Constitutional lawyer says the president s comments to comey were grossly inappropriate, but we do not indict people for being boarish or clueless. What youll see is political theater. Democrats eager to show that the president broke the law. And a democrat will say its like watergate. Every network, broadcast and cable will cover the show gavel to gavel. Look at this, mid afternoon yesterday we learned what comey would say, stocks went up. The dow closed 32 points from its alltime record high and a few minutes from now, it may be opening virtually flat, down maybe five or six points, well see what happens at the opening bell 28 minutes. In other words, as the left goes full bore after President Trump, investors take the rally maybe to new highs. Remember, june 2015, donald trump came down the golden escalator and announced his run for the oval office. Two years on, were seeing what politics look like when a business guy becomes president. Varney company about to begin. Okay. The brits vote today. And thats the cover of the sun, its the british tabloid. Its very colorful as you see. They dont like the socialist leader of the labor party. Now, the ft, Financial Times, poll of polls, shows Prime Minister theresa may with an 8 point lead. Theyve started voting already. First the exit polls should appear around 5 p. M. Eastern this afternoon. Of course at fox business were on it. Next case. James comey takes the stand about an hour from now. And here is what youre going to hear him say. President trump asked to drop any probe of former National Security director Michael Flynn that was connected to sales statements about his conversations with the russian ambassador. Thats one. President trump did not ask to drop the broader probe into russia or possible links to his campaign. When comey told the president he was not on anybodys side politically, trump said, i need loyalty. I expect loyalty. Stuart these are all excerpts from comeys Opening Statement released yesterday afternoon. Judge Andrew Napolitano is with us, hes read it several times. Big question, did the president break t law . I think all i have now is the statement, which obviously is going to be amplified by many hours of friendly and contentious questioning. The statement is like a Christmas Tree with ornaments that everybody likes. Enough there that democrats like. Enough there that republicans like. Theres pars words and lawyerlike language. We know a couple of things, we know that the statement was reviewed by robert mueller, the special prosecutor in the justice department. No prosecutor would allow his potential star witness to testify in a forum that the prosecutor is not participating in without reviewing that testimony in advance. We also know that though republicans would like to be able to ask jim comey about barack obama and Hillary Clinton and the democrats would like to ask him about things that are not directly relate today his statement. Hes not going to answer. Hes not subpoenaed. He volunteered to show up. He can pick and choose what questions to answer and what questions to decline to answer. Stuart okay. Jonathan turley, you heard me quote him. I happen would agree with jonathan. Stuart let me repeat it. I think its necessary here. Jonathan turley, a constitutional lawyer says, look, no obstruction of justice, but we do not prosecute people for brish o clueless behavior. The key word is prosecute, impeachment is a political matter. The people who are his detractors dont have to prove a legal case like you would to a jury. They just have to throw enough mud up there that the house thinks they should go one step further. Do i see enough mud in the statement . Absolutely not. But we dont know whats going to come out today when comey is interrogated. I dont mean to be critical of the members of the complete, but jim comey is probably smarter than anybody thats going to be interrogating him and certainly more familiar with the rough and tumble of interrogating under oath than anybody questioning him. Stuart two questions, number one, we know that the president is probably in the white house luncheon room. I think i know whats coming. And that he tweets. Is it possible hell tweet a response to james comey as hes saying it. And that the members of the committee will pick up on the tweet and present it to the witness. Of course its possible. Its utterly unprecedented and in this hightech age, almost a hightech dialog between them. The president in the private quarters and mr. Comey answering what hes tweeting out. Stuart thats called a tease and thats going to give us a fairly large audience. Youre airing that in 55 minutes. Stuart yes, we are. Last one real fast. Is there anything that President Trump should be really afraid of . Yes, appearing to have engaged in the interference with Law Enforcement for corrupt or venal purposes. That is the definition of obstruction of justice. Stuart well, do you think thats likely . No, but again, my thinking is only animated by the seven passages that comey released last night. I dont know what hes going to say as ty interrogate him of eachin of the seven pages. Stuart judge, youll have a full day. I tell you. Stuart we shall. Im waiting for those tweets. I dont know whether hell do it or not. Judge, thank you very much indeed. A pleasure. Stuart Brian Brenberg is a professor at Kings College in new york city. He joins us now. Now, this could this be good for the president s legislative agenda, the g. O. P. s legislative agenda because the man is under pressure. I could see the g. O. P. Rallying around their guy and getting things done and giving him a