doufish today. i'm larry kudlow. this is "the kudlow report." mitt romney on a role. blasting obama after five huge primary wins. take a listen. >> all of the thousands of good

and decent americans i have met who want nothing more than a better chance, a biting chance. to all of you, i have a simple message. hold on a little longer. a better america begins tonight. >> team romney and team obama take the gloefves off. and some say the appearance on late-night tv by the president may have violated campaign laws. and we go toe to toe in one just one minute right here. voters aren't only voting on a referendum on obama's committec but also his leadership. obama just dumps his assistant attorney general on the fast and furious case. our question this evening, where is the president's leadership? i ask america's mayor, rudy giuliani. and scott walker, courageous

battle against big-government unions and activist campaigns to recall him, probably the second most important election in america this year, he's already saved a billion for wisconsin, i think it's a great story, and he is going to tell us all about it first up this evening, 194 days until election day. not a long way off. in fact, this election is heating up faster than almost anybody expected. so the nbc's efrp amon javiers joins us. >> harsh political facts for newt gingrich today, who sat down with television interviewers and said he is facing political reality. take a listen. >> give him some credit this guy has worked six years, put together a big machine and put together a serious campaign. i think obviously that i would be a better candidate. objective fact, voters didn't think that. >> we're hearing today the

gingrich camps and romney camps in touch with on one another. two men have spoken. unclear what role will newt gingrich will play in any romney campaign going forward. last night, we should play the sound bite again. this is mitt romney taking the reins of the republican party and announcing is he going to bring it to barack obama this fall. take a listen. >> to all of the thousands of good and decent americans i have met who want nothing more than a better chance, fighting chance. to all of you, i have a simple message. hold on a little longer, a better america begins tonight. >> and with that, campaign season is in full swing. we've seen the president out in different states across the country. so far this week, courting the youth vote. mitt romney beginning his campaign, newt gingrich all but conceding that his campaign is over with. so it looks like campaign 2012 is really on. back to you, larry.

>> all right. many thanks to eamon javiers. let's debate mitt romney's slamdown speech that everyone is still talking about. brad whit house, democratic national committee and his counterpart of the republican national committee, sean spicer. this was a slamdown speech. you know that. and i want to get reaction. it's still about the economy, mr. romney said. and we're not stupid. that's a direct play off the bill clinton, a slamdown on obama. how will your man get around that? >> i think what everybody recognizes, or people should recognize would be stupid, would be to go back to doing the things we were doing in '07, '08 under bush, that got us into this mess. that's exactly what mitt romney wants to do. >> what does he want to do -- >> let me ask you to clarify. are you blaming bush, obama blames bush. '07, '08 the financial crisis.

what did mitt romney have to do with that financial crisis. that's the part i don't get. mitt romney running for president. george w. bush is retired. >> i will answer that question for you, larry. what mitt romney wants to do is go back to those policies. he said i would repeal wall street reform, the very put in place to prevent another financial crisis. extend the bush tax cuts for the wealthy and add more on top of them. >> those are the same bush tax cuts that president obama has continued twice, so if you want to talk about continuing bush policies, you guys are doing a great job over there. >> as you know, sean, mitt romney wants to -- wants to pass more tax cuts on the bush tax cuts. cut rates even more. >> brad, let's -- >> and he wants to borrow money from china to do it. mitt romney is saying this, larry, we shouldn't borrow money from china to do things that we -- to do things we shouldn't

be doing. he wants to borrow money from china to keep his own tax rate low. >> larry, let's get to -- you know. >> larry, did you have a question for sean? >> no, let's get to the facts. one, you extended tax cuts twice under president obama, so they are your poles. for the first time ever, the united states credit rating was downgraded. in 2007, the president said it was unpatriotic to add 4.6 trillion of debt, you have added more in three years under president obama. if it was unpatriotic then over an eight-year period and you have done more of the in three, that's awe problem. >> i'm glad, sean, you don't have any -- >> you have 700,000 people out of work. >> one at a time. go ahead. brad, can i ask you this? another slamdown line last night. because he has failed, he will run a campaign of diversions,

