Sara eisen the dow is up 81 the best day for retail since late july as the markets go green for august absolutely we are also following a big business story President Trump making waves doubling down on a previous statement that, quote, both sides were responsible for the violence over the weekend. Multiple executives stepping down from the white house business councils, some vowing to stay and work with the president. Listen to the restaurant ceo andy plesner who is a big trump supporter. Listen to what he had to say i was really happy with jaime diamond who came out and made his statement. This was very positive because i think two years ago jaime dimon never would have said anything american executives speaking up is incredibly important. Dont walk away from the table, stay in the game, lets see what we can get done. Now listen to former secretary treasury Larry Summers disagreeing and saying wishes to speak to anyone in the senate, anyone in the president s cabinet or key officials in the white house, he will be unable to, if he is not a member of the president s council. He is not fit to be the ceo of walmart if his judgment is so bad as to suppose that being a member of this council is giving him some kind ofy be, what he m and what a number of ceos are, is scared. Scared that if they leave the president , the tools of power will retaliate and President Trump has brought our country to the point where ceos cower, to the point where ceos cower, that is a particularly damming indictment, far beyond anything in charlottesville, his presidency. Larry summers coming out swinging on this issue more so than any economics issue i have heard him talk about lately. We asked him to put it in historical context, and he said this was a more dramatic episode. His point about being scared the president would retaliate is unfair because walmart might argue, we have a Customer Base, we have an Investor Base to whom we are responsible, has nothing to do with whether we think the president will slap us around. But whether our customers believe we are representing them, serving them, doing our duty or possibly boycotting them. You could potentially argue they would want to resign they are scared what their customers would do almost the opposite argument and i would come back to the point maybe you can claim thats what ceos felt, what mr. Summers felt, in the immediate aftermath of the president s election, where his tweets had negative share price effect but clearly ken fraziers resignation marked the shares up that day so its a bold claim from the treasury secretary there, but we understand his point in the background. But still, ken frazier was the target of two president ial tweets and they were fiery saying that he has more time now to lower ripoff drug prices that might make another ceo a little bit, i dont know, hesitant to actually speak out and leave this council were going to discuss it. Sarah hagan is here and former aid to president bush. And the former press secretary, ben, what about this idea that some ceos could be too scared for retaliation from the white house, should they be . Is that appropriate for a chief executive to be . Well, i think at this point there might be greater Reputational Risk staying on one of these Advisory Councils with President Trump. I dont blame them they thought he was going to be irrational actor they wanted to have a say over policy and advise certainly when it came to regulation, but the problem is these Advisory Councils havent really done anything theres no infrastructure bill tax reform isnt going anywhere. They have become a photo op to support President Trump. And so ultimately when you watch the events in charlottesville. And i encourage you to watch the unedited footage on vice news and watch the antisemimigtes a racists in our country something terrible is happening under this president this is a time for moral clarity. And a number of Business Leaders have stepped up where the president has failed to act. I commend them for that. Do you think, sarah, the fact that so many ceos, and were counting five on this particular issue, have left a prestigious White House Council as a sign that the councils arent that effective and the ceos dont really get listened to or could it actually imply that the ceos dont feel that some of these high agenda business items are going to get done . Well, i dont think that its because they dont think these agenda items are going to get done i think were all hoping they do, particularly Business Leaders, but i do think that they have a Customer Base that they have to take care of. And if, you know, someone like walmart or any of these large companies, wellknown companies with big broad Customer Bases, you know, see that these leaders are standing by a president who seems to equate neonazis and counter protesters, thats a real big business problem for them in addition to having concerns about the statements as individual, theyve got a business to run. And i think theyre making a business decision. Sarah, how much political pressure is the president under . Will he be feeling it . And if it did spread and include a member of his cabinet or white house staff speaking out, would that be a really significant negative step for the presidency it would be very significant if somebody resigned over this it doesnt appear that anyone is, but i suppose that is still possible that would be a turning point. And i think you would see other people in the administration resign i do think, though, if that doesnt happen, this is a turning point for the president. Republicans in congress are no longer going to stand with him if tax reform gets done, which we all hope it does, its going to be out of mutual need and survival its not going to be out of a desire for shared success for trump that these republicans are feeling and desiring this