Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 11252019 20240713

Active and retired military, call at 2027488000. If you are a navy seal and want to talk about this situation from your perspective, 2027488001. All others can call us at 2027488002. You can text us at 2027488003. And on twitter at cspanwj our Facebook Page available to you, too, at facebook. Com cspan. The wall street journal reports it was yesterday that the defense secretary, mark esper, fired the Navy Secretary Richard Spencer sunday after mr. Spencer attempted to cut a deal with the white house over the case of a disgraced navy seal. Mr. Spencer told the wall street journal he tried to make a deal in which President Trump would conduct anavy to review of chief Edward Gallagher who would then be allowed to retire with his trident pin. Mr. Esper only learned of these efforts after the fact and thus. Ost confidence in mr. Spencer that is the wall street journals accounting. If you go to the pages of usa today, some back and forth over the specific case of the Navy Secretary and background behind it. This is the view of the editor, the key focus was the conduct of Edward Gallagher, who earned a reputation of a war breaking pirate. Indiscriminate firing into a neighborhood with a machine gun and killing a captive with a custommade knife. He was convicted only of posting in a photo with the dead teenager and demoted. Right wing the president ordered his rank restored november 15. Theeditors going on to say admiral pressed on worried about a gallagher effect on troop culture. Pin earnede revered when becoming a member of the unit, the president tweeted thursday the navy will not be taking away at a gallaghers trident pin. Trump certainly has the authority to order such a thing as commanderinchief of the military, but is it worthy of obeyed . There is a commentary section that follows what the editors posted. This is from a retired Lieutenant Colonel in the marine corps reserve. Officers, we are trained we do not have a responsibility to dissent, we have an obligation to dissent. Acting courageously to challenge Senior Leadership helps to ensure the best possible outcome. At that dissent must end once a decision is made. Continuing to debate undermines good order and discipline especially a decision made by the president to rectify the disgraceful actions. Our military leaders may not like the president s order. However, they must obey them and lose the ethically. Anything short of that is considered at best insubordination, at worst, treason. That is some of the set up involving this case with Eddie Gallagher and the firing and removal of the secretary of the navy by mark esper. We will get your thoughts on it and you can give us a call. If you are active and retired military, call us at 2027488000. You arealso call us if a navy seal yourself, 2027488001. Others. 7488002 for all if you want to post on our social media sites, you can do so cspanwj as our twitter feed and facebook. Com cspan is our Facebook Page and you can text us at 2027488003. All we would ask is that you put your name and the city and state you are in when you text us. Lets hear from pittsburgh, pennsylvania. This is donald calling the line for retired military. It donald, what do you think about the events of the last day or so . Caller i have my thoughts on the days events. I think they are exposing a patriot to the political Spinning Wheel we are on. Chief gallagher served his country bravely, with valor. If he made a hiccup or two, that often happens. I think this has been too politicized, let the navy take care of this and get the media and the politicians out of the way. Chief gallagher served his country honorably and he deserves all the accolades coming to him and let him go on with his life. Host one of the things coming out of the story is posing with that photo of the dead nicest isis fighter. Ded used goodrhaps he judgment, but lets remember he was in the heat of battle seeing his colleagues, comrades, brothers and arms may have been and ther injured misstep of him posing like that. If he had it to do over again, i would suspect he would not do it. Lets remember all the other photos that have been taken throughout the wars. Lets not throw him into the ocean and throw him away as a patriot. Host you said let the military take care of it. In that case, the removal of the Navy Secretary, is that is is that an appropriate move . Caller he is probably a political appointee, not a man who served and someone who did not experience combat and the pressures that chief gallagher were under. Host that is donald in pittsburgh pennsylvania. We have set aside a line for active and retired military. Paul calls on the line for all others from connecticut. Hello. Caller hello, sir. Good morning. Served in the navy for 4 years, nonconformistery sailor during the vietnam era. I think what is going on is certainly a political maneuver on the part of the president. Cozying up to the military to spend his trademark. Et military justice play out this individual, gallagher, was acquitted, but not totally forgiven because the courtmartial process had technicalities. This is probably why he was acquitted, not because he did not do the deed. The kind of activity we saw in the prison, the military conspiring with the cia to commit torture, this is an extension, the behavior and conduct of those navy seals is unforgivable. Host what do you think about the desire to hold onto this trident as chief gallagher wanted to . What is the importance of that considering you were in the navy . Give us some context . I understand the fromian he had support the naval seal commander in brokering a deal with gallagher to retire instead of face the full prosecution and Justice System of the military. To avoidat in order being pardoned by the president is what angered the civilian part of it, namely the trump administration, this is the way i understand the series of events and it is outlined in the navy times. Host from tim in arlington, virginia, retired military. You are next on this. What do you think . Jag, so iam a retired have a lot of thoughts on the subject as a whole. At the thing i wanted to key in not athis perception, crazy perception, but flawed that you are somehow doing the war fighter of favor by getting emphasis out of the way. I think the connection i dont know that there has been scientific studies or not, but it seems common sense the connection with all these folks that have ptsd and similar emotional and mental trauma after their deployment that i see in position of the law of war to the extent we can, the civilizing of war is a counter to that and you are doing the war fighter a favor by creating a moral safe space for them to , butt really violent acts within the context of legality and you lose that win you start breaking down the when you start breaking down the barrier between being a warrior and being a murderer. That is what it seems to me, the president conflated those things. As long as you are killing bad people, or people he perceives as deserving to die were not worth not killing, then what is the big deal . I think you lose the moral safe space where warriors operate in a Civilized Society like ours. Host i dont know how closely you followed the case, but there were a series of charges laid against him and the thing he was convicted on was the taking of this photo with so many charges and ending up with the taking of the photo. I dont know if you followed it closely. Caller not closely, but i was a prosecutor it was my primary job for 5 years and i dont think it is at all uncommon, particularly in a case with political overtones and a case with a very senior guy who does unquestionably has done a lot of important and heroic things in his day, not at all unusual to see a compromise with the jury. Keeping in mind with the ucf j ucfj system, you do not have anonymity with the jury, so you broker deals i suspect what goes on in the jury room is private. I always suspect it is a matter of there is bargaining being done among the jurors, that they dont feel comfortable calling something may be what it factually is. I did a lot of sex crimes prosecution. You charge somebody with rape and that was a word they did not want to attach to this particular conduct, so they would pleabargain it down in the jury room. There was a criminal conviction and a sentence involved, whereas if you needed a unanimous jury that was my supposition, that there was enough feeling on the jury that he did something wrong, that they did not want him to walk out exonerated. At the same time, they did not feel comfortable, for whatever reason. Arlington,is tim in virginia, giving his perspective as a former jag. 2027488000 for active and retired military. 2027488001 if you are a navy seal and want to give comment and it is 2027488002 for all others. Here is the statement from the eventsry spencer on the saying the secretary of defense, mark esper, asked for the resignation of Richard Spencer after losing trust and confidence in him regarding his lack of candor over conversations in the white house regarding the handling of eddie say ther and goes on to chairman spoke to the commanderinchief regarding the case of gallagher, secretary esper learned secretary Spencer Priestley and privately opposed proposed to the white house to restore gallaghers rank and allow him to retire with his trident pin when recently asked by secretary spencer, secretary esper confirmed despite multiple conversations, secretary esper was never informed of his private proposal. I am deeply troubled by this conduct shown by a senior dod official. I have determined secretary spencer no longer has my confidence to continue his position. I wish richard well. That is from the defense departments statement on the events. It was chief gallagher on fox and friends yesterday talking about this issue, was asked by the host why he thinks the navy was trying to pursue disciplinary measures. [video clip] this is all about ego and retaliation. They could have taken my trident anytime they wanted and now they are trying to take it after the president restored my rank and all the an ig showing corruption going on during my case starting with crying craig miller to admiral green and we came up with more evidence we will be exposing that the secretary of the navy was meddling in my case and trying to get organizations not to support me while i was incarcerated. Host that took place yesterday before the firing. The line for others, we will hear from roseann in san diego, california. Caller hi. I wanted to say i agree with the second and third collars, the jag from virginia and the former navy man in connecticut. I think this is a complete,. Otal travesty i think trump is interfering where he doesnt belong where he is not really fit to be a commanderinchief. Host as the commanderinchief, doesnt he have a say in this issue . No otheres, but president does stuff like that. Interferes then goes over to what the navy or military does, but he does. He is not fit to be a commanderinchief, so the fact he is doing what he did is really offensive. Host what was it about the instance concerning chief gallagher that bothered you the most . Caller gallagher killed people, he violated the ucmj. He was turned in by his fellow navy seals. He is no angel. He committed war crimes. Host as the jag officer talked about, only convicted on taking the photo. Caller of course, we expected that before he even had it his trial, a courtmartial. It is just wrong. I think it is the slap a slap in the face to every seal or soldier or airmen who does not commit war crimes. Why dont they all just go out and shoot people and rape people . Host retired military, in richmond, you are on. Caller i understand military protocol. It operates on discipline and integrity and for a person to take a person of a dead soldier, you are just like the taliban or isis. That all over the place. And heto step in sounds like putin. Host what specifically was wrong with the president s action . Caller he is stepping on his own people. He is making the military look bad. He makes it look like our thetary doesnt have integrity, the military knowledge to take care of our own and it looks bad for our country when he steps on the military. Host here is the statement from the outgoing secretary of the navy. Unfortunately, it has become apparent in this respect i no longer share the same understanding with the commanderinchief who appointed me in response to the key principle of order and discipline. I cannot obey an order i believe violates the sacred oath i took in the presence of my family, my flag, and my faith to support end of and defend the constitution of the United States. That event took place yesterday. We have heard from many retired military, 2027488000 is the number to call. Open to active military if you want to give thoughts. If you are a navy seal, 2027488001. For those of 2027488002. At you can text us thoughts that 2027488003. Jimmy, you are on. Caller yes. I want to tell a little story about the military. I was in the military. I was in germany in the 1960s. Them get rid of a man i drove to vietnam personally myself. Two crazy houses and back it, saying there is nothing wrong with this man. They kept pressuring him and pressuring him and he begged to let me go back to vietnam for the third time. Host thank you for the perspective, but how does that apply in the case of chief gallagher . Caller i think chief gallagher should be punished by the military, not by the president who ducked the military himself. He should not have a right to jump in and interfere in the army business. Host doesnt the commanderinchief title give him that right . Caller they gives him the right, but as a man that ducked the military, dont know nothing about the military, why should he interfere with the military . Host that is jimmy in pennsylvania. One of the topic points that comes under this discussion concerning chief gallagher was the idea of the trident pin and him retaining that. If you go to wikipedia, it says the special warfare insignia known as the seal trident or the budweiser recognizes those members of the United States navy who completed the basic underwater demolition seal training and designated as a u. S. Navy seal. It is one of the most breastizable insignias of the u. S. Navy. Call on the lines and you can do so. San diego, california, retired military. Caller good morning. How are you doing today . Host i am fine, thank you. Go ahead. Caller i am retired military. The commanderinchief has the responsibility and authority to do whatever he wants as far as eliminating his responsibilities with the military. I seem to remember general truman fired General Macarthur at one time. What i really want to say is combat. I dont mean on a ship or airplane, if you have not been not been and you have in physical contact with anybody, i dont see how you can judge the action of somebody something that took place 300 miles away from where you are at. Advocates are the same issue. Come back and tell us