Transcripts For CSPAN Washington This Week 20240622

Here is the divide. The republicans, of course support School Choice and a number of items. Thats important. You cant support a School Choice option and leave the Public Schools untapped. You need to make sure states have the right to republicanun run schools the way they should. There shouldnt be a regulatory hurdle that stifles programs. We strangle, i think unfortunately too innovation innovation. And lastly, if the parents, both democrats and republicans, are telling you they want options, be open to options. This will be a challenge for democrats. With over 130 million being invested between 1990 and 2014 from nea and aft into democratic candidates. They have a very fine line to walk because thats a Public School constituency. Money coming from public unions. And yet some of your people are saying we want something elgs. That should be a National Conversation but ultimately supported at the state level. Id say state first, National Conversation but let the states do what they need to do. Awesome. I think we can open it up to the crowd. Well have microphones around. Theyll come out momentarily. I may start with a twitter question. This twitter question was perfectly in matts wheel house. This is perfect. Youve done some of the best research on this. In talking about standardized testing, a question from twitter there were questions about the amount of time. Question about the amount of money. How much money could be saved by eliminating standardized tests and replacing them with smaller , pragmatic, competency tests. Maybe speak to your broader look into the cost of standardized testing because it dovetails nicely. The short answer is we cant save very much money at all. I did a study looking at how much states are spending on nclb required math and reading tests. It comes out to Something Like 30 bucks a kid. Less than the cost of a textbook. I ran some simulations. Lets say you got rid of testing. How much would you save . Across the country it looks like a big number, 6. 7 million, but that number spread across the whole system comes out to, like i said, textbook per kid. Decreasing teacher salaries by 1 , reducing class size. So the emphasis that policymakers are putting on standardized tests and how those tests are used, 30 per kid isnt a lot. We ought to be thinking about not are we spending too much but are we spending too little. Fascinating. Thank you. Now well take a question from the audience. Well go right up front. Is this your first aei education event. We generally have two rules. If youd be so kind as to identify yourself by your name and affiliation and, number two, if you would ask a question. That would just be outstanding. Thank you. Hi. Im jill, vice chairman of Loudoun County school board and coowner of a private educational company. I wanted to talk about what matt was saying when its working through the political system some of these issues, it gets lost doing that political movement. What direction do you see or what any activist in your companies, organizations can focus on some of the localities. Im a bit biased, im on a school board. Im concerned when looking at the state level and trying to advocate for changes and laws, if you dont have the buyin from the school board youll not have a buyin from the paurntrents. Parents. And thats where the power is the buyin from the parents. You are training parents getting good people on the school board. Theres a lot of youd probably have something to share with this as well. There are the lasting change only happens when its from the ground up and true in our traditional systems. To go to School Board Meetings weve made it intimidate inging. Finding solutions to inform parents about what your School District would offer, welcome them to go to things. Go to parent events, so you get to know them and what their needs are, but i think theres got to be both ways, youve got to be looking at how can we reach out to parents and inform them of their options and how can we be listening to them more. More local School Districts, in our Traditional School system did that, we might have a different result. Its when we see parents who are able to make choices in our in schools of choice that are more active. Weve seen a lot of communities people who said, oh, they dont know how to choose schools. They actually know how to choose schools really, really well. So if we help them educate the community about their choices and whats going on, i think well have a better result. I agree. Outstanding. Appreciate it. Other questions . Yes, we have one right up front here if you could wait for the microphone, that would be awesome. Sharon, voice of a moderate. I wanted to talk to you about educating parent as because ive been talking to the suburban moms and basically, they hear a rumor and it gets carried away. Like the Charter Schools are supported by the people who support for profit prisons. You hear these people talking about the schools that are going to have the same structure as a prison and thats why americas going to go down stream. But then people that have dyslexic, learning disabilities have a big problem with common core. Everybody talks about education and theres no one definition of what common core is because nobody seems to get it, but also what is the definition for charter versus School Choice and when you talk about the states and the testing, so were all in the same platform, so people can move from state to state and have the same educational standards, my daughter moved to illinois from. My question is, how do you have a National Standard and still have this debate . Because people relocate and if they relocate from the south to the north, my daughter was two years behind. How do people who are interested in informing the public and public debate standardizing definitions of which is what a chart e School Charter school is, or this is what the common core is. Thoughts on that. I chime in and just say its really hard to educate people about you know, kind of everything about education. Sort of our pet issue, but i think about noneducation areas and how little i know about them and how hard it would be to educate me if i wasnt particularly interested. Just try to rain the information down. I think when education does become politicized, that can work against, attitudes about the common core, so you think the hypothesis in louisiana, common core is a really hot topic. You think all the public attention its getting, people would be more informed about it in louisiana than elsewhere, but when you ask people to respond theyre more than likely to get them wrong than in any other places. More than anything, it seems that the Political Polarization had pushed people away from the knowing the simple facts about things. So kind of depressing response. Increasingly polarized times. So, when i hear you mention for profit prisons, Charter Schools, challenge is is a definition thats indemic just to Public Education. Think about the buy america campaign. Buy an american car and someone will say half the parts are coming from another country. Is it really an american car . I think what we need in america is not a common core conversation, but a conversation about a common core. A core that links us across space and time to what are the principals that make this country great. What are the values that we think are important to one generation to the next and what role can education play sustaining the economic social well being of this nation. A common core con verversation gets us on the same page to say what do we think is important and then we can maneuver from there. For me, from a Civil Society standpoint, we need to have a heyer conversation, then work lower. Great. Lots of comments that were related to the finding that, to opponents to School Choice tends to skew old. Supporters tend to school young. Im interested the responses of folks on the panel of why we think that is or the people who dont want change are the status quo and typically, theyre older people who think the only thing was this kind of school they went to, but the fact is, that school is no longer the same way it was. Or youve had in a lot of the population, had teachers who have been at this for a long time and dont want change. The young people are the ones who have just come out. Trying to either enter the teaching profession and have found it to be very hostile for them. Or theyve been in schools themselves and are experiencing it. And understand freedom. I think millenials understand more the freedom to choose. Youve got the status quo thats going to fight for no change then young people who want change. You also have an ageing population, those 65 and over. They tend to vote a lot. And theyre going tovote a lot and theyre going to make sure were not spending enormous amounts of money on something thats not going to support them. Whether its support for medicaid or other educational issues. For me, im older, i need to make sure i protect this, versus the younger generation. I have an older daughter. She lives off us still, so she can be more liberal about her ideas, but at the point she starts paying her own bills, she becomes more conservative. Awesome. Great. Maybe another question from the audience. We have some more off twitter, which i am happy to go to. Yes, right here. Hi, im jordy, working at the nea. So, i have a comment, which doesnt follow your rules. Just end it by going, eh . I wanted to bring the attention to the sample size of 1,000 and then mentioned that the subset was a quarter of that, so, were only talking about 250 people who are potentially involved in making choices that are actually about their students, but to what mr. Robinson said, that voters tend to be people that are not necessarily in that demographic, so they may not have all of the correct information. Thats the comment. The question sort of stems from that. Whats the anticipated impact provided everyone could have as much choice as they want about the type of school they send their child to on Public Education . And the second part of that is if theres a an expanded ability to choose within Public Education, what does that look like . Public School Students remain the majority. Within the next decade, theyll probably remain the same. I think youve got to make the math easy. 50 million. K12 students in place right now. If you open up with esca vouchers, tax credits, you see more students leave, but whats more important to me in terms of impacting education is what and how we deliver education. Theres some parents who said i have enough money to pay for a private school at a very elite place in this city because i put my kid in Public School because i believe in the mission and the its close. Theres a transportation