>> he's the skeptical environmentalist >> now all of a sudden, a guy snoeb ever heard of comes along and he's got the answer. >> people got incredibly upset. they said that can't be true. >> cool it. we'll talk to the man at the strafe new film that could make you rethink your views on climate change and for that matter al gore. also in japan, holograms replacing rock stars? news anchors we presume are next. show starts right now. good friday afternoon. we begin today in washington and in china. you can't turn on the tv or pick up the newspaper without hearing about those draconian proposed cuts to trim our deficit. but the story with a far greater impact on your life, your job or why you don't have one are why,

again, the situation is as dire as it is is on the other side of the pacific ocean. here's why. >> reporter: medicare. social security. defense. all potentially on the chopping block as our politicians try to show that they are cutting off america's credit card. and they are doing it with cuts to programs that out of work americans may depend on the most when times for them are the toughest. so of those cuts could even lead to more job losses. but even if some genius in washington were able to slash government spending to zero, we still wouldn't solve our actual problem. which is that the banking system and trade policies in this country are depriving america of the investments it so desperately is in need of. that in part represented by our trade deficit topping $200 billion just last month. instead of stopping the money pouring out of our country, politicians just raise our credit limit and keep spending. at this rate, china will hold a

trillion dollars in u.s. debt by early next year and, remember, that's just this year. doesn't mention the millions of american jobs lost. enough to lower unemployment to 3.6%. washington, by the way, has the power to stop this extraction. a perfect example? look no further than caterpillar. the world's largest manufacturer of construction equipment. for more than 85 years, the gem of peoria, illinois. except now, the twinkle is in china's eye. they are opening factories, shipping jobs and bringing it straight to their chinese buyers. face it. it's more cost efficient to build machines in china when the customers are in china. no shipping costs. no import tariffs. a no-brainer. so how can you blame a company like caterpillar for watching its bottom line and making the moves that produce the best results? speaking of results, caterpillar's third quarter profits surging 96% year to date.

96%! we're a free trade country whose biggest competitor isn't. we trade freely with china and what do they do? they put a tariff on caterpillar's imports from america. they forbid american companies from bidding on chinese projects. but we let foreign companies, including chinese ones come here and outbid our own american companies. is it really free trade if it's not reciprocal? our relationship with china is one of the biggest reasons for the multitrillion-dollar hole in the bucket for investment here at home. it's the reason that's stopping reckless spending in washington is just a piece of a much larger puzzle. and it's the reason ignoring piles of u.s. dollars leaving our country to china and the banking system while forcing american workers to work longer and harder is an insult to the real values of capitalism and fair play that this country is built on. >> we are joined now by peter

maurici. do you get any sense, professor, that we are any nearer to addressing the extraction that is our trade with china? >> today the president said china manipulates its currency and is spending huge sums of money to accomplish that end. hallelujah. finally at the white house they've got it. now that he's angry, now that he's been humiliated in china, the question is is he willing to do something about it. >> what could he do? >> we could put a tax on the purchase of yuan by americans for the prpss of importh all those koofomakers into walmart. it's about time it cost caterpillar the real cost of its investments in china to the american economy. and we can do that in proportion to china's currency manipulation. it stops, we stop. it continues, it gets bigger, the tax gets bigger. >> if you were to look at china's motivation for what they are doing, to deliberately affect all the trade policies that are beneficial to them, create jobs, albeit many low

paying, but create jobs and employment in that country, you have a government status quo in china whose primary interest is in preserving their status quo, much the same as the u.s. government has an interest in preserving its status quo and to do what you suggest, to create the taxation that would create the fairness and the rigging that you suggest would be hugely disruptive to tens of millions if not hundreds of millions of workers in china, which is the biggest concern china has. what leverage do we have to force china to deal with the potential social unrest that they would face, were they to unrig their trade practices? >> right now they are benefiting dramatically by cheating on the system. if we taxed them in the manner i described, this would create disruption that is greater than unwinding this regime. they are not going to move unless we move first. the bottom line is we have negotiated and negotiated through three presidents with china. and china simply isn't going to