how we are supposed to take and conduct ourselves. That was an absolute tragedy and should never have happened and the lieutenant got convicted for that crime. Host because you have experience, what do you think of the act of him taking that picture with the dead isis fighter . Caller so what, who cares . The guy was a bad guy in the picture was taken. He did not physically killed that person. Hethat bad guy is a bad guy, deserved to die. Host why do you think the picture is appropriate . Caller why not . What is wrong with it . There is nothing wrong with it, it is dead. He is a corpse. I killed him. I took a picture with him. Host that is james in san diego, california, calling for those active or retired. This is james from mesa, arizona, off our text service you can respond to. Give us a text at 2027488003. He says the president of the United States should never go against his military. This is from jeff in glen bernie saying chief gallagher is a war criminal, the law of Armed Conflict exists to prevent war crimes and he clearly violated it. You can make your thoughts off text, twitter, our Facebook Page, and give us a call as well. Connecticut, our line for others, you are next up, go ahead. Caller i wish the president never got involved in this case. I have been following the case not 1s fellow seals, testified on behalf, but i am taking their word that they accused him of shooting a old man,irl an firing into crowds. They said he would go on these pirate missions. Very interesting what the jagged said how jag officer they can plea these cases down. What is wrong with taking the picture is we are in the age of social media and this stuff goes around the world 5, 6, 7 times in the flash of a minute. It is amazing and who uses these pictures . Jihadis. Jihadis on their website to justify why they have got on their side. It is they have god on their side. It is disappointing. They should strip his trident pin. This is a man accused of war crimes. It is not good to send a person leadershipack into a position when he has lost the trust of command and his fellow seals. Host that is stephen in connecticut giving us a call. Steve up next, retired military, hudson, florida. Caller good morning. I agree that the president has every right to do whatever he does, it is part of his office and part of his job. Maybe he should not have, but he did and we should go with that. As far as mr. Gallagher being a war criminal, it is easy for these perfume princes in the state to decide what is right and wrong. If you have never been in combat, you dont understand these things. Has one of the things that an out of this is what this action does with discipline overall in the military of the United States. Caller there will be impacts on everything and even though it is in the military, there is a lot of politics to it. A lot of politics say who does what and who did something that is really great and what was really bad. These perfume princes sitting in washington, d. C. Far away from it host specifically to the idea of discipline, do you think discipline gets affected in these cases . Caller definitely when the president steps in and overrides the military, that is a black eye for the military and not a good mark for the president. Host we set aside a line for navy seals, this is ron. Caller once a navy, always a navy seal. When you are over there [no audio] people need to let it go, just let it go. Shit happens over there. But ifou can keep going, you could cut back on the expletives because it affects the Radio Program and people watching. What do you think of the case of chief gallagher . Caller what they are doing to gallagher what the democrats are doing to the president is worse than what they are doing to gallagher. Democrats are ruining the country with the help of the mainstream media. I am high strong. Strung. I am sorry, sir. Host active military from connecticut, you are next up. Caller good morning. As i can see it, there are two issues at hand and they are linked. You have chief gallagher being found guilty of what is essentially a war crime and the president issuing a pardon. That is fully within his rights to do that. The other issue is the unconscionable behavior of the Navy Secretary overwriting his chain of command by going straight to the white house instead of through his boss, who is the secretary of defense. Everybody so far has behaved appropriately except for chief gallagher taking the photo and that should only be a slap on the wrist. I dont see this as a controversy except there are folks in the media who want to play politics and use the military as a cudgel to bash the president. Host you said when it came to what chief gallagher was charged with, a slap on the rest. How did you come to that conclusion . Caller chief gallagher was charged with taking a photograph, he was found guilty of taking a photograph. If found guilty of taking a photograph, is that really a reduction in rank . I am not even sure that is a reduction in rank offense, it is taking a photograph with a dead bad guy. I simply dont understand the controversy, here. Everybody is acting appropriately and the only reason that is controversial at all is there are politicians who want to use the military to bash the president. Host does this present an image issue for the military . Caller he was tried and found guilty. As far as i am concerned, there is no image issue. Host is there a discipline issue . Some of those involved expressed issues about discipline. Caller he was tried and found guilty. Host correct, discipline within the rest of the ranks, how it influences those involved in the military. Caller i went to high school inh a guy who was charged the killings in connecticut. The man was railroaded through the marine corps process of justice. Thatr as i am concerned, did not affect the good order and discipline of the rest of incidents like this are not going to create a precedent where somebody can commit a crime and say i am going to count on the president to give me a pardon. Stuff like that does not occur. Host active military member giving his thoughts from connecticut. For the next 29 minutes, we will keep on with this topic and you can make your thoughts known. 2027488000 if you are active or retired military. If you are a navy seal, 2027488001. All others can give us a call at 2027488002. If you want to text us, you can do that at 2027488003. When you do that, all we would ask you to do is include your name and where you are from, your city and state and you can text us your thoughts. We will hear from william on the demo on the others. Caller i will preface this by hat. Ng you i wear a maga i was in from 1965 to 1969 and i people dont what, inlize what you go through the military. They are complaining about this guy taking a picture, that wasnt as bad as bergdahl, he got a bunch of military guys killed. Host the removal of the Navy Secretary, what do you think about that . Caller he should be gone and lose his pension along with the him. Al right with host this is virginia. Caller good morning. I served with eddie in afghanistan and i want everyone to listening eddie to know eddie is a man with honor. He treated taliban fighters and the enemy when we engaged him and made sure they got back say so they would go through the proper Justice System. Eddie is a man of honor and what the man they did to him, i dont know if it was pr or a publicity stunt, it is not correct. Intervening in our soldiers today to make sure they are treated properly. Host you were a seal yourself . Caller dod technician, so i was point man with eddie. We served very closely together. I have not seen him since then, but obviously been tracking the news and was very happy to see him get pardoned because i know it is a sham. Host you agree with the firing of the Navy Secretary . Caller i believe if the president came out and pardoned him, what ended up happening as to pull his trident host what is the importance of the trident. . Aller as a tech, i wear badge that says i am a technician. That way everyone knows who i am. Trident. Thing with the you go through a lot of trials and tribulations to earn that and through all of his time in combat, he has earned that trident every day. Doing the drops to take the trident away for him doing the jobs he was trained to do takes away the honor you earned and who is going to want to get a trident now . You want to talk about recruiting for future generations, who will want to put themselves through months and years of stress, training, ptsd, all that stuff to potentially have it taken away for doing a job the country needs you to do. Host this is the president yesterday sending out a series of tweets saying he was not pleased with the way Eddie Gallaghers trial was handled by the navy. Despite this, was exonerated on all major charges. I restored eddies rank. A large cost overruns from past administrations contracted procedures that were not addressed to my satisfaction. The secretary of the navy Richard Spencers services have been terminated. Eddie will retire peacefully with all of the honors he has earned, including his trident pin. Admiral and ambassador to to be the new secretary of the navy. A man of great achievement and success. I know ken will do an outstanding job. Nina in st. Louis, missouri. Caller can you hear me . Host i can hear you, go right ahead. Caller i have never served in the military, but i do come from a military family. I have several members in the navy, marines which is a branch of the navy, air force, and navy i heard about the taking thefor picture of the enemy combatant and the flashbacks i got of skullsctures of japanese mailed back from battle lines from our soldiers killing japanese and sending back what they called souvenirs that had the skulls of jed dead japanese soldiers. I get flashbacks of the postcards of the lynch victims from the south. There are things that we as. Eople need to condemn there are very primal actions that we, as human beings, need to turn away from. When we are talking about people who put on a uniform to represent us as americans for these things to happen, they need to be addressed in a way that states very clearly this is not what we represent. Host we will hear next from john in kansas, but tired military. Hello. Caller good morning, how are you . Host i am well, thank you. And i i am a vietnam vet have been in a firefight. I am nothing compared to a navy seal. Absolutely nothing compared to a navy seal. These people are trained they are warriors. I have been in the military 24 years, i am retired. I am a vietnam vet. When i was in the military, we joked who is going to have our back . The government trains you to go out and do these things and yes, there are rules. Someone does something, it is secondguessed and as far as the picture, yes, there is a picture. When i was in vietnam, koreans cut t offhe ears cut the ears off their victims and wear them around base. Not there and maybe this guy had guys that did not like him for nonlegitimate reasons. Host we will hear from a retired seal, rich, in boston, massachusetts. Caller who am i talking to . Host this is cspan. You are calling the washington journal program. Caller oh, the guy on tv. What i am upset about is you have to be careful what you do because the president is the boss. About want to remind me what you do with ceos and all that stuff. Host lets start with you being a retired seal, is that the case . Caller yes. Host what did you think of the actions of chief gallagher . Caller i think it was extraordinarily in poor taste. You have a man that is retired and the interjection in parts of speeds speech that says an introduction interjection shows surprise. I dont think mr. Gallagher was a professional. Host what do you think of the actions of the Navy Secretary Navy Secretary and his removal from office . Caller i think it is wonderful what they do. I think the lack of control. What they are doing in the navy is the same thing the president is doing here. Host lets stick to the navy. Do you agree with the Navy Secretarys removal . Caller no. Host why is that . Caller because she is a professional. Host lets hear from jonathan in illinois, retired military. Caller i would like to say what the secretary of the navy is trying to do is uphold good order and discipline. Gallagher was tried and found guilty at the courtmartial. The evidence showed he was guilty so when the president circumvents military justice, it is a detriment to the entirety. It is more than about the seals in the military, it is about the United States. The United States is a country that does what is right at all times even when facing adverse actions. We have to make sure we do that and the military tries to do that and we are trying to hold this person accountable and yet the president refuses to do that. He lets his ego and personality or emotions dictate what is right or what is wrong, which is totally opposite of what good order and discipline is. Host we had a navy jag talus with all the charges chief gallagher was charged with, it was taking the picture he was ultimately tried on. What do you think about that being the thing that sticks versus all the other charges laid against him . Caller i think the pictures only were more than just in poor taste, but they were illegal and they were going against good order and discipline. He was tried for that, held accountable for that and to act as though it never happened or it is ok to do by the president is wrong and with the secretary of the navy and some admirals i think it is admirable upon them, but totally wrong upon the president. Host from gary next on the line from others from north dakota. Jamestown, north dakota, hi. Caller i have no problems with what trump did pardoning this fellow. You can look back at history, world war ii, you had the battle lma, theulge and a massacre. You know what gis would do with german prisoners, especially if they were ss. There was the baton death march where gis in future battles, they catch japanese, they did not live very wrong. You can go find incidents in korea and vietnam. These jag officers, they are doing their job, but they should be in the front lines. I am a civilian. Maybe the best example is you look at movies with the enemy at the gates with what russians did with their political prisoners, send them to the front lines, give them a rifle, 5 rounds and secret police are behind them with machine guns. Host what did you think of the removal of the Navy Secretary . Caller i got no problems with that. Host because . Caller if the Navy Secretary disagreements with trump forced to resign whether he was retired or resigned he should not be there. He has disagreements with trump, he should not be in that job. Host that is gary on the line for others. 