host: larry kudlow will you write a book about your time in the trump administration quick. >> i do not att the moment i'm busy living life. never say never but not at the moment. host: how many jobs doo you have? [laughter] >> of course there is foxbusiness every day.

i love that. that is the both of what i do i also do a lot of different segments for foxbusiness and fox news in fact i did one this morning for fox and friends at your radio show every saturday morning for three hours the national radio show runs here that we are live stream and also syndicated i write out that pieces constantly and some informal political consulting with my friends on policy so i am busy im grateful so it is a blessing for me. host: this is your second wstint in the white house? >> just a few years ago it was

a lower position during the reagan administration the director of omb was david stockman who remains a friend of mine and yes that was my first job. >> your 2016 the connects the reagan revolution with jfk what is that policy connection the story wanted to tell for years in the back of my head working with a terrific researcher and co-author so basically in a nutshell jfk was ah progrowth democrat was a tax cut democrat and a

supply-side democrat when he ran in 1960 he went as the growth guy and nixon ran as the status quo known as the republican party and was okay with a high tax rate eisenhower had no interest cutting the tax rate they inherited from fdr do deal kennedy said i want 5 percent growth with low employment that is a little-known fact that the connection to reagan 25 years later is that reagan lowered marginal tax rates on

help to reignite a more abundant economy at the reagan tax cuts launch prosperity jfk launched decade-long but was undermined by lbj great society richard nixon gerald for jimmy carter none of them understood tax cuts or the incentives effects of the economic growth effects of lower marginal tax rates maybe we can talk about that. and arthur laffer who still around my friend and mentor and jack kemp and others brought the o supply-side, essentially the

tax cuts tox reagan and he thought about them and ran on them and it was very controversial just as it was in jfk's day and reagan had two rounds of tax cuts. >> in 1961 you quote jfk to say it is a major aim of the taxx reform program to broaden the tax base to reconsider the rates. >> absolutely. and there are some juicy quotes that could easily apply to reagan kennedy was the first guy to use the phrase a rising tide lifts all boats that was used later by jack kemp who was a very dear friend and also a mentor by

reagan. and cut from the same cloth and then to bridge reagan to trump on those policies. i was too young for jfk really i was only 17 when i went into the reagan white house. but if i may, i want to go back because i am reading a book the title is the jazz age but it is over warren harding but in the 1920s, harding's

vice president to coolidge and his treasury secretary who was a great figure from pittsburgh and entrepreneurial banker put together a huge reduction of marginal tax rates the income tax amendment was 1913 the 16th amendment when woodrow wilson left the office it was over 70 percent and those guys brought tax rates down to 25 percent and launched a tremendous prosperity boom in the 1920s. then i will go one more on this in another one of my favorite figures is ulysses s grant he was arguably america's greatest general.

but grant did two things. he did two economic things he never gets credit but the fact is and then restoring the greenback to gold with massive wartime inflation and then also to, help launch the second industrial revolution which is sometimes referred to the gilded age and a phenomenal period in america just to be consistent my guy grant is

getting taxes and harding's cutting taxes kennedy is cutting taxes, reagan is cutting taxes, trump's cutting taxes on the ground which i have been around for the others that would've been great front. host: and all of your books you talk about economic terms i was hoping we could have a broader discussion of how they all work together. growth in the bond market and the stock market, what is the interplay between all of these quick. >> . >> i waited simply say the absolute basic key elements to economic growth and prosperity, let mee step out, im for growth and prosperity. and my whole career that has

been so. i served in government by the way the first government i have one —- the first of ever had's role reserve bank in open market operations and secretary to paul voelker who was president of the new york fed. i had threeve government assignments. it seems to me if you do nothing else in government you should promote policies to generate growth, prosperity, jobs and optimism that is our job i am a free-market capitalist i believe in free enterprise capitalism think that is the surest path to growth. in the cnbc days i had my show there for many years i use to open up the show every night by saying free-market

capitalism is the best to prosperity. i still believe that. so coming back tomi your points essentially you need the lowest possible tax rates, the least possible government intervention and the sound currency which i call king dollar. if you break that are moved to a regime of high tax rates, excessive governmentex intervention and regulation , you will find yourself with high inflation, high unemployment and recession. i have argued to the years that there are almost no exceptions to that.

this is a controversial point, economics profession nowadays like everything else inag the economy has moved far to the left does not agree with that. although i will say the modern monetary theory is taking a licking with inflation but i am prepared to argue in historical terms as well as economic policy terms thoseal are the essential ingredients lowest possible tax rates minimal government and government regulation and a sound and reliable king dollar. host: is the fed to powerful? is it necessary? >> i won't argue the necessity on —- the necessity part although that is interesting j.p. morgan was his own person

who rescued the monetary possible on —- policy himself. yes it is right now. the most troubling part is that it has lost sight of the principal mission to keep the currency sound and the price level stable. nowadays talking about woke culture and economics, the fed and some of the appointees are talking more about climate change man price stability. i am not opposed to diversity but itma could manage its own human resources property on —- properly but the idea wants to equalize the economy, it takes

a left-wing socialist view that we should all be equal at the finish line when in fact in a free society what we want is equal opportunity at the starting line and then the finish line wedi will exercise our god-given talents in many different ways. but i think the fed is geared toward something called equity and climate change. i am not a climate denier but we do not have a climate emergency or an existential climate risk. even the un reports don't show this. it is a political obsession. and i think the fed completely missed the boatut on the inflationn problem we are

experiencing today. host: one of the other issues product is income inequality. is that a concern? should we be concerned somebody makes more money? >> no we should not. the idea for me is by law, we should have equality of opportunity at the starting line. but we cannot guarantee equality of results. we cannot. even in communist countries in the old soviet union. i grew up during the cold war and in the reagan years fighting soviet communism the