move because it knows that washington will never act. there's lots of disruption right now in the world, and it's not in china. it's in places like indiana, ohio, illinois, minnesota, where millions of people have lost their jobs and the people that service them have lost their jobs and an extraordinary multiplier effect that probably comes up to 5 million. new york it's time for the disruption to be there. china doesn't want to play fair. they don't want to have harmonious free trade so it's about time we look out for ourselves. you know what was said. if we're not going to look out for ourselves, who is? >> if you look back to the last time this country was dealing with a currency manipulator, which was really the mid'80s with the japanese yen in a meaningful way and ronald reagan's efforts with the plaza accord which ultimately cut the stlauflt currency in half. how important was that to ending that currency manipulation and should the -- should reagan's plaza accord in '85 be a model

for the way we engage china in 2010? >> well, significantly reduce the american trade deficit in the expansion that resulted during the clinton years was largely driven by exports. i documented that in an article in "foreign affairs" back in the middle of that decade. we just tried to get that plaza accord. but you have to remember. the three largest economies after us are japan, germany and china. all of them, one way or another, are valuing from undervalued currency. and they don't want to give in. so we tried to get germany and japan to come along with us to pressure china to undo what they are doing. frankly, we got no support. so there is no room for a plaza accord. barack obama is back in washington tomorrow morning. he should convene his cabinet and decide to do two things. put on that tax. and there's a long list of things that china does to keep our products out. for example, they require solar panels to be manufactured there if they are purchased there. so somebody who makes solar

panels, the two big markets, the united states and china says, well, i'll manufacture in china so i can sell in both markets. every single one of those restrictions, they are well documented. we know what they are. we should put them up in mirror image and they don't go away until china stops, period. no negotiating. the time for negotiation is over. a 35% tax on currency conversion and reciprocity in trade. it's the only way out. >> professor, always a pleasure. thank you, sir. peter morici. thank you. the only question is how long will washington wait to deal with this real elephant in the room. let's ask someone with the pow twoer act. senator tom udall, democrat from new mexico. senator, a pleasure to see you. lots of high praise for washington for being so-called grown up for their willingness to entertain this -- the proposals perhaps in this deficit commission. are we going to see similarly grown up behavior if you will in engagement with china who has been openly rigging their trade. and this is not a new thing. the netherlands did this long

ago. england did it in the 1800s. it's a well proven way to develop your economy so long as the counterparty doesn't put up too much of a fuss. any sense of how much longer we're going to be willing to take this? >> well, i don't think we should take this. i think we should do everything we can. i thing president is pushing hard on this. i'd like some of the proposals that your professor put out there. the thing that we have tried that was blocked just before the election was to remove the tax provisions that actually encourage american companies to go to china and to go overseas. it seems to me that's the first thing we can do internally here. a lot of these other things are under the control of the chinese. but here in america, we could change the tax code and say to companies, we're no longer going to reward you if you ship jobs overseas. i think that's a decisive thing. it's something that would make a difference, and i think companies would get the message

and try to reorient themselves to putting jobs here in america. >> you talk to somebody like jim owens. i referenced him in the rpth for caterpillar. it's not that jim owens and caterpillar say bad guy or a bad company that's nearly a 100-year-old legendary enterprise that's based out of our country. but the economic structure, the taxation caterpillar faces to manufacture tractors here and sell them there because the chinese government is not willing to accept a foreign competitor in that country without creating some sort of investment or jobs in their own country which seems pretty tactically rational. and, yet, our country, america, doesn't basically take that advantage away so as to protect our own industry here. i'm not suggesting overprotectionism so much as i am the end of unfair play and the beginning of reciprocity so that we can at least have a chance for the american people to do what they do best which is work hard, innovate and use