is going to be about their own survival well, how is that different from any other topic, sara well, i think, look, republicans wanted president bush to succeed because they liked him and worked with him well i think that was true for the previous president , obama and clinton, too, on the democratic side i think many republicans this morning are waking up and saying, i thought trump was, you know, unorthodox, i thought his tweeting was inappropriate, his style was certainly not something we have seen in the past, but i could live with all that because he was the leader of the party today they are scratching their head and saying, what does he really think about these issues . And can he provide moral clarity and what does that mean for me will they get together on tax reform possibly its not going to be out of hoping and trying to help the president get reelected in a few years. Ben, do you believe that a ceo has a rational fear of reprisal, even if it is a tweet . And as an addon to that, does it really matter once again today, the president tweets about amazon. Is it hard to argue thatamazon is suffering as a result this morning . I think President Trump has squandered the power of the bully pulpit his Approval Rating is nothing like we have seen in decades at this stage of the presidency and so thats not the only metric that these companies track. For example, they track what their Customer Base cares about. My firm runs a Sentiment Tracker for Many Companies to look at the fundamental values of the consumer and diversity and inclusion is very high on that list its very high on the list of their employees. And associating themselves with President Trump instead of their consumers and employees on that is not a great calculus to make. I dont think there is a fear go ahead, sara, im sorry. On the amazon tweet today, who knows what prompted it, maybe the Washington Post editorial, but can the president do anything about it he complains about amazon not paying enough taxes and hurting retailers, which may be valid points, but is there anything this president is going to and can do besides just bully these companies on twitter well, i mean, certainly there are actions that the federal government could take that could be very harmful to companies now, if that started happening as a retaliation for an editorial, that would be a real problem for the Trump Administration you can see people in court. But i think increasingly the president s words over twitter are just meaningless i dont think the ceos are afraid of them i dont think they should be we havent seen any longterm damaging impacts by things he said about multiple players. And increasingly, that will be less the case. And what he did yesterday, he got one doover on his comments in charlottesville on monday what he did yesterday, i think, probably makes it so that nobody takes anything he says too seriously, particularly when hes criticizing others, other companies, other actors in the political space. Well, well see about that. Guys, well leave it there thank you for joining us on this debate sara fagan and ben lebolt. We are seeing demonstrations across the country sparking unsolicited donations to the altright economy. Our Contessa Brewer has more on that story contessa reporter wilfred, paypal, godaddy, those are just some of the companies who grabbed headlines for ending service to altright groups daily stormer is wellknown in altright circles. It participated in the charlottesville rally setting up the hate ban as the alternative to uber. Its web host godaddy prompted and ended the service. Google did the same thing. Today daily stormer moved to a russian domain when youtube changed the compensation structure, many went to patreon in order to get paid this summer patreon kicked off lauren sumner. Enter patreon who specializes in controversial offerings and then get paid for it. Counter. Fund will provide an intermediary to paypal credit cards and turn bit coins into cash for a fee to help fund the altright movement gab launched their social Media Service as an alternative to facebook and twitter cracking down on hate speech. Though gab has been rejected by the app store nine times, its raised more than half a million in just the last 36 days it has more than 200,000 users worldwide. But dont call gab altright or white supremacist. Gab rejects all assertions that we are solicited or affiliated to such organizations or groups. For us, its about giving people an authoritarian dictatorship the freedom to speak, the freedom to did send. Its one of the many antiestablishment groups not following ideological principle but they will put paypal out of business and create a crypto currency, an alternative to bitcoin. Contessa brewer, thank you very much for that when we come back, well go to markets well break it down, next. And the ceo exit parade continues from the manufacturing council. The fallout and the state of the relationship between the white house and american business. Later on, details on apples massive war chest and the t be its making on original content, when squawk alley continues. For years, centurylink has been promising fast internet to Small Businesses. But for many businesses, its out of reach. Why promise something you cant deliver . Comcast business is different. We deliver superfast internet with speeds of 250 megabits per second across our entire network, to more companies, in more locations, than centurylink. We do business where you do business. Markets are in green today ahead of the fed minutes well get at 2 00 p. M. Eastern time. The dow is going for four straight wins. The tech sector is up more than 20 for the year for more on this, well bring in David Rosenberg and ken allen, Portfolio Manager at tu price. David, the nation is having the blistering political conversations and yet the market is up. Why