Home interest rates hit the highest since 2002.

0:00 Speaker 1 With us today is Steve Forbes, and there’s so many problems going on in the world. I don’t know where we start. Steve Forbes, what is your biggest concern? What keeps you up at three o’clock.

0:15 Speaker 2 In the morning, Other than the state of the New York Yankees and the New York Mets, what keeps me up is the grab by the government the control of the economy march you might call modern socialism. They’re doing it through regulation. You have the EPA trying to use regulations to disband gasoline powered automobiles and force us in

0:39 the evs. You have other agencies putting on huge controls on the economy. And those bills that Congress passed, the Chips Act and the so called Inflation Reduction Act, are providing John hundreds of billions of dollars in cash and subsidies that are going to be made available to private companies if they play ball with the federal government. If

1:03 you’re in a business and your competitors are getting lots of money, free money from Uncle Sam, you’re gonna have to feel you’re gonna have to do the same thing to stay competitive. So it’s a way for the government to get control of the economy without approval of Congress, and few people are paying much attention to it. Yeah,

1:19 they see subsidies, but they don’t realize this is not just about subsidies. This is about controlling huge pieces of the American economy, starting with the auto industry.

1:30 Speaker 1 Well, it happens electric vehicles. Ford made a decision that they’ve been losing in the last two quarters, it was like seven eight billion dollars, and he decided that they’re not going to do electric vehicles going forward, didn’t do more hybrids, and Toyota chairman decided that they’re going to give people a choice whether they want diesel, whether they

1:54 want hybrid, or whether they want electric vehicle ordinary gas.

2:00 Speaker 2 What else have you heard, Well, what you find is that these auto executives are finally waking up that they should pay attention to their customers who prefer the internal combustion engine i e. Gasoline and diesel using those fossil fuels.

2:18 But the APA has come out with a regulation seven hundred pages that mandates that by twenty thirty two, virtually no new cars can be sold in the US that are powered by fossil fuels, which is just preposterous, And the government is continuing to do these regulations, forcing companies to do things they wouldn’t do otherwise. You see it

2:42 in banking, you see it in high tech, you see it in the chip making industry. Boy, they are really a bit debate. Oh, we’re going to get this free money. Then they find out Uncle Sam tells them what your policies are on personnel, on the parental leave, and the like.

2:59 Uncle Sam does not give money any more than Tony Soprano gives money without a price.

3:05 Speaker 1 Definitely it there’s always a price. And what I’ve noticed, by the way, on Friday, the thirty year mortgage was over seven percent. Who’s going to buy houses? I mean, are we leaving to destroying our economy because we’re destroying almost every sector.

3:26 Speaker 2 Yes, And they’re putting on regulations in every household appliance, anything that makes life easier they want they seem to want to destroy. And that’s what the Republicans have to hammer home. Whether it’s energy, whether it’s automobiles, whether it’s your dishwasher, whether it’s your shower heads, whatever, these people are trying to control without the consent of the government,

3:47 without the consent of the people. We saw what they did with gas stoves. They said, oh, we’re not going to abolish gas stoves. However, they put in regulations that would make a legal ninety six percent of gas stoves that are out there as we know, a new they’re trying to do away with our traditional pizzas. These people

4:03 are stopping at nothing, and they’re turning us into European style economies where instead of the usual three and a half four percent we’ve done historically, we’re going to be a punk rate of barely one percent. And that’s not America, and it’s bad for us and it’s bad for the world.

4:18 Speaker 1 On Friday, China is big property company Evergrand file for bankruptcy and it’s billions and billions of binions. What’s going on? I mean, didn’t by the Fed raising the rates so fast so high, doesn’t that cause the bankruptcies in the real estate industry?

4:42 Speaker 2 Sure it does because for a generation, especially in commercial real estate you mentioned housing as well, we had suppressed interest rates and as a result that people got used to having virtually free money. But as you know, in the commercial real estate sector, there’s a over hundred billions of dollars of loans that are going to be reset

5:02 in terms of interest rates, which is going to and you already have the company still having a problem getting people coming back to the office. We see what’s happening in midtown Manhattan, and so you put that together, high vacancy rates, higher costs of your debts, your mortgages, got a real crisis. And that’s why the Federal Reserve should

5:22 leave interest rates alone, let the marketplace set interest rates, and stop trying to hurt the economy. The Fed still believes you got to slow the economy down to fight inflation. All that does is create more poverty, political problems, and because of those problems, you get more spending.

5:39 Speaker 1 You’re going to create a recession, possibly even worse than recession by trying to bring down Well, the the CPI was like three percent. I mean, I’m satisfied at this point in three percent versus destroying our economy.

5:56 Speaker 2 Well, that’s right, and they they should just let the marketplace settle things. As you know, in a real marketplace, if something is desirable, people will buy more of it. The prices may go up. Companies figure out how to make it better cheaper, and let the free people decide these things, not unelected bureaucrats were more interested in control

6:20 than they are in their general prosperity. This is what made America, and you’re an example of it, the most mighty nation in the world. Was precisely that people anywhere, from any background could have a chance to make something of themselves, do something unusual without government permission. They just went out and tried it, and their success is our success,

6:41 everyone’s success.

6:43 Speaker 1 Steve Phillips, thank you for coming on. And we pray for America. Let’s hope that the leadership in Washington does the right thing so America doesn’t suffer and Americans don’t suffer anymore.

6:56 Speaker 2 That’s right. Absolutely, Casimatini’s for president. Thank you, thank you. I