red hat was terrific and jim whitehurst told me it would be nice work. i promise to ma find it right you right here on "mad money." i'm jim kramer and i will see you tomorrow! the economy is slowly recovering, the fed says things are good enough to start tapering. the stock market on a five-year rally. and, yet, president obama is at the low point of his presidency. his poll numbers have never been worse. especially his handling of the economy. why is this? one-word answer. obamacare. speaking of obamacare, look at these creepy images of a 20-something guy in onesie pa pajamas. the image team obama sent out this week to encourage young people to talk about and sign up for obamacare. is it going to work? sounds like a question for the kudlow youth summit comprised of

three young millennials. do we really know what the heck the fed really did yesterday? i ask this because gold dropped 40 bucks today and the question is whether bernanke was really that dovish or is this the beginning of a long-term exit strategy tightening policy? oh, and how about some real monetary rules for a change? all these stories and much more coming up on "the kudlow report." beginning right now. good evening, everyone. i'm larry kudlow. this is "the kudlow report." we are here live at 7:00 p.m. eastern, 4:00 p.m. pacific. the verdict is in on the obama economy. according to the latest polling, the majority of americans, 59% say, they personally feel the economy has finally begun to recover. but here is the kicker. there may be improvement, but no thanks to the president. 55% disapprove of obama's job on

the economy. and the president's overall disapproval has climbed to an all-time high of 54%. now, these amazingly bad polls make it clear the economy has proved to be no silver bullet for the president, but the question is, why? let's talk. here now is democratic strategist steve mcmahon. john hinderacker is back with us. terry jeffrey returns. cns news editor and chief. my pal, terry jeffrey. why is it that with the economy improving, i know it's not great, but it is improving. why doesn't obama get credit? why is his poll so lousy? >> i think obamacare is at the heart of it but part of something bigger. earlier this year the census bureau showed numbers in first quarter 2011, 108 million americans were getting one or more means tested federal benefits, namely welfare. 35% of the population. in november, there was 144 million-plus americans who were employed.

back in november of 2007, the month before the last recession started, there was 146 million people working then. so under obama, 4 1/2 years after the recession ends, we haven't facility built up the j. american understand obama and other democrats who like to seduce part of the population into government dependency, and obamacare is part of that. people get up, go to work every day and are supporting themselves and helping build our economy, they sense that. they see that. they know that that is where obama is bringing us. >> listen. let me go to steve mcmahon for a second. a gallup poll, here's one, 72% of the people polled view big government as the greatest threat to america, and terry jeffrey touched on part of that. the dependency on big government. and obama goes on the campaign trail and talks about the economy, but always in terms of big government. all right? so, steve, he's got problems with obama care. he's got problems with big government. is that the reason why his polls are so lousy? and i will concede to you that

the economy is somewhat better. i will make that concession. what about the rest of it? >> well, listen, i think the economy, and the length of time it's taken for the economy to begin to get back on track, is a challenge for the president that's enenduring one. i also believe, larry, the economic recovery has been a little bit uneven, and so there are people out there who are reading about it, they're hearing about it on cnbc, then they're hearing about it from people like us on shows like this, but they're not feeling it in their own lives. so i think that goes a long way toward explaining the president's numbers. of course, there's a partisan aspect to this, too. if you look at where democrats are in terms of their approval rating, versus where republicans are, you know, some -- 46% or 48% of the population that voted against the president aren't going to probably like anything that he does. whether it's obamacare or whether it's keeping interest rates at low or investing in infrastructure. if the president can't win with a certain group of people -- >> that's a fair point. >> -- terry sounds like one

thoe those folks. >> the independents tip the scale and tip the scale against obama. actually the odd thing to me is even though people acknowledge that things are better, i think 55% or something, they don't give obama any credit for it. john, i want to raise another point. not only obama care which has proved to have a catastrophic launching, on the front page every day, but the think the president's falsehoods have really damaged his standing with the american people. you know, if you like it, you can keep your insurance. if you like it, you can keep your doctor. if you like it, you can keep your hospital. i didn't know about the website problem. no one briefed me. in other words, john, to me, those falsehoods, as i choose to call them, have really damaged obama's credibility and standing. >> they've hurt the president, no doubt about that, larry, especially if you like your plan, you can keep it. but i really think, larry, that the main reason why the recovery hasn't helped obama more is it's