factor, so, for me, i dont see Public Education as some would say being destroyed by School Choice. Thats not even an admission. Its to diversify how we deliver to an adverse group of americans. I think the impact is on how you structure the Choice Program. If we say were going give a 10,000 voucher to the first hundred parents who show up on tuesday at 10 30 a. M. At the office to apply, thats going to attract a very Different Group of parents and have a very different impact. Than a different kind of Choice Program like the one we have here in d. C. Where you go through a lottery rank the schools that you want and i think the main drawback is that theres still a default school, which is the school in the area where you can afford to buy or rent real estate. You can imagine a version of that that broke down the barriers and provided to all families the kinds of choices that only affluent families currently enjoy through the ability to choose where to live. Now, just providing that choice on its own isnt enough. My brookings colleague, russ, in collaboration with klein is is here today, have done work documenting how choice actually functions in more than 100 districts around the country. So, its not just about choice is this great thing. Its going to raise all votes and its all going to be great. But it matters to you provide accessible and accurate and relevant information to parents to help them make informed choices. Do you have a system thats accessible to everyone and not just the people who show up on tuesday at 10 30 . Do you cover transportation costs or is it only a choice for parents who can somehow figure out transportation and so on and so forth. The second question of what it looks like. It varies a lot. But i think we have some clear ideas about what it ought to look like, which is going to determine the effect it has on the kids who make the choices. You wanted to jump in real quick. When we have black friday, we see hundreds of thousands of people standing in line to buy products. If we had black friday every friday, you wouldnt have that many lines in place. That means people wouldnt wait. Same with choice. When we give Parents Choice and we see thousands line up and take advantage, its because they want Something Different and now, they have an option to do so. But if you made it every day, we dont know this internally thousands of seats in states that are still unfilled. Theyre available. People qualify. But they just havent had it, so theres more work we have to do. Just because you make it available, doesnt mean everyone will jump. I would point to d. C. Real quick. D. C. Experiences as we brought up. Weve seen that take off, the traditional Public Schools improved dramatically. Do things to try to aattract parents. I wouldnt say to its not about trying to abolish or dismantle Public Education. I think its helping to create a more Thriving Market for all sorts of schools to be available options. So, that you dont just have this really crappy school that youre assigned to. That all of your options are better because of it. Great. One question from twitter. Another is kind of spread. I think people that are digging into the report itself, which is awesome, about the urban really rural split. Something you brought up is that theres a suburban urban split but it seems to be a lot of rural folks who were not fans of school vouchers, tax credits education savings accounts, even though we might think of them in a republican constituency that might do that. Gerard is nodding, so maybe well get him go first. This is a really good question. And actually, this kind of goes back to the other on what were some surprising findings. We did see in small town and rural areas based on where and how would you describe where you live and there was substantial support. Among rural and small town americans. Had a significantly higher support for vouchers compared to urban folks and thats another finding that goes against conventional wisdom. And so, but the thing and i didnt pull out rural respondent as much because the sample size is a little smaller than those who were in the urban pool of respondents. So the margin and just to get to the point made earlier about the sample size of the roughly 250 School Parents in the survey, i i mean, theres 70 plus years of science that have gone into survey design and constructing these surveys so they can reflect, truly reflect, the population youre trying to evaluate. And so, we through randomization and what they call random digit dialing and with some waiting after the field work, which is an Industry Standard approach to correcting for demographic discrepancies, we can get an accurate reflection of School Parents within a margin of error even with serving 250 folks. I think thats the witching hour, so if we could have a round of applause. [applause] great having you. On this weekends newsmakers, our guest is matt schlapp. He talks the 2016 election, the role of the tea party and his own thoughts on recent republican candidates including donald trump on immigration. I actually heard him on the radio saying what he was talking about was illegal in print. I think his tone and the words he chose are different than what i would choose but the fact is when you have a broken immigration system it is hard to characterize the nature of the illegal immigrants. That being said, i believe immigration is a wonderful part of our history. It is a part i embrace. It is a part of our economy that we have to get right. I think what president obama has done with these executive orders has made the system worse. We destroyed the ability to get bipartisan compromise on the steps we need to take as congress. I think it is easy to attack donald trump. I think they ought to listen to what he is saying. I know donald trump. He is not a racist. He is trying to characterize the fact that a broken immigration system can lead to a lot of problems like crime. The challenge back to his critics are do we know everything about this population that we think . This is legal population. We have to know. I think we ought to embrace all of those folks who can make america stronger, debtor and help grow our economy. You can watch the entire interview today at 10 00 a. M. And 6 p. M. Et on cspan. Coming up next, from washington journal, a discussion on the current state of the American Dream. Then, remarks from Mike Huckabee , ben carson and jim webb at the National Sheriffs Association Annual conference in baltimore. Ms. Burke host we now continue this discussion. And daily beast correspondent Eleanor Clift. Eleanor, talk about what definition you use for the American Dream. Guest over my life, i have said i am the product of the American Dream. My parents were immigrants who came with very little, worked hard had a store in brooklyns and in queens. Had three children. My brothers went on to be engineers. Colleges were affordable. Public schools were the great mixing pot in america. When i think of the American Dream, that is my first thought. Today, people would add Affordable Housing and education , wages to keep pace with the cost of living, and a sense that you want your children to, if not do better financially i do not know if we want to measure in those terms that your children would have a quality of life comparable or even better than your own. I would even brought in that to a sense of community broaden that to a sense of community and a concern for the planet. That is my thinking and i hope others would share that. Host Terry Jeffreys, is that an economic and values comes up . Guest yes. They go together. I agree with eleanor. You talk about immigrants, in america, people came here from distance places. They had to take care of themselves and their families are you they fed and housed themselves, offended for themselves. They rose their children in small communities were people shared values. That is the heart of the dream. People want to be able to raise their kids and a country that is free and prosperous and safe. We want to be able to pass on to our children all the great wings we got from our parents and our greatgrandparents. If we leave behind a country that is less prosperous and free and safe, then we have done a disservice not only to our own children, but to their children. Host what policies or legislation is having the biggest impact on the American Dream and whether you can hand it to the next generation . Guest i believe a Pivotal Moment in American Life was in the 1930s during the Great Depression when people were somewhat desperate economically. Franklin roosevelt as president , he opened the door to a welfare state. He did it with Social Security which at that time many people thought was unconstitutional. If you look at how roosevelt presented his arguments for the Social Security program and the message sent to congress, he talked about it as a replacement to the family. He said in olden days, americans would take care of their children and children would take care of them, people in communities would take care of each other he talked about that believe. Since the 1930s, with the advent of federal benefit programs, we saw on increase in the number of people dependent on the government, an increase in the size of the federal government, and with that, there has been a breakdown with the family. One hardpacked, the cdc came out with this preliminary data on its annual birth report. They do statistics on every person born in the u. S. In 2014, 40. 