♪ ♪ ♪ paul: welcome to the journal editorial report, i'm paul gigot, two new court filings by special counsel robert mueller and another in southern district of new york giving a glimpse into the cases against former trump attorney michael cohen and former campaign chairman paul manafort, do they give us indication where the russia probe is headed and whether it spells trouble for president trump. welcome, kim, let's take this from the top in order and talk about russia memos first, any

new information there that is of note? >> well, not really in terms of the russia probe as you mentioned, there were actually two court filings, paul, one from the southern district that largely dealt with the main crimes that cohen had agreed that he had done, tax evasion, misrepresentation to financial institutions, campaign finance violations, recommending a pretty harsh sentence for him. paul: right. >> a shorter memo to special counsel that goes to russia and we didn't learn anything, sought to details the ways in which he cooperated with the special counsel's office, the only thing new there is there had been some contact between cohen and unnamed russian individual in 2015 but even the special counsel document has to acknowledge that that meeting never went anywhere. paul: this is meeting with russia approach cohen and -- and

suggested synergy on government level. >> correct. paul: russia and trump campaign, but the memo admits that cohen didn't take the meeting. >> didn't follow up on it. paul: that never took place, so that's really not an earth-shattering bit of information here. >> well, no, especially not -- remember we waited all week, all trump critics said this was going to be a momentous day and learn about collusion, nothing in the memos that suggest. paul: one other thing that mentions cohen memo, certain discreet russian related matters core to the investigation from the regular contact that cohen had with trump campaign officials. there's, again, no details, now that could suggest that there's some more information to be revealed but, again, not in this memo. >> no, we are going to have to continue to wait as we have been

doing now for months and months for the special counsel to finally put out a report to find out what other areas if any he has been investigating. paul: let's turn to manafort sentencing and mainly concerns manafort alleged lies after plea deal and -- and there is a suggestion and these relate mainly to manafort's businesses in ukraine, things that he pleaded guilty to. but there's reference to ukrainian business partner of his, anything new there because of course ukraine and russia are right next door and that's been suggested they could be related? >> yeah, no, so again, on the manafort memo, the big speculation was what did he lie about, did he lie to bob mueller about questions regarding own underlying crimes or something to do with russian collusion. it looks like from this document that it's all about his own underlying crimes, so lobbying,

money laundering, a long-time business associate of paul manafort, ukrainian-russian, he was charged back in the summer with witness tampering and the suggestion that somehow he is and manafort attempt today get to certain witnesses and have them cover for them, this all seems to go to those questions, what conversations he may or may not have had on that and a lot is redacted but even the white house from what it understand it goes to paul manafort own underlying crimes. paul: let's move to southern district, robert mueller passed off part of the negotiation, campaign finance violations to the southern district and that involves the payments to stormy daniels and another woman who alleged to have affairs with donald trump and the campaign -- cohen paid them to keep quiet. now the document says that cohen acted in coordination and at the

direction of donald trump and democrats are saying that's a crime and donald trump is now involved in conspiracy to violate campaign finance laws. what's new -- we knew that from the plea deal, didn't we? this isn't new hereto? >> no, not necessarily new. i think it's startling for them to see it in there in court document individual one, that individual one is the president, claiming in court document that he knew about this, had discussions about this, now, look the justice department isn't going to go after him because of long-time guidelines that suggest you cannot indict a sitting president. the question as you mentioned are democrats, what are they going to do with this, is this what they need to now officially start impeachment proceedings as soon as they take over in the house. and i think that is the importance of this. paul: well, what they are going to do, i think, let's step back a bit, call up michael cohen, no

question about it, maybe witness one in new congress and make issue of campaign finance violation, alleged violation and will decide is it something that politically they can get away with to impeach donald trump, so something that started with russian collusion could it really end with impeachment of michael cohen -- of donald trump for paying off somebody not to talk about a sexual affair, we will have to watch and see if they can do that politically, thanks for being here, kim. when we come back wild week on wall street after china trade trigger selloff, more volatility ahead? which i used to offer health insurance to my employees. what's in your wallet?