too little, too late. the "washington post" poll where 59% said they'd seen some kinds of economic recovery, 44% out of the 59% said they were seeing a weak recovery. they're right. here's president obama in office for five years and finally we see signs of a weak recovery. that is nothing to brag about. i think most people think the economy should be better and the administration's policies aren't helping. >> i think -- come back to steve mcmahon here. years ago i interviewed president george w. bush, 2005 or 2006. the economy had been coming on nicely. he had a bush boom for four or five years. i asked him, steve, why he doesn't score bigger points on the economy. why the economy wasn't polling better. and he answered me, tersely, with one word. "iraq." and that dominated his whole

viewpoint, the people's viewpoint. what i'm suggesting here is that, all right, i accept the fact that the economy is not booming and think you're all right, basically saying the same thing, but it is better i'm willing to concede that. however, i think one word, obamacare, and underneath that one word are the falsehoods that i described earlier. people just will not even begrudgingly give him any credit because they're so annoyed, angry and pissed off at him, steve. i think that has a lot to do with it. i'll go you one more. i want to include the nnkssa, n wiretapping business, i'm not sure i know everything there is to know about it. that's an example of big government. people don't want that. they don't want the federal reserve, they don't want the feds listening to their phone calls, et cetera, et cetera. so that adds to it, steve mcmahon. >> yeah, in fact, the nsa is a great example of -- i agree with you. i think the nsa is a challenge for this administration. he came into office promising to undo the policies that he

objected to as a senator, and now he's embraced them as president. i think probably for good reasons. but that doesn't change the fact that he looks a little hypocritical. i hate to say it. and it's an area where, frankly, the far left and far right come together. it's where rand paul and ron wyden probably agree. i think that hurts the president. i agree, larry, the representations you made about if you like your health chaare, you can keep it, has been devastating to his own personal credibility. as they get the health care law and the health care website, the signups more online working better, i think those things are going to improve. you can see a little bit of improvement already. there's no question that this last 60 days for the president has been utter disaster, and the nsa rulings that came out of the court, or the suggestion the nsa program is unconstitutional the other day is going to put pressure on him from the left which he's not used to enduring and going to create additional challenges. >> and this new task force, they want to reform the nsa.

the nsa is part of it so it's not only obamacare. you know, terry jeffrey, look. 50% of americas own stocks directly or indirectly. through pension funds, own it through 401(k)s or own it through a brokerage account. actually the stock market rally has to some extent affected the middle class. you're knocking out a couple hundred thousand jobs a month now. i'm not going to be partisan. the numbers are the numbers. nose are better numbers than they were two, three, four years ago. and, yet, he continues to plunge in the polls. so i want to ask you, is this -- is his iraq obamacare? is that's what's going on here? and somehow you keep on the falsehoods and even the nsa? but particularly, is his iraq going to be obamacare? because if that's the case, terry, he'll never get out of this. he'll never get out of this and be a hindrance, not a help to his party in the midterm election. >> larry, i don't think it's as

severe as iraq was for president bush in 2006 in that midterm election when the democrats took back the house. i think a lot will depend on how the republicans in the house of representatives now deal with issues. if they, for example, provide a pathway to citizenship i.e., amnesty for aliens, that will depress enthusiasm in their base and distract from obamacare. the republicans want to keep the focus on obamacare. obama doesn't want to so he put the employer mandate off until the year of the midterm election. said to the degree that obamacare is the focus, it's bad for obama. >> all right. john hinderaker, wind up with you on this. i think there's one other element that really kills this guy even while the economy is improving. i don't think the public believes he has the executive managerial skills to run his job. you know what, bob woodward said the other day, the reason there was a budget agreement was

because obama wasn't involved. i think the public sees with some clarity, john, that this guy, whatever the merits -- he has merits, i'm not going to trash him completely. he has merits. one of them is not management. the other is not executive skills and the other is not deal making. i think that hurts him, too. >> you're exactly right, larry. as a manager, people figured out barack obama is an empty suit. he's had a very difficult time realizing his objectives. the obamacare -- you know, things like obamacare really hurt when they resonate and they confirm something that people already suspected. i think people already were suspecting that obama didn't really know what he was doing as an executive, and i think obamacare has confirmed that in spades. >> i'll just add this -- >> larry -- >> steve mcmahon, i know you're not happy with me. i'm going to add this. i'm give you a chance to respond. this budget deal, all right, with senator murray and congressman paul ryan, okay, i know it was a small deal, not a