win as the democrats go after him. Yeah, i think it can, if the president responds correctly. I really hope he doesnt do what you and the judge just talked about. Stuart tweet. That will be a problem. If he can respond in a gracious way and say, look, im here to focus on the pro growth agenda, taxes, health care, then youve given the g. O. P. Something to rally around and they can say this has been a side show and we want to get to our main agenda. Lets focused on that. The president , were with him. Yes, its possible, but depends on the president s response and youre making me nervous by the conversation with the judge. Stuart what are you worried about . Lizzie is here and shes go the a big smile on her face. Liz im wondering if youre going to get lindsey graham, marco rubio or john mccain ready to rally around. The comey thing, if he thought it was obstruction of justice, he didnt tell his bosses, that undercuts his office. And theyll paint he was threatened over being loyal and about his job. The issue, was he threatened . The president said on tv, this russia thing, you know, thats why i was upset with comey. Stuart i just feel that i dont want to get involved in he said this, and he said that, and then this happened. And nobody can follow it. Nobody. The markets are very good at ignoring the drama. Look at the document yesterday and they said is there something legal here . Answer, no, were fine. Liz the republicans could get hostile. Stuart weve got the nordstroms stock on the screen, look at that, its up 22 , premarket. A 9 gain for nordstrom. We all know nordstrom the Department Store. Why is this happening . Im told theres a possibility nordstrom goes private. Thats interesting. So somebody will buy out the common stock, presumably the premium and up goes the thing. Any more. Liz nordstrom is announcing the exploration of possibly going private. This is an issue, how will they go private . Who is going to help them. Another beleaguered retailer with a bad balance sheet. To go private you have to have another boatload of debt. Stuart if youre going private, you have to buy out the shareholders. Liz and buy it. Stuart 8 higher. What do you think of that. Id like to know what theyre going to do next. If you take a private, a bigger online play or is there a play there. Stuart imagine those who sold nordstrom short. And suddenly its up 9 a share and the shorts are holding a nasty little bag. 21, 22 , theres a gain. Lets look how the overall market is opening up this morning. Im going to say its a muted opening, but please remember, the dow closed yesterday 32 points away from an alltime record high. Investors have seen what james comeys going to say today. Theyve seen it already yesterday afternoon and they still move the market up. Dow jones average, s p average and the nasdaq, all of them went up and are going up a little bit more first thing this morning. How about the price of oil. Talk about a drop yesterday, down 5 . Look at that, down a little bit more today. Were swimming in the stuff. Theres a glut of it on the world market and were down to 45 a barrel right now. All right. How about the big five . This is what we love to quote. These stocks utterly dominate the market and have done the last year, 18 months. Theyre premarket, the fab five, theyre up on the day that comey testifies, apple, amazon, alphabet, facebook, at near here record highs. Back to you brenberg, weve got time on the show for you. Look, this turmoil in washington, you can see right there whats happening to stock prices. Explain it. Its the beauty of the stocks, theyre not washington dependent. Theyre transforming every industry they walk into, it doesnt matter really whats going on in washington. What matters, theyre pushing in, and nordstrom, a few minutes ago, because of amazon. I love that theyre engaging in Creative Destruction and thats why investors are interested. Stuart youve got to watch this stuff. Youre about to see political theaterment i theaterment theater. Im going to give you an example yesterday, object and obstruct from democrats. Congressman repeatedly cutting off the Deputy Attorney general, would not let him speak. We will play you the sound bite. 40 minutes from now. Former fbi director james comey will testify on capitol hill. There will be drama and dramatics, political theater. Well be watching. Watching your money, tech stocks still on a tear. Apple the most valuable company in the world, but, hold on, there are some who say its time to sell. Watch this. Theyre all great companies, might be getting close to time to make the fabulous four. I think were soon approaching harvest time for apple shares. Theres really . Weve written positively about them at barrons. We like the anticipation of the next iphone. Im not sure about the launch of the next iphone. Im more excited about the runup to it. Think again. This is the new new york. We are building new airports all across the state. New roads and bridges. New mass transit. New business friendly environment. New lower taxes. And new University Partnerships to grow the businesses of tomorrow today. Learn more at esd. Ny. Gov huge drop for the price of oil yesterday. It was down 5 . And its down again this morning. Were looking at 45 per barrel. Alibaba, that is chinas amazon, up big and i mean big time. It gave an upbeat forecast. The citys revenues were going to be up about 45 in the future. The stock is up 12 . Thats premarket. Tesla, wow, its been on a tear recently. Look at it go today. Were now at 363, and a high and tesla this morning. The left, as in democrats, may be showing a little contempt for our