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Glenn Beck

Clinton, McCain Frontrunners after Weekend Primaries; Is Media Fair to Mitt Romney?; Will Bill Clinton Help or Hurt Wife`s Campaign?; Primary Students Pose Problems in New York

Aired January 21, 2008 - 19:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GLENN BECK, HOST (voice-over): Tonight, McCain may have won South Carolina, Romney Nevada, but the GOP race is still wide open. Next stop, Florida. Do any of these four have what it takes to pull away from the pack?

Plus Obama takes on Bill Clinton again.

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D-IL), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He continues to make statements that aren`t supported by the facts.

BECK: Could Clinton`s role actually send his wife`s campaign off the rails?

And another border agent falls in the line of duty: run over and killed by suspected drug smugglers.

All this and more tonight.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BECK: Well, hello, America. With Nevada and South Carolina primaries now behind us, it looks like, according to the media, that the front runners are finally beginning to emerge. They will tell you relentlessly that those front runners are John McCain and Hillary Clinton. Here`s "The Point" tonight.

You`re kidding me, right? McCain/Clinton? That`s not a choice; that`s a ticket. And here`s how I got there.

I told you last week about a "USA Today"/Gallup poll, and it showed by a margin of four to one that Americans want change. I`m with you, but I hate to burst your bubble here. John McCain and Hillary Clinton are not agents of change. They are the politics and politicians of business as usual, and they`re like-minded enough to be running-mates.

You know, America`s future is not in her past. We don`t need reruns in the White House. Here`s a piece of McCain`s victory speech after winning South Carolina. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R-AZ), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I seek the nomination of our party, because I am as confident today as I was when I first entered public life as a foot soldier in the Reagan Revolution, that the principles of the Republican Party are confidence in the good sense and resourcefulness of free people are always in America`s best interests.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: I can see he feels that. It wasn`t like he was reading that or anything like that. The Reagan Revolution? Come on, McCain. I mean, you`re old enough to be in the American Revolution. I know that`s a low blow, but jeez, for the love of Pete, you`ve been in Washington forever.

McCain should be ashamed of himself for even mentioning the name Ronald Reagan. You`re not a conservative in the Reagan model or any other. You`re a career politician. And the career has not been built on change; it`s been built on gigantic mistakes.

Hillary Clinton took the Democratic win in Nevada. And she ain`t exactly reinventing the wheel either. You know, there must have been some comped drinks at the polling station, because I can`t think of any other reason why Vegas voters can`t see that Hillary Clinton is a product of the creaky Washington machine. She`s the ultimate beltway insider and power broker and will -- will really only perpetuate the status quo that has stalled this country`s progress for far too long.

Here`s a taste of the fairy tale that she told in Nevada.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. HILLARY CLINTON (D-NY), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: And I know that we will build on what we achieved here today and continue to make it clear, here in Nevada and across the west, that the Democrats, we`re the problem solvers. We have the answers for what we need to do to keep our country strong and move with confidence and optimism into the future.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: This woman hasn`t changed her wardrobe in 30 years. Do you really think she`s going to change the country?

Tonight, America, here`s what you finally need to hear. What people say in America and what they actually -- what they say they want and what they actually do are entirely different things. Real change is not going to come from a guy who`s moving his office from the Capitol to the White House or from a woman who moved from the White House to the Capitol and back to the White House. Don`t we deserve change that comes from an entirely new ZIP code?

Joined now by Democratic strategist Julian Epstein and Republican strategist Andrea Tantaros.

Andrea, let me start with you. South Carolina. John McCain is not winning with Republicans. He`s not winning with the base. He`s winning with independents. How can you possibly win the White House when your base is saying, "Wait a minute. I don`t want you"?

ANDREA TANTAROS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Very good point. John McCain moving forward is going to have a problem, because he doesn`t have support from the conservative Republican base, and a lot of Republicans, like you pointed out, your point is dead on, Glenn. Hillary and John McCain are very much alike.

BECK: I mean -- honestly, I could see John McCain being the kind of guy who says, "Hillary, let`s reach across the aisle. Let`s team up." They could run together.

TANTAROS: Well, he`s teamed up with all those other liberal senators, because she is a liberal. He`s teamed up with Edwards, Kennedy, Feingold. He`s teamed up with some of the most liberal senators.

She has also reached over and teamed up with some of the most conservative Republicans -- Tom DeLay, Bill Frist -- in an effort to cloak herself as a moderate, but we know that she`s not.

BECK: OK.

Julian, I mean, I don`t have a problem with people reaching across the aisle to get something done. We have to start working...