big deal. but nonetheless, it was a deal. okay? and the bob woodward throwaway, i think, has a lot of merit. this is the first time you've seen a true bipartisan deal of any kind in the congress, in the bhaum obama era. this is the first time. i know it's small pate toes, but it's the first time. since the president wasn't involved, people were able to do that. final vote, they got nine or ten republicans. i give you the last word, steve mcmahon. it's a chicken that's come home to roost. >> listen, let's not pretend like the president was sitting there designing the website. pst not a managerial indictment of the president. last january, it was mitch mcconnell and joe biden who did it. so the administration jumps in when they have to. they don't jump in every single time. finally, let's not forget the

republicans' proclivity which we might see again as early as february to stick a gun in their mouths and shoot their heads off and when they start negotiating over the debt ceiling, are we going to raise the debt ceiling or default on our debts, and they start trying to hold the president hostage and he says, no, we're not going to do that, watch and see what happens to the approval ratings. this thing is a seesaw. >> you make a point. this is why i supported the paul ryan deal. all right? it was a 70% deal on this sequester. but it stopped all the shutdown talk. and i'm going to support -- >> until february. >> -- there's going to be a deal. it may not come as soon as february, but you're right, that's another test. we will see. gentlemen, appreciate it very much. steve mcmahon, john hinderaker, terry jeffery. this is a downer. customers at the target store during the last few weeks have had their debit and credit card information hacked. what's the company doing about it now? we have a live report just ahead. later in the show, we reconvene the kudlow yoouth

summit. we ask real millennials whatthy think of the new push to get young people to sign up for obamacare. here's the key question. does this creepy strange looking guy in onesie pajamas do anything for them? we'll explain if you stay tuned. don't forget, free market capitalism the best path to prosperity. i'll say it 100,000 times. obamacare is not free market capitalism. i'm kudlow. we will be right back. my mantra? family first. but with less energy, moodiness, and a low sex drive, i saw my doctor. a blood test showed it was low testosterone, not age. we talked about axiron. the only underarm low t treatment that can restore t levels to normal in about 2 weeks in most men. axiron is not for use in women or anyone younger than 18

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welcome back to "the kudlow report." an iconic american restaurant chain may soon go on the block. darden restaurants is looking into selling its red lobster change, the reason, explosive price hikes for shrimp, one problem that plagued red lobster all year. shrimp price inflation into the 13% to 18% range. darden announced its net income fell sharply to $19.8 million to $33.6 million a year earlier. larry, is it bad my favorite thing at red lobster are their cheddar biscuits? >> no, but i love shrimp, myself. >> i do, too. but those biscuits.

>> all right. i have never really done the biscuits. anyway, bertha, thank you very much. as always, we appreciate it. now, folks, call it target's nightmare before christmas. the retail giant acknowledging today a security breach may have impacted millions of customers who used credit or debit cards to purchase items at their stores. nbc's steve handelsman joins us now live from alexandria, virginia, with the latest details. >> reporter: larry, thanks. good evening to you. at this target and the rest of the 1,800 target retail stores across america, this has got to be a terrible christmas season sales buzz kill. it's going to cost the company an estimated at least $25 million to pay back the credit card companies for what they might get ripped off for. and it's got to drive away customers. so, target has issued a statement. here's part of it. "target's first priority is preserving the trust of our guests," it reads "and we have moved swiftly to address this issue so guests can shop with

confidence. we regret any inconvenience this may cause." but, in fact, a lot of target customers are not confident. they're worried. we caught up with one in boston today. here's katie. >> it's really concerning because i've shopped here quite a few times since black friday. makes me want to go check out my accounts and make sure everything's straight. >> reporter: that's good advice. experts and target and the feds who are investigating this believe this started on black friday. and continued undiscovered until last sunday. not involving target online sales. but that means millions and millions of credit card swipes in the, again, 1,800 target stores for 17 days, somehow at least all got ripped off. was it a reprogramming of the swiping equipment? was it a hacking into the network that transmits that data? is there an insider in the data

