Speaker 1: Local business news twenty four hours a day at Bloomberg
Speaker 1: dot com, the Radio plus mobile app, and on your radio.
Speaker 1: This is a Bloomberg Business Flash and I'm Karen Moscow.
Speaker 1: This updates brought to you by Marks penn of LLLP,
Speaker 1: ranked among the top three forensic accounting firms in New
Speaker 1: York by the New York Law Journal for the six
Speaker 1: year in a row. Visit Marks Penneth dot com. Fiat
Speaker 1: Chrysler Automobiles managed another US sales gain in February, extending
Speaker 1: its streaked to seventy one months, driven by promotions tied
Speaker 1: to the President's Day holiday and continued strong demand for
Speaker 1: Jeep sport utility vehicles and Ram pickups and vans. Sales
Speaker 1: climbs twelve percent Redefined Properties, a grain device of real
Speaker 1: estate company Echo Prime Properties for a value of one
Speaker 1: point three billion dollars to boost international expansion. US DOT
Speaker 1: Index futures, meanwhile, are higher, with smp EMNI futures of
Speaker 1: thirteen points. Dow EMUNI futures are up one seven. NAZ
Speaker 1: Documity futures up twenty eight to take your treasury down
Speaker 1: to thirty seconds the year one point seven four percent
Speaker 1: NIMEX screwed oil up one per cent or sixty cents
Speaker 1: at thirty thirty five, A barrel comic schooled up eight
Speaker 1: ten percent or nine dollars forty cents at twelve forty three.
Speaker 1: Eight announced the euro at dollar oh eight seven seven,
Speaker 1: the en one thirteen point oh four, and Canada's economy
Speaker 1: i'd expectedly grew in the fourth quarter as a week dollar,
Speaker 1: reduced imports by the most and six years taking pressure
Speaker 1: off the Central Bank to cut interest rates to a
Speaker 1: record low. And that's a blue bird business flash. Tom
Speaker 1: and Mike Karen, thanks so much from Washington this morning.
Speaker 1: We tell you it is eight forty eight on Wall Street. Well,
Speaker 1: we've got a technical difficulty this morning in New York
Speaker 1: that sometimes happens. Can tell you our technical director will
Speaker 1: be upon it. Mike, why don't you bring in our
Speaker 1: good guest. Is William Cohen going on here today? Uh,
Speaker 1: it's very appropriate to talk to um. Well, I guess
Speaker 1: you'd called him Secretary, Senator, Congressman Cohen because he served
Speaker 1: in all of those roles Congressman and senator from the
Speaker 1: state of Maine before becoming the Secretary of Defense. Uh.
Speaker 1: And he served under both parties he served as Secretary
Speaker 1: of Defense under democratic administrations and senator as as the
Speaker 1: political parties fight it out on this Super Tuesday, I
Speaker 1: UH am of mind of Senator Arthur Vandenberg and his
Speaker 1: famous victim that politics stops at the water's edge. A
Speaker 1: lot of people talk about that, but they don't talk
Speaker 1: about the fact that he was a tremendous isolationist UH
Speaker 1: when the country was heading into World War Two. It
Speaker 1: was after the war that he became an internationalist and
Speaker 1: led the Republican Party in that direction. I'm wondering if
Speaker 1: we can, if that can happen, if we can get
Speaker 1: back to that in the future, because there's sure is
Speaker 1: a move towards isolationism right now. UH welcome disengagement. I
Speaker 1: think that's the way it's phrased now and a very
Speaker 1: mistaken policy. The world has become much more integrated economically,
Speaker 1: to be sure, and the notion that somehow we can
Speaker 1: simply retreat to the continental cocoon of the United States
Speaker 1: and watch events unfold on Bloomberg or CNN, etcetera is
Speaker 1: is full hearty. What is most disturbing to me is
Speaker 1: to watch this political process of ours UH and do
Speaker 1: not feel a deep sense of embarrassment and shame. The
Speaker 1: level of rhetoric taking place during these primaries has been embarrassing.