president during the hearings of mr. Comey today. Let me take you to yesterday where there was a similar outpour of outpouring of contempt. Watch this. Senator, im very sensitive about time and like to have a lengthy explanation to you. Can you give me a yes or no answer. Its not a short answer, senator, it is its either youre willing to do that or not as we have precedent in that guard. The chairman, they should be allowed to answer the question. The chair had to step in and say the witness has to answer the question. To be fair. Stuart and with us is lisa booth. Hi, stuart. Stuart good morning, lisa. Now, lets suppose a democrat does something similar with james comey today. Badgering the man, for example, not letting him answer the question. I think that will make the democrat look bad. What say you . Well, and it will probably happen. I mean, i guarantee well see that here in 40 minutes from now, during the hearing, but youve got to think about it, stuart. I worked on capitol hill for a and so, theres also political component as well, for someone like senator harris. And questioning rosenstein and put it on youtube and put it out on press release and she gets to tout that she was standing up to the trump administration, so theres a political element of this, especially with a young senator like camalla harris and sticking it to the donald trump administration. Stuart i dont think it will look good though. The whole world is watching this. Every broadcast network, every cable network, gavel to gavel. You dont say. Stuart you dont say, exactly. What do you make of the idea, that maybe the Republican Party may rally around him in his time of difficulty and therefore get something done on obamacare and taxes. Am i wildly out of line by suggesting that . I dont think youre out of line and if everything stays where weve been now, and nobody says theres evidence of collusion. In comeys written statement. He basically confirmed what the president said hes not under investigation, that this is a Counter Intelligence investigation. If everything stays the way it is now. I think youll see republicans rally behind him. And i think the best thing that republicans at large is something to get done from a legislative standpoint. They have to get tax reform done. They have to have movement on health care prior to the midterms or he think thats the most damaging and could cost the most harm to the Republican Party not to tell voters you elected me for a reason and we got something done, we governed, we did what we promised. If we cant do that, i dont know what case the members have to voters to get reelected. Stuart theyve got to get on with it. Theyve got to. There is no choice here. Lisa, im out of time. Ive got developments in the Department Stores. I know youll be watching, as well as the rest of the world. I will be, have a good day. Stuart reports that nordstroms is considering going private. Its premarket, a 17 gain and thats helping the other Department Stores. Look at them go. Kohls 4 . Macys 3 . J. C. Penney, et cetera, et cetera. The idea that nordstrom may be bought out and go private, thats inspiring the Department Store industry for a modest gain, who would have thought. Liz inspiring. I feel inspired. Inspiring might be a little strong. Stuart weve been talking about retail ice age for months and months and months and now we have this. How about that . 10 00 eastern, democrat senator mark warner, off he goes and the comey testimony, warner is going it compare the hearings today to watergate. You will hear it. A bar in d. C. , as in washington, opening for a comey viewing. And every time trump tweets about comey, drinks are on the house. Well talk about comey in just a moment. Deartheres no other way to say this. Its over. Ive found a permanent escape from monotony. Together, we are perfectly balanced. 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That is going to give away free drinks if President Trump tweets about comey during the comey hearing. And look who is here, Ashley Saunders is the general manager of the union pub where the free drinks will be given away in the president tweets. Shes going to join us on the phone. Hi, good morning. Stuart what prompted you to do this, giving away free drinks if the president tweets. Are you expecting him to tweet . Im hoping for at least one. It would be disappointing if he didnt. Stuart have you gotten any advance orders . Have people booked up tables and all of that kind of things . No, we arent taking any reservations, but getting ready to open right now and i can tell you theres a line almost all the way down the block. Stuart theres a line down the block, are you kidding me . Really . Are you close to capitol hill . Are they waiting for you or for the hearings . I think a little bit of both. Were one block from the Senate Building and a few blocks from the capitol building. Stuart let me get this right. Its the union club in washington d. C. , the union pub, i should say, in washington d. C. Yes. Stuart if President Trump tweets about comey during the hearings, everybody gets a free drink. What happens if he tweets about tax cuts or obamacare . If its in relation to anything comey is saying, we will give out a free round, but if its something thats clearly unrelated, it will not count. Stuart okay. Do you happen to know if youve got any competition from other bars on your street . Im going to highly doubt it. I know other bars are showing and hosting specials, but because i think we did something that sets us so far apart, and were the place to be. Stuart you know, President Trump occasionally watches this