collection or storage center, a la, edward snowden who steals this material maybe with a usb key? that kind of simple inside job has been discovered in the past. they're investigating, trying to figure it out. meanwhile, the alert is out to target customers to check their credit card accounts. either online, actually online. don't wait until they're mailed home. here's somebody who did it. this is ryan evans here in the d.c. area. let's hear from her. >> i logged in and saw my account's overview and they highlighted my credit card account and said, review these, there's fraudulent charges or suspicious activity on your credit card. >> reporter: so ryan's credit card's been canceled, larry. that's the advice for everybody. this involves debit and credit cards. the ones issued by target, the red cards, that target used to attract customers with a 5%

discount. those cards and any visa card, mastercard, american express, anything used in any target store from black friday to the present moment, if you've got one, you might want to replace it. and that ends up, larry, with a lot of people who are loyal to target coming into a store like this and shopping with something they don't normally bring, which is cash that might be safe for them, but can't be good for target. back to you. >> yeah, steve handelsman, great reporting. we appreciate it very much. that's a tough christmas story. now, folks, switching gears. was ben bernanke as dovish as you think he was yesterday? okay. i know stocks soared yesterday, but gold plunged today and it could be that bernanke launched a multiyear exit strategy tightening in motion. we're going to try to figure out what's going on with your money and the fed. that's next up on "kudlow." (vo) you are a business pro.

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everyone loves pillsbury grands! stick with innovation. stick with power. stick with technology. get the new flexcare platinum from philips sonicare and save now. philips sonicare. welcome back to "the kudlow report." i'm larry kudlow. it's been 24 hours since we heard the news of the fed's bond buying cutback. january, the central bank is going to reduce its bond buying program to $75 billion a month from $85 billion a month. at that rate, they will be finished in october of next year. i'm asking this question, was ben bernanke actually as dovish as many of you and the stock market thinks? let's ask an expert. here now is robert mctier, the former dallas federal reserve bank president and he's

currently a fellow at the national center for policy analysis. bob mcteer, sometimes you have interesting counterviews and i want to see what you thought about this. one thing, today, gold hemorrhaged. gold has been going down for quite some time. it got knocked down. the dollar is holding up nicely. if the fed was so dovish or going to be so dovish, why isn't goal going to $1,300 or $1,400 with a big rally? why isn't the dollar collapsing? something's wrong here. i asked you how you read bernanke yesterday. >> well, you know the term "forward guidance," and he was pretty dovish on interest rate guidance going forward. what he says about short-term rates and how long they're going to be low will effect long-term rates today. so i think -- i think he probably was trying to keep long-term rates down by emphasizing very low short-term rates. that's something they can easily

change their mind on later. if we get into next year, or maybe the beginning of the following year, and the fed thinks they can go ahead and allow interest rates to normalize a little more, they can do that. they don't have to stick with these long-term projections. >> that's what i was thinking. that's an important point. forward guidance. i don't know, we've seen it before. i'm pretty skeptical about guidance. i know janet yellen is the empress of the doves, but i want to ask you this question. two-part. number one, did bernanke lock her in? we're in a q.e. exit strategy. did bernanke lock her into the strategy? when stanley fisher becomes the vice president of the board, stanley fisher doesn't like quantitative easing. he's said that publicly. there, too, the fed may be much less dovish than people think. >> well, in a way, they threw janet yellen into the briar patch where she would love to be. i suppose that she's even more

dovish than she is and is happy to be committed to a very slow wind-out. i was surprised on stanley fisher. i have a very high regard for him. he's very good. he was a very good governor of the israeli central bank. but putting him in there with janet yellen as a team does seem to create a little bit of a potential friction. i don't know if that was her idea or somebody else's idea. >> i think it's a pretty clefer idea. now, look, this business about buying bonds which adds cash to the financial system, the so-called monetary base, it really hasn't affected the money supply. you've written this on your block. m-2 has been growing and has been growing at 6%, 6.5%, has not had an impact at all. i'm more than happy to see them stop buying all these bonds. i think it's distorting everything out there. might they go faster -- in other words, again, i come back to