15 minutes left on this topic. Give us a call on the lines. You can post on twitter and send us a text. Some quick headlines of other things happening in the world, the washington devoting a good chunk of its above the fold taking a look at the actions of the Navy Secretary and his removal. On the latest dori they have haveg out story they coming out on impeachment, it was adam schiff bucking ideas and himself testifying should the trial go over to the senate side, should the house judiciary write articles impeachment once the house resumes in december. One other headline about Michael Bloomberg, which you have seen as far as his intentions on 2020 candidacy, usa today saying he makes it official, he is in as of yesterday. That is from usa today this morning. For retiredine military in washington, d. C. , hi. Caller good morning. I completely disagree with how this process has been done. The previous caller was absolutely right, the president made a poor decision getting involved in issues he is not aware of. I am not surprised considering his behavior in the past. I have been police for 27 years, in the coast guard and Law Enforcement detachment teen. American or anybody should want to take a picture with anyone that had been killed you should have an amount of respect and the koran. It is very morbid to pose with a picture. People get upset when you pose with a deer. I think it is incredibly morbid. It is despicable, to be honest, and i am not surprised coming from a draft dodger. It is uncouth and the previous caller made it clear it is not keeping in good order. Host what is it about the president s actions you disagree with . Caller the fact of the matter that he is not familiar with this because you are in chain of command does not mean you know the process. The navy has a method or way of processing good order and when someone steps out of line, they are punished. If he is not satisfied with the punishment, it is within his power to do whatever he wants to do. Now it sets a precedent with others that this is okay, that this behavior is acceptable, it is not acceptable to want to pose with anyone. There are people that have taken pictures with people who have been hung and murdered and lynched. It is bad politically because overseas since we are in a combative state, we are technically at war and if one of our soldiers was captured, how would we feel if they were be paraded around or having pictures with them . Keeping. Bad i find it to be abhorrent. Host james and marilyn, our line for others. Caller this is james, good morning. Let me say at the offset i find our president to be a moral vacuum. I would like to address a chance phrase a previous caller used referring to the bad guys. That is an Elementary School concept, good guys and bad guys. We are all human beings and the very christianity this administration seems to wear on its leave commands us to love our enemies. Host the president s actions involving the Navy Secretary, what did you think about that . Caller the whole thing is a mess. The man posed with a dead corpse. We should be honoring those we kill in combat. The people we die in combat are not the people who direct the war. The young men inflamed by passions and every death is regrettable and closing by a dead body shows they are not even considering the dead body as having been a person. The president has no idea how government works, so he wanders in like a bull in a china shop. Maybe a bull in a russia10 shot. Remember when he learned he had the president ial power to pardon . Then he pardoned a bunch of people and then he forgot about it, this is a publicity move. Host lets hear from felix on the line for retired military. Caller pedro, cspan, and america. Good morning. How are you on this Beautiful Day . Host fine, thanks. Caller i am a u. S. Naval trained air Traffic Controller and please allow me this little bit of levity on such a serious topic. Do you or anyone in america know the difference between a naval aviator and all the pilots in the world . Host i will say no, but i am sure you are asking rhetorically. Caller it is a mile runway, anything over 90 feet is a waste, that is landing and aircraft on a ship going 25 knots into the wind. Som a procedure not nut to speak. E draftrfumed princ dodger sitting in the white house was premature in his action. The u. S. Navy has a naval review board to review all actions. Once the actions have been reviewed, the president can intervene and either restore or uphold all of those things and to all of america, you all have a great day and a pleasant holiday. Host specifically the actions of chief gallagher, what did you think of those . Caller i worked with a lot of seals when i was in the navy. It is my understanding and i am not a seal perhaps an actual seal could call in. To be a seal, you dont get your superiors to vote you in, it is the people you work with who vote you in to see if you are good enough to be voted in and it is not limited understanding that chief gallagher was turned in by his peers. Not nobody else, it was the people with him and there are the ones who voted him in. Perhaps an actual seal could reflect more on that. Host what do you think about the removal of the naval secretary . Caller he defied orders. He has to go through chain of command. What you had said earlier this morning, perhaps he should have went to the secretary and then called them in. Host felix giving his perspective as a retired military person in north carolina. A few minutes left in this segment for you to give comment. We will hear from todd in florida, our line for others. Good morning. Caller good morning. How are you . Host i am well, thanks. Caller i know that your argument somewhat has some merit, but look at what President Trump has done for your country. He stopped gays in the military. He stopped government funding abortions. 1920 communist law, you have not hit that nail on the head. Have a host the actions of the naval secretary in this case, what do you think of those . Caller i think it is like shaking hands with syrias leader going you have a nod of nerve, mitt romney, look at my Great Health Care plan. Host we will go to keith, retired military. Caller good morning. I want to talk about the secretary of the navys actions. The military across the world are full of badges and symbols that mean something to the world. The secretary of the navy was trying to uphold the sanctity of the trident. His primaryy one of jobs, to uphold the sanctity of all the symbols and emblems related to the navy. I think he was well within his rights to due what he did. Host do you think this is a discipline issue or in this matter, it had larger impacts of discipline in the ranks . Caller i think it is a much larger issue, not really focusing on the discipline part, it is what that symbolism means. It doesnt matter if you are talking about a trident or purple heart. If somebody lies and says they earned a purple heart and it is taken away from them and the president gives it back to them, that diminishes purple hearts across the world. I think that is what happened with the trident. Host you disagreed with the president s actions in this matter . Caller i do. Host because why . What theecause president has done is diminished that trident forever and the people who look at that trident on their walls, on their desks as part of their military history, it means a little bit less today than it does yesterday. Host lets hear from another retired military person in new hampshire. Good morning. Caller good morning. How are you today . Host i am well, thanks. Caller i think that one of the things that is happening is we are confusing disciplinary action and action under the uniform code of military justice. Ith administrative action the fact of the matter is gallagher was found guilty of a charge that his actions reflected poorly and brought discredit upon the service and so the administrative actions, removing of the trident, is something that should be well respected because what we are trying to do there is demonstrate to the rest of the that what they wear on their chest means something greater than themselves. Host because you brought up the administrative side, what about the actions of the Navy Secretary . Caller the actions of the Navy Secretary i think i am theused about that because around the went chain of command, if you will, to try to avoid the president even getting involved. Those actions are wrong, but if, in fact, what he was trying to was take away the war fighter insignia, he is absolutely right, but that is not how the story is coming out. The story is he was trying to keep the president from getting involved in getting gallagher a free ride out. Host what did you think of the president s actions specifically to chief gallagher . Caller i completely disagree. Host because of what you said before or are there other aspects . Caller yeah, because he was found guilty of an infraction, which i think brings great discredit upon the uniform. The president dismissed that as a minor charge, which, compared to war crimes, probably is, but his actions are not the kind of thing i would expect we would the way weary would expect our military to behave in combat. Host one more call. This is from newport news, virginia, the line for all others. Mark, hello. Caller hello. Host you are on, go ahead. Caller i just want real quick real quick. My father ran gas stations in the 1960s through the 1970s and vietnam people came and got jobs there. Every of them i knew brought stacksacks i do mean may be 7 or 8 inches tall of nothing but vietnam a vietnamese laying there brutalized and stuff like that. If just the ones i knew brought back stacks, i would have to think there were others. This thing got out about this man, this navy seal and it is just a sham like the man earlier said to jump on this man and crush him. Host why is that . Caller what host what was wrong about the picture . He was a man that tried to kill him. It was a person that tried to kill him. Say, i think this picture taking thing, people dont have an idea of how many pictures have already been taken. Host that was the last call on that topic. We are going to take a look at farmers and bankruptcies in the farming community. Dale moore will join us next. Discussion on 2020 and the divisions within the democratic party. Those conversations are coming up on washington journal. A look at books being published this week. Immigration history area has a book on xenophobia. Collection of interviews with the president and members of his administration. Cofounders explain their investigation into President Trump and the creation of the steele dossier. Professor profile on the late democratic congresswoman and her support for feminism, and gayrights, human rights in the 1970s. Published, glenn jacobs explains how he went from a professional wrestler to the mayor of knox county tennessee. Former acting solicitor general argues thatd states removing President Trump from office is the best way to protect democracy. Chafe and explores the friendship between Thomas Jefferson and lafayette. And watchhese titles for many of the offers authors on book tv. Campaign 2020 has live coverage of upcoming events. Candidate and former Massachusetts Governor patrick will speak at the politics and exit breakfast in new hampshire. President trump holds a Campaign Rally in florida, his first since changing his residency from new york to florida. And coverage on cspan cspan2. Atch online at www. Cspan. Org listen with the free cspan radio out. App. Host good morning. Guest thank you so much for having me on. Host if you are a farmer in america, what is your debt situation like . Guest theyve got over 416 billion in debt. About 150 60 of planting, getting crops in the ground, buying equipment. Thats a lot of debt for people to deal with. Host when you look at maps of these situations, some of the hardest hit areas. Guest its one of those things, it tends to be cyclical. Everyone is hurting and algal culture. In the midwest with the trade stuff going on, soybean trade is way down because of the battle going on with china. Thingsnature is making tougher as well. Shes not been the best Business Partner this year. Host is there a common reason why this debt is happening . Demand, if i and sound like an economist, youve got to take that with a grain of salt. That sixnderstand years and the market is changing. Grain development is picking up. Prices started coming down. Then you add in trade and Mother Nature and market volatility, thats part in parcel of the process. Has been felt in corn and soybean areas. Host when it comes to gary, do things like preferences of almond milk or oat milk, is that helping . Guest its not any one particular thing. This is what is causing the problem. Its the matrix of those. It gets overused. Negativeect storm of factors hit the market. That. Ot just the numbers are really showing it in the midwest right now. Host how is the bankruptcy situation . Guest we have seen an uptick in bankruptcies this year. That is not where it was back in the 80s. Interest rates have a lot to do with that. We are looking at chapter 12 bankruptcies, which are specific to agriculture. Those are harder to track down. That return on investment is getting to the point where farmers and ranchers are having a hard time putting that together and making sure the ranch is able to go on to the next generation. If you what to give us a call and talk to our guest, if you work in agriculture, it is 202 7488000. Ll others, 202 7848001 you can also post on our twitter feed and text us. You can post on our Facebook Page at facebook. Com. Is annual net farm income 88 billion. That isbout 40 of coming from government assistance. These are trade assistant payments. It is the farm bill. There is Crop Insurance plane into that. Would you take away the government assistance, thats half of what it was six years ago. Host how much is the government given to farmers to help with that . Was 16ast year billion. This year, 14 billion. When you look at the last two bers, we will be close to billion dollars. Thats for two years. Next year started all over again. We are going to see a lot of nervous bankers out there who are holding this that. They are continuing to struggle and figure out how to make ends meet. Its a very capital intensive business to be in. Host break that down for us. What does farmers mean . Farmers, whondpop has more sway . Guest when i look at my bosses thems the country, some of have a handful of acres. A lot of their marketing is at farmers markets. Some of them are large farmers, no matter how you cut it. Husband anday be a wife. They are all working together. They are still a family business, they may be a very large family business. All of them are taking a hit. Dairy as an example. A lot of smaller terry farmers are having a tougher all of it because that capital new to keep havingration going, workforcea ready keeps the dairy up and running. Host who gets the front of the line . Is it the smaller farmer . Guest everybody gets in line at the same time. Urls will for assistance based on a number of factors. Are eligible for assistance based on a number of factors. It depends on when you find what the criteria are. If youre a 10,000 acre farmer, thats not going to determine if you get assistance. That will be what you are eligible for. They are designed to help the smaller farmer moving up the chain. 