3 of babies born in the u. S. Were born to unmarried mothers. The seventh year in a row were 40 or more of 80s born in the country were born to unmarried mothers. The growth of the welfare state and the decline of the family go hand in hand and are a drag on the American Dream. Host it sounds like Terry Jeffrey is saying were on the wrong track for the American Dream. Guest we are celebrating americas birthday. I do not want to rebut everything he just said, but i disagree with it from beginning to end. First of all, people are not coming to this country to a wilderness where they are forging on their own. They are coming to route its is where it is difficult to make your way. Freedom is a nebulous concept and i argue that freedom to know you will not get bankrupt if you get sick is an important part of freedom. Talk about connecting dots that really do not connect, what he would call the welfare state, i call it the growth of the government, which we all have a part in. Nobody makes it on their own. Everybody relies on government resources, whether it is the roads we drive on, the libraries we use or attend. Connecting that to the breakdown of the family, there are lots of reasons for family breakdown, and most of them have to do with economic and the fact that Nuclear Families that we grew up with, it is difficult in many cases for young men to get a job that earns enough to keep the wife at home. These are visions we grew up with. The Family Structure today is very different. With the advent of a marriage now, i think we will redefine marriage again in another way. America is a very different america than even the last eight years. I read a column by William Schneider with third way, and he points out that the coalition that elected president obama is the new american electorate. Single people, young people minorities, people ignored in the past. I think people who are part of the more traditional america are uneasy about this. The face of america is very different today, and much of it is positive. Host we want our viewers to join in. This roundtable. We continue this discussion on the status of the American Dream on this july 4 on capitol hill where the parade and concert and fireworks will happen off the west front of the capitol later today. We want to hear your thoughts. Republicans can call in 202 7488000. Democrats, that he would republicans can call in at 202 7488001. Democrats call in at 202 7488000. Alice calling in on the line for republicans. Good morning. Caller thank you for cspan. Ms. Clift, i watch you every friday, religiously. To think that having 43 of the kids born today is fine and part of progress, you have married couples who barely can keep their head above water. Should the american taxpayer keep funding people anyone can have children, but the responsibility for raising them, paying for them, feeding them, getting them health care, should the average working person keep paying for people who are totally irresponsible . I want you every friday, and you people from the secular left are killing this country host we let Eleanor Clift respond. Caller that guest that was a lot of namecalling. He does not know me well. Host if you want to talk about the concept of the american them and how it plays into the American Dream. Guest people on the left and right are concerned when families breakdown and cannot take care of children. There is a role for government to do that and take care of it. We have not changed our ideas about it. Parenting classes should be done. I quote charles murray, very much on the right, says that the most stable marriages now are among the richest people in the country. They need to proselytize that. I think Public Schools should Service Community centers. We should deliver services to the kids. The kids on today and are not getting all the benefits of the wealthier people in the country. We will all pay the price in the future, when they have difficulties. Early intervention, and in the upcoming president ial campaign preschools universal preschool education beginning at age three will be a viable concept. You will see republicans jump on that. Host Terry Jeffrey, we had a caller who said freedom from government interference in his family and what is happening is a big part of his definition of the American Dream. Guest that is true. The government has a duty to protect peoples true rights and to protect people from crime. We have a system where the local Community Protect people from crime, not the federal government. If you look at illegitimacy legitimacy is, the cdc has done this since 1940. Before we created federal welfare, 1940 was the first time Social Security was made, Something Like less than were born to unwed women. The structure of households and the nature of families, their data for 2014 showed something fascinating. Horrible. The absolute number of married couple families with minor children was smaller in 2014 then two years ago in 1963. In 1963, there were 24 million some married couples with children. Last year, there was 23 million songs ring. I took the Census Bureau statistics for total number of household and arrived the percentage of american households that are married with children under 18. And every year through the 1960s, at least one in four people were married with children. It has continually went on a. Org on a downward trend. Only 19 were married couples with families last year. Compared to 44. 6 in 1977. Part of that is the baby rumor generation not having as many children as their parents which is a problem. But 40 of the babies are born out of wedlock. The Census Bureau says 35 or so of children are not living with married parents. That is a tragedy for america. For the government to say we have Nursery School run for threeyearolds, that is a destruction of the American Dream. Host we are talking about the American Dream in getting your comments and questions. Numeral muriel is on the line. Caller i hope you all have a great fourth. Im from the left, and im not out to kill the country. But when you talk of the American Dream, you have to speak of the reality that sets in when you wake up. And people need to wake up. All we have to do is look to greece. I know people are going to say, that is a negative arm, it and it is, but it is reality. In greece, they the bankers are closing the banks and freezing out the people who have their own, personal money in these accounts. Theyre using tear gas on the masses gathering for the vote tomorrow. This is not being reported on the regular news. But i know this is happening. Host Eleanor Clift, lessons to be learned from what is happening around the world. Guest first, the american dollar is strong. The u. S. Economy is far stronger than the european economies. When people look to park their money somewhere, they do it and america. We are not the next greece. Greece is part of the eurozone. They use the euro. They cannot print their money their own money. They cannot figure a way out of the debt crisis. I still hope there will be resolution there, where the banks are able to reduce the debt load and allow the Greek Economy to recover. Apparently, everybody is uncertain to what, if they do in fact, pull out of the eurozone what the impact would be on this country. I think there would be little, if any. We have, a long way since president Obama Took Office and we were losing jobs at the rate of 800,000 a month. I think america is poised to do well in the coming years. Host Terry Jeffrey, your thoughts on the lessons to be learned as we look at the American Dream. Guest the lady is right. Greek banks have limited how much people can take out of their own money. Guest that is what fdr did. Guest lets look at some of the facts. In my column this week i took the number of households, 120 million something in the u. S. And divided the debt of the u. S. To the end of the last fiscal year. It worked out to 144,000 per household. The debt is at that 18. 1 trillion or so. I read a piece last week about how the treasury have frozen this limit on every daily treasury statement they have put out for 15 weeks. The on march 16, they would hit the debt limit, so they arbitrarily froze it. Congress allow them to do that. We have a government playing games with the debt. The markable debt of the u. S. , treasury bills and notes and lawns, the biggest holders of that remarkable that are the Federal Reserve bank, the chinese a communist regime and the japanese. The u. S. Has floated shorterterm debt because they have a lower Interest Rate. Right now, we have the debt and low Interest Rates. Eventually the race will climb. The amount of money we have to spend servicing the debt will climb dramatically. And each month as we move forward and each year as we move forward, we continue to accumulate that that. The 144,000 from the last fiscal year, every households including those on welfare that will grow. Guest you string together so many statistics and facts, and most of which do not bear direct relation to each other. The upper to create the sense of fear. Mentioning that china is communist, i suppose. Guest it is communist. Guest and they are entrepreneurial. That is a sign that we should host Eleanor Clift, the daily beasts washington correspondent and Terry Jeffrey of cns news. Com. We want to get our viewers involved. Patrick is in oakland, california, line for independents. Caller good morning. Happy fourth of july. I am a vietnam veteran. Went to georgetown ahead of clinton. I am disgusted with the state of the rhetoric in america today. I have to give president obama bad marks for not getting his message across effectively. When you take republican ideas and you put them into the legislature and say that is ridiculous, obamacare or whatever, i can barely even contain myself. I will let you guys talk about it. For me, the American Dream is lies and political flimfl ammery. Host . Eleanor clift guest i agree. I think the public is tired with the backandforth and rhetoric. I hope, as we embark on the 2016 campaign that ended its will have gone that message. Bernie sanders, who has never run a negative ad they do not work in vermont where he is from he says he will keep his Campaign Rhetoric on a high level. If the two nominees end up being Hillary Clinton and jeb bush there is a possibility they could have a civilized discussion, but hope springs eternal when it comes to politicians. Guest in 1980, america was at a low moment in history. They elected reagan. Reagan was considered a great communicator, because he called america back to its founding principles. He shared the romance of america and shared that with americans in the way he spoke. People were truly inspired by reagan. There is no doubt we could use another leader like that, not just in terms of someone calling back to our principles, but someone who can communicate like that. Host these candidates who have used the term American Dream and their Campaign Take off which we should in our first segment. Are you surprised . Guest no. Instead, most americans are word. If they are a certain age in the country, they know we are on a bad trend. Especially people who have children or are raising children, they are anxious about where the country is going and where it will be 20 years from now. Guest it is an income gap and it is really unequal as a society. Bbob putnams book our kids talks about the rich and the poor. Basically 30 of the population of anyone with a college degree. The gap between people able to attain that level of education and 70 of the country is growing wider. A plays out even an elementary schools, where he points out activities that used to be free 20 years ago ands, chorus, parents have to pay a fee. You cannot afford those if youre of a low income. The threeyearold should be going to school, because in most families, if they are intact, the mother and father both work. The amount of words that Young Children here make a big difference in their education when they are young. Those gaps need to start closing at a young age. All the advantages seem to be going to people at the upper end of society. We