Transcripts For CSPAN Road To The White House 20131014

To keep the kind of thing that the senator from louisiana mentioned might happen if we dont. So, my time is up in all likelihood. I yield the floor for that reason. The senator from louisiana. Let me say how much again i respect the senator from tennessee. No one on his side of the aisle, except perhaps maybe the good senator from alabama spent more time on budget issues because thats the senator from alabamas job. But the senator from tennessee has taken upon himself to be a leader. I do agree with him that we are in on the right page, the right chapter in the right book to talk about the fiscal issues. I dont agree the strategy to get us here is the right strategy. Were here. No sense in pointing fingers. The senate needs to find our way forward because the senator from tennessee is correct. Where we are now, there are no winners or losers. Its about whats doing right for the american people. He wants to do that for the state of louisiana. He wants to do that for the state of tennessee. We have lots of people counting on us to lower the temperatures find a way forward. Secondly, i agree with him that whatever we can come up with here has to be broadly broad ly supported on both sides or on both sides because it has to be something to bring to the house and say, look, this is the best we can do and not go over this cliff. But thirdly, i want to make a point. On this budget control act thats law let me say, the Affordable Care act, in lawyers terms, im not one, they would say its not settled law. Its passed and upheld by the Supreme Court. Ill take your word. As far as were concerned, its passed. The budget control act is as well. The house is willing to take the sequester which is the lowest number. Whats disingenuous and what the democrats will not be for is taking the lower number overall and keeping defense at a higher number and therefore cutting the heck out of everybody else. No agriculture money, no education money, no health care money, no nothing. But they want to keep defense hold. Thats what the other side is trying to do. I realize thats not what my republican friends here want to do. Its not just taking the number but how the number is going to be allocated across the appropriations. Thats how the defense appropriations bill is put together. It absorbs all of the money and leaves all of the other budgets starving. I know defense is important. I supported a strong defense. I stood against irresponsible cuts to the defense department. But to take a lower number in the whole budget and say well take a lower number and give it all to defense and you cant find anything in health and education and social services that are so important. Thats not right either. Let me have one more point. I said one, one more point is this when the senator from tennessee has been very brave because there arent that many brave people around here. Hes said we may need to raise a few revenues here and there. We cant solve this problem by cuts alone, the last big deal we did, we were able to figure out how to raise revenue and make some cuts so we could have a good way, a steady way to balance our budget and not pull the rug out from underneath this very promising economy. Ive got 5 unemployment in louisiana. Im not talking as a state that doesnt have jobs . Our problem is we have so many jobs we need people to fill them. It breaks my heart were about to pull the plug on that and were close. I know how much my people are counting on us getting it done. I want to thank the senator but i hope hell stand up to some of the other voices over there that say we can solve this problem by cutting, cutting, cutting, and just cust mandatory programs and entitlements. I think he knows thats not correct. I know the senator from alabama i want to take 30 seconds and say for the record, i dont want to think that i thought the strategy that was undertaken was the right strategy. If i was misunderstood, i think ive been really clear that i did not think that took us to a positive place. The point is we are where we are. Were finally on the right page. Lets stay there. The house and senate will gavel back in on monday. This was the week they were scheduled to be back in the districts. However, stlinss no agreement in funding the government wand the october 17 deadline on the debt ceiling, they will be in session. The house returns at noon eastern. First roll call votes are expected at 6 30 p. M. The senate in at 2 00 eastern will take up two judicial nominees beginning at 5 00 p. M. With votes at 5 30. Watch live coverage on the house at cspan, the senate at cspan 2, or online at c spahn. Org. We want to know how the Government Shutdown is affecting you. Please send us your out the. Make your short message and upload it from your mobile device at out the. Com cspan. See what others are touting about. The discussion on the former shutdown with two members of congress. From washington journal, this is about 45 minutes. Next up for washington journal, were going to get the perspective from two former congressmen who went through previous shutdowns. Martin frost served in congress from 19752005. Democrat from texas. And tom davis, republican from virginia serving 19952008. Both congressmen served at one point as heads of their Respective Campaign committees. Thanks for being with us this morning. Good to be with