maria: have a great day. thanks so much. "varney & company" begins now. stuart, take it away. stuart: good morning, maria, good morning everyone. smartphones with camera are everywhere and sometimes a tape surfaces sheds light on big issues of the day. case in point, google, the fight over sensorring political opinion. right after the residential election, google top executives held a company meeting. they vented. they didn't like trump's victory. cofounder sergey brin as immigrant and refugee i find this election deeply disturbing. a very stressful time they said. they were expressing personal opinions, said google. it never affected their work. we're asked to believe a couple

of very powerful billionaires that feed us, news and information worldwide never brought their opinions to the job. are you buying that? next case, apple. new phones, one with a very pig screen. it looked like a handheld tv but it is the new watch that caught my attention. it has a built h in heart monitor and a fall alert. you remember that commercial, help, i've fallen and i can't get up? the apple watch can surely help in that situation. i want one. tesla, another top executive leaving. the vice president for worldwide finance will be gone by next month. this follows the sudden departure of the chief accounting officer on the job for a month as well as head of hr. the stock still holding at 288 per share. how about that. stocks overall, we're going up again. the dow well above 2thousand --

26,000 level. this is a very big day for millions of people up and down the eastern seaboard. florence is about to arrive. we'll take you to the carolinas. "varney & company" is about to begin. ♪ stuart: president trump tweeting about florence, here it is. we are completely ready for hurricane florence as the storm gets larger and more powerful. be careful. it is now a category 2 storm. winds over 110 miles an hour. the real story is the size of this thing. ashley: the size. 400 miles across. unfortunately we don't really know where it will make landfall. what does it do when it does? will it spin right off the coast or spin on the coast? this is a story about winds, water, storm surge, six, 12, 15 feet. then the rain. is this caption shows, it will

move very slowly once it approaches the coast. maybe early tomorrow morning. don't be fooled by this just because it is downgraded to category two. it is cataclysmic how much rain it can drop. 20, 30, 40 inches of rain. stuart: jeff flock on the ground. a cure few is in effect. cops asked to you leave? reporter: we'll talk to the chief. we'll see if we get permission. i usually had pretty good luck in the past. we'll stay. this is the berm that protects us. this would protect the beach. i want to take you down to the beach. this is not even high tide, we're already losing a whole lot of the beach out here. as you can see a pretty angry atlantic out here. we're looking at high tide, two hours. we'll be back on this beach in

your broadcast in two hours. by the way i said we're going to stick it out. this is pretty strong building. we'll be in that one there. it is about five stories. that should be okay in terms of storm surge. i was here on this very beach in hurricane bertha back in 1996. right now, bertha was more powerful than this one coming in. this is a much bigger storm. as you pointed out, ashley did. we don't know where it will go. steering will collapse. it may steer here norfor god knows how long. that will bring a lot of rain. it is an extraordinary event but we'll be here. stuart: yes you will, jeff. see you later. let's get to politics, not long after donald trump won the election the executives at google held a company meeting. they expressed their anger and extreme disappointment at the result. watch this. >> i find this election deeply offensive i know many of you do

too. >> i feel like a ton of bricks dropped on my chest. what we all need right now is a hug. >> can i move to canada? [laughter] >> is there anything positive you see positive you see from the election result? >> boy. that is a really tough one right now. stuart: i need a hug. got to go to canada. please. senator john kennedy, republican from louisiana. senator, these executives clearly took sides. they say their opinions never intrude into their work. do you believe that? >> i don't know but we're going to find out look, this is america. you can believe what you want. you can vote however you want. but given the immense power of google, stuart, what i think we have to ask us, are they taking those beliefs and using the power of their social media platform to basically bash the

president and promote san francisco values to the rest of america? stuart: i think they are doing that, mr. senator. >> well that is not acceptable. that is not accept ann. stuart: how do you regulate them? >> i don't want the, the government shouldn't regulate them in the sense i don't want government deciding what can be posted on social media. i think that's a mistake. i do think we're going to have to come up with some sort of independent, third party, like the non-profit group we use to as sign domain names. it is not a perfect example, it's a third party group that everybody accepts and the response to what i'm saying of course will be well, it is a private sector company. well, that's true but number one, their power, they're not the average private sector company. google is not a company. it is a country.

one of the most powerful countries in world. and number two, if they are going to promote and an anti-trump agenda and a pro-san francisco values agenda, then they need to disclose that to the people that use the platform. stuart: yeah. >> i'm very disturbed about all of this. stuart: got it. >> we don't need a hug here. we need a little fairness. stuart: keep your hugs to yourself. mr. senator, hold on for just one second, please. i have to switch topics and cover technology. there is some big stuff in the news here. apple unveiled its biggest and most expensive iphone lineup ever, and its first watch which wins fda clearance. that is interesting. michelle mckinan with payne, capital management. >> thanks for having me. stuart: fda approval because this watch has a heart monitor and a fall monitor. i think this thing is designed just for me. >> you have to be, right?

you're one of the largest consumers. i'm not saying that you're -- stuart: i'm elderly, i'm prone to falling down and i can't get up. >> the baby boomer generation represents 70% of american as consumption. if you're apple, of course you will go after the baby boomer generation because that means more revenue for them. stuart: it makes a lot of sense. >> it does. stuart: the big screen, 6 1/2 inch screen, that looks like a portable handheld television which is computer, a phone as well. another product for my generation. >> you can read it, right? stuart: i can. all in all, a good move by apple with these introductions. >> absolutely a good move by apple. we can't forget about the millenial generation, i'm a larger generation than the baby boomers. we're also focused on health. they get the millenials and the older generation and a win-win. stuart: okay. another one, i talked to you about tesla, yet another senior

executive gone. this is the worldwide finance vice president. a couple weeks ago it was the chief accounting guy. what's with tesla? >> i don't know. there is definitely some rumbling happening underneath the surface at that company. when you think about the performance last year, teslas was up over 45%. if investors didn't take profits they're feeling bad for themselves. this is reminder for investors when you have profits you take gains. also what is fascinating, tesla used to trade very much like a tech stock, right? stuart: it does. >> high multiples, high prices. who knows, maybe it is coming back down to reality maybe trading more like a auto stock trade at much lower multiples. stuart: i'm fascinated by stocks with all these rumblings holding at $288 a share. more valuable than gm. >> if you think about it, that is crazy. stuart: hold on michelle. back to senator canada.

to senator kennedy. did i say canada there? i was confused by the young person who wants to move to canada because of trump. i digress. colleague mitch mcconnell, says control of the senate will be a knife fight. why is it so close when the economy is clearly booming? >> i think because the national media is so anti-president trump, and so anti, in many respects american values. look our country is clearly split. about half of our country votes republican. about half votes democrat. it has been that way for a while. i think that's healthy but many members, well, let me just say it, a lot of members of the national media, it is more like 90-10. having said that i don't think the american people are fooled. there are a lot of cultured

cosmopolitan, washington, d.c., insiders up here who think they are smarter the average american and that they can fool them, the american people. i think the american people see right through it. i think a lot of experts are going to be wrong about the midterm elections. but i think you have to call it as you see it. i support the first amendment. i do. i support a free press. but no fair-minded person can look at the national coverage say there is level playing field. there isn't, stuart. the good news i think american people see right through it. i said this before. the american people don't have time to read aristotle every day. they're too business city earning a living. but they get it. stuart: you're absolutely right, mr. senator. that is why you're a favorite. >> can the new apple phone, can it bring you, fetch you a beer? a way to do that? stuart: give it a couple years,

senator. it will order one up for you. >> i might buy a new one if they do that. stuart: thanks, mr. senator. we always like having you on the show. thanks for coming. >> thanks, stuart. stuart: now look at this, it is thursday morning. we're going up triple digits all over again, about 114, 115 points up. well over the 26,000 on the dow jones industrials. big gains elsewhere. more trouble at cbs. "60 minutes" producer jeff fager is out. he sent a threatening text, if he reports on sexual harrassment allegations against mr. fager she could be out of a job. well, he is out of a job. nike is proposing a plan to repeal oregon's sanctuary state status. oregon says ending the sanctuary status would make it harder to attract talent from other countries. when you're a home is in a natural disaster, these are the

guys. they will be gearing up and cleaning up in after florence. we'll talk to ball four's ceo after this. that's why we designed capital one cafes. you can get savings and checking accounts with no fees or minimums. and one of america's best savings rates. to top it off, you can open one from anywhere in 5 minutes. this isn't a typical bank. this is banking reimagined. what's in your wallet?

stuart: here is example where you don't meet the analyst expectations you are taken to the cleaners. kroger sales fell short of expectations, plus the company says it will sacrifice profit to continue investing in online ordering to compete with amazon and walmart but they didn't meet expectations and they're down 8%. that's a big drop. get back to hurricane florence. we have someone in the disaster cleanup business. sheldon yellen ceo of of balfore restoration. i don't want to be crass about this, people are hurting here, but clearly an open student for your company. i take it you jumped on it. you have resources heading down there now?

>> yes, sir, we do. as of last night we've checked in all of our 1206 six people into rocky mount, north carolina, where we stage equipment, mobile command centers, tractor-trailers, food, water and equipment to perform. we will then be dispatched throughout the coast as needed. we have 150 people standing by from about 29 other belle for offices to be dispatched each day starting tomorrow. another 150 people every day for next six days. we'll build up to 2,000 people on the ground there. stuart: sheldon, hold on a second, who is paying for this? are you under government contract? are you moving people down there and picking up private business? >> we pick up private business. we deal with multinational companies and we do all the commercial work and multifamily work that comes our way. we have preexisting clients, red alert clients, that know us,

throughout the years. i have been doing this 34 years. belfor as a brand has been known. back in '99 during floyd, we rebuilt half of wrightsville beach, half the properties on the coast there. we have already received calls from some communities that wanted us to be on notice for them. stuart: sheldon, i don't want to be crass. people are hurting. people are in danger, got that. but would it be true to say in the short term this is an economic problem? short term economics bad, but, long term, probably a positive because a lot of money is going to be spent on reconstruction? do you agree with that? >> yes, sir, i would. you hit the nail on the head there. in the short term everything comes to a small little halt. and again, we got to make sure everybody is safe. and until people return back to their homes and their businesses which could be three or four-days later, things are at a

standstill. utilities are down. infrastructure is affected. until the government authorities get things back up and running, which takes a little bit of time, then all of a sudden, all of the resources many could into town as you're talking about, and these communities start to rebuild themselves and there is enormous amount of influx of people that need hotel rooms, that need more gas, that need food, buy clothes, working to restore these communities back to their preexisting conditions. and, then, that economic boom does take place. stuart: okay. i'm sure, sheldon, running short on time. great work. you have a lot of people going into operation down there. congratulations to belfore. sheldon, yellen. >> thank you, stuart. stuart: look at the market, we're going up. ten minutes from now we'll be up with well over 100 points for the dow. nice gain for the s&p and plus the nasdaq as well. jamie dimon well, he said he

could beat trump if he ran for president. dimon says he is smarter than the president. now he did walk those comments back a little, but that didn't stop the president from responding. we'll tell you exactly what mr. trump is tweeting about next this isn't just any moving day.