their resources. but no one can do it in a rigged game. >> that's right. that's right. and that's why we need to push this. we need to use -- you know, china is in the wto. we need to push everything we have. every tool in the toolbox to make sure that under wto rules that they follow and if they don't, we can protest and we can take them under the wto process into a situation where we can find them in violation. >> yeah, the final thing and then i'll move on to the deficit and some of theseother conversations. but if you were to look at the special interests that are represented by the chamber of commerce and the profits engine of some of these large corporations, do you believe that a move towards reciprocity and fairness that would hurt the profitability of many u.s. multinationals who are benefiting from being long china in a rigged trade game?

do you believe that the political will to overcome that resistance from those special interests is there? >> well, i would like to see us take this issue on. i think it's -- it's draining our economy. it's hurting the ability to build our job base in america. and i really believe that this is something that makes a difference to our economic recovery. and we should take it on. >> and when you look at the context of the need to begin to take on china at the same time that the call went out to take on the deficit, do you think it's appropriate to talk about cutting social security or cutting medicare or cutting defense for that matter when we have a vacuum cleaner of money still being sucked out the bask our country in the contsks our trade relationships and investment structure. it's not that the deficit is not an issue. but to tell people you're going to cut their benefits or whatever, or defense spending while indulging some of these other relationships seems a bit

crazy, don't you think? >> yeah, no, i think it is. and the other big part of the picture here is that of the money flowing out of the country, we're talking about significant sums in terms of energy. >> yes. >> foreign oil. we're spending hundreds of billions of dollars purchasing foreign oil from countries that aren't particularly our friends. and it's contributing to terrorism around the world. we're really funding both sides of that particular battle out there. >> yeah, listen. i couldn't have said it better myself, senator. the entire trade deficit is one-half china and one-half foreign oil, and that is the sucking sound or part of the sucking sound of money out of this country. we look forward to tracking your efforts to plug the hole in the bucket, sir. thank you very much, senator. >> thank you. >> all right. tom udall. coming up here on "the dylan

ratigan show," don't ask, don't lead. a number of troops think that not allowing gays in the military isn't a big deal. so why is washington so scared to right this wrong? plus, a new poll shows republicans and democrats want very different things from their politicians. we'll mix it up. exchange traded funds. some firms offer them "commission free." problem is they limit the choice of etfs to what makes financial sense to them.

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we're back to mix it up with some of the other headlines. don't ask, don't lead on gays in the military and compromise versus obstruction in congress. let's start with what the troops themselves think about gays in the military.

turns out most don't think it's that big of a deal. "the washington post" reporting on a pentagon survey not yet made public should shows 70% of troops think the effects of repealing don't and don't tell will be mixed or nonexistent. senator john mccain vowing to filibuster it if it gets that far. time to nix up with our panel. what is going on here? >> well, i mean, it's fairly straightforward. there's two reasons why they are not lifting this ban on don't ask, don't tell, or the policy. it's the republican base. you know, john mccain said prior to the 2008 election if the military said it was okay, i would do it. when gates came out and when the survey comes out it doesn't mean anything because at the end of the day, this has nothing to do with our military preparedness. this has to do with appeasing the republican base which is simply anti-gay. there's no other way to say it. >> is that fair, matt? >> i don't think so. look.

i'm pretty agnostic on this issue. but i do think it's a little more complex than people make it out to be. certainly more complex than, say, asking the -- a rank and file soldier, a marine or sailor or whatever what they think of it. so let me throw out a couple of potential questions that we should consider. that i think maybe the military is considering. if don't ask, don't tell is overturned, would a military chaplain be required to perform a gay marriage? if they don't perform a gay marriage would they be relieved of duty. will military bases, would they be required to provide housing for gay spouses because, after all, sometimes they do that for heterosexual spouses. a lot of military bases are in places like ft. benning, georgia, camp lejeune, north carolina. will those states be required to recognize marriages of gay military members? so again -- >> stop there for a second. matt, how would -- not that you are the ultimate authority on this isuppose, but how would questions like that in your view be responded to?

