Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 20150124

A very good saturday morning to you. Right now, in this country, some 61 of workers, 18 and over, have access to some form of paid sick leave. About 49 million American Workers lack paid sick leave. Thats what we are talking about this morning. Only three states in this country require some form of paid sick leave. Here is a map this morning from the National Partnership for women and families. Those three states, california, massachusetts, and connecticut, connecticut and massachusetts laws provide 40 hours of sick time per calendar year. Calendars taxed at 241 hours. Law goes into effect in january. There is also over a dozen cities and municipalities around the country that have their own laws when it comes to paid sick leave but president obama has proposed a sevenpaid sick leave california year in his state of the union address. Here is the president on tuesday talking about that proposal. Today we are the only advanced country industry on earth that doesnt guarantee paid sick leave or paid Maternity Leave to our workers. 43 million workers have no paid sick leave. 43 million. Think about that. That the forces too many parents to make the gutwrenching choice between a paycheck and a sick kid at home. So i will be taking new action to help states adopt paid leave laws of of their own and since paid sick leave won where it was on the ballot last november lets put it to a vote right here in washington. Send me a bill that gives every worker in america the opportunity to earn seven days of paid sick leave. Its the right thing to do. Host that bill that the president is pushing for is called the Healthy Families act introduced last year by congresswoman rossa de loroa and former senator harkin of iowa. Members watching were tweeting about the president s proposals on paid sick leave. Sherrod brown [video clip. . We need to take a leave on lead. There is congressman nick volvanier. Free sick leave . Not doing so william on the nohandsout promise. One more tweet, peter difasio said its time for the u. S. To catch up with the rest of the world on childcare and paid sick leave laws. These help families succeed. This gourds your thoughts on that proposal and how you think it would impact you. Youve own experiences with paid sick leave in your job. Here is an article by james shirtz, a reporter an analyst with the american with the Heritage Foundation in his piece after the president s speech and after the proposals were released last week. On he writes what the media missed about obamas new proposal is its a wage cut for workers. He writes in that piece that it sounds great but the president never explained where businesses will get the money from for it. In fact, the cost almost certainly will come out of workers paychecks. The government should let employees and businesses decide for themselves how to divide compensation between wages and leave. Workers should be the ones to decide whether to work at a firm that offers lower wages and Fringe Benefits or vice versa. Some value paid sick leave. Some have tight budgets and would prefer higher wages instead. We are asking for your thoughts this morning on that proposal and your experiences in your own working life. We will start this morning with sue calling in on the line for independent. We have line for democrats, republican independent and employers and business owners. But sue, good morning to you from colorado. Caller good morning. I dont have any objection to paid sick leave. I have always had it through my working years. The paid family leave, might not have the same family. They would not be the able to access that benefit whereas pregnant women and children, they do have that benefit. I think it should be unpaid or it should be rolled in to accumulated sick time, et cetera. So that its fair because not everybody choose the same path as far as their lifestyle zoo thanks for the call. From colorado this morning. The president proposing paid sick live f leave and talking about the family medical leave act currently pushing a bill in congress that would give federal employees six weeks of paid parent al leave. Benefits are funded for those programs through employee paid payroll taxes and based oba percentage of pay. Were asking for your thoughts this morning on paid sick leave. I want to hear about your experiences with your business, your employer. Also have a special line for employers. I want to know if this is something you provide, think you can afford in your company. Caller good morning. Thank you for cspan and thank you for my call. I have got two comments. One, i dont see any reason that private employers shouldnt get paid sick leave. All government workers, whether they be federal, state, or local, they get paid sick leave. So i just think it would be right. I think it would be right thing to do. One other comment. It sticks in my craw that every time the word i cant think of the word now that is mentioned about Social Security and medicare and entitlements. Thats all thats mentioned. And every federal employee gets entitlements, and part of them are sick leave and vacation and all that. Thats entitlements. Host staying on the paid sick leave, what seems fair to you, californias law that goes into effect this july is for three paid sick leave days per year. The the president s legislation pushing for seven. The laws in california, massachusetts, requiring that companies provide five paid sick leafs. Whats fair . Caller i think seven to start off would be fair because everybodys going to get sick at one time or another or have a sick kid or Something Like that. Heck yes they should get paid. All federal employees get paid sick leave. They dont seem to mind. And if one federal employee voted against that you know they dont deserve anything any more than anybody else thats out there working. Host dave, thanks for the call. Caller hello . Host turn down your tv. We can hear you. Caller ok. About the paid sick leave. Ive ran a Lawn Care Company here in ohio for the last 30some years and ive got to be honest. With all of the things that keep piling up on businesses, every time it becomes very