also our guest host for the morning, richard lefrak, the president of the lefrak organization and, yes let's look at equity futures at this hour. dow jones would open up down 68 points. i should say open up lower. it would open lower. michelle, back to you. >> let's get back to our conversation with representative paul ryan. your plan wasn't out and a week ago steve israel said already what you want to do is protect millionaires over medicare and he's taking issues with the reforms you want to put in place in medicare. it already started the whole pushing granny over the side of the cliff, et cetera. how are you going to combat this? this destroyed this argument last time. >> he standing here. i think he's going to come on and try to destroy what i'm trying to do. the president's health care law takes a trillion -- >> seniors who are watching right now, should they be worried? >> yes. >> should they be worried? >> yes. the president's health care lou lau puts new board of 15 bureaucrats in charge of price. we say get rid of the board, stop the raid, leave the program in tact for curren

richard lefrak will join us for two hours.dget committee chairman paul ryan will join us. and it's trump tuesday. a no holds barred interview with the donald. spot. you have to dig a little. fidelity's etf market tracker shows you the big picture on how different asset classes are performing, and it lets you go in for a closer look at areas within a class or sector that may be bucking a larger trend. i'm stephen hett of fidelity investments. the etf market tracker is one more innovative reason serious investors are choosing fidelity. get 200 free trades today and explore your next investing idea. ♪ ( whirring and crackling sounds ) man: assembly lines that fix themselves. the most innovative companies are doing things they never could before, by building on the cisco intelligent network. i'm giving you the silent treatment. so you're calling to tell me the silent treatment? ummm, yeah. jen, this is like the eighth time you've called... no, it's fine, my family has free unlimited mobile-to-any-mobile minutes -- i can call all i

i've done them with george perez and michael and gill desser, richard lefrak, a friend of mine. and i think doral within two years will be the best resort in the country. >> donald, thank you very much. i did see you tweeted yesterday that the mira logo has been nominated as one of the top 100 buildings. >> and it's on its way to being number one after the people vote so that will be good. >> we will see you back here next week. >> congratulations, donald. >> speaking of architecture, google today, 126th birthday for architecture. the country itself sits on the edge of economic reform. michelle caruso-cabrera is in cuba. hey, michelle. >> hey there, joe. coming up, we're going to tell you the latest on the pope. man was taken away at the mass last night. we'll tell you what that's about. and we're going to take a look at a lot of the seized properties that castro took back in the 60s. what do those properties look like now? we'll show you when "squawk box" comes right back. >>> >>> welcome back to cnbc "squawk box." i'm michelle caruso-cabrera live in havana, cuba. pope benedict

a very special thanks to our guest host, richard lefrak. make sure you join us tomorrow. "squawk on the street" begins right now. >> thanks for coming in. >>> good morning and welcome to "squawk on the street" on this, the first day of spring 2012. certainly fe lly feels like it new york city, at least. carl quintanilla and david faber are both off today. futures moving lower this morning. decline in february housing starts certainly not helping malters. right now looking at a lower open on the dow by about 78 points. as for europe, we're seeing pressure on bankers. in particular miners. we are, in fact, seeing the ripple effects coming out of china this morning. comments from a bhp executive about slowing demand for iron ore is sending miners lower. also vehicle sales forecast sending those shares lower as well. dollar moving higher, meantime. luxury, demand is still intact. that's what tiffany's said wits rosey outlook. sales in asia up 19%. new york flagship store saw a 20% rise in fiscal fourth quarter. positive sign for brokers coming out of jeffries this morning. ma