Roger Stone’s The Stone Zone dissects Trump’s geopolitical wins—a 90-day China tariff cut (145%→30%), $80% drug price slashes, and RFK Jr.’s 2026 ban on synthetic dyes like Red No. 40—while exposing "chemtrails" as a DARPA-engineered "crime." Economic analyst Barry Habib warns Biden’s $2T deficit demands GDP growth over austerity, slamming Fed Chair Powell for stifling recovery with high rates, and urges tariffs, tax cuts, and wasteful spending reforms to avoid bond market collapse. Stone frames Pope Leo XIV’s brother, Lou Provost, as a MAGA provocateur mocking Pelosi and Clinton, before Habib’s final plea: tax cuts or face history’s largest hike. [Automatically generated summary]
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I don't know about you, but I, for one, am not tired of winning under President Donald Trump.
We have a ceasefire in the war between India and Pakistan.
We have the Russians agreeing to meet with the Ukrainians at long last.
We have the announcement of a trade deal with China, and the president has made a historic announcement that is expected to cut prescription drug prices by as much as 50%, perhaps more.
I'm particularly impressed with Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert Kennedy, only two days after federal officials, including RFK, took action against synthetic dyes for foods and beverages, PepsiCo and their chief executive officer announced that their company has already begun phasing out artificial colors and reducing other ingredients in its products to meet consumer preferences.
Quote, we obviously stand by our science.
Raymond Laguarta, the head of PepsiCo, said our products are very safe.
There's nothing to worry about, but we understand there's probably going to be consumer demand for more natural ingredients.
We're going to be accelerating that transition.
Ideally, we do this in a very pragmatic, orchestrated way as an industry and not create unnecessary panic and chaos.
What's shocked me is how many cereals and other common foods that we buy here in the United States, which have dangerous, in some cases toxic additives, when the same exact name brand is sold in Europe, they don't because those ingredients are already illegal there.
Now, under the leadership of RFK, we are outlawing those toxic ingredients here.
In the meantime, RFK has determined that the vaccinations, the MRMA vaccinations, actually include DNA fragments from aborted fetuses.
This has caused a religious objection among some Americans.
Let's listen to RFK.
We also understand that some people don't do that.
The MMR vaccine that we currently use has millions of particles from, were created from aborted fetal tissue, millions of DNA fragments, and there are people who have religious objections toward those.
And those people should be treated with compassion.
If they come to a hospital and they're sick, we need to know how to treat them.
And one of the failures of the CDC in the past is they weren't telling doctors, no kids should die of measles in this country.
Even in 1963, before the introduction of the vaccine, there were 400 deaths a year, and there were up to 2 million measles cases.
So it's only very, very sick kids should die from measles.
Nobody should.
There's something that we're saying that the rubella portion of the vaccine, and you were talking about the produced from the fetal cell line, originated from an abortion that took place in the 60s.
But the MMR vaccine doesn't contain the cells in its final form.
It doesn't contain cells, but it contains DNA fragments.
Got it, got it.
And so that's your point.
Yeah, so, and people have religious objections to that.
And although I might not share those objections, I respect them.
And I think those people, you know, a lot of the men and I said, hold me, and I went down there and spent time with the community during the outbreak.
And they said they didn't want to go to the hospital because they were treated as pariah.
They said we were treated like lepers there.
And that should not be part of American health care.
If somebody comes in, if they have a religious objection, we should still be treating them.
And your big point is a choice.
I agree completely with RFK.
I do object, and I think he's been very forthright about saying it.
Meanwhile, he has announced plans for the FDA to phase out six remaining synthetic dyes for food.
Green number three, red number 40, yellow number five, and number six, blue, number one and two, by the end of 2026.
In January, the FD had already ordered that red number three be out of U.S. foods and beverages by 2027.
But now, under RFK, the agency is moving much, much faster.
He's also announced that the HHS will begin looking into geoengineering.
That's what some of us know as chemtrails.
You've seen them in the sky behind airplanes.
Now, as HHS Secretary, Robert Kennedy Jr. has confirmed that this geoengineering has been happening, and he has correctly labeled it a crime.