hard any more to have a business and maintain a profitability for the company. I mean we have the e. P. A. Thats out there that monitors and checks, and then we have the government with the taxes. I mean here just recently i paid my taxes and i paid over 70,000 in taxes. Its frustrating. Host david, if you had to do this with your company, if a law was passed by congress of course the president would have to push that through a republican congress. But do you think that would paying for that would come out of salaries . Would you have to lower wages to pay for sick leave . Caller where would the money come from . The company. Do i have to increase our products that we pass it on . You know. At some point theres a Tipping Point where people say, ok, enough lawn care. I want a nice lawn but now its getting just a little too pricey any more. And so you start losing customers that cant afford that service any more. Its just things like going to the gas pump, well, the price of gas can go up. But people need it. Thats something thats a necessity. So you cant argue that point. But with some of these others like a Service Company and if youre looking at a Service Company that is not really an absolute necessity you know, then it becomes a questionable thing. And my point is that this country and the people in it are the ones that are working are paying their share. And at some point this whole thing is going to come down because you cant have 4 people on some 48 people on entitlement. You want to talk about paid sick leave. A person might get up that morning and say, hey, i just dont feel like going to work. So that happens seven times and now the kid actually is sick, then what happens . I mean, people managing people is quite an item if youve never done. If youve never had to make payroll, it is not that easy. Host david from ohio. The numbers are on the bottom of your screen. Your thoughts on the president s proposal. Oak harbor, washington. Good morning. Caller good morning. I have worked both as an hourly wage earner and as a sal rid employee. This proposal doesnt give anything to sal rid employees. My experience with paid sick leave as an hourly employee, one of the first things that happened is the employees got together and bargained to be able to give sick leave to their needy fellow employees. Well i took Vacation Days when i was sick and i wasnt sick very often, and one of my fellow employees was sick every start of the deer season. Was sick every monday after super bowl games. Was sick if christmas was on sunday and on monday he was sick. And later on in his employment he became seriously ill with a kidney problem. And i had good meaning lady employees come to me and say, well, youve got a lot of accumulated sick leave that you havented. Why dont you used. Why dont you donate it to this guy . So i think paid sick leave can be a problem there. Because its so frequently abused. Host and you think more so if the federal government steps in and mandates seven days across the country here . Caller yes, i do. If it doesnt carry over, ok, if i cant take that seven days to my next year there are many, many people that are going to be sicksen days. And so thats a lost production to the company. Or to the office. If its carey over, thats fine. Theres got to be some limit to it perhaps, but then they probably there are a lot of people that wont take it. Theyll save it for when they really need it. But there are those that will abuse it, use their seven days every year, and then if they really get sick they will want to have some kind of a transfer program where they can try to get other employees who havent used theirs to donate to them. Host i want to hear your thoughts. On twitter. Heres a recent study that looked into comparing the United States to 22 other industrializeds countries. Comparing sick leave policies. You can see the stats compared to 22 other countries. The United States simply listed a no policies on sickness pay in terms of national policies. The president looking to change that in his state of the union. Plenty of comments this week. In the new yorker this week. Nelson up next. Good morning. Caller good morning. I work for a corporation that is a hospital for 27 years. As an hourly employee, we accrued sick leave as well as vacation leave. And at the end of the year you got paid for the Vacation Time that you didnt use and you also got paid for the sick leave that you didnt use as an incentive for not being out of work. Thats just one idea that could that could help employers as an incentive for employees for not being out of work. And we want to hear from employers this morning. And have a special line for employers. We would like to hear your thoughts on that proposal and the president s proposal. Lets go to our line for republicans. Margaret in west virginia. Caller good morning. Thank you for your program. Im not working now but years ago i worked in food service all my life. I worked for marriott. And they had a really good program. You accrued your Vacation Days and your sick days according to how many hours you worked. Like if you worked 40 hours a week you accrued a percentage of a sick day and a percentage of a vacation day. And they carried over and they didnt you didnt have to use them by the end of the year. You kept them. And they kept growing. And we had our of course i worked in the School System so we had Vacation Days at christmastime, we had Vacation Days at thanksgiving. You didnt get paid for those. But you didnt have to use your Vacation Days, either. And i accrued mine when the company went out i worked for that company for 12 years and i had over 2,000 in sick pay that i got when the company went out of that service. And i cant remember how many Vacation Days i had. But i thought that was a very good idea. It was very helpful for every employee, the ones that did get sick, the ones that didnt get sick. I dont know what that company does now but it was a really good idea for me at the time. Thank you. Host thanks for the call from west virginia. Weve shown viewers the history of some paid sick leave laws in the United States. Then on the ballot last november. Just some