program. We have a discussion for t we have a discussion for the president , he should tweet, union pub bottoms up. Ashley, youre a good sport. We appreciate it. Good luck. Liz not even a free pretzel for tax reform tweets . Popcorn. Why not . As opposed to a steak dinner. Okay. Look at the futures, this is how were likely to open the market in literally two minutes time. Of course, its the comey hearings day. You cant escape it. Every network, cable and others will be running this full tilt, gavel to gavel. We will open up in two minutes time, down 7 or 8 points. Please remember, we closed yesterday 32 points away from the alltime record high for the Dow Jones Industrial average. We found out what comey was going to stay mid afternoon. The market went up and its going to open, oh, flat to slightly lower this morning. We need some commentary on it aside from moi, myself. Lets bring in elizabeth mcdonald, shah gilani, and scott martin. It doesnt seem to matter to the markets what comey is going to say today or the worldwide publicity hes going to get. This market looks like its poised to keep going up. Shah gilani, what do you say . This is a testament to the market, strong earnings. Initially, the upbeat attitude the market had to election of donald trump, its faded a little, but its held the gains and gotten higher. Its about earnings now. Heaven forbid we get good news out of washington, something actually done in terms of infrastructure, in terms of taxes, it will go through the ro roof. Stuart go through the roof, ill quote you on that. Scott martin, comey notwithstanding, it seems like the market goes to go up. What say you . I think to shahs point, the market wants to see us move on from russia, move on from comey. The reality is so far, the preview that weve seen, its helpful for the agenda, its helpful for getting some stuff done thats put on hold. Thats what the market wants to see is things follow through and the fact that the markets held on here. We had a bad day some weeks ago, it feels like forever ago. Other than that, the market has held on waiting for that progress. Stuart three, two, one, bang its 9 30 eastern time and the markets are open and this is jim comey day. Weve opened with a 4 point loss, that means we are 36, 37 points away from an alltime high. Okay . Thats very interesting to me. The screens on every tv all over the country, probably all around the world, are going to be locked onto james comey and the hearing on capitol hill that begins in 30 minutes time. Despite that, the markets close to a record high and weve opened dead flat. Show me the s p 500, why dont you . Were virtually at no change there, its pretty much dead flat. Slightly higher. The nasdaq composite. I believe its close to a new high. Its 14 points up, nearly a quarter percentage point higher. How about oil . Tumbled yesterday, 5 drop. No effect on the stock market. Right now its at 45 per share. Individual companies, very interesting, nordstrom. Talking about possibly going private. That would mean a buyout of some sort at a premium to the stock price, thats why its up 16 . Thats helping the other Department Stores which have been badly beaten down. Kohls,macys, dillards, on the upside the first i think this. We follow these stocks and why not, they keep going up this morning. Facebook is up. Amazon 1013 per share, fractional loss for microsoft. Alphabet 1005 at this point. Apple is holding virtually unchanged at 155. Got to show you tesla. That thing is still, well, earlier this morning, hit an alltime intraday high of about 364. Its now at 362. That is a high during the trading time, i believe. Got to get the technicalities right. Liz there you go, you did. Stuart all right, were off and we are running. And we have the market opening with a 5point gain as of right now. Okay. Lets suppose we come to about 1 00, 2 00, this will be the end much the comey hearings for this day, i think. Theyre scheduled until about then, where do you think the market is going to be the end of the hearing . I think if the president is quiet, we get what we got yesterday, the market will breathe a sigh of relieve. Months by month, markets arent spooked by drama. If we dont see a change of evidence, markets if republicans go after comey aggressively. He talks and drops bombs into the probe into russia and if he says i felt my job was threatened when he demanded my loyalty and he said on tv, the russian thing, thats why i fired him, if it goes down that line of reasoning, it could be slippery on the markets. Stuart were going to cover it and watch for precisely that and figure out if President Trump is going to tweet directly to the hearing about what mr. Comy has to say. Liz if he tweets bottoms up, you at the union pub. Stuart im in trouble. Im in trouble. All right. Lets move on from the comey hearings, lets go to the british election. What we have in britain is the voting has started already. The Financial Times has a poll of polls, which shows theresa may with an 8 point lead. It looks likely that she will win. Will that have any effect on us at all. Should she win, and should based on the poles. It will give a boost to the ftse in london and the european stocks and absolutely, i think its helps a little bit . It should. Stuart scott martin if theresa may wins, shes going to get 44 of the vote, we understand. Thats the polls forecast, if that happens do we benefit in america . We probably do in the sense that the status quo prevails and therefore, theres not any upset to the market. I think the next step with regard to theresa may, stuart. What happens with theresa may, with the comments