Glenn Beck: Ramsey's bailout solution

October 1, 2008 - 13:14 ET

GLENN: Oh, yeah. Hello. Welcome to the program, from Rockefeller Plaza in Midtown Manhattan. Third most listened to show in all of America. My name is Glenn Beck. You know, my wife listens to Dave Ramsey every day. Every day, she never listens to my show. No, uh-uh. God help me if she ever did that. Every day I come home and she'll go, you should hear what Dave Ramsey says. Dave Ramsey says... (mumbling). So I thought, because my wife says Dave Ramsey is the king of the universe and, of course, he knows so much more than I know and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, I thought I would get him on now and maybe you can solve it, O king of the universe, Dave Ramsey. How are you?

RAMSEY: Hey, man, how are you doing? Thanks for having me.

GLENN: So sick of hearing your name. I'm so sick of hearing, my wife every night.

RAMSEY: I don't know if it's any consolation at my house but it's the same way at my house. Mine never watches Fox Business Network, won't listen to me about money stuff.

GLENN: Yeah.

RAMSEY: And she says Glenn Beck says...

GLENN: What do you think about wife switching? I'm not into switching but, hey. You actually have a plan for a bailout. I can't wait to hear this. Go ahead. Because you know what? You know what America is? America is one of your callers. I listen to your show and I'm like, you've got to be kidding me. Because they are always like, "Oh, I bought a $14 million house and I've got $10 in the bank and I'd like to know if I should buy a new Maybach. And you're like, what! That's what America is.

RAMSEY: There's a certain percentage out there. I think me and Jenny Craig, we've got a long career ahead of us.

GLENN: Man alive. So what's your plan?

RAMSEY: Well, you know, you are hearing the same things I'm hearing and that is that 70 to 90% of Americans don't want us to go because of the Paulson peddled fear, $700 billion into debt. And we're heading headlong into it and yet there's a lot of people that are afraid right now. There's a spirit of fear over Washington and over New York as well. It's almost palatable. I was there where you guys are, walked right past Rockefeller, as a matter of fact. You know, because of that I think we're rushing to judgment here and I think we're about to pass very, very bad bill.

GLENN: Yes.

RAMSEY: And some of the greatest minds in America --

GLENN: Hang on just a second. Have you seen the new bill this morning that's being -- that's in the Senate?

RAMSEY: It's the size of a phone book and I've been on interviews all morning. So I haven't looked.

RAMSEY: It's pretty much the same but I think they added some tax benefits in it, et cetera, et cetera.

RAMSEY: Right. They put some window dressing, $250,000 on the FDIC, alternative minimum tax they are doing away with or something.

GLENN: You can still put lipstick on a pig.

RAMSEY: It's something they needed to do anyway. Lipstick is something we need. Pigs we don't.

GLENN: Yes.

RAMSEY: So, you know, there are other alternatives to give this market a powder, to give the stock market a volume and calm it down that are being talked about by some of the better minds in America right now and some of the calmer ones.

GLENN: Let me ask you this before we get into this because I know you've got several -- I think you have, what, three or four, three things that you have. So before you get into that, I think you and I disagree fundamentally. You think this is fear, and fear mongering. I believe that we are, and have for quite some time, we are in deep, deep trouble just ahead. You don't believe that, do you?

RAMSEY: No. As a matter of fact, I'm very sure we're not.

GLENN: Okay. Well --

RAMSEY: The Great Depression is not --

GLENN: "You should listen to Dave Ramsey. You should listen to him. He's brilliant." Okay. So what are your solutions?

RAMSEY: Well, the bottom line is the Great Depression is not at our threshold. Now, I will agree with you on this. If we do not pass something out of congress, the market is having such a temper tantrum that we're probably going to have a pretty bloody winter and our 401(k)s and our Roth IRAs and my money and your money that's invested in the stock market's going to go down. I don't have any question about that. Are we going to go into the Great Depression? No. If Peter Schiff is the Yin, I'm the Yang. If he's a pessimist, I'm an optimist.

GLENN: Well, see, I don't necessarily agree with everything Peter Schiff says. What I do agree with is the Great Depression was not October 9th, 1929. The Great Depression really was in the 1930s, in 1933 when government started getting involved and saying we're going to do all these great things. Government is going to -- government is going to make this thing a Depression. Not the market.

RAMSEY: Well, that's a possibility. Not a Depression, but they could really cause a deep recession and could make this worse. And what you're dealing with there, you know, to go back, your observations are exactly correct because FDR --

GLENN: Hear that, Tania?

RAMSEY: FDR went to a guy named John Maynard Keynes to put together the New Deal and John Maynard Keynes, Keynesian economics, it was a socialist and he taught socialism and believed in socialism and so socialism was introduced to America as the New Deal. And the very crux of the New Deal was that. Now, did it cause us to revive? Yes, it did. But then we didn't do away with the Social Security system, we didn't do away with the TVA, the FHA, the VA, the Fannie Mae. We stayed in these businesses and they've all gotten progressively worse ever since. And so you're right that the roots of what we're dealing with today actually started in Keynesian economics back there and we see socialism continuing to creep through our culture. And Keynesian economics is taught, by the way, in college as truth.