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stuart: the hurricane is coming. it's called florence. it's a cat 2 backing winds packing over 100 miles an hour. the point of the storm is the size. look at the screen there. the size of it. it is 400 miles across. we should tell you that the tropical storm conditions, wind and rain, have now reached the outer banks of north carolina. so it's there. tropical conditions, outer banks, north carolina. it's a big one. jpmorgan's chief, jamie dimon, he is one of the top bankers in america, he says he is smarter than president trump and he could beat him in a election. then he backed off a little bit from there. but of course, president trump has responded. so ash, give us the tweet. ashley: surprising thing was it didn't come faster. here we go from the president. the problem with banker jamie dimon running for president he doesn't have the aptitude for smarts and is a poor public speaker and a nervous mess. otherwise he is wonderful. i made a lot of bankers and

others look much smarter than they are with my great economic policies. stuart: yeah. maybe we shouldn't laugh. ashley: why not? stuart: the president wants us to laugh. liz: jamie dimon is smart enough to know that the left-wing won't accept a banker running for president so. stuart: he is that smart. ashley: true. stuart: let's go. let's go. we have a great market for you. it is thursday morning. we'll be up, i think about triple digits, i'm pretty sure about that. 114 is the dow futures reading. up 11 for the s&p. up 48 for the nasdaq. looks like we're going up for the opening bell today. stay with us please. we'll take you down to wall street. ♪

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you still thinking about opening your own shop? every day. i think there are some ways to help keep you on track. and closer to home. i'm all ears. how did edward jones grow to a trillion dollars in assets under care? thanks. by thinking about your goals as much as you do. ♪ stuart: 45 seconds to the opening bell and tesla, looks like they're taking another hit. another senior executive is, is going i should say. there is a big string of these people just leaving the company and elizabeth macdonald has a choice word for tesla. liz: i think it is doomsday for elon musk. the crack of doom is now ringing for him. i will explain after the bell. stuart: very good. very good. ashley: we're doomed. stuart: i'm very interested. i am inclined to agree with you.

how much more can tesla take? good question. 15 second those go. [opening bell rings] today we should move above that significantly. yeah, well above 26,000. what am i talking about? bang, 9:30, we're off and running. i'm sure we're going to be up. yes, we are, nicely so. 92 points, 86 points. i see a lot of green amongst the dow 30. we're very close to one hundred point gain in the early going. up 101. a couple of stocks are actually down. those would be home depot and walmart. must be a reason for that. the dow is up close to .4%. s&p 500, nice gain there, .4%. looks to me like those tech stocks are doing well. quick check of apple. as you know they came out with new phones and newly designed watch yesterday.

222 in the very early going this morning. that means they're about six buck as way from their all-time high. scott martin is with us, john layfield is here, liz macdonald an ashley webster also here. starting with apple. you could say this thing is personal. bigger screen, six 1/2 inches, good for people my age. a watch, newly-designed watch that monitors your heart rate. it has a fall detector. ashley: that is good for you, too, stuart. stuart: wonderful for mean. john, did they design this thing spill for geriatrics like myself? >> i think they did. one of the biggest consumer audiences. that is a big deal. 1.3 billion people use an apple product globally. they're not creating new things. they're getting new iterations and generations but that's enough. stuart: scott, what do you say, not so much about designing a watch for me, that's not the point. i'm trying to say this is very interesting introduction of products. seems like it's a plus. what do you say, scott? >> yeah. the features are nice, stuart.

it may not be for geriatrics. my friend ray fell at dinner because he tripped over his handbag. they talk about the screen cracking, that will improve. the water resistance. that is impressive. i dropped mine and dropped it in things like water. so it is good to have protection there. i wish they would fix siri. that still doesn't work very well. stuart: yeah. what have you got. ashley: i think it is great. i have an apple watch three, i hate when they come out with the apple watch four and tell you why you need to replace the one you have now. this new feature with the echo -- echocardiogram, whatever it is. liz: fda improved it. just in time for christmas gift with mom and dad over holidays. they are possibly working with aetna to give the apple watches.

aetna has given away 50,000 to customers. if you get them to cover it as insurance. stuart: vice president of worldwide finance at tesla, earlier, moments ago you said this is doomsday for elon musk. liz: let me go through this. this is 33rd executive that left, left stock option packages on table over the years. the stock lost 25% of its value since musk tweeted about secured funding. howard schultz stepped down as starbucks as executive chairman to stablize the company. watch for musk to step down and lose his role as chairman. he will keep ceo and product architect but that is what could happen. stuart: wait. that could happen. >> liz: i'm saying watch for it. watch for it. watch this, wait. nearly two billion of convertible bond debt is rolling over. they need more money to pay the maturation of those junk bonds. stuart: okay. liz: they have to do equity raise is dilutive of more money.

stuart: scott, despite what we've gone through, tesla stock is at $290 a share. what do you think of that? >> it is amazing, stuart. this goes back to the charts more than everything. we played with tesla in client accounts last couple years. played is probably the right word. there has been nothing accountable about this stock whatsoever or really the company itself and certainly its ceo. look it, tesla is probably a buy around 250, 260. there is support down there. if you get bump up to 320, 330 i think you sell or don't buy or get out. stuart: first of all, the kaepernick controversy with nike. now nike is going political again. they oppose the repeal of the sanctuary law in oregon. they want to keep oregon as a sanctuary state. john, come into this. seems to me that nike is getting very political. i'm wondering if being political is good for business? >> i think it is terrible for

business. look at the biggest national anthem protest of all time, '68 olympics in mexico city, carlos smith, when they did the black power salute. history showed they were right. took decades. they were ruined financially before that came around. i don't know what history says about kaepernick and sanctuary state but terrible for business for nike to be involved in politics. stuart: back to the big board. we have a solid gain. we're up 120 points. we're up half a percentage point. sorry, lizzie. liz: understood. stuart, 126, 127 where we are. kroger sales fell short of analyst expectations. they will sacrifice profit to keep on investing in online ordering services. they want to compete with amazon and walmart. because they missed expectations the stock is down 9%. look at microsoft, please. liz: oh. stuart: don't have to play the trumpets but that is a new all-time high.

$113.28 per share. if you had told me all those years ago when i was buying it years ago, that it would get to 113 i would never, ever, believed you, ever. ashley: look at it now. stuart: ahead of the hurricane, look at insurers, allstate, travelers, they're the ones with a lot of business in the carolinas. both of them up today, especially travelers. how about the home improvement stores? lowe's and home depot, they are both down today. and the utilities that serve the carolinas, are as you know, duke energy and scana. those two stocks down a fraction. still on the hurricane, let's talk about the economic impact. scott, short-term pain, yes, long-term gain for the economy. what do you say? >> most likely. stuart, it depends on the damage though as we've seen with some of these terrible disasters in our history sometimes businesses get destroyed and don't rebuild and flee the area and that hurts it economically. i agree with you in large part.

looks like most of the demand that has come pulled forward and home depot and lowe's is already weighing. that is good as everybody is boarded up. you also have pent-up demand returns after everything gets back to normal. i think there is short term interruption long-term there is -- liz: we have to think about long term pain for that area, sorry, right? because it is about overdevelopment of the coastal area, but it adds to the economy the development of area. it's a tough call. stuart: probably there is long-term gain. a lot of money spent rebuilding. >> yes. stuart: john, you're in bermuda, we always tease you, what do you do when hurricanes approach like this, do you hunker down or leave the island? >> hurricanes are north fatly not like earthquakes and tornadoes. i grew up in west texas. they don't appear suddenly. you have usually several days advance notice. bermuda is different from the east coast. bermuda is a volcanic island.

bermuda is built for hurricanes. mandatory building standard are in place, you don't see a lot of damage from the hurricane. the worst part when it hits land, spins off tornadoes. that is where most of the damage is caused. stuart: well-said, john. google tape executives, lamenting big time president trump's win. scott it is on the screen now. they just detested the president's win and they said it in a company meeting. they say that they don't put their politics into practice but you think, hey, do you believe them, b, surely there is some regulations coming, isn't it? >> i don't believe them now. i have to be honest with you as google shareholder for many, many years we talked about it on this show, as google is a big part of my life, i'm really disappointed about this. you know, just too bad that they lied to us about the political allegiance let's say they had or didn't have as they said. it is clear there is obviously some stake in the game they want to have here.

yeah, there is probably some regulations coming and it is just a bad look for google. stuart: won't destroy their business number. they may nip around the edges but not going to destroy facebook an google's business model. i don't think so. anybody disagree with me on this? no, they come out of it. we're up 115 points on the dow industrials as we speak. what else have i got. we're thanking people. it is only 9:39, and i got to say good-bye to john and very good to scott. i'm very sorry gentleman. you lost a minute there. next time. we're up at the high of the day 130 points higher for the dow industrials. 26,129 is where we are. the trump administration inviting china back to the table for another round of trade talks. here is the question, did they blink? we'll ask a former trump trade advisor on that one. first the latest on

hurricane florence. yes, the winds are slowing a little. make no mistake this is a very dangerous and potentially deadly storm. janice dean has the latest on this for us. she's next. i can do more to lower my a1c. because my body can still make its own insulin. i take trulicity once a week to activate my body to release its own insulin, like it's supposed to. trulicity is not insulin. it works 24/7. it comes in an easy-to-use pen. and i may even lose a little weight.