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but those gains have evaporated tuesday and as president trump weigh intoed debate at one point calling himself tariff man, where do china trade talks stand and can we expect more market volatility as negotiations continue? let's ask wall street journal columnist dan henninger, columnist mary o'grady and assistant editorial page editor james freeman. mary, are we going to get a trade deal with china or not? is that the reason for the market's volatility? >> i think it is. it's sort of silly that president trump had dinner with xi and came away with everything solved and the administration tried to put a very positive spin on it but we don't have the framework yet. what we have a promise to work on the framework within the next 90 days and there's some other good signals from china. they have a series of government

agencies that are basically have announced punishments for companies that steal intellectual property, so, yeah, it may happen but i think that the market understands that this is a long-term process, they will buy more fruits and vegetables. paul: natural gas, a lot of goods. >> many things they were already buying before all of this started but this is a big steep hill to climb and so it's going to take climb. >> i'm glad to hear the market understands that. there's a lot to understand and get your arms around and especially the fact that all of it runs off of president trump and the one thing that donald trump complains about are trade deficits, we have 376 billion-dollar trade deficit with china. he wants that if not disappearing, on the other hand, it's clear that there are many other things going on in this negotiation such as the theft of intellectual property, the fact that businesses have to have

chinese partners and so forth, the structure of the american economy and then suddenly this week you have the arrest of the chief financial officer for the chinese telecom company huawei at request, it's the whole national security apparatus that is involved in this negotiation with china. how the market absorbs all of that is a good question, they are struggling. paul: james, how china reacts to that arrest. i was in washington this week and talking to larry kudlow, talked to secretary steven mnuchin and consistent message that they heard in the talks an leading up to the dinner in xi a new seriousness of china, more interest in details, actually putting specific proposals which they wouldn't share with us, but putting those on the table, but thin we get this jolt from huawei, how will the chinese react? >> i think the one nice message

that's come out in the weeks since that dinner is the chinese are finally acknowledging intellectual property theft is a problem. how good will their solution be and how far will they go, we will see. it seems if they are accepting that they have to behave like a normal country in following the rule of law they would also respect that we have laws that if huawei is violating them they will be prosecuted, that really shouldn't be a trade issue, the more we learn about the huawei issue, the more you see bipartisan concern, not trump concern exclusively, a bipartisan concern that this is a bad actor or at least a threat. paul: it's fascinating to watch friends of mainstream media because they seem to be cheering not the trump to get a deal but for something to fail. i mean, they seem to say, sell-out, he hasn't really gotten anything for it, i mean, it's an odd kind of turn of events because before they were

criticizing for trying to work hard on china. >> i think that's true, there's a bias against president trump but he's created a lot of the problem by as dan said, put emphasis initially on trade deficit which is preposterous and the main thing is intellectual property issue and as james said that's bipartisan issue, that we have to work on and in the end it's going to be a very long road and in the interim you risk higher tariffs and that's what the markets are worried about. >> i am the tariff man said donald trump. he loves tariffs, his most favorite president was william mckinley, member of house of representatives in 1890's imposed the mckinley tariff. chinese are dealing with 19th century economic model in donald trump, but the threat is real, 25% tariffs, they have 90 days to work this out and i think the

markets and the economy is worried that you can get into a chronic tariff situation going into 2019 which would suppress economic activity. paul: but i think the chinese have to understand, beginning to understand that there's a consensus that these -- that chinese predatory behavior is a problem and it's not going to go away just if donald trump goes away in 2 years, briefly, mary? >> xi road to more aggressive nationalism is not popular across the board and there are reformers in china that prefer the way that china was going when it joined the wto, they'll also be pressuring him. paul: all right, when we come back, despite temporary trade truce with beijing, the rest of chinese executive threatens to turn turmoil, gordon chang on

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paul: arrest of chinese tech company executive threatening to throw u.s.-china relations further into turmoil, cfo of telecom giant huawei arrested last weekend in canada at the request of the united states for allegedly violating sanctions against iran, move likely to escalate tensions between washington and beijing as delicate trade negotiations continue, columnist gordon chang author of the book, collapse of china, good to see you. >> thank you so much. paul: let's talk about the arrest, what signal is the united states trying to send, do you think?