only equality they had in the soviet union was a quality of poverty and then who ran the place were the rich guys but there was no widespread prosperity and that's true for all socialist or communist countries so now we should not strive to and inequality we should strive for growth and prosperity we should maximize opportunities we want to have unlimited opportunities and that is why i argue the government cannot manage the economy and the price system or markets you have thousands and millions of people operating on a free economy and i want the economy to be

free and i want them all together on personal freedom that that is a job for the private sector. that is why i say free-market economics is the best best path to prosperity i want individual freedom inside the economy freedom to fail and freedom to succeed one of the great aspects a of america and it is still true to this day you have an entrepreneurial story where people have an idea they may scratch money to finance and it may not work it may fail. it may fail several times you might go bankrupt, but at some point you may get it right and then you become a massive success. that is what is so brilliant

about the gilded age with the industrial revolution the second industrial revolution and the information revolution in our lifetime and the stuff that we routinely used today did not exist when i was in prep school or college or starting out. all of that. did you have a spare mimeograph machine? all of thatonon is gone. we don't have xerox anymore. [laughter] even i have figure out most of the stuff and how to use it but the point is you have kids dropping out of college putting things together they fail and then succeed and hit it big that is the american story but behind that but behind that is freedom. if we lose that we will lose everything so i spent a lot of

time to promote freedom frankly in the economic sector but all throughout the country. freedom of speech there is a big debate with them misinformation and government bureaus this drives me crazy i had dealings and i was in the white house he calls himself a free speech absolutist freedom of religion i want to free economy a free economy will out produce every state and centrally planned economy and i will sit here all day and tomorrow and sharere historical examples i free economy outperforms. >> getting too far from jfk in the reagan revolution that

kinda surprised me so is that government policy or waxing and waning supply and demand quick. >> there are a lot of factors and from the korean war but i would just say principally you had 91 percent very high taxes which were very onerous. now some critics of this you highly pools and nobody paid then you did have some loopholes some very famous the polls from hollywood studio owners that most people particularly the entrepreneurs have to pay very high income taxes corporate taxes were

high. which was so prominent during the harding coolidge tax cuts those incentives were not a run round a very government run economy highly regulated. the federal reserve properly, i think kept the dollars stable you had episodes of inflation that basically we were under the old bretton woods dollar exchange system but anytime the fed tried to tighten economy had no other outlet because it wasas so tightly controlled by high taxes and

regulations and i know president eisenhower who is many great qualities economics was not one of them. there is a long story there his top advisor was burns and he advised next and to push the ball down the road during the reagan years he was ambassador to germany very good in his later years and he and i became very friendly he was a mentor of mine and then he had to agree i had a point over tax rates and all those years eisenhower, nixon he seldom work during the reagan years. [laughter] but there were three

recessions and that is what gave kennedy a step up in the election he ran as a growth guy and nixon did not deal with much on economic policy or domestic policy and i remember nixon's son-in-law and daughter are very dear friends of ours. i met nixon in the middle eighties, i was out of office back on wall street he had his office downtown new york in those days. and the cops would bring in various policy people and president nixon would go on foreign trips. i had at least one visit or maybe two. [laughter] but i had written numerous opted pieces in "the wall

street journal" criticizing his economics as president. he did everything wrong. took the dollar off the gold standard, booming inflation. [laughter] so the first time i met him he comes in and says you don't think much of my economics do you, mr. kudlow. [laughter] i said no sir, with respect i don't. [laughter] it was a very cool moment. this is the mid- eighties. i served in reagan's first term but nixon acknowledged in his books later that the reagan tax cuts worked because he was intellectually honest. host: a collection of your columns came out in 2018 and want to do a quote from them and this is election day 2016

forcing trade deals is spot on acting and interest of american workers is correct but large scale tariffs are a terrible idea. >> yes. believe it or not, that is still my mantra. this is a good story. president trump was much more attuned to tariffs than im. before i went into office, and became his director march 2018, he t had just put through steel and aluminum tariffs. i did not agree in fact our laugh for and i wrote an op-ed piece criticizing the deal.

president trump knew all about it he read it while he was calling me secretly to be the director the subject came up once or twice but we agreed to disagree. it is interesting i am not a fann of tariffs they are international taxes and they are tax breaks it is just as much as a break so i regard myself as a free trader but i will make two qualifications on this. one is that you do have to think of the issue of reciprocity. what is the other side doing to you on trade? this is an important point it is interesting the only two op-ed pieces i wrote in his

administration only two. they both preceded the g7 meetings. and in those i quoted a conversation that he and i had where he believed he was a free trader and under ideal circumstances to say no tariffs, no nontariff barriers and no a subsidies. and that is the world that trump yearned for a classic free-trade goal. zero tariffs and zero subsidies for favored industries and i wrote that and i quoted that and i

remember at the g7 that we had in w canada which was 2018 we were and bilateral with justin trudeau and president trump and your seniord advisers on both sides talking about trade because trump was threatened to impose card tariffs on canada which would d have devastated canada. and trump said you know, just income if we have no tariffs and no nontariff barriers and no subsidies we would all be in great shape with free trade. then he looks at me he said

you said that your whole career having you? and he knew that. but he expressed publicly that view. people don't understand that and his trade representative , a brilliant guy and bob was just on my show we were in atlanta for the america first policy conference and talked about this. people forget we had usmca was not perfect free-trade butad it was a good deal. we hadth free trade deals with japan and brazil and south korea. all free-trade where both sides in the spirit of reciprocity gave up some protections.

now the biggest was china and the most controversials was china trump had big tariffs there36 was 365 billion so fa' biden has not taken them off and i would argue we needed those tariffs to bring to the table to get their attention. and i will give you another view from the point of view which i completely agree then and now one of trump's greatest achievements as president is hearing the bill on the china threat and made it very clear to people in

this country and around the world that china is an adversary. they are not our friend or foreign-policy adversary. so the rhetoric was tough is tariffs were tough but we did bring them to the table nobody has been able to do that before. and we have a b bunch of concessions from them and i was on o the china trade team it was hard. this was the so-called phase i deal the phase one free trade deal was rooted in tariffs that is a certain inconsistency that it was necessary for the other i think it's holding it pretty good lots of progress on

intellectualer property theft they bought a lot of our commodities technology is still a work in progress but i think on the whole phase one was a great success of trump was reelected we would have moved on to phase two but nothing is happened trump wouldn't say it the way i said it that in a perfect world he would agree no tariffs in a perfect world.

