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The Comcast story just gets weirder and weirder by the moment. Clark recently told you that the cable monopoly has been violating Net neutrality by degrading your connection if you watch video they don't own or control. They claim they're doing so for network management reasons, but no one believes them.

The FCC recently held a hearing on Comcast's alleged infractions. The monopoly worried that the hearing room would be packed with opponents, so they actually paid people to go to the hearing and fill the seats. They were hiring extras to keep their opponents out of the room! When Clark first heard this, he really didn't believe Comcast could possibly be stacking the hearing room. But now the company admits to it. By that admission, Comcast is only bringing more attention to how it interferes with your freedom of speech.

Why would Comcast want to make it unpleasant for you to watch a competitor's content online? This is about money, plain and simple; the Internet is hurting their cable business because so much TV and movie content is now available online for free. That allows customers to either cut back on their cable package or eliminate it altogether. After the hearing, the FCC announced they'll come up with steps to discourage cable and Internet providers from behaving like this. Comcast, however, remains defiant and says the FCC doesn't have the right to do this. Clark will let you know how it all works out.

One final thought: It's very dangerous when any monopoly decides to be judge, jury and executioner in determining what content you can and can't see. Our government has to make a stand now. If Comcast gets away with treading on the Constitution, how soon before others follow?

Yesterday Clark revealed the customer-no-service problem he's been having with Orbitz. To recap, Clark had a hotel booked through Orbitz that proved to be a dump. So he checked in and then quickly turned right around and checked out. He then had to contact Orbitz to get his money back. Upon calling them, he went through 7 customer-no-service reps with no resolution. He also sent 2 e-mails and got no response. Then he went on the air yesterday to discuss what was going on.

Within 3 hours, he was tracked down at home by an Orbitz mucky-muck who fell all over herself trying to accommodate him because he was a premium member. Clark politely informed her there was nothing she could do to help him. He wouldn't accept a refund because they probably wouldn't have been trying to help him if he were just any John Q. Orbitz customer. The money would have been coming from unclean hands and only because of his status as a nationally syndicated radio host. In short, he values his integrity more than he values his wallet.

Clark did request that Orbitz improve its customer service experience. He and the woman had a pleasant yet tense conversation. The rep revealed that Orbitz out-sources 100% of its customer service overseas. It turns out that most major online travel sites out-source like Orbitz. Maybe that's why they all have customer service problems. He was assured that Orbitz's out-sourced reps are authorized to solve customer problems, but that definitely was not his experience as his call got bounced around all over the world with no solution.

CLARKONOMICS: People's eyes often glass over when Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke starts talking about macro and micro economics, M1 and M2 and other gibberish. The real question he should be answering before Congress is are we or are we not in a recession? Bernanke really hedged his bets on that one during his latest Congressional appearance. He instead talked about a market facing risk from housing, credit card and job sector woes.

Let's take a look at the housing sector and see how it's been impacted by the Federal Reserve. A few weeks ago, a listener called in looking to refinance a mortgage. He wanted to know if he should wait for the Fed's cuts to get a lower rate on the refinance. But the Fed's interest rate cuts actually drove mortgage rates up by almost a full point. Here's why: Say you're an investor. The Fed is pumping money into the economy, and that makes you fret about inflation. You then have to calculate into a mortgage how afraid you are that the rate of inflation over 30 years will kill your rate of return. So that automatically slightly bumps up the mortgage rate.

However, there is some good news about where we're headed as a country. If we are moving toward an economic spill, we have a great point of entry. The rate of unemployment is hovering in the 4s; historically, economists did not even think it was possible to get this low. So that's a good thing. As unemployment rises from here, remember that we've seen far worse before. And no, you don't have to look back to the Great Depression -- just look back to the early '80s.

The reality is that we're in a "hangover" phase. We borrowed too much, bought too much and didn't pay enough. Dancing to the music of cheap money is over. There are a couple of long-term things we need to do to establish sound financial ground. First, we as individuals need to spend only the money we have. Not a penny more. Second, our government needs to spend only the money it has. Trying to borrow from tomorrow to pay for today is a problem. That's why the Fed flooding the market with money and lowering rates is not having the desired effect.

CLARKONOMICS: Clark took a challenge from a caller named Jack who said the radio host does not focus enough on what makes an economy grow or shrink. Though we sounded the Clarkonomics intro for this segment, it might be more aptly titled Jackonomics!

The one fundamental that will determine if an economy is a winner or a loser is productivity. You have to create an environment where people can use their brains to grow the economy. So our country's long-term goal in creating wealth should be to make an environment where entrepreneurs can thrive. Clark often thinks of Ireland as exemplary in this respect. The Northern European nation lost many of its citizens in the 1840s when they fled to escape the potato famine. Citizens were, in fact, the greatest export of Ireland, and the country had been an economic basket case ever since. Finally, Ireland decided it no longer wanted to be the 98-pound weakling of Europe. So the country took an economic cue from the likes of Singapore and Hong Kong and morphed into a Celtic tiger. Instead of exporting citizens, Ireland now imports 100,000s of workers from all over Europe.

What did Ireland do to become an economic powerhouse? First, the country established predictable and reasonable tax rates. We are so far away from this in U.S. with our cryptic tax code that it's not even funny. Second, the country controlled government spending. We would do well to follow Colorado's TABOR (Taxpayers' Bill of Rights) example to do the same. Unlike the Singapore model, however, Clark does believe that government should oversee health, safety and environmental issues. Capitalists need to be kept in check too.

When Clark was done speaking, Jack said he could agree with everything the radio host had just said. Jack went on to stress the importance of property rights in growing an economy. However, he and Clark agreed to disagree on the issue of collective bargaining in this respect.