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stuart: we're up 145 points, up 146, 147 for the dow industrials. 148. 150. let's leave it at that. hurricane florence is now the cat 2 storm. winds over 130 miles an hour. janice, the size of the storm, and the storm surge.

right. >> absolutely and rainfall as well. this will not be a wind story. winds are 110 miles an hour. i want to make mention until the tornado watch until 9:00 p.m., we have landfalling systems and threat of severe storms and weak tornadoes that will do structural damage. cat-3, 111, when it starts. we're high-end category 2, one shy of major hurricane, because of core of the strongest winds are down, just 20 miles, that is not, the time for to you say, oh, this is a nothing storm. because the legacy will not be the wind, stuart, it is going to be rainfall and the storm surge as you mentioned, lasting for several days. current wind gusts, impressive, at least tropical storm force winds alongs the outer banks and coastal north carolina, these are the hurricane force wind. we'll feel hurricane force wind along the coast about 80 miles away from the center of the

storm. tropical storm force winds, 200 miles away from the center of the storm, well inland, we'll feel the effects, because they're going to stall, that is why it is still dangerous. so yesterday, at this time, we were talking about cat-4. we're talking about cat 2. but the national hurricane center has not lessened its effects in terms of storm surge and rainfall. that stays the same. the energy that this storm has, it is expanded its wind field. as you mentioned, so it is very large. just like sandy. remember hurricane sandy in the northeast, 80 mile-an-hour stained winds. it is cat-1, incredible amount of damages along the coast. the fact it stalls, for not one, two, three days of rain, wind and surge, that is why this is potentially dangerous and catastrophic, not because of the winds, but because of the rain. somebody will get 20 to 40 inches of rainfall. so one will get over 12 feet of

storm surge. stuart: i just can't imagine being in any place that gets even a foot of rain. >> agreed. stuart: can't imagine it. janice, thank you so much for great work. appreciate it. >> got it. stuart: got to move on to trade, the trump administration wants talks with china before the trade war escalates. we invited them to get back to the talks. curtis ellis with us, a former advisor to the trump campaign on trade and on jobs. we invited them pack to the table. did we bling? >> no. stuart: ah. did they? well they haven't yet. >> they haven't yet. look, president's trump critics all along said he has got to negotiate this, got to negotiate this. so that is what we're doing, we're negotiating. stuart: do you think the chinese will come back to the table and do you think they will blink and make any kind of concession? >> they have every reason to do that. the economy is slowing down. stuart: but will they? >> well my crystal ball --

stuart: you don't think so, do you? >> i have my doubts. i certainly hope so. i certainly think they should. they have been violating all of the rules of the road. and president trump has been very clear, that we're not going to let them continue doing that any longer. that is why he has put these tariffs on the table, and he is ready to put them in place. stuart: so, they're ready to go in place these tariffs. >> that's right. stuart: now if they don't come up with some new negotiating point or a new negotiating position, those tariffs will be imposed, won't they? >> yeah, they certainry will. stuart: you think that is going to happen? >> for 30 years we talked, talked, talked did nothing. now president trump finally said, done what we should have been doing all along, if you don't live up to your end of the bargain, we're going to put in place the remedies that every agreement says can be and should be imposed. stuart: again i'm going to go

back to it, you do think that those tariffs will be imposed? >> yes, i do. stuart: you do? because the chinese will not bling? >> i wouldn't say that they may. they may find a way to actually do what they said they would do when they joined the world trade organization which move towards being a market economy. right now these are government-controlled enterprises are dumping their goods in the american marketplace. that is not the way it is supposed to work. stuart: okay. i want to ask you about the u.s. and canada. >> yes. stuart: we had this deal on dairy. our stuff can go there. we have access there. >> right. stuart: is this a completely free dairy trade situation or what? >> what is going on, what they're talking about is increasing the amount of american dairy that can be sold in canada. they are still managing the dairy market in canada. they want to protect their dairy industry there. dairy farmers in quebec, as mr. trudeau is from quebec, that is always been a sensitive

thing. free trade, absolute free trade let's use the popular word, load star. that's, that is the star we guide by but we never get there, right? when navigators navigate to the north star, they're not trying to get to the north star, they're trying to get to albany. stuart: we don't have free trade in dairy. we have the increase in the amount of dairy stuff that we can send to canada. that is the deal. >> that is where we're going, yes. stuart: that is the best we can say at this point for that? >> maybe some day we'll get to the north star, i don't know. stuart: we shall see. curtis ellis, thanks very much for joining us. i'm intrigued about china, that is a fact. dow 30, most in the green as you would expect when the dow industrials are up nearly 150 points. want to tell you about jeff fager, executive producer of 60 minutes, he's out amidst allegations of sexual harrassment and threatening text to a reporter. here is the question, is this another legal headache for cbs?

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ythen you turn 40 ande everything goes. tell me about it. you know, it's made me think, i'm closer to my retirement days than i am my college days. hm. i'm thinking... will i have enough? should i change something? well, you're asking the right questions. i just want to know, am i gonna be okay? i know people who specialize in "am i going to be okay." i like that. you may need glasses though. yeah. schedule a complimentary goal planning session today with td ameritrade. stuart: wilbur ross is now touring noaa, that is the hurricane people basically, part of the commerce department. we expect to hear from him

later. any news out of wilbur ross at noah, you will get -- noaa. you will hear it real fast. this is another new high for the day, 26,163. executive producer of "60 minutes," jeff fager has been fired. it was the straw that broke the camel's back. >> i was that reporter, since jeff fager publicly referred to our exchange today, i want to be transparent about it. fager in a text said to me, quote, if you repeat these false accusations without any of your own reporting to back them up, you will be held responsible for harming me. stuart: faithfer has been hired. all rise, napolitano the judge is here. is this firing justifiable? >> doesn't appear to be on basis of that text.

basically saying i want you to know what you're saying is harmful to me, so you better back it up. if you don't you will be held accountable to me as anybody would trying to protect their reputation. the straw that broke the camel's back, there must have been other reasons for the firing and this is the most recent of them. there were allegations him. i don't know if those allegations were proven. david rhodes is the president of cbs news, as you know used to be an executive here at fox, says that he was fired because of the text. talk about firing a superstar who acquired 76 emmys for his program. there is no disputing that. there has to be more here than meets the eye. if this was reason he was fired, expect major litigation and serious effort to settle it. they don't want it to be played out in a courtroom in manhattan. stuart: in this case and others of a similar nature, do you believe that the punishment fits the crime? >> if the crime is just sending

that text, absolutely not. now, i haven't seen his contract. i can guess what's in the contract which permits firing for cause. cause is defined as breaking the law or doing something which would publicly impair the product. cbs, cbs news. i don't know that this private text to this woman who worked for him fits in that category. stuart: of course the crimes, the allegations run the gamut from rape to inappropriate touching. >> there has to be -- stuart: even inappropriate words. >> there must be, what we call an evidentiary basis. there must be some evidence independent of just the words of the person making the complaint, to support the allegation in order to justify the firing. now david rhodes probably knows if that evidence exists and if so, what it is, he has hired two very significant law firms with

very experienced former prosecutors. now, on the defense side, to investigate this, and we'll see what they come up with. much like les moonves leaves without a nickel, pending the outcome of the investigation. at that point he is going to demand the balance of his salary on his contract and something else, to compensate him for the harm caused by the firing. stuart: that is the last word. judge, thank you. we'll see you later. thank you. look at this headline from "the washington post." it is an editorial. another hurricane is about to batter our coast. trump is complicit. >> [laughter] is there anything they won't blame on him? stuart: stay tuned, judge. because i have an editorial on that in just a moment. stay right there.

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another hurricane is about to better our coast but trump is complicit. because the president is not fighting climate change in quite the way the post wants hurricanes are trump's fault. at best, at the very best, that's juvenile logic. wait, there's more. here's another headline from the washington post. if cares about hurricane florence his policies don't show it. did you hear that? if cares? if trump cares? the post thinks he does not care that he sitting back waiting for it to happen. this is madness. when one of the country's leading political newspapers and gauges in this insulting speculation you know that the left has lost its mind. they have a serious purpose here. blaming every issue on the president every time. lawrence hits and flooding and distraction. immediately the left will look

for anyone whose slightest lead has not been met. if the cleanup is not only an immediate, the media will say trump is incompetent and obviously does not care. they will do and say anything that turns a hurricane into votes for democrats. it will be ugly. no wonder 69% have lost faith and trust in the media in the last ten years. if you want the real story, come to us, please. the second hour of burning company is about to begin. thursday, 10:00 o'clock eastern time, mortgage rates. >> four and a half, 4.6%. stuart, this is going up. if the biggest increase in some four years. growth and consumer credit, let us not forget the fed will meet later this month and could raise the feds fund rates again.

mortgage rates are on the way up in the demand is there and the strong job market has certainly led to consumer confidence. question is how more expensive will it get for these mortgages and how does that hurt the overall housing market. stuart: we will still take 4.8%. [laughter] >> oh sure. stuart: the dow is up 170 poin points. big gain. boeing is a dell stock and the biggest gainer of all those dow stocks, up 2%, $6.360 on boeing. apple a big gain for the dow and at the dow stock. it's unveiled new phones and a new apple watch you more on that in a moment but that is up dollars 50 cents right now. all time high. look at them go. microsoft, nike, visa and american express. never been higher. kroger is the analyst - sales fell short of analyst

expectations. kroger will continue to invest in its online ordering services. they tried to keep up with amazon and walmart is the analyst that you down 10%. back to my editorial. worth between the headline again. washington post writes in an editorial that does is complicit in hurricane florence. let's see if charles has his customary smile - yes, he does. [laughter] >> when you start with comity like that i can't help but be laughing. explain . stuart: a simpleton from new york, explain what's going on. >> it's insane. if you read into the editorial is not just the headline or passing swing they take at him. they get into the fact that not only is donald trump responsible for these new high winds and hurricanes but responsible for these new slow winds which keep the pickings parked over one

area for a long time. i'm not a scientist or meteorologist but i'm confused about that one. they're not just let me jump but blaming all the stupid people and all those of us who are so dumb that we thought, you know, donald trump is something different but the blaming all of them for this hurricane, as well. stuart: what got to me is when they applied the president does not care. that he will sit back and let - he doesn't care. what an insult and personal insult that is to our president and our country if you ask me. >> it reveals how dishonest and how dishonest any debate they will enter into is going to be, they don't care about the truth and it's more important to them to malign the guy that it is due, i don't know, reach some understanding where we fix problems. that would be a novel idea.

