our retirement plan with voya gives us confidence. we can spend a bit now, knowing we're prepared for the future. surprise! we renovated the guest room, so you can live with us. i'm good at my condo well planned, well invested, well protected. voya. be confident to and through retirement. maria: its been a great show thanks for joining me the conversation continues here is "varney" & company and stuart right now. stu take it away. stuart: it was a great show good morning, maria and good morning, everyone it's one week since the killing of qassem soleimani. one week. that's it. things have not turned out as so many had expected. in particular, the widely- forecast stock market sell-off well it lasted one day, and then the buyers took over and the markets rallied to record after record after record war talk histeria has faded and america and iran appear to be standing down and moving away from direct military conflict. what a week, what a difference a week does make. here we go again, by the way. where trading begins this

morning get ready for more all-time highs. the dow is approaching quickly, the 29,000 level, it's up 100 points at the opening bell and another up 10 points for the s&p , looking at nasdac up another 51 points and right about the 9,000 level. clearly, the bull run is still going. as for the price of oil, well that's settled down, way back down i should say, 5,942 is the current quote. what a week. we've got a significant new development in the boeing crash in tehran, a video shows the plane on fire in the air, and breaking into pieces as it came down. i'm going to use the word " suspicious." the iranians initially suggested mechanical failure or engine trouble brought it down but that's hard to square with a shattered plane descending in flames. we're on it. as usual, there's a lot to go up so let's get on with it. "varney" & company is about to

begin. president trump: as long as i'm president of the united states, iran will never be allowed to have a nuclear weapon. the missiles fired last night at us and our allies were paid for with the funds made available by the last administration, iran appears to be standing down. finally, to the people and leaders of iran, we want you to have a future and a great future , one that you deserve. the united states is ready to embrace peace, with all who seek it. stuart: president trump right there you saw it on this program addressing the nation. stocks rallied after the speech and they're up again today. time we brought in market watch er dennis gartman. first of all, dennis, the usual question where are we going from here? are you sitting back and being

absolutely astonished by this because i certainly am. >> i am absolutely. the last 54 hours have been stunning to say the very least. i trade only from my own account and i have my money at risk every day and when the news hit last week i started to get short of equities and i had no choice i was buying derivatives on the short side to cover long positions that i had and when the news came out the other night of the missile firing i actually got more left short and had no choice and when i found out that the missiles had basically been directed i had to give the iranians credit either their missiles are very precise or they missed by a mile but they hit nothing and we knew there was no human life lost. i had to start covering and when the president made his decision i had to cover and get out. no question, i should say i've covered almost all of my short positions and got long. you've had no choice but to be able to do that or to have to do that in a 54 hour period is extraordinary. these are stunning times to say the very least. stuart: the strategy of buying any dip was a terrific strategy,

probably for the last three years. >> it has been the only strategy, i wish that i had followed it. it has been a bull market. i've been marginally long on that period of time, and i've had a nice increase in my net worth in my equities positions but do i wish that i had every dip? absolutely i don't have the courage to do that. god bless the people who do, they've done very well, thank you very much. stuart: i don't want to throw any cold water over this but i think we can all expect after 10 or 11 years of a bull run, we can expect a pullback relatively soon, can't we? if you play the law of the averages surely we can expect the pullback soon. >> after seven years we should have expected a pullback. after eight years we should have expected a pullback. after nine and ten years we should have expected a pullback. we'll get a pullback when a pullback comes. there will be some and it'll probably be a geopolitical circumstance that is predicated upon, that will inevitably be

the inevitable bear market, prices will go down 25-30% when it happens but right now, it's still a bull market. it shocks every professional i know but the market has been moving from the lower left to the upper right and we're almost to the point of ill-logic and the market can remain ill- logical far more than you and i can remain solvent. stuart: [laughter] also true. dennis thanks for being with us all these years. thanks very much. >> thanks for having me on. stuart: sure thing. we get into the iran situation now bringing in former state department official christian wh iten. all right, christian you've been following this like everybody else has. could i say this? did president trump win? >> yeah, he did. he really pulled a rabbit out of a hat if you had a week ago or more charted out these set of possibilities it would have seemed frankly fairly remote that we would draw a hard line, a red line against iranian misconduct as we did with the killing of soleimani and there would be some sort of outcome where the iranians could appear

to react but not really not react at all and we would essentially win, but that's really what its come to. stuart: look we've got a stand down. will it last? what comes next? >> i think you will see this is a long, grey war with iran. it's much better than sort of a hot, red war but you're going to see conflict continue, iran is not reformed. i think they are probably stunned by this new resolve they are seeing from the united states and from the west, but this is still a revolutionary millennial regime that wants to export islamic tyrany, and isn't going to give it up. the president in leading yesterday's statement saying that he's not going to allow iranian nuclear weapon, that may actually require some military activity by us because iran of course was left with all of the capabilities to produce the nuclear weapon beating through the iran nuclear deal. stuart: just hold on for a second christian i'll get back to you in a moment. i want to deal with the plane crash, the boeing plane crash in

iran because there is a video, and it's very telling, ashley? ashley: yeah, it's a video that shows this plane as many witness , including a pilot in the area, say that this plane was on fire. i know you see it crashing into the distance there, but, the series of what could have happened very wildly are the iranians say that they are disputing suggestions that the airliner was brought down by a missile; however, the ukrainians are calling for a criminal investigation believing that the missile could indeed have been one of the main culprits in this they believe it's among the main theories or possibly a tor missile system was involved and of course there could be other things too as i say maybe this plane hit another flying object, a drone, it could have been terrorism with a bomb on board or as the iranians said more, one of the engines caught fire and that the plane was trying to turn around and come back this happened just minutes after it took off. got to about 8,000 feet and then

boom, everything just went dead but there was no data from that point on but they have gotten the black boxes, but they are damaged and some data, the memory in it has been lost in some cases, how much they get from that, i'm not sure, but you have the iranians saying we want a criminal investigation there's something very obviously not right here, but the iranians themselves saying whoa hang on. stuart: let's get back to christian. you've watched the video, you've heard what we've been saying. what's your take on this? >> i think there's a high probability it was shot down actually. iran hasn't actually had to defend its air space from foreign intervention since the iran/iraq war. stuart: hold on a second, christian. you're suggesting that it could have been taken down by a missile. what's the implications for iran if that is the case? >> well, it's in competence on the part of the military. i think they may have expected an immediate american response when they hit our base in iraq.

and they mistook this plane, trigger-happy people on the ground, possibly mistook this plane for an american bomber, who knows, and they just don't have a lot of, it's the military that depends a lot on proxy forces and offensive missiles that can strike targets such as the ones they used in the attack on our bases. it's not actually a great military and i think there's a high probability there is something that went wrong. stuart: we'll leave it right there. christian whiten, thanks very much indeed. the theme on this program has always been the retail ice age. well look at this, bed, bath and beyond, they lost money, they declined to give a financial forecast for the rest of the year, kind of ominous. the stock is down 12% as of right now. that's pre-market. we should be playing the organ music, maybe. how about tesla? it's at $495 a share that's the pre-market price today, it is the most valuable u.s. auto

company in history. how about that? overall, yup the bull run continues here is how we open up 100 again for the dow industrial s, up 10 for the s&p, 50 for the nasdac. yeah that a bull run again. speaker pelosi on impeachment, but she couldn't hide her true feelings. watch this. >> any time soon? >> i don't have any more time to say that. i don't know how many times you want to ask it. stuart: tired of the question, by the looks of it and still holding on to the articles of impeachment. we're going to get into this in our 10:00 hour, this morning. look at capitol hill. lawmakers were briefed by the administration on the attacks from iran, next, congressman kevin brady was in the intel de brief. is he convinced, was hi convinc ed that soleimani had to

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stuart: all right we keep showing you this, because we ought to the dow is up another 100 points at the opening bell, you know we'll get pretty close to the 29,000 level. how about that? kohl's, big retailer, down big. it lowered its guidance, when retailers do that these days, they get taken to the cleaners. that's happened to kohl's, down 8% right now, that's at $45 a share. we've got new advertising rules coming from facebook, not sure i understand them, but susan does, tell me. >> basically they're saying we're not going to sensor the ad s first of all so we're still going to run them but we'll give you more tools so they don't have to see them, so in some ways that is limiting the targeting of these ads to some users on facebook and also instagram. stuart: so if i don't want to see these ads, because i don't either believe or don't like them, they're going to give me the tools to say --

>> that's right. i don't need to see this, this doesn't need to be in my news feed or on my instagram role. we did hear from one of the facebook's top executives this weekend given that $3 billion will be spent on digital advertising in this 2020 campaign. they have given kudos to president trump and how he ran 2016. if we can bring up those quotes i thought it was very telling because this came from one of the top executives. this is one of the right hand men from mark zuckerberg, and he says, back in 2016, was facebook responsible for donald trump getting elected? i think the answer is yes but not for the reasons anyone think s and russia in particular says he got elected because he ran the single-best digital a d campaign i've ever seen from any advertiser, period. they knew that social media would change narratives and the votes. stuart: and it did. got it thanks susan. billionaire and multi- billionaire, mike bloomberg, a candidate for the presidency slamming president trump in a new op-ed.

now, i've not read it and i know ashley has. ashley: i have. basically, he says that i'm the real economic innovator. i'm the one that can bring you jobs and better-paying jobs at that and president trump has broken every promise he made before he, as he became president. let me just show you he wrote an op-ed for market watch and i want to show you the headline. trump is for people like me he's been great for people like me but i'd be great for you and he says in fairness we face serious economic problems before president trump took office and that's one of the reasons he won he promised to fix them instead he's made them worse. he says that the share of national income, going to workers rather than investors is near an all-time low, too much work in the hands of too few people, made a lot of promises, blah blah blah so you get the theme here. stuart: it's about income and equality. ashley: absolutely. stuart: a man of $52 billion is going on about income and equality. ashley: i became mayor of new york just after 9/11 and i rebuilt this city and i can do

that for america. stuart: and totally fails to give the trump economy nothing. ashley: nothing about the unemployment levels right now. stuart: none. we'll leave it there. >> [laughter] stuart: to call an english expression, "rubbish." to iran, lawmakers on the hill got an intel briefing from mike pompeo and the military brass yesterday common kevin brady was there, good to see you. >> good to see you how are you? stuart: were you convinced when you you listened to that intel briefing that we really did have to get rid of soleimani right there and then? >> soon to be clear, i had surgery over the holidays, was doing some medical rehab at the exact same time, but i've been in these briefings for four different administrations, and by their very nature, they don't reveal a lot of great information, because mainly, because frankly, house and senate members tend to leak, and so the value of them is not the new information, more of some of

the decision-making and factors of why they made that action more importantly, the next step forward, the members of congress that attended the house briefing felt like they got that type of information and sort of perspective but at the end of the day, look, those briefers are not the president. they're not going to set policies and they're not going to reveal information that can be frankly leaked publicly and i think that's just how these briefings are. stuart: i want to get your reaction to senator mike lee, who emerged from the intelligence briefing, and said this. roll tape. >> it was probably the worst briefing i've seen, at least on a military issue, in the nine years i've served in the united states senate. stuart: senator lee is something of a libertarian and doesn't like american troops elsewhere in the world? >> look i have a great deal of respect for senator lee but i think those are some of the elements in there. you don't go into those

briefings seeking a policy debate on resolutions, authorities and when the president should see congress' approval. those are questions both for congress and for the commander-in-chief. you know, i think at the end of the day, we all are more realistic about what we expect from those briefings and in the house, among our republican colleagues, they got the information perspective they were hoping for. stuart: before you leave us, congressman, i've got to throw this at you. headline in the wall street journal. high-tax states are losing people, money, and seats in congress. $16 billion worth of income going to low-tax states like florida. your thought, kevin? >> well, no, actually, those people have been moving for a long time, and my frustration is these are great states. i mean, they have dynamic economies. people love living there, but they are so brutally taxed at the state and local level and they just can't stay there and i

hope these states will reconsider the way they tax. stuart: i do understand, congressman and you're quite right. kevin brady. we'll see you soon, thanks. again, look at futures please we're going up again, right from the get go of the opening bell up 100 for the dow industrials you saw it live on "varney." former nissan chair, carlos ghos n holding a press conference for hours, this morning he's got even more to say. we'll tell you what he had to say in a moment.