JULIAN EPSTEIN, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: I hope not. Absolutely.

BECK: We have to start reaching across the aisle. But in John McCain`s place, he reaches across the aisle, and it goes into insanity for anybody who is a conservative.

So you`ve got -- you`ve got Hillary Clinton, who is the ultimate power broker along with her husband, and you have John McCain. How is this fundamental change? How is either party reflecting what the American people are saying that they want when it comes to change?

EPSTEIN: Well, we`ve bitten off a lot there. Let me try and start with each -- McCain and then Clinton.

First of all, I think McCain is a true conservative in the Reagan tradition in the sense that he`s got strong support from defense conservatives in the Republican Party and the economic conservatives. I don`t think he has the social...

BECK: He doesn`t have the...

TANTAROS: Economic?

BECK: He doesn`t have the economic. He doesn`t believe in tax cuts.

EPSTEIN: Absolutely I think he`s got a lot of support from economic conservatives. If you look at the polls of where he`s won, he`s done very well with economic conservatives. Where he doesn`t do well is with social conservatives. But I think, like Bush 41 did in -- in 1988, I think he can repair that in the general election.

BECK: Hang on. Andrea -- wait, wait. Wait, wait, wait. No, no, no. I want you to answer -- I know. You can pick up No. 2 but Andrea, he`s good with economic conservatives? The guy has voted against the Bush tax cuts twice. Ronald Reagan was all about tax cuts. He doesn`t understand tax cuts.

TANTAROS: Absolutely. Tax cuts is a huge part of the Republican platform, and John McCain voted against them twice. Then he voted for them in 2006 but never disavowed his rhetoric on the Senate floor, when he sounded eerily like Ted Kennedy, using class warfare-laden rhetoric.

BECK: Julian?

EPSTEIN: No.

BECK: Julian, I`ll give you this war thing.

EPSTEIN: I don`t want to come on here -- I don`t want to come on here and defend John McCain.

BECK: Yes.

EPSTEIN: But I mean, with due respect, you`re not listening to what he`s saying. What he said in both incidents is that -- and the Treasury Department, Bush`s own Treasury Department, has said the exact same thing.

You cannot have tax cuts unless you have spending cuts, because what happens is the money that you inject into the economy with tax cuts you take right out, because you`re increasing deficit spending. It`s simple economics. That`s what McCain has said.

I disagree with him on a lot of things. I think he`s an appealing candidate, because he does take a lot of independents, and I think independents will determine who wins the next election. And his ability to do things, to buck the establishment, which is why I think Amy doesn`t like him, to go for things like campaign finance reform, immigration reform, I think is why he has appeal with independents. The candidate the Democrats fear the most is McCain. So please bring us Mitt Romney. We`d love to run against Romney.

BECK: Good. No, no. And I think you have just made the point on why conservatives just don`t like John McCain. I mean, you`re in love with him, Julian. I got to...

EPSTEIN: I respect him. He`s a man of honor. I think he can win, but I disagree with him.

BECK: OK. Now we`ve got to move on. This past week has proven the media bias against Mitt Romney is staggering and only getting worse. He is the delegate leader. But did you know that? He`s the Republican candidate who is usually in first or second place, not in fourth or fifth.

A new poll shows him now six points ahead in Florida, but yet the media is saying that he`s about to drop out. Could that win in Florida turn the tide of his media perception, or will they just continue to disregard this man?

Joining me now is somebody who knows about this poll in Florida. He`s the guy whose company put it together, Scott Rasmussen, president of Rasmussen Reports.

Scott, when I go up and saw your poll on the front page of the Drudge Report, I couldn`t believe it, because he was behind everybody. Now he`s what? He took a six-point jump? A seven-point...

SCOTT RASMUSSEN, RASMUSSEN REPORTS: A seven-point jump. But a week ago it was a four-way tie. Nobody was really ahead or behind.

And what you`re seeing in this poll is not so much a change in the minds of voters or the attitudes of voters. It`s a change in the voting rules. John McCain has won with independents in other states, like New Hampshire and South Carolina. They`re not allowed to vote in Florida.

BECK: Yes, but, hang on just a second. You didn`t change your methodology in Florida.

RASMUSSEN: No. No.

BECK: So there is something.

RASMUSSEN: Absolutely.

BECK: And there is something to be said. He was behind. Well, you`d know better than I do. I think he was behind six points or in fourth place in Nevada six days before the election. And he had a surge at the end.

RASMUSSEN: Well, Nevada was a caucus. We didn`t poll out there. It`s very difficult to poll in a caucus.

