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Published June 19, 2017
DISCLAIMER: THE FOLLOWING "Cost of Freedom Recap" CONTAINS STRONG OPINIONS WHICH ARE NOT A REFLECTION OF THE OPINIONS OF FOX NEWS AND SHOULD NOT BE RELIED UPON AS INVESTMENT ADVICE WHEN MAKING PERSONAL INVESTMENT DECISIONS. IT IS FOX NEWS' POLICY THAT CONTRIBUTORS DISCLOSE POSITIONS THEY HOLD IN STOCKS THEY DISCUSS, THOUGH POSITIONS MAY CHANGE. READERS OF "Cost of Freedom Recap" MUST TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR OWN INVESTMENT DECISIONS.
New Calls to Monitor Social Media More Closely in Wake of Attack on GOP Lawmakers
STEVE FORBES: Obviously they can improve things, but you are never going to get everyone. But the key thing is you do try to see trip wires, and also do a better job in trying to find these terrorist sites, how they use them and how they communicate with each other. Obviously there’s no silver bullet sadly to speak of on this kind of thing where you get a fool proof way of doing it, but they can do more. The other thing they should be doing David in the future is cooperate with authorities when you do get an incident like out in San Bernardino, and open up those cell phones on a case by case basis. Common sense will go a long ways.
JOHN TAMNY: Anytime they gang together to reduce our individual freedoms for something that is wholly symbolic there’s a lot wrong with it. We have a drug war right now where the Feds catch a lot of drug dealers but that doesn’t dampen drug use in the US. The idea that they could spot the eventual killers from thousands of communications is laughable to give away a freedom that will not make us anymore safe.
RICH KARLGAARD: I’m glad you draw a distinction between the terrorism groups, the declared enemies of the United States, and this nut who shot Congressman Scalise. Because if you’re going to try to catch the nuts you’re going to have to sweep up millions of people who have said pretty similar things about President Trump and this administration, literally every crazy uncle at every Thanksgiving party talks like that. But I think it’s appropriate for Facebook and the social media giants to be a little more cooperative, you know, with great success comes great responsibility.
ELIZABETH MACDONALD: I agree, I don’t think we should have the government stepping in here. You’re right, Facebook is using a more powerful algorithm to weed out terrorist propaganda without human review. If they can do that to find the threats, yeah, I think the company should do that on their own. I would say this is the D.C. gotcha politics media machine nexus has got to stop. There’s a vicious cycle going on, the media there knows that they play gotcha politics, TV, the politicians play into it. Not every policy difference is a matter of life and death. Bernie Sanders said ObamaCare reform is going to kill thousands of people, climate change is going to lead to mass extinction according to Jill Stein. It’s the politicians who have to stand down on that rhetoric and knock it off.
BIL BALDWIN: I’m not worried you know if you mail a threat to the White House you get visited by the police. Why should a digital threat be any different? So yes, the FBI and Facebook should be monitoring online threats just the way they now monitor online offers to sell opioids or explosives.
BRUCE JAPSEN: Well I think they will get better at this, I mean to our audience that doesn’t understand what’s going on with artificial intelligence. They’re using this more in the health care space and Steve knows that at the Forbes health care summit IBM Watson gave a presentation where they can analyze claims and they can see patterns of behavior. It may not catch a terrorist but they can certainly find someone who needs treatment and is not getting it.
Some Democrats Sue Pres Trump Over Foreign Business Dealings
STEVE FORBES: Absolutely not, David. Nobody had even heard of emoluments until after the election, trying to find ways to discredit Donald Trump. The fact of the matter is he has not taken money from governments which is what this is supposed to prevent, direct bribes and the like. He has extensive holdings throughout the world. You hold a Trump reception somewhere throughout the world, it’s not money into his pockets, and he’s got his sons running it anyway. And I love it, the Democrats Hillary Clinton took $675,000 for three speeches at Goldman. It’s not because she was a dazzling speaker, they wanted it because they thought she was going to be the next president of the United States.
