Lou Dobbs...

Longtime CNN anchor and commentator Lou Dobbs joined me on last night's Kudlow Report to discuss Omama-nomics, Tim Geithner, the demise of the dollar, the threat of American declinism, immigration, trade policy and other hot button issues.

On CNBC's Kudlow Report Tonight

This evening at 7pm ET:

***SPECIAL***



ONE-ON-ONE WITH LOU DOBBS

The former CNN anchor will be our special guest this evening.

Topics will include:

- Today’s heated Geithner hearings
- Paying Down TARP
- Healthcare (plus a look at the mammography fiasco)
- U.S. Jobs, Economy & Growth
- Obama in China; Schumer's China Bashing
- The Stock Market
- Direction of the Country; Immigration; Afghanistan; Trying 9/11 terrorists in NYC

***Also joining us to discuss healthcare & TARP will be Sen. John Thune (R-SD)

WASHINGTON TO WALL ST. DEBATE
Free Trade; Schumer's China Bashing

*CNBC's Rick Santelli
*Robert Reich, Fmr. Labor Secretary; Author, "Supercapitalism"; CNBC Contributor; Univ. of CA., Berkeley, Prof. of Public Policy

THE STOCK MARKET

Alison Deans, Fmr. CIO Neuberger Berman Private Asset Management

Please join us. The Kudlow Report. 7pm ET. CNBC.

SPECIAL...

Lou Dobbs joining me on Kudlow Report tonight.

7pm ET on CNBC.

On CNBC's Kudlow Report

This evening at 7pm ET:

SENATE DEMS HEALTHCARE BILL
CNBC’s Hampton Pearson reports.

BY THE NUMBER$…THE CBO BREAKDOWN
Rep. Dave Camp (R-MI) will join us.

WILL OBAMA-CARE SACRIFICE STANDARDS?
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) will join us.

IS INFLATION COMING BACK?
Does the dollar’s decline and surging gold prices show the Fed is fighting the wrong battle?

Panel:

*Judy Shelton, Economist; "Money Meltdown" author
*Vince Reinhart, American Enterprise Institute Resident Scholar; Fmr Dir. of the Federal Reserve Board's Division of Monetary Affairs
*Michael Panzner, Wall Street Trader; "When Giants Fall" Author; Financial Armageddon Blog

TAXES…
-A payroll tax to spur job growth?
-A repeal of Bush’s tax cuts?
-A Wall Street transaction tax?

*Michael Boskin, Fmr. Bush Economic Advisor; Stanford Univ. Prof. of Economics; Hoover Institution
*Steve Moore, WJS Editorial Board; "The End of Prosperity" co-author

CALIFORNIA BANS POWER-HUNGRY TVs
CNBC’s Jane Wells reports.

CARLY'S SUPPLY-SIDE RUN FOR SENATE IN CA
Former HP chairman & CEO Carly Fiorina will be aboard.

Please join us. The Kudlow Report. 7pm ET. CNBC.

An Interview with Tom Coburn

Last night I spoke with one of the Senate’s brightest lights — Sen. Tom Coburn (R., Okla.), who also happens to be one of only two physicians in the chamber. We discussed where the Democrats’ behemoth government health-care takeover bill is heading, as well as his plan to read the 2,000-plus page bill in its entirety on the Senate floor.

President Zero Sum Goes to Asia

Obama declinism on King Dollar and U.S. economic leadership.

President Obama took his declining dollar to the Asia-Pacific economic conference, and he added to it a declinist opinion of America’s economy. His big message? Don’t count on American consumers to lead the world from recession to recovery and beyond. His second big message? In the U.S., we must save more and spend less.

Huh? This is the same limits-to-growth, central-planning wisdom we hear so often these days at home. It’s also tone deaf, to say the least. Despite a sinking greenback that is wreaking havoc among the Asian economies, and in the face of repeated currency warnings by Asian officials, Obama brought no King Dollar stabilization message to the conference.

Before getting into the currency question, let me say this: I think more saving (and investment) by U.S. citizens is a great idea. But this need not come at the expense of consumption. In a prosperous free economy, people should be able to save, invest, work, and spend as much as they like. More is better than less in each case. Grow the pie larger.

Of course, if the president and his team want more saving and investment, they should end the multiple taxation of saving and investment. Unfortunately, our system taxes saving as income, capital gains, dividends, and inheritance.