stuart: the news this thursday morning is this. the bull run continues. see those green arrows? yes going up again right from the opening bell. next case. nissan former chair carlos ghosn spoke to maria this morning. what more did he say? >> well he talked about the mistreatment that he suffered at the hands of japanese authorities when he was put under house arrest in november 2018. take a listen. >> i showered twice a week with only 30 minutes exposure to the light, and only during the working days, because during the weekends, staff did not allow you to get out and to the light. the most important thing is interrogation can take place at any moment, it goes up to

eight hours. >> there he was unable to see his wife for nine months as well , limited access to prescription drugs but no reference in terms of how he made the great escape which has captivated the entire corporate world but video has emerged of carlos ghosn's private jets that landed to the airport in istanbul and taking off to lebanon where he eventually land ed. stuart: but that does confirm the escape? >> the international caper and this will certainly be a movie plot in the future. stuart: the international caper, [laughter] what a great word that is. tell you again, the bull market lives and thrives today. we're going up for the opening bell and we'll take you to wall street after this. ♪

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similar to what happened in december of 2018. there was a pullback, a decent one in 16 and certainly in 14 that were buying opportunities but what it shows you stuart by and large is this is a very strong market, it's a very strong underlying fundamental economy, and that's why the market wants to keep going up even when it does pullback. stuart: well it's going up right now. the bell just finished ringing and we're open for trading and we're up right from the start, we're up well over 100 points on the dow industrials and having the benefit of our radio listeners we've got quite a few, left-hand side of your screen, mostly green. at least three-quarters of the dow 30 are going up this morning , and the dow at this moment is up 118 points, that's a gain of .4%. what about the s&p? what's the percentage gain there , .47%, and a new all-time high for the s&p 500. the umteenth in a row virtually. now look at that the nasdac composite all-time high just

moved above 9,200, that is absolutely astonishing. scott, i heard that. is there anything on the horizon , anything at all on the horizon that would put an end to this? anything at all? >> you hear everything. i'll tell you, i mean there's a couple things. one is certainly geopolitic, forgive me but i don't trust iran further than we can throw them so there's going to be more issues there, north korea has been quiet for a few weeks now and they promised us something on christmas, that never arrived , so look, there is geo political things that will happen. the other quick thing about the market, stuart is you talked about as well with mr. gartman is the higher we get the higher the chances we do pullback here but one thing i love, 9,200-plus on the nasdac, can you imagine the day? i want to be on the show nasdac, 10,000. that could be amazing. stuart: eager to see it. ashley: i'll take control and hit the new record high intraday 28, 872 tipped above that, so you have a gang buster start. stuart: now at 2,888, that's a

new high. s&p new all-time high, nasdac, astonishing, 9,205. i can't wait for 10,000 but i'm not making that prediction. so now look at tesla. pre-market i believe it is up again, yes, it is, 494. here is something that's hard to believe. tesla is the most valuable u.s. auto company in history. if you've bet against tesla in the last six months scott you've lost your shirt. >> you have, and a lot of things have gone on with tesla. certainly it's the haters as the kids like to say where everybody was betting against tesla, and that certainly motivated elon musk. yes, he could use some dancing lessons, i think that's one thing that he's got to work on but other than that, look. the cards are very good. he's delivering on other things with regards to space, he's got the underground tunnels potentially opening up in las vegas, there is just a lot of buzz around the company and a lot of buzz around him that is chasing up the stock price.

stuart: i've got him completely wrong. susan? >> well we had charlie brady coming on, our tech guru. ashley: senior editor. he came up with some pretty good , all-around good guy, yes, but now ford made $144 billion in sales, gm made $138 billion in sales. tesla? $24 billion in sales, so that's 10% of gm and ford yet this company is worth more than those two combined. i would call elon musk a kind of a bill gates called steve jobs, just the reality distortion fields around him making you able to believe in his story and by the ways hi cars sell more per unit than gm and ford. stuart: but where is the growth going to be? i can see growth for tesla. i don't see that much growth for ford and general motors. their sales actually declined in the last year. ashley: ford is going full board electric anyway. stuart: your stock goes up and you get the buzz when you're expanding and taking a bigger chunk. >> but is your stock worth that much more, twice, three times

more than the sales that you make? stuart: the market says so. i'm not going to do that and say they're not right, but anyway, over at the discovery channel, they are saying few platforms will survive the streaming. in other words there's lots of streamers out there discovery so they are all going to survive. susan? i can see disney. i can see amazon, and i can see what's the other one? >> netflix. stuart: they're not going away. >> okay, well, there's been a long career in television the head of discovery, the ceo but by the way discovery is one of the best-said performing media p cans last year, and he says only two to three streaming platforms will survive. now, as for discovery itself, given that it's a smaller player , he says it would take a larger player to come into buy up their content, and it's interesting that you said that they have had talks with other streaming companies but they have a lot of reality tv content to sell so maybe there might be likely mergers in this company.

stuart: consolidation sounds very likely in that line of business. dow industrials now up 166 points, they've reached 28, 900 that's an all-time high. we've got the big tech on the left, apple, alphabet, microsoft , facebook, tesla all up. apple, look at that. $307 a share. do you think it's a bit pricey for a guy like you to get into right now, scott? >> well, we own it so i guess i'm not going to buy any more of it let's say here, but i will tell you. the stock is getting a little pricey, yes on a historical basis, earnings per share all these other little boring evaluation things that'll get me decayed on the show these things are all getting up to the higher levels but similar to what susan said about even tesla stock, it's about the future for these companies, guys, when the market is pricing them today, and apple is such a big part of our lives they have a lot of exciting things coming down the pike, 5g whenever it arrives and whenever

it does work sounds really cool so there's a lot of reasons to be excited about apple stock and why if it does have a pullback say below 300 and you've got cash you want more that's when i'd jump in. stuart: 307 as we speak. >> the segment this week is over apple's app store. they had a record day on new years day, $386 million spent in one single day on the app store by apple iphone users and according to a lot of estimates and analysis up there it looks like gross sales on the app store and this is a transition to services away from hardware with $50 billion, i mean, those numbers are staggering. stuart: absolutely they are. and so are these look at the market. i keep saying it but the bull run obviously continues. we're up 130 now, 28, 881. take a look at boeing. it is up today, maybe this is because the idea that mechanical trouble brought down that boeing plane in tehran. that's being shown the door here far more likely is the suspicious circumstances of the

plane, we got the video on fire in the air, breaking up as it came down. boeing, you know, is up on that news. ashley: but all three major markets right out of the gate have hit record highs just like that. the dow, the nasdac and the s&p. stuart: but just one week ago soleimani was killed. ashley: right. but this is on the news that we have the chinese signing that phase i trade deal on january 15 and that's confirmed. stuart: more to the point he was confirmed by china. >> that's right even despite the fact that we heard this in the white house. stuart: it's more good news and more put to the market up a bit more. bad news though on bed, bath and beyond. oh, they're playing the organ music. probably justified down 16%. yeah. ashley: [laughter] stuart: how about those 20% coupons that you get in the mail well i don't know if they are liberal or not but the stocks in bad shape. several j & j that would be

johnson & johnson, several upgrades to the stock gerri willis at the new york stock exchange give me more please, what's the news on paper powder? gerri: so a study out this week, a new study the biggest to date from the government saying that baby powder use may maybe it doesn't raise the risk of ovarian cancer so very important , critical study and we have no fewer than three brokerage firms raising price targets on j & j stock, cantor fitzgerald, wells fargo, jpmorgan the price targets 150- 155, even 168 so a lot of optimism and j & j on the basis of the study and by the way, as i said this was not an in-house j & j study. fellow government doing this study, saying talcom powder may not cause ovarian cancer back to you. stuart: fascinating gerri thank you very much indeed and we take a look at both general motors and ford. both companies promoting hundreds of temporary workers. what's that about? ashley: yeah, 930 at gm who have

been temporary workers for three years, now made full-time, they didn't understand what was happening, they were called to a meeting they thought was a regular union meeting and someone on the stage said guess what you guys you're all full- time and there was a massive celebration. ford has also done this 592 positions actually part of the collective bargaining agreement that the uaw struck with the auto people that after three years please try and give these people, they average 21 to $24 an hour. stuart: just look at the stocks they don't go anywhere. ashley: back in neutral. stuart: tesla is worth more than general motors or ford. you wonder why, well look at the stock. ford's been at $8 or $9 a share for as long as i can remember and general motors never really made it above $40 a share, no matter what they did they are hanging around in the mid 30s and there you have it. times up sorry about that scott. we'll bring you back soon, and that's a promise. market up, 154 as we speak, 28, 900.

who would have thought. are we starting to see speaker pelosi's caucus? watch this, please. >> i think we are reaching a point where the articles of impeachment should be sent and we could have both on whether witnesses will be called. stuart: and i'm sorry, senator blumenthal, he's not the only one, we'll discuss the growing democrat demand in the senate questioning speaker pelosi's endless impeachment delay. but yet brexit, because prince harry and meghan markle are making a mexit. that's what they're calling it. the royal couple quitting the royal family, didn't know you could do that. a story that everyone is talking about and we're diving into all of the dramatic gossipy details for you, but first, the retail ice age, bed, bath and beyond facing big losses, 2020 the year