>> well, i don't know. i guess the military could take them up. but those are secondary questions. the bottom line is can you get kicked out of the military for being gay? how you deal with a chaplain, housing, those are all tiny subsidiary questions and have never been brought up before. the bottom line is -- >> they should have been, though. >> i could sit there and resolve them now. if we're going to listen to the military, let them work those details out. in states where gay marriage is recognized, gay marriage is recognized inspect states where it's not, it's not. i mean, the bottom line is though, this policy is only there for political reasons. now the military, the leadership and the rank and file has said not necessary. >> do you agree? before we drop this, matt, do you -- do you concede sam's point that the biggest impetus to hold on to this, to not give it up is the political momentum that you are able to accumulate as a politician by having -- by pulling the john mccain line within a core base of the republican party that may not be

the entire republican party, whatever it may be. but that the biggest incentive is the political incentive. >> i don't think so. i'd certainly hope to think that that's not the case. i think that ultimately, i mean, first of all, this issue has been with us for a long, long time. it's not like it just came out of nowhere. we've been struggle with this. republicans and democrats have been struggling with it for a long time. and there are -- it is a serious issue as we, you know, fight two wars. well, i think we're still fighting two wars. combat operations in iraq have stopped. at the end of the day the bottom line has to be what -- what is best for the military? what's going to keep this country safe? >> but the military -- but we're passed that. the military has said it's fine. gates said it's fine. any meaningful military leader at this point is okay with it. just as we would defer to them as to the airplane design or anything else, if the guy in charge says it's okay, it's okay. anyway -- >> let me just say something. my position is i do think the military should make this

decision. and as long as they are not being pressured by civilian -- the civilian side to be politically correct or to somehow, you know, social engineering, i think they -- if they think gays in the military is fine, that's what it should be. >> they've said as much, right? anyway, let's move on to what voters want from their politicians, whoever those politicians may be. do they want compromise? do they want gridlock? depend on the party apparently. a new poll shows 66% of republican voters want their leaders to, quote, stand up to obama. only 29% want their leaders to work with him. across the aisle, just 43% of democrats say obama should stand up to the gop while 46% say he should work with them. matt lewis, this strikes me as one of those where the word game in the poll probably has a lot to do with what ultimately comes out of it. but what do you think is the distinction between democratic -- the democratic base and the republican base as to their expectations from their

leadership, period in this congress? >> well, some of this might just be that democrats right now are demoralized after the election and that conservatives are fired up and want to hit the ground running. but, look, i actually tend to think this poll is accurate. and if you look at the success of conservative talk radio, if you look at the success of some conservative, you know, television shows, versus, say, like liberal talk radio. i think a lot of times this is a microcosm here, dylan. a lot of liberals don't want to listen to the liberal version of rush limbaugh. they want to listen to npr. and i think that speaks to their temperament more than their ideology. a lot of liberals are sort of temperamentally modest iwould say is maybe a good way of putting it. conservatives are maybe more ready to fight right now. so i think that the poll very likely is accurate. >> sam go ahead. >> i think there's some truth to what matt is saying. i would describe it more that left leaning people tend to have

some measure of doubt. they're not so assured that they are right all the time. they have some type of humility and understanding that i can't have every single fact, i can't have everything. frankly, they want the country to move forward. on the right, there is a quality of zealotry, whether it has to do with gays in the military or their world view and imposing it upon others. i think this is a problem we've dealt with in this country. we have had the left in this country, however you want to define that, been willing to compromise on some level, to move forward. it's been that case for years and years and years. in the meantime, the right has been convinced that they have literally god on their side and whatever they deem is their values or their morality should be imposed upon others. >> interestingly, though, both democrats and republicans very happy to facilitate massive extraction of all the money from our country. >> well, that's a question -- >> that one doesn't seem to have a political bias. >> i agree with you.