distractions, and distortions. that kind of campaign may have worked in another place at a different time, but not here and now. now, your man doesn't have his own policies. all he does is slam. he slams paul ryan, mitt romney, splamz the supreme court. you know what i'm getting at. a very negative campaign. i don't think that's going to work. and romney challenged him on that very effectively. >> it's working so far. president up 49-45 over romney, up in the battleground states. i don't know what you're saying won't work. what won't work, going back to the policies that failed us before. mitt romney run as an economic wonder kin. what is he proposing that's different? >> let's look at the last three years. >> i'm going to let sean go ahead. >> if we want to talk about policies and failures, let's look at the last three years. debt and deficit out of control. the economy, unemployment, 8.2%.

750,000 more people unemployed than the day the president took office. grocery prices up, energy costs are up, health care costs, college tuition is up. i don't know what's going in the right direction, and you've got projects like keystone out there that -- and the majority in the house and even a democratically controlled senate want to pass, and this president is saying no to keystone. that's thousands of u.s. jobs. >> sean, if mitt romney wants to compare economic records, we're happy to talk about him finishing 47th out of 50 in jobs in massachusetts. >> he created more jobs in massachusetts when he was governor than you've created the entire united states. >> first of all, that's not true. >> yes, it is. >> mitt rom snow last night, giving this speech to the general election, didn't mention a word about being governor of massachusetts. and why is that? he he was a failure as governor of massachusetts. >> he's not running for governor of massachusetts. >> he has to run on a record.

>> so, brad, let's talk about your record. talk about -- stop talking about mitt romney and talking about president obama. when are you talking about your own record? >> i don't know why you are unhinged. >> i'm happy. >> we have created 4.1 million private sector jobs. you may want to ignore that it's a fact. >> i'll give you the last word. >> if this is going to be a record about failed policies, these guys are leading the charge, i think most americans know this economy is not headed in the right direction, the debt and deficit are out of control and we need a leader who is going to put us back on track and america back to work. >> not mitt romney, son. >> i hope you come back soon. gentlemen, thank you. >> thanks, larry. >> you know, truly, i love those guys. they are great. i'm not sure we settled anything

at all, but they are terrific. let me switch gears. stock market work. huge apple day. markets ended up on the upswing. dow up 89. nasdaq up, and thanks to apple. stocks and inflation hedge. that's my question. i believe inflation going up, not down. i will play sound from two masters of the universe. they made bullish on our air earlier. and jeremy siegel, seeing the dow 15,000 by the end of the year, and jim o'neil sees the s & p at 1500 or even higher. take a listen. >> the odds of 15,000 are probably close to 3/1. >> the drug story is in the u.s. and it's the start of the year before the year is over. s & p 1500 or higher looks like a slam dunk to me.

before the year soefis over, we on for that. >> joining me now, chairman of hollimon and company. thank you very much. bullish as those two guys? >> yes. >> yeah? >> and, first of all, in part because of the few people i listen to, 2008, there were a few people to be listened to at that time. right now, a few people here. these are important comments from these two guys. not always right, but right more often than most people and they've seen a lot of markets. and in both cases, i think they are using facts, you know, the previous segment you just had, very interesting. the real world is looking pretty good. >> question. is inflation coming because i believe it is. bernanke very dovish, and i want to know if stocks, therefore, are inflation hedges. this is an important issue. >> in a word, yes? when i first came into the

business, a preemminent investor named john templeton. one of the first things he said in the bear market of 1974, was buy stocks. single digit multiples, price earnings multiples. apple nigh nine times earnings. maybe ten or eleven. you have valuations very low. own businesses which is what you want to own in times of inflation. if you don't get inflation, you will do okay with these. >> i'm not saying 120% to 15%. >> that's exactly where i'm going. that's what i heard from bernanke today. and you are saying investors can protect themselves and that gets it to jeremy siegel's 15,0,500. >> if you get a modest up tick in inflation, the federal reserve will come down hard if we have inflation and we have the fed with our back in mind.