202 7488000 for those who work in agriculture. 202 7848001 for everyone else. Is it based on acres . Guest its a combination. Farm andve a 100 acre you have traditionally raised 100 acres of soybeans, when you go into sign up for the farm program or youre getting assistance or when you are buying Crop Insurance to protect your risk, it will be based on what you are producing on your farm. Its based on the crop you got. Have a formula process they go through to determine what you are eligible for. Some other factor may have an impact. Host we are talking with dale moore. Our first call comes from oklahoma. This is on our line for farmers. Go ahead. Caller i am from ohio. Host go ahead. Caller you can see how things keep going. Thepush toward having corporations, people are going bankrupt. They have the ability to take from people. They could use illegals to run the operations on the ground. Theyve got to be fought for. Farmers have got to be fought is it the suicide rate taking up on those people. That is no way for americans to be treated. Guest that is one of the programs you touched on. When people are going through this stress, we are working quickly with the national armors union. We are not always aligned on policy matters. We helping to educate and work on the neighbors in farm country and ranch country, recognizing when individuals are going through stress were they need help. Its tough in a rural area to take a Mental Health issue that you are dealing with. Its not something people like to talk about. Weve been working with the National Farmers union in a partnership to come up with ways to educate and train people who can train other people across our organizations and states to recognize those signs. All of the issues you mentioned are things that add to that stress. Oklahoma. In caller good morning. Wondering, could you explain the benefits of america carrying an 800 billion a year deficit . Naftaere the benefits of that caused america to lose 70,000 businesses and 5 million workers. How is that beneficial to farmers . What part of oklahoma are you from . I grew up west of dodge city. Im very familiar with where youre from. One of the things we look at from an agricultural standpoint, the north American Free trade agreement when it went in 25 years ago until now, weve seen agriculture exports to mexico jump to 18 billion. In canada, it is 22 billion. That agreement has been very good for agriculture. There are areas we need to work on. We hope to see some fixes when they get the new agreement done. As for the other industry sectors, when i look at what my for, those other jobs and areas fit into how they support agriculture, how they help us. We are the most productive country in the world. We are empathetic to what they are dealing with another industry sectors. Part of what we understand and what we recognize if we have a fairer trade going back and jobs thate of those may have been lost when the agreement went into effect, we will get some of those back in this new trade agreement. We will start addressing some of those issues. Usmca do fores farmers . Guest it keeps what we already have and is working well. , that has had some issues has kept us tied up in terms of dairy farmers. Its a challenge for u. S. Dairy producers to get their milk into canada. An agreement in place. Is keeping those terriers down. Forth,oming back and its very critical for farmers and ranchers. Host joann is in minnesota. Hello. Everyoneood morning out there. Happy thanksgiving. For 47 lived on the farm years and worked the farm. Timese been through hard and good times. I would like to say to those not in the farming industry, since 2015, farm income has been cut in half. Many farmers are tightening their belts so tight that they can hardly live. Farmers can only hang on for so long. The u. S. Mca needs to be passed. Its the marketing time of year. It would help a tremendous amount of farmers. When farmers have money, they spend it and it helps all of america. I would like to say to all the usmca,ians, please pass not next year. The farmers feed the world. Sometimes they cant hardly feed themselves. If you are not in the farming industry, you have no idea what its like. Host what kind of farming do you do . Caller we do grain. We do corn and soybeans. We used to have milking and cattle and hogs. We got out of that. Prices were really low. Weve been farming for 40 years. It was a good life. It was a good place to raise children. It is hard financially. Host we will let our guest respond. Guest i was going to say amen to everything you said. Much for allvery that you do. Keep the faith. I am going to keep hammering away for you. Host we talked about income for farms. Total farm debt is 416 billion. Guest farmers and ranchers over the bank. Some of it is longterm debt. Thats what it takes to buy the land. 116 billion of that is shortterm debt. To buyu have to borrow theseed, the fertilizer, equipment, all that that goes into the ground. At the end harvest and hope and pray that when the time comes the market is where you needed to be in order to breakeven. Break even. Host tracy on our line for others. You are up in minnesota. Go ahead. He talked about the 1980s and supply and demand. I wouldve been the fourthgeneration farmer in our family. Farmingfather started on a used model t pickup truck. He had a two row plow. Thats what he started on. He and his sons, one of which was my father, they grew the farm. My grandfather was the second richest person in the county. The first was the doctor. My grandfather had a 10th grade education. What caused our farm to go under and me to lose that legacy was roundup. You talk about supply and demand. About harvested crops sitting in foreign ports, becauseting on the dock the Foreign Countries didnt have the infrastructure to transport the food where it needed to go. Now, we see in southern storagea foreign ground units because we cant get rid of it. Guest comell let our in. Guest you mentioned a number of things that we have seen. Its something that we take for bented, we hope these would good bargains for what we raise, whether its a commodity or a product derived from those commodities. We have been somewhat unique on building the infrastructure in those countries to enable them to receive the product we are raising. You touched on this a little bit. In the 80s when farmers and with 20 were dealing interest on the money borrowed, that had a tremendous impact. I dont care how successful you were, those Interest Rates really hammered the mid and women who tried to make a living in agriculture. Ost this is a question how do tariffs affect selling at farmers markets . Asked a veryve interesting question. This is one where i have to admit i dont know technical details. Or purpose grower is marketing at a farmers market, its the same thing marketing once produce in the United States. Those tariffs do not apply directly. That same farmer may be dealing with the impact of tariffs if there equipment is made from steel or aluminum that comes from a country where we have a in other products technologies they are using from that country. Out howrying to figure they have an impact, not just on farming and ranching but the whole industry. Host we have a viewer from texas. How have current immigration policies affected ranchers . Is tougher to sort out. We are looking at one of the biggest challenges. I dont care what state you are in. When my boss is out in the countryside talking to our members, he hears about labor. Stablelity to get legal workforces for years. Its the biggest challenge that farmers and ranchers face. Its yearround help in our dairies and poultry operations, our swine operations. Its a big problem. We are hopeful that we can get some fixes to that. Its never an easy thing to get through. Host virginia on our line for others. Good morning. Caller good morning. I appreciate your work and what you are doing. I have a twopart question. The chineseerstand trade situation is putting pressure on the market. I was watching pbs last night. There was a documentary on the indians. What they said really hit me last night. Forward willoing not be a shortage of food or quantity of food, the problem is going to be the quality of food. ,nce been happening as you know putve got monsanto who proprietary restrictions on individual farms. A lot of your viewers may not know that. Likee got big growers tyson, a lot of are independent farmers like my grandparents are being pressure cooked into a capitalistic structure where they arent even able to own the seed they put in the ground. Now with what they are trying to cross breed in the lab, i agree with that statement. The problem wont be the quantity, the problem will be the quality of the food. Host thank you very much. Guest youve raised a lot of things in one particular outlook. Youve touched on some things. There are parts of the world where we have seen productivity in new technology and applying those technologies across different platforms, whether its organic, the latest hightech approaches. Its issues related to transportation. Boats coming the in and going around the world, the ability to get what we produce two other markets around the world. In india, you have production. He did a lot of work in india in the 60s and 70s, to help them grow food for their people. There is still that infrastructure issue. Protecting it from insects and pasts that eat up along the way. I appreciate the point you are making. That is something we hear a lot from our members across the country did country. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I was wondering, what is happening right now . Is there a financial and social movement to take the situation away, where you are pushing organic and smaller scale farms . Everyone knows farmers are so important. If we can elevate their position to a more important position, not just growing our food, being a steward to the environment in different ways since world war ii. Can you talk about that . Thank you. Guest thank you for your question and your observation. This is very important to us at the farm bureau. We look at farmers and ranchers of all sizes and in different Production Systems they may use on their operations. One of the things that is so important is the diverse city we see in marketing approaches, whether its to consumers at farmers markets or to growers delivering food to companies that carry them into the Grocery Stores or feeding programs. We need everybody in agriculture with the tools and technology they need, the scientific and of asian helps us improve our land, improved you know, just production methods to bring that efficiency while adding to not only food and fiber and feed that is necessary for all of us, but improving the environment in the process. Farmers andng that ranchers, certainly the ones that i work for, are very proud of. Whether you are a small or large former, we work very diligently to make sure everyone has a seat at the table. I guarantee you. That is one thing i learned when small townng up in a in kansas if you were not listening, it was a good way to get a good thump upside the head. It was not just coming from mom and dad. Host john. Go ahead. Caller i am not calling to be obnoxious. [laughter] i think that there needs to be self diagnosis in the mirror about greed. What the caller said about passing it on down, i disagree heartily. Landhave a small piece of that i least out. I notice some commotion amongst farmers were they have been buying land out from under each other and its all about survival and i think they have not passed it down to the community. I think that they have taken religious backings into their politics. Are putting a lot out there. What specifically do you want our guests to comment on . Caller the greed factor. Not passing it on. Host ok. Do not think you are being obnoxious. Explain without being too nerdy, but one thing, pedro and john, farmers do not get to set the price for what they produce. Cotton,thats been, fruits and vegetables, dairy cows, pigs, chickens, beef cattle, whatever it happens to be. When i sell that i have to see what the market will hang me. I dont get to say, it cost me a so i willraise this, charge one dollar . 10. I very much understand the point you are making, advice to heart, looking atate you what farmers and ranchers are doing to try to be good citizens and provide fiber and feed for this country. Host so the cost of the things giving dinner for 10, for those who are spending thanksgiving dinner for 10, for those were spending, how much does the average former make . It varies greatly. If you spend 50 you can probably bet in total about . 23 inse dollar, maybe . 21 up in a farmers pocket in some up in afashion ends farmers pocket in some form or fashion. Thats a pretty good snapshot when you look at a typical the basket, things giving dinner not being need different in that regard. Host maurice, hello, in east dublin. Caller good morning. Yes, i am a nerd myself [laughter] got to hang onto each other, brother. Caller i have very Little Something before the farmers. When reagan was elected, the United States was the largest importer of Raw Materials and the largest exporter of finished goods. In the eight years of his administration, that ratio changed completely, flipped. Here is the thing. My farmers get these issues worse than any other group of that segment and there has been no sympathy for them. Theres any number of stories and which black farmers are run off their land after the civil war, when they were able to acquire land and that land became owned by families who continued to farm on it, so in my estimation, much of what is occurring is karmic. You talk about the usmca. This is just a reformation of nafta. Have not been any issues in it that would totally rebalance the scales as relates to farming, so thats a nonstarter. They should have gotten behind tpp and the passing of it, but what these farmers, most of them do and have done is they voted for republicans who have not had in mind. Erests they have had the corporate farming interest in mind. Ok. we will have to break. I apologize for that. For, was focused on minority farming issues. Well put some things in motion and ive seen succeeding administrations from president bush to president obama have worked on that. Secretary perdue. I had a chance to walk to him. Point while made, point well taken. I appreciate you giving me a call and yanking on my suspenders here. Host thanks for your time. Guest thanks, pedro. I very much appreciate the hospitality. Host coming up, a discussion on 2020 allah takes with elie andal of the nation, later, we will talk with Grover Norquist about the impact of the republican tax cap. Tax cuts. Those conversations coming up on washington journal. The house will be in order. For 40 years, cspan has been providing america unfiltered coverage of the white house, the Supreme Court, and Public Policy nts from