i think there's a real problem with that in this country that covers -- that reaches into both. >> we get locked into some of these other debates. nobody is watching the store and they are robbing this country, start with bill clinton, through george bush and into barack obama while we play ping-pong with other things. last word to you mr. lewis. >> the real world implication here is if republicans -- if the republican base does not want to compromise and if the democratic base, by and large is willing to compromise, republicans are going to win more public policy battles than they lose. >> and i don't disagree with that. the question is whether those public policy battles will end up creating jobs and investment in this country or not. which, as you and i or all three of us know if it doesn't happen, the republicans are as good as dead, as sure as the democrats were and the republicans before them. i don't see how you create investment in this country without deal with the guerrillas in the room. thank you, sam. matt. good weekend. up next, virtual rock star. could the next lady gaga be a hologram?

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♪ looks like the next lady gaga could be a hologram. this is a virtual rock star. and she, or rather it, is playing sold-out shows all over japan. miko has a backup band playing live music and a live audience paying 50 bucks in real money, per ticket. but technical three, star of the show, not even singing. miku is a vocaloid. a voice synthesizer prommed by typing in lyrics and musical notes. so the performance may be fake but the fans really go nuts for it. miku spand bunch of cover band on facebook. she's got legions of followers. more than 50,000 facebook

friends. i'm not sure what i'm terrified more of, the weird hologram virtual apocalypse concerts or the fans playing dress-up. what i do know is that if the holograms are take over music, cable news surely is not far behind. still ahead here on the d.r. show. sarah palin, when she's not shooting skeet or hiking through bear country, she's weighing in on the fed and international monetary policy. toure has a few thoughts on this in his daily rant. it is friday, after all. first, a climate change scientist who says we have enough to worry about without overhyping the danger. all the hype makes rational solutions less likely, not more. not to mention it causes us to spend more money on things we don't need. maybe the problem with global warming is not just the global warming problem if you know what i'm saying. we'll talk to the man at the heart of this particular documentary. a controversial one at that, on global warming, after this.

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the ice is going to melt. >> the trees will die and fall down. >> countries will be under water. >> i'm scared that it's going to happen quite soon. >> fear has been ruling the climate debate. it's about time that we realize the current approach is broken. >> "cool it." that's the title of a new doultary on climate change and its message to all global warming fear mongers out there. in the film bjorn lomborg travels the globe in search of real solutions to global warming and in the process offering a fresh perspective on the way we think about the world around us. it also takes aim at the other climate change movie by al gore. joining us now, bjorn lomborg, a man called an environmental h

heretic and the devil incarnate for questioning the current debate. he is a professor at the university of our house in denmark and author of "the skeptal environmentalist." it's an absolute pleasure to meet you. what is wrong with the current debate? >> fundamentally people saying it's not happening at all or people saying it's the end of the world. both statements are wrong. we know the scientists are telling us global warming is real. it's a problem. we're making it and we need to tack tele. it's also wrong to scare people silly as we saw with those little kids and say it's the end of the world. we have to throw whatever money at it we possibly can. pan sick a very unlikely way to make good judgments. >> you actually argue in your film that the fearmongering to draw attention to global warming, while maybe attractive, well intend at tts outset becomes a barrier to solving the problem and results in spending a lot of money that doesn't solve the problem. >> the two ways we're solving global warming, and i'm putting it in quotation marks is we're

promising these grand carbon cuts which most politicians then don't do because it's great to promise but you don't actually want to spend the money. but to the extent you do spend the money which prints in the eu do. we're going to be spending $250 billion every year for the rest of the century. you know what the outxhf that will be? we'll reduce temperatures by one-tenth of 1 degree fahrenheit. we're spending $20 trillion and you won't be able to tell the difference in 100 years. >> sound like the american health care system. >> you said that. i'm not going to get into the american politics of it. but the second way we try to do this is by saying to people eoh, smart little simple things. change your light bulb, drive a prius. when al gore went to opractice, they went together you know, to shop at home depot and buy these energy sifg. >> problem solved? >> that's the sense you get. by all means, do this. they are great ideas but just let's not kid ourselves and believe that's what's going to fix global warming.