But yes, Mitt Romney is doing a little bit better right now. Seven points better in Florida over the past week. He is in the lead. Rudy Giuliani and John McCain are fighting it out a few points back, and the big loser, by the way, in the last week in Florida has been Mike Huckabee, who`s now moving into a distant fourth.

One of the wild cards is Fred Thompson. He still picks up 12 percent in this poll. We expect that he may be dropping out of the race very soon.

BECK: If he does, who do his people go do to?

RASMUSSEN: Don`t know who they go to. It depends a little bit on how he does it. But they don`t like John McCain very much. They`re not thrilled with Mitt Romney, and so it`s going to be a tough choice.

BECK: Maybe -- maybe to Huckabee?

RASMUSSEN: Possibly. But you know, at this point, the people who are -- were picking Fred Thompson over Mike Huckabee have probably found a reason not to vote for Governor Huckabee. I thinks it`s a wild card.

What we`re seeing is people are voting, not just on the candidates but on the dynamic of the race. And, you know, last week in South Carolina, Huckabee struggled a little bit. He couldn`t win with the evangelicals, but now there`s a different choice for Florida voters.

BECK: OK. And McCain has the softest support.

RASMUSSEN: Right.

BECK: Only about 20 percent of his people say, "Yes, I`m die-hard McCain supporter." Everybody else is going, "Well, I don`t know."

RASMUSSEN: They`re not sure about him because one of the reasons people are considering voting for John McCain is they believe he`s the most electable. And that`s a big issue in this race for Republicans. They want somebody who can win the election in November.

BECK: Gosh. I don`t want the elephant to win if the elephant is actually an ostrich. Maybe it`s just me.

Scott, thanks a lot.

RASMUSSEN: My pleasure.

BECK: So where am I wrong here? John McCain, Hillary Clinton. It`s not a choice. It`s a ticket. Do you agree or disagree? Go to CNN.com/Glenn right now and cast your vote.

Coming up tonight, first there was Beniffer. Then we had Brangelina. Now it`s Billary. Can Barack Obama slay this two-headed monster?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Well, you don`t have to be an economist to know it`s getting tough out there. In fact, I believe it helps if you`re not one to know what`s really going on.

You see signs every day. Every time you go in a store and you buy milk or gas or that new 52-inch plasma television. We`ll look at the economic crisis that is unfolding here and overseas in tonight`s "Real Story." Tomorrow could be a blood bath on Wall Street.

But first, when Bill Clinton was running for president back in 1992, he made one thing very, very clear. Al Gore may have been his running- mate, but his partner was his wife, Hillary.

They were a team. Bill gave Hillary lots of time in the spotlight. Sadly, I believe most of it was devising some sort of evil health care plan and playing second fiddle to a fat girl in a blue dress. But that`s a whole different story.

Bill owes Hillary, and this election he started making a payment on that debt. Most agree that it`s Bill`s job to attack Barack Obama. That way Hillary can stay positive and, you know, look good and cry once in a while. And as former president, Bill Clinton commands massive media attention. He`s the one candidate backer whose opinions actually make headlines.

And when it comes to would-be Democratic votes, he`s got credibility. So when he says something nice about Hillary and something not so nice about Obama, people listen. At least about the part about Obama.

Of course, this bothers some people more than others. Here`s an example of one person it bothers an awful lot from "Good Morning America."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: I completely understand him wanting to promote his wife`s candidacy. And, you know, Michelle is out there doing the same thing on my behalf.

I do think that there should be some certain -- there should be some standards of honesty in any political discourse. That`s part of the change that I want to bring about. And you know, if you have something that directly contradicts the facts and it`s coming from a former president, I think that`s a problem.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Who knows what it feels like to be a conservative now? You do, Obama. Yes.

With Bill now using this tactics against somebody in his own party, will it work? Or will he finally be revealed to his own party as the snake-oil salesman that Republicans and conservatives have always known that he is?

Let`s check in with Ari Melber. He is a regular contributor to "The Nation."

Ari, this must be a low point in your career. You`re on this program, and you write for "The Nation." You`ll never get this off the resume, you know.

ARI MELBER, CONTRIBUTOR, THE NATION: It`s going to be a big problem.

BECK: I know it will be. They`re going to revoke your credentials.

MELBER: I regret it already.

BECK: All right. Let`s just talk about Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton for a second on good cop/bad cop. That`s clearly what`s going on. She can stay totally clean, and he is really good at just dissecting people.