washington dc washington, d. C. Around the country. So you can make up your own mind. Cspan is brought you by your local cable or satellite provider. Cspan, your unfiltered view of government. The media marketplace has shifted dramatically in the last dozen years or so and the sec has failed to keep pace. We have rules that assume the media marketplace is three broadcast television stations at night and a daily newspaper that clunks on your front doorstep in the morning. As we are talking, it it is it is a vastly different landscape. Fcc commissioner brendan carr on the communicators. Cspan is life with president live with President Trump as he holds a Campaign Rally in florida, his first since changing his residence there from new york in october. Journalngton continues. Host this is elie mystal. He is a contributing editor to the nation and the executive editor of above the law. Host good morning. Guest good morning. Host tell us about what you do. The trumping about administration is pretty exciting because every day premarch something illegal happens. Host and the above the law website . Guest the court will take a huge gun case they will take a case that really should be moot. That about a new york law restricted how you can travel with guns. New york changed the law after was challenged, but the court is thinking of taking it up really to throw a fastball at any kind of gun regulation. And i say again, people who are concerned about gun reform and are not focused on the Supreme Court are just doing it all wrong because with this conservative court, no Gun Legislation will pass constitutional muster with these five conservatives. Host do you expect the other four to follow suit as far as opposition . Guest i think it will be a straight 54 decision with kavanaugh or alito riding the majority opinion. The politicshave picture new york, the former new york mayor getting into the race. What do you think . Guest i mean, are you serious . Theposter child for unconstitutional harassment of black and brown bodies is asking black and brown democrats to elect him president . Is he out of his mind . That is like the scorpion asking to becoming of the frogs. Interesting, pragmatic centrist policies, but absolutely no support in the black and brown communities for he has not done the work. He has not done the grassroots organizing. He thinks he will buy his way in and he has not answered for one of the most destructive policies toward the africanamerican and Latino American communities. Host and you take that policy in light of everything he has done as american politician as well . Guest he does not have the record of promoting black and brown issues. He does have a great record on philanthropy and gun rights. He has been very strong on guns. Nanny stateome policies which some people like in some people dont. I go back to the organizational aspect. How will you parachute in to the middle of this race having done none of the work these other candidates have an expect thats going to work out for you . This man was defending stop and frisk, not just every day of his 13 years as mayor, even after it was ruled unconstitutional. That was as early as january of this year and now he comes out with an apology oh, i was wrong . If someone can tell is serious about their apology is if they make amends for that position. Billion dollars. He can do something about the lives he destroyed. Instead he is running for president. I think that tells you what you need to know about his commitment to reversing the wrongs of that. Does it say to the rest of the field that he has decided to enter . Guest idol think it says anything about the rest of the field. I think it says something about the democratic donors. Elizabeth warren, Bernie Sanders, they have the donor class shot. They are frightened. So they are passing around maybe it will be the mayor in south bend who has never held a statewide office . May be a billionaire . May be deval patrick. He is black. Youll like him, wont you . They are passing around to be saved from the progressive wing of the party and its really interesting they thought they had their candidate. Joe budden. A has proved, as usual, to be relatively ineffective campaigner. Joe biden this is a man, who the only time he can get past iowa is when he is on his way to disneyland. That is biden doing his thing. Then theres Kamala Harris, i believe if Kamala Harris was a white male from california all this money and dont a glass people would have gone behind her. She has centrist policies. She appeals to multicultural, multiethnic demographic. She should be getting the centrist money, but shes a black woman and i think they have some issues, this particular group of donor class issues thrown their full weight behind a black woman. I do not understand why kemal is is doing better kamala not doing better with this particular group. Mr. Cancian lets throw people host leicester people into the conversation. The numbers youre watching American History tv. All weekend, every weekend on cspan 3. , 2027488000, 2027488001 facebook,n post on twitter. Our guest, elie mystal of the nation. Also contributing editor executive editor of above the law. What is you make that correlation about people not putting money towards Kamala Harris just because she is black . How do you come to that . Guest i see a completely centrist person with progressive bona fides who, for some reason, is not being supported by the people who claim thats what they want as centrist, pragmatic people, who has experience will be ready on day one. I cannot explain your people throwing their hat into Pete Buttigieg it was an untested mayor of a town that is as big as my suburban Community Just outside of new york city. I have no idea how people are throwing their money and support behind buttigieg and not harris, unless you are talking about race and gender. Like otherwise it does not add up. Host again, calls are lined up. Lets start with florida. Our is shelby on independent line. Your first up. Go ahead. Yes. R thank you for cspan, this thanksgiving week. Ar, i believe you have hit very good point. Theres an intersection, it seems that is going on in our country right now, where we have this almost schizophrenic context that people want someone that looks or perhaps really makes them feel as if somehow they are supporting their point of life view. I agree with you that i cant understand where we are late in the game, having all of these money back candidates and mr. Buttigieg is a nice young man as you stated, but the young man has no experience. They claim that president obama, former president obama, had no experience, but of course, he ,ad been a senator from chicago and south bend with the issues tohas there speaking that. But i want to speak about the context of where we are as a country. We are in an intersecting moment , the farm bureau gentleman that was just him prior, i believe speaks to the heart of this matter because farming, whereas we no longer , and theur crop food gentleman that called in, the last call, the black farmer, the platform or association gentleman who spoke to the issue where we have a group of americans who have been voting against their own interests, and now that impact has come home to roost for all of us. This has to do with education where we have this invested in education. We have not supported the hbc yous which gave us an educated lacked populists and educated talented 10th. Of which i include my myself and my husband and my young people, educated as a shins. Host we got your point, thanks. I think shelby is right. We need a broadbased coalition. The way to defeat trump, if that is what youre going for, every buddies as the democrats are is tooncerned about that, build a broadbased coalition, not just of the democratic raise, which are mainly black women and black and brown citizens, right you go build a Broad Coalition of those people plus suburban people, less farmers who have understood they have been left out of the trump whatever policies. I think what you will have to look for is a candidate who can appeal to all of those constituencies. To me, there are progressive candidates who can do that. There are centrist candidates who can do that. There are conservative candidates who can do that. Having 52 billion dollars does not do any of that. Money will not be what wins this president ial race. Virginia host virginia, robert. Democrats line. Caller thank you. I am a democrat. I have concerns about bloomberg. He did apologize for stop and frisk. I do not know whether that was sincere. But he was also in charge for the Surveillance Program in new still has not apologized about that. Im very interested and concerned about overall law the nation. Across democrats all too often deferred to Law Enforcement on these issues. The best whene is it comes to some medical enforcement reform and is that the case is that the key to getting brown voters . Host cory booker and Julian Castro have been amazing on this issue. If they read through their plans , they are really great, they really get to the heart of changing the way policing happens in this country. Right now, if you are a democrat, the price of admission is we will legalize marijuana unless you are joe biden, still thinking about that. We will end private prisons. Pay up. End cash thats the price of admission. That gets you in the door. I am talking about candidates who are talking about the force parameters for police, talking about reducing the power of prosecutors and police in this nation, looking at people who are looking at reforming the qualified community. When we are looking at people who get under the hood, i am looking at booker, castro, harris although she has other and bernie and war well not is detail oriented, i think as booker or castro, certainly seem to have the overall sense of, like, the massive amount of change needs to happen to address the leasing in this country. The idea theret is a progressive push this time around in their concerns about that progressive push from some democrats . There is. The energy and the focus in the passion of the party is with the base on the left. That is just true, right gecko if you have more centrist and pragmatic policies, it does not mean that you cant be competitive or when this nomination. You have to show how you are you want to say pragmatic, but i dont think thats the right framing you have to show how you will help people like me, progressives with my concerns, who what massive, serious, structural change. The breakdown in this election for the democratic side of the group of people who believe randoms an aberration, a comic into the middle and once we get rid of him we go back to normal versus people who understand trump is a symptom, that trump could not exist without systemic problems that need to be addressed. That once you take trouble way you still have the systemic problems in this trump a way you saw systemic problems in this country. That is what you say you say. People who want systemic change and people who want to go back to normal. Host alabama. You are on, go ahead. Caller hello. He talks about black and brown voters on here, but im doing some figuring out there, the blacks in the browns, they are only 30 of the population, so i dont understand what they think everything they say is going to matter in our election. I dont believe that. And another point is, donald trump will be reelected again. I mean, the democrats have gone so far to the left there is no way possible for them to come back. There is eight people in my family only that never voted before that registered to vote in the 2016 election. People got tired. In therehy obama was to terms. When he got reelected the second time, everybody went and registered and they said, not happening no more. Guest was it because obama was black . No, because of his policies. Hillary clinton wouldve been president if she would have got away from some of obamas policies. Guest like obamacare . Caller i think your first woman president is going to be nikki haley. Guest would you vote for Michael Bloomberg or joe biden . Caller nope. Guest that becomes the point, right you echo there are people in this primary who think they are running, basically arguing they can to ms. Bruce, who registered to vote because obama got elect did, right . That bruce guy is not voting for mike bloomberg. Hes not voting for joe biden. He is going to vote for trump, right . The way to defeat bruce and alabama is not convincing bruce to come back to the fold. It is convincing other people in alabama, particularly black and brown people in alabama, of blackthere are a lot people do tend to live close to where they were formally enslaved. There were a lot of black people in sec country, right . The wafer to the bristles of the world is organizedck voters and registered and we have to look at candidates who will do that as opposed to candidates who will spend dollars and blood and treasure trying to convince bruce. Among the field of democratic candidates, you listed several. He was your favorite . As it stands now . Bumperi have many stickers in my house. I tend to like the progressive policies. I tend to like the people who can build multiracial, multiethnic coalitions. I tend to like competency. To bes generally going hard for me to vote command because i think that one of the things that we have seen over the last few years is it seems womens time to lead. They are activated. They are organized. They are running in so many different fields, they are winning in so many different areas of our country like i am most likely going to vote for one of the women, but which one of the women . That is all up for grabs. Host alabama. Joining us with our guest, elie mystal of the nation. And the website above the law. Go ahead. Caller good morning. You are one of my favorites, elie. I am so glad i got on here. I watch you on george, im dave agoura. I love, love, love you. I want to say this. ,ust like the other alabamian and irom alabama also, would raise you 12, 15, 20 on my family members who registered to vote to get donald trump out of office. He is an abomination. And we have people that are still going along with this man that is a pathological liar. He is doing everything against lawica and on the military of donald trump, you know what yet that we have got to wake up. And im good to speak to my young black people. Do you know these judges that donald trump and Mitch Mcconnell is putting in office right now . That have a lifetime career on the bench . You all best wake up, black people. Everybodys say, oh, joe has got all of the black roads no, he dont. No, he dont. Do not know what is wrong la and klobuchar. Wake up, america. We will be stuck with this pathological liar in the white house. Guest i love gwyn. Point. Kes a good donald trump has already reformed the courts. The Circuit Court judges, one fourth have been appointed by donald trump. These people have lifetime appointments. They are archconservatives, and any policy you think is important climate change, gun reform, womens