you. The latest news is that the discussions on the debt ceiling have moved to the senate. As two former house members, how do you think the colleagues or the representatives up there are feeling now that they seemingly are out of the action in terms of determining the fate of this thing . Well, ill start. Were in the majority. We basically made ourselves irrelevant to this. They cant put a work product on the floor. You have to be able to produce a work product if youre in the majority. You have members in the republican conference that wont do a debt ceiling without it opening up the government because they recognize if you do a debt ceiling resolution, the government will stay closed for any length of time. The other group in the caucus wants to repeal obama care or try to get concessions that theyre unlikely to get because theyve driven themselves into an environment and the opinion doesnt support them. Republican opinion supports them. All of the marginal seats, these members are in tremendous pressure to reopen the government and raise the debt ceiling. In terms of practical issues as getting a, quote, work product as congressman davis said, this is months if not more than that brewing on the house side. No question about that. Theres a difference between now, i believe, and 1995 when we went through this the last time. Even though gingrich was the moving force behind closing the government, once gingrich decided to make a deal with the president , with clinton, it was done. His caucaus would ultimately accept what he did. There was grumbling, im sure, and tom was in his first term there. He could deliver. Boehner cant deliver. He cant deliver anything at this point. Its made the republicans irrelevant. An article in the paper today about the effect that this has happened on the senate races in the year coming up when the republicans thought they had a legitimate shot of taking the senate back, those chances are much weaker. It is not inconceivable, i didnt think this at the beginning of the year, its not inconceivable the democrats could take the house back. Could be a reach because of the way the districts are drawn. But the republican ifs they speak this up could make pelosi speaker again. First of all, a year is a long time. I was in the district the last time we went through this. I had 60,000 federal employees. Part of 2 republicans, i got reelected 21 in the district that bill clinton is carrying for president. Lets tell you what changed at this time. Martin is right. The speaker doesnt have the power in the caucus right now. The caucus basically and its a divisive caucaus. Republicans in the different parts of the country representing different constituencies. If you look at the Republican Caucus today versus 18 years ago or whatever it was, today, fully 80 of the members of the Republican Caucus are from districts where romney got over 55 of the vote. 17 members of this conference are in districts that obama carried. 7 members of the conference. A third of the members of the conference were from clinton districts in the last shutdown. So the pressures are republican pressures on members, not bipartisan pressures. Theyre leaning to the national polls. You didnt have fox news, msnbc, a blog. Rush limbaugh was just starting on talk radio. The information, the crap to content ratio are high in what people are hearing and basic facts and understanding that make it difficult for leaders to lead. They dont control the media message. The money in this town has moved away from the parties because of Campaign Finance reform, the Citizens United case. The money is no longer with the parties. Out with the wing groups get egg ready to ambush any member that strays from the party line. We dent have any of these factors when we went through the last shutdown. This has made it legal for leaders to lead. Do either of you see yourself heading up the Campaign Committee in the house. Would be a challege. Both of us were opposed to Mccain Feingold that passed because it took money away from the parting committees and put it away from the third party groups. Sure, i can run the committee today. Going to have some fun with it. It would be more interesting than being a member right now because being a member would be terrible at this point. But the other thing, there used to be a pride of being in congress. You walk through the neighborhood, you go to events. The congressman is here. Right now, theyre really in disrepute. Theyre low in terms of the public scale and in terms of respect and ridicule. I go to Grocery Stores and stuff in my district. People have nothing good to say about being a member of congress. They want to put a bag over their head. Theres a lot of blame to go around. Republicans did pass on the appropriation bills to the senate. They agree on what the numbers can be. On the other hand, the senate wanted to sit down and negotiate what the overall number would be and the house wouldnt sit down. So theres plenty of blame to go around on this. You have to recognize it in our democracy. You have to work together. The interesting thing. I know the public doesnt fully understand the inner workings of the congress. The speaker controls the agenda. The speaker wants a bill on the floor, its on the floor. If he doesnt want the bill on the floor on the house, itss not on the floor. So boehner could put a bill on the floor tomorrow to