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well we're up but not quite as much as we were a couple of minutes ago but we're still very close to 28, 900 the bull market lives this thursday morning. retailer ice age out with bed, bath and beyond, the stock is way down this morning, jackie deangelis with us live right now with a new ceo, right? but not working just right yet? >> good morning, to you, stuart that's exactly right. mark triton, the ceo of target came over to bed, bath and beyond in november, and he did an amazing job turning target around. the in-store experience, the online experience, that's what investors want to see him do, at bed, bath and beyond. so, yesterday the earnings report, it was a huge miss, under wall street expectations,

and the company actually pulled fiscal 2019 the guidance, the outlook that they gave, saying we're going to release a new strategic plan in early 2020, so everyone is waiting to see what they come up with. now, he has made some big change s already. he ousted six senior executives, he's recruiting new people, working with financial advisors to change the business model and he also sold 2.1 million square feet of real estate that brought cash back into the business and they're going to lease it back. it's better for them in terms of the business model. now, the company said that thanksgiving being a week later than expected, that was a problem. they also reported same-store sales that were lackluster down 8.3% when the street was expect ing 5%, but remember, it's all about pricing. amazon, target, walmart, that's the competition. now, i have one of the coupons that you mentioned before, these 20% off coupons. that's how they try to get people in the store, they're also offering price match

guarantees, you know he's working on it but we're going to have to see how this shakes out. this stock has really take in a beating, stuart. stuart: especially this morning jackie thanks very much indeed. turning now to our industry watcher, retailer industry watch er is with us today. look maybe i was a little premature in calling for the organ music on bed, bath and beyond but we haven't really given the new ceo a chance to succeed but do you think there's a shot that company goes out this year? >> look it's definitely a possibility. i'm not bullish on them, but we do want to give the new ceo a chance. citing things like thanksgiving and being very close to christmas is ridiculous in my opinion because everybody was in that situation, and it didn't harm the sales and it didn't stop u.s. consumers from spending a trillion dollars this holiday season, the bigger problem is that walmart and amazon and target sell the same merchandise and provide a better experience. stuart: okay, i think the number

is 9,000 retail stores went out in the year 2019. nine thousand. what about 2020, how many? >> i think upwards of 6,000 more stores could close across-the-board. we're seeing trouble at j jc penney had a rough day, kohl's had a rough day, macy's had a rough week but stu here is the thing. when blockbuster was dominant in the movie rental business, nobody could touch them and then along came netflix and within a couple of years blockbuster was out of business but guess what? americans watch more tv and movies than they ever have before. they are just doing it in another format, and so i also see thousands of stores that are going to open this year. stuart: but it seems like the retail business, brick-and-mortar has been hollow ed out. i don't know if it's as much as being restructured so when you see traditionally digital companies, opening stores, companies like casper, so we're

seeing that's where the action is. i also think that we are starting to see some interesting moves with some of the department store, i think macy's is really trying hard. i think malls and department stores as long as they can do three things. get investment in partnerships with the fang companies, so facebook, apple, netflix, google , get involved with the tech companies, amazon, to combine their powers online and off line, that's number one. number two, close stores and create smaller formats and number three, connect everything digitally. make it a digital experience in the store. if they do those three things, they have a chance to keep up in the coming years. stuart: i'm still astonished by the performance of amazon over the holidays, just astonishing execution of the delivery business. michael thanks for joining us see you soon. >> thank you. stuart: remember, the big airbag recall. it was about five years ago, tek ata, well they're now recall ing 10 million airbag inflaters. a bit late. >> it's a bit late but they

were used to replace the dangerous ones that killed 25 people, back in the 2015. stuart: so they are recalling the replacements. this is because of the ammonium nitrate that's present. tekata used it to create a small explosion to inflate the airbag but the chemical deteriorated over time especially when exposed to heat and humidity so the permanent replacements don't use ammonium nitrate but this impact cars made by audi, bmw, honda, fiat, ford, gm, mazda so be careful and take a look at those recall notes and of course , send in your car to get it replaced. it's very important. stuart: and they will probably find a problem with the brakes. ashley: [laughter] stuart: check the dow, overall the dow is up 120 points, and we've got about two-thirds of the dow in the green. got it. coming up, in our 11:00 hour, we've got quite a show for you, gene munster, dan henniger, and bret baier, don't miss it, keep

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that's news. dr. mark segal is here, and now we're talking here primarily about lung cancer and melanoma. >> correct. stuart: and is this because if the death rate is going down, let me look at lung cancer, the death rate going down is that because of better treatment? >> that's part of it. first of all we have less smoking 14% of americans, so over the many years since the 1990 we've seen a steady decline in the death rate of lung cancer which is our number one cancer killer by a lot. number one is the smoking going down. number two, earlier diagnosis with cat scans, number three, better treatments are surgery, better surgical techniques, better radiation and finally the most exciting, immune o therapy is now working against lung cancer and other cankers here is what happens. stuart: wait, wait are you talking about keytruda? >> it's a magnificent game- changing drug and that's made by merck, that's the number one i want to talk about where literally the cancer hides from the immune system but this drug

makes it light up your immune cells come in and it's a target ed immunotherapy that then allows patients to live longer. stuart: can i summit up like this. if you are diagnosed with lung cancer, your chances of getting over it or having effective treatment are really going up, you've got a much better chance of survival now than you did in the past? >> living longer. higher quality lives but i want to add and melanoma, immunotherapy, we're finding it earlier, diagnosing it and getting out and curing it if not giving you immunotherapy that knocks it down but i want to add that we have an obesity epidemic in the united states, and other cancers death rates are not declining at the same rate because we're eating too much so fat-driven cancers like colon cancer, pancreas cancer, breast cancer, prostate cancer are not really declining, because we have this obesity epidemic. fat drives inflammation which drives cancer and on the good news front, lung cancer.

stuart: okay i'll go on a diet, doc siegel, thank you very much. >> good to see you. stuart: appreciate it and a new op-ed from the transportation secretary who says self-driving cars can save lives. ashley: yeah, because the reducing the human error crashes will be significant, with electric vicks, including crashes involving those who may be impaired or distracted and in the end, she says these autonomous vehicles will indeed save lives. she's also promoting the fact that the feds need to take over some of the coordination and regulation because there are separate private industries into these out there doing their own testing using their own agreements with states such as california and arizona to test these things she wants to have all of this under an umbrella government agency so that everyone can be on the same page. stuart: oh, okay. ashley: save lives. stuart: thank you, ashley. cracks in the caucus.

democrats question speaker pelosi over her endless impeachment delays. they're coming out against her, against these delaying tactic, i'll call it that, we'll discuss it. it's the story everybody is talking about, i don't know why but they are, prince harry and meghan markle leaving the royal family calling it "megxit." that's coming up in the next hour, "varney" & company rolls on. at, and you know what they say about curiosity. it'll ruin your house. so get allstate and be better protected from mayhem, like meow.

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what are you doing? humorous tweet from the president. he is right. all time stock market highs again and again and again today. almost 10:00 here in new york city, in three seconds, we'll get the latest read on mortgage rates. time's up. ashley: edge of my seat. this is interesting. 30 year mortgage down to 3.64%. that is the lowest level in 30 weeks. it was at 3.72 last year. five-year arm down to 3.3%. adjustable rate mortgage. stuart: if you take a five-year arm, 3.3%, you locked in 3.3% five years. doesn't move for five years. ashley: right. stuart: that is deal 1/2. ashley: not bad. low rates. strong labor market. should be good for housing demand. but we'll see. stuart: any impact on markets, right now after the mortgage rate news. probably no impact there. we still got the bull market going as of now, the dow is up

123 points. just a tad shy of 29,000. now this. politicians always have to consider how does this look? if i do this, how will it come across? a politician is always in the public eye. it is part of the job. it is how they win support. speaker pelosi is not coming across very well. what she is doing does not look good. i'm referring to the impeachment delay or rather the impeachment farce. the speaker still has not allowed the charges to go to the senate for trial. it's a blatant political ploy, stretching it out to hurt the president for as long as possible. the speaker is doing damage to the constitution. she is not supposed to dictate the terms of the senate trial. she is doing damage to her own party too. democrat senators manchin, feinstein, tester, blumenthal, coons, all of them now want the

speaker to go forward without delay. will she hold it up to the last minute before the november vote? she could do that. her political gamesmanship would look even worse. this is another blunder, the optics look, just didn't work. iran. senator warren would not call qassem soleimani a terrorist. his killing was reckless she said. that just doesn't ring true, does it? joe biden defended the iranian nuke deal, he was part of it, which president trump said had given iran money missiles at our bases in iraq. he was defending the nuke treaty. bernie sanders said trump's strike on sole -- soleimani was like killing dissidents. democrats are supposed to be really good at politics, or maybe they were until trump came

along. these days they're consumed with rage, blinded to the way politics looks to voters. listen to this. >> i think we are reaching the point where articles of impeachment should be sent and we should have votes whether witnesses will be called. stuart: even senate democrats are getting impatient here. come on, bring it on, speaker pelosi. that was richard blumenthal from connecticut, one of several democrats frustrated with speaker pelosi's delay after delay after delay. california's dianne feinstein says if it is not serious or urgent, send them over. jon tester said this. i don't know what leverage we have. looks like the cake is already baked. bring in arizona congressman andy biggs, head of freedom caucus. this is my opinion. i don't think it is looking good for nancy pelosi. what say you.

>> i think you're exactly right. she made a horrible miscalculation. she is looking bad. people are frustrated on both sides of the aisle that will not be good for her. what you're seeing in polling numbers, president trump is getting favorables up, because the economy you reported on is going well. i think people see this is a farce, it's a sham, it's a political ploy. it is horrible for nancy pelosi and her colleagues. stuart: let me move on to the iran situation. second tar of state pompeo they briefed congress on killing of soleimani. it was was a intelligence briefing. were you in on the intel briefing and were you convinced by the briefing we should have taken out soleimani when we did? >> i was in the briefing, stuart, and i believe there was constitutional authority, there was legal authority and there was moral authority to do it and

strategically it was necessary to take out mr. soleimani who is a, who is a radical terrorist and there is no other way to say it. he is kind the killings and maimings of literally thousands of people, americans and others. he was going to do more. he was doing more damage engaged in immediately and had plans to do more against the u.s. including he was involved in the iraqi attack. the attack on the iraqi embassy last week. stuart: seems like we have a stand-down on both sides at the moment. guess you call it a pause. but, in that intel briefing was there any suggestion, the pause, the standdown might not last very long. any hint about that? >> i can't talk about what was said there. my impression what is in the public domain and what i believe to be true, you have de-escalation and you have the president offering to come to iran and try to see if they can

seek some kind of terms of a rationalization of the relationship. i will tell you that the sanctions that are put on been very detrimental to the economy of iran. that is why you're seeing people in the streets resisting the current policies. they aren't seeking regime change in iran. they're seeking policy changes and those policy changes that they seek that iran quit engaging in proxy wars. quit trying to expand their influence. they want the focus back on iran. that is good for the united states. if we can get the ayatollah to go that way, it would help stablize the middle east. stuart: sure would. not regime change, policy change. very important. congressman biggs. thanks for joining us. >> thanks. stuart: check the big board. rally holds not quite as strong. we're still up 114 points.

how about the price of gold going up, recently. down 8 bucks today. back to 1551. look at oil, $58 a barrel now. right after the missile attack on our bases oil spiked to $65 a barrel. didn't last couple hours. we're down the 58.87. remember strategist bob doll on this program had a prediction about the economy and president trump. he was on the show earlier this week. show it to me again. roll tape. >> incumbent as you know, run for re-election and don't have significant party challengers or recession, almost always win. stuart: he when on to say that, yes, president trump wins in 2020. that the economy expands at 2% in 2020. the global economy expands at 3% and stock market rally looks pretty good. come on in, gary kaltbaum,

kaltbaum capital management president. break it all down. i call him the trillion dollar man by the way. do you agree with what he had to say? >> i agree but i also have to add what other candidates on democrat side are talking about. imagine the debate, elizabeth warren says, my plan will lose two million jobs. donald trump says, my plan created 7 million jobs. bernie says he will raise taxes on people making 29,000. trump says i lowered taxes. look where we're at. i'm in the camp that if the economy stays the same, we're in pretty good, he is in pretty good shape to win the election. stuart: bull market runs on? >> as of right now, absolutely. look, you have easiest monetary policy in history, with a good economy. the last time we saw what this central bank is doing, we were 9% unemployment. so that combination doing the trick. i do believe the economy is accelerating here. stuart: well, one last one, i

said this to all of our guests this morning. i sit back, i'm astonished by this. i never seen a bull market run that lasts so long, so intense, even after 10 years. how about you? >> as of right now it is getting intense. by the way, that is what worries me for the next few months when this move ends because, we had a melt-up in '99. everybody joined in and crazy moves like we're seeing like in tessa is happening right now. so that is my big worry. plus we had a gargantuan move last year. we'll see. but if i think the economy stays sound, interest rates stay low i think we'll be in shape, notwithstanding pullbacks we get every now and then. stuart: gary kaltbaum, as always, thank you. we'll see you soon. good stuff. do you remember the show on your screen, on your screen now? remember this one? it was called part -- "party of

five"? susan: yes i remember that. stuart: there is rao boot. the parents get taken by i.c.e. cabot phillips joins us about that. we'll break it down for you. president trump heads to ohio for the first rally of the year. he will head to new jersey later this month. what on earth is he doing in new jersey? we're on that one. first to the deadly ukrainian boeing jet that crashes in tehran, iran. iran says the jet was on fire before it hit the ground. retired colonel kirk lippold joins us next. he was on active duty in the persian gulf in the 1980s. he is with us. hey, saved you a seat.