you've seen the new fox polls which show three gop senate candidate leading in their respective races. kevin kramer north dakota, indiana, marshall blackburn, tennessee and now they are in the lead slightly in their states. this comes after mitch mcconnell said it will be a knife fight for the replicants to keep control of the senate. what is going on here? >> mcconnell is probably smart to make that point because republicans should be worried in this environment. obviously democrats are enthused right now and house is the greater danger but if republicans lose the senate they would be - it would be the worst case scenario. stuart: do you think bill lose the senate? >> i do not but the only way they don't is by keeping people on their toes. the thing that should worry republicans is yes, all those candidates and it's good news but all those candidates are in

the lead but the problem is they are - they are leading by smaller margins much smaller margins than donald trump one oh states by. that means there is an enthusiasm gap between donald trump and the generic republican candidate. republicans have to do something to make sure they get those orders out. it's the missing trumpeters from 2016 and every single election since then. that keep republicans up at night. stuart: charles, 56, 55 days to go to the election and will be watching it every day. charles, thank you. apple unveiled three new iphon iphones, their biggest and most expensive lineup to date. marketwatch is with us today. you say, i believe, even with higher price iphones apple still dominates. are you buying it back. >> i wait for pullbacks now but

look, when they started with the thousand dollar phone i was worried it was too expensive but people but it like crazy and i think they will go with this one. whether waterproof or other things they're adding to it but people love their ecosystem. i think they came out with a phone with no changes but gave a new name, people would go crazy. that's how apple is at this point. stuart: i made a joke but it looks to me like the big screen new iphone and the watch that has the heart monitor and the ball indicator seems to be aimed at aging baby boomers like myself but we would like a big screen you can read more easily. if i fall downstairs i like to have a heart monitor and a fall detector. it's legitimate to say that there are two something by going after the market that includes me in all serious, i can tell you, people with the watches for fitness and things like that and

this at something they not done that great with the watch in the past few years but if this will add any of apple that, believe it or not, at this high price and at this gigantic market cap they are accelerating their revenues and earnings here which is an absolute miracle. it tells you tim cook is on the game here a lot of people do not think he'd be another steve jobs. he is damn good. stuart: tesla, another executive leaving the company. this time it's the - vice president for global finance, i believe. for senior executive in a week. come on, you never touch test. or would you come back look, stock is still at 288 there were 290. >> it's 380 whether i buy it and i said no. am i am much more about fighting here and maybe, maybe not. here is the problem. elon musk said three things and

last year that did not come true in the latest is he saying were definitively going fits in the next quarter. if he does not come through, it will take another $80 in it. i'm a big believer in the missouri chevy state and he's not showing me anything good in the last couple of months. i'd be weary and i think the only thing he has going for him is a strong market and easy money so we have a weak market this would be down at 200. stuart: thank you, sir. see you soon. big hour for you on varney. caroline is bracing for hurricane florence, that they live shot - that's the map. look at how big that storm is. 400 miles across. the storm to drop, wait for it, or 3 feet of rain for the storm surge could bring up to 15 feet of water on land. question, have you prepared for a storm like that? we find out from the person who used to run fema. apple unveiling that watch that could potentially save lives.

doctor siegel will show us how that works and whether or not i should get one. i think i might. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell warning of a knife fight to keep republican control of the senate. later the seller we talked to the candidate hoping to unseat democrats. in wisconsin, other question - why is it to close race with the economy doing so well it's like an hour of "varney & co.".

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stuart: we are up 177 points, 26173, about two thirds of 1% on the upside. look at that. they are still around or down a ton $9 a share but an upgrade this morning upgrade was from cell to hold. from one analyst, luke warm, i

would save it stock has fallen 25% in the past month. nine dollars on that one. at sea, their coo stepping down and they will not replace her. no impact on the stock and it's up $49 a share. hurricane florence we've got it. top two storm, the story is that size. it is 400 miles across. jeff flock in the middle of it. carolina beach, north carolina. jeff, is everyone gone? reporter: i will tell you, stuart, lot of people have left. good morning, sir. these are the power company, please just pass us. i'm not seeing anyone out on the street. talk about the definition of a ghost town. it is, i know people are here because we met them and talk to them but i tell you they are hunkered down. there's a curfew in the navy made a right out here if you can but this is the main

thoroughfare through town and lake park of art. again, you go to say maybe you see the boards and again as we discussed some people have boarded and some people have not. we are right by the beach. i can't get you down to the beach in the vehicle but i wanted to spin around outside and show you what the town look like. most people are gone. are you headed out of town? hold on, jason. let's see if we can get these folks. you are going to cross the bridge. yeah. many people left back there, do you know? >> a few of our neighbors know what [inaudible] >> you think they're pretty safe? yeah. you want to go somewhere else? i don't think it will be catastrophic. appreciate it. good luck. he has his stuff and .

stuart: jeff, how you do it. that's how you do it, jeff. superb coverage of a hurricane right from the middle of it. getting people right there as they are skipping town but that's how you do it. you are good at this. future for you in hurricane. [laughter] will be back to you. joining us is david, former fema director. welcome to the program, good to see you. >> good morning. stuart: how do you prepare for a large area? i got to put it to you, you can't prepare for that, can you? >> at this point you have evacuated or you haven't and even prepared or not. if wherever you are you need to hunker down. if someone wants to evacuate at this point i would contact their local emergency manager or officials and find if they can evacuate or should they stay

where they are or go to a local shelter. preparing for the flooding is actually difficult. the hurricane is down to a category two which is good but we will still have a huge title search and still going to have the rain and flooding. this is a significant event even though were down to a category two or category one storm. stuart: give a problem with public expectations? a lot of people think we got to get back to normal immediately and if we don't, well, we've got a problem. government is inefficient. it's not realistic to assume that after a storm like this you can snap back to normal. >> it really is not. it takes a coordination between the local, state and federal government. we've learned with katrina federal government cannot do it all. everyone has to be prepared. when you have this just like you said, 400 miles across and the rain we will have from ten or 2e

will be a significant amount of flooding in this area and are not get back tomorrow. stuart: flooding is the danger here as opposed to high winds. >> yeah, we will have high winds over the coast still over 100 miles an hour and that is significant. i think in the long term it will be a flooding issue. we saw in houston but that was flat and then in the carolinas we had a lot of hills and valleys and that will mean it will be much deeper water and more flooding. stuart: i got 30 seconds. tell me, do you think that we are as well-prepared as we possibly could be from what you've seen so far? >> i do. i actually do. governor stepped up early and state emergency manager stepped up early and called for an evacuation. we do not see that in katrina or in other areas. they made the call to decorate

the area and they done it. good emergency managers in place. people most for the part listened and evacuated and out of harms way. we saw the nursing homes being evacuated and those are all positive steps. i think we've done as a country as much as he possibly can do to get ready for the storm. stuart: david, thank you for joining us. i'm sure we'll see a lot of you over the next few days. by the way, president trump tweeting about "the wall street journal". here it is. perhaps the president was watching the program who blinked in the china pro- talk. we are staying on florence. staying all over it. anheuser-busch will fill their cans from one brewery with water, not beer. they will send 300,000 cans of

water to the hurricanes zone. check out that big board again. up 170, now up 150. we will take a bit more party after this. to rent a movie?

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stuart: this new apple watch is intriguing. it will track your heart health and it sends an alert if you fall down. without making too much of a joke here, that's perfect for a guy like me. i am prone to falling. the enemy is doctor mark siegel. >> it tells of your breathing properly and if you fall down or

resting. it will call 911? you got to be careful. i love this feature but i think it could have an overuse possibility. stuart: what does the fda, doctor gottlieb they? >> he said it's a watershed moment because it's a very first time fda has every approved a price based on software alone. they did not rip apart the apple watch hardware. it's only the apps they looked up at the beginning of a trend. huge for health innovation. stuart: tell me about the heart monitoring. he said something that gives you an ekg the next usually in the office we do. >> that is vectors looking at every part of the heart and it will tell you if you have an arrhythmia or irregular heartbeat up to six men people in the '90s habit. i could take a patient and have them recorded and push a button and it comes to me. i could get parties ekg in the middle of the night. stuart: if i were to get a watch and i am wearing it and i get a

little - if the watch tells me i've got an irregular heart rate it will pick it up and i press a button and if you are my doctor you get the results immediately, just like that. >> it will save lives. i predict. stuart: what about false positives? >> that is why doctor is in the equation rather than self diagnosis. i don't want apple watch wearers figuring out whether they have an irregular heartbeat or heart damage but it has to be gone over with a position that knows how to evaluate. stuart: watch out, doctor. i might buy one of these. >> i'm ready. [laughter] i don't think too much information has been. i love this. i like this but it's the future. this ties in with telemedicine and ties in with remote care and this will be a way - eventually will have her health at our fingertips. it's a huge step in the right direction especially when he says approval was based on software, not hardware. stuart: interesting development.

doctor siegel, thank you. top of the next hour we will talk to one of the foremost oysters on apple. he says apple is the most underappreciated stock in the world. at least, one of them. i want to know what he thought of yesterday's unveiling.