After the British government announced new geoengineering efforts to, quote, combat climate change last week, RFK responded, we will soon end this crime against humanity and our planet and bring justice to the plutocrats who are perpetrating this mass uncontrolled experiment.
To be very specific, what we are doing is releasing these toxic chemicals through aerosols into the air.
In fact, RFK recently sat down on a segment I saw with Dr. Phil, and he stunned the audience when a woman asked him point blank about the toxic aerosols being sprayed over us every day.
My biggest concern is the stratospheric aerosol injections that are continually peppering us every day, the lady asked.
Bromium, aluminum, strontium, it's sprayed into our skies.
You know, we don't do that, but it is done, we think, said Kennedy, by DARPA, naming the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency.
A lot of it is now coming out of the jet fuel.
Those toxic materials are being put in the jet fuel.
I'm going to do everything in my power to stop it.
We're going to bring anyone who's doing that to stop.
This is why I respect RFK and why he is making, we're good on his word to make America healthy again.
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump has signed a historic order to reduce drug costs for Americans.
He signed this executive order yesterday implementing most favored nation prescription drug pricing, which delivers dramatically lower drug prices for the American people.
But the president is, well, always entertaining in the way he announces things.
Let's listen to what the president had to say.
I mean, I'll tell you a story.
A friend of mine who's a businessman, very, very, very top guy.
Most of you would have heard of him.
A highly neurotic, brilliant businessman, seriously overweight.
And he takes the fat shot drug.
And he called me up and he said, President, he calls me President.
He used to call me Donald.
He calls me presses, so that's nice respect, but he's a rough guy, smart guy, very successful, very rich.
I wouldn't even know how we would know this, but because he's got comments.
President, could I ask you a question?
I'm in London, and I just paid for this damn fat drug I take.
I said, it's not working.
He said, I just paid $88, and in New York, I paid $1,300.
What the hell is going on?
There he is.
The comedian-in-chief, the stand-up comic-in-chief, Donald Trump, always entertaining, but making an important point.
Again, the Secretary of HHS, Robert F. Kennedy, will establish a mechanism through which American patients will now be able to buy their drugs directly from manufacturers who sell to Americans at a most favored nation's status price, bypassing the middlemen.
This order is expected to reduce the cost of pharmaceutical drugs by up to 30 as high as 80%.
The order also directs the U.S. Trade Representative and the Secretary of Commerce to ensure that foreign countries can no longer take advantage of Americans as other administration officials work to negotiate directly with manufacturers.
Americans fund about 75% of big pharma profits, while we've been paying three times what other nations do for the exact same drugs.
Drug manufacturers discount these products to gain access to foreign markets, and then they subsidize those discounts through high prices charged in America.
In essence, Americans, therefore, have been subsidizing drug manufacturing profits and foreign health systems, despite drug manufacturers benefiting from generous research subsidies and enormous health care spending by the U.S. government.
Trump's order ends this scam once and for all.
No more subsidizing foreign socialism with U.S. wallets.
Starting today, the United States will no longer subsidize the health care of foreign countries, President Trump said, and we will no longer tolerate profiteering and price gouging from big pharma.
Meanwhile, Donald Trump's Secretary of the Treasury, Scott Besson, by the way, I think Scott Besson is absolutely among the president's very best nominees, very best appointments, announced a historic win in a major win for the president.
Besson said that we had reached the framework of a trade deal with the communist Chinese.
Let's listen to the Secretary of the Treasury.
What has to happen is it has to be fair for the American people.
But in January 2020, President Trump produced a template.
We had an excellent trade agreement with China, and the Biden administration chose not to enforce it.
The Chinese delegation basically told us that once President Biden came into office, they just ignored their obligations.
So we already have a large framework.
The other thing to remember here, Jonathan, is that this is a pause down to 10%.
The April 2nd level for China is 34%.
So we will be working to see where their final reciprocal number ends up.
And the negotiations are a combination of tariffs, non-tariff trade barriers, currency manipulation, and subsidies of labor and capital.
So this is a major, major win for President Trump and his America First Trade Doctrine.
The United States and China have agreed to a deal that cuts both countries' tariffs on each other's imported goods by 115% for at least 90 days.