Team Obama also intends to tax wealth more by raising the top personal tax rate from 35 to 40 percent. And they apparently don’t object to Nancy Pelosi’s plan to slap another 5.4 percent tax on the incomes and capital-gains of successful earners in order to finance a government takeover of health care.

Wealth is a crucial form of saving. And the investment that comes from extra saving is used to finance the entrepreneurial start-ups that create the jobs and incomes that allow families to spend. However, by creating a zero-sum game between saving and spending, the Obama planners are falling into an austerity trap -- one that would hand the American economy a second-place finish in the global race for capital and growth.

At the same time, Obama has no plan to stabilize King Dollar, and the Asian economies don’t like it. China’s top banking regulator said the Federal Reserve’s money-creating binge was the main cause of “massive speculation.” Similar sentiments came from top officials in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Japan.

And while Ben Bernanke tried to calm dollar worries during his recent speech at the New York Economics Club, it was clear that the greenback’s value ranks low on his priority list. Nothing but dollar lip service from the Fed head.

Because of the slumping dollar, U.S. import prices have jumped 10 percent at an annual rate over the past three months, and nearly 6 percent excluding energy. This is a tax hike on consumers and businesses, and it could depress holiday sales. It’s reminiscent of the gigantic energy shock of 2008 that was caused by the dollar’s collapse.

And what’s the current U.S solution to the dollar problem? Blame China, and call for a revaluation of the yuan. But beggar-thy-neighbor protectionism never works, and it causes bad blood between the countries involved.

The powerful Asian economies actually have a better idea. They want to move toward a free-trade currency-cooperation zone -- much like the euro zone, fathered by Nobel economist Robert Mundell. This makes more sense in terms of world price stability and free capital flows. But the U.S. refuses to play.

So Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and others are forced to desperately buy sinking dollars in order to protect their export industries. But this only creates inflationary money expansion. The beleaguered U.S. dollar is in effect exporting U.S. inflation overseas.

President Obama did talk about entering free-trade discussions. But his Commerce secretary, Gary Locke, threw cold water on the idea in a Singapore speech. He said trade agreements have to wait because of a crowded U.S. legislative agenda. (Hat tip: James Pethokoukis.) He may have a point: The South Korean free-trade bill has been languishing for several years in the Democratic Congress.

Then there’s the massive U.S. health-care takeover plan, which is now estimated at $3trillion. This additional dollar depressant will tax the patience of China, Japan, and other would-be buyers of our massive debt creation.

We cannot spend, tax, or devalue our way into prosperity. Nor can we command the respect of other nations by telling them our economy cannot grow as rapidly in the future as it has in the past.

Ironically, these same Asian countries -- with their accelerated growth rates -- have borrowed a page from American free-market capitalism. Yet Obama makes no defense of our free-market system, and provides no leadership on the leading economic questions.

In terms of global leadership, Ronald Reagan would say, “If not us, who? If not now, when?” It’s a pity that President Obama doesn’t share the Gipper’s commitment to American leadership.

On CNBC's Kudlow Report

This evening at 7pm ET:

OBAMA'S CHINA VISIT
CNBC chief Washington correspondent John Harwood will join us live from China.

THE DOLLAR
Obama gets an earful on easy money.

Panel:

*David Malpass, president of Encima Global LLC
*CNBC’s Rick Santelli
*Peter Navarro, author of "The Coming China Wars,"

WILL A CHEAP DOLLAR HURT HOLIDAY SALES?

*Kellyanne Conway, president and CEO of the Polling Company
*Vince Veneziani, writer at Business Insider

IS GOV’T HEALTHCARE GOING TO PASS?

Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla) will be aboard.

FINANCIAL FRAUD TASK FORCE

Mark Calabria, director of financial regulation studies at the Cato Institute

SARA PALIN, POPULISM & THE GOP

Panel:

*BigGovernment.com’s Andrew Breitbart
*Craig Shirley, Republican consultant and author of "Rendevous with Destiny"
*National Review's Jim Geraghty
*Kellyanne Conway, president and CEO of the Polling Company

Please join us. The Kudlow Report. 7pm ET. CNBC.

Is Government-Run Health Care Going to Pass?

Is big government, command-and-control of health care and the economy going to pass the Senate, and then the entire Congress, to become law? Last night I spoke with terribly smart Republican Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire. Gregg’s a budget expert and member of the Senate Health Committee. He isn’t too optimistic right now. He thinks the House version will basically become law. Very scary stuff.