MELBER: It is what`s going on. It`s concerning to a lot of people in the Democratic Party. But as you say, across the country because Bill Clinton, who was a great president, great on the economy, strong foreign policy, widely respected, high approval ratings.

BECK: Remember -- remember, Ari writes for "The Nation." Don`t be shocked by his opinion.

MELBER: Well, you don`t have to take my word for it. He has about double the approval rating of the current president.

BECK: That`s not saying much.

MELBER: ... of the public.

BECK: Right.

MELBER: But moving on from his record, unfortunately, aside from his good record on governing the nation, he now has said many things that Obama is responding to and saying they`re distortions.

Particularly, what we saw, really ugly contest in Nevada this weekend, allegations of voter suppression flying in both directions. But also, President Clinton going on the radio and saying that Barack Obama`s campaign rests on a false premise and implying that Barack Obama was not against the Iraq war when he was. That`s a very concerning development for the campaign.

BECK: So how`s he going to be able to stitch this back together? I mean, they`re feasting on each other. At least the Clintons are. I mean, Kennedy has now come out and said, "Knock this stuff off." Ram Emmanuel has come out and said the same thing. But I don`t think the Clintons are going to stop. They smell blood in the water. They smell a win. They`ll take it.

MELBER: Well, yes. And they did win the popular vote in Nevada. And what is happening is that, more so than anything that I think Hillary Clinton is doing, Bill Clinton`s savage, personal attacks on Barack Obama are, as you say, they are working amongst some voters.

And one proof point here is Bill Clinton is more personally, savagely confronting Barack Obama than he ever confronted George W. Bush. And everyone knows...

BECK: The distortion thing with Bill Clinton, he`s one of the only people that can really pull it off. He can be savage and brutal and distort, and it works. People buy it for some reason.

MELBER: Well, so as you say, it may have worked up to this point. I think the question and the comparison with Bush is, in a long Democratic primary, with 20-plus states on Super Tuesday, and potentially a delegate fight going longer than that, does the word get out to the broad Democratic electorate that Bill Clinton at times has been unfair and, as Obama said, distorting of his record? Will that backfire.

BECK: I love the fact that you guys are finally -- after all these years of all of us on the other side going, "Wait a minute. He`s not telling the truth," I love the fact that the left is finally feeling the wrath of Bill Clinton.

Ari, thanks a lot. I won`t -- I won`t disgrace you again. We will ask you back, but we won`t force you to.

Coming up, apparently preschoolers have confused apple juice with crazy juice. Preschoolers are being kicked out of school now. Who`s to blame? I`ll tell you next.

And, unless you`ve been living under a rock, you know the U.S. economy is hurting. The rest of the world is buying American assets on the cheap, but is it what we really need? Is this good for us? Find out, coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Well, it should come as no surprise when I tell you that New York City schools are tough. That goes without saying. There`s fighting with teachers. There`s throwing of chairs, cursing at each other and at other students. But this is what happens in preschool in New York City.

In New York, the rate of expulsion for 2- to 5-year-olds is 19 times higher than the rate of those kids getting kicked out of school from kindergarten all the way through senior in high school.

But why? Is New York just a tough town? I wish it were that easy. It`s not. New York is the place where there are more working parents and our kids are getting less attention from Mom and Dad than any other place. We must never forget that the family is the foundation of our society, and when that thing breaks down, man, it`s over.

Dr. Patricia Sanders is -- Saunders is a clinical psychologist and a director of clinical services at the Metropolitan Center for Mental Health.

Pat, the break down -- this is really just the breakdown of the family and Mom and Dad working too hard and not going to church and everything else, isn`t it?

DR. PATRICIA SAUNDERS, DIRECTOR OF CLINICAL SERVICES, METROPOLITAN CENTER FOR MENTAL HEALTH: Well, I think that`s major contributing factor, Glenn, but I think it goes deeper than that. The way young children behave is often a society of society and what the problems are.

We`ve got parents who are under-supported. They don`t have the kind of social networks that families need, whether it`s extended family or church or other community services. We don`t see that in the big cities.

BECK: But -- but hang on just a second, Pat.

SAUNDERS: Yes.

BECK: But you also -- you know, I hate this "It takes a village" society that we live in. I know that we all have to work. I go to church.

You know, I have people who came over to my house last night because I`m feeling unwell. They came over from my church and helped me. Somebody else came over to my house this morning from church to help me on some stuff. And you know what? I get it. I get it.

But you know what? Families first. Mom and Dad being home and drawing the line and saying, "Hey, we don`t behave this way" and this is the way they are and then being engaged in their kids` education. Isn`t that primarily what has to happen first?