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stuart: another presidential tweet just coming right at us. i will read it for you. u.s. cancer death rate, low of the in recorded history. a lot of good news coming out of this administration. i will let it lie right there.

check the big board. rally still intact. we're up 134 points. 28,879. bed, bath & beyond down for the year. play the organ music. why do they did that? the earnings are down 17%. >> video after ukrainian jet crashed near tehran airport. ashley take us through it. ashley: there are reports from the ground, looking at video and from a pilot in the area, this plane was on fire. we don't know why but before it crashed. it was a few minutes after it took off the tehran airport. this video tells the story. the big question is, what happened. iran has said that the pilot was trying to turn back although the pilot was never heard from shortly after take off.

got to 8,000 feet. ukrainians came out with stronger language saying they are not discounting a terrorist attack or a missile attack b there sure what. they say this needs to be criminally investigated. they have the black boxes, we understand some are damaged and some memory lost on them. how many clues that provides investigators we'll see. iran will not share it with boeing, will not share it with the united states. they're leading the investigation with ukraine also on site. many questions on the suspicions of this crash. stuart: you can't have a plane fall out of the sky fall on fire breaking into pieces from mechanical failure. i don't know that for a fact. ashley: highly unlikely. stuart: i think that is true. bring in retired navy commander, commander of the uss cole, kirk lippold. welcome to the program. >> good morning, stuart. stuart: i will take a little bit after right to left turn for a second.

iran's president tweeted this earlier this week. i will read it for you. those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290. ir 655 never threatened the iranian nation. he is referring to the shoot-down of ir, iranian plane 655 with the loss of 290 people on board. you were on active duty then. does this sound to you like rouhani is making some kind of a threat about planes in the air? what do you say? >> i think he is trying to create the circumstances where iran can try to avoid any responsibility for this ukrainian airliner, what may have happened to it. operating complex weapons systems is a very dangerous business. uss vincennes when they accidentally shot down the iranian airliner was clearly a tragic mistake. the navy learned from it.

we shared it with the iranians. they are trying to share this like it was actually on purpose. stuart: trying to link the crash boeing plane in tehran to shoot down of the ukrainian airplane, he is trying to make a link between the two? >> it is absolutely tragic. it typifies how this regime will manipulate and lie in order not to have any blame for what may have happened. united states navy and united states were very up front in what happened with that tragic incident with the uss vincennes operating near the strait of hormuz at the time. when we looked at that system, and we did the investigation, we determined it was a fact that it was training shortfalls and we figured those. i was a recipient of the intensive training went on afterwards when i was command of uss cole so we would never have repeat like that. clearly iranians may need additional training what may have been going on that evening. we'll have to wait to see what

the investigation says. stuart: president's policy seems to keep iran in its box so they can't break out, to hurt a lot of people, keep them in the box. do we have the power, the military power in the region to keep them in the box. >> great question. two things play into this, stuart. one is capability. the other is credibility. we have the capability. we were not quite prepared i think for a full-scale war with iran at this point in time. i think that the president made the right decision in stepping back. but you also have to have credibility you're willing to use it. clearly the president said, if you're going to harm or kill americans, there will be consequences. they will be harsh. they will be severe. comparing 52 sites that the president talked about with the 290 lost in the iran air, apples and oranges but the iranians want to link that. i think at end of the day, you are going to see that what we did was step back from the brink but the hard questions still remains. iran is going to continue to

pursue ballistic missile and nuclear technology. what is the world going to do to prevent it? they are now, where north korea was 15 years ago. we're going to have to stop them. stuart: commander lippold, thanks for joining us. >> thank you, stuart. stuart: you better take a look at apple. yep, hit another all-time high this morning. it is now at $308 a share. however our next guest says, don't expect apple to make the same gains in 2020 as it did last year. he will make his case. apps are used everywhere...

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some people say that's ridiculous. i dress how i feel. yesterday i felt bold with boundless energy. this morning i woke up calm and unbreakable. tomorrow? who knows. age is just an illusion. how you show up for the world, that's what's real. what's your idea? i put it out there with a godaddy website. make the world you want. stuart: gone back up some more.

now we're up almost half a percent, almost 150 points. 28,900 almost. apple hit another all-time high this morning. i think right at it now, $308 a share, but our guest who is with us says, look, don't expect the kind of gains for apple this year, that we saw last year. jerry long from deutch bank is with us. i take your point. apple was 80 or 90% in calendar year 2019. i don't think people expect them to do another 80 or 90% in 2020 but you expect it to go up a little, don't you? >> certainly. the stock had a great run in 2019. what was unique about the move last year, so much was valuation driven. the multiple moved from about 14 to 22 times. the market did move up as well. what is interesting about apple, estimates haven't really changed too much.

didn't really change too much last year. i think what is it going on with the market. investors are pricing in quite a bit of fundamental appreciation potentially through the year. i think people have realized that the iphone 11 cycle was not as bad as initial expectations were in early 2019. people are looking forward to the potential 5g iphone released next year. stuart: okay. >> fundamentally there is a lot of bullishness to the stock. stuart: you're not bearish on the thing at all? you don't think it will go down? i got jefferies saying you think it goes to 350. do you agree with that? >> 350 is possible in the bull case. we're a hold rate on stock. we think at current valuation. stands to premium s&p 500 which always trade toddies -- traded to a discount. we think it is fairly priced at this point.

stuart: thank you very much indeed. we appreciate you being here. thanks a lot. president trump, he gives, yeah, he gives his first rally of the year. it is tonight, trying to think of a good word. a rally tonight in toledo, ohio. off he goes to wisconsin. listen to this, later this month, he goes to, new jersey, one of the bluest of blue states on the planet. why is he doing that? i will ask the trump 2020 campaign, coming up next. but first, we got to do this. prince harry and his wife meghan markle announced they are taking a break from the royal family. buckingham palace not happy. we have the story because that is what you're talking about next. ♪

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♪ nothing is going to change my world ♪ stuart: i like this. ashley: great song. stuart: pools of sorrow, waves of joy, drifting through my open mind, boy sing me, caressing me. ashley: you are a balladeer. stuart: psych -- psychedelic backdrop. we'll move on from that. meghan markle, they want to take a step back from the royal family. ash, did the queen find out about this by watching tv? ashley: she certainly did. she was not happy about it. hurt, disappointed, just some of the terms used for the royal family and queen herself. took everyone by surprise. harry and meghan markle came back from a six-week vacation in

vancouver, british columbia, like everyone on a nice long vacation, i don't want to go back to work. so they said they will step back. tell you quickly, what buckingham palace statement was. discussions with the duke and duchess of succession at early stage. these are complicated issues that will take time to work through. they say they want to be financially independent. stuart: oh, yeah? ashley: we understand they will live in the cot-cottage of grounds on windsor castle, which had 2.4 million pounds, over $3 million done of renovation. if you're going to take off, pay back the taxpayer for that. also they won't receive prince charles money, duchy of cornwall, will get two million a year for that. they will not be compensated for royal duties which they get 5% of their expenses paid by the queen. other 95% from charles. to be financially independent is

very relative, ha-ha in this case. stuart: before we go on, susan, whose side are you on. susan: whose side am i on? i'm not picking any sides. i wonder what financially independent means? will megan act? will harry write books. stuart: are you interested in the story? susan: i am interested. stuart: have you read about it? susan: i did when it was tweeted out. stuart: why are you interested? susan: royal intrigue, palace intrigue is interesting. i'm on the side of the queen. as a grandmother i don't want to be railroaded by my grandson and my wife, i paid 2 million for their wedding security detail. and they're trying to step back from that? ashley: there is history here because princess diana did the same thing when she announced separating from charles, was stepping back from some 50 charities. no one knew she was going to do that. her son has taken even bigger step. said i'm fading away.

stuart: despite susan's interest we move on. susan: yoko moment. stuart: that big board still shows healthy rally. we're up over 150 points. we hit 28,900. tonight, president trump heads to ohio. it is his first rally of the year. it is actually the first of three scheduled rallies. all for the month of january. look at the last location. wildwood, new jersey. oh. mark later is with us, trump 2020 strategic communications director. mark, new jersey, it is about as blue as you can get. do you think he can flip new jersey? >> well, you have to ask the question, i mean, let's be honest. the democrats have a self-avowed socialist leading their, leading their primary right now. so i think every state is in play but not only -- stuart: we have a neosocialist government in new jersey mark,

have to tell you that. >> not just because, not just about the electoral map. it is also an opportunity, shows that this campaign is also focused on winning back congress and the house of representatives. so you're going to see the president there giving his strong support, showing his strong support for republican congressman jeff van drew. stuart: i tell you if the president went to new jersey, promised to repeal salt, he would win new jersey, i am telling you. >> well i leave that to the tax experts to be able to decide that. but look, this is a president who is growing the map. he is not satisfied with just the states we won in 2016. that is why we have people on the ground in minnesota, new hampshire. i'm heading to nevada here in a few hours. we're going to make a play for just about any place, and every place across the map. the president's record says we could probably get it done. stuart: what is on the agenda for tonight? impeach peach and iran? >> the president definitely

shares his mind what he is thinking at these rallies. so i wouldn't be surprised if both of those topics came up. what you're talking about is a president showing leadership, taking out the top terrorist in the world. taking him off the battlefield, standing strong against iran, not just letting it fall by the wayside because they're using third party proxies. he is definitely holding iran accountable for their malign activities. i think american people recognize the strength that he is showing when doing it. stuart: okay. we'll see if they're lining up already to get into the event tonight in toledo, ohio. >> they have been out there since last night. stuart: really? >> overnight. stuart: that is something. in ohio, in january. that is pretty good going, i got to say. mark, thanks for joining us. see you again soon. >> good to see you, stu. stuart: taxes on beer doubling in the state of new york, empire state. what have you got? ashley: that is the proposition. it is not in place, new york

lawmaker, democrat, wants to raise the beer gas per gallon from 14 cents to 30-cent what they charge on wine. he wants to even those out. would generate extra $50 million per year for the state university of new york system and its counterpart in the city of new york. big pushback from the beer industry, the craft beer industry, saying we have 500 more or at least 500 craft brewer is statewide, picking on a industry hurt by this, barely putting a dent in the budget problems of the state. the reason they're doing it, gap between middle class income, being able to afford a state university is growing. they're trying to throw more money at it. but it is not popular among obviously the beer brewers and beer drinkers. who thunk. beer and college they go together, look at grubhub, uber eats. that would be uber of course.