need to think of our society as a whole, because we all will and if it. Host i give you read all from washington, d. C. On our line for democrats. Good morning. Caller hello. From the things i read, it looks like the American Dream has been ending for about 40 years. How cynical our americans are art to supporting programs and policies that that republicans put in place. Those with a dream format those are the dreams for africanamericans for a while. White europeans felt isolated because they thought those programs were not affect them. But when i started affecting them, there was a problem. What bothers me is that no one really talks about how, the impetus when African Americans could enter unions, they started eroding at. Republican policies started positively affecting africanamericans. And then help them rise up from poverty that were put in place like lyndon johnson. Host Terry Jeffrey, a lot if you want to respond. Guest we need to preserve an advanced the American Dream for all americans. I think we have Serious Problems in the country and our Public Schooling system. In dcm baltimore, the Public Schools do a lousy job of educating kids. They score lower than other places in the country in reading and math. These are kids in government schools. What i would do and congress can do it in washington, d. C. , is give every child in dca voucher equal to the amount they spend per people in Public Schools, which is higher in dca close to 20,000 depending on the area. Give every parent and child a voucher saying you can take your kid to every school you want. Private, christian, catholic keep them in Public School. Lets give every kid in dca and opportunity. That is what john boehner, harry reid, nancy pelosi ought to do. Give parent Something Real that they can do. Guest are you referring to Public Schools as government schools. That is a bad thing. You are an american and live under this government. Guest one of the things wrong with Public Schools today is i think they are used by people in government to advance a value system contrary to the sort of life that advances the American Dream. I would rather have my children in Catholic School where they are taught traditional values and are taught that my families and other families have believed in the past our declaration of independence says all men are endowed by their creator to certain and unalienable rights. Can they even teach those in schools . Guest i think they teach the decoration of independence. Did you go to Public School . You have every entitlement to educate your kids in Catholic Schools, but in a government founded on the separation of church and state, does the government have an obligation to underwrite religious schools of any sort . Guest i am not saying all dollars Public Schools, i am saying gave people the choice. They are spending money in dcn not educating kids. The decoration of independence says all men are endowed by their creator to certain unalienable rights. If our schools will be mutual of whether there is a god and whether our rights come from god, then schools cannot teach the kids of that the decoration of independence is create is correct, and our Founding Fathers said that should topic schools not teach that . Host we have about half an hour left with our panel. Jim is on the line. Good morning. Caller good morning. This is a problem with america and why the dream is being stifled. You have to people on your panel to your, you are too far left. Terry, you are too far right. We keep voting president s to bark to either side and we do not see action in the moderates. Eleanor, when you talk about greece the Banking System is not the problem, the banks are not the problem, it is the voters who vote for Government Programs but do not want to pay taxes to fund them. That is the problem. They cannot issue debt they cannot afford and they cannot reduce. This is the example of a government socialists that you propose. You keep saying how america is doing better than europe, but europe is an example of socialism you want to go to. I do not understand how your mentioning this now. It does not make sense. Host Eleanor Clift, and then we talk about the areas where you agree and policy. Guest there is lots to be read about greece. I recommend a writer for the New York Times on how the tanks have done fine and the greek voters have paid the price. They are not the problem. Pensions have been cut 45 . The social contract made in the earlier times and i agree with you that it is loaded and needs to be reduced but you cannot do it overnight. You just upload the economy if you do. I think there are lots of economists who can argue that out. I sympathize with the greek people and with angela merkel, who is trying to keep the euro zone together and work out a fair compromise. I hope after the vote tomorrow that they will be able to ride a compromise. Host are we to polarize or are there places you think the parties can Work Together and have Movement Forward in the coming months or year, legislatively . Guest it seems when the parties moved together, they move in the wrong direction. A good example is the trade Promotion Authority. It allows the president to make deals with 12 countries, including vietnam, where they ir economies owned by the government. Another fact about American Life, manufacturing jobs have declined dramatically. Not everyone will go to college. They never have. A minority of americans graduate from college. If youre not someone who gets a dea or graduate degree, gets a b. A. And get it graduate degree, how do you survive . Historically was manufacturing jobs. But corporations have convinced people and parties to establish a system where you can move your jobs said please is like vietnam and malaysia, and bring your products back to america. Creating manufacturing jobs over there and not here. Americans have to look at that. Both parties are cooperating on the wrong side of that. Guest i am for working with vietnam. We fought a bloody war out of moral obligation to that country. The trade Promotion Authority recently passed with republicans and some democrats that the president wanted is an example of the parties working together. In many ways, trade has been oversold as the panacea to create more jobs. It has cost jobs, but the nature of work is changing. I support the trade Promotion Authority. I think it is the way to the future. Globalization. The world is getting smaller and we need to Work Together, particularly on controlling climate change. Host the status of the American Dream is our broad topic. Jared is waiting in michigan line for democrats. Good morning. Caller i would like to bring up a few points. Number one, president obama and Michelle Obama are really the American Dream, and the republicans hate them for it. Number two, the debt was raised by president obama. They tripled it. He tripled it and started this country on this spending. President reagan i mean. Number three is republicans never said anything about the debt under the bush administration. And all of a sudden, it is the biggest thing in the land. Host Terry Jeffrey. Guest i agree that president and Michelle Obama are the american their life stories are great, even if i disagree on their policy vision. The truth is that the republicans took control of the house of Republican House of representatives after the passing of the Affordable Care act, because people who elected them were worried about the debt. The debt has continued to grow under republicans. The treasury said the debt to be frozen, but that is an accounting gimmick. None of the politicians are talking about it. But later this year, we have to lift the debt ceiling, come to a spending deal, and it will. And the Disability Program is going to go bankrupt. They have to find out some way to bail that out. All of this stuff that will happen in this congress. You see republicans and democrats cooperating on growing the government and the debt to the longterm detriment of the country. Guest except for one president clinton left us with the surplus, people have been screaming about the debt and the sky has not fallen. President reagan said do not worry about it, it is big enough to take care of itself. He used humor to deflect the issue. Right now, it is so cheap to borrow money. We have a decaying or. If the structure. We should repairing roads and bridges, building fast trains, using this moment to use all of almost free money out there to give our society the jumpstart it needs if we want to compete with communist china. Guest right now, the u. S. Is borrowing money cheap. The average Interest Rate is like to percent. What the federal government has is an rate mortgage. We increased our debt every year, right now we pay a low Interest Rate. That low Interest Rate will not stay. When that goes up, we will not only pay a higher Interest Rate of all the debt accumulated, we will pay a higher Interest Rate on the new that trying to fund this too large government. Host if you want to follow along with Terry Jeffrey and his work with cnsnews. Com or terryjeffey. Eleanor clift, the daily beast. Com or eleanorclift. Com. They are here with us as we talk about the American Dream. Al has been waiting from vermont , line for independents. Good morning. Caller thanks for letting me speak. I won two correct you about the clinton surplus. It was not a surplus because they were using the Social Security surplus as part of that calculation. Congressional elections, there is no consistent replacement. Look at the dingells in michigan. The sentence of political families like kings and queens. The Supreme Court making laws out of thin air. We are also passing laws like the Affordable Care act that the people have not even seen. Some people cannot feed themselves in this country. The new symbolism of bondage is the ebk card. The government ran for months without a debt ceiling. The future is not good and things have to change. There should be two lines on cspan. One for net producers and one for net takers, not for Political Parties and independents. Host thanks for the suggestion. Eleanor clift, political dynasties and Supreme Court on the American Dream. Guest first of all, wasnt it former president ial candidate mitt romney who used the expression the takers that got him a lot of trouble . And a sense, we are all takers. We all get benefits from the government and i am grateful for them. The Supreme Court is nine people. Five were appointed by republicans, four by democratic president s. We used to think the Supreme Court was above politics. I think we have seen decisions that have made us believe otherwise. But from the day al gore saw his chance at the residency overturned by the Supreme Court he accepted that graciously. That is the tradition we should aspire for and to in this