>> i don't know if it's a signal. first of all, the united states has to defend and enforce its own laws and we haven't done that for a long time with regard to china especially with regard to the iran and north korea sanctions, a certain amount of this is coincidence, i don't think that they planned this for saturday night when trump and xi jinping were meeting in buenos aires, you know, you have to rib that china poses a multifaceted challenge to the united states, we don't have luxury with dealing with just one problem at a time, therefore these things are going to happen and happen because the united states has decided not to be on oblivious. paul: how are the chinese to react to this, will they walk away from the trade talks? >> i don't think that they'll walk away from the trade talks because the chinese understand that they need access to the u.s. market, you know, last year

china's merchant and we can see this from official state media and also from the nationalistic global times which is connect today communist party. they are really upset. paul: interesting, the huawei executives, we are private company, we have nothing to do with the government, that's the same message they tried to send to foreign intelligence officials because they are trying to sell around the world to telecom networks and companies and 5g all over the world. in your mind can you separate huawei from theuawei is technicy private but the connection and the coordination between huawei and the communist party is close. also the coordination with the people's liberation army which is part of the communist party is close.

huawei grew extraordinarily fast, this didn't happen on its own, it happened for a lot of reasons but the most important one was because of its connection and support from beijing. paul: do you agree that the western intelligence agencies should block its -- its ability to operate in -- in say u.s., uk and so on? >> well, certainly especialfully the five i's countries, intelligence sharing consortium. canada is the only one that has sort of not made a decision yesterday. paul: intelligence director gave speech warning about penetration by state's sponsored company into 5g. >> certainly does not want huawei in canada's 5g network, 5g will connect everything. paul: your toaster. >> chinese in beijing will know when you use your toaster.

this is the internet of things and this connects everything. paul: all right, let's move to trade negotiations more broadly. how do you feel about the -- the way things have developed so far coming out, because as i said, i talked in other block i talked to u.s. officials, they said they saw a new seriousness on the part of xi himself but also the whole staff team. >> yeah, chinese are extremely worried. there's a sense in beijing that xi jinping, chinese ruler took on the u.s. prematurely, that china certainly does not hold the high cards a lot of people once were saying and political dimension to this. xi jinping put on rules on succession and everything else out the window during 6 years. paul: restored something of cult personality. >> got rid of the rules and which, you know, president trump faces election every four years or american president does, xi

jinping faces election every day because he has become responsible for everything. last year that was great because things were going well for china, he could take all the credit, this year when things are not going so well for beijing he gets all the blame. there's nobody he can blame because he's taken responsibility and authority from everybody else. paul: what you're saying he has real incentive, xi has and the chinese have to do a deal because if they don't you're going to start to see and this is my point that they would start to see businesses move supply chains out of china, that's already happening. >> it's already happening. paul: likely to accelerate if there's a real trade breakdown. >> yeah, and a lot of people were looking at saturday's dinner to decide whether they should keep supply chains in china for this year. big-box stores like wal-mart make many commitments, actually mostly all commitments in the first quarter for the year and that means that, you know, they'll probably stay because they might think there's a truce, i don't think long-term

we could k have enduring agreement. we've had so many deals break down with xi jinping, it's not likely that they'll come to terms that they would be willing to accept and we would be willing to accept. paul: can you get them briefly, truce for a couple of years? >> yeah, we could do that but it'll break down. paul: okay, all right, thank you gordon chang, appreciate it, thanks for coming. still ahead job growth slows in november but the u.s. labor market continues to show signs of strength. we will take a close look at the numbers and new report that is the federal reserve could slow interest rate increases next year.

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paul: job growth slowing somewhat next month with economy adding 150,000 jobs in november, friday's closely watched report from labor department coming amid fears and report officials consider slow of pace increases in the new year, we are back with dan henninger, mariana stacy o'grady and bill barr, the president said he's going to nominate former attorney general to be his next attorney general. what do you think? >> i think it's a good choice, he was attorney general during george h.w. bush's presidency, started reputing the idea that donald trump doesn't like bush values because bill barr represents them.