this point. if the fed is so easy and so dovish, and if people really believe that, the gold price, the classic barometer of inflation and uncertainty should be soaring higher, bob, and it's not. and i'm very interested in that because although i look at the money supply, and i look at nominal gdp, i still look at gold and the dollar. >> well, the fed's real easy on interest rates, but you and i learned to watch the money supply from milton friedman. and they have not been easy on the money supply. they've tried. but it hasn't worked. and i think the fed's policies have never been as easy as people assume they were. >> right. >> and all these bond purchases were not tantamount to creating money. they were simply not creating that much money. and i think the gold price reflects that. >> i think you're dead right, and i think the fact that this, you know, bond buying hadn't really worked and the monetary base hasn't filtered through, it's not circulating to enter the economy. the fed is much tighter than

people think. that experiment hasn't worked. so the fed may as well try to get the heck out of it. i don't know how they're going to unwind it in the end. i have to get out of this segment, but i wanted to hear your views. you're a little bit skeptical, yourself. that's what i'm hearing. is that right. >> i think the bond buying has reached diminishing returns. i think early on it was very, very crucial. lately it hasn't done much. >> bob mcteer, former president of the dallas federal reserve. now, the paul ryan budget has passed. now the republicans are once again training their guns on obamacare. senator pat toomey is about to join us to talk an tbout the ry budget, obamacare and no more taxpayer bailouts for failed banks. stay with us. we're "kudlow."

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welcome back to "the kudlow report." russian president vladimir putin says he will pardon one of his best known opponents. oil tycoon khodorkovsky. his pardon comes eight months before his jail term was set to end, anyway. but it's also just about seven weeks before russia hosts the winter olympics in sochi and the kremlin is trying to soften its

image before those games. larry? many thanks, bertha. now, despite its plummeting support, shockingly low enrollle, ongoing website glitches and continuously changing goal posts, senate majority leader harry reid seems to be in fairyland. nevada democrat telling "politico" that he believes obamacare will help democrats hold the senate majority in 2014. that has got to be a stretch. however, joining us now exclusively with the gop response to that, pennsylvania republican senator pat toomey. senator, welcome, as always. welcome to "the kudlow report." i know that you and senator cornyn introduced a new bill today to end taxpayer-funded bailouts of big banks and i want to get to that a lot. but just for a second, or so, i want to talk about this other thing. first of all, what do you make of harry reid saying the democrats are going to hold the senate on the basis of obamacare? >> i just don't know what

reality senator reid is living in if he really believes that. obamacare is a complete disaster. the american people are increasingly seeing it for what it is. by the way, the worst of it hasn't hit yet. how this ends up being an asset for the democrats is completely beyo beyond me. >> as you see it, senator, what is the worst? when is it comes? >> it's hard to know. i'm frightened large employers are going to drop coverage because costs are rising so much. i'm worried next year premiums for people in the individual markets are going to go through the roof because of the adverse selection that's been happening. those two things, alone, are enormously problematic. who knows what other unintended surprises we're going to discover along the way. >> a second quick topic, sir. you voted against the budget deal yesterday, i take it. could you tell us briefly what your thinking was? >> yeah, larry, i think we walked away from our commitment to control spending. we lifted the spending caps in the near term, so we'll spend

more this year and spend more next year than the statute allowed. and we say we're going to offset that, but unfortunately, the offsets include some gimmicks that aren't really real. spending reductions in the future we're unlikely to honor and i just think that shows a lack of resolve on a huge problem we have which is that we spend too much money. >> all right. avoiding a shutdown, though, that really helps republicans make the case against obama care. and i think that was the political thinking behind chairman paul ryan's effort. >> yeah, i don't fault paul ryan for this. he was in a difficult position. he did the best he could under the circumstances. and avoiding a shutdown is a good, you know, a good fact. but at the end of the day, i wasn't happy with the product and i think it's just important to make a statement that i am going to continue to be committed to try to limit and, in fact, reduce excessive spending. this moves us in the other direction. >> all right. thank you. i get all that. let's go to your bill. you basically, as i understand