we've got our back with respect to inflation and jobs. so that's the duel mandate. i think bernanke has done an okay job. mitt romney wants to fire him. at the end of the day -- >> the dollar will go up with inflation. >> the dollar will go up? >> don't forget -- you have to come back. >> the dollar has been going down for 12 years many you're basically saying inflation is good for stocks. bottom line. >> bottom line, we have been imported a lot of stuff from china. apple's numbers just came out. they came from china. they went from 12% of the business to -- >> you're not worried. an expert on china. >> opposite, very good for us, and they used to export deflation to us. exporting. >> great stuff. coming up next, an exclusive interview with america's mayor. rudy giuliani, outrages by the

secret service and gsa scandal and sounds off on the obama culture of corruption from big government. still ahead tonight, this election a referendum on the obama economy. that's my view. still the worst historical recovery since the great depression and our free market panel will square off about the election impact. later, another big exclusive, scott walker, governor walker of wisconsin. he wants big union bosses out of government. and he's going to tell me how he can win the special election coming up in five weeks. and folks, don't forget, inflation or not. free market capitalism, the best path to prosperity. we need more of it. i'm larry kudlow, please stay with us.

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welcome back to "the kudlow report." does mitt romney have the chops to turn this country around? at last night's victory speech, romney raised his campaign to a new higher level with the 2012 verse of morning in america. are. >> to all of the thousands of good and decent americans i have met who want nothing more than a

better chance, a fighting chance. to all of you, i have a simple message. hold on a little longer. a better america begins tonight. >> here now is america's mayor, as i always call him, mr. rudy giuliani. welcome back to "the kudlow report," sir. >> nice to be back, larry. >> you were a great turn around guy as mayor of new york on the economy, crime, everything else. on the day after romney's win last night, is mitt romney, does he has the chops to be the kind of turn around guy that the united states needs? >> yeah, this is exactly in his wheel house. this is what the man does. the -- the whole background of mitt romney is taking over businesses, and trying to figure out how to straighten out the balance sheet, straighten out the business, bring more value to the business. after all, you know, that's what private equity firms do. that's how they make their fortune, and the reality is, i know they are trying to use how

successful he was against him on the democratic side. from my point of view, i would rather have a president who was successful in business, than the president who has no experience like the one we preently had. >> you wait the until just recently to come out and endorse him. did you have any doubts? what might those doubts be? >> probably that had more to do with the fact that i had a lot of good friends running in this race. i would have liked to have supported rick perry. rick perry supported me. he was one of my most loyal supporters. didn't happen. rick never got to the point where it made any sense to do that without endangering the ability to defeat barack obama. i had a real affinity and friendship with newt. i supported rick santorum when he ran for the senate, and rick helped me a lot during my political races. so i had a lot of obligations to people. so i felt it was best for me to stay out of it until the republican party figured it out. >> so no long lingering doubt, that's what are you saying?

whole heartedly behind mitt romney? >> i have no doubt mitt romney has exactly what it takes to handle what this country needs right now. and it fits exactly into his area of expertise. both as a governor, head of the olympics and as people look how he made money in the private sector, now we need those skills, working for us. >> a political question. in new york city, would mike bloomberg go rogue and run for president as an independent third-party guy? >> only mike can answer that. michaeke always told me he wouln if he had a realistic chance of being elected. my guess, mike would not do it honest honestly, no reflection on mike. no chance of being elected president. this will come down to the democratic states, republican states, and if mike would pick up a state or two, at most, he

could throw it into the house of representatives. i don't see how he could take back any -- any of the republican states from mitt. maybe he would have a little success with a few democratic states. with obama. >> all right. let me shift to obama on this. when you ran new york city, you had a lot of crisis, step in, be responsible and accountable. i want to ask you what is your opinion of how president obama has handled the gsa and most specifically and importantly, the whole secret service sex flap? he is accountable? shown leadership? what is your take on this? >> i have a slightly different stwruft of them. i think the secret service thing is not something that the president really should be held accountable for. the problems in the secret service were pretty deep. the president doesn't get that deeply involved in figuring out what secret service is doing and not doing. the secret service, pretty darn independent agency. on the other hand, gsa, his