country. To accept the Supreme Court. I do not agree with everything they do, but we had two significant rulings on upholding a core element of the Affordable Care act and on samesex marriage, which does respect the majority pooling and this country, which supports marriage equality. Host we get more into the term of the Supreme Court on our next segment with Lawrence Hurley of reuters. Terry jeffrey, on political dynasties and Supreme Court. Guest five elderly lawyers on the Supreme Court can totally change the nature of the country. A 1973 they said there is a right to kill an unborn child. We have killed tens of millions of unborn babies. The declaration of independence says that we are undoubtedly are created to certain unalienable rights that among these are life, and the pursuit of happiness. By killing an unborn child, we violate those rights. Also the democrat in the declaration of independence, they say the laws of nature and natures god, that is what separated the United States from great britain. According to laws of nature, only a man and woman can have a child. Two men cannot have a child according to the laws of nature. If we do not murder the baby and widely its godgiven rights does that baby have a right to its mom . If you like the Supreme Court saying in a split decision that two men have the right to marry each other, you cannot simultaneously say the baby has a right to her mother. What the Supreme Court did is violate the rights of children and violated other things and took from children the right to a mother and father, which is a natural, godgiven right. Host we talk more about the Supreme Court in our next hour of washington journal. Ed is waiting on our line for democrats. Caller good morning. Interesting guest. I hope you have them another day. I have a phd in physics. And i studied in germany. I know exactly what is going on in the country. We allowed our infrastructure to collapse, allowed industries to go overseas and take jobs away from the country, and we are devastating this country. They should be supporting this president. He has done a remarkable job even though he has no republican support. The country is collapsing. We are almost number 30 in the world when it comes to hardcore sciences and math and engineering in comparison to the world. They need to take notice of that. Another problem is you have the right wing media. It does not have this countrys interests at heart. They are splitting the country. The nation needs to wising up to realize that they are hurting the nation. And your guests has some good ideas if we can continue this discussion. I wish to listen to this another hour or so. I think you are on target. Do not listen to the right wing stuff going on. And the people running for president now, they did not have our country at heart. And what is called harcourt hrc, Hillary Clinton is the only one that has policies that are the best course. Host we get mike on our line for republicans a chance and then let our panel jump in. Good morning. Caller thanks for letting me speak. The guy ed, he said something that struck a chord. He says the country at heart. Everybody really needs to think about what is good for a country. It is simple. The problems have not changed. The approach has. It says something about how the five older guys in the Supreme Court making decisions or would make a good decision is for them to be connected to the youth of this country. The youth that everything is affecting . They are living their lifestyle. They are not looking outside the box. They are still trying to learn and relate to laws constantly changing. If everything is changing, why not involve everyone with the change . Host two views on the problems of this country. Guest of the nine people on the court, three of them are women and so they are not all guys and they are not all old. It is a lot of power. That five people get to make, which is the number of votes you need. They have made some momentous decisions. There has been resistance ever since they upheld reproductive rights for women. And since they desegregated schools and 1954. There was a backlash for a long time. I expect resistance will continue for the Affordable Care act and marriage equality. I guess we should be grateful we live in a country where people can continue to express dissent even after the final word has been supposedly common come down. Also, inequality in the country and the flat wages people in the middle class have not seen singling out and you see people accumulating tons of money at the top, that is an issue on the campaign trail. Republicans are talking about it at well. It is incumbent for them to solve these problems and not just blow hot air, as my mother would have said. Guest i talked about it on cspan before, but it is worth noting again, that the wealthiest community in the u. S. Is measured by Median Household Income. Falls church, virginia. 10 miles down the road. According to the Census Bureau calculations, seven of the 10 wealthiest counties in america when measured i the Median Household Income is in the d. C. Servers. The wealthiest people live around the federal government. Why is the highest income here rather than in places where private industries and Small Business prevail. If you want to get richer in america, moved to washington and get associated with the government. Guest a lot of statistics that you throw out again, but what does that have to do with how we close the gap . Are you saying get rid of the federal government so people cannot get rich off the federal government . Guest if you read another document that said all our rights come from god, the constitution created a limited aderholt government. The 10th amendment said that the powers not given to the federal government were reserved to the states and the people. Because of touchet expressly enumerated the powers of the federal government. One thing that has made more people on this country dependent on on the government. We celebrate independence today. If you depend on the government for your housing, food, and medicine, youre not independent, you are dependent on government. Guest i still remember the Tea Party Protest there with their big sign saying get the governments hands off my medicare. When you get benefits, you think you are deserving. It is all those others who are not deserving. Excluding those grievances, which has begun particularly on the right, it is destructive. Host ramsey in michigan, line for democrats. Caller good morning. The American Dream want away when you stop seeing made in the good old usa. When you stop seeing that, that is when the American Dream ends. When the republicans went to china and opened up with a communist museum, that started everything going downhill. Our jobs on over there. Republicans do that. Americans, we love to work. Guest i think he has a point. This story has been underreported, particularly in light of the tpa and the fact that the president and republicans are trying to create. It also includes mexico and vietnam and malaysia. But we have free trade with mexico. Under a fast track in 1984. We used to have a proud employer in detroit, which was the capital of making automobiles in the world. I believe they have 2. 7 million 2. 7 billion in mexico to build transmissions and engines and mexico and they create a bunch of jobs in mexico. Why is forward ford leaving the u. S. To manufacture and mexico . The Senior Executives of ford are not looking at it page article a. They are just trying to maximize their bottom line of profit. I know there are many Small Business people who have manufacturing firms. They can get cheaper labor in vietnam or malaysia or mexico but they do not leave their comedic the they do not leave their community because they love their country. We have the right to assemble, what form a union, they can negotiate with the folks who run ford for the wages they get in detroit. But when ford moves overseas, they invalidate the right to unionize. We have to realize there is a difference between a capitalist Small Business who runs his business according to his moral beliefs and sometimes forgoes profits because of something he believes in more than profit then multinational corporations are only one say raise their bottom line. Host owner chris, frank from new jersey, line for independents. Good morning. Caller how are you doing. It seems like everyone seems to be dancing around the herd of elephants in the room. The thing that killed the American Dream is the fact that inflation outpaced wages two to one. The other fact is the American Government is bought and paid for by corporate america. They are controlling what goes on. The legislation never once the wage to raise, the minimum wage. They always say we will lose jobs if we do. If they had done as we should have, we would not have lost jobs. They are making sure organize labor is killed in america. I think they corporations would like to see minimum wage go down to or dollars an hour, if they could. In 1968, when i was a child, gasoline was . 28 a gallon. Now it is three dollars and some odd cents. Of course we had this short drop by now. Things have gone up 10 times in other words. The minimum wage is 16. Is it is six dollars. If it had kept up with inflation, it would be 16. Guest first of all, are you a supporter of unions from your earlier comments . Guest we have the right to work and join a union. Just like people can for my corporations and treat cars, people can form a union and negotiate. Guest that is where you really are. That you would be on the side of not joining the unions. I think the caller is right, that there has been a concerted effort to minimize the strength of unions and the country. They have been severely weekend. They had a momentary victory on the trade Promotion Authority and it did not last long. Corporate power has gotten into a lot of hands. This will be an issue on the campaign trail. You will not hear republicans unilaterally stand up for personhood of corporations and corporate power. They are hearing from the people. There is popular sentiment. Things have gotten out of whack. Guest people may not think about it this way, but we have a state tax. It is back. The state tax does not affect ford or general motors. It affects the american family. What the debt tax says is that these Family Businesses that have been successful in traded jobs and there came in 80 and the people who run them on their values, the debt tax sucks is is is out of families and into multinational corporations. The newspaper industry is an excellent example. This country was full of smalltown newspapers run by people who live in that community and cared about it. The state the estate tax took those newspapers and transfer them into a giant conglomerate corporations. People