SAUNDERS: You`re right, Glenn. But you`re assuming that there is a mom and a dad. In New York, we see more and more single parents and moms who are not even the primary care givers. We`re seeing grandmas; we`re seeing aunts. And we`re seeing a growing number of single dads.

We`re seeing parents under enormous stress. You know kids don`t come with operating manuals.

BECK: I know.

SAUNDERS: And as a parent has been neglected, abused, traumatized themselves, they`re going to pass it on and behave the same way with their children.

BECK: Why is it worse in New York City than any place else?

SAUNDERS: I think families are particularly insulated in large urban centers. With the population density here, the idea of privacy is at a premium. And people walk, you know, three feet away from each other, and somebody`s crying in the street. They turn the other way. So...

BECK: You know, Pat, I will take -- do you live in New York?

SAUNDERS: Yes, I do.

BECK: I just moved to New York a couple of years ago, and it shocks me how you can walk down the street, and once you`ve been here for a while, you really don`t see somebody who is right here. You just don`t see them.

SAUNDERS: It`s true. People are in the zone. People disassociate because it`s so overcrowded. We can`t pay attention to other people. I`ve seen people step over dead bodies in the street and not call 911.

BECK: OK. Pat, we`ll continue to watch this, and thanks for being on the program.

Coming up, thank God it`s a holiday. World markets are selling off, and the only reason why Wall Street isn`t is because it`s closed. But tomorrow could be Black Tuesday and get really ugly. I`ll explain in "The Real Story" next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Well, we have another story on how dangerous our southern border has become. Another U.S. border agent was killed over the weekend while trying to stop a team of suspected drug smugglers from Mexico. It`s a tragic story. And we`ll have more on it in just a bit.

But first, welcome to "The Real Story." Markets around the world tumbled today and only the continuing power of Dr. Martin Luther King stopped the same thing from happening here. These are by the way significant numbers. China`s benchmark index fell five percent. Hong Kong, 5.5 percent. Japan and the U.K. tumbled nearly four percent and Paris dropped five percent. India`s index plummeted 7.4 percent, a drop that would equate to almost 900 points on our Dow which is just under half of what we dropped in 1929.

Unfortunately, our little reprieve can`t last forever. It`s over tomorrow. Futures contracts which are used to bet on the market indicate that many traders believe we could be in store for a 400-point drop on the Dow tomorrow. It could be Black Tuesday.

So what`s driving the panic? This worldwide panic, is it simply the fears of a U.S. recession? Mm-mm. The real story is investors are beginning to see the next shoe in the credit crisis that is about to drop and that shoe is called bond insurance.

Please, try to stay with me. I mean, wake up, man! This is going to be tough but let me try to explain what it is. Your city, my city, al of our towns need money. Fund projects like building schools, maintaining roads so what they do is issue these municipal bonds. Well, just like you need mortgage insurance on your house, the bonds need to be insured, as well; nobody wants to be on the hook if a town can`t make their payments. So far, so good, right?

But because of the subprime crisis, some of those bond insurance companies are running low on cash. And that is hurting their credit ratings. Just like your personal credit, each time their score drops, it gets harder and harder for them to borrow new money which is forcing the companies that own the bonds that they insure to take massive write downs. For instance, Merrill Lynch. They had to write off $1.9 billion simply because one small insurer was downgraded. So if a small insurer can hurt Merrill Lynch that bad, what happens if the rumors about downgrades for major insurers which are tied to $2.4 trillion in securities are true?

Gang, we are in new territory. Nobody knows. But with the Bank of China reportedly contemplating an $8 billion write down because of our problems, the fair to say when the U.S. coughs, the world doesn`t get flu anymore. It gets typhoid fever.

Terry Savage is the author of "The Savage Number" and she is also a nationally syndicated columnist for "The Chicago-Sun Times." Terry, good thing, bad thing, doesn`t matter that our markets were closed today?

TERRY SAVAGE, AUTHOR, "THE SAVAGE NUMBER": Probably good thing because as we are talking now tonight we will have another round of the European and Asian markets trading and maybe they`ll become a little less panicked over the financial situation, a little more realistic or maybe bargain will hunters step in. We`ll see what futures do overnight, as well. But no question about it. The rest of the world is looking at America and saying, you folks have problems. We own dollars. We don`t like the idea you`re cutting interest rates. We don`t think it will jump start your economy and we`re getting lowest interest on the T-bills we buy and looking at the president`s program to give rebate checks and say, you know, too little too late and borrowing the money to do it. That`s not good and so the rest of the world is saying, gee, if the U.S. economy can`t grow and boom, what`s going to happen to ours? And that`s what is happening to stock markets around the world.