The Treasury Secretary held these discussions in Geneva, Switzerland with the Chinese.
The talks aim to address the escalating trade war, which has seen the president impose tariffs as high as 145% on Chinese goods, with China then retaliating with 125% tariffs on American products.
Clearly, the president's strategy has brought the Chinese not only to the table, but to a deal.
Now, under the New Deal, the U.S. will slash its previously imposed 145% tariff on Chinese imports down to a mere 30%, while Chinese will then match that reduction from its retaliatory 125% duties, cutting them to just 10%.
Additionally, Secretary Besson said China had agreed to help the U.S. take aggressive actions to stem the flow of deadly fentanyl and other precursors of fentanyl from China to illicit drug producers in North America.
Bessett told reporters that China blew off their trade obligations as soon as Joe Biden entered office.
He pointed out that, as you heard, that we had a deal, we had a template for trade with China under President Donald Trump, but as soon as Joe Biden became president, he decided not to enforce us.
So they basically, the Chinese, just blew us off.
On True Social, the president expressed he was very happy with this exciting new deal.
A very good meeting with the Chinese in Switzerland, he said.
Pope's Brother & MAGA00:07:32
Many things discussed, much agreed to, a total reset negotiated in a friendly but constructive manner.
We want to see for the good of both China and the U.S. opening up of China and American business.
And under Secretary of the Treasury Scott Besson, great progress has been made.
We have more political news coming up for you here in the Stone Zone.
We appreciate your tuning in every day here.
Five days a week, we talk history, news, politics, style, culture, and yes, of course, food.
So whatever you do, don't touch that dial.
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We're going to talk about the Pope and his brother because the Pope seems to be MAGA.
The Pope seems to be, probably the Pope's brother seems to be MAGA.
I'm hoping that the Pope's brother will go visit him in Rome and maybe give him some of that MAGA religion.
You tuned in to the Roger Stone Show and we'll be right back.
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Americans deserve access to the best of what our country has to offer, especially health care.
Across every state, every community, America's rural hospitals are the first line of defense protecting our families, neighbors, and loved ones.
No matter where you live, hospital care doesn't clock out.
They're there 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.
Each year, America's over 5,000 hospitals care for millions of patients, providing 24-7 emergency care, delivering babies, cancer treatments, and other life-saving care that patients rely on.
Behind every one of those patients are doctors, nurses, and caregivers working tirelessly to keep people healthy and safe.
Hospitals are our community's lifelines.
They employ our neighbors and keep our families healthy.
But now, some in Congress are threatening access to care.
Tell Congress, protect patient care to keep America strong.
Don't cut rural health care.
This is the Stone Zone with Roger Stone.
They went after a guy named Roger Stone, who's sitting in the office.
And I'll say this in Trudeau Roger, he's no baby.
And right now, he's cleaner than anybody in this place.
No, they treated him very unfairly.
Now, get him a zone.
It's the stone zone.
Here's Roger Stone.
Welcome back in the Stone Zone.
The far left media and their allies in the Democrat Party are in full panic mode after it was revealed that Lou Provost, the straight-shooting Floridian, who's the brother of the newly elected American Pope Leo, isn't just a Catholic, but he's unapologetic MAGA.
Provost, a Port Charlotte, Florida native, proudly lives his life like many forgotten Americans with faith, freedom, well, and the First Amendment.
But now, after his younger brother ascended to the papacy as Pope Leo the 14th, the leftist media mob is frantically digging through Lou Provost's Facebook looking for anything they could use to cancel him over.
And I guess they think they found gold.
What they found instead was a red-blooded American patriot who tells it like it is.
It's absolutely glorious.
Lou Provost shared a video of a liberal support group for those suffering from Trump derangement syndrome with the caption for my upset, crying, left-leaning friends and others suffering from TDS.
This service seems right for you.
Even more amusing, on April 4th, Lou Provost, we posted a video of a younger Nancy Pelosi arguing for tariffs on China, exposing the radical 100-degree flip-flop that Pelosi and her Democrat cronies have pulled to appease the leftist globalists.
The original post didn't hold back, saying these effing liberals crying about tariffs are just unreal.