host: good afternoon welcome to booktv in depth our guest this month is larry kudlow the author of american abundance, 1. jfk in the reagan revolution 2016 and then the collection of his columns came out in 2018 and that is called insanity once more you know this is the monthly call-in program one author his or her body of work here is how you can get a hold of us.

what was reaction from your long time republican friends when you joined the trump administration quick. >> it was pretty good actually. very positive. people encouraged me tole do it for a variety of reasons. i wasn't looking forward hours. the busy i was on a different adnetwork and radio show i had worked with candidate trump and the campaign with the tax cap plan in particular quite a lot occasionally i was a spokesperson he invoked me and my name several times and of

course i knew him in new york city for many years and he was a guest on my tv showing radio show i knew his family and like tim i was not looking for a job but i don't know i continue how it started. it's funny in march 2018 how this got started we're appearing connecticut for a weekend and i was coming back fromen indoor tennis and the phone rings in my car and it's a president. i had spoken to him and i had seen him in 2017 and he calls

me i had pretty good reception and gender national economic council at that he was calling to yell at me that he just wanted to talk about things and then he mentioned the nec it was s a sunday afternoon and said i will call you back. i said okay. host: when the phone rings from the? white house we please hold for the president quick. >> yes. so i am home in new york and he did call. [laughter] and that is when we had a more

earnest and direct conversation about the national economic council that was about to make a change and a bunch of policies. >> they were very good conversations i am not bashful about my views and then he said no one knows we're having this conversation. >> okay is that i will call you tomorrow night and talks the more. >> so the next night we are having dinner with some friends in new york city and midtown i had the cell phone in my back pocket just in case

and the phone rain and it was him. [laughter] of course i walk out into fifthh avenue then he got much more specific on that call it is sort of amusing because my wife out my —- my wife came out to get me because i had to go home to do a radio show so we're talking going at madison avenue finally i just said, sir, are you offering me a position? he said yes. your my guy. you're the only guy nobody knows were having this conversation. congratulations. will you talk to on —- take h the job i said yes i will i am honored. and i was honored.

so that was that and i went to go do the radio show a dearho friend of mine tells the story later and says he takes a call from the president at dinner gets up walks out of the restaurant and that we don't see him for four years. [laughter] so that's just how that happened and then that call he offered me the job sunset the night before i didn't get it. but in any case he says you will come down here thursday or friday. so nobody knows this so the next morning i am sitting at home preparing for my tv show and he calls me and says you

look so handsome. he says turn on the tv. of course the news broke. of course he leaked it. [laughter] but to me those are endearing qualities he is natural and he flows and maybe he did say some things differently but he is areas and i am loyal to him. host: you know him as donald quick. >> one selected did you ever call him by his first name? >> no. when he was president-elect and then president and while i served there he was either mr. president or serve. always. host: back to insanity our set

looks different because we're in larry kudlow's library in connecticut. we allow you on —- appreciate you allowing us to come appear. this is october 20th : come i want to thank milania trump for starting me on the path of restored confidence. >> president trump had said a couple of things that did not thrill me things came up in the campaign come if you look back it wasn't very important but it was a big deal during the campaign and i recall milania trump is a wonderful

, wonderful woman and we became good friends in the white house. she was on tv and defended president trump and made it very clear she was 1000 percent behind him and these things were passing and no big deal so i wrote about that. but it is funny that in that column, he told me later that he personally was not thrilled about that column that milania loved me. [laughter] i don't thank you had to write it but she loves you. i don't know i am not one of her intimates but i had great

respect for her and i watched her on a a couple of cable tv shows it was very impressive and clear to me her support was unwavering it was written to some extent tongue-in-cheek that i did. she liked it more than he did. [laughter] >> i have a question in the context where president trump said were taking the dollars in china in the form of terrace on —- and form of tariffs that's had a very

positive effect on things are those false statements china did not pay the tariffs they were paid by the american public and consumers. host: i think we got the idea. >> he referenced may 3rd 2019 about tariffs on china and taking in billions of exdollars. >> is there something you can extrapolate? it was difficult to hear. >> i am not sure in economic terms the tariffs imposed a significant burden on china because prices went up and to do my demand for chinese currency went down inflation went up interest rates went up

it is true those tariffs would be paid by us companies but our economy was booming during that period but the corporate tax cuts were so important in gave such a big advantage but particularly in the world of tariffs because they are tax rates we did increase tariff rates on certain chinese imports especially technology-related what i call we hadily jewels which to protect but we slashed the federal rate which more than offset any tariff rate impact

so as i mentioned earlier even though it don't like tariffs in the ideal world perhaps president trump doesn't either he rang the warning valve. and brought them to the table and then we finally consummatedum the china trade he trade deals on balance even though i am free trader i think those were necessary and there's talk of the tax rate it would put us in a tremendous disadvantage and wind damage the top position

so i would urge them to keep those tax rates low to be as competitive as we can and then many flows back to the lesson as an aside it turns out the reductionio of corporate tax rates paid for themselves were just getting irs data the laffer curve were to lower marginal tax rates created higher tax revenues revenues went up as tax rates went down because you have more economic activity more people working earning more income so they paid more tax collections even other rates for down the income was up and tax avoidance is much less there's no point looking for tax

shelters if you have a low tax rate it's not w worth the effort. so we could withstand any demand a i mess impacts that were well offset by the corporate tax rates that's a way that i put it. host: hudson florida good afternoon.n. >>caller: good afternoon. >>caller: i watch your show religiously. [laughter] so where will we be next year if we have joe biden in office