she made about changing some laws and practices Going Forward with some of the terrorism over there and procedures taken by police. The markets want to see stability. They dont want to see terrorist attacks. Theres been tremendous action here or everseas with respect to the attacks. Regardless the market wants to see some of the authorities to take steps to at least rectify whats going on. Stuart were what, 20odd minutes away from the beginning of the comey hearing and weve got a pretty much unchanged market. And i guess you could say investors are saying, wait and see. Any bombshells, well move on that. If it goes smoothly, well hold near record levels. Thats where we are at this moment. This is interesting, Credit Suisse has named eight Technology Companies that the bank says will keep moving higher. And you know, that the fabulous five are among them, so scott, lets see what weve got here. Do you agree with that . I mean, here is another prediction, the big name Technology Companies just keep on going up. I know we talk about this all the time, but you have to. Its so important for the market. So, scott, are they going to keep on going up . They are. Now, i feel like the folks at Credit Suisse, stuart, have been watching this show because, you know, its great to get these recommendations out there, you know, to talk about how great the tech stocks are. Now, would have been nice if they told us 25 ago like we did here back in the fall. Now, the reality is this, if you look at the areas theyre talking about, the fair and balanceds, the apples, theyre companies that are seeing tremendous Earnings Growth and tremendous Profit Growth and a tremendous part of everyday life. Thats why you should own not not because theyre pushing up the nasdaq. Because theyre amazing in technology. Stuart anything else, scott. Theres no ceiling atop of them. If you look at the market since the election, the dow is up 18 since Donald Trumps election, up a little over 7 year to date. The stocks on average, five of them are up 31 . Stuart you know, youre a brave guy because you said on election day, the dow at that time was at 18,000, you sai here comes 20,000. We hit 20,000 and you said 21,000. Got it right and ive heard you say it, 22,000 and beyond. If politics fall into line, well get there. You look at leadership in terms of tech stocks, theyve got growth, earnings, theyre brand names. Some have become verbs. They are the future. Stuart interesting. Brenberg, now youre an economist, youre not a market watcher, so im not going to ask you to comment on stock prices. Ill ask you to tell the audience and me why it is these five Technology Companies are so important to americas future . Theyre doing things nobody would have predicted five years ago. From a check standpoint, Creative Destruction is the engine that drives an economy and these are the Companies Better than anybody else in the world that are producing that. Thats why investors are in on this. They dont know what the upside is, but they see the Companies Moving into industries and making money and gaining customers and thats why you buy. Liz these stocks of responsible for about a third of the gain nearly half. Liz nearly half, pushing on that. Stuart never seen anything like that before. Its a little scary because in terms of capitalization and the weighting, but this is not anything these companies are producing massive earnings, massive profits. Its not about eyeballs, this is about making money. Stuart and im going to speak about one of member of the fabulous five. Barrons Senior Editor said its time to sell apple shares. Scott martin, what do you say about apple now. Of of the fab five apple is probably the least exciting one to me. Why . Its mainly hardware. They talked the other day about the speaker thats going to take on alexa, and for me, if theres one of the fab five and cut it down to the fab four, apple would be the one. We still own it because its cash flow crazy. They have tons of money on the balance sheet, they just need to get mother innovator. Stuart 225 billion in cash. Pocket change. Liz a gentle respectful rebuttal to scott martin from wall street, apple has a gigantic Customer Base around the world. If they get that speaker going to the Customer Base, its additive to the bottom line. Stuart they can milk the Customer Base. People like apple more, but they like what amazon gives them. Liz and scott martin is probably right. And thats why it will prevail. Were about 20 minutes away from the comey hearings and the Dow Jones Industrial average is dead flat within 30odd points of record time. Were up two points as we speak. Lets talk about alibaba, i call that chinas amazon, its up very big this morning. I almost said bigly, i almost did it. They give an upbeat forecast, huge revenues a couple of years down the road. The stock is up 10 . Verizon is a winner. And yahoo is planning to look at ply east. Oil is 45 a barrel this morning and were falling 20 cents per barrel on top of a 5 drop yesterday. And how about the price of gasoline . Right now its an average nationally of 2. 35 a gallon. I confidently predict that that will go down. I think it goes down to about 2. 20 a gal. Liz i think youre right. Stuart i think im safe with that. Oil 45 means gas, i think, at 2. 