that want to check about growth in jobs, think about how the debt tax destroy businesses and jobs. Guest how i wish the death tax was responsible for all the changes in journalism. The estate tax only affects people at the very top. The right has use that as an issue to make people think it will affect everyone. It only affects the extremely wealthy and it goes back to the Founding Fathers wish not to have inherited wealth govern political power. Host taxes is our next roundtable discussion we will have, i think. Caller good morning, cspan. As far as American Business principles and all thats, theres boon a lot of been a lot of decades perspective from things like issues like that come up, like oil. Yeah seem fairly well read and well educated. I think i remember hearing you call in at some point kgo to the show in san francisco. Your affiliation with the Republican National committee. So guest thats ok. Im not in any way associated with the republican party. I was born in san francisco. Thats my home area. But im a journalist. Host lets go to arizona. Republicans. Dan, good morning. Are you with us . Stick by are you with your phone. Becky. Caller ok. Here i am. Host go ahead. Caller i wanted to talk a little bit about the reason for the marriages being a mess and the schools. The reason that marriages are falling apart is because of one thing. Its the law that they passed, and i dont know when it was, called no fault divorce. So anybody that wants to get out of a marriage because they met someone they like better, someone who makes more money, whatever, they can just dump you. Its been done to me twice after working like a dog to get two men through college. And once they got out, once they graduated and got a goodpaying job i got dumped. Host i thought you were done. Do you want to talk about the marriage issue in this country . Guest no fault divorce has been around now for decades. Its not exactly new. And before that, people would have to manufacture perhaps maybe allege true reasons becky. There was a lot of character assassination. So i think no fault divorce is a good thing. Host i want to give you a choons we started by a definition of the American Dream. Is it time for us to redefine the American Dream . Sit going to have a different definition another 20 years from now . Guest no. I think what we need to do is get back to the American Dream, the principle that the founders set that our rights come from god. To get back to the principles of government outlined in the constitution that cuts the federal government to a limited role and leaves the rest of the states and the people. Ifrpbleds i think the American Dream is alive and wole. It needs some fixing, some tweaking if you will. And i think the country is poised to do very well in the coming years. I look forward to a vigorous debate between the two parties over the next year. Host and look forward to a vigorous debate when we have the two of you on again. They were charged with building the transcontinental railroad. They started here, was moving west at Central Pacific started on the west coast and was moving east. They met in utah. That is what propels us even farther. We become that point of moving west. See all of our programs from omaha today at 2 00 p. M. Et on cspan3. Three men and a woman believed to be members of the puerto rican nationalist gang that attempted the assassination of resident truman opened fire from the visitors gallery of the house of representatives. Five congressman were hit her in jensen of iowa. Kenneth roberts of alabama. George phelan of maryland and albert from michigan. The gun wielders goes to the evil distinction of having generated a criminal outrage unique in americas history. One of the most violent acts that ever occurred in the chamber. There were debates right after that saying we cannot let this happen again. We to wall off the visitors gallery with bulletproof glass. The more they talked about it and thought about it they said no, this is a bad idea. This is the peoples house and the people cannot be walled off from the floor. The Capital Building is a symbol and that makes it a target. The british burned the building, there was a bombing in world war i by professor. There was the shooting in 1954. 1971 was a bomb set up by the weather underground. In 1983 there is another bombing on the senate side by those opposed to president reagans foreign policy. In 2098 there were two capital policeman shot and killed. There had been those instances over time and yet capital has remained remarkably open building. Senator has story and richie historian richie on the prominent events tonight on q a. The National Sheriffs association held its annual conference in baltimore this week where they heard from several 2016 president ial candidates including the arkansas governor Mike Huckabee. This is an hour. Up next, Mike Huckabee talks about the importance of respecting and supporting Law Enforcement and the need to reduce crime rates. Our coverage of his remarks is about an hour. Thank you again to all the First Responders that are here. I am jonathan thompson, the executive director and ceo of the National Sheriffs foundation. Today is a great honor. We are taking ourselves in a new direction and with that goes so many obligations. So many opportunities that we can and should take advantage of. Today represents the First Time Ever that president ial candidates have been invited to participate in your annual conference. All of the candidates received an invitation to participate in this event and talk to you, the men and women in uniform who walk that blue line. Hear your questions, to talk with you about the issues you face every single day. Republican and democrat, they were all invited. Ladies and gentlemen, i want you to take notice over the next couple of days as to who is here. I want you to take notice of the people that arent here. And i want you to take notice of those that are here, that they are standing tell with you and they are renting they are answering your questions and they are talking to you. They are not talking at you. They are talking with you. Our first candidate is former arkansas governor Mike Huckabee. Governor huckabee has the distinction of being one of the longest standing governors in that states history. He left a legacy of tax cuts, job creation, the reconstruction of states road system, k through 16 education reform and a heralded and duplicated Health Initiative that focus on the less expensive approach to prevention than the closely Big Government topdown approach of intervention. Governing magazine named the governing as one of its Public Officials of the year in 2000 510 Time Magazine countered him as one of the five best governors in america. He has been honored by numerous organizations for his commitment to music education. He served as the chairman of the Prestigious National Governors Association as well as the Education Commission of the states. May southern Governors Association and the interstate oil and gas commission. Governor huckabee is also a New York Times bestselling author former host of number one weekend show on Fox News Channel and a longtime radio personality. Governor huckabee is an avid musician and a bass player. His hobbies also include hunting and fishing. He was named one of the 25 most influential people for conservation by outdoor life magazine and was named the end of the year by an american sportfishing association. The former governor and his wife, janet, who is seated here with us today, have three grown children and five grandchildren. Ladies and gentlemen, please stand and welcome governor Mike Huckabee. [applause] governor huckabee thank you very much. I am kind of that all the republican candidates did not show up this week. Otherwise, your conference would have been extended by three more days considering how many they are and still growing. A lot of people have said, is it going to be difficult having that number of candidates and how in the world will we sort them out . I do have a solution to that. I dont know if it will go over with some of the others. For me, it is a very simple one. They all drop out and endorse me and then we move on. I think that would be a great idea. Maybe we can encourage them to do that. It is an honor to be with you today and i appreciated the tribute that you have given today to the members of a Baltimore Police department, welldeserved. And i want to say that, one of the reasons i look forward to being with you is that you serve one of the most important parts of Law Enforcement in the country in that every single one of the 3000 plus sheriffs in america are elected by the people of their communities. So we always know that the motto of Law Enforcement is to protect and to serve them for the sheriffs office, if you dont serve, they will send you home. And if you do serve, they will appreciate it by reelecting you. It is one of the important elements of our lump our Law Enforcement community because of that. We are living in some very challenging times, to say the least. I am afraid that my kids and even more significantly my five grandchildren are growing up in a very different kind of america than the one that i was so blessed to grow up in as a little kid down in south arkansas. A few years ago, as governor, it was always my duty sometime during october, when they have National Reading week, to go to a Public School and sit down and read a story to children and it would cause the press to come in and take photos and you whole point was to encourage people to read. So i was scheduled to be at the Georgia Elementary School and spring arkansas on a saturday morning. I had been in the junior high science fair earlier that day. It had run a little late. By the time i got to georgia elementary, i was already if you meant behind. The principal met me at the door ringing her hands say we have to hurry the kids are down there and waiting for you. So we hurried down the hall to melanie keyess firstgrade class at the george elementary school. All the kids were sitting on the floor facing forward. Why right in front of them was one of those little firstgrade shares for me. Chairs for me. They handed me the book that they wanted me to read. I looked at these kids and i thought, i just dont want to break into the story. I want to spend a moment or two getting to know them. These efforts graders. I said, before i read this story, kids, would any of you like to Say Something or ask a question . Being firstgraders, every hand went up, everyone of them. I thought, boy, this is going to be easy. So i pointed doing to and another and i noticed right in front of me, dead center in front of me was a little girl and she just did not have her hand up. She had her hand up like this, making sure that