GLENN: Yes.

RAMSEY: Versus Adam Smith which is free market as truth. So you've got to be a very wise business student today to stay a capitalist. Anyway, what we're saying is what some of the best minds are saying is that we could insure these bonds rather than buy them all. Like FHA, we insure mortgages there, and we could do that for pennies on the dollar. The mark-to-market accounting thing has been talked about ad nauseam. As a matter of fact, last night the SEC, the Securities & Exchange Commission issued an accounting opinion loosening up the mark-to-market rules a lot. It was a good move.

GLENN: Wait a minute, wait a minute. I have -- maybe you can explain this one because I read that. They loosened it up but it's really kind of unclear. It's basically saying, "You, you get to decide what it's worth. You don't have to worry about the market. You get to decide what it's worth." And that doesn't, that doesn't do anything about its actual value. I mean, I know we have a mark-to-market problem and most people don't even -- let's just move on because this is really, this is C -- this is what you do on the business channel.

RAMSEY: It's for -- to stay very wonky, it's Tier 3 investments which are these bonds and they are the ones that have the least marketplace. They are the least liquid. So there's not a real market for them and it's very difficult to use the marketplace to establish a value. You've got to establish a value using some other methodologies and now they are allowing that. That's going to loosen things up.

GLENN: All right. Hold on just a second.

RAMSEY: If we did away with the capital gains tax, we would see a huge flood of money into the real estate market and we would see a healing in about a quarter like you've never seen before. Now, that's a political lightning rod because we can't have rich people making money. That's against the law. But, you know, it would be fun for one of these presidential candidates, maybe the one that's supposed to be a maverick, to actually bring some different ideas to the table and go against Washington and with 70 to 90% of the public, he might win the presidency, were he a real maverick.

GLENN: Right. But he's not going to.

RAMSEY: And he's going to lose.

GLENN: Hang on just a second. I need to run this disclaimer here.

VOICE: The host of this program is not Dave Ramsey, Jim Cramer, Neil Cavuto, Larry Kudlow or any other person who actually knows what they're talking about when it comes to picking stocks, identifying investment opportunities, saving money, cutting coupons or scratching lottery tickets. In fact, the only money-related advice that should be listened to from the host is how to quickly open and devour those little gold chocolate coins. Any losses incurred in the markets due to following the host's advice should be an indication of the intelligence of the investor and not an attack on the credibility of other financial professionals.

GLENN: I'm sorry. My attorney said I needed to play that now on this show.

RAMSEY: This is why we love your show. You're fabulous, man. I'm a huge fan.

GLENN: So the capital gains, let's just go through the odds of these. Any of these being listened to here, Dave. Because this is a plan, this is a plan that I actually would listen to and go, okay, wait a minute, I think I'm for this. Capital gains, not going to happen. Right?

RAMSEY: Not going to happen because the Democrats control congress. But you know what? If you stood up and said, okay, here's my plan, let's insure this stuff, let's do away with mark-to-market, let's go away with the capital gains tax, conservatives all over America that were cheering for Sarah Palin would line up behind the John McCain ticket.

GLENN: You are exactly right.

RAMSEY: He could point at the Democrats and he would become the next President.

GLENN: How about going a step further and saying all corporate income tax is reduced to 15% even if it's 10 -- even if it's for the next year, all corporate income tax is reduced. Because then you hit small businesses, which is 70% of business in America.

RAMSEY: Well, if we're building a bill to thumb our nose at the Democrats and not to get passed, I think you just keep piling that stuff on there.

GLENN: Okay, good. Well, those wouldn't be passed anyway.

RAMSEY: That's what I'm saying.

GLENN: That's what I'm saying.

RAMSEY: Not a snowball's chance. Let's have some fun.

GLENN: If you want to build a bill that will get passed, capital gains tax is not in, right?

RAMSEY: We have to make somebody king if it's the Democrats. So Paulson wanted to be king for 90 days before somebody else.

GLENN: See, that's another thing about this. Aren't you worried at all that Paulson has the right, in these bills, he has the right to just expand this? I mean, that's -- Dave, that's why I believe the Depression is coming. Not because we can't handle -- we can handle stuff, but there are other forces outside, there's Russia, there is the oil, there is Iran, there is all kinds of stuff out there that is breathing down our back. But beyond that you have things like Paulson just, hey, we can expand this any way we want.

RAMSEY: Well, and the problem is not Paulson. He is going to be gone in 90 days. The problem is who replaces him.

GLENN: Any idea who that might be?

RAMSEY: Well, it would be under the new Obama administration apparently.

GLENN: Does that frighten you?