Speaker 1: I I was in Europe in Munich two weeks ago
Speaker 1: a major security conference. I think all of our allies
Speaker 1: who were there are puzzled, embarrassed for us that the
Speaker 1: people who are running for high office have been reduced
Speaker 1: to caricatures. And I think it does not bode well
Speaker 1: for the United States. So at the political level, I
Speaker 1: think we've got we've seen it a a a defining
Speaker 1: of decency down to paraphrase former Senator Moyne Hans phrase,
Speaker 1: and we have lost our sense of what our role
Speaker 1: in the world is, and so other countries look to
Speaker 1: the United States for leadership. Well, there is a sentiment
Speaker 1: of being expressed by candidates whore running today, especially in
Speaker 1: the Republican Party, that we need to disengage from a
Speaker 1: world affairs and focus solely on the United States. Big mistake.
Speaker 1: What what should our role be? If you were a
Speaker 1: candidate for president, what would you be telling the American
Speaker 1: people about in a in a world, a multipolar world now,
Speaker 1: about the United States role and its abilities to carry
Speaker 1: out that role, or in a nonpolar world, which is
Speaker 1: just as bad, if not worse, namely where you have
Speaker 1: no country that is able to exercise a major influence
Speaker 1: on shaping events that produce a more peaceful environment. My
Speaker 1: advice to any president is to be engaged in the
Speaker 1: world affairs and to go to the American people and
Speaker 1: explain what it means. Right now, there was a sense
Speaker 1: of nationalism building in the United States on the United States.
Speaker 1: It's all over the world. You can see it in
Speaker 1: the Baltic countries. You can see it now in Germany,
Speaker 1: you can see it in Greece because of what has
Speaker 1: taken place. So what has to happen. The United States
Speaker 1: is the only country that can take a leadership role
Speaker 1: at this point to try uh and and build a
Speaker 1: system or create a new system whereby we can promote commerce,
Speaker 1: peace stability. And right now there's a notion that we've
Speaker 1: been overcommitted in time to recommit ourselves in build nation
Speaker 1: building at also the mistake just the president, you need
Speaker 1: to have the best possible people giving you advice and
Speaker 1: rebuild your military capability because it has been heard very
Speaker 1: badly by the sequester across the Pacome. Mr Secretary, I
Speaker 1: have to rip up the script. It is time for
Speaker 1: this new san Whenever anyone's views. You are more qualified,
Speaker 1: literally than anyone I know, to speak of this. I
Speaker 1: believe you grew up in the strangest of households Russian, Irish,
Speaker 1: Jewish Protestant. You then went on and one time I
Speaker 1: saw you you said, look, this future is a brown America.
Speaker 1: You are married to the absolutely lovely Miss Langhart Uh
Speaker 1: for as she's forty nine. I believe in holding last
Speaker 1: I knew Secretary Cohen with what you have heard the
Speaker 1: thirty nine excuse me, surveillance mistake. What you have heard
Speaker 1: in the last couple of weeks strikes home to you
Speaker 1: with the diversity of the Cohen experience. If Mr Trump
Speaker 1: becomes your nominee, can you support him? Uh? That would
Speaker 1: be very difficult for me, given what he has been saying,
Speaker 1: appealing to very racist sentiments that are still are quite
Speaker 1: prevalent in many parts of the country. Uh. To label
Speaker 1: all Mexicans to be potential rapists, all potential immigrants coming
Speaker 1: from the Middle East to be incipient terrorists, I think
Speaker 1: this is this is not good to the country and
Speaker 1: it's certainly it is not a brand of leadership that
Speaker 1: I would be supporting. How did we get here? I
Speaker 1: think a combination of things. I think what has happened
Speaker 1: it started many years ago. But I think the whole
Speaker 1: notion of degrading the government UH, and it started with
Speaker 1: perhaps Senator Goldwater UH and President Reagan really fed into that,
Speaker 1: saying that your problem is the government is a problem,
Speaker 1: not the solution. And I think I've always believed that
Speaker 1: the government is uh is your enemy until you need
Speaker 1: a friend. And we've got to have a balance here
Speaker 1: that you need government for a number of important functions,
Speaker 1: but that government's hand has to be light and not
Speaker 1: too heavy. But the notion of degrading government, I'm running
Speaker 1: against Washington. I'm i'm i'm. I believe the entire system
Speaker 1: is correc up. I think they're the system is corrupt
Speaker 1: in the sense that a few people can raise a
Speaker 1: billion dollars UH and thereby have undue influence on the
Speaker 1: entire political process. So there's that element to it. I
Speaker 1: think we really have to get back to saying, are
Speaker 1: we a United States for America's at e furbouse union
Speaker 1: or is it eurbouse purse from many many? Uh? And
Speaker 1: we we become fractured in that sense that I don't
Speaker 1: know that we have, uh, the ability or the willingness
Speaker 1: to say, hey, it's one America. We have our preferences.