BECK: I just heard somebody last week, a some Wall Street guru say, you know what, if you want to protect your money, you should buy bonds. I thought to myself, buy bonds? Where is that a good idea? Except unless you`re a bond salesman.

SAVAGE: Well, actually, temporarily, the Fed can try to push short term interest rates down to get the market going again but the rest of the world that buys our debt looks at America and says, wait a minute. You are creating money to offset all the stuff that`s draining out with the write downs. You are borrowing money in the future. We don`t want to hold your debt. And you know what we have to do to get them to lend us money and finance the deficits, we have to bribe them with higher interest rates.

So, longer term, I think interest rates could go higher. Although temporarily an economic slow down might bring them down a bit. It`s a dangerous thing, though. They`re as risky stocks in many ways.

BECK: Now, the bonds, so the average people understands, if the towns can`t get bonds, that means the bridges aren`t going to be repaired or the sewage goes left unfixed, right?

SAVAGE: Well, we`re making a big leap here. First of all, the credit rating agencies are the ones that downgraded these mortgage bonds. That caused this thing to start. Many of these municipalities had money invested in some of these securities, the insurers, as well. So there`s an issue here not only with municipal bonds and the insurance on them but the financial system is very interconnected.

The hedge funds have all kinds of investments that are related to the ability to get credit so in it the financial markets are very interrelated and what shakes one passes through to the others. So there`s two aspects. There`s the technical market side of it and then there`s the U.S. economy side of it. If your economy`s in a recession, what about the world?

And finally, there`s this issue of the world saying to us, America, get your house in order. You don`t have a lot of room to manipulate here.

BECK: Terry, thank you very much. We`ll watch the markets tomorrow and see what happens. Terry just said it. All of our markets now are interconnected. Everybody is depending and so it really shouldn`t be a shock to anybody that, you know, foreigners are investing in the U.S. at a record pace but they`re not buying bonds, they`re just buying our stuff, our property.

Our falling dollar basically has everything that we have on sale. We just have to hope that it`s not a going out of business kind of sale. With, you know, some of the more jingoistic among us, they may have problems with them loading up on blue jeans but "The Real Story" is that`s going on for decades and it`s good for America. After all, in many cities, the industry that`s thriving right now at least in this one is tourism.

Individual investors play by the same rules as everybody else and they are subject to the same whims of the marketplace. Nobody should have freaked out when Mitsubishi invested billions of dollars, remember this, in the `80s they bought Rockefeller Center. Everybody freaked out. They shouldn`t have. It was a private company but government investors have other motives in mind besides profit.

Unfortunately, America, we`re now beggars and beggars can`t be choosers. It was nice when everybody made such a fuss about Dubai when they tried to manage our ports a few years ago but the middle east is now literally buying our banking system and you don`t hear a peep and this could just be the beginning as the dollars fall, everything we own, everything we make gets cheaper and cheaper for the rest of the world.

Combine that with the fact that the states and municipalities cannot raise money because the bond insurance problems we just talked about, and you have an environment that is ripe for investment of wealthy, foreign governments.

Perhaps that`s one reason why Michigan`s government or governor has gone on to Europe and Asia five times to search for new investments. Americans are finally beginning to realize that we can`t have it both ways. We can`t get back to the sound financial principles both in Washington and our own homes that made us the richest country on the planet, and keep financing ourselves to death and watch as we are slowly taken over by not just foreign investors but by foreign governments that we made rich.

Peter Morrissey, he is the director of economics in the Office of International Trade Commission. Peter, sovereign funds, completely different than private investors. I don`t have a problem with Mitsubishi coming over and buying all kinds of stuff but sovereign funds are different. We are selling out our sovereignty, are we snot.

PETER MORRISSEY, PROFESSOR, U OF MARYLAND: Yeah. But first, a correction. I`m a professor at the University of Maryland. I was in the past the director of economics at the International Trade Commission.

BECK: Sorry. Thank you. We stand corrected.

MORRISSEY: Foreign investment in the United States is a good thing in general practice. Toyota coming here to build cars, we get better technology, we get better cars. That`s a good thing. But why are sovereign funds, foreign governments buying up U.S. banks? Quite simply, the U.S. banks are broken. They made a lot of bad loans and pursued the bad banking practices and can`t attract private money so governments are coming in and buying in. Why would they buy in when the private sector won`t? The answer is, they are going to get a lot of influence out of this.