RAMSEY: It terrifies me from a socialistic standpoint. I will tell you this, though, it frightened me when Bill Clinton was elected and I prospered in spite of it. I cheered when George Bush was elected, and I prospered in spite of it. And, you know, as old as I'm getting and being a self-employed small business guy all my adult life, I have just figured out that really blessings and cursings coming out of Washington don't control my life. And I think that's one of the reasons this stuff, you know, we need to speak into public policy but at the end of the day I'm going to survive in spite of these clowns.

GLENN: I agree with that unless the government becomes so onerous that you can't get around it. And there's a possibility, if things would spiral out of control economically and you have somebody like Barack Obama in there who is a -- he's a Marxist. You could have a government that has gobbled so much stuff that, how are you going to get around it.

RAMSEY: Well, my only hope would be then that, you know, the folks of us out here that call ourselves fiscal conservatives or economic libertarians, there would be enough of us that woke up and believed in freedom to run them back out of office.

GLENN: I would love that.

RAMSEY: You know, and the problem is now I'm putting in a position where I'm going to be voting against Republican senators that vote for this because there's no way I'll ever back a candidate that votes for this mess. Republicans and Democrats alike. And you know the sad thing is Republican leadership, they are a bunch of wimps, man.

GLENN: They really are. They really are.

RAMSEY: They have not stepped up on this thing. Instead they are Bush's girl.

GLENN: Let me -- you know what, let me throw this out. I would like a bill that includes General Petraeus going in and fume gating Washington. I'd like General Petraeus to set up -- no, seriously set up a little court where, like, "Hey, Barney Frank, come here, sit down." Because they are looking for oversight. I don't trust any of these guys with oversight. I want somebody that I trust to have oversight of the overseers. You know what I mean? And I don't trust anybody in Washington.

RAMSEY: This is the problem. Every time somebody says you need to be accountable, I always go, well, who are you accountable to.

GLENN: Yeah, exactly right. Hang on. I guess we have some people on the phone that want to talk to you. Go ahead.

STU: Hi, Glenn? I try to call Dave Ramsey's show all the time and apparently he gets calls. So I was able to just get right through.

GLENN: So you are --

STU: What I wanted to say is I have three houses and my wife had a great job. Unfortunately she lost the job. So I bought the three houses with her job. Now she was a volunteer, by the way. So I'm planning on my next Memorial Day party and I live on a lake and I want to buy a fleet of wave runners. Now, I make $12,000 a year. Should I finance it all, Dave, on convenience checks or is there another way?

GLENN: Dave, how --

RAMSEY: Payday lenders.

GLENN: How do you do it? I listen to -- listening to your show is like listening to Dr. Laura. People call Dr. Laura all the time and go, "Yeah, I've been whoring around for, like, the last four years. I have four children from four different fathers. Do you think I should go out Friday night? " How do you not just clobber some of these numbskulls?

RAMSEY: Well, because I'm a numbskull at heart. I got a Ph.D. in D-U-M-B and I just remember how much shame and guilt was in my spirit in those days and so I can return to their pain and help them try to draw out of that.

GLENN: Aye-yi-yi. Just, sometimes I wonder. Do you think the average person has any idea -- well, you disagree with where we are. I was going to say do you think the average person knows how much trouble we could be in here? But you disagree with me.

RAMSEY: You know, I think that Washington doesn't think -- I think there's a lot of arrogance and condescension coming out of our representatives on this. I think the average person does know that there's trouble and honestly believes that things like Home Depot and Microsoft and Coca-Cola and McDonald's are, you know -- to use a bad phrase these days -- fundamentally sound and are going to continue to make money, that this is a credit crisis and that all of those major national publicly traded corporations are not going to be worth zero anytime soon.

GLENN: Right, right. Okay. Dave, thanks a lot, man. I appreciate it.

RAMSEY: Well, I'm honored to be with you. Thank you for having me. Let's do it again.

GLENN: You say hi to your wife for me and I'll say hi to my wife for you. Thanks a lot. Appreciate it. Bye-bye, Dave. I swear to you my wife says that all the time. "You should listen to Dave Ramsey."

STU: I love listening to that show for that reason.

GLENN: Oh, people, you just, you scream in the car. You're like -- and Dave is like the most --

STU: So calm.

GLENN: He's so calm, and I would rip people's heads off. I'd be like, I would have no calls. Because I'd be like, "What, are you stupid? What part of you thought that was a good idea?" I mean, nobody would call in. Nobody would call in. Well, it would be like this show. Here's our number, 888-727-BECK. 888-727-BECK. I have to -- man, these attorneys.

VOICE: Attention, attention. Any financial advice given by Glenn Beck or any person heard on the air at any time on the Glenn Beck program should not, repeat, should not be followed. Glenn Beck once bought stocks whose success was predicated on a late Nineties boom of the rotary phone and he also advised against buying Apple stock back in 1984. You will incur major financial loss, divorce, alcoholism and hard core drug addiction if you listen to any of the financial advice on this program. Thank you.

GLENN: Okay, the rotary phone thing was true, but the Apple, never. Well... okay.

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