history of paid sick leave days and some polling on this topic courtesy of the Public Religion Research institute showing why support for paid sick time support for requiring companies to provide all full time employees with paid sick days if they are in immediate or family if they or an immediate Family Member get sick. You can see the breakdown among all respondents about 80 , democrats those most in favor then independents, republicans coming around 60 or 70 according to the numbers from the Public Religion Research institute. You can see that chart in the Washington Post wonk blog has also written about this topic as well. We want to hear from our viewers this morning. Our line for independents. Good morning. Caller yeah. I think the Big Companies should. Because yeah. I think the Big Companies should because i think they can afford it. With the smaller companies, you know you might have to work something out with business and government where they could let their employees go if theyre sick. Its just the dignified thing to do in a dignified society. Because people are going to get sick. Thats just the way it is. And i dont agree with the fellow that said that he sees it being abused. I just generally dont see that. I see people wanting to work for their bread, then be dignified about it. I just dont see people abusing their sick leave. Host have you seen people supporting this if it comes out of their own pay checks if there has to be a specific payroll tax or something that companies employed to be able to provide seven sick days if thats the mandate . Caller well, if thats what they want. But like i said, i think these big multibillion dollar companies, the one that is are kicking about paying people more than 7 an hour, they can afford it. What the little guys, yeah, the little companies yeah thats a better deal for them because they just dont have as much money. So i think thats a fair thing to do. Host to the point of Big Companies versus smaller companies. Some more numbers from the institute for womens policy research. Companies with a thousand or more employees. For smaller companies, just 38 . You can see the breakdown between public and private sector. Were talking about it for the next 20 minutes or so. If you want to see some of the charts, they are at the institute for Women Policy Research if you want to follow along with those. Larry in columbia, south carolina. Caller i support paid sick leaf for employees. I work for a Retail Company and of course they pay us low wages down here. What the compensation was they did provide us was that sick paid leave you had an option to make up part of your income by taking out insurance they would after you and that way if you really got sick you know the part that paid more of your income for you on the size so they would file Insurance Claim to make up the other part of the insurance. And they also provide our parttime workers with insurance, too with sick leave, too. They get a percentage of their time together. So it was a pretty good idea. And of course retail youve got paid low wages but our company was a very Profitable Company here. And i worked for them for over 38 years when i got sick here and it was a good idea that when i went out sick and ive got a friend now he got sick and i got in a car wreck and of course the company i dont know, they dont pay income so he doesnt have income right now. So thats a hard part on a person that doesnt offer that. Host when it comes to earnings, lower wage employees are less likely to have access to paid sick leave days. Those making under 15,000 full time employees about 30 have access to paid sick leave days. Those making 15,000 to about 35,000 58 have access to some form of paid sick leave days. For those making 65,000 plus, 88 of fulltime year round workers have access to some form of paid sick leave days. We have a special line for employers. Curts on the line. Caller thank you for taking my call. I want to interject a new angle for you to make you explain how this is going to be devastating to Small Businesses. I own a Small Business in omaha that we have about 70 employees in a day care industry. Now, its nice to want to thank that everybody has got great intentions but the fact of the matter is that any more a lot of people dont have great intentions. The problem that youre going to have and especially in the day care industry, is everything in my industry revolves around ratios. So for instance i have to have one teacher there for every four infants that i have inside my building. Well, if this law gets instituted, whats going to end up happening to our industry is lets say, for example, you get around the end of the year, december 26, december 27, 28. If you have got a couple dozen employees who have three or four or five sick days left most of your employees i believe are going to want to have Good Intention bus youre still going to have several are going to say theres only four days left in the year. I have two or three sick days left. And if i dont use them im going to lose them and you are going to have several employees that are going to call in sick. Well, what happens when i have several employees on the last week of the year that call in sick and now i no longer have enough staff to maintain my state mandated ratio levels . So when mrs. Jones and mr. Jones comes and drop off their child and i dont have enough employees inside the building, how aim supposed to provide that service for my customers . Host the one mandate youre talking about caller its going to be devastating. Host conflicts if it comes into effect. Question for you. If this is something that were put into effect, would you raise prices on customers to be able to cover it or would you have to take it out of employees salaries . Caller how is there other ways . Theres two ways to grow Small Businesses. You grow it on the revenue side and you cut costs. Thats all there is. Its a Small Business. We dont have an infinite pile of cash sitting there. So what im going to do is im going to come back and im going to figure out, ok if i have seven days per person, i have 70 employees, my average wage is 11 thats going to cost me x