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takes more than just investment advice. from insurance to savings to retirement, it takes someone with experience and knowledge who can help me build a complete plan. brian, my certified financial planner™ professional, is committed to working in my best interest. i call it my "comfortable future plan," and it's all possible with a cfp® professional. find your certified financial planner™ professional at letsmakeaplan.org. ♪ ♪ yeah i'm the taxman stuart: absolute favorite. don't you love it? i'm the taxman.

liz: i could see you getting so angry about taxes driving up a pole. stuart: i get mad, not what i hear this song. a poignant song. dow is up 128 points. we're at 26,129. look at the big tech names, please, especially microsoft, which is now at $113 a share, up 1.25%. facebook is down though, 161. amazon's up, not much. apple at 225 with all those watches. microsoft at 113. there is lots and lots of positive economic news out recently all across the board. the economy is looking real good brian brenberg, professor of economics at kings college, is that correct? >> that's right. you know that. >> i remembered it correctly. good for my age.

okay, the economy really going strong. when will we see a strong pickup in wages because we haven't so far? >> two things you need to see. one you need job openings, you need people feeling confident they can get a better job. that means they're quitting the current job to get another one. that number be is at record high right now. stuart: so why aren't wages there? >> we saw 2.9%, stuart. that such better than we saw the two previous years. we're starting to see acceleration. you can't get it until people feel like they can get a better job. you're starting to see people go out in the market to negotiate, put themselves in the drivers seat. until they do that, nothing else matters. theythey have got to feel that . stuart: are you telling me any moment now, any month now we'll see wages really go up? >> i think you will see a steady incline in wages if we continue to see people feel good about the economy.

they have to take the initiative. they are willing to do that now. they weren't willing three years ago, stuart that is the big change. stuart: did you see the story about rahm emanuel? >> i saw the story. stuart: leaving office, created a tax force to look into universal basic income program. free money. >> that's right. free money. stuart: what do you think? >> i think it's a terrible idea for chicago. i said this before. stuart: you wait a minute, professor. you think it is a terrible idea for chicago. it is okay elsewhere? >> no, i didn't say elsewhere. we're talking about chicago. the fact that rahm emanuel doing this on the way out the door. funny he is doing it out the door. he knows he can't execute it in the real world. but to take credit for the idea when you leave. stuart: i can't figure out whether it is replacement for all other forms of wealth but -- >> that is how it is spoused to work but politically never works that way. nobody wants to take away old benefits. which means it is way too

expensive. by the way it doesn't fix fundamental problems in illinois, which is being at thats, regulation, legal environment unfredly to businesses. you can dump all the money you want on people but if you don't fix that. sorry. stuart: this is the united states of america. i always thought if you want money you work for isn't. >> that is the only sustainable way to do it. that makes people feel better about their lives. they are earning money they're given. liz: fill land's failed experiment was, tax rates finland found, income tax rates would have to go up a whatting 30%, or 33% to pay for it. so, you know, that is -- ashley: don't remind stuart. stuart: you missed it, brian. >> that is why rahm is not doing this while he is in office. doing it so somebody else has to raise the taxes. stuart: we had a brittish socialist on the show yesterday. >> why didn't you invite me to be in on it? stuart: thanks, brem berg.

you're all right. thank you. our next guest says, this really different from what our guy normally talks b he says turkey under president erdogan's regime is not a good place for the united states to have nuclear weapons. it is time for to us remove all of our nukes from turkey. van hipp is of that opinion. american defense international chairman and he joins us now. this is not your normal sort of talking point here or normal subject. turkey has nukes, our knews are in turkey? why do we have to get rid of them? >> well, i'm one that believes, stuart, where you put your nuclear weapons is serious business and u.s. nuclear weapons, prepositioned off of u.s. soil should only be in those countries who are stable and reliable and strong u.s. allies. that is not the case today in turkey. actually wrote about this in my book a few years ago. unfortunately the situation in turkey has gotten worse. erdogan this year has said, has

threatened to cut ties with the united states. he says now that they're not going to comply with iranian sanctions. by the way, they didn't do it before. go back to the failed coup attempt couple years ago where open source information says we have roughly 50 nuclear bombs there at inner lick airbase. he shut off power to the base. he would not let american fighter aircraft take off and leave this is not a reliable ally. it is not stable. they have a serious financial situation in turkey today too. stuart: if the rift is so wide between america and turkey, should we not just push turkey out of nato? because it is not a founding member, i don't know whether it's a founding member or not because it is a member. should we push them out? >> alliance worth trying to save. i think we have to go all out to try to save it. this is where i think president trump has been right, he tried to encourage nato to be stronger, to get into the 21st century. i'm a fan of the general, our

nato commander, in greece looking for more things we can do there. threats change, when threats change you have to deal with the threat. sure we want to turkey. i want to strengthen that reliance. we're not talking about tanks and other supplies. we're talking about nuclear weapons. these are b-61 nuclear bombs. this is open source. 700-pound nuclear weapon, 10 times more powerful than the atomic bomb that destroyed hiroshima. this is serious stuff. financially the currency in freefall down 25% in the last month. the central bank is expected to raise interest rates today. erdogan yesterday proclaimed himself as head of their turkey international wealth fund. not reliable. not stable. stuart: let's see if we move forward and get the nukes out. van hipp, original idea. appreciate it. back to florence.

expected to make landfall in the carolinas later today. that is live shot from atlantic beach. the storm is expected to bring a massive amount of rain directly affected. kristina partsinevelos is in myrtle beach, south carolina. myrtle beach is pretty big town. the looks like people are there. they have not evacuated. >> you're right, stuart. this is a convenience store gas station. they are staying open. they want to serve the community. nobody for miles is open. you have people waiting in line. water bottles completely wiped out on the side over there. you will look inside. a lot of people went out, spoke to them, when they were pulling out gas. they have been through this before. they have seen the hurricane. they're not too worried because they're well-prepared. they're boarding up their homes. they said if they survived hugo they could survive this we do know this is category 2.

it has been downgraded. that doesn't mean it will not be pad wind and torrential rain. the wind will pick up 2:00 p.m. eastern time. very shortly the rains continue from saturday throughout sunday. we'll see massive, massive flooding here. seems, look how packed it is in the gas station? only one available. i will throw it back to you. stuart: we will take it, kristina. hang in there, girl. thanks for joining us. we will see you later, promise. i have breaking news for you now, wilbur ross, secretary of commerce, toured noaa, the hurricane people. they predict hurricanes, basically. we asked about florence's impact on the economy. roll that tape. >> overall it will not move the national economy. we have an 18 trillion-dollar economy. 1% of 18 trillion would be a 180 billion. that is a pretty big number.

stuart: edward lawrence joins us. you also asked the secretary about the impact of on the economy in the carolinas. what did he say about that? reporter: varney, he wanted to get a first-hand look exactly what this hurricane is going to do to the economy in this area. he toured the noaa center for weather and climate prediction. that is where i am. they're real concerned once the storm comes onshore the amount of rainfall. they're looking 20 to 30 inches of rain, two to three feet of rain coming in from this storm. it will be disrupt transportation lines. in fact it already has disrupted some of the shipping lanes. listen to what the secretary had to say. >> so it will have some impact on export import. since we import more than we export, probably that will be a little bit of a help to the economy but it will slow down shipping. it will raise the cost of the transport because the vessel is on water more days. it will have a lot of implications. the biggest ones though will

probably be agriculture, number one. regular disruption of business. people can't conduct normal business. reporter: with agriculture talking about getting some food products made in that part of north carolina, south carolina, to the marketplace. as you saw, the roads are already clear of this area. it is causing disruption in the supply chain. again his major concern, loss of life, and secondary is effects on the market, loss of damage and property. stuart: edward lawrence, see you soon. a leaked tape from google shows google executives venting after president trump's election win. its cofounder calling the election deeply disturbing but they promise it never affected their work. i will give my take on that, top of the hour. more "varney" in a moment. ♪

♪ ashley: in the last hour louisiana senator john kennedy joined us to discuss google and

internet security. roll tape. >> i do think we're going to have to come up with some sort of independent third party like ican, the non-profit group we use to assign domain names. it is not a perfect example but it's, it is a third party group that everybody accepts and the response to what i'm saying of course, will be, well, it is a private sector company. well, that's true but number one, their power, they're not the average private sector company. google is not a company. it is a country. ♪ do these moves look familiar? then you might have a condition called dry mouth. biotène is clinically proven to soothe and moisturize a dry mouth. plus, it freshens breath. biotène. immediate and long lasting dry mouth symptom relief.

stuart: let's see if the price of gold is hanging around $1200 an ounce. it is 1209. let's get to the politics, the midterms. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell says some senate races will be like a knife fight when it comes to control of the senate. joining us now is gop senate candidate from the great state of wisconsin. lea. welcome to the program. >> thanks for having me on. stuart: question from the get-go, why are the races so close? why do democrats look sew good when the trump growth agenda produced a peopling economy?

>> the stakes are obviously very high, clear in wisconsin we have a race in a state that has been a purple state and tammy baldwin, who i am running against has been in office since the clinton years. the voters in wisconsin will have a choice between the failed practices and policies of the obama administration and booming economy we're seeing right now with the trump administration. stuart: are you running on trump and the economy and the trump's gop? >> trump, the economy, what we've done in wisconsin. we have created an economic miracle in our state. i got into office in 2011 in the state senate. when we turned things around. we had a state with 9.3% unemployment rate. we're at 2.3%. we had $6.3 billion budget deficit. we have surpluses giving back to people in the state. stuart: that is pretty good, i give you that. >> that is what we're running on. we need somebody with strong leadership to take common sense to washington, be reinforcement in the u.s. senate. stuart: manufacturing, wisconsin is a manufacturing state, very

strongly so. >> and a farming state. stuart: and a forming state. trait and tariffs on manufactured products and farm products that is a big negative. is that something acting against you in your race? >> i've been traveling around the state. i've been talking to farmers. i've been talking to people in manufacturing. it is interesting. the farmers said to me by and large, i told the president this when he called after the election we're getting a raw deal as it is. we think if the president can get as you fairer deal, access to more markets. we will if i give him time. they are prepared to give him leeway. stuart: we like the economy, like the boom, not real happy with tariffs but let you have a shot at it? >> exactly. look at disparity with the dairy products in canada, 275, to 290% tariff. it is ridiculous. how can that be a fair deal? if the president can negotiate fair deals they're willing to give him that benefit of the doubt. >> what brings you to new york? are you fund-raising by any

chance? there is a lot of wealthy people in manhattan? >> i came to see you, stuart. stuart: i don't believe it. did you come to raise money? did you? >> as somebody who is running for office your two jobs are always to reach people as many as you can and obviously you need to raise resources in order to get your positive mess on out and we have a positive message in wisconsin. i'm proud to be a mom with a cause, a nurse, a military mom, who never thought i would get into politics. daughter of greek immigrants, standing here with you on this show as somebody a u.s. gop nominee for the senate. it is pretty exciting. only in the great country of america. stuart: i'm an i immigrant from foreign country. you're the daughter of greek immigrants. it's a wonderful country. >> it is. we need to make sure we have strong leadership to continue those wonderful principles those founding fathers envisioned four our country. leah vukmir.