20 nationwide, we shall see. All right, when are we going to see the lower gas prices, brenberg . This is great. How long have we talked about running out of oil and running out of resources and now were sitting here saying weve got so much oil prices are going down. This is great and we need this for the economy. Stuart when we went on the air, im not sure, two years ago, we went on the air with our threehour show nine to noon. Two years ago we did it. I think that oil back then was around 80 or 90 a barrel and now its cut in half and the price of gas has gone from way over 3 to just over 2. And i think thats done an enormous amount of good for americas economy. Its a huge cut for america. Stuart its huge, what a shot in the arm. Look at me im saving a lot. Scott martin, go ahead. Doesnt it seem like brenberg is the kind of guy who has an electric car, so perfect and environmental, it doesnt seem like he has an electric car so he doesnt care about oil prices. Stuart thems fighting words. Scott drives a scooter around chicago. I lost my license. [laughter] i drive a chrysler town and country van. How old is that van . Its three years old, im about to trade it in and do you know what im they go of buying . You wont believe it. What are you buying . What . Another van. Stuart no, a cadillac. Liz really . Yes. Beautiful. Stuart im thinking of buying a cadillac. I think dollar for dollar. Like a 75 cadillac . [laughter] no, i think put General Motors stock on the board, please. Ive got to get to social media. Twitter is now warning you, before you send a tweet, warning you, that was meant saying theyre just offering a warning, you want to take that back is basically what theyre doing. No impact on the stock, but its at 17 per share as we speak. A little bit of a move on the market. Look at this. Now were up 16 points. Im not going to call that a huge rally by any means. But, you know, theres 18 minutes to go to the comey hearings and were up 16 points on the Dow Jones Industrial average. One more thing on social media, snapchats growth has slowed sharply in the past couple of months. Scott, are they feeling the heat from instagram . The answer is yes. Definitely. You know, isnt it funny how quickly Companies Like instagram, its parents facebook, stock on snapchat. Once they were an ipo everybody took them on. The problem for me is the demographic, they cater to late teen, early 20s years. Those kids dont spend money, therefore the advertising dollars are know the going to come in over time as everybody expected. Stuart snap is down to 18 a share as we speak. Lefthand side of your screen, thats the hearing room, the action starts in 16 minutes. Ive got to say thank you very much indeed to shah, scott and brian, good coverage on a very important day. Gentlemen, appreciate it very much. Now were up 21 points, were just shy of the 22 21,200 level. Im checking my notes here and the alltime record for the dow was 21,206. We hit that last friday at the close, june the 2nd. So, thats the number to watch. 21,206. If you hit that, that means youve hit the alltime record high at precisely the moment when the democrats try to undermine President Trump on capitol hill. Now this senator mark warner, hes vice chair of the Senate Intelligence committee. Hes released his Opening Statement. Emack, what does he have to say . Hes the democrat setting the stage where this will go. First point, we began this entire process with the president and his staff denying that the russians were ever involved and then falsely claiming no one from his team was ever in touch with any russians. We now know that is not true. Next up, the president appears to have trends director comeys job while telling him i need loyalty, i expect loyalty. Next up. I do want to emphasize what is happening here. The president asked the fbi director to drop an investigation into the former nsa, National Security advisor Michael Flynn. Next up, final point, in further violation of clear guidelines, this is where mark warner brings in watergate, the clear guidelines put in place after watergate, the president then called the fbi director, james comey, twice and asked him to lift the cloud of the russia investigation. Theres the obstruction argument. Stuart thats the Opening Statement. The obstruction of justice argument and i think he actually uses the word watergate and draws analogy of the comey hearings and the hearings of the 70s. Hes going off trump. Liz the president didnt do himself any favors, on television saying oh, its the russia thing and comey. Why you had a problem with obstruction of justice why didnt you go to your boss at the time. Stuart the Dow Jones Industrials are moving up more, 25 points, 29 points, 21,203. What did i say the record was, 21,206. Its possible that at 10 00 this morning, when the hearings begin, its possible that the dow will be right at an alltime record high. Next case. This from california democrat senator, kamalla harris, ahead of the comey hearing. What have we got on this. Liz here is how the democrats are going at this, first, comeys statement validates news stories that showed trump interfered in the fbi investigation. Ive got many questions, shes saying essentially the fact that he asked for his loyalty and then basically fired james comey shows that the president is thats proof according to the democrats that President Trump did interfere in the russia investigation. Thats their line of reasoning. Stuart okay, thats where what theyre coming out with right upfront. Liz thats correct. Stuart moments from now, youll see it, James Comey Testifies to the Senate Intelligence committee. Our next guest knows mr. Comey personally, he is former u. S. Attorney matt whitaker. Come on in, please, matt. Welcome to the program. Good to see you. Good to be here. Stuart ive read, you know comey and you like comey, but you say President Trump was right to fire him. Make your case. My case is pretty simple. When i came into the