with that craziness or however you say there is something wrong with them but anyone that can g take care of the economy but where will we be? host: thank you for calling. >> i cannot comment on the problems i know what i see that my own personal view as i say many times that calvary is coming up think it will be a gop sweep in those houses and i think that will stop some of

the economic and social excess of the biden administration. giving you my own personal views. i think the biggest problem we will have in the next couple of years is getting high inflation that was a big mistake by the biden administration, too much spending into much borrowing in the federal reserve missed the inflation though so we are paying for that now. is no' a 12 year thing like it was in the seventies the bad news is getting eight or 10 percent inflation back at 2 percent will not be pain free. now hopefully a republican congress will move to reduce

spending and borrowing hopefully a republican congress will open the spigots to oil and gas production and pipelines all of which were closed by biden and hopefully a republican congress will make sure they slow down the money supply and move the interest rates up accordingly and protect the value of the dollar so i do thank you will see policy changes but it won't be easy and they don't think it will be pain free. >> for those who do or do not want your show they will play a quick montage. >> save america, kill the bill. >> save america. killed the bill. >> 's no save america.

save america and - kill the bill the wisdom is simple save america kill the bill. >> save america kill the bill. tonight i am launching a slightly new mantra kill any new bill that will come next year. >> [laughter] that's great. the good news is we killed the bill so far. it keeps coming back it was a rally cry that bill would have been another five or $6 trillion of additional federal spending with massive flash on —- inflationary consequences and also hidden

in the bill are very huge tax hikes doing great damage to the economy there was a save america coalition among conservative groups i was a supporter of joe mentioned. i thought he was a brave democrat he somebody who would say the democratic party from itself if they ever gave him a chance frankly i wish he would run in the primaries in 2024. he is a friend of mine and has been on the show may have spoken on the phone i don't talk politics but i talk policy. i think senator sinema has done a great job to fight off the tax increases.

so far we have killed the bill. no more bills. by the way i want to add oneer thing there is another bill out there sometimes called the china compete bill which has nothing to do with competing with china it is as much as $300 billion of additional federal spending industrial policies and corporate welfare building out the chip industry that does not need bailed out. and one dozen republicans voted for in the senate and they should not half. i will say that. host: maryland good afternoon. >>caller: good afternoon peter the great. we appreciate your efforts. mr. kudlow, you mentioned to the previous color about making comments about mr. biden cognitive abilities.

i have listened to you on the phone with stephen moore and with sue new and you called the president and idiot. so enough of that. but. >> i don't believe that. ->>caller: you did that in any event, you refer to reagan tax cuts and tax policy of three decades of prosperity. but his policies cost george bush the first a second term because economics is what clinton ran on and the state of the country's economy. thirty years would have taken is up to bush number two which was an economic debacle as well. host: there is aot lot on the

table there. first of all the idiot remark. >> i don't think i said that. in passing that i don't believe that. i have been critical of biden. , idiot? i doubt it. putting that aside but pop of bush temporarily reversed a small part of reagan's tax cuts and it was a mistake. we went intocu recession and he lost the election. but the bulk of the tax cuts stayed and bill clinton who continue to raise the income tax when reaganga came in it was 70 percent when he left it was 28. park publish raised it at 31. clinton took it at 40. still below 70.

then george w bush brought it down and 35. so basically the tax cuts stayed in tact. they were not as low as 28 that basically stayed intact. but pop up bush so many of us that helped vice president bush try to talk him out of raising taxes and we said don't do it. he did. it and lost the election. host: if you want a fuller answer he writes about that in jfk and the reagan revolution. it is funny because we were talking yesterday with a happy warrior persona on the air that's why i was surprised to

call mr. biden. >> that's not my way. i am very critical of biden. i gave him a honeymoon chance i wasn't in the beginning. but for me to get personal like that is very unusual. host: booktv in-depth continues from larry kudlow's library in connecticut.

>> i grew up in the way new jersey, and my father was a this man who became a very good real estate agent. and i have one younger brother who has lived in los angeles, hollywood for many decades. i love him to death. he is my favorite hollywood liberal. he is a screenwriter, postproduction has done very well for himself and my favorite hollywood liberal. younger brother. host: this is from american abundance a quotation in the introduction. in late november 1995, i had no prospects, no confidence, no ambition and no

sense i could do the job. what was going on? >> i had my crash and burn, hopeless addictions to alcohol and drugs. that was the worst time in my life itt had been building up over several years and then it went away to a treatment center in minnesota for five months to get well. my wife sent me up there for long-term care. that then that is when i got out and basically what i wrote was kind of true. i wasn't really sure what would happen. the most important thing was to stayy sober and i have now coming up on 27 years through

god's grace and the greatest blessing of my life. those were tricky times. it seems like a long time ago. in almost every way things have worked out better than i ever dreamed possible or dear dream possible. judy and i will have had 35 years married this summer, 27 years of sobriety. god has been very good to me. and at that point i was being honest in the book. who knew? i did not know. i had no idea.

host: what do you remember of the last few months? >> blessedly very little to be honest i still go to 12 step and i am very active in my church and i think about that from time to time every now and then maybe you are asked to tell your story in front of the group that i want to bore the viewers thatck you go back in time and think you never really want to lose that because those are terrible days i will spare the qualification but it was the

worst moments of my life with no question and i don't think i returned to a more spiritual way. to look at the world things that i have learned from the 12 step group have served meve very well in my career the last three decades. i never withheld that. i have done interviews on that but actually in the trump white house on my 25th anniversary, milania was

hosting a conference on alcohol and drugs and it so happened, i don't know how but it was my 25th anniversary coming up and she asked me to speak which i did in a general way. but if you think about it from that point in 1995 to being a very senior presidential adviser that is a long stone's throw but one cannot have happened without thehe other and i am very grateful for that. and i as i say god has been