integrity, sense of public duty, one of the things you have to understand about bill barr he's great believer in presidential authority, he defended president trump's invasion of panamá at the time, can you imagine donald trump did something like that and in the coming year donald trump needs attorney general that understands presidential authority. i might add as well that while he was in the attorney general's office he had someone working for him named patrick, he is now white house counsel. he has worked for bill barr and the fact that white house counsel knows attorney general knows will be very important for legal pressure this president is going to come under in the next 14 months. paul: fascinating, james, how worried should we be about slowing economic growth in the rolling markets? >> i'm not too worried. maybe no surprise but -- [laughter] paul: mr. complacent,

mr. sunshine. >> look, solid, not great job's report, you -- maybe you could have liked obviously more job creation but still this year overall average hiring better than last year, so wages are up, a lot of good news in there but if you're the fed and you're basically saying we are going to watch the economy closely, this is not an outstanding report, it's a good one, you have slowing global growth, based on their policies, i think, it's reasonable that they would slow down. paul: average growth in jobs, 170,000, that's down from 200,000 in the first half and now wages up 3.1% but still not exactly booming. i mean, i think this is a little cause for concern, mary? >> well, paul, i've made a list of things to worry about. [laughter]

>> the i didn't -- ying and the. >> more pessimistic. i'm only part irish. >> you have trade, which we know all the problems in trade on the horizon, labor shortages in the country and dysfunctional immigration system. you have the fed and you have money tightening elsewhere in the growth, you have slowing global growth, you have brexit, you have the u.s. fiscal deficit. paul: slowing china. >> gridlock in washington and you have the only thing that the republicans and the democrats can agree on which is spending more money on infrastructure. now, none of those things are good for business investment and business investment is going to be at the core of whether this -- this economy keeps going. i'm not saying that there's anything terrible in the next six months but the market looks out further than that and reasons to be -- paul: i want to zero on key point which i think mary made which i think is

business investment and the trade uncertainty's impact on business investment, you can see it in all reports, you hear it from ceo's in quarterly earned statements that trade is causing them to hold back, much as barack obama regulation onslaught caused them to slow back. >> you are a federal reserve expert if you are head of federal reserve jarome powell, living in the world mary described, what do you do? >> i do not raise interest rates in december, i put it on pause and say we can do it later and continue to withdraw the balance sheet and keep moving on that ground, don't raise interest rates because there's so much uncertainty right now. you can always do it again next year but wait, a world screaming for dollars, dollar is very strong. don't shrink the amount of dollars in the global economy. >> sorry --

>> the analysis one reads is interest rate is baked in in december and next year they may take -- paul: that's what i think they'll do, but if i were them i would really debate very hard whether to stop in december. >> well, not to get too wonky here but the yield curve is what people are freaking out because once you get flat and inverted yield curve it predicts recession, it only it was really inverted in the 5-year because people had been, you know, loading up on the 5-year, shorting the 5-year as a way to play the interest rate change and all of a sudden they went the other direction and i think that's why you had the yield go down. paul: sign of little inflation and enough uncertainty to raise rates, all right, still ahead, to not raise rates, still ahead the senate and saudis following briefing in the murder of washington columnist jamal khashoggi, lawmakers say that

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and visit fda.gov/genericdrugs. paul: mike pompeo last week denying direct connection between saudi crown pins -- prince and the murder of jamal khashoggi but after closed-door briefing tuesday by cia director gina haspil, just how congress should respond to journalist's killing, tennessee bob corker in briefing, the chair of the foreign relations committee, welcome senator, good to see you. let me ask you before we turn to foreign policy, the president is going to nominate bill barr

former attorney general to be next attorney general, what do you think of that choice? >> well, first, good to be with you, look, i don't know much about him but what i do know that he's been received fairly well and seems to have been a professional but i'll know more about him next week. paul: okay, all right, thank you, senator. you were in the grieving with gina haspil, what do you think, did mohamed bin salman know and order the murder of jamal khashoggi? >> paul, just as i'm talking to you right now he did, it was the most precise specific presentation i have ever received from intelligence officials and he would be convicted in 30 minutes in front of a jury, there's no question that he ordered, he monitored it and he filed up after the fact in my mind and it could have been ha i heard the clip about pompeo and mattis, could have been that maybe -- maybe

additional information came in that they had not seen but the time we had the briefing but, listen, there's just no question, i don't think anybody left the briefing with any doubt about his direct involvement. paul: why would the administration be saying no smoking gun evidence, it's puzzling. >> yeah, and it's a mistake, paul, because you know washington well and so what you have now is people on both sides of the aisle trying to figure out a way to push back because it's just not true and to say that if you buy enough arms from us and if you lavish praise on me, you can go around killing journalists and there's no problem and so you've got congress figuring out a way to push back and as you know i strongly prefer the administration just deal with this in the appropriate way, i think sometimes after legislating it's a blunt object and sometimes misses the mark,