Speaker 1: My goodness, there are big issues out there, and we're
Speaker 1: talking about whether the size of somebody's hands or whether
Speaker 1: the color of their face or hair. I mean, it's absurd. Now,
Speaker 1: this goes back again the Secretary Cohen's book with his wife,
Speaker 1: Love in Black and White, which was out a few
Speaker 1: years ago. Secretary Cohen, thank you so much for joining
Speaker 1: us today. William Cohen, of course of me, as was
Speaker 1: the Angist king who we spoke of. Or that's a
Speaker 1: wonderful Michael, just a great conversation to have after what
Speaker 1: we've seen the last couple of weeks. But somebody from
Speaker 1: the foreign policy side, and again he gets back to
Speaker 1: Arthur Vandenberg in his view in the ninety fifties of
Speaker 1: politics stops at the water's edge. We can't even get
Speaker 1: outside of the capital. Yeah, that would be the debate
Speaker 1: as well. Right now from Washington, it is eight fifty
Speaker 1: six on Wall Street. The following is from Bloomberg View.
Speaker 1: Opinions and commentary from Bloomberg columnists I'm Justin Fox, a
Speaker 1: columnist for Bloomberg view. The cities with the healthiest job
Speaker 1: markets are often those with the least affordable real estate. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: cities were housing is inexpensive usually don't have a lot
Speaker 1: of great jobs on offer. Still, I figured there had
Speaker 1: to be some places where jobs are plentiful and housing
Speaker 1: a lot cheaper than in Boston or New York or
Speaker 1: San Francisco. So I went looking for them in the data,
Speaker 1: using a Brookings Institution report to identify metropolitan areas with
Speaker 1: better than average economic growth since two thousand nine and
Speaker 1: a National associ Station of Realtors report to identify those
Speaker 1: with more affordable than average housing, and then sifted out
Speaker 1: the areas with a below average share of college graduates
Speaker 1: because education levels are a good indicator of job quality.
Speaker 1: Five metropolitan areas met my test Cincinnati and Columbus, Ohio, Minneapolis, Omaha,
Speaker 1: and Pittsburgh. None of these is what you'd call a boomtown.
Speaker 1: Columbus is the fastest growing of the bunch, and it's
Speaker 1: only the twentieth fastest growing large metro area nationwide, But
Speaker 1: these places all have unemployment rates well below the national average,
Speaker 1: with Omaha's the lowest at just three. They could grow
Speaker 1: faster if only more people moved there. So what are
Speaker 1: you waiting for? I'm justin Fox, a columnist for Bloomberg View.
Speaker 1: For more Bloomberg opinion and commentary, please go to Bloomberg
Speaker 1: View dot com or view go on the Bloomberg terminal.
Speaker 1: This has been Bloomberg View and Bloombergview commentaries compared hourly
Speaker 1: weekdays on Bloomberg Radio. It is Super Tuesday. I'm here
Speaker 1: with a super Michael McKee in Washington and support of
Speaker 1: FM in Washington. Welcome all of you coast to coast
Speaker 1: across this nation on an important political and economic day