it, you're looking at this doctrine of too big to fail which i think has not been terminated and you say you don't want any taxpayer funding if big banks do fail. how, what mechanism would you use to achieve that? because it's a difficult task. >> it is, larry, but the part of dodd/frank that contemplates how to resolve a failure of a large financial institution is badly flawed in many ways and the most egregious flaw is it sets up a taxpayer funding mechanism and empowers the fdic which is not qualified to do this to manage a liquidation, and by the way, grants them all kinds of powers to subjectively decide how to do this. we have a legal system in america for handling the failure of a corporation or a bank. it's called bankruptcy. now, i've acknowledged that the existing bankruptcy code is probably not adequate to handle the potential knock-on effect of a big significant, large financial institution. so what senator cornyn and i have done is proposed some

changes to the bankruptcy code so that we could resolve the failure of a large financial institution without resorting to a bailout and with a process that is well defined, rules based and established in law so that creditors and everyone else would know what the risks they were taking. >> just real quick, senator, the volcker rule, okay, that is front and center. no proprietary trading inside the banks. no private equity operations inside the banks. no hedge funds inside the banks. it's too risky. you can just use hedging techniques to hedge against the banks' position, but that's it. what's your view on the volcker rule? >> i think it's a big mistake from the beginning. first of all, proprietary trading has been a profit source for these banks. so if you think you're doing something to improve the credit worthiness and the stability of the banks, diminishing their profitability does not achieve that. secondly, it's going to raise the cost of corporate america to borrow funds. you know, it's interesting that the dodd/frank legislation

exempted u.s. treasury securities from the prohibition. you can lose your shirt in prop trading on treasuries, as you can with anything else. but they knew that in the absence of that trading, you'd have less liquid markets and more expensive issuance and what corporate america is going to face. >> all right. we'll leave it there. senator pat toomey of pennsylvania. happy holidays, sir. thank you for helping us this even. >> thanks larry, for having me. >> you bet. time to get back to your none. i hope you didn't have too much tied into gold today. it's down big-time to a three-year low. we're going to talk about that. and stocks with our team of investment experts up next on "the kudlow report." life's an adventure when you're with her.

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was the stock market irrationally exuberant yesterday when it rose almost 300 points? did it misread fed policy? all right. stocks are still sitting near all-time highs. today's biggest loser, however, was gold. the precious metal dropped below $1,2 $1,200, a 3-year low. here, lee munson, chief investment officer of portfolio llc, and robert gelfin, ceo of mqs management. gentlemen, welcome back. robert, let me just begin with you. stocks are up 2% yesterday.

>> uh-huh. >> gold was down 3 today. if the fed was signaling so much easy, dovish policy, why didn't gold jump up a lot? why didn't the dollar go down a lot? doesn't seem to be working out. maybe we're misreading the fed. >> well, i think that the market, stock market was happy that the ball was kicked off on the end of the bond-buying policies, and that helped the stock market. gold was hurt particularly today with the increase in real interest rates that we saw with bonds selling off. and i think that was the real reason that gold was hurt. the problem with fed policy, hasn't necessarily been that it's too easy, as your earlier segment with robert mcteer said. it's been that fed policy has been distorting markets by suppressing bond prices. and that type of misinformation, essentially, coming out of the markets creates risk and inhibits economic activity.

>> all right. lee munsen, let me go to you. i want to give you the same whack at the same ball. i don't know real interest rates went up yesterday. at least the charts that i've looked at. i don't think there was much movement in interest rates at all. here's what i did see. inflation expectations as measured in the bond market actually went down. commodity prices went down. in fact, commodity index has been falling for weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks as has the gold price. that doesn't strike me as an easy money consequence. it certainly doesn't strike me as an inflationary consequence. are we reading the fed wrong? >> i think so. first of all, when you start talking about commodity price in gold, you , have to remember th real marginal demand from commodity price is coming from the slack from china. we have to be came about looking at commodity prices informing us about do mostic inflation. i don't buy that. i think we read that wrong. in terms of gold, it's more of a sign that we're going to actually grow this economy going forward with moderate inflation. that's what we saw yesterday