open up the government. And it would pass because youd all of the democrats would vote for it. Probably enough republicans if they had a vote on it would vote for it. But i guess hes afraid hell be deposed midterm if he does that in his own caucaus. Its hard to kick a speaker out in the middle of the term. Hes seeing some bills put on the floor like the transportation bill for 2013 that the members they took that bill off of the floor because they knew they couldnt pass it. This would pass. Thats his problem. It would pass with a 20, 25 republican votes. All the democratic votes. I dont know what the procedures are for removing a speaker in the middle of the congress. You can do it easily. Point of personal privilege. Its not hard. They almost did it to gingrich. I think ken was the last speaker they removed. Open up the phone lines, your comments and questions for martin davis martin frost and tom davis. 282553881 for republicans, 2025853880 for democrats. Lets hear from littleton, colorado, good morning to tony. Good morning, thanks for taking my call. Im glad we have people on who have been through the last shutdown. It looks so much different to me this time around. Because, one, the economy is so much worse and people are in so much worse shape than they were 17 years ago. I think that has been lost on our current congress. Back then when we came out of it, we came out of it stronger. I think were coming out of it weaker. Im wondering, are we possibly moving to even a breakdown of the democracy. I dont mean to sound hyperbolic, but its coming to an end, but people are really angry that i hear calling in. Both parties. Yeah, and maybe you can comment on that. Is it different . Are we in a more dangerous place than we were before . Tony, a very insightful question. Let me give you my analysis. We have come to behave as voters like this is a parliamentary system. What you find today is very few democrats in republican districts and republicans in democratic districts. 90 of the caucus is rin districts that obama carried. You find very few outlier member district where someone is in a district they shouldnt be. That wasnt true 18 years ago. My district, bill clinton carried my district. Obama carried my district. I was able to win when theres a lot of ticket splitting. Less ticket splitting today than any time in the last two generations. Thats okay, except when the members come here, they behave like parliamentary. Its bad the republican conference is as divided as they are, but they get no votes or help from the democrats on these issues too. The theory of the Minority Party is you got the votes, put it on the board. Republicans do it to the democrats too over health care saying were the opposition party. We have changed. And the problem is that our governmental structure is not a parliamentary system, it. S a balance of power system. Its not setting very well. Its coming apart. One of the differences between now and 1995, i believe, is that the Business Community has little stroke inside the republican party. You had a lot of Business Leaders who have gone to the hill and said, look, this is crazy. We need to extend the debt ceiling. We need to reopen the government. And theyve been ignored by the republican party. Previously, tom, in your party, the Business Community spoke with a pretty united voice, republicans would listen. Now, they can tell the Business Community to go take a hike. Quick, because tony mentioned the economy they wrote about the economy then and now. When the government shut down the 198596, silicone valley, the burgeoning tech sector. Unemployment 5. 6 and most economic forecasts showed growth. The same could not be said about the economy. Unemployment shrunk to 7. 3 . The labor, the number of people who have a job or looking for one is lowest rate since august of 1978. Arkansas on the democrats line. High . Caller yes, thank you. My question is i know that you read this. We the people we the people want some of it back. I do not understand why both parties, i voted democrats. But both parties are pointing the fingers to each other and saying this and that. And also, its a shame that i listen to this on tv. People getting food stamps cut, medicaid cut. Why are we sending money overseas like egypt and all of the other countries and humanity here. It was an out and out shame to our country to be on tv and a woman, a veteran, died for this country. She didnt get her benefits. They finally voted it through that she did. But its a shame that it come to that point. You made a statement that cant be answered. I hope whatever happens this coming week, october 17 deadline, they manage to extend the debt ceiling. They manage to get the government open for some period of time. Then, maybe, theres an opportunity for the two parties to sit down. This is a horrible situation. Its not in the best interest of the country. Its crazy that the government is closed right now. One of the problems is that you had so many people inside the rep pub party wanting to put conditions on reopening the government. Its a simple matter. Either the government is open or its not open. And lets see how it happens in the coming weeks. Let me say, the democratic caucaus is shut down with the Republican Caucus in the 1980s several times. Sure. But still, the reason for that is if you believe youre spending too much, and i happen though be one of