this is about changing the entire engine of growth for the last 200 years. it's about changing china and india. the only way we're going to do that is by dramatically increasing investment into green energy research and development. get technology to solve this problem. listen. solar panels cost ten times as much as fossil fuels right now. sow you get a few meaning western putting them up. imagine if we could get the price down to below pass toil fuels in the coming decades. everyone would buy them. we'd have solved the problem perform let's take another look at a clip of the movie. >> in many ways, fear has been ruling the climate debate. this is one picture which summarizes how a lot of people see global warming as this all-ending catastrophe. the tag line of al gore's film is, this is the most terrifying film you'll ever see.

>> what do you believe is the path to the innovative solution that you envision? what is the barrier to the beginning of the innovative solution that you envision? >> i believe it's about bridging these well-meaning people. lots of well-meaning people throughout. both who say let's not waste all this money and those who say this is terrifying. most people want to do good. but the point is, we've been failing for the last 18 years on tackling global warming because we've been trying the wrong way. maybe it's time to try a new approach. i helped organize some of the world's top climate economists, top economists, including three nobel laureates. they looked at all the ways we could tackle global warming. invest in research and development into green energy. that's about 500 times more good than the current approach. and the beautiful thing is, we can do this cheaper, more effectively and we can make our politicians do it. so there's this great quote from an american environmentalist. he says politicians are weather vains.

they just go wherever the wind blows. our job is to get the wind to blow in the right direction. i hope this film will get us to start saying we're not going to applaud politicians who just make empty promises of grand spending we will applaud politicians who make wise spending and invest more in research and development. >> if you look at the barrier that fear is to rational decision-making, which is basi basically what you are arguing if i invoke fear, get the blood to leave your brain, rushes into your legs. your leg veins dilate. legs full of blood. no blood in my brain. my lizard brain is in charge, i'm good to go and you noi have to make a bunch of decisions about carbon credits? >> you're not going to do very well. >> or war on terror or any other thing? why is fear such a liability when it comes to policy making cl weather it's global warming or anything else? >> first of all, it's great to get attention. that's what we've seen both with the iraq war and with global warming. but it's bad because this

panicked state doesn't mean we say, all right. let's just think about this. let's just think how we're going to do this. we make these grand gestures. every politician loves to stand there and say i'm going to save the world. at the end of the day it's about make these pragmatic, smart, middle of the road solutions. not panic. not deny the problem. but find smart solutions. and that's what this film is about. i really think there is a possibility for the vast majority of americans and people around the world to come together and realize smartness is hopefully not a democrat or republican trait. it's something we all can agree on. >> absolutely. bjorn, a true pleasure. congratulations on the film. bjorn lomborg. the book "the skeptical environmentalist." the movie "cool it." certainly worth a gander. just ahead here, forget corporate america, we should look for entrepreneurship and innovation in our high schools. no joke. maybe they'll solve global warming. we'll talk to a teenager who has become the new party king of new york city.

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time now for man versus internet. here's one response. here's one in response to our mix it up debite on don't ask, don't tell. >> i don't know why any gay soldier would fight for a country that refuses them their

rights and pursuit of happiness. again, i agree with sam seder on this. this is little more than a political prop for a certain political constituency that is looking for a way to project their fear and/or hatred of homosexuality. the balance of the country and the soldier for that matter don't seem to have any issue with this. logon. tweet us your thoughts. find me@dylan ratigan on the twitter. many of us looking hard to find the beating heart of real american capitalism. real entrepreneurship. real opportunism. maybe we should look at the high school kids. 15-year-old ricky smith on his way to taking over the teen party scene here in new york city. and make something pretty good dough in the process. his dance parties at clubs throughout the city attract hundreds of attendees, students. parents are on board as well with a strict policy of no drugs, no alcohol and no