consumers are having issues with food delivery apps. susan: they are. according to a survey by ugov, wrong temperature is the main complaint, 28% of the time. late orders is 27% of the time. also wrong orders, side dishes or even the main dish occur 1/5 of the time. this is, at a time when you are being asked to pay extra for this food to be delivered but it is not being delivered in the right way. this is hurting companies like grubhub. in fact grubhub i think is down to 5 billion-dollar valuation. last year at this time it was worth $13 billion. it has fallen 60% or so. analysts say there will be industry consolidation. and only room for two major players. will uber eats be part of it? right now the number unplayer is door dash, which is 37%. grubhub is 30%. uber eats is down, they're subsidizing $3 for each and every delivery according to

cowan. the ceo said if i'm not number one or two in the market i just get off. you wonder if they sell off uber eats which some say would propel uber's stock price. stuart: obviously consolidation is in the air in the food deliver byes. susan: for a man that never ordered food. stuart: who am i to make a comment like that. ashley: have it ordered for him. stuart: mcdonald's, what is this, making a beg push in digital? ashley: created a whole new department in mcdonald's at management, digital customer engagement team. this is this one for you. part of the experience of the future. they say, look, they have been putting a lot of money into the self-serve kiosks better having customers engage with digital, high-tech side of the business. they have team works on that. where it goes next, who knows. just shows you they're relying on tech to try to innovate. stuart: understandably. i just don't like those kiosks. ashley: you don't like them? why.

stuart: no. ashley: can't be bothered? go to someone and order. stuart: i want to go straight to the counter. burger and a coffee. let's go. susan: that is not how the world works. easterbrook, the ousted ceo is the one that initiated in the digital change of the restaurant of the future movement. stuart: got it, thank you. amazon has fired some employees from the ring division. apparently spying on customers. that sounds bad. hillary vaughn, join us, what is going on here, hillary? reporter: we got this information from a letter that ring sent to five senators answering questions that they had about their security practices saying they did end up terminating four employees that viewed more video than their roles actually required. all four people fired, were in their roles allowed access to video but they were fired because they viewed more video than their roles actually required. those people have been fired. but one other thing we got from a lot of information that ring sent to congress, that they

really have not had any significant data breaches. they have not seen a wide amount of ring cameras being hacked but what they have seen is what we reported on your show on tuesday, is people, buying stolen data off the dark web, emails and passwords, then using that log-in information to access cameras. they said it becomes such a problem they're monitoring themselves dark web content to see if any of their own users have their emails and passwords circulating on the dark web. they're also monitoring third party breaches where the stolen data comes from. they're also encouraging users to implement two factor authentication, which is a way to protect and prevent anyone from hacking into your device and also using your email and password to get in. stuart? stuart: hillary, got it. before we continue, look at bottom right hand of your screen. that is rally and a 1/2. i'll trying to do the math. we're 74 points away from 29,000

on the dow. the rally continues. nancy pelosi, speaker pelosi, still hanging on to those articles of impeachment. next we have a senator who says, send those articles to the senate or end this partisan game, do it now. mike braun, no-nonsense business guy from indiana next. whoa, this is awful, try it. oh no, that looks gross what is that? you gotta try it, it's terrible. i don't wanna tray it if it's terrible. it's like mango chutney and burnt hair. no thank you, i have a very sensitive palate. just try it! hey guys, i think we should hurry up. if you taste something bad, you want someone else to try it. it's what you do. i can't get it out of my mouth! if you want to save fifteen percent or more on car insurance, you switch to geico. it's what you do. dog, dog, dog.

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stuart: let there be no doubt this is a rally across the board. 28,900, well above that on the dow. 9200 on the nasdaq. well above that. 3200 on the s&p, well above that. all across the board. this is a major rally in progress. the economy, surely that is president trump's bread and

butter. yes it is. mike bloomberg is going right after the president on the economy. says it's a bad economy? susan: says almost half the country doesn't own stock. stock market all-time highs everyone enjoying it. unemployment rate is low he admits that. half workers are making less than $18,000, median income. president trump pushed biggest tax cut for wealthy in history. going to people reich me i don't need it. i have a real track record when economic leadership looks like. stuart: can't say anything good about a economy booming for three years. historically low unemployment rates. all he has to say income inequality, it is bad. susan: he does admit the jobless rate is low but people are not earning amount of money they deserve. half the national income are not going to workers but to investors. stuart: okay. okay. ashley: sounds like bernie sanders.

stuart: leave it right there. let's get back to iran, bring in indiana senator mike braun. mr. senator, welcome back. good to see you. >> good to be back on. stuart: i believe you were at the briefing, intelligence briefing yesterday, about the killing of soleimani. can you, i know you can't tell us exactly what was said but can you tell us if you were convinced that soleimani had to go when he was killed? >> no doubt about it and what is interesting to me we all heard the same briefing and it was very quiet early on because, i don't know that there is a democrat that isn't glad a monster like him is gone. it goes back decades and the justification for doing what president trump did, you know, he took out a drone. they missiled an oil facility. they staged the riot and fire at the embassy. and then killed a contractor and injured four soldiers. do you really want to wait for

what is next? it was clear to me that the imminence was there without the details. so it begs the question, also, stu, what would reaction be had we not done it and that had occurred? would they have been stalwart in their point of view? i doubt they would have. stuart: i'm told speaker pelosi will introduce a measure today which would limit the president's powers to act as he did with soleimani. and give some warning to congress that what he was about to do. do you think that will fly? >> that did get the ire of mike lee and rand paul. to be honest, i think congress has defaulted over years of not being willing to stick its neck out and has given that tacit, you know, overt authority to the president. i think it is time we do take more responsibility and involvement, not just tied into this particularity. because this made sense. we do not want to restrict the

flexibility of what happened here. in the long run, yes, congress ought to be more involved, say we did something more significant with iran or any entanglement in the middle east or anywhere else which trump campaigned against. i think that is smart in the long run. in short run he needed flexibility to do what occurred. stuart: you wrote a article on fox news.com, speaker pelosi send impeachment articles within 25 days or end this game. speaker snapped at reporters asked about impeachment yesterday, but she is still dragging this thing out. i guess you could drag it out forever if she wants to, but i think the politics are turning against her to do this. >> when five or six democratic senators and across the spectrum of manchin, blumenthal and many others, there will be more in the upcoming days. you had a weak case. the mueller report flopped.

the ukrainian thing was rushed through. and they are, between a rock and a hard place. when the polling turned against them in pennsylvania, michigan, wisconsin, not only on impeachment, but to where trump is beating a democrat, she is in a terrible place. the sunk costs are there to besmirch his record. now she is dealing with it. has no really good options. i think it will be coming over soon. stuart: got it. senator mike braun, always a pleasure. thanks for being back with us. >> you bet. stuart: yes, sir. i'm sure you remember the show, "party of five." well there is a reboot and it premiered last night, actually. it has an immigration twist now. can you believe i.c.e. takes the parent away? what a story. we'll deal with it next.

stuart: the popular '90s drama, "party of five" was the name of it has a reboot. it has a political twist. ouch. roll tape. >> will be with you shortly. >> no, we're not done yet. you have done nothing wrong. no, get your hands off her.

she is not less after person than you are. what is the matter with this country? >> show them who we are. >> they don't care who we are, poppy. don't you understand that. stuart: very political. cabot phillips. i don't remember the original show. i don't remember it was political, or funny, whatever, but i can't believe they advanced it this level i.c.e. taking parent away, totally political? >> i can believe it. this is par for the course, we know hollywood, left as a whole has to politicize everything, whether sports, entertainment, television shows. remaking older shows with political twist where the enemy is the trump administration vaguely being referenced, i.c.e., immigration policy average americans, i think there will be backfire. people are starting to get fed up with the hollywood elites telling them what to think. why ricky gervais' speech was so

popular, people loved it so much going after the hollywood elites instead of being virtue signaled constantly. there it with be a backlash. taking every opportunity they have. the quickest way to critical claim, take up social justice cause, attack conservative policies. quick way to get people to support you. that is why they're doing it. stuart: old and tired. all the time this comes at you. drives me up the wall. however, listen to this. cnn, settled a lawsuit with the cone tuck high school student, nicholas sandman. he is the teenager who they and several other newspaper operations accused of starting a confrontation with a native-american. they nearly ruined that young man's life. is there some redemption here? some justice i think. >> there is justice. more important more cases like this happen. if you're the media, you don't get a free pass to ruin someone's life. this high schoolkid was called a

school shooter. he was called a racist, big got, seeking out contribution. a cnn contributor, have you ever seen a more punchable face in your entire life? all the things was said about the young kid. turns out he did nothing wrong. the media jumped on narrative, narrative we want to find, conservatives seeking out violence against people of color, immigrants. they saw this, that fits narrative. they will jump on it, roll with it. even though no facts to back it up. when you have the idea you want to fulfill the narrative, find whatever story you can, whether it is true or not before you look at facts. how you fall this kind of thing. hopefully financial accountability will cause more media outlets to say we don't want to misreport the facts because it will happen to us. stuart: i didn't see the financial accountability. >> original suit was $250 million for damages. they settled privately. we're not sure what exact number given. i run an online publication, campusreform.org. we have videos sent to us, wow

that could be really good story. i don't run any video. first five minutes, i look into the verify facts. even if i think it could be true, if we're not sure, we'll not publish that, that is our credibility on the line. sadly some in the mainstream media get a pass, they can brush it under the rug, we might have ruined the kid's life, he was evil maga supporters even though there the justification wasn't there. stuart: may i announce this on your engagement on christmas eve i think it was. >> yes. miss emma michelle. she is culmination of a whole lot of prayer and i'm a very blessed man. very blessed. stuart: great story. way to go, son. former trump advisor, kt mcfarland says the president is in the midst of the most important 48 hours of his presidency. she is one of several big guests in our 11:00 hour. it is "the power hour," and it is coming up next.