we appreciate it. stuart: we reached it to her opponent, democrat senator tammy baldwin. we have not heard back from her at this point. here is what is coming up for you before florence hit, companies like budweiser, anheuser-busch, lending a hand to the eventual recovery effort. what they're exactly helping to prepare next. check the big board. we're up 90 points. the gain has been cut in half, but we're still up 26,089. more "varney" coming up. ♪

stuart: now we're up 84, 85 points. just above 26,000. millions bracing in the carolinas for hurricane florence. anheuser-busch, teamed up with the red cross to help out for relief efforts after the storm. bill bradley, anheuser-busch's public affairs president. take me through the story, bill. what are you doing? >> good morning, stuart. thanks for having me on. first i like to say on behalf of my company and 18,000 colleagues

in the united states, that our thoughts and prayers with all the people affected and displaced by this coming storm. as you mentioned we are working with the red cross to mobilize clean drinking water into the affected area. we've already sent in six truckloads to stage in the area, in the north carolina, south carolina, and virginia areas. and we stand at the ready to send in more, if and when needed. stuart: bill, did you convert a brewery from making beer to canning water? is that what you did, right? >> so kind of, stuart. for the last 30 years we've had this emergency drinking water program. we have operated it out of our cartersville, georgia brewery, just outside of atlanta. so a couple of times a year we pause production of beer to can clean drinking water so that we have it in inventory and ready for situations such as hurricane

florence. stuart: have you already -- what do you say, six truckloads of water already on their way? >> that is correct. that is a little more than 300,000 cans of clean drinking water already staged in those states and ready to go. stuart: more to come? >> more to come, yes. we work with the red cross as you mentioned. they have of course will determine where the best locations for their disaster relief operations are. our local distributors in those areas who, in those areas who are currently sitting on the water will work with their local red cross operations to get the water to the people as quickly and efficiently as possible. stuart: have you ever thought about handing out some free beer? >> [laughter]. we typically save the beer for after the relief efforts are kind of done, stuart but we're always up for an ice cold budweiser, certainly. stuart: we're getting thirsty

here in manhattan. we are not affected much by the hurricane. we'll take a truckload, bill, we'll take a truckload. >> we'll see what we can do. stuart: you are doing a great thing. we appreciate it so does everybody else. bill bradley from budweiser. thanks for joining us, bill. look at that, google executives, they are venting about president trump's win in a leaked videotape. they say there is no bias against conservatives at google, certainly not, my take at the top of the hour coming up. ♪ at fidelity, our online u.s. equity trades are just $4.95. so no matter what you trade, or where you trade, you'll only pay $4.95. fidelity. open an account today.

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stuart: a few days after the presidential election executives at google held a company meeting. top officials at one of the

richest most powerful companies in the world did not hold back. they did not like donald trump. were angry an appalled at his win. we know because a tape of the meeting has been anonymously released. right from the get go the venom comes oozing out. sergey brin, google's cofounder said as a immigrant and refugee i find this election deeply offensive. i know many of you do too. that set the tone for the whole meeting. google provided a statement to fox saying executives were expressing their personal views. it goes on, nothing was said at the meeting to suggest that any political bias ever implements the way we field or operate our products. so the guys who write the algorithms never bring their biases with them. hmmm. it is the peter strzok argument, isn't it? yes i feel that way but i didn't act that way. my personal beliefs are always

separate from my professional decisions. not buying it. my point here is not bias one way or another. it is power. these guys know everything about every single one of us and they feed news and information. the news and information they want us to see. that is an extraordinary degree of influence over all of us. it is sinister. it is like big brother. i don't know how to regulate the problem away. but i do know we should do something about a couple multibillionaires who detest the president and have a chokehold what we the people are allowed to see and here. it is just not right. the third hour of "varney & company" is about to begin. ♪ stuart: you heard my editorial. reaction from the two men on the

screen. oz sultan, worked on the cybersecurity for the trump campaign and judge napolitano. what does the judge say about regulating these companies. apple unveiled the most expensive iphone ever. apple heart watch features a heart rate monitor because of that, it won fda clearance. first time that happened. brian white with us, global head of internet software. head of research. >> good morning,. stuart: you are the hotshot apple analyst, are you. >> we've been very bullish. stuart: agree on that. >> i agree with that. stuart: you bullish on apple. >> we were at the event yesterday and a lot of issues you were discussing plays right into the wheelhouse of apple. data privacy. they have always taken a very hard-line stance on this in the past. and you know, that is what we said, apple in this tech world, with all these issues that have

come up really become the robert jordan of the tech industry for sure in my view. stuart: products they released yesterday. i'm intrigued at the watch. it has fda approval, i know all about that. has the heart monitor, heart rather monitor, tell something warn you, if you fall down and can't get up. that seems to be tailor-made for, aging baby boomers like myself? is that what it is geared to? >> this watch, i think touches a lot different age groups. for sure, a lot of health issues are for younger people but some. people you talked about, i follow, if you kick it up in a minute, also a lot of heart-related monitoring. if you give approval, this data will not to anywhere unless you get approval. if you get approval, the doctor will look into that date takes where is the stock going?

currently 228 to 227, 225. where is it going? >> we have a price target of $275. that is the highest on wall street. and the way that we've looked at apple, we compared it to some of the sugar water companies, companies that make coca-cola, things like that, and you know those companies have grown about 1% a year over the past five years. apple has grown in the teens. those companies trade at pe 20 times. apple ex-cash is about 14 times right now. warren buffett's investment in apple kind of speaks, he always had proclivity for the consumer-based names and now he has invested in apple and i can see, he sees the moat apple can create around its products. stuart: they will milk what they call its ecosystem. >> exactly. stuart: we're bound into apple, in all kinds of ways. you can't easily escape it. you pay them a little bit of money for a long time to come. >> just like you buy soda, you

buy cereal. stuart: that's it. >> years ago i understand apple was new to the smartphone market and people were not sure how well they would do. it's a given. they will be around a long time in the industry. the nice thing they have only 15% market share. stuart: that's it? >> that's it. other industries dominate, companies have 85%. you have a long runway of growth. stuart: i'm inclined to ask you why don't they buy tesla? do you have an answer? >> i think they're definitely interested in the auto market. there is a lot of volatility but -- stuart: don't want to be a manufacturing car company. i got it. sir, a pleasure having you on the show, i hope you can come back soon. >> thank you. stuart: good luck. thanks now to your money. check that big board. we've come back, we were up 180 points at one page. we'll up and we'll take it. barry banister, head of institution equity strategy at still is with us.

barry, you say we're headed for a selloff. i read your stuff. when do you think this is going to happen? >> yeah, stuart the reason we peeled off 100 points in the dow last hour because of president trump's tweet on trade. i don't think we're in a hurry to make a deal with china. so the things we're watching, are the fed trade, dollar, china, oil, pre much in that order. there is a lot going on the trade front. i think we'll be roiled by that some more. there are other issues particularly the fed, as we go into the latter part of the year. stuart: what about this selloff. when does it come? >> when you think about the fed, they face a dilemma. they can either raise rates to for stall inflation or late cycle or remain overly easy and drive speculative financial bubbles they have no visibility into. so the fed is in a touch position. they will keep tiptoeing to the edge. that means they will gradually raise interest rates until

something breaks. we're looking for pe compression as rates go up into positive real levels. that is to say when the rate of interest exceeds the inflation rate for the first time 10 years next month that will be an event that caused us some pe multiple compression for the s&p. stuart: pe multiple compression. i don't have a clue what that is. i take it that is when the selloff starts, is it? >> price to earnings ratio is the valuation for the market and if the market goes down to real interest rates or interest rates after inflation going up then you get some pressure on the stock price even though the earnings are pretty good. stuart: however, on the other side of the coin you say president trump's trade policies make a lot of sense. go ahead. make your case. >> well, the sheer scale of china's efforts to subsidize and create national champions and forced technology transfer and distort markets is unprecedented in terms of the a threat to the

global trading system. i think the u.s. has less tolerance for continuing to be the deficit that eats the surpluses of the rest of the world. there is no real choice but to attack trade to instill better long-term growth for the u.s. and i think the dynamics of trade are widely misunderstood, i could say a few more words if you're interested. stuart: i am interested, you know what television is like, it goes real fast and i'm afraid we're done. barry, thanks for joining us. next time i want to know when the sell-off starts. i want a date certain. thanks, we'll see you again soon. now this, a u.s. bank, u.s. bank, that is the name of it, u.s. bank will offer instant pay day loans to its customers. the first significant bank to do that. checking account holders will be able to quickly borrow $100 to $1000 through the simple loan offering, borrowers have three months to rebay the loan at

interest rate of 71 cents. $12 for every other $1,000 borrowed. liz: cheaper than the other pay day loans. stuart: look at tesla. another executive leaving, vice president of worldwide finance. despite all these exits, tesla worth $287 a share. worth more than gm and ford. look at kroger. profits beat estimates, sales came up short, didn't meet analysts expectations, down 9%. florence now a cat-2 storm. it is still huge. will drop a ton of rain on carolinas, live shot, myrtle beach, south carolina. get latest on the storm's track from janice dean. we'll talk to south carolina congressman to find out if the state is prepared for what is coming. president trump signed an

executive order to go after countries or people who meddle in u.s. elections. we'll talk to the man that worked in cyber security for the trump campaign. the order allows for punitive responses. i want toe no what that means. we'll talk later this hour, the ceo of the nfib, the largest small business organization in the country. i want to know why now is a good time to start the company. this is the third hour of "varney & company." and you're watching it. ♪ rising demand for lithium used in batteries is exceeding

supply. current lithium brine extraction methods use solar evaporation ponds that take over a year to process. mgx minerals has developed a technology to rapidly extract lithium in just 1 day, using efficient clean technology. mgx minerals: the renewable energy company. symbol mgxmf stuart: you have to be looking there. that is myrtle beach, atlantic beach as florence approaches. winds at 110 miles an hour.