very good to me and i try to follow his path. b i'm not perfect but i try to follow his path. host: going back to calls. rochester new york. >>caller: mr. kudlow, i am wondering what is your opinion those unfunded liabilities social security that's coming up and getting closer also the 9 trillion-dollar balance sheet? what type of effect will we have when interest rates return to anything close to normal? it seems to me that there is a growing concern. i think the cato institute published a booklet of various editorials called fiscal cliff

and it is very concerning and i wonder your opinion. >> those are very good questions. they are different one is on entitlements of social security and medicare. the second is the balance sheet of the fed called the monetary base which is just briefly is printing money. the government spends money the federal government spends money and it borrows to finance it spending and then all too frequently the central bank where the federal reserve purchases the bonds that uncle sam sells so that is full faith and credit but then they

create money they literally print money that is what central banks do. i could go on and on i started my career at the new york fed so i learned that in 1973 but in any case the entitlement problem is an issue. look, i don't believe there will ever be a default of social security obligations or medicare obligations. at the end of the day the government that sells bonds to raise the money yes we pay taxes and havet, payroll taxes for social security and medicare but really there is a certain fiction about that on the medicare side. it is not funded anymore it is out of general obligations.

summit some future point somebody will have to look at that the very valuable systems that need to be preserved will be reformed there are decent proposals out there but we spend more than me taken and that is a generic problem that includes entitlements in has to be looked at and the other point that interest rates will return to something more normal and mortgage rates are up through 5 percent ten year bond rates are moving at 3 percent and both will go higher because of inflation and the federal reserve attempt to stop the inflation so that willll add to the burden and the financing of federal

that is going to be a lot more expensive than one more point these are all reasons why i don't like anyl marks that are spending discretionary programs that's why say save america killed the billen we don't need another $5 trillion worth of domestic spending. we cannot afford it it will be extremely costly to finance and ultimately it is inflationary. i want to say although i have been opponent of the biden administration's policies although there are some modest democrat economists have been also. but the point is, we have to come up with no new spending at all.

period. that's why i have been so emphatic separate from my concerns of raising marginal tax rates in the economic growth effects we cannot keep doing this. it is a matter of common sense. i will put it to you that way. i know i am a republican i reagan guy and trump guy and conservative and supply-side. i get that. i do nott. masquerade that. but i think what you see in the polls with the run-up to the midterms common sense people do not want to go out this far to the left whether ssgovernment spending or ending fossil fuels or taking parents out of the classroom or the open border were the foreign-policy there isn't a

campaign commercial that what you have here is the administration that has supported from traditional democratic concerns this is why i love joe mentioned so much and i speak as a former democrat many years ago i acknowledged i worked for ronald reagan a former democrat i worked for donald trump a d former democrat and i have often said the best republicans are former democrat that every republican senator agrees me on —- agrees with me and i say that tongue in cheek but the extremism in the biden administration is being rejected and ittt lacks common sense. you sit there and you see the inflation rate that has jumped before the invasione of ukraine. less than 2 percent before ukraine and then come back

with aon new proposal which cbo prices out $5 trillion of spending in another $3 trillion of debt. you say you cannot do this and joe mentioned was the standup guy along with senator sinema and i notice other moderate democrats are lining up and it is not o sustainable you see a bunch of democrats i know they are from swing states but i don't need to question their motives. the fact is we cannot have a couple of million people going across the border every year. we cannot do that. is not sustainable just like we will not and met natural gas and fossil fuels in the next eight or ten years. that we have a lot of work to

do. but the congressional changes coming. and in any of these areas whether taxes or spending or inflation or the border or education or civil rights. and you will see different occupants in the white house. host: 2019 july 9th talking to business insider, "i don't see this as a huge problem right now talking about 22.5 trillion-dollar debt. as a share of gdp so we are

still under 100 percent of vp. i think it's funny you have a long history of not being a debt monger and some of my conservative friends don't like that i am much more interested with me team of economic growth. let's go back tx cut debate. so, his tax cuts were priced out by the congressional budget office and the joint tax committee on a static basis meaning no economic good -- growth impact.

at $1.5 trillion. of course, you have democrats that said, oh my god, that will raise the deficit and the debt. of course, they have never cared about that before. tax cuts not only promoted growth but brought unemployment to record low levels, brought minority unemployment to record low levels, brought poverty to record low levels. they also paid for themselves. now, they did not in year one and i never said they would. they did not in year two. yes, there was a debt increase to finance those tax cuts. but here we are, through the pandemic and all of these numbers are coming in from the irs and treasury. they show record revenues. they zero -- show that the

corporate tax cuts paid for themselves. this has been the suspect or subject of a cup -- been the subject of a couple programs on my fox business show. the laffer curve works. in the first year or two, you may have to borrow money to finance lower tax rates. but whether they are individual or corporate rates, you are making an investment. you are making an investment in future growth and prosperity and jobs including minorities, especially minorities. you are making an investment in middle-class working folks, blue-collar folks. so it is worth it to incur a temporary deficit. that will increase the debt. it is worth it because down the road everybody will benefit. studies show for example, studies on the left of center.

you know, the brookings. they are not crazy leftists, but left of center. i don't know. 80% of the people got tax relief. 60%, 70% of the benefits of the corporate tax cuts went to working folks. middle-income typical families. that was worth it. when i made that statement in 2019, you know, i stick to it. it did not bother me. what bothers me is if you are going to spend a lot of money that will not enhance growth, that bothers me. ok? so, i will go back to my experience as a young man in the reagan budget office. reagan was not particularly worried about deficits.