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stuart: happening this hour, president trump to announce that he is cutting environmental regulations to make it easier to get infrastructure projects completed. pipelines, airport expansion, that kind of thing. if he goes off script, and makes some headlines, believe me, you will hear it real fast. now this. it's been one week since president trump shocked just about everyone by killing iran's top general, qassem suleimani. what a week it's been. it has not turned out the way so many people confidently predicted. just look at what's happened on wall street for a start. who would have thought that stocks would go straight up? that's not what we were hearing a week ago.

there were an awful lot of pundits asking how far down we are going to go. instead, it's been record after record after record and there are more records today. same with oil. the killing of an iranian general, then a missile strike on american bases, surely that would take oil to $80 or even $100 a barrel. it didn't. the highest it got was $65. we have now settled back to $59. some of us wish we could go back a week and switch our money around but we can't. and there are probably a few politicians who wish they could go back a week and adjust their statements. right after suleimani was taken out, the left swooned, trump is taking us into a war, they said, he's unbalanced, he is irrational. you know, you really shouldn't be questioning the commander in chief's sanity when iranian missiles are flying, but it's more than just words. speaker pelosi wants to change the rules. she demands that mr. trump ask for permission from congress

before he takes out a terror leader. that is frankly ridiculous. the news is always surprising. that is the nature of the beast. we have all been surprised at what's happened in money and politics in the past week. nothing went quite as expected. third hour of "varney & company" about to begin. stuart: theladies and gentlemene have a "varney" power hour on our hands. k.t. mcfarland, general jack keane on iran, gene munster on apple and tesla, dan henninger has a new piece on biden and iran and then we have bret ba r baier, he has the latest on the impeachment to wrap up the hour. it is a terrific hour. that is a promise from me. look at the markets. this is terrific. all the highs again today, all of them, all the indicators, at

highs as of now. the dow closing in on 29,000. look at that. 28,923 at the moment. way up across the board. john layfield is back with us, fox news contributor. are you as amazed as i am and all our guests are? let's start there. i'm astonished. how about you? >> absolutely astonished. i never dreamed this would play out as it has so far. it certainly looked like iran would raise the stakes here with more of an escalation than just sending missiles into a base and it looked like intentionally missing killing american lives. iran has targeted about seven tankers, two pipelines, they shot down a drone, they have done a lot of things to raise the stakes and it looked like the verge of almost being on war and now all of a sudden they pulled back completely. that to me is astonishing. stuart: it was made official today, china's finance minister, they announced it, china announced their top official is coming over here next week to sign phase one. now, when it's official like

that, i think that makes a difference. does it mean, john, that the china trade issue is kind of off the table for 2020? >> yes, i think so. i think if they don't try to push phase two, it's probably going to come after the election sometime, no matter who gets elected, especially if president trump gets re-elected, you will see phase two come. if a democrat gets elected, you will probably see something different entirely. but i don't think it will happen until after the election but that's good for the markets, because the markets are moving on what they moved on for the last several years. you have a good economy in the u.s., you have an accommodating policy from the fed, you have a low tax environment and low regulatory environment. a good regulatory environment. because of that, you see the american stock economy doing very well, especially when you compare that to the rest of the world. we are by far the best out there. stuart: now, everybody expects at some point the bull market hits a blip, and there is a correction of some sort. i think a lot of people expect that confidently. any idea when it might come?

a silly question, i know, but go ahead. >> the person that has that is the person who is going to be in for a lot of money. it doesn't look like it will happen any time soon. you still have full employment. the economy has slowed, it's gone from 3% to 2% growth the last four quarters but we have full employment right now. we have some head winds. but these are good head winds because we have full employment. we need about 800,000 jobs. this is a skill gaps issue. electricians and welders in the next five years that are not going to be filled. that's going to have a little bit of slowing effect on the economy. we also need about 27,000 jobs to build out the 5g network. it sounds like a small number but that's qualified jobs. we are not going to have that. so because we do have a full employment right now, we do have a bit of a problem of a head wind but that's a good head wind to have, when you have full employment, especially when the consumer's over 70% of gdp. the u.s. economy right now is very strong and it doesn't look like a recession is imminent. stuart: john layfield says the bull market continues. i think you're right, by the evidence on your screens. john, thanks for joining us.

see you soon. >> thank you, sir. stuart: sure thing. verizon, look at the stock, got big news. they are getting rid of cable bundles? ashley: eliminating them. they say look, so often a customer gets into one of these bundles, gets a cheaper rate for a year or two and once the promotional offer is up you are left with a hefty cable bill. doing away with them. you can now pick out your individual television package and get this, you can change it monthly if you want to. those packages begin at 50 bucks. you can also pick your internet speed. there will be three tiers starting at $55 for the slowest, $80 for the fastest. it's trying desperately to fight back against cord cutting by giving customers more choice and not getting, you know, roped into these two-year deals which are great but then you end up paying a lot more. interesting development. stuart: verizon the fios? ashley: yes. fios customers. stuart: they've got some options. ashley: if you don't like it after a month, change with no penalty. stuart: except it's difficult to change, isn't it?

ashley: always. yes. stuart: you can never speak to a real person. all right. move on. facebook. they will not stop political ads in this election year. okay. they won't stop them. are they going to allow people like me to get rid of them? lauren: not entirely. not entirely. it's a hands-off approach and unusual approach that facebook is taking by not limiting political ads, which means they are opening themselves up to disinformation, but maybe closing themselves to being attacked by critics who say they are censoring conservative views, for instance. they say it's a democracy, you want to put a political ad out, okay. if you are a user and you don't want to see that political ad or social issue ad, you can make some parameters but it's tricky. for instance, you can opt in to see messages that were targeted to other groups so you could have a little bit more control but basically, facebook's in charge here and in total, $3 billion is expected to be spent

on digital political advertising this campaign season. they want a part of it. stuart: not surprised at that. ashley: i want a part of it, too. stuart: thanks, lauren. interesting. all right. look at boeing, please. on the upside today, not much, buck and a half at $333. some updates on the boeing crash in iran. the iranians say the plane was on fire before it crashed. there is video showing it on fire and breaking into pieces as it crashed. that kind of tears apart the whole idea that it was some kind of mechanical problem on the plane. that's why boeing, the plane makers, up today $332. the price of oil, i think we are down to $59 a barrel. there we are. what a change that is. when the missiles flew, we went to $65 a barrel but within hours, we are down to $59 a barrel. the price of gold is down as well. we are off 11 bucks there at $1549 per ounce.

president trump traveling to ohio later tonight for another rally. coming up, we have ohio's gop chair on the show. i want to know just how good her state has it under trump. what's the performance of the economy there. it's thursday. dan henninger is on the show, taking joe biden to task on his hard-nosed diplomacy as he puts it. he says the democrats did the same thing in 1972 with nixon's re-election and look how that turned out. a live look at capitol hill. some senate democrats are fed up with pelosi delaying impeachment. now the chair of the house armed services committee tells her to get a move on. bret baier on that. and next, we have an iran power bloc. retired general jack keane, k.t. mcfarland breaking down trump's response to iran's aggression. "varney & company" continues. ♪

stuart: we are going to call this the varney power hour because we have some of the biggest and best names in national security on the show. on one side of me, kt mcfarland, former trump deputy national security adviser. also with me, general jack keane, retired four-star general and fox news strategist. may i start with you, general. do we have the power, the military power, in place to keep iran in its box? >> oh, yeah, absolutely. what has taken place here strategically is very significant. iran showed constraint, they backed up and they blinked and they haven't done that since the late 1980s. the move that president trump made, it was a bold move, calculated risk in taking down suleimani. it was an escalation, to be sure. it's had a huge payoff for him.

iran's credibility in the region is significantly diminished as a result of it. iran has huge capability to take out any one of our bases in the region. i'm not talking about iraqi bases with u.s. housed on it. i'm talking about our air bases, our navy bases and our major ground base in doha. they could have taken out any of them and a patriot missile system would not have protected them because their cruise missiles would fly under the radar of the patriot missile systems, as they demonstrated so capably in taking down the saudi oil fields. so why didn't they do that, stuart, in retaliation for killing suleimani? here's why. because they knew the united states would take out all of their oil refineries, all the major power plants, and take down all their cruise and advanced ballistic missiles in one night and they would be done as a result of that. and that is the calculation they made. stuart: we could have done that. >> oh, absolutely. stuart: the cruise missiles and

all the rest, we could do that. >> in one night. it would be over for them if we did that. stuart: did they know that? >> yeah, of course they did. they absolutely knew it. and why? because president trump got in khamenei's head. when he took down suleimani, stunned, surprised, pushed him back on his heels, reeling as a result of that. no one has ever done anything like that to the regime. not in 40 years. the other thing that adds to that is the desperation they feel as a result of the degree of civil unrest that they are dealing with with their population. they fear their population in a way that they have not for 40 years. why? their pension system is bankrupt, their unemployment and inflation is skyrocketing and out of control, there are significant food shortages and everybody in that population across the entire social fabric of the country is frustrated and they are blaming the regime for all of this, not the united states. stuart: no more questions, general. i think you got it dead right, all wrapped up very nicely. general keane, thanks for joining us.

appreciate it. >> good talking to you, stuart. stuart: thank you. let's turn to kt mcfarland who has an op-ed on fox news saying the 48 hours after president trump spoke yesterday are the most important of his presidency. kt mcfarland joins us now. we are 24 hours into this. how's it going? >> pretty well. i wrote that as he was stepping up to the podium, and i predicted that he would not be -- he would not trash talk iran, that he would offer the hand of friendship which he did, but he would also be very firm. here's how he got the a-plus on those remarks. he walked in saying we will not allow iran to have nuclear weapons. stuart: first thing. >> even before he started talking. then he laid out the case for why it was legitimate to go after suleimani. he then laid out the case for the importance of iran coming back into the world market. we will welcome you back in. he talks about bringing our allies and even our adversaries, russia and china, into a bigger solution for the middle east and

then at the end, he said something that really nobody paid any attention to. he said we're going to continue sanctions, we are going to ramp up sanctions. that's the maximum pressure campaign. in the past, every president has put on sanctions or punishment and the minute the other country either concedes or blinks or comes to the table, we let them have it all back again and then they have no incentive to keep going. trump understands that the economic message is the most powerful in this case. stuart: did you help author this maximum pressure campaign? i know it surfaced yesterday in the president's remarks, but it's a policy which the president adopted and kept to for some time. when you were part of his administration. did you help -- yes, you did. >> well, look, president trump is his own best foreign policy adviser, but when he campaigned, he said no more endless wars, we will use the economic weapons but you don't have an economic weapon unless the american economy is good. so the first thing he did was

fix the american economy. then he realized that because of our energy independence, and because we control the international banking system, right, if countries are going to buy and sell oil they go through american banks, american dollars, we can turn that off or on are sanctions. he realized those were the two most powerful weapons in his arsenal and that was the maximum pressure campaign, that we would not necessarily send in the marines, we would have that military option should we ever need it, but we would use economic warfare, diplomatic warfare, political, whether it's with iran, whether it's with china or whether it's with iran. stuart: the honorable kt mcfarland. great to see you back. it really is. >> it's really fun to be with you. stuart: don't be a stranger for very long, okay? >> not a chance. stuart: deal. thanks very much. by the way, we have our eyes on speaker pelosi, giving her weekly press conference. she just said she will send the articles of impeachment over to the senate when she is ready. and that will be soon.

she also said mr. trump did not make the united states safer by killing suleimani. those are the headlines from speaker pelosi. next, going to get back to this. everybody is talking about it. prince harry and meghan markle announcing they are stepping back from the royal family. they want to earn their own income. sure you can do that but how much you going to make? ashley webster breaks it down for us in just one short moment. ♪ with sofi, get your credit cards right by consolidating your credit card debt into one monthly payment. and get your interest rate right so you can save big. get a no-fee personal loan up to $100k.