Don't they know there's such a thing called video?
Just listen to what a drunk has to say in the middle 90s before her husband had grinder dates.
That's pretty hardcore by Lou Provost.
Also, I found it entertaining that Lou Provost seems to be red-pilled when it comes to Nixon and Watergate.
He actually posts a graphic in which it pointed out that, well, while Nixon only erased 13 minutes of a tape, Hillary Clinton erased 33 million classified emails, destroying them with a hammer and bit bleach, pardon me, when they were under subpoena.
So the president's brother, pardon me, the Pope's brother, is MAGA.
The Pope is a registered Republican.
He seems to be a moderate, but like all good Catholics, we pray for him.
Appears that on matters like gender nonsense and the right to life, he remains solid in the traditional teachings of the church.
When we come back, we're going to talk to Barry Habib, one of the country's leading experts on hauguses and mortgaging and a keen economic analyst about the impact of the announcements by President Trump that not only are we going to deeply cut prescription drug prices, but we have a trade deal with our foremost adversary, Communist China.
We'll be right back with Barry Habib on the other side.
Whatever you do, don't touch that dial.
This is the Stone Zone with Roger Stone.
They went after a guy named Roger Stone, who's sitting in the office.
I'll say this in front of Roger.
He's no baby.
And right now he's cleaner than anybody in this place.
Now, as they treated him very unfairly.
Now, give him a zone.
It's the stone zone.
Here's Roger Stone.
And you're back in the stone zone.
Joining me now is Barry Habib.
He is the chief executive officer of MBS Highway.
More importantly, he is one of the country's leading authorities on both housing and the mortgage industry.
He is the go-to guy on mortgages and housing, but also a keen economic analyst.
He is widely credited with saving the mortgage industry back in 2020 from margin calls due to Federal Reserve actions.
It was Barry Habib's presentation to the Fed that created stability at a crucial time.
He is now the four-time winner of the Crystal Ball Award given by Fannie Mae, Pulsonomics, and Zillow for the most accurate real estate forecasts among the 150 top economists in the country.
We're always honored to have him because economic matters, simple and understandable.
Barry Habib, welcome in to the Stone Zone.
Always great to be with you, Roger.
Thanks for having me.
So, Barry, we had some momentous announcement yesterday.
90 Days to Negotiate00:04:56
The United States and China have agreed to slash tariffs for 90 days.
Do you believe this will lead to a longer and more permanent agreement?
I do.
And I think the incentives on both parts, the U.S. is about to feel the pinch of it.
You've got to remember, Roger, that as of Friday, no ships left Chinese ports for the U.S.
And I think that was a big incentive to making sure there was a deal put together from the U.S. side.
Because from a consumer standpoint, if you hear, you know, you've been hearing about tariffs, you haven't really felt it too bad so far.
But where it really could hurt is that there's an item that you want that you can't have access to.
And I think that that is going to actually manifest itself as we approach the next 30 to 45 days, because it takes from ships leaving China about 30 days to reach the west coast of the United States, 45 days in the middle of the country, about 60 days to reach the East Coast.
So in the next 45 days-ish or so, we may see a void on some of the items that people are accustomed to having readily available.
And that's when people start to get antsy.
So this could be very, very good as a preemptive move.
Now, I'd like to just discuss the level of tariff whenever you'd like, Roger, because the percentages do make a difference.
You anticipated my next question.
Professor, proceed.
So, you know, that 145%, and we've talked about this in tests, that's window dressing.
Once you get above 50%, you essentially shut down viable trade because it's just too costly.
So dropping to 30% starts to make it viable again, and maybe there's room to negotiate.
So this 90-day period is going to be really good.
Hopefully that it can extend beyond that.
I think it will.
As I said, the incentives are there.
But Roger, let's take a look and understand how the tariff works, because what I've discovered is there's so much confusion out there.
And let's use an example of a shirt that you buy from China.
So let's just say there's a tariff of 10%.
Now, the confusion starts with who pays the tariff.
Some people think China is paying the tariff.
They're not paying the tariff.
If you have a shirt that you're importing from China, and let's just say that shirt is $10 and there's a 30% tariff on it, that means the importer is going to pay a $3 charge for that tariff.