appointee doing this. an appointee he brought back from the clinton administration to take over gsa. i find the allegations against gsa astounding. you know the gsa, you were in the government, i was in the government. i had dinner a couple nights ago with a former gsa administrator in new york who is flabbergasted that could be going on in the gsa. not an agency that has big parties. this is the kind of thing that happens, you know, on wall street or happens in a sales organization. where you are congratulating your best salesmen of the year or your best performers of the year. this doesn't happen in a government agency that is supposed to be helping us save money. and i think they indicate what the obama administration is all about. no real constraints on what they allow government to do. and this is a harbinger of what

would happen if obama got control health care the way he wants. >> that's what i was thinking. you are starting to hint, there is a culture of corruption inside the bureaucracy and the president is not on top of that. am i reading you right? >> i don't think there is a question about that. there is a culture you can get away with anything. when government workers being paid more than private workers in many instances. when government workers are being told by the president, they will solve every problem under the earth, when the s.e.c., sitting there trying to dream up another 5,000 regulations under dodd/frank to impose on american business, where the fda is making pharmaceutical companies go through areas of regulation. i have had occasion to review a lot of that, miles long this kind of arrogance happens. the arrogance of government power. not unusual, the president is insensitive to it, and i don't

think the president knowingly furthers it, but by the things he says and the way he talks about government and how government will solve problems and government all knowing, it creates exactly this kind of excess. >> so it's endemic to his philosophy. >> as opposed to a president like ronald reagan who tried to do everything he could to hold down the excesses of government. even when you do that, you're not always successful. but have you some success doing that. >> all right. we'll leave this there. many thanks to america's mayor, what i always call rudy giuliani. thank you, sir. great to see you again. >> thank you very much. you always do a very good job. >> thank you. >> all right. great stuff. so in addition, what is rudy giuliani, a former u.s. attorney here in new york, what does he think of the walmart scandal and the foreign corruption practices act? find out during the break if you go to kudlow.cnbc.com. and after the break, caterpillar

and boeing shock analysts. both reported blockbuster earnings and ceos of both companies positively down beat about the future. jimmy cramer connects the dots on that disconnect. recently, students from 31 countries took part in a science test. the top academic performers surprised some people. so did the country that came in 17th place. let's raise the bar and elevate our academic standards.

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expected both to fly high. jim cramer breaks it down. hello, jimmy. >> larry, every day on "squawk on the street" we are kicking around the notion of post traumatic stress. we are thinking about what execs are saying. today, caterpillar, positively down beat on what's happening. and brazil and china slowed. and i can see the collapse of coal. still up, things are brighter, u.s. nonresidential construction getting longer, both u.s. and china have the ability to turn things around. to me, cat is too negative. i think they remember too well the down turn. the real mystery, conservative outlook from bowings management. far too many orders to handle and commercial aircraft for planes like the 737, where the kinks are out and cost march begins are huge it makes me feel

far more bullish than the terrific company is letting on. i don't know if i want to buy cat management. too down beat for me. boeing, can't let cautious optimism color the story. as it started out very sluggish, and then ral eddielied 3. 7. a multiyear cycle and despite the rally, it be bought, perhaps for many years to come. larry, back to you. >> all right. many thanks to jim cramer. coming up, the glove are off. obama versus romney. it will be a referendum on the obama recovery. we'll square off on the whole subject. people with a machine.

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welcome back to "the kudlow report." i'm larry kudlow. in this half hour, the election will be a referendum on the obama economy, and mitt romney ran with that on his slamdown victory speech and tim gheitner, the most political treasury secretary in recent memory. he slams mitt romney. you'll hear all about it. and later on, embattled governor scott walker my special guest. how will he win his recall

election. a life and death battle with the public-sector union. what romney honed his general election pitch. obama took a wider note with funnyman jimmy fall loon. take a listen. >> now is not the time to make school more expensive for our young people. >> oh, yeah. you should listen to the prez. or the pree sflnch y of the united steezy. >> objectively, i thought that was a pretty good rip. but some say he might have violated election laws by going on the show. but that's not his biggest problem. the economy still looks like a me mess. a nice guy, but the question is, is he up to the job? time for an experienced ceo who