rights, health care any policy you think is important will be stymied by these judges for the rest of our natural lives if trump is able to get a second term of packing the courts and i have not even talked about the Supreme Court Stephen Breyer is over 80, ginsburg is 86. If trump gets another appointment on the Supreme Court, we are done. What about picking someone because of their policies . Is feelingow there like, there are people who are better at being trump versus people who are more progressive or more i think the best way to beat donald trump is to inspire the base. Those are one in the same. If you want to tell me that their candidates who are more appealing to moderates and that,ndents, i understand but you have to show me that those candidates who were appealing to moderates and independents can get the base motivated to walk through walls like obama had them motivated to walk through walls. People forget. When we talk about, for instance, white males in this country, the democrat has not won the white male vote in america since the 1964 per one happened to 19 624 . The civil rights act. Thats to me carter did not win white men Michael Dukakis did not win white men. Whoever is next time will not win white men. When you understand that, the only way to defeat that is to motivate the base of nonwhite women and men. The only way to do that is to motivate those people to the point where they are in a frenzy and they are willing. They are willing to stand in line and to the stuff it takes to get registered. They are willing to go through everything they have to go through and if you can tell me they are going to do that, we can talk about appealing to moderates. Host from wisconsin, we will hear from liz, republican line. There has been a of discussion about reparations in some of the past debates and i know im a person concerned about the deficit. How would you recommend people do reparations individually so we do not have to add to the federal budget for reparations and maybe bring people of color and others together in understanding . Guest you are concerned about the deficit but you are a republican . Caller mhm. Guest all of trumps tax cuts that have exploded the deficit to unseen levels, you are not worried about that . Caller i am worried about the deficit because as a republican, that has been longstanding for many years. Im not saying trump has honored that partisan republican platform. Host can i ask a question . His reparations something that you would go along with . Caller it is something i did. I was challenged by someone on a train when i was going out to see my son for basic training and we talked about what we were and we talked about reparations and such, and we looked at how well or not well the civil rights laws had influenced what was happening in america in terms of the quality and we came up with the idea of individual reparations and we both decided we would start an act of that. I went and got two dollar bills and got two dollar bills in started approaching people of color and telling them my apologies for any way i consciously or not consciously added to any problems with differences between the classes of people both black and white, and i signed that and handed it over. And it made for a lot of interesting conversations. Guest ok. So, if we are going to do reparations correctly, its going to be a lot more than two dollars and i think one of the ways that reparations are starting to gain steam is that we are starting to really study how to make reparations work. There is a bill in congress that keeps getting past, but mcconnell will not pass and trump will not sign, that is not about the actual cash payment, it is about studying what is the best way to make it happen. Maybe it is a cash payment, although i doubt it. Dont give me two dollars on the street because that would be insulting to me. I won 50. I want 50. Before we talk about the actual cash remissions, we need to talk about it direct payment is the way to do it, Educational Opportunities or whatever. I am happy to live in a world where reparations are taken seriously, they are no longer a joke or a thing that is for anor, i think that is amazing change that i didnt think was going to happen in my lifetime. But i think we still need to be in the study and planning phase to figure out how best to make this not just an apology, but a remittance for lost wages. That is a longterm project. Hopefully we are at the start of it. Host impeachment, how do you think it galvanizes the upcoming election . . The first problem that you have is that trump clearly did what he was accused of. He clearly solicited a bribe ukraine, in exchange for an investigation of his political rivals. He admitted to it on a phone call. 9, 12 witnesses all of unmatched credibility testified to it during the public impeachment trial. Ok, lets start there. Apparently, the republicans are planning to not care about the fact that trump did this. I dont know how they can sleep with themselves, i dont know how they look in the mirror and understand what this country is about, understand what this president has done, and do nothing. That is on their souls. But they are apparently willing to make that deal. As we go forward into the election cycle, two things will be at play. One, they will be democrats who promised me that if they are elected, they will pursue trump to the ends of the earth because you cannot get away with illegality that goes unaccountable. There are democrats who are going to promise me that. Then there are going to be are going to say im not here to talk about the past. Democrats trying to heal our wounds Going Forward by ignoring what happened in the prior administration. The country in general will have to make a choice about which way we want to go. You wrote a piece saying on the republican side of the senate, there are four classes of republicans. How do you appeal to those in an effort to get them to vote against the president . Guest i still think that there is a way to cap the 20 year. Here is the thing. There are 23 republicans who have to run for reelection in 2020. Not all of them are going to vote for impeachment. Lindsey graham is running for reelection. Mitch mcconnell, and so on. 23, 10 of them are in states where trumps Approval Rating is already at or underwater. His Approval Rating keeps going down. If it keeps going down, its going to be very hard for some of them to vote for trump and hang onto their jobs. They think they are voting for a quick trump as a life raft. If it starts to look like an anchor, you might slip. Then theres another class who claim to have a conscience. I tend to think that people like marco rubio are desperate hypocrites. They have shown themselves to be craven, we can hypocrites rep. Trott administration. But they claim to have a conscience and if they have any shred of dignity, any shred of confidence, they will see the obvious criminality that has been set forward by the public trials. Give me a quartet of those. Give me mitt romney. Give me michael lee. Towards 18,getting 19 senators. Who is going to be the last senator . Who is going to be the one to save trump . Me pat toomey going to say no, i will be the one to save trump . To 20. Et it is hard and unlikely, i understand that. But i think for democrats to be defeatist about it or act like there is no chance, and the Senate Leadership to throw their hands up and act like the republicans cannot be given something, cannot be dealt with, i refuse to the that fatalistic about it because the crimes are so obvious. Rita ints hear from new jersey, democrats line. Caller good morning. Im a first time caller, im very nervous. Guest dont worry, i dont bite. All, i wantedof to address Michael Bloomberg. We are so happy he is in the race. We love Michael Bloomberg. We were hoping that Michael Bloomberg got in at the beginning, he didnt. Never too late. My family is very conservative africanamerican family, and we dont like any of the candidates currently running. Joe biden in our opinion, what we love and respect is only going to serve one term if he wins. We want someone who can do the eight terms. As far as the comment you made frisk, i amnd personally offended by that as an africanamerican. Bloombergll, michael is not responsible let me say this first. Stop and frisk was not designed to target africanamericans. It was targeted to fight against crime and gun violence in the city. And we definitely needed that in jersey. Host i will cause you there. The court said that it was targeted at africanamericans, thats white was ruled unconstitutional. I think that the caller makes a point that is worth making. There are a lot of older black democrats who supported some of these horrible policies of the past. Joe biden, the author of the 1994 crime bill, that was supported by lots of africanamericans. There is a generation of africanamericans who are consistently worried about violence in their communities, consistently told that these kind of strong, broken windows would deal with crime in their communities, and so they supported those policies. But the statistics are in. Those policies did not help. Stop and frisk did not help reduce the crime rates. Once you take away stop and frisk, the crime rate continues to go down. The stats on whether or not these crime levels, over aggressive policing policies actually works are in, and they did not. Some people will believe what they are going to believe, you cant convince everybody. In general, we have seen that these kinds of policies do significant damage to the africanamerican and latino communities, far more damage than they could possibly argue to make up for on the reduction in crimes. Message that the the democratic field should be delivering to the independent who is currently not sure . Guest is this guy crazy . I think the main message when you get to a real independent voter is that trump puts people in cages, he is a lawless criminal. And if somehow you want to vote for that because maybe you will get a tax cut, you are just a bad person. Host george is in new jersey on our independent line. Caller good morning. Glad to see freehold represented. Abouted to ask the guest the dangers of the opera see in our government theocracy in our government. Currently, we have quite it it of representatives, senators, Supreme Court members who are members of christian evangels evangelicals. They are the ends justify the means kind of approach to their actions. They choose to support the president regardless of what their religious prerogatives indicate. Im wondering if you would agree with me that we are moving dangerously close to a deoxy in this country to a theocracy in this country and it serves us no benefit. Certainly we have been a theocracy at different points in our history. Now more than ever, we seem to be dominated by radicals within the Christian Community and im wondering if you would agree that this is a dangerous trend. Guest i dont know that i agree we are moving toward theocracy any more quickly than usual. I think what has happened is that the hypocrisy of the community has been laid bare. They are not in it for the christianity, they are in it for the power and for the supremacy. I personally have always believed that, but now i dont have to wonder or argue that point anymore because the consistent hypocrisy of the religious right by putting this thrice married on religious, unspiritual man has been laid so obvious. Why they still support him is because he delivers policies they want. It is as simple as that. Whatight evangelicals things, trump delivers those things. They want to suppress a gay rights and womens rights. Trump delivers those suppressions. That is why they are in. That, you dont have to combat trump on being holier than thou, because clearly the right no longer cares about the map. You have to inspire other people, perhaps true questions true christians, people of faith all around, to rise up against these policies that we see daily from the white house. If you do that, you break the over what itight means to be spiritual in this country. Host lets hear from another independent from west point, texas. Caller good morning, america, and thank you, cspan. Full disclosure, i am a white guy and i live in texas, so that puts me on the outs with your guest, i dont belong in one of his favorite classes, brown or black. I thought this was going to be about the law and i was sorry i misinterpreted that. I didnt know it was going to be a sermon on how to get rid of President Trump. At any rate, let me ask your guest one thing. You are talking about the stop you have the percentage of decrease in crime while this was in effect . When crime decreased more it was not in effect and even if it did work, it was unconstitutional, so we need to find a constitutional way to decrease crime. Well. Host do you have a followup . Caller no, i just was curious about that. Thank you so much for having this open to people like myself who can call in and express our opinions even though they differ from your guest most of the time. Whenh i could have got in you were talking to the farmer guy because being a rancher in texas, we face a lot of problems with the hogs, i dont know what the government was ever going to do. Apologize, i have to cut you short because this is the last segment. Guest it is interesting how victimized the white male can feel in this country. We are talking out a government dominated by white people up and down. The executive white man, the congress run by the white people. The Supreme Court and all of her circuits. The police. All these aspects and institutions of control run by white people. Feels likey in texas this guy doesnt like me. What is that . One of the things that trump has played perfectly is the sense of self victimization. By a Certain Group of white males in this country. He has played that perfectly. Post one more call, ricky in michigan. Caller hello, how are you doing this morning . , wanted to talk to you about you know, ive been watching trump ever since he has been listeningd ive been to people, i have friends that voted for trump. , they lookeyve done at the computer, the believe everything that was put out about hillary clinton, and these people look at this stuff and they know it is fake, and they still believe it. I cant believe the Republican Party. The Republican Party has been hijacked by putin. The oneted to say that who took over our election. Host thank you. Mark zuckerberg is having secret meetings with the trump people. I social Media Companies seem to be in the tank if not directly for trump and republicans, and certainly for the kinds of fake stories that embolden and empower trump. That is a huge problem. Hopefully, the democrats will get elected, regulate these Companies Like a public utility that they are, and we will start to see some changes. Host because you follow the Supreme Court, your thoughts on chief Justice John Roberts being part of the impeachment process . Guest that will be interesting. John roberts is a republican through