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stuart: i don't know why, but this country, our dear america, seems to be fascinated by this. prince harry, meghan markle taking a step back from the royal family. my fellow former englishman -- ashley: well, it's interesting in this country, a, because they do have an interest in the royal family, surprisingly so and also meghan markle is american. they want to step back, they made this shock announcement, didn't tell anyone at the palace about it, and now the repercussions. they say they want to take a step back to get out of the glare and to have the pressure of the media on them all the time, and to give their son a kind of life, archie, another view of life, not under the glare of the royal family.

how this happens, i have no idea. they plan to still live at frogmore cottage, a beautiful home on the grounds of windsor castle so that's not really stepping back. they are getting the trappings of the royal family and spending another part of the year somewhere in north america, people say canada but of course meghan is close with her mother, who lives in l.a. how will this work? as it stands as a senior royal member, you are not allowed to earn any income, period. you get the income from the -- from charles provides 95% through his trust, the duchy of cornwall, the queen provides the other 5%. this is all blah, blah, blah. bottom line is they want to pull back. they didn't tell anyone in the palace. we know the queen was hurt, disappointed, kind of saying -- she had a terrible last year. the duke hits a car while driving, injuring two women. then we have prince andrew associated with convicted child molester, jeffrey epstein, and now this. the general consensus -- i personally think if they really want to step back, take away the

titles, go live in the normal world, good luck. stuart: i'm with you. ashley: you with me on that? stuart: you want out? okay. you're out. don't come back. edward viii situation. ashley: exactly right. stuart: next one. joe biden. he slammed the president on his strategy in iran. biden called for hard-nosed diplomacy. well, dan henninger is on the show. he says the democrats pushed that exact strategy when nixon was up for re-election way back when. remember how well that turned out. we have tech watcher gene munster back with us. i will pick his brain on apple and tesla. where is apple going, what's driving its rally? will tesla's shanghai giga factory gamble keep investors smiling? they are smiling now. keep on it "varney." it's a big hour for you. ♪

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stuart: you know, this is not a day when we want to shift away from the markets for very long because we just keep on hitting record highs. if you do the math, the dow industrials are now, what, 78 points away from 29,000.

how about that. i did the math real fast on that. records across the board. next case, a headline in today's "wall street journal." here it is. joe biden's deterrence policy, colon, stop trump. it's thursday. the guy who wrote that has to be on the show and it is -- he is, rather. dan henninger, "wall street journal" editorial board guy. what does that mean? biden's deterrence, colon, stop trump? >> well, joe biden certainly understands that back during the cold war, one of the primary theories of foreign policy was deterrence. deterring the soviet union, deterring your adversaries. the way you deterred them from doing bad things was by having a credible threat of the use of force. didn't mean you had to use force but at least you knew that you could use force. there used to be national security democrats like senator joe lieberman who wrote a piece for the "wall street journal" this week saying he was concerned about where the democrats were, or senator sam nunn who knew you needed a

credible deterrent. in his speech criticizing president trump the other day, joe biden seemed to say there are only two avenues open to us here. either war with iran or only diplomacy. i'm suggesting that rather than having a strong deterrent, democrats have decided that what they will propose is diplomacy only, talking about talking. stuart: you don't think that works. >> i don't think it works. it doesn't deter anybody. during the cold war, there was another concept known as the bluff, bluffing, and if you said something that didn't have a credible deterrent behind it, you were bluffing your adversary and your adversary knew it. that is why qassem suleimani was running around the middle east waging and instigating these proxy wars in places like yemen, iraq and syria, because he knew that we were bluffing. that bluff goes back to, i think, barack obama's -- remember that red line in the sand in 2012? opposing assad's use of chemical weapons?

nothing happened. the iranians knew we were bluffing. now with donald trump, they know we have a real deterrent in place, a credible persuasive deterrent. i'm suggesting that joe biden's argument for stopping iran is to stop donald trump. that's not going to work. stuart: the president has introduced backbone into american foreign policy. backbone. he's not bluffing. they don't know what he's going to do. i think he's inside their heads and he's got them all jumbled up. >> that's one of his assets, he gets inside people's heads to the point where they can't really think straight anymore. i mean, as soon as the killing of suleimani occurred, what was the response from most of these democrats? donald trump is bringing us to the brink of war. here we are days later, stuart, and we're not at the brink of war. we had at the brink indeed of a negotiation with iran. even iran's foreign minister zarif said the 15 missiles they

fired into iraq were, in his words, a proportionate response, which is what you do when you are trying to do deterrence. so that suggests to me as it does, i think, to the general media right now, that the iranians perhaps are willing to sit down and negotiate seriously. stuart: exactly. the president has opened up the field to negotiation. >> serious negotiation. stuart: serious negotiation. because he's not bluffing. he's got a credible deterrent up his sleeve and he will use it. it's an extraordinary switch, isn't it. >> yeah. i think at some point, joe biden and the rest of the democrats have to come to grips with this and start addressing the substance of what donald trump's foreign policy is doing in the middle east rather than simply screaming rhetorically that pulling out of the iran nuclear deal has led tous to the brink war. it has not. stuart: i don't see a single democrat presidential campaigner who is saying anything like that at all. they are still saying he's going to get us into a war and we don't want it.

>> we are going to find out tuesday night in that debate they are going to have in des moines, iowa, right. bernie sanders, of course, is saying that we shouldn't be in iraq and he's going to lean heavily on joe biden and we are going to find out how far joe biden and indeed, amy klobuchar is also going to be on the stage, are willing to bow in the direction of the progressive position which i'm arguing is very close to where george mcgovern was in 1972, when he got completely wiped out by richard nixon in that presidential election. stuart: that's when i arrived in america. shortly thereafter. that's when i arrived. good stuff. great to have you here. see you later. okay. before we move on to apple, i know it's on the screen but just look at the bottom right-hand corner of your screen. the dow is now up close to 200 points. i'm going to do the math again. we are now 68 points away from 29,000 on the dow. all right. now look at apple. $309.75. way past the $300 mark.

come on in, loup ventures gene munster. am i right, i think you said it was going to hit $350 or was it $400? which was it? >> it was both, stuart. we talked about this year, a conservative case of $350 and then a $400 case kind of for the optimistic or 2021 case. i think what we have seen in the stock over the last few weeks is a progression of investors understanding two things. number one is this concept that the easier comps, that's what's moving the stock in china today, sales are up 18% in the december quarter, that's after being down in the mid teens percent for the past year. the easy comps are going to allow them to make their numbers and more importantly, what's moving the stock i think is a better understanding from investors that this combination of hardware, software and services, should yield a typical tech-like multiple and if you

apply a facebook multiple on this you get to $400. stuart: what's this about the app store being a very valuable part of apple? i don't see how that works. >> so the app store, they put out their numbers, grew at 16% in the holiday period for 2019. that was up despite the fact that the iphone units, they don't break this down anymore, but iphone units were likely down 9%. so there has been this long case, this is really important, with the app store, the news from apple yesterday, is there has been this long case that apple ultimately is going to be, their success is going to be a function of iphone sales. but what has been happening is iphone has been soft and the app store and wearables continue to do really well. i think that disconnect, that disconnect between iphone sales and services, is testimony to the resilience of their services business. it's just 20% of revenue but that's growing quickly and ultimately, i think that is part of the justification of a higher multiple. stuart: next one is tesla.

you have often commented on tesla, and i've just found out that they have become the most valuable u.s. automaker of all time. their market value is now more than general motors and ford combined. gene, how on earth can that happen? >> the reason why it's happening is because i think investors are fast forwarding several years, and that's what adds a layer of risk and uncertainty to this, but essentially investors are making the bet that the future of cars is electrification. very similar to the argument that happened when apple started with the iphone. they just had a fractional amount of units in the cell phone business, this is really before the smartphone got going, but i think investors started to recognize that the way that phones, we'll use phones, this was back in the day of fl flipphones, it was going to change. we started to see movement in apple's market cap ahead of their market share. i think you are seeing something

similar around tesla today, where investors are making some extrapolations, some may argue too aggressive. i think that ultimately, this company will continue to grow into its valuation. it will be a rough road but it will continue to move higher. stuart: we are all just sitting back astonished. gene munster, thanks for being with us. see you soon. >> thank you. stuart: i'm going to turn to netflix. the stock is at or certainly very close to a six-month high. $338 right there. they've got another season of the hit show "ozark" coming out. that is important? lauren: season three, yeah. because it's a very hot show for them. the other hot show is "the witcher." in fact, a jpmorgan analyst says because of all this hot content, they are going to add 7.7 million subscribers globally. if they spend money on content as they are, $15 billion, in 2020, and people get excited about trailers and announcements of all this new content and you keep adding subscribers, that's a win. stock is right near a six-month

high. stuart: i have not seen the show but i don't understand how -- lauren: ashley sees everything. ashley: it's great. jason bateman, laura linney. fantastic. stuart: is that how you spend your life? ashley: no. it sounds like it but -- these are high quality programs and i'm in tv. i love it. stuart: i recommend trotsky. this is for you, ash. the ceo of discovery says only a few streaming platforms will survive. what's the reasoning for that? ashley: yeah. he says as the war heats up and it's all about content, there are going to be those that will survive two or three, then others are going to reach what he calls a tipover point. he's also kind of plugging his own network discovery, which does very very well. it's got a huge amount of content. it's called non-scripted. it's just, you know, you can talk about hgtv and all the home programs. he's talked about and hinting

they may offer their own streaming service with all the content they have that would be focused towards the female viewer. he says all the big guys have come to discovery and talked about buying them but he says i think we would be doing fine on our own. stuart: good stuff. thanks, ash. next one, michael bloomberg published a new op-ed in "market watch." it trashes the trump economy, of all things, saying yeah, it's great for people like him but not for people like you. seriously? we're on it. paul krugman, we are dusting off that old transmission. here's the thing. he didn't attack anybody this time. he was the victim of a cyberattack. you bet we will tell you about that one. and a live look at capitol hill. senate democrats getting antsy about impeachment. speaker pelosi says she will hand over the articles when she's ready. bret baier comments on that in just a moment. ♪ at fidelity, online u.s. stocks and etfs are commission-free. and when you open a new brokerage account, your cash is automatically invested at a great rate.