he would say so a little bit. but he did not care. he had two priorities. one was to cut tax rates to rejuvenate the economy. second, to put money in defense to defeat soviet communism. ok? he did both. deficits temporarily went up. so did the debt. but he achieved his ends. the economy grew. nearly three decades worth of prosperity with very small interruptions and we defeated soviet communism. growth, peace through strength, strong at home, strong abroad. we get home, always weak abroad. those are the dictums. i learned that from reagan and i have never forgotten it. it has been 40 plus years. i will say as a senior trump

advisor he believed the same thing. weakness at home breeds weakness abroad. strength at home breeds strength abroad. what did trump do? he slashed corporate and small business tax rates and grew the economy and reinvigorated the economy. unemployment fell. he put a lot of money into the defense budget. we had to do that at that point. it was not so much russia as it was china. john f. kennedy talked about strength at home, strength abroad. kennedy was a firm anti-communist. people forget this. i know it was a long time ago. if kennedy were along -- alive today he would be a reagan trump republican. kitty wanted growth at home, 5% growth. which he wanted -- which he got posthumously from his tax cuts. and he fought the soviet union to send mail.

these are not historical coincidences. these are historic principles that work whether you are a democrat or a republican. one of my arguments today as a former longtime democrat. pat moynihan was the last democrat i worked for and he was half republican. the point is this, there was a time when the two parties were a lot closer together. then they are today. this far left stuff is being rejected. i common sense people through the country. you know what? i have so much faith in america. i am just a hopeless optimist about this country. as long as we protected these freedoms, this little far left woke aberration will not last. that's my take. hosts: host: next call comes from

martin in ohio. caller: i have been listening to kudlow a long time, going back to the cnbc days. i generally would always listen to him. not always agree, but i always listen to him. i want to touch on immigration, inflation, and tax. immigration, there is a podcast called macro musings, so here is homework, listen to that because that can help us. immigration is chaotic right now but we don't have birth rate -- we don't replace our people -- our birthrate rate is too low. we need immigration to make this a bigger, stronger place. if you can listen to people like her koran who want to have to hundred million people in america, but we would be fine with 360 people in america. that would make us better. if you are talking about growth, that is where you get it and those people, you get them on a pathway to citizenship, they start paying into the system.

that is how you solve that problem. for some reason, people on the right -- you talk about the people on the left of that are extreme, and there are extreme wackos on the right. you have these know nothing people and that is going nowhere. secondly, inflation. host: you know what, martin? there's a lot there to play with and we appreciate your calling and. -- in. guest: it is very well done. the third-best interview on tv? host: one of the three. guest: that is even better. i want to make a point about immigration. part of what the caller said i agree with. i think that immigration is a good thing, not a bad thing. of course, america has a long tradition of immigration. here is what i don't like, illegal immigration. i don't like open borders. i think that is where we are.

my own views have changed, revolved in the last 10 years over this question. because i'm a strong pro-immigration reform or. but the border crisis, the catastrophe at the border, is something we -- cannot be allowed to continue, it is not sustainable. president trump on this basically did two things. one is he got control of the border through the remaining mexico policy, through building a while policy, and through basically a policy -- remain in mexico was essentially catch and deport, because illegal immigration is a damage. illegal immigration includes the drug trafficking, which is a crisis point.

sex trafficking, kids trafficking, the narco terrorists run these borders. we cannot allow that. i guess my views have been tougher on the border because i have been looking at what has happened on the border in recent years. i think the bidens have made a terrible mistake opening up the border. title 42, if you are going to get rid of that, replace it with something else. the other part of president trump's policies were what i will call legal immigration reform. we have very good plan, which we could never get through congress. it will require more elbow grease and it will require probably a new white house and a new congress. there are a number of ways that we can legally, productively, consistent with economic growth, allow would million plus perhaps

legal immigrants per year. i don't have any problem with that. our economy could do it. america was founded on immigrants. and they were gigantic contributors to our fabulous economic growth over the last several centuries. but today's situation cannot last, in my judgment. host: what about his comment, martin's comment about right-wing wackos, as he called them? guest: i'm not sure what -- i don't know -- he mentioned market corian. i know mark kirk troy and is a smart guy. i'm not sure what a right wing wacko is. i don't know. host: let's hear from tom in phoenix. go ahead. caller: thank you for taking my call. mr. kudlow, you seem to be a person respectful to everybody, but if comments were made, my

assessment is they are accurate and true, so how bad can they be? at any rate, save america, kill the bill, your education is a service to this country and will help change things around from the disaster that we have now. there's a lot a people on the rights that are writing books and talking and their service is greatly appreciated and we need to -- when tv like cnn -- i'm sorry, not cnn, the program we are on. i used to write to the white house orifice -- white house office of correspondence. i don't know if the president gets to read them. i used to refer to him as the president teacher. the way he spoke, people understood, it was not any fancy stuff. i see you do lots of the same around the economic side and i

appreciate that. thank you. host: thank you, tom. guest: thank you, i appreciate it. i have a long history with c-span, out of it. -- proud of it. in my book, america abundance, i have a hats off to brian lamb, who i think is an iconic figure. so i'm honored to be on the show today. i love to do service with c-span. host: i don't know if you can answer this, but tom asked about the president and access or hearing from the public. how often -- you have been in that oval office twice. how often does it become a bubble? guest: actually, with president trump, i would say he kept in touch with more people more frequently -- he is constantly on the phone. that is the thing.

which made it interesting. so let's say we are having a policy meeting. let's say the economy. so we have a meeting in the oval with the boss. steve mnuchin is there and i am there, lighthizer is there, others are there, chris lundell is there. anyway, very important meeting with the boss. some subject would come up. could be taxes, could be trade. could be housing, could be fossil fuel -- no end to it. so you would start off by raising the top -- sir, we are here. i lost a lot of these meetings. he would listen. next thing, he would reach out to the outer oval office, can you get me so when so? get me so and so on the phone, i

want to talk to him, i want to talk to her. it would be -- his mind would associate somebody he knew from outside the government who might have something interesting to say about the topic. he would put that person on the phone, at the speakerphone on, and they would join our meeting. this would happen with some regularity. i know also, even when we are not in formal meetings, that he was constantly on the phone with people, and people that you might be surprised. not everyone was a trump supporter, not everyone was a republican. he wanted to get as many inputs as he possibly could. he is not giving away trade secrets, it is not like he would start randomly calling people for a national security meeting. but some of these -- i will call them open-ended discussions, not

necessarily decision discussions , which would be governed by various executive ordinances, but rather open-ended discussions, kicking stuff around. he loved to bring in people, ceos, sometimes podcasters, friends, you know? one of the great things in that trumpian tradition is, you know what, the so-called experts, including us, i guess, we are not always right, we don't all have all the wisdom, you know what i mean? this sort of beltway thing, credentials and degrees and length of service, nonsense. and trump was great at bringing in new blood and trump was great at getting and staying in touch with people who were not in the government. you know?

