This is a rush transcript from "Your World With Neil Cavuto," March 30, 2010. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
NEIL CAVUTO, ANCHOR: Forty-five minutes away from seeing France, but is it getting harder now to see the difference with France?
Welcome, everybody. I’m Neil Cavuto.
In just moments, President Obama and French President Nicolas Sarkozy, they’re going to be addressing reporters at the White House. Sarkozy is urging the U.S. to work together to invent what he calls the new rules for the global economy of tomorrow.
Now, President Obama appears to be doing that already, just today signing a bill that not only gives the government a lot more control of health care, but also takes over student loans. In fact, it seems the two countries aren’t that far apart at all on a lot of things. Let’s see. Government run health care, check. Big incentives to unions, check. Jobless rates at or near double digits, check. A top tax rate at or near 40 percent, check. Government spending as a growing part of GDP, check. Deficits, well, here, we actually got France beat. Go, USA. Check.
Not much a surprise to one Steve Forbes. He says we’re not quite France yet, but we are Louis XIV.
Steve, man, I’m — I was looking at all these comparisons, and I said, man, oh, man, that’s pretty amazing.
STEVE FORBES, PRESIDENT & CEO, FORBES INC.: Well, it is amazing. And, unfortunately, the president and others around him and part of the Democratic Party has this feeling that Western Europe is the model to go.
Bill Clinton, for example, was very enamored with the German welfare state. President Obama is now meeting with Sarkozy, with France, and yet this is a part of the world that, in terms of entrepreneurship, in terms of innovation, creation, has been lagging the rest of — certainly lagging the United States and parts of Asia.
And in terms of employment, in a normal economy, U.S. employment rates are much higher than those of Western Europe. So, whether it’s wealth creation, opportunity creation, job creation, when we do it our way, it goes our way.
CAVUTO: You know, it’s interesting, because there is this new push, certainly in Europe, for individual country leaders — Britain and France come to mind, less so in Germany with Angela Merkel — to think of themselves as leaders of the new world order. And they want Barack Obama in that club, where the U.S. is less of a single country leader, as much as a co-global player.
What do you make of that?
FORBES: Well, it’s one way to, in their minds, tie down the United States. And they also think that, if they’re in charge, things will go better.
Well, Louis XIV, whatever he did, he did unify the country, but he destroyed it ultimately by this centralized bureaucracy that he created. So, it’s a new take on Marx. That is, instead of the workers of the world unite, bureaucrats of the world unite. Let’s take it over.
God help us.
CAVUTO: But every day was a good hair day for Louis XIV. And we always forget that.
(LAUGHTER)
CAVUTO: Now, could I ask you this, though? Going forward, if Barack Obama signs on to this idea that the U.S. has got to play this bigger co- global role, where — where they’re all seeing themselves as globalists — and that’s the big question, less American, less French, less British, less German, less — where we’re globalists — what is the harm in that?
You hear from administration types, at least the gardener who calls me back, that that’s a worthy goal and good for the world. What do you think?
FORBES: Well, if they want to get together and have apple strudel or something in Germany or a nice meal in France or spaghetti in Italy, that’s fine. No one is against that.
CAVUTO: Why did you put my people last, the Italians?
(LAUGHTER)
CAVUTO: I just found it curious. But continue.
(LAUGHTER)
FORBES: But, you know, the — the U.S. has certain unique attributes.
We’re a country where entrepreneurship, the ability to innovate, has been without parallel in the world. And we’re losing those advantages by raising taxes, putting in crazy regulations, having the government nationalize more of the economy.
We know those things don’t work, so why don’t we play to our strengths, instead of trying to do what everyone else does? We’re individualists. We don’t follow the crowd. We create the crowd by doing things right here.
CAVUTO: I don’t know if we’re doing that anymore.
Steve, always good seeing you, my friend. Thank you very much.
FORBES: Thank you, Neil.
CAVUTO: Steve Forbes.
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