look at this, it is 500 miles wide. janice dean with the latest for us. janice, please. >> absolutely. this will be a water event, not a wind event although we'll feel prolonged effects from the winds it will be the inland flooding and storm surge that will cause the potential dangerous catastrophic event that is unfolding right now. category 2, over the warm waters of the gulf stream. the storm has a little bit of a chance to strengthen a bit. also the threat for tornadoes. tornado watch until 9:00 p.m. local time. we already have a tornado warmed storm. these are weak, weak tornadoes, but could cause structural damage because of landfalling hurricanes and counterclockwise winds and winds at different levels going into different directions. that is why we have threat of tornadoes. category 2. we think it will remain or keep its strength the next 12 or 24

hours. eventually it will make landfall. the fact it goes 150 miles in 24, 48 miles, that is the problem. it will sit and spin, like hurricane harvey last year, for southeast texas, the houston area, it wasn't because of the winds. because the storm stalled and brought epic amounts of moisture and rainfall. that is what will happen with this storm system as we could see somewhere along the lines of 20 to 40 inches of rain. on top of that a storm surge of 12 feet, 13 feet. wind gusts already feeling, 40, 50, 60 mile-an-hour winds. there is the center of the storm. the winds are going to be quite long-lasting in terms of tropical storm force winds. it will move well inland. this is friday and saturday, still seeing tropical storm force, hurricane gusts into saturday. this will be a long duration event t will not be a storm that moves inland and gets caught up

in a cold front and moves northward and weakens, it will be with us through the weekend. that is the concern, that is the legacy of florence will be the extreme rainfall moving as far inland as raleigh and the storm surge, nine to 13-foot storm surge will put places completely underwater and that is the concern and that's why people have been told to evacuate, stuart, this remains the story. even though it's a cat-4 yesterday, it's a two today, story is exactly the same. the rainfall and the storm surge will be what is potentially life-threatening and catastrophic. stuart: extraordinary stuff. thanks. >> you got it. stuart: still on the hurricane, south carolina congressman ralph norman. sir you will be judged politically how you handle the storm. the slightest mistake by any authority then you have a political problem. are you ready for this? >> yeah. unfortunately it is

unpredictable, the fact what we're going to be facing here in south carolina and north carolina is something that, you know we experienced during 1989 during hurricane hugo but, stuart, when you combine the wind and the water, we had dams break three years ago outside of columbia. very few people have flood insurance t will be a damaging storm. the only thing we can do is get the message out and i hope people don't take the fact it is downgraded to a category 2, 10010 mile-an-hour wind is amazing. stuart: congressman, i can't imagine being in a place with 20 inches of rain spread over one or two-day period. i can't imagine what that does to any area but it will be a large area, that may well be affected like that. congressman i want to bring to your attention an op-ed in the

"washington post" which says president trump is complicit in the hurricane because of his views on climate change. essentially "the washington post" is blaming trump for the hurricane. your reaction, please? >> what, how sad is it to politicize a tragedy that we're getting ready to go through. you know what is new with "the washington post"? what is new with the other networks other than fox is sad. we've got a job to do to protect our citizens, to make sure this does the least damage and whatever damage is done, to have the people in place to deal with it. because life and safety are utmost concern and to politicize it at this point, shows you how far left so many of the media are. so i denounce that. and it's sad that that they are resorting to this. stuart: it is madness. we're glad you denounced it. congressman, we glad you joining

us. we wish godspeed to all the citizens of south carolina. thank you, sir. >> thank you. stuart: various markets, this is the time when we check them all. bitcoin this morning valued at $6474. the price of gold still around 1200 bucks an ounce, 1209 to be precise. the price of oil backed away from the 70-dollar a barrel level. it is at 68.87. it is down a buck a. the national average for gas still right there at $2.84 per gallon. check this one out. bmw unveiling a autonomous motorcycle, got it? it can ride around a racetrack by itself, park itself even. bmw says this bike woken ever go on sale. they that some of the technology used on other motorcycles. kind of experimental. ashley: that's what we can do. stuart: learn after this. unveiling the new ad campaign with colin kaepernick, nike is getting political again.

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stuart: jeff bezos, amazon spy, announcing a 2 billion-dollar charity fund that will help homeless families and start preschools in loy income communities. the he announced it moments ago on twitter. $2 billion. nike making another political statement after making colin kaepernick the latest face of their campaign. the company is taking a stand on oregon's sanctuary state law. hold on, emac, they want to keep oregon a sanctuary state, right. >> there is a push to repeal that ceo of nike, mark parker, put out a statement, ending, oregon's sanctuary law, will end oregon's longstanding track record of a place that attracts diverse talent. political leaders and officials are saying this is not about legal immigrants. they keep muddying the waters about legal immigrants. this is about protecting local

residents and taxpayers from oregon from illegal immigrants, some of whom commit crimes. ashley: always have to make that point. always missing it. immigrants built this country. yes they did, they came here legally. we knee where they were going. stuart: the argument is with illegal immigrants. that's it. president trump is going after countries people that meddle in our elections. he signed an executive order. we'll talk to a guy that worked cybersecurity for the trump campaign. i want to know what happens if we find out russia is meddling again? what are we going to actually do? i say we have to do something about a couple of powerful billionaires that hate the president and have a chokehold what we see and hear. does that mean regulation? i don't know. i want to know what judge napolitano would do about it, if anything. ♪ making my dreams a reality

takes more than just investment advice. from insurance to savings to retirement, it takes someone with experience and knowledge who can help me build a complete plan. brian, my certified financial planner™ professional, is committed to working in my best interest. i call it my "comfortable future plan," and it's all possible with a cfp® professional. find your certified financial planner™ professional at letsmakeaplan.org. stuart: there's been an up day all day long but we're not up as much now as we were up earlier, up 180 earlier. up 81 right now.

trump has signed the new executive order punishing election meddling. our next guest says the executive order sets a platform for an immediate punitive response. those are the words used here. what exactly is meant by that expression, punitive measures? i'm asking you, if we figure out that the russians have had a go at us again, what do we now do? what's our punitive response? >> well, i think the general precedent that's set here is one of the opportunity for us to go after the russians where it counts. if you think about this in terms of food sanctions or oil sanctions or other things that could be brought to bear that would have an immediate impact on the russian populace, that's one. second, it shows the strength

and intensity of president trump's focus on not just fixing this issue now but for all time. stuart: tell me what we would do. we get the news somehow or other, the russians are trying to affect our election. they are meddling. we know it, we found it. you say we go after their websites. what does that mean? what do we do? shut them down, fry them, roast the building or something? what do we do? >> well, the d.i.a. and cia have both come out to speak to this. what the russians are largely trying to do, it's not necessarily just meddling. they are trying to spread havoc and discord. they are trying to do this in the american voter base which is completely unacceptable. i think it comes down to three things. one is the president could immediately issue orders to the military to go after some of these sites, to potentially also intercede on an international basis. two, we have the opportunity to

pressure them very, very heavily from the perspective of either trade sanctions and/or the restriction of the sale of products to them. three, this allows us to start looking at things from a larger macro lens. that larger macro lens is, if they're going to start meddling here, perhaps we shouldn't have so much levity with them in areas of warfare across the globe, specifically syria as well as some of the other areas that they are threatening our allies, looking at ukraine. stuart: i'm sorry to go back to this, oz, but i don't understand what it means when you say go after a website. explain it. look, i'm not a computer kind of guy so tell me, what happens to my computer if i'm messing with america's elections? >> well, you look at it this way. most of this manipulation has happened on either twitter or it's happened on certain facebook pages, it's happened on reddit and is happening on a variety of other social media sites so the opportunity here from the executive order

perspective is one to start working with these large internet companies in a manner and fashion that really starts benefiting the american populace. if we are now looking at a perspective of things like twitter censoring conservative speech, we should much rather have them censoring russian speech or speech that's intended to influence american voters in a very negative way. stuart: i don't know whether you saw that google video from just a couple days after the election, where the google executives were really saying we really hate this new president, we don't approve of this, then they say we don't allow our personal opinions to affect our work. in other words, we don't censor conservative opinion. you buying that? >> i don't buy that at all. president trump hasn't gotten any news coverage, if you look at google amp, their new page model for how they represent content online, how much coverage have you actually seen of this executive order, and the

opportunity now for president trump to really take the leadership perspective that we need on a national and international basis to start stamping out this type of election tampering. it's absolutely ludicrous to me that you have organizations of this scale, okay, that in europe have been fined over $2 billion for tampering with results, yet they can't necessarily say they are going to keep their politics out of things when it comes to statements coming from our president. stuart: very interesting. oz sultan, thanks for your perspective. we appreciate it. see you again soon. i want to bring in judge napolitano now. you don't like the way -- you don't like regulation because this is private enterprise but look, the amount of power that just a handful of people have amassed, they know everything about a couple of billion people. they dictate what you see, what you read and don't tell me they need competition because you're

not going to get competition. >> you sound just like the progressives in the early part of the 20th century when they went after the railroads and everything that was so big that it was as if it were a government itself. an argument debunked by all free market economists because those railroads were competing with each other and drove the costs down. google effectively has no competition, because of the barrier to entry. does that justify the government tampering with the freedom of speech of the people that run google, because they were morose, morose the night donald trump was elected, as some people around here were morose the night that barack obama defeated john mccain? people are entitled to political opinions. stuart: they decide what we see and what we read and what we hear. >> wait, wait. stuart: they have enormous input on that. they say their personal radical opinions never intrude into what we are allowed to see.