those who thinks the government is spending much more than it has. Last four years borrowed 40 cents on the dollar. Two leverage points where things stay in motion. The current trajectory continues. Thats the annual budget and opportunities to raise the debt ceiling. Whats important is you take these, you leverage them, you try to get some concessions so you wont have to get the debt ceiling the next time. This is your only opportunity to exercise any controls on spending. But the system counts on reasonable people coming together. This is got on the the point where its out of hand and the economy is jeopardized. You get to the point where you get the best deal you can. Both sides dont get 100 , but they get something. I guess thats going to happen by october 17. But it sure scares people. The debt ceiling is bad not just that it happens or not. The brinkmanship plays havoc on the markets overseas. Good morning. Good morning, everyone. I think obamas policy which has damaged our community. And i think the result of falling down lets move to nicole on our independent line. Nicole is in jackson, mississippi. Jackson, mississippi . Yes. Caller i was calling because theres been an effects on the Government Shutdown. In college, shes a fulltime student. Her day care her child you might be a chance that the day care will close. The head start is supposed to close due to the shut down. And the Grocery Stores to the ept shes a single parent. But in there with three small children. He had all of the groceries. Couldnt pay for it because the system was down. They werent sure if it was due to the government or just her card. The mom was upset. The kids were hungry. I gave them my milk. I dont have much myself. But the government is having an effect on people. I hate that i hate that for my niece and for everybody and i hope they can come together. Its horrible. All right, nicole, thank you. Let me say, the nbcwall street journal poll showed the right direction is down 14 . People are losing their confidence in government. Never a good thing for either party. But this is not helping. These are not internal factors. These are internal factors caused by the elected officials. One public poll in terms of confidence in congress that was down like about 5 . 11 , that was family and friends. Im not sure who thinks congress is doing a good job right now. I dont think the members think its doing good. No. The interesting thing is that here you have now in the next four or five days, two tough old veterans in reed and mcconnell. I have full confidence that theyre going to make a deal. Not sure what the deal is going to be. But thats not the way that this that the government should be run. It shouldnt rely on closed door meetings with a couple of old guys who have been through the wars. It should be a more open democratic process. Thats why i think ultimately the republicans have a real problem here because they wont put anything on the floor of the house. I understand boehners difficulty and maybe he gets a speaker. But at some point, it has to say, okay, its not like being speaker. They put four different offers on the floor. The difficulty i think youre referring to is the fact that whatever comes up is going to have the majority support within the Republican Caucus. They quit putting stuff up and the white house rejected them. A comment on twitter. The fact is they knew this was coming and look at and through it im sorry, they they took their july vacations, julyaugust vacations, labor day long weekend and they are all derelict in duty. So in reaction to getting the spending bills come, they knew it was coming and yet it got postponed. Why is it a mentality . People dont like to come off of their positions. Because, again, the parties are so polarized. These members are from safe seats. November elections mean nothing to 80 of the members. The primary elections that elect them. Theyre back in that comfort zone within the box of their party to get off of that, that takes a crisis mentality for people to come off of that. Its interesting because i thought about this what specifically what was asked in terms of this summer, if i had been in the democratic leadership, and if we had control of the house, which i wasnt and we didnt control the house, i think i would have said to my colleagues, to my members, were not taking august off this year. I think i if i had been in the majority, i think if boehner had done that, he would have been very popular, people like their vacations. They had plans. If boehner had done that and held the house in in office, i think in the country it would have been a popular decision. Would democrats tried something a year ago or so, they tried in the pro forma sections, they tried to keep them open thats a difference. We stayed on the floor one year and the democrats controlled and we yelled work work we held mock sessions when the democrats went home. Has to be an economic crisis here to have these kinds of things happening now. We have to argue because we have parliamentary habits and a balance of power system. It doesnt look right. The members got some really good smart people in congress. They are put into a system, though, that makes it very difficult to operate. And i look to voters. You elect these people. How many of you are active in primaries. The primaries are controlled by a very ideological band of people in each