i could see that her hand was waving vigorously in my face. I wondered how long could you keep this up . So i thought, ok, i will go to every other kid but her and see it she can handle this. Sure enough, for the next several minutes, it did not matter who i talked to. She was waving their hand at me. I was going to run kid and another and they were saying things what they were going to halloween. I could not imagine what this logo was so enthusiastic about. I was hoping she would say thats what this little girl was so enthusiastic about. I was hoping that she would say my mother thinks you are the best governor we ever had. Finally, she is the last one standing and she still has it going. I said, yes, sweetheart, i know you want to ask something. So you go ahead. I later found out it was ashley. What was it you wanted to say to me . She looked up at me and she says governor, we are already late for lunch. [laughter] you see, i found out that wednesday was found on day at george elementary. The truth is the little girl did not care that the governor of her state came other way across arkansas to read to her class of all the schools in the state of arkansas. What matter was wednesday was corndog day and if we didnt hurry up and get through that story and get those kids to the cafeteria, she might miss her corndog or else it might be cold. Needless to say, my staff give me the business about that. They were calling me governor corndog for a while. Until i reminded them that i would be calling them former members of the staff if they kept that up for that little girl, the only thing that mattered to her was getting to her corndog on time. And i tell you, i wish to god that little girl never had to worry about anything more important than her corndog. Unfortunately, she is going up in a world in which there are far more things to say against her than her corndog. We sometimes have heard the expression there is a new sheriff in town. I would say that america is going to be in real trouble unless we get some new leadership in town. There has got to be an understanding that the direction this country is going is going to make it very difficult for little girls like ashley to grow up and not worry about things like dogs. She is going to ask on dobbs. She is going to have to worry about whether or worry about things like corndogs. She is going to have to worry about whether or not foreigners will come into this country and attacker. There are some elements in our culture that want to put to the blame on the Police Officers which is about as smart as blaming the umpire when the pitcher beams the batter. They result of a lot of this antipolice sentiment across this country from elected officials, a starting with the attorney general, is we have seen a 24 increase of Police Officers killed and killings are up by 56 of all officers killed by firearms just this year alone. Its never been more dangerous to be a cop. And i dont think the problem is that we have too many Police Officers or that they have too much power. The fundamental problem is that we have too many criminals and they have too much power and we have not given the respect to the Law Enforcement community and the individual officers that i know i was raised with as a kid. Were living at a time of rebellion of the lawless and lawbreakers. Here in the city of baltimore, we saw what happens when a mayor and District Attorney disparage the local police trying to keep the city safe. Baltimore has the fifth highest murder rate in u. S. Cities of cities 100,000 and up in population. When the baltimore mob rioted, doing millions and millions of dollars of damage in this city, putting 144 vehicles on fire and injuring 114 Police Officers, it was not the police that we needed to worry about. It was the lack of a unified support at the highest levels of leadership for those who went out there and held the thin blue line against anarchy. [applause] governor huckabee in the city of baltimore, one in 70 are likely to be a victim of violence and in west baltimore its one in 48. To give you contrast, in fort worth, texas, its more like 1 in 179. In new york, where a new mayor decided that some of the policies of the previous mayors which had been very effective in dramatically reducing murders and violent crime, he thought their methods were too heavyhanded so he reversed them and shootings are up 20 in new york city from just a year ago. And in chicago, already this year there have been 209 murders 1,035 people have been shot so far, just through today. 77 of those homicide victims are african american. And over 18 of them are hispanic. I find it interesting that throughout most of america the cities with the highest crime rates are run by the most liberal mayors and governments in the country and often have the strictest gun control. It would seem that somebody might put all this together and realize that the problem is not that we have Police Officers on the street and we have too many of them. The problem is that we have too many criminals on the street and the very people in leadership positions setting policy, instead of getting behind their police agencies, are standing in front of them and protecting the criminals instead of protecting the Police Officers, and, folks, we will never get the crime rate down in this country until we stop it. [applause] governor huckabee my wife and i both have conceal carry permits and not because we dont trust the cops. Thank you, thats the sound of one hand clapping. I like that. Its a simple matter of reality. That if someone breaks into my house at 2 00 a. M. And wants to do injury to my family or to me im not going to stand there and be a helpless victim for the next 10 to 20 minutes waiting on Law Enforcement to come because they may be that far away. Ill still call 911, all right, but ill be calling them to tell them where to come and pick up the carcass of the idiot who tried to break into my home at 2 00 a. M. [applause] governor huckabee i want to speak to the reasons for the lawlessness of our country because i think there are many but im convinced the single most important reason is not because of policing methods for gosh sake. Its because of the breakdown of the basic family unit which is the single most important unit of all government. We sometimes think if we can just replace the people in various levels of the government, that all would be fine. But the first form of government that all of us experience is the government in our own family. And i know what im about to say is not politically correct but then again, i dont have a habit of being all that politically correct. But the fact is, repeated studies have shown that children growing up in a dysfunctional or in a broken family environment are three times more likely to get into drugs, to get into juvenile delinquency and to get into crime. Deviant behavior goes up dramatically when children do not have a home in which they are taught not only love but respect for authority. And if kids dont grow up respecting the authority of mom and dad, its very difficult for them to grow up and have the respect of their government, including their Police Officers. Look, i grew up in a different time and i know that and some people think im a throwback. I dont really care what people might say about it. Heres what i know, that i was raised that if i got in trouble at school, i was already in trouble at home. [applause] governor huckabee if i got in trouble at school, my message to the principal wasnt, youre going to hear from my familys lawyer. It was, please, dear god, no matter what you do do anything to me you want to, just do not let my parents know i got in trouble. I was a little bit of afraid of the school. I was scared to death of my father. My father was old school. My dad was probably the most patriotic guy i ever knew. He laid on the stripes, i saw stars. Oldfashioned patriotism. My parents taught me, if the Police Officer says stop, you dont turn around and say why . And if you want to argue with a Police Officer, the time and place to do it is if you think you have a case and you take it to court but by golly, out on the street, hes boss and youre not. Why dont we raise kids to understand that without a respect for the fundamentals of authority, our whole social contract breaks down and disintegrates . Behavior is largely the result of the value system that were raised with. A few years ago a prison warden had a great idea. He thought that it would be nice to offer all of the inmates in the prison an opportunity to send a mothers day card to their mothers. He provided the cards and the postage and all the inmates had to do was go by, pick up the card already stamped, write in the card, address it to their mothers and it would be mailed to them. Almost 100 of the inmates who had living mothers all got a mothers day card and they wrote the card, put it in the envelope and the warden was blown away with the success of it and the manner in which the inmates appreciated that opportunity so he thought, if it was this great for mothers day, we should do this next month for fathers day so again, he put forward the same invitation and said, anybody would like to send a card to your father, come by and pick one up, well pay the postage. All youve got to do is write the card and address it. Not one inmate picked up a card. Not one. The tragedy is that we have not fully appreciated the impact of kids growing up without parents who give them the most fundamental understanding of what makes a society work. In this city, in baltimore, only 16 of the teenagers between the ages of 15 and 17 are raised in an intact family. I want to say it again. The problem in america with crime is not that we have too many Police Officers, its that we have too few fathers who are raising their kids to respect authority and to understand how this country works when people are willing to do that which is right against that which is wrong. Thats what our problem is. Most of us were raised with a simple philosophy, probably drilled into it by our parents that said do unto others as you would have them do unto you, the golden rule. I know my mother certainly drilled it into me. As a governor for 10 1 2 years and before that as lieutenant governor, one of the things i noticed about our state budget was that a lot of things we spent money for we spent money because there was a breakdown in the moral code of our citizens. I know there are a lot of people and i get beat up about this a lot of times dont talk about morality, lets talk about lower taxes and cutting government. But let me explain. Thats a wonderful idea, but the fact is, the breakdown of the moral code of our society is the cause of a lot of the cost of our society. In every state in this country it costs more money