and some people in the administration were frustrated by that. i thought it was a great idea. i would do the same thing in my own level, if i had something cooking, i would like to hear from so-and-so and so-and-so. i have an around the block for a long time, i know people that have opinions i'm interested in hearing, so i loved it when he did that. we used to have national economic council would have come that lunches every two weeks throughout all the cabinet agencies and we would invite -- my predecessor, gary cohen, we would invite people outside the government to speak to us, we would go down to the board room in the white house mess and it is refreshing. they could say anything we want -- they want, we need to hear it. trump was the same way. experts will be the death of us. experts -- no, too many experts.

just saying. host: every author who appears on in depth, we ask him or her for their favorite books and what they are currently reading. here is larry kudlow's list. his favorite books include john sanford, the investigator. but they are, to rescue the republic. brian kill me, the president and the freedom fighter. current lady -- currently reading steve forbes on inflation. brian to be trebek, the emergence of arthur laffer. charles morris, the tycoons. in brian walters, the jazz age president. which of those would you like to bring up specifically? guest: i want to say two things. they are not necessarily my favorite books of all time, but it is what i either have read or am reading now. i want to say on john sanford, i love to read -- this, by the

way, these are fictions. john sanford's book the investigator, he has written one million books. i love mystery, cops, cia, spies. sanford writes -- his favorite cop is davenport. i have read so many john sanford books, i believe i know lucas davenport very well and i have been invested in his family and this is a book about lucas davenport's daughter, about halfway through it. so i will let you know how that works. the other one is i wanted to say jamie lee burke who has written about my other favorite cop, david robichaux in southern louisiana. i do not have a copy. i have never met james lee burke, i have never met john sanford, i would love to meet

them, they are fabulous writer. lucas davenport should sometime actually meet david robichaux. david robichaux is a recovering alcoholic and actually goes -- some of his books go into aa meetings, that is how good they are. i think it is great fun. the other stuff, i enjoy steve forbes, who is a dear friend, longtime collaborator. his book on inflation is terrific. inflation is so very important. i wanted to say that brett bear wrote a book about u.s. grant. i had brett on my tv and radio shows. an excellent book about grant, who is one of my favorite presidents. brian kilmeade wrote a terrific book about abraham lincoln and frederick douglass. two opponents of slavery,

different styles, different positions. very important book. he did a good job. i really am very keen on the foci brought here, i'm not sure what the assignment was going to be. the two books i am really keen on, one is the book about the gilded age, which is the charlie morris book, wherever i put that. that is the jazz age one. host: and waiting for you. guest: the tycoons. that links to the jazz age. the jazz age is about warren harding. i want to group them together because -- i'm going to give an opinion here. left-wing historians have destroyed these presidents. by the way, they tried to destroy grants, although i think it was you who told me grant is

starting to move up the list again. host: on the c-span quadrennial list of presidential rankings, grant has been moving up steadily. guest: deservedly so. not only did he win the civil war on the battlefield, but as i said to you yesterday, grant was the guy who tried to reinforce construction. grant was the guy who took on the complex plan. grant ended the civil war income tax and restored the value of the dollar to stop the civil war inflation. liberal historians don't like grant, they don't like warren harding, they don't like calvin coolidge. they just do like ronald reagan, but so much material has come out, reagan and his own hand, they realize reagan was quite a policy intellectual. let's go to the gilded age. the gilded age -- i'm going to

define it as kind of like 1870 to 1910 or something, give me some running room on that. i am going to include u.s. grant. grant was president from 1868 to 1876. the gilded age was the second industrial revolution. the gilded age was a phenomenal period of inventions -- railroads across the country, airplanes, oil, the applications of oil. i brought a list because i was hoping we could go into this stuff. best mustela, telegraph, rail lines, telephones, automobiles, airplanes, the red cross -- come on. and they are badmouthing everything about the guilder -- this tv show made them all out

to be villains. it was about social climbing and stuff like that. they completely missed the big picture. this was a period of unheralded prosperity for the united states. america became the greatest country in the world economically during the so-called gilded age. it was the second industrial revolution. my saintly wife is also a terrific painter, artist. you had the hudson river painters came through. john singer, tremendous stuff. stephen crane, elizabeth worden. the chicago exposition of 1893, i hope i get this right, if i don't she will correct me, it was 1893 or 1896. the wright brothers, 19 oh three, was during the gilded age. what charles morrison does is chronicles a few of these guys, rockefeller, carnegie, j.p.

morgan. i'm just saying, this was not an era of robber barons, this was an era of american greatness and prosperity with tens of millions of people getting higher-paying jobs. you cannot ask for more. it was a tremendous period of literature and art. that is why i wanted to bring that up. there's lots of good books about this. the tycoons is a good place to start. a lot of good books about this. william bill brandt has written about this. liberal historians have slaughtered this age and they are wrong. they missed the point. i don't know why. the progressive period under woodrow wilson cannot pose of anything like this. the other thing is the 1920's, the jazz age. again, you get people like to kill harding. there was corruption in the harding administration.

but as mr. walters shows, it had nothing to do with harding. and the people that were corrupt got busted. the teapot dome standoff -- harding had nothing to do with that. he was a good, middle-of-the-road conservative republican senator from ohio. here is the thing about harding. return to normalcy. i said this earlier in the show -- harding working with calvin coolidge, who is another guy, liberals hit coolidge -- coolidge, by the way, maybe the first law & order guy, he stopped the police strike in massachusetts, he was tough on crime, that is a big issue today. and andrew mellon was the quarterback. they slashed tax rates. and they slashed spending, and the even slashed the federal debt, even though i don't care about that as much as some people. we had unbelievable prosperity in the 1920's.