party that are activists and participate in that. Thats the democratic model. Other people stay home, look for the general election. At that time, your voices are minimized. I remember it must have been in 6 0s. I remember when they locked the doors in the California Legislature and they said people arent leaving here until we get this resolved. I would like a leader, a democrat or republican leader to do that in washington. Back to the calls. In pennsylvania, joseph on the democrats line, go ahead. Joe im joseph, im a democrat. Please give me some time to finish what i had to say. I was born in the depression. I remember what it was like. Si remember Franklin Delano roosevelt, he said he didnt know me, i know him. I have two questions for the learned expoliticians. If the government closes down, are we poor people out here not going to get our Social Security checks or our savings in our banks, our iras and our checkings. For all of the Republican People out there who say tea party people, the government is too big, keep them out of our business, but dont touch our Social Security. A lot of frustration there. The reality is some of the checks will not go out if the government shuts down. The people who are processing them are out of work. Not sure which of ill say in defense of my republican colleagues, they have put bills together, single bills that would allow some of the more obvious and popular parts to stay hope. The democrats rejected it saying they dont want do it piece mill. Theyre trying to take care of these issues. Who wins, who loses. You try to make it winwin. These conversations have been devoid of that today. Ed suburban maryland, to have a very bad effect on the economy. This is hurting. Im with a national law firm. People at the firm cant get paperwork processed, fha, other federal agency. The other thing that tom mentioned is say you run a restaurant, a cafe, you have a federal workforce. So the federal workers ultimately are made hold. They will ultimately get their money. But for weeks and weeks, you dont have anybody, you have a much smaller number of people shopping at your restaurant and cafe. That may put you out of business. Doesnt do any good for you if the federal worker six weeks or two months from now get your back pay. You may have closed in the process. In 95 or 96, was there an effort in congress to reinstitute or compensate people who may have lost money in businesses . No. No. You dont get that. We know this is driving unemployment. The problem is the people who measure the statistics are out of work. A lot of people who do business with the government, theyre going right now. I dont believe theyre saying were going furlough you but were going give you the back pay. I havent stheen. This is not just federal workers. This affects a number of other people. Thats why this is so crazy. Unemployment applications, 66,000 more last week. On the eureka line. One quick point here. At the end of the day when its said and done, its up to the president to make it work. Thats it. The president cant sign anything not on his desk. Issuing veto threats and that. I think the president initiating the remarks last week and showing flexibility was very, very important. One of the differences in the 9596 shutdown. Clinton and gingrich were open to compromise. None of the conversations indicate that obama or Speaker Boehner are open. Youre going find pressure on them to move off. The president doesnt want to negotiate on the debt ceiling. He doesnt want to negotiate on the cr you have to. You have to. Thats the way its the only Pressure Point you have. You dont want to be pushed where one party is so irresponsible they drive the country off of the cliff. You have to dial with that. I think theyre going to hold everybody responsible. First of all, all we need to do is take money out of politics. One thing thats holding most of the peoples jobs and because of the money involved in politics. If we get that out and put the power back in the peoples hands, well have a better outcome. Chairman of the congressional committee. What do you think . The problem with that is with the United States Supreme Court in a series of decisions over the last 40 years has taken the position that money is a free speech issue and the ability to spend money in politics is a matter of free speech protected by the constitution. And unless you were to amend the u. S. Constitution to say that congress has the authority to put limits on the cases, the Supreme Court is not going to let that stand. Look, i agree with you. We get money out of politics and its a different ball game. I love the british system. We have the first amendment. Buckley versus fileo in the 70s, theyve expanded peoples free speech, despite government attempts to limit it. The problem with Mccain Feingold and well intentioned laws. The Political Parties in this country has been a centering force in this country for 200 years. They compete to the middle of the road to win elections. You have limited money in Political Parties. The money didnt appear. Its out on the wings. The right and left wings. John boehner has no control, obama doesnt have a control of it. This is independent actors with their own agendas. Special interests have more control today than they did prior to mccainfeingold. In 199596, before Mccain Feingold, we couldnt raise limited amounts of money from corporations