BECK: What does that mean?

MORRISSEY: Well, consider the Chinese or Singapore or what have you. In those countries, the government banks have a lot to say about who gets money to build factories. For example, you want to build a car factory in China? Government banks are very important.

Now, suppose the five or six largest banks in America have significant Chinese investment. Don`t you think they have something to say when General Motor invests? Whether they would build an energy plant here or an energy plant in China? Credit is easily available in China. Maybe a little tougher to get here. On top of that, where do our political candidates just love to raise money? The Silicon Valley and Wall Street. Wall Street`s a fantastic campaign contribution farm because we have lots of highly paid executives from making bad loans to max up. You can have many people that make the maximum come pain contributions, remember it`s not companies that make contributions but their high-paid employees.

BECK: So you are saying that the high-paid employees will actually be fronts or could be fronts for these foreign governments?

MORRISSEY: Well, would you not be influenced by the principle minority shareholders in terms of the political views you take if you`re dependent for those shareholders for your job?

BECK: Do we have sovereign wealth funds. Does the United States .

MORRISSEY: That`s the riot here. We have sovereign wealth fund -- you know, the pension fund of the State of California invests all over the place but the largest the social security fund. We don`t let the Social Security fund buy into our banks or private equities because we don`t want the people in Washington influencing economic decisions. Yet, Secretary Paulson is perfectly happy, our treasury secretary, to have Asian governments with autocratic governments come in here and buy the U.S. banks and look who`s - who`s master minding this? Who`s the vice chairman of Citibank? The last secretary of treasury, Robert Ruben.

BECK: Peter .

MORRISSEY: Tag team on influence.

BECK: I got to thank you very much. We`ll have you back on again. That`s "The Real Story" tonight. America, we are enslaving ourselves and it`s time we wake up and wake up to other things.

But we also have to wake up to other things. Coming up, we have the death this weekend of another border agent. It is a stark reminder of how important it is to secure our borders. We`ll have the story you didn`t see on the front page of the paper, next.

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BECK: You know, I`m going to be honest with you. One of the reasons that I continually campaign so hard for the imprisoned border agents Ramos and Compean is because I don`t think most people really even understand, especially the politicians, understand how dangerous their jobs as a border patrol agent really, really is.

I mean, these guys are troops just as much as any marine is. Unfortunately, that reality was highlighted Saturday morning when a U.S. border agent who was pursuing a suspected drug smuggler was hit and killed by the fleeing car. The suspects then just went across the border back to Mexico where I`m sure we can count on the authorities down in Mexico to bend over backwards to help us find these bad guys. Paul Beeson is the chief of Border Patrol Yuma sector, he joins me now on the phone. Chief, can you tell me exactly what happened this weekend? Describe the scene.

CHIEF PAUL BEESON, BORDER PATROL (on phone): Well, Glenn, it`s a holiday weekend at the imperial sand dunes recreational area which is just west of Yuma, Arizona, just passed the -- it`s in California. Just passed the state line. The agents were out there working as part of a team performing anti-smuggling duties.

As they were conducting surveillance of the area, they noticed two suspicious vehicles depart the area. The agents moved in to intercept the vehicles and both of the vehicles, of course, noticed that the agents were behind them, turned around and ran south as is their, you know, I mean, that`s typically what they do in that area. Agent Aguilar and his partner were attempting to deploy a spike strip to deflate the tires of one of the vehicles fleeing south. As the vehicle was approaching them, Agent Aguilar`s attention was diverted by some bystanders that were in the area. There were folks out there recreating in the area. And so what he was doing was trying to warn them away from the area so that they would not get struck by this guy as he`s fleeing.

BECK: And he was -- and he was struck and killed. Is there a -- is there a fence there anywhere? Is there any kind of border barrier at all in this area?

BEESON: That area, there is not one up there now. We have been working on installing one in that area. One thing I do want to point out, Glenn, because I want it to be perfectly clear.

BECK: Yeah.

BEESON: That agent -- the vehicle intentionally ran down Agent Aguilar. This was not an accident.

BECK: How do you know that?

BEESON: We`re basing that off of bystanders` statements, witness statements.

BECK: That he swerved into the agent?

BEESON: Exactly.

BECK: I have to tell you, chief, I have to tell you, God bless you and every single border agent that is doing this hard work every day. I think you guys have been sold out down the river from every single agent and I want you to know when I talk to people across the country, they support you. The people are with you. And we think you`re doing a fantastic job. God bless you for getting up every day and doing it.