department of justice, jim comey was the Deputy Attorney general and he orient tated me to the department of justice and i would interact with him on a regular basis, i know him well, and what i do know, though, if you read rod rosensteins memo that outline the basis for firing jim, he was accurate. Rods case talks about how he took how director comey at the time took the Hillary Clinton email server situation and made it not just a denial of prosecution, but made it kind of a little bit of a political circus and ultimately did things inconsistent with not only fbi policies, but also fbi traditions. So the criticism of james comey is that he went political and politicized the fbi and stuck the fbi into the middle of political debate and thats something you should not do, is that in a nutshell, thats the criticism . That is the criticism. Its also he took the role of the department of justice and the attorney general and made it his own and it explained why a prosecutorial decision was maids which is not his role to make. Stuart but he said he did that because he did not trust that meeting on the tarmac between then attorney general and the former president of the United States. I mean, he basically said, i went public because i couldnt trust the judgment of the attorney general. I think i got that right. Yeah, well, i think that jim was correct in that analysis, still, it wasnt his role and he stepped into a place where, just, you know, he was doomed by the criticism he was going to receive and loretta lynch, who was attorney general at the time, was inappropriate in meeting with bill clinton on the tarmac, but at the same time, it was her decision and continued to be the do js decision to make on the prosecution. Stuart okay. Matt, look, thanks very much for joining us. We appreciate it. On the lefthand side of your scene, you can see the crowd assembling in the hearing room. Its jampacked and journalists all over the place. Ive got to tell you, its going to be on every broadcast and cable network, gavel to gavel, all the way through, starts at 10 00, should be over by late, late lunchtime, maybe, 1 00, 2 00, Something Like that. And thats whats going on right now. Now, the Intelligence Committee members are about to start taking their seat. Thats what youre looking at right now, and the backdrop to this, the money backdrop to whats going on in politics is that the dow industrials have opened on the upside. We heard what james comey was going to say, we heard this yesterday afternoon. Stocks went up after that. This morning we found out what senator mark warner, democrat on the committee, what hes going to say, hes going to liken it to watergate and the dow industrials are still just a little higher, 21,177. Thats whats going on right now. Were bringing in a reformed lawyer. [laughter] his name is Gregg Jarrett and were wheeling him in as we speak and sitting him down as we speak and hes got a microphone on, im going to ask him, look, i think that the democrats will try to push the idea that our president obstructed justice and that that is an Impeachable Offense and this is just like watergate. I think the argument seems to center on whether or not our president pressured, exerted pressure on james comey to walk away from the investigation of general flynn and your point is . Pressure is not enough. Look, the statement as it stands, james comeys prepared testimony does not constitute obstruction of justice, instead it largely exonerates the president. Here is why. If you look closely at the obstruction statute, it requires the president to have acted corruptly. With that, the statute defines what that is. It is lies, bribery, threats, withholding or concealing eviden evidence, destruction of documents. Com comey doesnt present that in the statements and therefore its not obstruction of justice. Hoping or wishing its there, is not the same as issuing a threat. I just heard liz talk about senator warners statement he seems to say, oh, demanding loyalty is a threat. Nonsense. Loyalty is one of those wonderful wonderfully fungible terms. Stuart let me ask you this, President Trump was in business, and it seems hes running this as a business. If you run a company and you say i want loyalty from you, and i demand loyalty from you. Why dont we get over this. What does that mean anyway. Stuart you cant say that to the director of the fbi when you are the president of the United States . Look, hes not a lawyer. He probably should if i were him, as a lawyer, i would never meet privately with the fbi director. Why . Because i can see a car wreck coming before it enters the intersection and i avoid the intersection because i know somebody will find out about it and will think its pernicious or nefarious or illegal in some way so i would never do it. The president is a businessman, as you points out. Stuart he is, thats what he does and i think he will always take that approach. And you have to understand it in that context, but, again, all of these actions by the president are not illegal, theyre not even wrongful. Theyre probably unwise at best. Stuart okay. Lizzie, youve got something to add on this. Liz well, the idea of obstruction, when there are what, seven probes at least, or five to seven or eight probes still going into the russian meddling in the election. Now, we did have the bombshell it appeared that russians, allegedly, hackers there planted cookies, as weve been talking about, in 122 local Election Officials sites and did they hack the vote. Thats the side story thats extremely important. Thats really bad. We do not want that happening. Stuart thats not connected