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.
VP'S SCARE TACTICS FAIL AS SENATE VOTES DOWN JOBS BILL
CHARLES PAYNE: You haven't seen it like this before. The Vice President of the United States suggesting that republicans are responsibly or would be responsible for rap, which by the way, is not even an economic crime., but somehow they are encouraging more rape of women. Then they are going to a fourth grade school room and talk to these kids. I remember when Senator Obama was running for office. He said wives and kids are off limits. Now, you can use women in the idea that they could be raped to push through a jobs bill? This is despicable stuff.
BEN STEIN: There are two issues here. One, if police are being laid off they should not be laid off. And if Vice President Biden said we should put out money to keep police from being laid off, he's totally correct. I am always on the side of the police and I think we should not let them be laid off. But, if he's saying if you don't pass the jobs bill people will riot in the streets and there will be social anarchy, that is virtually criminal in and of itself. That is virtually criminal to try to threaten the middle class people of America with mob violence if their representatives don't pass the jobs bill. That is extremely bad behavior.
DAGEN MCDOWELL: It's crazy. It's crazy talk. But you know what? These scare tactics work. TARP, stimulus, the sky is falling, the world's going to come to an end, healthcare, etc. But now people are becoming numb to it, so you have to turn up the volume.
ADAM LASHINSKY: Scare tactics are nothing new and, by the way, they are not exclusive to the democrats. In the last administration we had an administration using scare tactics to take away civil liberties from its citizens.
CHARLIE GASPARINO: Let's try for a second to take him seriously. His argument is that if the economy is bad, it generally leads to higher crime rates. Now, we just have to look if that's historically accurate. The 1960s was a time of pretty good economy and we had massive increases in crime.
STOCKS BARELY BUDGE ON NEWS OF QADDAFI'S DEATH
CHARLES PAYNE: They are focusing on a different war-the war on success and the war on America. The night before, Wyn Casinos reported their earnings and Steve Wynn went off. He went crazy. And he talked about this war on achievement in this country and on businesses. This is why the market has been sort of grinding its gears. There was a time when getting Qaddafi or killing Osama Bin Laden would have been good for 500 DOW points.
BEN STEIN: The market exists to discount future earnings and to tell people the value of future earnings of American corporations. This had absolutely no effect on that whatsoever. I agree that it should have just been a rousing cheer going up from the trading floor, if machines can cheer. But, it has no effect on corporate earnings and hence no effect on the market whatsoever. I don't think the fall of a dictator anywhere would move the markets at this point.
DAGEN MCDOWELL: I'd argue that if you're going to worry and fret about what's going on in Africa and the Middle East, you're going to worry a whole lot more about Iran, particularly with the assassination plot that was revealed, the amount of oil that the country produces and then you look to Libya. Who is going to fill the vacuum? There is no system of government in place. There are a lot of unanswered questions and a lot of uncertainty.
ADAM LASHINSKY: The real news here is when he fell from power and he was neutralized and the stocks did go up a little bit in February. This is just one factor. His getting killed is essentially old news or irrelevant. He wasn't causing any problems anymore. The threat of terrorism is far lower than it was. The President announced last week that we're getting out of Iraq completely. It's not over, but it's better.
CHARLIE GASPARINO: Catching him really has no impact.
PROTESTERS ACCUSED OF SELECTIVE OUTRAGE TOWARDS CAPITALISM
CHARLES PAYNE: Ultimately, the hypocrisy that Charlie talked about is why this thing is going to fail. I've seen it in the black community where there's good white people and bad white people depending on what political party they're associated with. When you protest millionaires in New York City and you don't go to Brian Roberts home, the top corporate bundler for President Obama who made 28 million dollars last year, you don't go to George Soros' house, you only go to people you think are registered republicans, your message is muddled.
BEN STEIN: Banks do a terrible job explaining what they do. Banks should do what the oil and gas companies have done and try to explain what they do. They do serve some purposes, but they're not explaining it at all. They are just portrayed as vampires. They've got to do a better job at explaining what their social utility is.
DAGEN MCDOWELL: The funny thing is, there was no more ruthless a businessman than Steve Jobs. In the new book about him, he comes out and says 'I am going to kill android. I am willing to go thermo nuclear war on this,' because he said Google basically stole the iphone's technology and then they worship Steve Jobs.
ADAM LASHINSKY: I don't think it's that complicated. These people actually are capitalists. They like Apple. They don't like banks. No body likes banks.
CHARLIE GASPARINO: If you go down there and interview those folks, which I have, they have lots of selective outrage. It's a very muddled message. They know very little about economics. They know a lot about Marxism and they know a lot about collectivism. That's the scary part about this. They're hypocrites too. They celebrate capitalism, which they say they hate and, at the same time, they're bashing it.
STOCKS TO SOAR PAST SOCIAL SECURITY'S 3.6 HIKE
CHARLES PAYNE: Freeport-McMoran (FCX)
ADAM LASHINSKY: Seagate Technology (STX)
BEN STEIN: Vanguard Total Stock (VTI)
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