can run the country. let's talk about this. we have the ceo and 1996 bill clinton campaign adviser mark penn. kelly ann conway, back, senior adviser for the 2012 gingrich campaign. and jim of the american enterprise institute. mark penn, pleasure to have you back. i know you don't agree with me, but foremost, this is an election on obama's economy. a referendum. >> i think virtually every election since 1932, about the economy. this is not owe b obama's economy. it's the american economy. the thing about yesterday. it's no longer obama shadowboxing. it's a choice. a choice between some of his policies that are beginning work and some who are a big question mark. >> when you look at the very slow growth, okay? you

there is fwroet, you look at the real unemployment rate. close to 5%. housing problems, gasoline problems and look at a lot of issues, do you really believe obama has a record to run on. he never seems to talk about his record. >> well, he's got some forward looking policies that have begun to work. remember, the calamity, when he took office, was one of the worst calamities in american history. this could well have been not a recession, but a depression. >> take it from there. i want to ask you a great phrase in your blog today. you said what we need is an apple google economy. not a big government economy. >> when i hear the president talk about his vision, let's look forward. what is his vision on the economy? sounds like some sort of real throwback of the past, where have you big businesses and a big government. we need to get labor big and they will all work together, that's not even nostalgia economics. that's back to the gm in the 1950s.

government motors i guess. we need decent tralized, market friendly, about consumer choice. the apple google economy, and that's the vision mitt romney is thinking about. that's the vision he'll talk about. not go back to some sort of nostalgia of the 195 0z, tax rates 90%, some of obama's economic advisers want them to go back too. >> kieelly, you were tough on romney. does this election, which this election revolve around the obama economics story or a referendum on mitt romney and his policies? which will it be? >> a referendum on the current president. every re-election campaign, even member on member primaries are referendums on the incumbency. the reason it's a referendum and not a choice, it's a re-election. the classic question ronald reagan asked, are you better off

now than four years ago is what people are asking this time. >> that's what mitt romney is asking this time. people are not stupid, which borrows from bill clinton. >> that was the best speech mitt romney has given of the cycle in my view. not just the apple and google economy according to mitt romney. really mom and pop. very populist and also something that neither he he narrow becama has been in months, optimistic and forward looking. >> he was very aspirational. one of the interesting things. very optimistic. he said the middle class can prosper. he ais always talking about how we have to tax rich people. your children can do better than you do. and obama seems so negative and pest mystic than these thing. romney already has the upper hahn. >> romney has optimistic words. he has ultraconservative economic policies. america not going to want to go

backward and keep going forward. and the problem is no matter how good the words are, the nomination, he's got a lot to account for. i think the rye appear budget itself is a ticket to oblivion. >> the carter people knew they couldn't win, so they tried to make ronald reagan unacceptable and he was going to start a nuclear war. does mitt romney, acceptable? does he clear the bar? i think he already cleared the bar of the american public, and i think kellyanne is right. >> i don't think the general public knows now or ever will know what the ryan budget is. >> right. they know what -- >> this is why he likes to use words like right wing or ultraconservative. >> he is very clever. >> in the beginning of what he

said, mark, with all due respect. obama inherited the economy. the thing about he inherited the economy is sounding like the dog ate the homework. >> obama right now has more credibility than romney. >> on what? on the economy? >> i've got it go. >> everybody,mney polling so far ahead on economic approval rate. i hope you come back, mark. thanks, everybody. coming up, two more exclusive interviews. that's why i have to hustle. tim geithner gets awfully political and former fed governor frederic mishkin looks at the inflationistic press conference. my take? too much inflation, why doesn't he ever defend the dollar? but then again, mr. bernanke doesn't call me. we'll be right back.