>> we look things up through them and we are not required to go to that book. they are a pipeline from us to information. there are other pipelines that we can choose or we can double-check what they give us. they are a private entity that chooses to run their business as they want. you are free to reject them. stuart: there's no competition. >> therefore, the government should interfere with them? what does their stock say? stuart: they have got all my information. they didn't pay me for it. they've got it and they spread it around where they think they would like to spread it around. >> you gave it to them, sir. stuart: actually, i didn't, because i don't have a facebook account. >> you gave it to somebody that gave it to them. stuart: it's unfair. it's not fair. you don't have a couple people deciding what a billion people see and hear. you don't do that. >> maybe we need competition. stuart: where you going to get it? >> i don't know. get some of your rich friends.

you have a lot of wealth. we will start a new google. we will call it the varney. stuart: i don't have a solution here and i don't know whether regulation or what form of regulation would work, but i'm saying we've got a problem because never in history has this kind of power, the power over news and information, been so concentrated in a handful of radical billionaire hands. >> know what your problem is? the first amendment, which prevents the government from telling google how to use its freedom of speech. thanks be to god. thanks be to james madison. thanks be we beat george iii. stuart: he can't control himself. totally wrong again, judge, but we're out of time. listen to this. california's poverty rate is now and still the highest in the nation, according to federal estimates. the census bureau says the

number of californians in poverty fell to 19%, even though that's a slight improvement from last year. seven million people still struggle to get by in the state and it's still the highest proportion of poverty-stricken people in the nation in rich old california. hershey's buying b & g foods. the maker of health oriented snacks like pirate booty, i'm told that's -- never seen it. healthy? that's me. shares of apple supplies up a day after apple launched the new iphone series. they are on your screen. corning, skyworks, not sure how to pronounce that one. take a look at hurricane florence's path. it's a cat 2 storm getting close to the carolina coast. jeff flock will be with us. he's in north carolina and will show us how conditions are now beginning to worsen. check the big board. stocks up this morning 94 as we

speak. we will talk to the ceo of the nfib, the country's largest small business association. optimism in this group is up to an all-time high. i say the entrepreneurial spirit is back.

nicole: i'm nicole petallides with your fox business brief. walmart to the downside. nike gaining one-third of 1% because walmart will be selling nike products. they will be starting this in the new york city area but hope to make this offer nationwide. in the meantime, the ceo saying we are bringing the growth experience, the fashion experience that customers can check out in just one cart. walmart acquired jet in 2016 for $3.3 billion and hope that this new focus on same-day delivery and also working on delivery service in other cities as well. walmart and amazon, winners in the last year. do these moves look familiar? then you might have a condition called dry mouth. biotène is clinically proven

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stuart: florence closing in on the north carolina coast. jeff flock is at carolina beach. i understand you are beginning to see it and feel it. it's coming at you. there you go. reporter: oh, yeah. yeah. i think it's clear that we're looking a lot more in terms of wind than we had. we have not had any rain bands yet. i have been watching the radar. at this point, rain bands have just been missing us. this is a weird track on this storm. as we near i think pretty much

the center of carolina beach, i hope you can still hear me as the wind begins to blow, that's one of the biggest -- you can see off to the left, that's one of the biggest structures, that's off to the left, if you can see, that's the courtyard marriott over there. a lot of people are holed up in that. there are a number of people that are here. it surprises me, but there are. maybe i will leave you with this one as we stop for a moment. come back around the other way. always the clever signs are always interesting to me. back up a little, jason, would you? back up, would you? i missed my sign. he missed my sign. at the bar there it said sorry, florence, you are barred. which for those of us who may have been in a bar, we know what that means but i don't know if that's true. i don't think they have much power over it at this point. stuart: it's arriving. you are beginning to feel it. keep your spirits up, lad. you're doing all right. we'll see you next hour. reporter: see you tomorrow, i hope. stuart: you will.

all week long, we have been reporting on what is a booming economy. number one, you have small business optimism, record high. two, 876,000 applications for new businesses filed in the first three months of the year. number three, job openings, all-time high. 6.9 million of them. come in, juanita duggin. welcome to the show. >> thank you for having me. stuart: why is now obviously such a good time, with all these businesses starting up, why now? >> well, the nfib has been surveying our members for 45 years, every month, and our small business economic trend optimism index hit a record on tuesday. it smashed through the reagan record in 1983 and it is obviously one of the best times ever in the last half century to start a business. stuart: is this all about the president's tax cut program? >> well, there's no question that this 21-month runup in the

optimism index is a direct result of the tax cut that was passed in december and the deregulation agenda. that is very, very consequential for this optimism index. so policy, it's a policy-based optimism index. stuart: are you pushing hard for what we're calling tax cuts 2.0 because that would make tax cuts permanent. there would be help for small business getting together to offer 401(k)s and small businesses will be allowed to write off more stuff as they start up. i guess you must be pushing hard for that. >> we are. we are very enthusiastic about the prospect of the ways and means committee voting today on making those tax cuts permanent. permanent means a lot because it gives the small business owner certainty. the tax cuts that were passed are only available for ten years which creates a cliff, much like what happened with the inheritance tax several years ago. so certainty of the permanent

tax cuts is really going to help the optimism and it will help the average small business owner. stuart: hard to see how optimism could get much better for small business. if you are at a 45-year high, better than reagan's rating, how do you go up from here? >> well, i have been asking myself that every month. every month i see it, i think it can't get any higher, and we were within .1% of the all-time record in july and when it shot up another point in august, our chief economist was flabbergasted but it doesn't look like it's going to flag any time soon. it's up in the stratosphere. it's a miracle. stuart: i want to break down that number. all-time record high optimism, then you also have an all-time record high for hiring plans for small business and i think a 10 or 12-year high for capital spending by small business. is that accurate? >> that's accurate, yes. the things that were lifting the small business optimism index at the beginning of the trump

administration were all based on expectations. now we are seeing that those expectations have been translated into actual business activity that is growing the economy. it's definitely a big part of that 4% growth. small business is half the economy, half the gdp, half the payroll, so when small business is doing well, the rest of the economy is doing well. stuart: got it. juanita duggin, thank you for joining us. see you again. snap. here's something unusual. they got an upgrade this morning. wasn't much of an upgrade. the analyst said you don't have to sell it, you might now want to hold it. it's up three cents. please bear in mind the stock has fallen more than 25% in the last month. etsy, a website where you order craft style items, its c.o.o. stepping down. they're not going to replace her. for some reason the stock is up nearly 2%. if you are in south florida,

you can now get your starbucks delivered to you through the uber eats app. 100 starbucks stores in miami-dade county and broward county offer the service. the option to order only shows up if a store is close enough for delivery. who wants coffee delivered in america? >> i would. stuart: you would? an iconic american company, wd-40, celebrating its 65th anniversary. next, we talk to the ceo. i want to know his secret for his long-running successful company. oh, and the market is up. surprised me there. be careful. up 119 points. i need coffee. 26,117. we'll be right back.

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ythen you turn 40 ande everything goes. tell me about it. you know, it's made me think, i'm closer to my retirement days than i am my college days. hm. i'm thinking... will i have enough? should i change something? well, you're asking the right questions. i just want to know, am i gonna be okay? i know people who specialize in "am i going to be okay." i like that. you may need glasses though. yeah. schedule a complimentary goal planning session today with td ameritrade. stuart: the latest car maker to offer a subscription service called the lexus complete lease. the program covers just one model, the 2019ux crossover.

it debuts next year. this is a two-year lease, 20,000 mile limit, one set price per month that includes the lease payment, car insurance and maintenance. just buy your own gas. that's it. the all-american company, wd-40, that's the name of it, it makes household lubricants as we all know, celebrating its 65th anniversary. come on in, the ceo of wd-40. gary, when we invited you on the show, i thought you were just single product company but you're not. you have got lava soap, 2,000 flushes, three-in-one oil but you never advertise them. all you do is advertise wd-40. why? >> well, wd-40 is the cornerstone of our company. back in 1953, there was a problem with condensation and corrosion in the umbilical cord of the atlas space rocket. the chemists got together and

after 39 tries, got the formula right. wd- wd-40. what we want to do is take the blue and yellow can with the little red top to the world. although we are 65 years old, it's 65 years young. we are refiring. it's the most exciting time in the company's history. stuart: what's this about the all-american company celebrating its 65th anniversary with a guy who has what i think is an australian accent? is that right? >> that's true. i have been with the company 31 years. i started in australia, but we are a global company. we are in 176 countries around the world. you know what's really exciting, as you would know, the average age of a company on the s&p is 20 years. we are 65 years old, going strong. we just moved our secret formula yesterday to a new bank vault. stuart: all other companies which have a limited number of products, they generally belong to a much bigger corporate

overcompany, big conglomerate, but you don't. how did you stay kind of independent for so long? >> well, you know, i think our job is to create value for our shareholders through having an engaged work force, and if you had invested in wd-4020 years ago, you would have had a compounded annual growth rate of total shareholder return of 15% over 20 years, of 20% over the last ten years, and 27% over the last five years. so i think by our people doing great work and it's all about our people and our brand, we are satisfying our shareholders and they are allowing us to be independent and do the great work we do. stuart: it's an amazing story. we are very glad you came to us with it today. you haven't answered the question. are you australian or new zealand? >> no, australian. australian. stuart: again, i'm very sorry. don't mean to pry. i was born and raised in england. i'm now an american citizen. you were born and raised

australian. are you a citizen? >> i am. i'm a dual citizen. i'm an australian citizen and u.s. citizen. stuart: you're all right, mate. fine company. fine company. wd-40. gary, thanks for being on the show. we appreciate it. good stuff. >> you're welcome. thank you. stuart: see you soon. more "varney" after this. nah. not gonna happen.

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with in-home quote or visit kohlerwalkinbath.com for more info. stuart: i think left-hand side of your screen, that is atlantic beach in south carolina. >> north carolina. stuart: north carolina. i do apologize. we've been looking at that pier all morning, expecting it to suffer some damage. frankly we've been expecting it to tip over into the sea. it has not happened yet. i dare say if you tune into this program tomorrow morning what

you're looking at in north carolina will look, very, very different first thing tomorrow morning. should be right in the thick of it tomorrow. i hope you join us for our coverage. neil, it's yours. neil: stuart, thank you very, very much. we're keeping an eye on the hurricane. i want to update you on the market, the back and forth we're up and down again. driven by president of the united states, donald trump, first optimism he was one initiated, and his foreign policy team initiate talks with china. the chinese seemed to be interested, it wasn't them rushing into the table, it was the president. maybe more read into that more than deemed necessary, and the way it was interpreted in "wall street journal," no we were not under pressure to do any deal imminently or not. then the market fell back a little bit. the market clawing back close to session highs here on the belief that something could be going on behind the scenes here. there is nothing going