and through, but he is a republican who cares about institutions. John roberts wants to bend the law as far toward the republican goals as possible without the lawbreaking. Which makes him different than the other conservatives who dont care about the lawbreaking. I do not think that john roberts wants to go down as the guy who let trump off the hook, nor does he want to go down at the guy who put the knife in trumps back. He will go straight up the middle, follow the rules as defined by the senate, and follow that closely. If trump people try to pull some shenanigans, even after they set the rules, i dont think he would let them get away with it. I think he will be a beautiful Public Servant and the upcoming impeachment. A contributing writer, you can find his work online. He is also the executive editor of the above the law website. Thank you for your time this morning. Guest thank you. Host coming up, we will talk about the republican tax cuts and their effects. That conversation coming up on washington journal. Announcer here is a look at some books being published this week. In america for americans, director of the university of minnesota Immigration History Research Center provides a history of xenophobia in the United States. Inside Trump White House offers a collection of interviews about the president and members of his administration. Progress, cofounders explain their investigation into trump and the creation of the steele dossier. And university of houston profiling professor, the late congresswoman and her support for feminism, gay rights, and human rights in the 1970s. Week,eing published this glenn jacobs explains how he went from a professional wrestler to the mayor of tennessee. Former acting solicitor general argues thatd states removing President Trump from office is the best way to protect democracy. And in revolutionary brothers, tom explores the friendship between Thomas Jefferson and lafayette. Look for these titles in bookstores this coming week and watch for many of the authors in the near you to on book tv on cspan 2. The house will be in order. Announcer cspan has been providing america unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the Supreme Court, and Public Policy events from washington, d. C. And around the country, so you can make up your own mind. Cspan is 1979, brought to you by local cable or satellite provider. Cspan your unfiltered view of government. Washington journal continues. Gordon is, he serves as the president of americans for tax reform. We hear a lot of debate about the impact of the 2017 tax cuts. What would you say about their effectiveness . Guest several things. What it did to economic growth, gdp, and it has gotten stronger. Wage growth is up. The last 15 months, about 20 . And that is particularly in the Median Income people, middle income folks the federal wages. We are also seeing 7 million job openings with less than 7 Million People looking. More people are leaving their jobs, which is a good sign. You want people to leave jobs they are not happy with that are not going somewhere, and they are finding jobs. And the total workforce, the number of people looking for work, under obama, that actually declined. One of the reasons unemployment went down is people were so discouraged they quit looking, they did not go to work, they stayed in school, they stayed home. They were not working. That was declining during recovery. It was just the weakest recovery in modern history. We never had a recovery like that. But worse, people were leaving the workforce. During recovery. Growth, he blocked entering the workforce. Every once in a while, you see lots of people get jobs, but the unemployment number doesnt move because as many people start looking for work and that is a good sign. People wanting to work and finding work, more people being able to choose their jobs. Voluntary. Not getting fired. Voluntary departures are up. Wages are up. Companies outring of the country. During the obama years and before, we had a worldwide tax system. For member what we said to people, we said your Company Earns money in france, you will pay taxes in france. If you ever bring money to america, we will tax you again. We were one of the only countries that did what we did, which was to double tax American Business earnings overseas, and so trillions of dollars was stuck overseas, not brought back to america. Is there a number of countries coming back to america specifically because of tax cuts . Guest step one, we stop the thousands of Companies Going out the door. You member during the obama years, burger king was bought by a canadian, Brazilian Company because the same burgers, same people, same everything except owned by somebody not the United States. It was worth more because of our tax policy. Our government did that to our businesses. So all of those things have shifted. All of those things suggest real, positive trend. The only challenge we have right now is the tax fight we have with china. At that gets settled, we will see Even Stronger growth. Host do you think there will be actual settlement . Guest just before you come to a deal, im not quite sure what to make it. It appears as if they are going to get certain things agreed to, china keeps changing their mind on what those are. And they will stop the increase on tariffs and begin to bring them back. That is the signal that the markets and businesses need to know. You need to know whether certain tariffs, what do i do . I dont know. It is a political decision rather than a marketing one. Host we hear from democrats on this program quite frequently that the deficit america will see has a direct correlation for the tax cuts from. 17. What do you think about that . First, they said it was only for rich people. And then they had to deal with the fact that on april 15, 2018, just a few months after the bill passed, the average, the median ,ncome for a family of four that family got a 2000 tax cut. The median single mom with one 1300, got a 1300 tax cut. These are tax cut on middle income americans. The tax rate went down, the total taxes went down. And so, the argument that it was all for the rich is what democrats say about any tax cut and then they turn around and use taxes for four people. A carbon tax on lower income people, a much better part is a cost of living. Shift to the deficit. Actually, revenue is coming in about what it was before and if you understand what did you project, about 80 of what they thought they lose has been coming in. What we did do, the democrats insisted on a massive spending increase. They were not going to give the president his defense budget. Spending is the projected increase in the deficit. Host the budget control act of 2018 . Guest each time they have done that, as soon as democrats had control of the house as well, that gives them a lot of control. For member, a public have a house and a fourth a lot of spending at of the present. Up to a trillion dollars worth. The democrats are using that to increase spending. Spending is too high. That is causing increases. What is helping us that the economic growth, more people working, bringing in more money. Have republicans changed generally when it comes to spending issues . Has that changed . Guest what the Republican Party is based on is reducing the size of the government which is what you have to do if you want to form government cost less. Right now it is bankrupting the country with the Entitlement Programs the congress doesnt vote on. The problem is not this congress, it is congress from to 19361966 and 1934 that created half of the spending budget through their Entitlement Programs. The democrats when they get into power add to the unfunded viability by creating obamacare or medicare for all. Every democrat once new entitlements. Not any of them want to perform any of the entitlements. There is a major difference on spending but until you have the votes in the senate, it is tough to reform Something Like entitlement. Host here is how you can ask questions. 202 7488000 for democrats. 202 7488001 for republicans. An independents, 202 7488002. At 202 ext us 7488003. Analysis on your side, the republican control of Congress Versus democraticcontrolled with spending issues. What is the chart me . Guest what the chart shows is that the top and bottom half and where you see the blue, above and below you have a democrat house and senate. Line, thet yellow yellow line is the first year where 95 of republicans in the house and senate fund the Taxpayer Protection pledge never to raise taxes and rejecting the bush tax increase. Before that, the republicans had control of old houses of congress for four of 62 years. You had democrats overwhelming control for 62 years minus water. Since the Republican Party , and wontparty raise taxes, and hasnt, they have wo the majority of the house and the senaten two thirds of the time. And so, the two parties have separated out and the Republican Party is an infinitely stronger localat the state and levels, but particularly at the National Level by being the party that will not raise taxes. They invade small countries they can pronounce. Host democrat line, you are on, go ahead. Caller good morning. You followed me for a on twitter, and i followed you. Heightened very conversations. My first question, i actually have three questions are my first question is what will that cost the government . What is that what pays for the cost of government . If taxes pay for the cost of government, that means you were law about not raising taxes, that means that government will be paid for. My second question, where is the 4 trillion that was repatriated . Im pretty sure that it was done already, so if the money is back here in america and if that is the case, then where is the money . Pledge tomake a reduce the deficit, but what he did was increase the deficit. Host thanks. Guest two things. One of the reasons i like the Taxpayer Protection act is that people can make a pledge not to vote to raise taxes. That doesnt mean taxes will be raised if you get outvoted. The democrats have raised taxes in the first two years of the clinton presidency, and every republican voted against those. Then they raised taxes again starting on poor people in the obama years and raise taxes in the first two years when republicans voted against that. But when the republicans got control of the house and the senate, they were able to stop any tax increase on middle income people and everybody as long as the republicans had control of the house or the senate and often, they had both. The president is put in a very difficult position where the democrats in the house have said you have to take all this additional spending, which is where the added deficit comes from, or we wont give you a defense budget. Just as obama was in a position where the republicans said unless you reduce spending over the next decade by 2 trillion, we wont give you the debt ceiling increase that he wanted. And the president had to capitulate. Obama dropped spending dramatically for what his budget had like 2 trillion over a decade, and that was extremely but he didnt want to do that. Just as trump would prefer not to increase spending. Blame people for things they do and any republican that votes for a tax increase should be blaming a democrat. But if you are in congress and you vote against something that passes, thats not your fault. Host virginia, independent line. Caller good morning, gentlemen. I appreciate your take on things. When you are talking about responsibility of people acting professional and doing the right thing, how about the idea of shutting down government . 2013ing down government in had a 20 billion impact on the economy. Do you hold republicans responsible, anyone responsible if they cant even run a budget . Cant program a budget and cannot operate the government without having to go to the extreme of shutting it down . You of course remember when we had the budget shutdown, many budget shutdowns during the reagen years because the house and senate couldnt agree. It didnt really affect anything. You had the more significant shutdown with the republicans in the house and senate when they won both house and senate against clinton and they pass a budget and clinton said i dont want to reform welfare. So he shut the government down. The republicans passed a budget, or the president who vetoed that budget . Hadsame thing when we arguments with obama when he said i wont sign a budget, i wont an act a budget at the republicans put or were put forward. Sometimes it comes true that you have a shutdown. The republicans have a very good piece of legislation. Smaller to avoid the many shutdowns that weve had over the years, lets just say if we cant agree, we go to last years budget. I think thats a great idea, everybody has a job and gets paid. And then you wouldnt have a shutdown. Host so the use of shortterm crs as a tool, what do you think about that . December 21 or so . Guest that is the current shutdown. While they are negotiating, they do that sort of thing. Perhaps they would rather have the crisis further away from the election, people can make correct or in collect political choices on that. I do like that the republicans have said if we cant agree, just go to last years budget so the government does not shutdown. You would not have to have shortterm crs. Host mike from twitter is asking which title i programs would you say are bankrupting our country . Guest there are a couple of things. What we could do is take the welfare programs where you get money because you are you, not because of social security, you put money in and it is supposed to be saved for you to take care of you when you are older. Tofare means tested programs the states and each state would get what they got last year and it would grow with inflation but not more. That is exactly what bill clinton signed, republicans three times past that reform for aid to families with dependent children. First Entitlement Program that had a serious reform. That went to the states and the states were able to take care of people who need it. A lot of people did not need to so there was a decline in the number of people on welfare. Happened was to states were able to focus on people who actually needed to do that with medicaid and obamacare and a number of the other programs, but the 50 states find out what works. We do know is that what we have right now doesnt work very well. That the different approaches, we will find out better ways. Host republican in florida, susan. Caller i think that the democrats are going to cheat big , so i think the stock market is going to plummet. I wanted to ask, what are some of the things we could do . Host i will end it because you are getting in and out. Guest your concern is the stock market may go down . I think a couple of things. If you see an agreement which freezes the tariffs so they dont go up and hopefully they come down with china, i think you should feel very confident about the stock market. You see every time there is progress on the agreement with china, the stock market jumps. ,t is just trying to be better it is really offending the idea of getting stability. Hopefully china stops dealing with intellectual property and trading her goods and services a little more fairly than they do. We are looking to get some improvement. I think the stock market is going to do well. The one thing that could damage the stock market is if people think that the democrats are going to win the house and the president the, take a look at the democrat proposals. Every single one of them will make your 401 k smaller. 