anyway, i do think congress is going to try to address this. paul: well, and the way you do it is important as you suggest, so the vehicle you've got there is something call lee sanders which could trigger world power resolution, the u.s. has to withdraw any troops that are helping the war in the saudis with the war in yemen, but me -- i think the war power's resolution is illegal and wouldn't be a measure that would undercut the president's ability to conduct foreign policy pretty dramatically? >> yeah, so there's actually three efforts underway, that is one. my guess is there's move, 51 majority, i will not support, i will not support moving to it. and then it's my guess is i will move to make all amendments germane. i think that will pass and so we will probably just vote up or

down on that and the actual result of that in my opinion, paul, is going to have zero effect, zero effect on actual policies but it sets a press debit and so many of us want to make sure if you're going to use, you deal with germane issues or what this sets for the future, think about how many countries in northern africa, we have the same kinds of operation underway so there's a second effort, it's called menendez young, it's something i hope we will take up in the committee itself, it does not deal with war powers. i'd like to see some refinement before i could support it but it will affect policy and then there's the third piece which is just a resolution that hopefully will come before the senate where we strongly push back on the crown prince and strongly condemn his actions as it relates to the journalist, i'm working with mitch mcconnell to come up with something that hopefully can pass overwhelming

in the senate. paul: that would be a statement of the senate's concern that we believe that mbs played a role in this and that the united states should do what? what should the u.s. do? what would be the sense of the thing that we do? >> yeah, in that particular case we already put forward the act, we sent later now and he has to determine within 120 days ago, that was 15 or 20 days ago, he has to determine 120 days whether the crown prince was responsible and then hopefully there would be some types of repercussions, so that's a direct issue. you know, the condemnation honestly, paul, it does not affect policy. paul: right. >> it just condemns the actions so the one that does affect policy is young menendez and i hope i can get some changes there but that one if it actually pass which is difficult as you know we are at the end to

have year. but next year will come around, the same issue will be here and it would affect policy. paul: affect by say arms deal, how specifically? the way they have 2-year ban on all arm's sales. let me say, paul, as practical matter they'll be not any arm's sales for some time, as chairman of the committee, i can block sales but so can the ranking member menendez and angle will do in the house side but as practical matter there won't be arm's sale, what i can do limit to offensive only, shorter period of time, gives us time to assess what actions are taking place and gives us the ability to buy those types of weaponry that protect them, you know, protect incoming missiles and it does a few other things that, again, affect policy but that would be a statement that is --

is somewhat measured, again, as practicality they'll be no arm's sales for saudi arabia for some time because there are people that have the ability to block them that will block them, not just because of what the journalists, the killing of the journalists but also people's concerns about what's happening in yemen, so i hope this peace process works that's underway right now. i wish the administration would just come out and strongly condemn -- think about what we did with turkey, we had a pastor that was in prison and we rightly so marked the heck out of erdogan, nato ally, why would we not do the same with somewhat of an ally saudi arabia. paul: all right, senator, fascinate to go watch, thanks for coming on, we will watch the debate, appreciate it. >> thank you. paul: when we come back the global carbon tax revolt, protests continue in paris after french president e e -- emmanuel

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paul: in a stunning turnaround french president emmanuel macron will abandon plans for controversial fuel tax, violent protests continue in france spurred in part by price increases that were schedule today take on january 1st, part of french government's plan to wean consumers on fossil fuels. dan, the thing that's strike to go me, emmanuel macron did not

run on higher fuel taxes, he thought the need to impose them in the name of climate change and started with rural protests from people who rely on gasoline to get to work and the -- go buy groceries. >> an amazing event and i think it really is a blow to the credibility of shall we call it the climate movement not just in france but everywhere, the press constantly run fear-mongering stories about future of the climate. emmanuel macron actually decided to do something about it, the idea is you have to pay to mitigate climate so he imposes tax on gasoline fuel in france and french people who drive their cars all of the time and we know fuel is expensive, wait a minute, we are paying higher taxes to prevent hurricanes, polar icecaps or something like that, this strikes the average person as nuts and so that has