to put a person in prison for one year than it does to put that same person in a Fouryear College or university and pay full tuition room and board, and buy their books and in most cases theyd havemoney have money left over for spending money, and yet we incarcerate more people every year because its the only way we can protect lawabiding citizens. The cost of juvenile justice is staggering. In my state 10 years ago, the cost of taking a juvenile into our system and making that juvenile a ward of the state was over 80,000 a year that would cost the taxpayers. When people say dont tell me about morality, lets talk money, im going to say to you if we dont get the morality of this country straightened out, well never get the money issue straightened out because the breakdown of the morality of our citizens is very, very costly. Everything we do in government is the response of somebody messing up. We had 323 boards, agencies and commissions in the state and they werent there because people needed more government. They were there because in every particular world we had to regulate something. If had 10 tow truck operators and one were good and there was one bad apple, the nine good ones would say we need a law that protects against these predators. We need a board that will administer the law. And the next thing you know, weve appointed a board we have regulations, rules and fines because the overwhelming majority of good people have to protect themselves against the minority of the bad and this is true whether its regulations of business, or whether its a matter of creating laws against crime. I visited all of the prisons in my state over the course of 10 1 2 years and im happy to say i only visited them as a very brief guest. I never inhabited one, unlike one of my predecessors. We had a saying in arkansas the five most feared words of an arkansas politician are these will the defend please rise. But in visiting the prisons, one of the things i asked our prison director, i said, how many people are here because of drugs and alcohol . He said in the entire Arkansas Department of corrections, 88 of the inmates incarcerated were there for a drug or alcoholrelated crime. They either committed a crime to get drunk or high or they were drunk or high when they committed a crime. As he reminded me, we dont really have a crime problem, we have a drug and alcohol problem. And so it is that the breakdown of our individual understanding of personal responsibility has a dramatic impact upon how much it costs us as taxpayers. Mental health is a huge issue. There are a lot of people we are incarcerating that we should be treating but thats expensive. I would also tell you its very expensive to continue to have people who come in and out of the system who are very desperately mentally ill and instead of getting treatment for their mental illness, we simply warehouse them for a while and then we turn them back on the streets and then they turn around and get back into the system. That revolving door has proven to be very costly. We need to return to law and order in this nation, teach respect of the law and respect of those who enforce it. During my time as governor, i had to carry out more executions than any other governor in the history of the state. It was largely because, for a long time, all executions had been placed on hold. The Supreme Court, by the time i took office, a lot of those cases had built up and once the green light was given to go back to executing those who had been deemed worthy of the death penalty, a lot of those cases fell toward me. I took every one of those cases very seriously. Because i knew something that every decision that i made as a governor if it was wrong somebody could come back and fix it. But there was one decision that i was solely responsible for making that had irrevocable consequences because once youve carried out an execution you cannot unring that bell. And because of the gravity of it, i would take every case individually and i would get the entire case file for that inmate. I would read through every single page, which included the crime scene photos, the interrogation reports, the trial transcript, the Appellate Court transcript, every motion filed. Sometimes it could be several large file boxes filled with file folders and it sometimes would take weeks, if not months, to go through every single page of it using every spare moment i had to thoroughly read those case files. And the reason i did that because i understood that if there was an injustice in the process of of that individual, it was my somber duty to be his last line of defense. And it was also my solemn duty to carry out that execution that had been dutifully processed by a legislature which created a law, the police force which apprehended the criminal, a prosecutor when prosecuted him and a Judicial Branch which had already by now reviewed that case repeatedly and now it was my responsibility to make sure that all that which had been done up to that point was carried out lawfully and appropriately. The night of an execution was the worst night of my life. For those who think that one can go through that process with a cavalier spirit, theyre made of Something Different than me. I never flinched to do my duty and responsibility but it was never something that i ever came to enjoy or take lightly. And part of the reason was is because i knew that if i made that decision, it was irrevocable. I tell you that because every time i had to make the decision to carry out an execution and to take a human life that had been properly adjudicated as guilty of a heinous crime, i had weeks if not months, to work through that decision and be absolutely certain that i was right. But when you and your colleagues in Law Enforcement step up to the window of a car at 2 00 a. M. And you have no idea whos in that car and what their intentions are, when you get out of your car on a city street and you approach someone and you stop them to ask them what theyre doing, you dont have weeks. You dont have months. You have to make a decision within split seconds that i had weeks and months to prepare for. And for this country not to understand and appreciate the extraordinary challenge that we put men and women in uniform through in this country, shame on us for not telling people what you have to do and how little time you have to do it [applause] governor huckabee im blessed to have glen grown up in this great land of america. I did not grow up blue blood but blue collar. I was born in the little town of hope arkansas, that you may have heard of before for other reasons. My dad was a firefighter. And on his days off he worked as a mechanic. It took two jobs and he barely could make enough money to pay the rent on the Little Orange brick red house we lived in on Second Street in hope. My dad never finished high school. His dad didnt, either, and his dad before him didnt. In fact, no male upstream from me had ever finished high school much less to go to college so im the first male in my entire family lineage to get out of high school and to go to college. When i was 8 years old my dad said son, a governor of a state is going to come down here to our part of arkansas and hes going to dedicate a lake tomorrow. Im going to take you down there to let you hear the governor make a talk because son, you may live your whole life and never see the governor in person. No one would have been able to convince him that one day his son would become the 44th governor of arkansas. Folks, the American Dream for me is not abstract, its not something ive heard other people tell about, not something ive read about. Its something i have lived and i love this country because its been so incredibly good to a kid like me. I feel like i owe something back. And one thing i believe that i owe back is to try to make sure that this country once again stands behind those in uniform has a clear understanding of the respect of law and order, and that we would hold up those who hold up our laws rather than throw them under the proverbial bus. I had the privilege of being the 44th governor of arkansas. It is my hope and perhaps with your help i would be able to become the 45th president of the United States. Thank you, and god bless you. Appreciate the opportunity to be with you today. [applause] governor, thank you. That was inspiring. We appreciate that. Before i begin, i want to share with you a couple of insights. Today, thanks to Cisco Corporation and verizon, there are probably several thousand sheriffs and deputies across this country that are watching this and we thank them so very much because they are such a huge part of what were trying to do for the american people. But theres also something thats unique happening today and that is that cspan, that little entity, has covered this event live for a multitude of people across the country and i know that when you speak and they covered it, the nations watching and the nations listening and we appreciate your support. Thank you very much. Governor huckabee thank you. As you and i talked about a little bit earlier, as you pointed out, there are a number of folks in the audience and across the country with questions. We reached out to our members over the past several months and said what is it you would like to ask a candidate for president of the United States and questions cover an amazing landscape so i have in front of me a few questions and i have some sheriffs in the audience that i believe would like to ask you questions, as well. Let me start. Governor and this, just to repeat these arent my questions because that would be unfair. I want our members to ask these questions. Governor, our nations infrastructure is increasingly vulnerable to Cyber Attacks and disruptions to our electrical grid. As president , how would you equip local Law Enforcement agencies to deal with such threats . Easy question, right . A lot of moving parts. Governor huckabee i dont think most americans understand how much at risk we are for an attack on the electrical grid whether its by a terrorist bomb whether its by some electronic cyber crime where someone gets into the system that controls our grid and is able to hack into the system. The most ominous threat would come from an electromagnetic pulse which a lot of people havent heard of but its the thought of exploding some nuclear twice overhead of anelectriccal grid which would fry everything electronic. Experts say if that were to happen, it would turn most americans into dead people within a year because everything goes into a screeching halt. We would go from being the land of the jetsons to the land of the flintstones in a matter of hours and its a reason why the thought of someone like iran getting a Nuclear Weapon ought to scare the daylights out of