BEESON: I appreciate that, Glenn. I do want to point out that we are diligently pursuing this. We are not going to rest until we identify .

BECK: Is Mexico helping us at all?

BEESON: As a matter of fact, they are. I believe that the Mexican government realizes the seriousness of this offense. They are -- they have been working with them. I have officers that are in close contact with them. We have been on the phone with Mexico City and they are working with us.

BECK: OK. All right.

BEESON: So we are getting quite a bit of cooperation for them and it`s certainly something we look forward to seeing continue until they`re brought to justice.

BECK: Chief, we`ll be in touch and follow the story. Thank you so much for talking to us.

Now let`s get some perspective on it happens on the border. I want to bring in Jessica Vaughn, a senior policy analyst for the Center for Immigration Studies, former foreign services officer. Jessica, let me ask you a question. Gee, no fence in the area. What a surprise this is going on.

JESSICA VAUGHAN, CENTER FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES: Yeah. Well, it`s about time that we gave our border agency what it needs to get this job done and this the special interests who have been holding up the construction of physical barriers along certain areas of the border get out of the way that so that we can get this done to protect our agents and to protect Americans from the criminals who are coming and going at will.

BECK: Jessica, how frustrating is this? Because it seems to me that everybody forgets about, you know, now immigration is -- is it the third most important thing during the election? This is a massive, massive problem. Everybody forgets about it. And yet, we have got border agents in jail. We have border agents that are being killed. I got to believe their morale is awful as a border guard. And assault has gone through the roof against our own border agents.

VAUGHAN: That`s right. Assaults against border patrol agents have gone up 30 percent from 2006 to 2007. There are Border Patrol agents assaulted every day, more than once a day along the border and from what I hear from Border Patrol agents and former Border Patrol agents is that morale doesn`t get lower than it is right now because these agents who go out every day and risk their lives feel as if their work is simply not valued by this administration. And that, you know, as hard as they may try to keep people from illegally entering, there`s nothing they can do if they`re not support .

BECK: Everybody said the morale was bad for armed forces under Clinton. Because they disregarded the armed forces. You know what? George Bush is Bill Clinton to our border agents. Jessica, I thank you very much for your time.

Up next, a recent article in "The New York Times" suggests that our returning vets that are coming home from Iraq are more likely to commit crimes than ordinary citizens. Really? Hmm. Maybe we should look into the "The New York Times" and the facts next.

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BECK: Well, welcome to "An Inconvenient Segment" where today we take a look at media bias. Chapter 12 in my book "An Inconvenient Book."

Now, some people, call me crazy, don`t just want to see Hollywood message movies. I know, it`s nuts. You know, I have this strange aversion from taking political queues from the same place I saw "Alvin and the Chipmunks.

I don`t need politics from Hollywood and I also don`t need "Shrek IV" to be directed by Newt Gingrich. Maybe that`s just me.

Let me predict a new batch of failed Hollywood message movie tons horizon based on an article that from "The New York Times" entitled "Across America, Deadly Echoes of Foreign Battles" in this in-depth piece of journalism, they uncovered devastating facts about our troops. Apparently, our troops are real people. That means they`re capable of committing crimes.

The "Times" used its extensive Googling power to combine search terms like "troops" and "bad" until it dug up 121 cases where troops committed a killing or were charged with one. Amazingly, of that total, 25 offenders faced murder, manslaughter or homicide charges, or stuff, charges resulting from fatal car crashes. Car crashes?

This is the murderous epidemic you feel a need to warn of us? Car crashes? But is their murder rate any higher than the average person. At least 500,000 troops served in Iraq and Afghanistan, probably more. But if you accept all of the "Times" killings as homicides, you still come out with an annual homicide rate of about four per 100,000 soldiers. Well, the homicide rate for normal citizens age 18 to 24 is six times that high. Even for "The New York Times" the story is a joke.

In "An Inconvenient Book" I lay out some the worst examples of media bias and leads to an ingestion process where lies become regurgitated until they`re truth to many Americans.

Now to many our troops will be seen as dangerous predators that just may shoot you or crash their car into you on a street corner for no apparent reason. When the exact opposite is actually true. On the balance, our troops are better people than us. Less inclined to kill when they`re wronged. And much more willing to sacrifice for what`s right.

By the way, the one time I do trust "The times" is their best seller list. We have been on the top five for more than two months now. Whether I free fall down the list after this segment, I don`t know. But if you haven`t read it yet, please grab it on a bookstore or online at glennbeck.com. Good night, America.

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