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evening. >> well, larry, as you know being the economic and political debates are both quickening. i sat down with secretary gheitner today and found him remarkably aggressive in going after republican arguments and attacks on the president's economic policies, especially on taxes, but sanguine that the u.s. economy will be able to withstand headwinds in the u.s. economy. including that the united kingdom is now recession. >> much stronger shape than we were six, nine, 12, 18 months ago and europe is doing a better job. of managing this crisis. the growth is week and they have a tough, long hard road ahead of them, they have done a much better job of providing a measure of common stability and they are putting a lot of financial force behind the reform efforts, again, the most likely thing to see, europe contained the risk of a major cataclysm. they collect these forms, take

some time to work, and our economy should continue to gradually strengthen through that. and it would be a terrible mistake economically for the united states for us to lurch prematurely to severe austerity and undo a huge amount of the progress we made in preparing damage from the crisis. push unemployment up and push us back to the recession. >> glen harwood wrote a piece, saying the president's depending commitments would require an 11% tax increase on people under $200,000 a year. >> that's an incredible made up hackish remark for an economist. even according to the cbo, the president's plan would bring our deficit down below 3%. the debt burden stops growing, in our plan, our strategy, we propose a series of tax reforms that would modestly increase the burden. the top 2% of americans. 98% of americans would receive

no increase in their effective tax burden. >> and, larry, tomorrow secretary gheitner will be giving a speech in san francisco on u.s. economic relations with china. he also took the community in that interview with me today to attack mitt romney's stance on wanting to declare china. currency manipulator saying it was a simplistic policy, have no effect in helping the economy. >> have you been covering presidential elections a good many years and cove it very well. my question to you is can you recall a treasury second who was so political and so partisan? slamming glen hubbard, slamming mitt romney? usually those guys in that office don't do that. >> it's interesting. i need to check tran i want scripts and see if that's the case. i can't recall an episode. hank paulson in 2008.

president bush wasn't running for re-election, it's a reflection of the season we're in. rhetoric sharp forever all sides, including those who sit near president obama within his government. >> john harwood, cnbc, portland, oregon. next up, embattled governor scott walker tells us why he thinks he will win his recall election. life and death battle with unions. scott walker, right back. [ male announcer ] you are a business pro. omnipotent of opportunity.

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wisconsin republican governor scott walker in a life and death struggle. public-sector unions has a major recall election june 5th this could be the second most important election in the country this year. my special guest and you'll hear from him in a second. let him explain why it's so important. >> when we prevail, we'll send a powerful message. not just in my statehouse, but in statehouses all across america and most importantly, in our nation's capital, where lord knows we need more courage. >> we welcome become to the show, wisconsin governor scott walker. governor walker, a great pleasure. you know, preparing for this interview, a lot of my conservative pals said, for heaven's sake, ask him what the message is if he loses. you have the battle, and what's the message if you lose. last friday you said you're

going to win. tell me how. >> well, i think for ussist real simple. the choice we have in our state, much like the choice in america. in our case, two different views of of government. putting the power back in the hands of people and we want people to go forward, the direction we've been taking, or do we want to go backward? prior to my big election, being elected to office, democrats controlled everything and those are the days of billion dollar budget deficits, and double-digit tax increases. people don't want to go back to that, and i was just in illinois the other day. do they want to go back to what we see in realtime to the south of us in the state of illinois. people want to move forward with less government, more freedom, more prosperity. >> "the wall street journal" reporting that wisconsin state property taxes fell the first time in a dozen years, and the policy is budget restrap, more contributions by the unions have been in place. other examples of cost savings

you can point to? >> absolutely. we talked about the first time in 12 years dropping property taxes and pointed to a billion dollars worth of savings. the best thing for our schools, for years, they used to have to buy their health insurance from essentially one company. it happened to be affiliated with the teach every's union. they can bid it out and it saves our school districts tens of billions of dollars. >> what's happened in the job situation? wisconsin lost 12,500 jobs. >> from the time i first took office, a net increase. march to march, you look at what happened last march and april, that was the piece of the protest time in the state of wisconsin. you know well, any employer, particularly small business, doesn't want uncertainty. we saw it back then. things have quieted down now and our reforms are having a chance to work. you see the first quarter of this year, we've had more than 15,000 new private sector jobs.

employment rate in the state of wisconsin, 6.8%. lowest since 2008. lowest than the national average. two points lower than the state of illinois. >> let's look at the election for a section. june 5th. five weeks from now. have you asked mitt romney to come in and campaign with you? >> no, in our case, what we'll do, and i think mitt romney has a great case to be made here in wisconsin and across the country. we're going to focus on our record, about what we've accomplished together and more importantly, how we'll use that positive foundation to move our state forward and the tax payers of our state and talk about the cop trast between go backward and forward, and the simple question about who runs things in government? is the hard-working tax payers? >> romney will get blasted by big labor the same way you are? how would you advice how to hanel the national attack?