and labor unions. It was reportable. We had to report everything we raised. Now we could raise it from large individual contributions. You no longer have those sources of money. They cant give it to the parties. We dont know who theyre giving it to. Not only are they not giving it to the party, its not reportable. That was the problem with Mccain Feingold, it drove all of this underground. It didnt reduce the amount of money. We didnt mean to. We knew it would be the effect. Tom, some of us had an inkling this would happen. I had arguments with my own party, democratic party. He said therell be limits on corporations and unions can spend because were going to say 60 days before an election, they cant do it. And i said, well, what happens if the court rules its unconstitutional. They said the lawyers said its okay. The lawyers were wrong. Even so, they were pretending this was somehow going to inhibit outside groups from spending money by putting a 60day cutoff. High in the sky liberal euphoria. Mario, new jersey, independents line. Caller good morning. Remember we got here the debt ceiling was raised and the contingent was they would pass the budget no budget, no pay. So what happened . All of the republicans wanted was regular order. So the democrats passed the budget. The republicans pass the budget. And the republicans in the senate and the house refused to go to conference. Why did they do that . They wanted this crisis. Without the crisis, they had no negotiating position. They could have negotiated at an equal level, they would have to give anything. Why are we here . Why are we living under sequester. They dont want to give a penny in revenue. They want all of their changes. They want the medicare changes, the medicaid changes, Social Security changes. They dont want a penny in revenue. Thats what the impasse is. Thats why a big deal can never be created until they get off of that position. Open the government, raise the debt ceiling. They both say they want the same thing. A couple of questions. They didnt get a conference in the house and the senate because when youre in the house, you get recommit and you get a lot of embarrassing votes up. The Republican Leadership didnt feel they were helpful on that. The house did something that the senate didnt do. They passed a number of appropriations bills. The senate has passed zero. The senate has passed zero. But its like 65 of government because you had d. O. D. And some of the others. Republicans feel they gave the tax cuts last year when they were expired and tax rates went up for many americans. So obama cares additional tax on people, they felt theyve given enough. Compromising people have to move off of the positions, thats how you get there. Were at the point where democrats dont think that the republicans are giving enough, vice versa. We have to do the shutdowns and i think what may come out of this, we dont know yet, but what may come out of this week is an agreement to go to conference on the underlying resolution. So the agreement where the democrats and the republicans would appoint conferees in the house and the senate. This is for the budget, for the year just started, october 31. But to do that, they probably would have to be silent on the subject of revenue. Democrats want whats to be done to be revenue positive. The republicans want it in neutral. The problem is spoke to the appointed conferees. Hopefully theyll come back to the practice that would produce spending. The impact on the work space here in capitol hill on the crises. The headline from the Washington Post this morning, protracted debates grates on lawmakers dispositions. After these, is it hard to continue working with your colleagues once youre going through these very difficult times. Angry republicans in the conference. The republicans want to open up the government. Dont think we should be messing around with the debt ceiling. You have a contingent thats fuel bid some of the pacs over there on the right that dont want to do this. But, sure, members arent seeing their families. Theyre sitting here on weekends. Theyre sitting here for lengthy times when we were scheduled to do other things. The first shutdown, our family put money down on a trip to new york over christmas week. We lost our money on that. 96 did have a positive effect. After the shutdown in 95, you had an agreement on raising the minimum wage. You had an agreement on welfare reform. It did cause the parties during 96 to sit down and try to work the things out together. But im not sure that will happen this time. More of a spirit of cooperation after a lot of showmanship in 95, got down to business in 96. You didnt have the pacs on the right or left. You didnt have the media models that thrive on polarization. And david from new york on the republican line. Thank you for taking my call. You hear voices from all sides of the fence. To take the taxpayers dollars and to try to create jobs and even an economy for this country and or their states. And to hand out them by states. Given a grant through the government, right . State money given to them by the federal government to the department of agriculture. And they use that grant to put up a gondola. To get up to the top of the mountain. Chair lift. I thought the department of agriculture gave farmers money. So that means some farmer missed out on money he should have got that Hunter