with the market going up so much because in essence, we had -- we're getting rid of the concerns that this is a big diesel engine that could get cold and not start. right now the bond markets yesterday were saying, you know, this is like a porsche gd-3 in third gear coming out of a th r hairpin turn coming out of the momentum, make 5%, 6% next year in the stock market after a huge year like this. >> all right. let me come back to something you just said, very interesting. that the stock market was happy that the fed was getting out of the bond-buying game. okay? i happen to agree with you. i think it will make the markets more efficient, actually lee is saying that, and, you know, stop distorting interest rates and whatnot. so that's a good thing. and glad -- a lot of people disagree, though. i have friends who are market monitorists. they're very smart. they maybe sign on to this but they don't want the fed to throttle back in their bond buying. they don't want to the fed to take cash out of the economy. they think that will hurt. so we have two different views. you say getting out of qe iii is

good. a lot of other people say getting out q iii is bad. i frankly am confused. >> i think the pem wpeople who want it to continue, they're concerned, that one, inflation should be higher and think monetary policy is the potential salvation for all our economic problems. i disagree with both points. actually, in a growing economy with the sort of technological advancements that we see, productivity increases should really be causing prices to decline slightly and that's a benefit to consumers. at the same time, monetary policy can't solve all our problems. a lot of them are fiscal problems. >> yeah, we need regulatory reform. >> exactly. >> and pro-growth tax reform. we need the government to get out of the way and let entrepreneurs start creating new products and do the things that america used to be great at doing. that's what we need. all right, gentlemen. sorry we're little short on time. lee munson, thank you, bob,

appreciate it very much. we're about to reconvene "the kudlow report" youth summit. that's right. here's the image we need them to tackle. it's the 20-thing young man in pajamas team obama tweeted out a few days ago. we're going to ask the target audience about that and more next up. look at that bizarre, bizarre tweet. e of your future. your retirement. ♪ ameriprise advisors can help you like they've helped millions of others. listening, planning, working one on one. to help you retire your way... with confidence. that's what ameriprise financial does. that's what they can do with you. ameriprise financial. more within reach.

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all right. the success of obamacare relies on how many young people enroll. so far, ain't looking good.

the obama administration is using a series of ads targeted to millennials featuring the already viral pajama boy. young people come to the obamacare pajama party. has president obama already lost their support entirely. >> let's talk about this. we're reconvening the "kudlow youth summit, on the ground to tell us what people are talking about. columbia university democrat. alex smith, national chair of the college republicans. and john, president of the nyu college republicans. his parents are dear friends of mine. okay. let's go right to work. what's the deal with this goof ball ad? now, the obama people, they're not stupid. why would they run such a thing? >> you know, larry, i really thing it's insulting. the obama administration really think this is the best way to get the youth vote? i mean, just by seeing the targeting us with such superficial advertisements, we really see how the obama administration views the youth. i mean, then again, this is the

same administration that thought they could get youth votes by running lina durnham talking about her losing her virginity on one of the ads. he's concerned about plummeting ratings and the youth coalition. >> the numbers are really lousy. i'm going to go to you and ask you the same question. let's see. the latest pew poll has young millennials, 41% approve of obamacare. 54% disapprove of obamacare. i think that's pretty similar to when we last talked about this a couple weeks ago. "a," what did you think of this goof ball ad? is ting go to help or hurt? "b," has anything changed regarding the so-called youth signup for obama care? >> yeah, sure. so, you know, we talked a couple weeks ago. it was a lot of fun. in this time, you know, i want to think that it's crazy around christmastime, organizing for action, ofa, is a little crunched trying to get a lot of people getting the word out to get the signups. i understand this ad is a little

wonky. i think the ad and all the backlash and all of the conversation that has proceeded the ad in the last two days has created a lot of kfsconversatio and fervor around the question of youth signups for obamacare. the ad might not have gotten what it wanted to do -- achieved what it wanted to do, it got a lot of young people in particular talking about obamacare which is the thing that they really need to do before this december 23rd deadline. >> 18-month-old babies wear those kind of pajamas. why couldn't they have given this guy real pajamas? >> it's rustic. you never know, it might be anden endorsement for some kind of footties for a company. >> a constituency we don't know about. all right. alex, you're talking to people here, there and everywhere. what are you hearing? >> i'm hearing this ad is ridiculous and really the president should have taken some of the money he seems to hate so much out of ofa and focus grouped this out. young people don't want to be seen like this.