BRUCE JAPSEN: I don’t think so. I think it’ll be a historic lawsuit if they win, but I think given what’s going on -- but I think what bugs people about this is that this is sort of a disregard for ethical norms and given what’s going on this week with now he’s admitting on Twitter that he’s under investigation for obstruction of justice and people want to see the tax returns, we don’t know what he owns, we don’t know what his conflicts are.
JOHN TAMNY: Yeah this is all partisanship and of course they violate the clause now in theory simply because at least since President Nixon every ex-president has gotten rich out of office, so based on that you could say that every president is violating some kind of conflict or emolument clause simply because you could say every decision they’re making has to do with future earnings after office. In Trump’s case, he doesn’t need future earnings.
SABRINA SCHAEFFER: Well I think some people would like to see this move into a blind trust, but I think the larger point is unlike presidents in the past, especially in the early republic which people have pointed to who have had business interest government has grown so large that it’s almost impossible for someone from the business world to come to Washington to serve in the White House and not have some kind of conflict of interest. When government is in the business of health care, and of energy, and education there’s literally nothing they don’t touch so it makes it impossible to find and attract and retain people here who don’t have a conflict of interest.
RICH KARLGAARD: Well I think Donald Trump hurts himself with some of these tweets, I don’t think he should have picked a fight with the FBI. But look on this Trump is not a boy scout, there’s no casino owner in the world that’s a boy scout the only issue that matters is whether Trump colluded with Russia to subvert democracy. There’s no evidence of that, probing into his financial past is a waste of taxpayer money.
ELIZABETH MACDONALD: Well I don’t know how they have standing to prove that they were personally harmed, that’s what they have to prove. And by the way the Founding Fathers I believe the first five had plantations and farms, they kept their businesses, they were not found to be violating this emoluments clause, which sounds like a margarine brand. This is his business transactions, I think that it’s going to be tough to prove foreign government official went to his hotel because he’s president, that’s the case they are trying to make here.
President Trump Launches Apprenticeship Program in Effort to Fill Jobs Gap
RICH: No it’s not and you know where those jobs are? They’re in the skilled trades, and we have a terrible mismatch between the number of skilled trades jobs that employers can’t fill and the people who are qualified for them. There’s only one out of 20 public high schools has a vocational track today so we really need something like this apprenticeship program.
BRUCE JAPSEN: Well this made me yearn, hearing the words apprentice and Donald, it made me yearn for the days he was back hosting a TV show. I would just say this would work if these businesses are going to get a tax credit of some variety or a grant and then perhaps elevate that a little more if they’re hired on permanently I don’t know if there is any teeth behind this either way.
ELIZABETH MACDONALD: Well what they’re going to do is streamline possibly get rid of those 43 different jobs programs stretched across 13 agencies curtail the labor department’s budget. There is something like 6 million jobs that are vacant in these trades that need bodies put in there, so I think this is a smart move. And there’s nobility and integrity to doing and making things with your own hands.
STEVE FORBES: That’s right David, one of the things the president is proposing is doing away with all the regulatory barriers and they’ve got to do it on the state level as well. Some states are doing it, Connecticut for example has restrictions on the number of apprentices a company can hire now they’re in the process of increasing those numbers.
BILL BALDWIN: Good, even if it does use taxpayer money. I’d much rather have my taxpayer money being used to promote training in let’s just say nursing or plumbing then have it all spent on reducing college debt for studying post-colonial depression studies.
SABRINA SCHAEFFER: Well I mean I like the idea of apprenticeships but I think that the market is already handling this. But for the last 8 years the administration has been sort of at war with for-profit colleges, these are institutions that provide skills based training all of the time, in areas that we really need from behavioral sciences to medical care, and Washington has really been giving them a hard time. I think yesterday or earlier this week Secretary DeVos took the first step to removing the gainful employment lie, I think that is a really important first step to helping a lot of people.
Father’s Day Picks
ELIZABETH MACDONALD: PARNASSUS MID CAP
BILL BALDWIN: POLARIS
https://www.foxnews.com/transcript/new-calls-to-monitor-social-media-more-closely-in-wake-of-attack-on-gop-lawmakers