is that happening and how long can it last well, i dont think its up for any other reason than this time last week the stock market got dramatically oversold on all these geopolitical tensions surrounding north korea. So i just think that theres some reversion trade going on helping out the market here. So we are basically taking out a lot of the jitters from a week ago. I dont really advise anybody to look at the market on a daybyday basis i think that the mantra as you discussed is how great the market is doing, but its really a handful of stocks. I mean, youve had three dow stocks account for over half of the increase the median dow stock for the year is only up 2 and the median s p 500 stock has basically done nothing since midjune so that is basically two months of nothing so it is a wide market and, in fact, its not worthwhile talking about the market at large. Its become, in my opinion, very idiosyncratic and special situation oriented but the market itself when you look at the mediate stock in any of the major averages is moving sideways for the past couple months. Its a good thing about price waiting, which we try to Pay Attention to, ken. And you also take note of the Strong Performance of a small group of big tech stocks, which again today over at some trust initiation with the buy. What do you make of that well, i will dovetail what david said in terms of the size of some of these companies that has become enormous with intech. And one of the big stories over the last year is the largest market caps in the world are tech companies, apple, google, microsoft, facebook and amazon, and these companies are riding the ultimate plat fortune that the internet has become to become stronger as every day goes by. And so i think all of those have good growth ahead as they continue to the penetrate enormous markets and i especially look to amazon for its still really low share in the Retail Market and in the technology market. So i think that there is good runway ahead for many of these stocks, especially amazon as i mentioned. So david, you have been bearish sort of on the idea that the economy is in a healthy place for a while. And waiting for some sign of it to turn. Im wondering how you recognize numbers like yesterdays retail sales, global numbers like what we saw out of japan with 4 growth, even german gdp is the best it has been in over a year. A rising market that continues to find footing in small pieces of good news, whether it is in the u. S. Or abroad or corporate earnings, its not like whooer turning in the economy right well, ive actually began my writings on cnbc shows that have been advocating a situation all year long towards the overseas markets, whether thats been the emerge markets, ive singled out japan. Of course, they have struggled a little bit lately, not just because of the economy, but because of abes political problems but japan is a nice value turnaround play and ive been quite bullish, actually, on old europe all year long so everything you said, completely agree with, is there any evidence of any acceleration in the u. S. Economic growth . This year the answer is no the retail sales number yesterday, and i wrote about it in my daily, very spurious that you would have had a 0. 6 increase in seasonally adjusted retail sales, yet the raw data was the worst july for the raw da data they are either posting weak Financial Results or cutting their guidance for the rest of the year so the answer is that i am quite down beat on the u. S. Economy. Im not calling for a recession, but i dont see anything going on in terms of domestic growth that has me excited. And actually, i think when you look at the domesticoriented stocks in the market, they have not done a whole lot look at the small caps relative to performance this year they are oriented to the local economy. If youre talking about the source of the stimulus for the economy this year, its been up until recently a 10 unexpected appreciation of the u. S. Dollar thats really goosed the currency translation to earnings and sails for the large multinationals thats the big story when you think about it ken, i just want to come back to some of to your major tech investments. Youre talking very positively about the structural tail winds behind some of those companies and despite that attraction for the broader sector, when we talk about computing or online retail, it seems like it is so heavily dominated by just a few player are there any small players out there that can make some market share gains that perhaps arent on such deep evaluations or is this going to be dominated for decades to come by one or two players . I think thats a really good point in terms of power players. If you look at computing, the two biggest players are going to take a strong share of industry profits for years to come. Those being amazon and microsoft. But within the overall market, which is so huge, i think theres room for Smaller Companies even a Larger Companies that arent the mega caps to do quite as well that point in that regard, salesforce. Com, the third biggest and most successful in the xloud cocloud computing trei mentioned red hot that is smaller that has a lot of platforms. It is still a relatively Small Company compared to the size of the ecosystem and the power its going to have Going Forward as it gets more and more important to the customers ken, david, thank you so much, guys a lot to watch today appreciate it very much. Thank you still to come, a top congressional republican, house ways and means chairman kevin brady will be here squawk alley back in a moment. Agency help you e with Homeowners Insurance and protect yourself from things like fire, theft, or in this case, water damage. Cannonball now if i had to guess, id say somewhere upstairs theres a broken pipe. 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