to comey and the president. Liz thats not connected to this right now, correct. Stuart thats a separate issue. Liz correct. Stuart i agree with you, grave cause for concern. You start messing with the vote and now youre really talking serious intrusion, but thats not what its about today. Liz fire engine red alarm bells about that. All of this business about collusion. Collusion is not a crime except in antitrust law, as you well know, its anticompetitive behavior, price fixing and so forth. The only possible crime could be if somebody in the Trump Campaign with actually engaged in an overt act with the russians to perpetrate the hacking. Res no evidence of t in fact, nobody has ever claimed that. So, all of this hype about collusion is legally misplaced and erroneous. Stuart on our screens just moments ago. There was senator marco rubio and elizabeth, you brought him up moments ago. My contention would be that the Republican Party will rally around a president , a republican president who is in trouble, and who wants to get his legislative agenda passed. You brought up the very valid point, watch senator rubio, watch his questioning. Does he want to help the president , having been personally offended by the president in the campaign. Liz thats a good point. Hes known to be an independent thinker and he has an integrity about himself, and so, if he starts going after james comey and say, elliicits out of james comey or felt threatened in any way, according to Gregg Jarrett, that he would lose his job and he was fired and that equals obstruction, then your a going to see slippery sledding on the market. Remember, the president has Constitutional Authority not only to hire and fire for a reason or no reason at all, anybody in the executive branch. He actually has the Constitutional Authority to tell them what to do. Do this investigation. Dont do this investigation. Past president s have done it, most recently jfk and lbj. All the way back to Thomas Jefferson who ordered his attorney general to prosecute aaron burr and micromanaged the trial itself. So, historically the president is on solid footing. Nobody talks about that, but legal scholars are well aware of it. Stuart however, youre talking legally. You are a recovering lawyer. Right. Stuart youve got a law degree and this is not a legal arena. What our viewers are looking at is the political arena. Right, and look, there is the political act of impeachment which is completely different than the law. Gerald ford once famously quipped, what does impeachment mean . He says its whatever Congress Says on any given day. Stuart hes right. The Founding Fathers identified impeachment, and used high crimes and misdemeanors, but never defined it. I think they wanted an evolving standard to take place. Thats completely different from obstruction of justice as a crime. Liz what james comey will say. He will say the fbi was not investigating donald trump personally and when he understands what the president was talking to him about, it was about the Michael Flynn lying about, you know, talks with the russian ambassador, not about the broader russian probe. But then, the next step is, is when the president starts saying, oh, you know, the cloud of the russian probe, complaining to james comey about that, will james comey say that was an issue for me and the fbi, it felt like the president was pressuring us there to get that done. I dont understand why thats an issue for him. The president wanted the truth to be told. Why is that nefarious. Stuart hold on a second, i dont want to get bogged down in legalisms. I dont want to get bogged down on who said what to why and where. The issue about of that committee today is going to be did our president break the law. Did he commit an Impeachable Offense. And the answers that those questions will dictate how the market goes in the future. Were joined by elizabeth peek, columnist for the fiscal times. Weve got a minutes to go before the gavel and the dow industrials are dead flat and liz peek says what . I think all eyes are going to be on this hearing, but, yes, i think from the prepared testimony, we know that there is absolutely nothing here that leads to impeachment considerations and thats what the democrats the democrats want to take the eye off the ball. They dont want people looking at the stock market, which is up. They dont want it looking the people of the countries looking at the optimism which is rising in the country. This is a way of underi think moo the president and honestly, honestly maybe im reacting to the fact that the other side has been so unfair. Cnn had to recant a story today which was basically based on Anonymous Sources very scary, maybe im reacting to that. This is so much unfair slamming of the president for political reasons. I do. Stuart all right. Now we are about to take you live to the hearing room you can see on your screens. That is on capitol hill. Former fbi chief james comey will testify before the Senate Intelligence committee literally moments from now. We know what he will say, that President Trump asked him for his loyalty, to quote, let go the investigation into general Michael Flynn. The democrats will try to show obstruction of justice. They may make comparisons to watergate. You may hear the word impeachment. It is unlikely james comey will provide evidence for it. Legal experts generally agree poor judgment on the part of the president but he did not break the law. He is running the government like he ran his business, that is giving him politicalc troub. Stand by for drama. Stay there, please. Watch history unfold because this is