smoking. makes me wonder why i didn't think of it way back when. probably because of all my drug use and smoking. i'm kidding. okay. here to tell us how ricky smith does it is none other than ricky smith. nice to see you, sir. >> nice to see you, too. >> how did this come to be? how did you end up where you are? >> i've always realized that you know, parents are very concerned about where their children are and what they are doing and they just want them to be safe. so i figured that if i can make something that's really fun for kids and parents are also okay with it without kids having the stigma of like, i'm doing something that my parents are okay or i'm in the kiddie pool basically. >> i hate that stigma. that's the worst stigma when you are 15? i would do this except my parents think it's okay and as a result, i cannot. >> you'd be surprised how -- >> it's a marketing challenge for you. >> exactly. i try to straddle the line and i realize that there's a big market for it. and -- >> where do you do it?

this is an expensive town. hodow you find a place? >> i've done two events at the altman building on 18th street. i've been another event in tribeca and our next event on november 27th will be at the voodoo lounge on 78th and first avenue. you were telling me before the commercial you have plans to try to continue the expansion of this party empire. >> i think that there are really a lot of places it could go. there's the opportunity for other cities. there's the opportunity for, you know, sponsorship and getting big corporations involved because there are certain products i know that kids use a lot. and it's -- it's sort of an in. and i think we could really do something great there. and tlair lot of places it could go. i'm really excited to see what happens. >> you also have differentiated yourself by forming a trust bridge with the parents and a trust bridge with the teachers. tell us a little bit about how you form that and how your able to form that and straddle the

line to create a dynamic product. >> i think another way that this came about is that i realized that all the teen parties that do exist right now, by club promoters, they are all adults. and why that's great and, obviously, a lot of -- most of the business in the country is through adults, obviously. >> you can trash talk the adults. it's fine. your day will come. go ahead, ricky. >> and i realize that it would work better if it was run through kids. and i think that it's a lot easier because, you know, i know the kids. it's not like they are going to someone's party they don't know. it's -- it works better that way because i do have -- i do know them. and i think -- >> is there competition? are there other ricky smiths working the streets of new york right now? >> well, i think the thing that sets me apart from the competition is that i do talk to parents. and i do try to keep things as open as possible, and i try to

make sure that everyone is comfortable with everything that's happening. i probably have gotten 30 to 40 calls from parents over the past few months and i try to answer everyone's questions. i take e-mails and i try to make sure that everybody is comfortable. >> what actually happens at these parties of yours, ricky? >> it's basically like a -- i guess you could say like a club environment. there's dancing and it's -- usually house music. and it's basically just a bunch of kids hanging out and dancing for a couple of hours. >> and the truth is you did this for the glory, the money or the girls, ricky? >> combination of the three. >> if you were to take your entrepreneurial spirit and then look at all the problems we talk about here on cable networks and all of the politicians, do you think you could solve global warming or something like that? >> oh, definitely. just hand it over. i'll figure it all out. >> we should start a competition. we'll get you and your buddies.

>> yeah, let's do it. >> get the health care system under control. you think you can pull that one. >> got some ideas. >> free energy. >> no problem. >> education? >> education igot. >> not an issue. >> anything you can't do, ricky? >> nope. can't vote. that's the only thing i can't do. >> that's true. ricky smith. an absolute pleasure. congratulations. not only on what you are doing but on your spirit and the role model you set for all of us, daum adults and students to apply ourselves to the environment we live in. thank you very much. coming up on "hardball," chris matthews weighing in on rush limbaugh accusing democrats of being racist. first, reality star and physical policy star. ♪ [ upbeat instrumental ] [ rattling ]