another industrial age. literature, art, everything exploded. unfortunately, herbert hoover came in, and even though he was republican and he served in coolidge -- coolidge called him wonder boy. hoover was a good businessman, he was a mining engineer, and he did great humanitarian things in world war i, but as secretary of commerce, coolidge had no time for him because he was a big government guy. even though he had the hoover institution in stanford which is all about free markets, hoover himself -- hoover took the tax rate from 25% to 65%. i know there was restricted tariffs during these republican years, but not like that. it was a terrible mistake. it turned what was a modest downturn a major depression, than fdr, in my view, made it

worse because he kept raising taxes and kept regulating and kept controlling prices. i am reading these books and i like to productize about these books. i love the gilded age stuff personally. if i had to do it over again, you could kind of plot me -- i would have liked to have been -- i don't know, grover cleveland, a democrat, is one of my favorite presidents. he was a pro gold, spending cutter, would not fathom the income tax, from buffalo, new york. he was governor of new york and president all in about six or eight years. he is the only guy to come back and be president again, i think. i like grover cleveland. i like u.s. grant. i like warren harding. i especially like calvin coolidge. i like ronald reagan. and i like donald trump. host: wasn't grover cleveland

the father of baby ruth? let's hear from -- guest: that is -- his opponents go after these guys on those grants and they forget -- grover cleveland was the last gold democrat. anyway, william jennings bryan, we can go through that another time. host: we have time for one or two more calls. john is in florida. you are on with larry kudlow. john, you with us? let's try john in connecticut. caller: this is john from connecticut. i want to know if you think that john kennedy, senator from louisiana, would be a good presidential candidate in 2024. host: thank you, we are going to leave it there, we are running short on time. guest: john kennedy is a very

smart man. i will leave it there. host: is he somebody you know? when you are in the white house, how often did you talk with senators? constantly? guest: tons. i had a lot of dealings with senator kennedy. i introduced him -- he spoke here at the state party fundraiser, he was on a tv show recently, he is a very smart guy. host: frank, florida. you are on the air. caller: that is kirk in washington. host: i apologize. caller: you asked a wonderful question of mr. kudlow and i happen to enjoy watching mr. kudlow. i somewhat agree with some of his positions, but some of them i do not. one of them -- i think the caller had mentioned about

spending of the trump administration. that has always been -- people in the state of washington think the republicans drive up the debt, the democrats try to fix that. what is mr. kudlow's position on that? and one more thing. elon musk made a great argument about robots coming in to take place of workers. he made a position that they would start having to pay workers a salary because there would be no more jobs. i will take my question off the air. thank you very much. host: that was a little hard to hear. did you get anything out of that? guest: robots are not going to replace the workforce. that is the most exaggerated, overstated argument. robots will help grow the economy and create jobs, just

like all these industrial revolution improvements to -- do. gales of creative destruction, i'm an advocate of that. i'm not sure i heard his first question. host: i could not hear it quickly -- clearly enough. i want to do something in our last five minutes. i want to go through some headlines and just get your quicktake on these. these are from recent newspapers. here's the new york times, a story on dr. carlsen, american nationalist. guest: i read it quickly. tucker is a friend of mine, he is a smart guy, he has done a fabulous job as a broadcaster, and it looks like a new york times political hit job to me. host: wall street journal, u.s. economy shrinks 1.4%, amazon loses money.

guest: look, high inflation, the fed is going to have to take away the punch bowl. the stock market is going to be in for a rough time the next six to nine, maybe 12 months. but i want to say this, people should buy and own stocks for the long run. the fact that the market does go down some more, which i think is likely because i think the economy is going through stagflation, we may be on the front end of a recession next year, people should buy the dip and hold on -- by the indexes and hold them forever, do not try to out tray the market. in the cavalry is coming. host: washington post, biden aid plan for ukraine signals deepening war. guest: look, i did not read that. my view is joe biden has been a dollar short and a day late on

helping ukraine. but i will also say it looks like they are catching up to where they need to be. i am impressed with defense secretary lloyd austin about this. and i think the united states should do everything it can, everything it can to help the ukrainians win the war in ukraine. not american troops on the ground, but everything, we should help ukraine win the war and drive the russians out of their territory. host: media relaxant -- media reaction to elon musk proves conservatives guest: i happen to like elon musk. i like what he is doing with respect to twitter and his crusades for free speech and i think he is a brilliant guy. happy to have him on board. host: one final story, this is from the washington post.

cowboys member pleads guilty in january 6 cooperation deal. january 6, where were you? guest: i was at my office in the second floor. i did not read that. i will make one comment. january 6 was a rough day for everybody, but i will say this. people who accuse donald trump of somehow fomenting insurrection or revolution, they ought to go back and look at some facts, and my friend murdoch has written about this but others have too. it was president trump who ordered 10,000 to 20,000 national guard people to police the capitol and the city of washington. that order was rejected by the mayor of washington and by the speaker of the house. so for a guy who has said -- is trying to promote insurrection, don't you think it is odd that

he wanted 20,000 national guard's people to protect the city and the capitol? i believe that there appeared -- leave at there. host: and from insanity, september 16, 2017, there is not a racist, hateful, white supremacist bone in donald trump's body. we are going to finish from this quote from larry kudlow. i don't believe in retirement, i don't understand the word, i just adore working. work is a virtue. what else am i going to do? guest: i don't believe there is a racist tone in donald trump's body. i will repeat that. i cannot imagine not working. as long as the lord gives me the strength to work and opportunities, i will continue to work. i love it too much. i was -- i would keel over on the set of some tv show and you will cart me away and we will be done with it. host: they're a cut though,

think you for being on book tv. thank you to you and your wife for hosting us here.