Mountain got. Thats very corrupt. I give you another example. There are farmers here that i know that have farms that dont even farm the land. They live on the land. But they farm nothing. There are neighbors who say, listen, i see you have hay fields. You dpoent do anything with them. Why dont you let me use my tractor. Ill buy the gas. Wont charge you any money or anything like that, let me make the money off of the hay. Another example here is a farmer around here owns a big farm. He does nothing. He has horses. He doesnt do anything with the horses. A neighbor comes up, rents out space in his barn so she gets her own clientele to bring the horses to his barn. She takes care of the horses, feeds them, etc. Its so corrupt, the whole system, that i really just dont know whats going to go on. And i say to you, gentlemen, or rather i ask you to discuss this on your show today. Because you said our government doesnt even care about our business sector. Reaction . Ill start on this. I think what the fellow was asking, im not certain, i think he feels going to the question of ear marks the way the appropriations are made. When i was in congress, i was proud of the fact when i got an ear mark from my district and i put out a press release because i thought i had done something for the people i represented. Some of the objections have been when congressman tries to earmark funds for their buddies, defense contractors, people who have nothing to do with their own districts and theyve done that in secret. It should be out on the table. If a congressman wants a contract for his district and he gettings funding for it, he ought to put out a staple defending it explaining why theyre defending it. I was able to get funding to create a Mass Transit System in dallas. A speaker no longer has that as a tool. Ear marks are an important part to the legislative process. The bridge to nowhere wasnt extra money. That came out of the allocation. We knew where it came from. Somebody ear marked this money somewhere down the road. Some bureaucrat does it. Administration, state leader. Theres nothing wrong since the money comes from the house of representatives that they allocate pieces of it. It should be transparent. Not for private companies. But i think earmarks are an important piece of it. The government should live within their means. We had four years of balanced budgets. Thats where congress ought to be heading. Weve been heading in the opposite direction. Were using the last four years borrowed 40 cents for every dollar we spent. Were not taxing people to do anything today. These are going to be paid by our kids. Thats what the whole fight is about from the republican narrative is we need to put a stop to this and the only leverage we have are the budget resolutions and the debt cerealing to have these kinds of discussions. So theres nothing wrong with that. The difficulty here is its been broking down with no agreements. So by going over the hill on both of these. Over the cliff, you make things worse. What happened in the 90s when tom and i were there. 93, 94, Congress Passed a budget resolution, passed implementing legislation. They did both. Cut spending and raised taxes. As a result, then you had balanced budgets on through the latter part of the 90s. Congress is willing to take a balanced approach. Now you cant sit down and talk about that. You cant start a dialogue about that. And thats a big difference. We took tough votes in the 90s, to set up the framework to do revenues and budget cuts and to implement that. Both parties get credit for that. The bush tax cuts expired. That was a tax increase. The president would have gone for a different level and gotten more revenue. You get one bite at the apple. Republicans got burned over that. Theyre not going to raise revenue again. Albert is on the republican line. Good morning. Good morning, sir. Sorry about my cold. I have two questions about each of your giveses there, theyre yes and no. Are we a democratic republic . And the question is arent we collecting enough money now to pay our bills. Were not collecting enough revenue. However, we could make some budget cuts and raise a little more revenue. Were a democracy. As tom pointed out, were a balance of powers, divided government, were not a parliamentary system. Were a unique form of democracy. The oldest continuous democracy on the face of the earth right now. Its not running well. The immediate effect effects of the shutdown is to drive down deficits. Theyre hurting the economy. Former representative from virginia tom davis, former head of the national Campaign Committee and the former head of the Democratic National committee talking about the 9596 shutdown. One last question for both of you. One quick advice in terms of whats this how do we keep this from happening again next year or the years to come . We should do something about the debt ceiling. These votes are becoming very, very painful. They are leverage points. You tie it to some percent of gdp. Two of the other countries, denmark and australia have parliamentary systems and other than that, its not relevant. Balance of power, this is tough. Its been an appropriate leverage point. In the past, people have been able to come to agreements. At this point, it threatens the whole economy. It threatens the markets and threatens basically the american dollar. You have both parties and the