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tgif. thank god it is friday, which more than anything means my man toure's time has come for the daily rant. today, he's sharing his thoughts on the mamat famous housewife this week. first, she's a financial expert. she told fed chairman ben bernanke to, quote, cease and desist his pump priming and playing around with inflation because she's scared by quantitative easing, which is like using a magic money

printer. then she said this -- >> we should not be experimenting and playing around with inflation. it's not for nothing that reagan called it as violent as a mugger. as frightening as an armed robber and as deadly as a hit man. >> okay. reagan was talking about double-digit inflation, the '70s while the current consumer price index rose just over 8%. the lowest 12-month increase since march of 1961. but i'm not getting in between a mama grizzly and a good out of context quote. also this week, we saw sarah palin skeet shooting in alaska with her daughter. on her tlc travel show which premieres on sunday, we see pailin in the woods and the water, being outdoorsy and dispensing wisdom to her children. >> pull! yeah. pull! don't retreat. just reload. >> i love it when she says that. so we have palin the policy wonk

speaking truthiness to power and palin the folksy outdoorsy gal who is comfortable with a gun. what does this heady concoction of feets of strength and personal realities mean? she's priming the pump for a run for the presidency. hallelujah. i thought she was head faking a shine up her brand and plump up her bank account. but now i think she's going in like drake. she will be the best to po tential presidential political theater ever. and the only people happier about this than me are the people on the eighth floor, the people that work at "snl." watch closely. this ride may not last a long time. palin's unfavorable rating is at 52%. it's not like "dancing with the stars" where you get propelled forward on the strength of your personality no matter how well you dance. being in a presidential campaign is like being under a microscope where your intellect, integrity and character are tested on a minute by minute basis. put palin under that scope and i

predict she'll burn up in flames like a bug under a magnifying glass under the alaskan summer sun. >> do you truly think that her decision to sort of venture into economic punditry or policy of any ilk that is in that arena is valid interpretation for her presidential ambitions? >> absolutely. she's saying i'm a thinker. i have thoughts. i can opine and decide on the big meaty, intellectual issues of the day that a leader would have to. so, i mean, this, as much as anything, tells me she's really thinking about it. i hear mitt romney's people are taking her serious. she's going to be in this thing, too. but the numbers just aren't there, man. >> at the same time, for those who look and say, you may not think the numbers are there, but the numbers are more there for sarah palin than they are for virtually any other presidential candidate on the republican spectrum right now.

her name recognition is up. that her following is up. when you hear that rhetoric, what -- >> i mean, i've got to laugh. she's got the huge name recognition but so much of that name recognition is not positive. you know, when i put her up against romney, huckabee, pawlenty, now charlie crist is getting in there. i kind of laugh. i don't really think any of these people constitute a serious alternative to obama even as his unfavorables rise and people are like, i don't know if we want him again. but the republicans have to provide a serious alternative. and i don't see that on the horizon at all. and sarah pail sin definitely -- i mean, like, can you imagine 6 to 9 months of obama and palin talking back and forth through the media and campaigning? >> until we get to that, isn't -- i mean, we're sort of out into the future here anyway. but isn't there a huge incentive for the republican party to make sure she does not either run or

win the nomination for the very reason that you would be so entertained and so many others would consider the presidential election a foregone conclusion as opposed to a contest? >> i would completely agree, which is why i'm not going to say the gop shouldn't let her run. i want them to let her run and, i mean if it makes a presidential debate among the republicans a total farce and brings mitt romney down and brings huckabee down, then, let it go. >> isn't there something, though, with sarah palin. forget policy qualifications. forget the absurdity of reloading and the terrified mama grizzly. we've already proven that fear is a decision-making matrix tends to result in horrible things. but is there something valid underneath sarah palin, forget the personality, that goes to the sense of injustice that exists in this country, period. >> i mean she, clearly represents something real that the country feels. that the democrats and the

president are going to have to speak to. and we can't ignore