401 k ,t to tax your they want lawyers to sue the 401 k to invest. They want more regulations on your 401 k . They want to raise the price of energy on all the companies your if i had to say what the next election is going to be about, the republicans have another tax bill coming out in addition to the one thats out, and that will be the one that they campaign on. Democrats are not going to help pass it, they want to go in the other direction. Middle incomeon americans making their savings more secure. 100 million americans have 401 k s as a savings. Havellion americans individual retirement accounts. That is a good chunk of the American People. If everything that elizabeth anyen or Bernie Sanders for of the democrats running would do like raising the corporate rates for all the other taxes, step one of them, they first on the face of your 401 k . They damage your life savings. Your life savings is going to be damaged because they say they are throwing punches of the company but your life savings you invested gets damaged with those taxes, regulations, and antienergy proposals and legislation and regulation. If the republicans hold the senate, the presidency, invest heavily. If they hold the senate and the presidency, stay in the market, but it will not be as exciting as if they get the house to make those changes that will strengthen investments in 401 k . Host Elizabeth Warren at the debate the other night talked about her idea of a well tax and what it would do for all americans, not just a certain sector. A wealth tax is not about punishing anyone, its about saying you build something great in this country, good for you, but you did it using workers all that we pay to educate. Using roads and bridges that all of us pay for. You did it protected by police and firefighters that all of us pay the salaries for. So when you make it big, when you make it really big, and you make the top 1 10 of 1 , pick in two cents so everybody else get a chance to make it. Here is the thing. That is something the democrats care about, independence care about, and republicans care about. Because regardless of party affiliation, people understand across this country that our government is working better and better for the billionaires and the rich and the wellconnected and worse and worse for everyone else. We come together when we acknowledge that. It is interesting that she wants to talk about a wealth tax. I understand that is inflation, and that is saying look over here and tax the rich. But if you look at her proposal, it includes a 6 wage tax, income tax, 6 on all workers in order to pay for part of her medicare for everybody. She has dramatic tax increases on middle income americans. Countries would love taxes. Almost all of them. Them got rid of the wealth taxes because they dont raise the kind of money she is talking about. Difficult, but one thing to keep in mind is when people talk about raising taxes theye rich as she does, have to finish the sentence. The sentence goes on going to finish raise taxes on the rich first. She wants a wealth tax which is not mentioned in the constitution. Its not constitutional. When we have income tax, they have to put into because constitution, you may have an income tax. You would have to amend the constitution to get a wealth tax, or you could have an income tax and call it a wealth tax which is what they probably would do. The top tax bracket when they put the income tax in was 7 . She says its only 2 . Top tax bracket now, about 37 . Make 11 million. 11 million in todays money. To be in the top bracket when they put the income tax in. Now its about 450,000 for the top bracket. She is only going to tax the rich. And that number would come down each year just as a value added tax in europe goes up every year. We saw that with the alternative minimum tax which was designated to hit about 50 people. Less than 200 people were not paying their fair share. A tax that ultimately millions until the republicans changed it. It was scheduled to hit 20 Million People and 30 Million People. A tax on 200 people was a lot further, it became a tax on tens of millions. And we go through this again and again. Hittax is only supposed to people and it came down and started hitting poor people. Each time we do this, politicians love to have trouble down taxation. We tax the rich and we get everybody and help fund the spanishamerican war tax. Phones, usen longdistance. That goes of 5,000. Tax on rich people, that tax less than 100 years and it was a tax on everybody. Her tax the rich will soon be a tax on everyone and she has already told us for her medicare for everybody that she has got a 6 wage tax. Look at europe. She wants to say we should have things like europe. Taxationited states, on middle income people, we dont tax the rich people, that is not what is different. In the United States, middle income families, a family of work pays 11. 7 of their income also Security Wage taxes. You go to france, its 21 . Belgian, 28. Sweden, 25. Denmark, 31. This is not higher taxes on rich people, this is higher taxes on the median emily in the country and then add to that all the programs that she likes with the value added tax. The average sales tax, 7 . Europe, 20 value added. 21 for denmark. The country she points to wax the middle class terribly hard. Much higher taxes than we do. The difference between us and europe is how heavily they tax the middle class to pay for all the programs that she is going to do the same thing to the middle class but she is pretending that somebody else is going to pay for it. If the europeans could have done this, dont you think the european leftwing parties would have gotten all doing this . They didnt, they couldnt, and she cant, either. Host carolyn, democrats line. You are next. Caller i just have a couple of questions. First of all, you talk about taxes. I think its very confusing. Most people in america if you let theout it, democrats explain their own policy, not you. We all know that republicans, they dont tell the truth. Guest the numbers i was just quoting is from all the European Countries together. These are not my numbers, these are theirs. You will have to deal with reality, sorry. Caller here is the reality. About one, do not talk what the republicans are doing because trumps policy and terms of increased rates, 22 states. The number one employer is walmart. No policy degrees walmarts one dollar increase. Lets give trump a boost. Lets increase the wage by one dollar. 22 states, walmart is the biggest employer. They increase their minimum wage by one dollar. That is a fact. Guest one dollar per hour . Caller number two. We areama was president , not going to stimulate the economy. The stimulus that we got in the midst of a recession was less than trumps tax cuts. If the republicans had allowed us to manage democrats while we were in charge, we would have stimulated the economy just like you did. One, there was an effort at massive spending increases by the president and massive tax increases by obama. That was in the first two years of his presidency. People reacted so poorly that he lost control of the house and the senate because the American People rejected his big tax, big spending, High Energy Cost approach. When you challenge is ask what people are going to do, that is where the Taxpayer Protection pledge is so helpful to the American People that they will never raise taxes. Obama was very angry that the republicans promised they would not raise taxes and he could not talk them into it. But if you remember, joe biden saying the same thing president did. Inning for president back 2008, no one making less than two and 50,000 under Barack Obamas plan will see one single penny of their tax raised, whether it is their Capital Gains tax, their income tax, their investment tax, any tax. There were a whole series of tax increases that directly hit lowincome people. The efforts to raise energy taxes as well. These things all hit average americans. They promised that they wont taxes the middle income, but clinton did the same thing. Turn around and raised gasoline taxes. Raise taxes on everybody except the top 1 or 2 . Clinton,a and democrats all voted for it as well. They raise taxes on lower people even of a promised they would. And so i think its very important for the summary says they are going to tax the rich that they have a track record. They tax everyone. And everybody running for president on the democratic side. The carbon tax is a gasoline tax on not just the oil used for your car, what your Home Heating Oil and your airconditioning and your electricity, all energy usage. Its mostly lower income people. They can afford it. Your average people, that is a massive tax increase. I do think you should look at what the democrats do and judge what they say based on what theyve done before. Theyve told us they want tax the middle class, and they do. Host florida, independent line. Caller yeah, here is my situation. Its like we are on a merrygoround. First and foremost, my problem with republicans is when they are not in office or in power, they are crying deficit. Then when they are in power, the deficit goes right out the window. Thats my first issue. My second issue is the numbers , i dont know where you are getting that. Guest department of labor. Simply because of this, are they taking consideration the number of people that are dropping out of the workforce in comparison to the people who are in the workforce . Thereld be a point that are not more jobs, there are more jobs than workers. Because we are dealing with a baby boom generation that is retiring, taking early social security. Im kind of in the sweet spot. And im getting 100 or so job offers per day. For all of the people that are retiring that are 50 to 65. But then theres nobody taking my place. So, that goes to that. Host thanks. Guest very good point. I actually interested earlier in the show and the good news is that both discouraged workers under the republican tax cut and trumps presidency, discouraged workers are coming back into the workforce that there are so many jobs, and that is one of the healthy things. That duringe right the obama years, people were leaving the workforce and unfortunately, the overall job Participation Rate was declining. Now it is expanding. We not only have more jobs, but more people in the market looking for it. Thing, they are looking at a massive tax that nancy pelosi is putting forward and they actually passed in the house. When we talk about what the democrats are going to do to lowincome people, if you are trying to buy health care, they want to use up to 75 of tax on drugs. This is a rather dangerous project. They say they want to do it to tell them to lower their prices, but once they get those taxes in, they are not going to go away. With the reagan tax cuts that made america a detonation, those tax cuts passed over the years were bought and paid for. Guest theres two things. One, spending increased dramatically. Did,military spending which was actually one of the few projects every day. As soon as the soviet union fell apart, they brought it back again. They stick with it. We actually brought spending down after the cold war at that time. I would take a look at both the growth of the economy in the reagan years, and look at the debt compared to the wealth. Was there too much spending . Absolutely. In 1982, the president agreed to a tax increase. Three dollars of spending restraint for every dollar of tax increase. Never delivered the spending cuts. Spending was too much. The democrats had the house the entire time, and you could fight that but there is only so much you can do if one of the bodies is held by the democrats, they can for spending in order to keep the government open. Host from illinois, democrat line, joe is next. Caller i just wanted to mention about the tax cuts, affecting a general level of income. I am a senior citizen. I have a mortgage deduction. It has affected what i used to pay taxes. Guest several things. Overall, every state got about a 25 cut in taxes that their citizens were paying. It was a broad tax cut. I mentioned earlier, the average income family of four got about a 2000 dollars tax cut going into the future. A single parent, one child earning less is a 1300 tax cut each year. And there were some numbers that came out, great wall street journal article a number of months ago. Average wage earner income went up by about 4000 during the trump presidency. , 16ng the obama and bush years. That number when up by thousands. 4000 in the two years to three years that weve had with the tax cut, the deregulation under President Trump. Could it be stronger if we had more spending . Absolutely. I am not suggesting spending restraint is not key, it is central. We need to reform entitlements, we need to reform government to cost less. But what we could do on some of these issues, is to begin to deregulate, begin to reduce the tax burden. We have a lot to do. Host from athens, tennessee, republican line. Richard, hello. Caller a real quick question. We have about a 22 trillion debt. What is our magic number where that is the edge of the cliff where we cannot go past . Guest oh dear, dont tell the politicians but there is not necessarily an edge of the cliff. Japan status, 200 gdp. They are doing ok but they keep raising taxes to pay it. They took their last 5 of the 10 the last five years. They have a declining population and an aging population, so they have challenges that we dont have. Americans have more children, we have poor immigrants, we are not in the position that china is in the next 25 years losing 250 Million People between the ages of zero to 55. That 250 Million People over the age of 55 instead of under the age of 55 and the under 55 population is declining. It is not just that they are moving up, china has tremendous challenges. We had minor challenges compared to that but we do need to reform the entitlements and total spending. And witty growth. You get growth, you get more revenue and more opportunities, more people working, less people on welfare getting government support. All of those things together are very important. Plus regulation, lower taxes, reduced spending, and that will get more growth which gives you more people working and more income to the government. Host americans for tax reform, etr. Org. Thanks for your time. Coming up, that is the end of the show. We will have another show for you at 7 00 tomorrow morning. We will see you then