>> my advice, talk about the fact that once and for all, we're standing upthe hard working taxpayers, people stuck overwhelmingly paying the bills and that's really about putting them back in charge, not a handful of special interests. the other thing that knees to be addressed nationally, the real difference between the current president and his administration believes success measured by how many people they can get signed up for government assistance. particularly unemployment benefits. our alternative, we viewed success by how many people we get off unemployment. we open up the opportunities for free market system to work and people to get jobs in the private sector, that means more freedom and prosperity for people across the country and i think the essential message we need to deliver. >> scott walker, good luck on the campaign trail, sir. thank you for coming back on. >> thank you. and hopefully people can join us at scott walker.org to leash more about what we're doing. appreciate it. fed head ben bernanke held a

press conference. they sowned awfully devish. a few technical problems, but we frederic mishkin. sorry, we'll be a little truncated. >> no worries. >> look, i am -- bernanke sounded pretty dovish today said inflation rate has gone up. fed raised inflation forecast, but not going to change interest rate policy. with all of the money they've created, rick mishkin, when will the inflation rate really accelerate? >> the key is -- the idea of this have created all of this money, that will lead to inflation doesn't make a lot of sense. the balance sheet has expanded, but most of the gone into excess reserves. the banks just parking it in the federal reserve system. the real issue here is the economy still has a tremendous amount of slack, that our core inflation still pretty tame. the economic data a little bit better, still things don't look great, considering how far we

have to go to get back to an economy that's healthy. >> i definitely agree things don't look great. i want to challenge you on inflation. 1.6 trillion in excess money on the fed balance sheet. and business loans, to leading indicator, credit creation, starting to rise at 15% rate that tells me some of that excess money is being used. the dollar has been soft, gold and commodities strong. are you not worried that there is a doubling of the inflation rate from near 3% to 5% or 6% in the next couple of years? >> no, i really don't think that's the issue. still a problem that fed has to worry about inflation rising somewhat. but basically there is still a lot of flach in the economy. inflation expectations which are really key are growned. you don't see that moving up. that would bet canary in the coal mine that they have to worry about. but you haven't seen a problem there at all. >> rick, pretty clear the fed

will keep its target rate in place for a couple more years. probably to 2014. what is your reaction to the criticism that's developing at the feds? that the zero interest rate has really damaged savers, probably cost savers, retirees, people who live on fixed income, probably cost them a couple trillion, done them a lot of harm, done the economy a lot of harm because of the fed's overeasy money? >> i don't think it's the fed's overeasy money. it's the fact that the economy is not very good is the real problem is. lower interest rates are a problem for older people and unfortunately, i'm getting there. and it worries me i don't have much high returns. but this is basically a ramification of an economy that's very week. this is what happened in japan. low interest rates because of the bad economic performance, we're not in that kind of a boat. much better off than they were, but we still have a problem. this is life. not great, but what can you do? >> but just real quick, i'm

running out of time. they are hurting savers, but subsidizing and selling the treasury debt. seems like a bad deal for ordinary middle class people. >> the key is it's not the fed is doing it, it's the way the economy is that's the problem is. >> rich mitch kshkin, we apprec it. tomorrow night, special report live with eric cantor. be there with us. [ male announcer ] how do you trade? with scottrader streaming quotes, any way you want. fully customize it for your trading process -- from thought to trade, on every screen. and all in real time. which makes it just like having your own trading floor, right at your fingertips. [ rodger ] at scottrade, seven dollar trades are just the start.

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