Now, what happens after that's important because then nothing else is tariffed.
There's markups.
That importer is going to send it to a wholesaler.
They're going to mark it up a couple of bucks.
That wholesaler is going to send it to a retailer and they're going to mark it up a couple of bucks.
And then the realtailer, when they sell it to the consumer, will probably mark it up at least 100%, if not more.
So you could have an item that does have a 30% tariff, which sounds onerous.
But the cost of the item might only change from $45 to $48.
Instead of like being $44.99, being $47.99.
So while that's certainly something that's meaningful and something that makes a difference, when we look at a number of 30%, we start to think, oh my gosh, that's 30%.
That seems like an awful lot.
And in some cases, like if it's a vehicle that we're imported and everything's imported, it could be.
But on much of the items that we get, people often forget that the other markups to the wholesaler, to the retailer, to the consumer are not subject to the tariff.
So the tariff is only on the raw imported item at that percentage.
It gets diminished on a percentage basis before it hits the customer.
Obviously, Secretary of the Treasury Besant made this announcement of a trade deal with China at a time that the stock markets were closed.
How did the markets react this morning to this news?
We had a huge rally in the stock market.
Obviously, trade is very important.
We know that it also means a lot to the job market because, you know, the Dow today responding by up over 1,100 points.
This is a sign that the stock market really loves this news because, look, it means a lot for jobs.
Those people that unload the ships, that transport the goods, the retailers that have to have those goods on their shelves.
It's very important for the economy to keep the economy in good shape.
In addition to that, there are things that could come out of it bilaterally.
If there is a more fair platform for trade, if it does help American workers, if it does help American exports, that, in addition to it, will also help the U.S. economy.
So, you know, President Trump's negotiating tactics are not conventional.
Jerome Powell's Economic Dilemma00:14:10
But maybe they shouldn't be because in the past, some of the more conventional ones have not been effective.
But if we do get something good out of this, this could be a very effective way to have a more level trading partnership with China.
And something else that seems to have come out of it that President Trump was also discussing was that China will be more cooperative in restricting fentanyl from coming into the U.S., too, which obviously is something really critical.
So you have been a pretty articulate critic of the Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.
I saw recently where he announced that he was essentially not going to hike rates.
He was going to do nothing with inflation down to 2.4% from a 9.1% rate in June of 2022 under Biden.
Seems to me the president is already stabilizing the economy.
What should the Fed be doing at this point, if anything?
They should be cutting rates.
Clearly, Jerome Powell is like a deer in the headlights who is more concerned with his legacy than doing what's right because he has zero in the way of backbone or gumption.
And I was very critical of Jerome Powell because he was complicit after Biden went with that $1.9 trillion budget buster, which was going to be inflationary.
Jerome Powell was complicit and potentially politically motivated by keeping interest rates at zero and to add gasoline to the fire, keeping quantitative easing going, which then caused inflation to explode, as you perfectly articulated, to 9.1%.
Inflation like we had not seen in 40 years.
Jerome Powell has a lot of dirt on his hands for that.
But one of the reasons why he had so much dirt on his hands is because he looked at data that has a very long lag.
Unfortunately, the data in the United States not only has a long two-month lag on the PCE inflation reports before it's reported.
So you'll get May's report at the end of this month.
I'm sorry, you'll get to get a report within the month of May for the end of this month, but that's going to be for the beginning of April.
So it takes two months for it to come out.
You don't get it till almost the beginning of June to see what happened in April.
And that in and of itself is a delay.
But the components within it that we've discussed in the past, like shelter, which is the largest component, 44% of core CPI, these reports have a lag of 9 to 12 months.
So he's looking at that.
It's like trying to drive your car down the highway, but only looking in the rearview mirror.
He's not looking ahead.
Now, I have a lot of issues with Jerome Powell, but I also feel that he has been inconsistent.
So let's just take apart a few things from Jerome Powell.
Number one, is policy.
By his own words, we are in a restrictive policy stance.
That means that interest rates are currently designed to slow the economy by his own admission.
And John Williams, the New York Fed president, articulated it very well.