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stuart: going to the president,

who is answering questions in the white house about china trade and phase one. listen in, please. >> -- also bankers, we also have regulations for a lot of different -- lot of things are covered that people are going to be very surprised to see, but it's a big chunk of it and we'll start right away negotiating phase two. it will take a little time. i think i might want to wait to finish it until after the election because by doing that, i think we can actually make a little bit better deal, maybe a lot better deal, but phase one was -- is a phenomenal deal. could be up to $50 billion in farm product so that's something that -- the most they ever did was $16 billion so they go from $16 billion to up to $50 billion so that's numerous times more than they were buying in the past. it's going to have a huge impact and i see farm prices are going way up. i see corn is just -- had some big increases over the last little while. cattle has been doing really well. and the farmers like me anyway.

that's what i like about the farmers. but you know what i did do, you know this better than anybody, i was able -- they were targeted by china, you know, china's negotiating, i don't blame them, but they were targeted, they say the farmers like trump so we'll target the farmers and they did, and the first year it was $12 billion and i took $12 billion, i asked sonny perdue, secretary of agriculture, what do you think, sonny? he said it's 12 billion and i think that would have caused tremendous consternation and they were hit for $12 billion and i took $12 billion out of the tariffs. we had tens of billions of dollars left over. i gave it to the farmers. next year it was $16 billion. i took $16 billion out of the tariffs, i gave it to the farmers so the farmers did pretty well, and now they're doing great and prices are going up very substantially and china is kicking in. china has already started to buy, japan, the deal is done, they have been buying. it's a $40 billion deal. but the big question i have is whether or not the farmers will be able to supply that much because it's much more than --

it's the biggest contract ever signed. so i think it will be great for the farmers but also great for regulatory, great for banks, you know that, great for finance companies, really a lot. we are going to be covering the opening of china and various other things in phase two. reporter: on impeachment, sir, would you support a deal for witnesses if that included testimony from adam schiff and hunter biden? >> well, i'm going to leave it to the senate but i would like to hear the whistleblower. i would like to hear shifty schiff. i would like to hear hunter biden and joe biden, you know. how does hunter biden with no experience whatsoever -- sean, would you like the hunter biden job? he has no experience, making no money and all of a sudden he's making millions and millions of dollars. you take that. would you leave the union for that? i think so. huh? i know it's so but i'm not going to tell him. no, no, i would like to hear from hunter biden. i would like to hear from -- he's a corrupt politician, adam schiff. he's corrupt. he gave a sentence -- he never

knew i was going to release the transcript, he gave a sentence that he made up, he made it up and it was not -- it was not what was said in the conversation. that's why i released the transcript, got approval from ukraine, we released the exact transcript and it turned out to be totally different. these are corrupt politicians, the whole thing is a hoax but i would like to hear hunter biden, joe biden, adam shifty schiff and some others. the informer that never showed up. once i released the transcript, you know what happened. the informer, he never showed up. and the second whistleblower, john, whatever happened to the second whistleblower? the second whistleblower disappeared. there probably was none or maybe we know who the second whistleblower was. maybe we do. but he never showed up. all of a sudden they don't talk because they were really unexpectedly met with the actual conversation, the exact conversation. so yeah, if we do that, i would like to have those people plus others testify, because it's the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the united states government.

this has gone on since the day i came down the escalator. this isn't just here. this isn't just the ukraine hoax. this is the witch hunt, this is the whole thing with russia that turned out to be a total fabricated plot. the ones who are guilty are the democrats, the dnc and all of the dirty cops that were involved, that we caught. yeah. reporter: mr. president, i'm sure you saw mike lee's comments. did your national security team really say that it would be wrong for congress to debate military action on iran? >> here's what happened on that. i had calls from numerous senators and numerous congressmen and women saying it was the greatest presentation they have ever had. mike and rand paul disagreed because they want information that honestly, i think is very hard to get. it's okay if the military wants to give it but they didn't want to give it and it really had to do with sources and information that we had that really should remain at a very high level. could we individually maybe give one or two of them some information, possibly, if we can

do that. i get along great with mike lee. i have never seen him like that. but other people have called and they have said it was the best presentation they've ever seen. let me tell you what was the best. forget about presentation. the result. we killed a man who killed many many americans and many many people, thousands and thousands of people, and when i go over to walter reed and i meet these young incredible folks, mostly, it seems mostly men but also women, where their legs are gone, their arms are gone, in some cases both the legs and the arms are gone, and the face and the body is badly damaged, and frankly, five years ago they couldn't have lived and today they can live because of the wonders of medicine and the wonders of walter reed and the people over there, the job they do, the medical doctors, but i will say this. we caught a total monster and we took him out and that should have happened a long time ago. we did it because they were

looking to blow up our embassy. we also did it for other reasons that were very obvious. somebody died, one of our military people died. people were badly wounded just the week before. and we did it. and we had a shot at him and i took it and that shot was pinpoint accurate and that was the end of a monster. then -- and that was, really, that was the second attack. it was not -- we didn't start it. they started it by killing one of our people and wounding badly other of our people. so that you call retribution. ukraine, if you look at what happened with ukraine, that's a hoax. well, this is a hoax, too. iran went in and they hit us with missiles. shouldn't have done that but they hit us. fortunately for them, nobody was hurt, nobody was killed, nothing happened. they landed, very little damage even to the base. they landed. but we had a chance to take out a monster, we took him out, and it should have been done a long

time ago. reporter: should congress take further military action against iran, would you seek congressional approval? >> it would all depend on the circumstance. i don't have to and you shouldn't have to be able because you have to make split second decisions sometimes. sometimes you have to move very very quickly, john. but in certain cases i wouldn't even mind doing it. you know what bothers me? when i see a nancy pelosi trying to defend this monster from iran who has killed so many people, who so badly, i mean, so many people are walking around now without legs and without arms. he was the big roadside bomb guy. he was the one that sent them to afghanistan, he would send them to iraq. that was big. that was his favorite thing. he thought it was wonderful. he doesn't think it's wonderful anymore. when nancy pelosi and the democrats want to defend him, i think that's a very bad thing for this country. i think that's a big losing argument politically, too. yeah. reporter: so outside the jcpoa and also with total sanctions

implemented, what's left? >> if i didn't terminate it, it expires in a very short period of time. one of the problems of which there was many, $150 billion, $1.8 billion in cash, all of that money and then that money was used for terror, because if you look at iran, it wasn't so bad until they got all that money. they used that money for terror. that's when it became really bad. you just take a look. it really got bad when they had $150 billion, $1.8 billion in cash. the jp -- the agreement, i always call it the iran nuclear deal that didn't work, the iran deal, it was just something that is no -- is no good for our country. it expires in a short time. that means they would be on the path to nuclear weapons. and for me, it's about nuclear weapons. more than anything else. iran cannot have a nuclear

weapon. iran will never have a nuclear weapon. they understand that. we have told them very strongly. iran now is not wealthy like it was when president obama handed them $150 billion. they are a much different country. we will see whether or not they want to negotiate. maybe they want to wait until after the election and negotiate with a weak democrat, somebody like a biden or a pocahontas or buttigieg or one of these characters. maybe they want to wait. but i think they are probably well off doing it now because if you look at the polls, if you look at what's going on, we are doing very well. they are losing a tremendous amount, they are getting hurt very badly by the sanctions. it all can end very quickly but as to whether or not they want, that's up to them. not up to me. it's totally up to them. they can straighten out their country, iran right now is a mess. they can straighten out the economics of their country very very quickly. let's see whether or not they negotiate. reporter: on the sanctions, when

should we expect to see sanctions on iran following the attack? >> immediately. it's already been done. yeah. we have increased them. they were very severe but now it's increased substantially. i just approved it a little while ago with treasury. reporter: who will they be against? >> you'll see. we will put out a minor announcement. it's actually a major event. it's like this. this is to me a major event and so far, i have no -- i have had no questions on the fact that we can build a highway in, you know, a small fraction of the time, that we can build all of these beautiful bridges that we want to build but they can't get approvals. i've had no questions on that. are you shocked, sean, when you hear that? honestly, they should be having some questions. okay. john, go ahead. reporter: mr. president, the plane that went down, what do you think happened to that plane? >> well, i have my suspicions. reporter: what are the suspicions? >> i don't want to say that because other people have those suspicions also. it's a tragic thing, when i see

that, it's a tragic thing. somebody could have made a mistake on the other side, could have made a mistake. it was flying, it was flying -- not our system, it has nothing to do with us -- it was flying at a pretty rough neighborhood and somebody could have made a mistake, and some people say it was mechanical. i personally don't think that's even a question, personally. so we'll see what happens. reporter: [ inaudible ]. >> i don't know. i really don't know. i don't want to get -- that's up to them. at some point, they will release the black box. ideally they get it to boeing, but if they gave it to france or if they gave it to some other country, that would be okay, too. i think ideally, that will be released. i have a feeling that that's just some very terrible -- something very terrible happened. very devastating. reporter: mr. president, the situation in venezuela has not moved on as smoothly as some people, likely yourself, have hoped. what are you prepared --

>> well, nii never thought it would go smoothly. venezuela never went smoothly since it became a socialist or worse than that country so i never expected anything to go smoothly. we will see what happens with venezuela. they are doing poorly. i mean, there's a great case when i say this country will never be a socialist nation, there's a great case, it was a wealthy country 15 years ago, 20 years ago. that was like a really wealthy country. and now they don't have water, they don't have food. we're supplying a lot of food. we're supplying a lot of water. so no, it takes a period of time. it's been, you know, i have only been here a relatively short reporter: are you prepared to do anything else. >> i will not say that we have a good strategy. we're taking people. colombia is helping people. some nations surrounding are helping people. we're doing a good job. they have a system very broken. we'll see what happens. stay tuned. reporter: embassy in baghdad, can you more details what the

plot was? >> it was obvious. this was anti-benghazi. benghazi was a disaster. they showed up a long time after it took place. they saw burning embers from days before. i said get out today, immediately. they were saying we think we can have them tomorrow. no, they got to to right now. they were on their way very quickly. they got there almost, they got there quickly. could have done that with benghazi, got enthere. if they had done what i did, you would not know the name benghazi. it is now a famous name. this was was not benghazi. we got the apaches there. they were not protesters. they were iranian backed. some were iraq but they were iranian backed absolutely. they were looking to do damage. they were breaking windows. those are structurally strong

windows as you know. they were almost through. had they gotten through, i believe we would have had a hostage situation, we would have had worse a lot of people killed. those people were going to do very serious harm. they were soldiers, they were warriors. we stopped it. we stop i had. that was totally organized plot. you know who organized it. that man right now is not around any longer, okay? he had more than that particular embassy in mind. reporter: john bolton testifying in the senate trial? >> i always got along with him. he didn't get along with some of people. that is up to the senate. i wouldn't stop it. i would have to ask the lawyers because we do, to me, for the future, we have to protect presidential privilege. when we start allowing national security advisors to just go up say whatever they want to say, we can't do that. so we have to protect

presidential privilege for me but for future presidents. i would no problem, aren't they with have to be able to protect. people can't go up say whatever my thoughts are, whatever your thoughts are about us, countries views, you don't want that to be out. we have to protect presidential privilege. reporter: mr. president you said yesterday you want nato to do more. could you -- >> i spoke to -- i spoke to them yesterday. i spoke to the secretary-general yesterday and we had a great conversation. he was very i think he was actually excited by it. i actually had a name. nato, right, and then you have me, middle east nato-me. what a good name. i'm good at names. usmca. like the song, ymca. nobody could remember, usmca. think of the song ymca, now

everybody says it. they don't remember previous name of bad deal, commonly known as nafta. if you add the the words, add w, middle east at end of it. that is source of problems, bill source of problems. nato-me, nato plus me. he is not getting it. he used to smile. before i ran he was smiling. now he is not smiling. you know what i'm talking about. reporter: more nato personnel in the region? as opposed to us to be honest with you. this is international problem. and we can come home or largely come home and use nato. this is international problem. we caught isis. we did europe a big favor. we got 100% of the caliphate. we have thousands and thousands of isis fighters are killed and thousands and thousands, tens of thousands are in prison right now. europe doesn't want