executive branch say lets look at what was recommended in simpson bowles, the system set up and largely ignoreled by everybody on the recommendations. The recommendations werent perfect but they were a starting point. Start first in florida, tampa, flf flf, in particular to hear from Richard Daniel sson w is with the Tampa Bay Times. Thanks for being with us this morning. Good morning. Good to be here. Writing a bit about how the impact the Government Shutdown is impacting florida in terms of areas of Social Security benefits. What are you hearing from people youre reporting on . Well, overall our reporting at the Tampa Bay Times suggests the longer the shutdown goes on, the more pronounced the impacts are going to be. When it comes to security in flar, the checks are still continuing to be cut on the payment schedule that is normal. But doing limited business, they will process an application for benefits but they wont do other things. They wont issue a new Social Security card. They wont replace the Social Security card or replace the medicare card. And so as a result, theyre not seeing as many people come in. I happen to live in clearwater, which is one of the cities in the country historically that has the highest percentage of residents over 65 years old. Ive been to the local Social Security office here to help my mom with her Social Security. And usually, i wants pretty crowded. I drop by on friday, just to see what it was like. And it was not nearly as crowded. I walk in and another guy walked up and said, indidnt even know you were open. That suggests a lot of people arent really sure what they can do or whats available to to them. So for some of the services that are being handled right now, a backlog is being built up. Maybe some of the services that are being handles there could be a backlog. So the longer the shutdown goes on, the bigger the backlog is going to be. A graphic shows the impact of the survey on the impact of the shutdown on the stage in florida. One of the top ten States Affected in terms of areas of Social Security shortages. You talked about medicare offices, what about payments and doctors. Are they affected at all . We havent reported yet on that type of impact. I couldnt say it further. The shutdown progressed here now nearly two weeks. You mentioned that some of the offices have been closed or open depending on where you visited. You say you ear from clearwater. People getting Social Security recipients getting guidance from their local offices on this. My understanding for the field offices are open. Theyre dmoingt what they normally do. Go in, get a lift there. There are nine Different Services that they can handle right there on the spot. But there are some services that they would normally do that they arent in a position to do. They do for people who do need assistance, they also recommend that you go to the Social Security website and you can make an application for benefits there. I note in the article this week in the Tampa Bay Times about the effect of on tourism dollars, vitz tore dollars in the tampa bay area. This is the headlines. Millions evaporate. A Shutdown Forces a delay of the defense contract. A fourday national sbechbs and intelligence conference at the tampa Intelligence Center was abruptly postponed because the government was shut down erasing more than 7,000 Hotel Room Nights and estimated 500 million from the local economy. Is that are there other sorts of government hft related conferences etc. That would affect the local economy . I asked the local about that. They said they tnt have anything on their books they felt like it was likely in jeopardy. Just to talk a little bit about that particular conference, it was a symposium of 4,000 people involved in intelligence, defense, homeland security. A big national get together for people in this industry. The hotels depending on this business had these reservations on the books for two years or more. I spoke to someone at the tampa hilton downtown who said that the symposium was going to account for more than 400 rooms a night at her 520room hotel. And when that went away, thats not business you can replace quickly. At the hoover house here on the campus. Its significant because its the primary residence. Its significant because she feels the one who designed it. She had such a strong grasp of design and how she wanted the house to look even though she was not an architect were lucky to have a lot of the original drawings and documents of how she wanted the house to look. Lou henrys influence came from the travels in the southwest of the United States, pueblo architecture from her travels in north africa where she travelled with herbert hoover. Its a great legacy of lou henry. She designed the house, she created it. It was inspired by her ideas and she had very close involvement in all aspects of the houses creation. Is. This week on q a, josh bolten talking about the duties during the bush administration. Josh bolten in the second part of the discussion about your time as chief of staff of the white house, start off by giving us what you saw with the press, the media, that world. How did you view them . Usually with some hostility. Its the natural state of affairs between the white house and the press corps because thats the thats the nature of what the press needs do. They need to they need to try to catch the white house out