He said, if you take the Fed funds rate, 4.375, you subtract the rate of inflation, let's use round numbers, it's about 2%, the difference between the two.
And then he thinks there's a number there that they call this fancy name called R-Star.
You add that above the inflation rate, which means the difference between the two will tell you where the neutral rate should be.
We are currently 1.25% restrictive.
That's pretty restrictive.
Roger, we are pretty restricted.
So we are designing it.
The Fed is causing the economy to forcefully and purposefully slow, which I think the labor market's a lot weaker than we think.
And I think inflation is heading in the right direction.
Yes, there are uncertainty of tariffs, but we are forcing the economy to slow down.
And that's why President Trump has been, I mean, maybe a little overboard in his comments, but he has a lot of merit in the things he's saying about Sean Powell.
And the Fed, Roger, they're like a bunch of frickin' Lennings.
Okay.
These guys, they follow each other.
They're afraid of their own shadow.
Look at the UK.
The UK just got a vote.
5-4-4 dissenting votes.
That's a meaningful discussion where people are not afraid.
People's voices are heard.
They represent different thought processes.
The Fed is like a bunch of freaking penguins jumping in the water.
One jumps in, the rest of them jump in.
Nobody has their own mind.
Nobody has their own backbone.
And Jerome Powell is just worried because in February of next year, he goes off into the sunset, right?
And when he does, he's so fearful that it's going to have, oh, he let inflation get out of control that he's willing to risk to the health of the U.S. economy because of his reputation.
But there is no evidence that inflation is getting out of control.
If anything, inflation's come down.
You're 100% correct.
The only uncertainty is these tariffs, which is what they're running for cover under, because tariffs potentially, it's different than inflation because it is a one-time price adjustment, whereas inflation is persistent year over year.
However, inflation is something that has been improving, but there is a period of uncertainty.
But you are 100% correct.
It has been coming down.
Although I will tell you that the run rate for the last three and six months is above the year-over-year rate.
So there is reason to believe that potentially it could nudge up, but not in a meaningful way, and not to risk the health of the economy and the labor market.
There is one other thing that I'd like to talk about is one more inconsistency of Jerome Powell.
So we recently had first quarter GDP.
First quarter GDP came out with a negative number.
It's the first time in three years we've seen that.
Clearly a red flag.
But Jerome Powell, in this particular instance, Roger, was able to say, hey, you know what?
Let's use a little critical thinking here.
So he rationalized it by saying, and he was correct, that a lot of it was front-running imports.
The calculation for GDP takes imports minus exports.
So you then are reducing GDP artificially by this front-running.
So therefore, you could say, okay, well, he's probably right.
But yet it's amazing to me that he doesn't use the same strategy when contemplating the LADS.
He just looks at data.
In other words, GDP, no, I don't like the number, so I'll rationalize it.
I won't look at just the data.
But the job report last month, 177 jobs, I'm calling BS on that one.
Because first of all, there were 60,000 revisions.
They'll be revised lower, so it was a much weaker number.
And the numbers came from imputed data we've talked about in the past, this birth-death ratio, which accounted for about 80,000 of the jobs.
This number was really closer to a 50,000 job report.
It was a lousy job number, but yet Jerome Powell looks us in the eye and says, economy's in great shape, labor market's in great shape.
He knows all too well that's BS.
And he's able to be critically used critical thinking on the GDP number when he doesn't like it, but the jobs number?
No, he's just going to take it at face value.
That's a double standard.
I'm calling BS on it.
Barry, how do you think the president's announcement regarding lower pharmaceutical prices for all Americans will affect the economy?
Well, I think that could be a great thing so long as it does not discourage research and development.
I think it could be one of the greatest things for us because it is an unfair playing field.
We pay so much, so much more, but we are also the breadbasket of all these new breakthroughs.
So long as there are still incentives in place and there's a way to thread the needle by keeping the incentives in place, but reducing the cost, it could be one of the greatest things that happens to us.
We have about it.
It's doing an amazing job.
We have about two minutes before we have to go to a break, and we'll be back with more of Barry Habib.
Barry, how important is it that the president's tax cuts be renewed in January?