always been the dilemma at the center of a lot of the climate change proposal when they are proposing economic policies on people would there ever be pushback, guess what, there is pushback. paul: we should say, mary, violence are never acceptable but the idea of revolt against carbon taxes, we are seeing in democracies all around the world, you watched in canada. >> in canada trudeau was going to put a tax on 30% of the emissions and he had to walk that back earlier this year because there's been investment strike, capital strike, people -- the taxes are too high and that was one of the penalties that people didn't want to go to canada anymore because of that increased tax but -- right, explains the change of management in ontario recently, there's an expectation that the right party will win in alberta

this year, sorry in 20 -- in 2019 and also, you know, for example, they are taking the federal fuel -- this carbon tax to the courts and saying, look, you're not allowed to collect this money, we can collect it so one of the problems is that this isn't as much about the tax itself as it is -- i mean, it's about fighting carbon as it is about getting more revenues for the government. paul: kim in washington state this november there was referendum second time in washington state in recent years, i went down to overwhelming defeat to impose a carbon tax, i remember tony abbott, former prime minister of australia repeal their carbon tax yet some of our friends even in theory if you think about it from a free-market point of view, carbon tax would be the most efficient way of trying to actually slow down carbon omissions and reduce the use of carbon fuels but that seems to

be something that the public really isn't buying, why do you think that is? >> well, it's because paul, yes, from a wonky point of view it may be an efficient means of raising revenue but no one buys that you are actually going to get rid of other taxes if you institute a carbon tax and so they see it as additional form of taxation on top of what we are already have in terms of some tough energy taxes here especial think gasoline tax, et cetera, no one wants to go there, there's also not a belief that the money that will be raised from a carbon tax would be put into renewable energy or investment strategy for a smarter climate, they know it's going get ready strib -- redistributed to pot to spend in priorities, no, they are not buying, macron imposed this, if you look around the world and

what mary was talking about, to the extent that carbon tax was on the ballot or politicians are making top priority have been on the ballot, it's been voted down, this is just something that voters are not in favor of. paul: mary, briefly, there's a disconnect between elites obsession with climate change and doing something now and average voters who just don't trust the elites. >> yeah, average voters knowing that if china doesn't do anything about, you know, global warming -- paul: or india or indonesia or africa. >> there's another problem here which is that the elites are i think misreading the economic costs of this so-called global change because if you look at it going out to the end of the century, it's not a high cost as they make it. paul: we have to take one more break, when we come back hits and misses of the week (vo) 'twas the night before christmas

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♪ ♪ paul: time now for hits and misses of the week kim, first you. >> paul, a hit to the republican senate for confirming kathy kraniger, trump's pick, 5050-49, has been under acting manager omb director mulvaney, works with him, rogue agency that needs more transparency and smarter rules for protecting consumers, this, of course, provoked on all-out rebellion by progressives against her but the republicans stood tall, this is going to be good for the economy overall. paul: james. >> hit to florida governor rick scott for suspending and replacing broward county election supervisor brenda snipes, the serial violator of election, missed ballots,

deadlines, amazingly she's fight to go regain her job but good for the governor for hanging tough. paul: mar yeah. >> hit for japanese prime minister, aging population and a labor shortage the lower house has passed legislation that will offer skill unskilled workers, low-skilled workers visas and this is a step in the right direction for japan. paul: dan. >> paul this is a hit for the bush family, the funeral, many words for them, one that stands out graciously, they graciously invited president trump and president trump sent presidential plane to bring casket from houston, spoke well of the trumps, of the bush's excuse me, the small gestures that add to civilized associate -- society and we saw them on display in washington. paul: thank you, if you have your own hit or miss tweet it to

us jer on fnc, thanks to my panel, thanks to all of you for watching, i hope to see you all next week. ♪ ♪ >> good evening, everybody, we have got a lot to cover here tonight. breaking news top stories major selloff on wall street today, dow jones industrials s&p, the nasdaq, those indexes all falling more than 3% on the day, the dow plummeting a breath-taking 799 points, bank stocks hit particularly hard, bank of america, morgan stanley, citigroup, all down more than 4% on the day, regional banks, even harder hit, undoubted by reversal, president trump standing strong in trade negotiations with communist china, the president vows to add more tariffs if the two countries ca