don't want to be seen like children. we found this out in the 2013 research report when we asked young people how they wanted to be seen. they ranked cool at 5%. by in large, young people want to be seen as a hardworking, competent and responsible. staying on your parents' insurance until you're 26 because the obama economy hasn't created jobs for you is not their ideal. >> it's not their ideal because they don't live at home. >> absolutely. >> are they signing up? that's the ultimate question. so far most of the numbers, the states are more -- their websites tend to be better than the federal obama website. the states seem to be reporting people 30 and under, only about 25% sign up. >> sure. >> whereas the next group i'm going to say in round numbers, 50 to 65, they're running almost 55%, 60%. that's not the split that the authorities want. that's not the split obama wants. what's he going to do, john? >> he's going to continue trying to market to the youth vote.

there's not really much he can do. i can tell you personally about a lot of students lost a lot of respect over him especially about the website. i know that's a superficial answer. >> this is for nyu students. >> yes. >> not the most conservative school in the country. >> no. >> i want to get that out. yours isn't, either. columbia. not the most conservative school. so you're saying in the dorms, all right, in the dining rooms people are saying they lost respect for the president, or for his plan or both? >> for both the president and the administration. what i can tell you -- i can't tell you the amount of nyu students who believe in obama blindly, but what i can tell you that the number is starting to decrease. which is good to hear. >> let me ask you this. do you think, however, republicans are filling the void? that's a key question. >> yeah, i agree. that's the thing. i see a lot of republican and a lot of conservative backlash an everything obamacare. they tout around the term this is their big party platform right now. let's bash obamacare.

i need to see action from republicans for young people to have another option to believe in and believe that's worth putting their vote into, and frankly republicans have been criticizing this ad the last two days, had been criticizing all efforts by ofa, by the obama administration -- >> nothing positive. >> nothing positive. nothing innovative. nothing to get young people excited about health care. >> i'm a reagan conservative. this is an important point here. i've seen polls saying that the public doesn't like obama care at all. but they don't trust republicans, and in particular, the issue -- and i focus on this -- will republicans take care of sick people? pre-existing conditions. i'm just going to call them sick people. however many there are that may not be covered. i don't think, yet, the gop has proven to the general public. >> yeah. i agree. i agree. i, you know, in all sorts of -- in all sorts of conversation recently, it's been the mantra that republicans, the mantra right now is don't get sick.

>> for sure our party needs to be better about positive messaging to young people. that's why they didn't vote for us in the last election. >> positive messages in general. >> i think what we need to do is really put forth conservative solutions to health care reform in this country. you know, buying policies across state lines. different reforms like that study committee put out. >> different tax reforms. let me jump -- i don't mean to interrupt. we have jose i believe in miami. are you out there? >> yes, hello, larry. >> thank you very much for coming on. jose, i'm reading a difficult story, obamacare enrollment of latinos hurt by immigration law concern. in other words, the latino population, a lot don't want to sign up. they may have, you know, cross family issues where some are legal, some are illegal. i.c.e. says they're not going to use personal information for immigration. i don't believe that. you tell me what's going on, because i think immigrants -- latino immigrants, if particular, were a target group for obamacare. >> yeah, the reality of it, larry, this is a bad deal for

hispanics like it is a bad deal for the rest of america. hispanic youth will be adversely affected and hispanic community has a large young population. and as you've seen in the polls, the president's numbers have plummeted with the hispanic community. and that's due to the broken promises. he promised the reform of immigration system. he didn't do that. he hasn't led in second term. promised to fix the economy. hispanic unemployment at 10%. there are more hispanic families living below the poverty rate. >> i don't have as much time as i would -- just quickly, though, jose, people are asking is there an opportunity here for republicans -- and i want to ask you that question, whether it's immigration or a broader question. does the gop have an opening here? real quick. >> larry, we have leaders, we have leaders like marco rubio who have led, chris christie, governor jeb bush who demonstrated you can lead and have an impact and resonate with the hispanic community by promoting positive ideas. >> it's a tough story. a target grew on obamacare.

they're not signing up. young people aren't signing up. hispanics aren't signing up. i don't know who's going to pay for this thing. that's the big issue. jose, thank you. sorry we never have enough time. the kudlow youth summit. thanks very much. that's it for the show. i'm larry kudlow. thanks for watching. we will be back tomorrow night with much more free market capitalism. ♪

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