On CNBC's Kudlow Report

This evening at 7pm ET:

BEN BERNANKE’S SPEECH:
An eye on the Fed, dollar & gold

Panel:

*Steve Liesman, CNBC senior economics reporter
*Peter Morici, University of Maryland Robert H. Smith School of Business Professor; U.S. International Trade Commission Fmr. Chief Economist
*Andy Busch, BMO Capital Markets; CNBC Contributor
*David Goldman, Associate Editor First Things Blog

OBAMA IN CHINA
The China challenge & currency buzz

CNBC chief Washington correspondent John Harwood will join us from Beijing.

CHINA CURRENCY DEBATE
Yuan a strong dollar?

The aforementioned panel will debate.

"HEALTHCARE WILL PASS THE SENATE"
Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) will join us with his perspective.

BULL/BEAR DEBATE

*(bull) Jack Ablin, Harris Private Bank Chief Investment Officer
*(bear) Joe Battipaglia, Stifel Nicolaus Market Strategist

Please join us. The Kudlow Report. 7pm ET. CNBC.

On CNBC's Kudlow Report Tonight

This evening at 7pm ET:

OBAMA GOES TO CHINA
NBC’s Steve Handelsman reports.


IS THE U.S. MESSING UP THE WORLD'S MONETARY SYSTEM?
An in-depth look at the message of the dollar, gold prices and stocks.

Panel:

*Zachary Karabell, CNBC Contributor/River Twice Research President
*Andy Busch, BMO Capital Markets; CNBC Contributor
*Steve Moore, Sr Economics Writer for the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board; "The End of Prosperity" Co-Author

IS OBAMA REALLY GOING TO LOWER DEFICIT?

*Keith Boykin, CNBC Contributor; Former Clinton White House Aide
*Tony Fratto, CNBC Contributor; Fmr. White House Deputy Press Secretary

MADOFF PROGRAMMERS ARRESTED
CNBC’s Scott Cohn reports.

9/11 MASTERMIND TO BE TRIED IN NYC
Tim Brown, 9/11 Firefighter Survivor will join us.

SHOULD GITMO BE CLOSED?

*Ann Coulter, Syndicated Columnist; "Guilty" Author
*Christopher Amolsch, Criminal Defense Lawyer

Please join us. The Kudlow Report. 7pm ET. CNBC.

Kudlow Jobs Summit

We debated President Obama's jobs summit plans on last night's Kudlow Report. Joining me were Robert Reich, former Labor Secretary and Casey Mulligan, University of Chicago economics professor.

The Congressional Assault on Fed Independence

Investors and political analysts should keep a sharp eye on the congressional assault on Federal Reserve independence. This is a transparent effort by members of Congress to use the financial-reregulation bills as a means of applying political leverage to stop the Fed from any 2010 midterm-election-year exit strategies that might raise the federal funds target rate, stop the purchases of mortgage-backed bonds, and drain cash from the economy.

The Chris Dodd bill unveiled this week spells it all out. The White House would appoint the chairmen of the regional Federal Reserve banks (New York, Dallas, Richmond, etc.), subject to confirmation by the Senate. In addition, the Federal Reserve Board in Washington would appoint all the directors of these regional Fed banks. Right now, the local member banks appoint two-thirds of the directors, with the remaining one-third appointed by the Fed board in Washington.

These would be the biggest changes to the unique public-private composition of the Federal Reserve System since 1913, when the Fed was created under Woodrow Wilson.

Remember, the local Fed boards now appoint the reserve-bank presidents, who then vote on policy at Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meetings. So this is a transparent effort to influence Fed policy through the FOMC voting members by changing the people who vote on these members. Think of Barney Frank. The House Financial Committee chairman has often remarked that the hawks on the FOMC always seem to be the reserve-bank presidents. He wants doves.

Now, I’m not going to defend the Fed’s actual policy. As I have written many times, the Fed should be targeting financial and commodity-price indicators, which today are all signaling that the Fed is too loose and that it is creating far too many new dollars. Gold keeps hitting new record highs in nominal terms. The greenback has become the U.S. peso. Instead, the Fed has been targeting the unemployment rate and GDP. In terms of preventing any new bubbles, this really is the biggest problem.

However, I will defend Fed independence. If the Congress, backed by the White House, runs monetary policy, the inflationary tilt will be even greater.