Well, as you know, I've been kind of involved in this on a couple of committees that I belong to, and I think it is very important.
If they're not, the stock market will not like it, Roger.
It will not like it one bit.
But by the same token, we do have to be careful that we don't take the budget so far out that I know that we're going to play the come here and we're going to say, look, it will increase revenues.
And all that is true.
But if you do blow out the budget further than the bond market is willing to accept, it could potentially backfire.
So they have to, again, this is a matter of threading the needle and using just enough to get the tax cuts extended without loading it up with too much.
I know he wants the big, beautiful bill, but he can't get the bond market to the point where you get the bond vigilante saying, hey, you know what?
The deficit's going to be too big.
There's going to be too much supply coming to the market.
And we see interest rates increase dramatically.
That will also hurt the stock market.
So we've got to be careful.
When we come back on the other side, I'm going to ask Barry Habib, the chief executive officer of MBS Highway, one of the leading experts on the housing and mortgage industry, as well as the overall economy, about the national debt and the deficit.
So, please don't go away.
We'll be right back in the Stone Zone with more of Barry Habib and a breakdown on the economic news of the day, Donald Trump keeping a number of his key promises and the impact of those announcements.
Whatever you do, don't touch that dial because we'll be right back.
This is the Stone Zone with Roger Stone.
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is the Stone Zone.
Get in the zone.
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Here's Roger Stone.
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My guest, Barry Habib, the Chief Executive Officer of MBS Highway.
More importantly, one of the most brilliant economic analysts in the country, specifically an expert on housing and mortgages, but also a shrewd economic analyst who has won numerous awards for his accurate real estate forecasts.
Joining me here in the zone.
Barry, how concerned should Americans be about the national debt that was allowed to grow so exponentially under Joe Biden?
And what is the very best way to address it?
You know, Roger, it's a great question.
And we're not left with many good choices right now because the time for making good choices is past.
The cans have been kicked down the road and it's been exacerbated by the Biden administration.
Now, when you look at the size of the yearly deficit, it's about $2 trillion.
So we're not going to be able to get this down in one shot.
But if we can get the trajectory to be reduced, that's why the president is so concerned about gross domestic product.
It's not necessarily the size of the deficit, but its relationship to gross domestic product.
This is the key.
You can have a $2 trillion deficit be manageable if the economy is growing at a much faster pace.
That's why Jerome Powell has to wake up and has to understand that we should keep this economy accelerating and not contracting and not in a restrictive stance because that exacerbates the level of debt as to the gross domestic product.
So what we want to try and do is we want to try and see if we can, A, through Doge and other spending cuts, try and eliminate waste, fraud, abuse, but also try to make some reasonable cuts.
It's hard to do because nobody wants to see cuts.
And when you think about the compensatory spending that you have, you have very little discretionary that's left unless you start to touch something like Medicare or Obamacare, because that's where the big money is.
And that's where you can really make some cuts.
But they may, in turn, be unpopular.
And, you know, nobody knows better than you how that could influence midterms or presidential elections.
So these are things that, you know, I'm sure that they need to be very cautious and strategically minded with making these cuts.
But we do need to get this deficit down.
Last time we talked about this, you pointed out that there were three legs of the stool: that yes, the president needs to use the tariff stick to get better trade deals for the country.
We have to renew the tax cuts.
In fact, if you're opposed to renewing the tax cuts in January, well, then you de facto supporting the largest tax increase in American history.
But we have to get serious about spending.
Elon Musk has shown us the way with his Doge project, uncovering not millions, not billions, but trillions of dollars of waste, fraud, and corruption.
All right, I want to thank our guest, Barry Habib, the chief executive officer of MBS Highway, and the voice I respect the most when it comes to the overall economy in America.
Barry, thank you so much for joining us today in the Stone Zone.
Thank you, Roger.
You're the best.
Thank you.
And to those out there in our Stone Zone audience, God bless you and Godspeed.
Until we meet again, please remember to tune in tomorrow for more of the Stone Zone.
We talk news, history, politics, culture, food, well, particularly food.
And we'll see you tomorrow.
God bless you.
Thanks for listening to The Stone Zone with Roger Stone.
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