amount per year, im going to come back and divide that out by how many customers i have. So im going to have to raise my revenue. Im going to raise my prices on what im charging my customers. Im also going to probably then at that point have to come back and cut wages. You know youve got to keep in mind for every one dollar i have to raise a wage, i also have to raise another 1520 just in payroll taxes also. So im going to do a combination of both. Im going to cut some benefits, hold back on any existing jobs that i probably want to hire if i dont have to hire. So its going to slow down my hiring process. Its going to raise my costs. And its going to raise prices. Thats just all there is to it. I mean its great to want to think that everybody has great intentions but the fact of the matter is in the working world especially with lower wage earners, when you get to that point towards the end of the year, youre going to have several people are going to go, you know, ive got four days of sick pay left. I really just dont feel like it. Another problem that ive noticed in the last ten years especially, and before i was an employer i spent 17 years working a manufacturing plant. It always seemed like on monday mornings your fulltime staffs have a attendance issues and then the same thing on the flip side fridays you also had to schedule more people because your parttime girls dont want to come in to work especially in the afternoon. A boyfriends or have Football Games high school Football Games or baseball games. You know. So this will affect your attendance policy. Host curt in nebraska with his perspective as a Small Business owner. A lot of tweets about this topic as well. We have another 15 minutes to talk about this. I want to note some of the other news going on around the country. Heres a picture coming in from the royal family funeral for King Abdullah of saudi arabia who was buried yesterday. This is on the front page of the Washington Post this morning. As we said, the president planned to cut short his trip to india to pay his respect to the late king. The nbc news story noting that Vice President joe biden had been due to fly to saudi arabia but will remain in washington. The change means that president obama is skipping his plans to see the taj ma hall in india as part of this longplanned trip to india and one tweak on this topic from mark who is the cbs News White House correspondent. One other story from overseas. This coming in the aftermath of the collapse of the government there. Host ans up next. Caller i was listening to the comments. Im retired now but when i worked for the government for 30plus years the sick leave that you earn comes in handy and your family paid leave. Because you never know when a Family Member gets sick. It comes in handy. The only thing i hate somewhere along the line i guess the government changed the policy on the sick leave when you go to retire or something. You dont get a chance to i guess keep that part. I was listening to comments on the employers. To me, from what i understand out of it and everything, youre already paying for you pay it in your payroll taxes. So whatever your wages are your employer is paying his part of his payroll taxes and also taking it out of yours. Thats part of your tax withholding. And so host you dont think employers should take this out of employees wages to help cover it . Caller no. It is coming out of their wages. That what im saying the payroll taxes. Hes paying you so much an hour and hes using the tax tables for what youre supposed to take out of your paycheck for your payroll taxes, which is your federal tax withholding. So all thats in there. And so everyone should have i think everyone should have some kind of sick leave and paid leave. Because youre sick, you need it. And you should also be able to care rit over and not have a limit that you have to use this up before the year ends and all that. You just carry it over and it adds up. For the person to use. And then if you do run out of it that means you either on the private sector, whichever, that means you are losing your pain hourly pay or something that day or are you borrowed the lee and they take it out of your retirement check when you retire unless youre going to pay it. You have to do one or the other. But the employee and employer they are really not losing either way. I was listing to some employers who said that they have to raise the cost of everything and let the employeings, if they dont come in what do they do if something happened if they got sick or died . Theyve still got to replace or put somebody in there. Host maurice is waiting, ohio. Line for republicans. Caller i disagree with that whole premise. Because as a company i have about 12 employees. Ive been in business about 22 years. Whats happening is we have had to modify our sick polsy along the way to accommodate and also restrict those abusers. And our policy is three days of sick, two days of personal sick days we know that the abusers are. So if youre an abuser youre not going to get paid unless youre really sick. Youre going to have to go to the doctor to present a doctors excuse to get paid for that day. And if you dont provide it then youre not going to get paid. Because there are those people that have a lifestyle where they may drink too much so op and so forth and they elect not to come to work. If you provide a policy like this thats a check and balance policy, then they can choose not to get so drunk or so out of contact with coming back to work the following day after a holiday or Football Game or so on. So what we like to do is provide five days off two are personal sked yul8d you would within the week. So youve got to schedule those a week ahead of time. Then youre granted those things so those personal things you want to do. If you decide to go to the super bowl and get hamored you can take monday off if you schedule it far enough ahead. Host what kind of business are you in . Caller im in the Electronics Security surveillance business. Host in acron, hoy, on that line for employees. A few comments that weve gotten on our facebook page. Percy next from ohio. Caller they waste more time debating. A lot of money is being spent just debating. If they took this money im all for seven days paid sick leave with doctors excuse. But theyre wasting give subsidies to the Small Businesses that cant afford it kind of seems like it would work out. Host judy up next. Our line for independents. Good morning. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I will only take just a second. Just a couple of comments. I have worked in the fast Food Industry for over 20 years and i have witnessed people coming to work sick with fever. Throwing up in the garbage can continuing to make your food. Knowing that if they went home they would not get paid. They have no sick leave. The company was the one of the third top Fast Food Companies in the United States. Anyway, they are coming to work passing the sickness along. The company will not take even an emergency room or doctors excuse. So, and i have put in my resignation with that company and now work for the largest retailer in the United States. The same thing goes. They will not accept a doctors excuse, emergency room excuse. They give you like Three Chances at that u the president in his state of the union calling for the passage of the Healthy Families act introduced by rosa delauro as the chief sponsor of that legislation. That would provide seven paid sick days over the course of a calendar year. The president also other proposals and looking to provide money for studies for states look into the possibility of providing more paid sick leave and for states to provide more family medical leave paid family medical leave. Justin up next our line for democrats. Caller ive had joshes with sick days but sometimes they wont let you take off the days whether theres people in the businesses that can cover you. But my thing is that if you have seven sick days and you take those seven sick days to save on vacations, to me it doesnt really make sense because if you actually know that youre going to get sick sometime within the year why use those seven sick days for a vacation when you can sit there and plan ahead the next year that you have some days that up those days that you can take vacation to a different town. But why go so far and take a week off i have had employers that employed me that i get sick and they wont let me take the time off. To actually get better. And they didnt require anybody to even get paid even if it was sick leave. Host so you were making this choice the president was talking about between going to work sick or staying home and not earning a paycheck . Caller i would rather go sick but i agree with the woman that its not a good idea to go to work sick. If you get other employees sick thats more people off. Its more money being taken away from other employees that are working that arent sick. But as far as the seven days go, actually having sick days, i would say its to me a waste of time because using it for a vacation and dont plan ahead for when you do get sick then its just a waste of time to me. Host all right. On our twitter page. Caller i wanted to call in. I work for a Large Company with over 1,000 employees. We work seven day as week year round and theres only 2 of the employees that we would consider habitual missers. And most people like myself take a great pride in our work. And feel we want to show up. So were only allowed two sick days a year. Only 2 are habitual missers and i dont feel it would matter how many days they would give us because were always there. Host one more call. Good morning. Caller good morning. Caller we bargain for this. This is the reason that a lot of companies moved out of moved out because of the union and their wages and benefits. So why are we bringing this up now . And seven days a year for sick leave for people working seven days a week is against osha to work seven days a week. Why bring it up now . Host some stats that just recently came out on Union Membership. It was actually cited in one of the lead editorials in todays wall street journal. Last year Union Membership fell to 11. 1 . Down from 11. 3 and continuing along term slide. Thats all the time we have in this sellingment to talk about paid sick leave but up next well talk about some of the other proposals from the state of the union, tax proposals. Jeb hence erling heres bait fom the interview thats going to air tomorrow. Last year you had a bill that would basically wind down all Government Support for the housing well, thats not true because the federal Housing Administration is still around so i would push back on your outside well, it has a pretty good footprint in the market so go ahead. So not replace them with a Government Back stop. Snelt however had a bipartisan bill that would replace fannie and freddie with a Government Backstop. Do you think this year that you would be more willing to move more in that direction than compromise with the Senate Version or are you planning to move forward with something similar . As you may recall, theres a change in management in the United States senate and i for one think thats a good thing. The American People do, too, since they overwhelmingly voted out harry reids obstructionist policies. So i think you would sigh a very Different Senate bill today. U i have strong beliefs about where Public Policy ought to go but i always stand ready to com before we get into the final details is this realistic for the president to push 320 billion in new tax revenues through a Republican Controlled Congress . The guest what the president is trying to do is put forward a statement of what he supports. And republicans i think will put forward their statement of what they support. Its not going to be easy to reach an agreement. I dont know that they will. If they do it will look significantly different from what the president is proposing right now. Host too ambitious . Not ambitious enough . Guest i think its what he needs to say at the time democrats need what to do to gain more support. This is designed to say whats the difference. From that its a real success. Host heres a bit from the president talking about several of the tax policies that he is pushing. Well show our viewers that. As americans we dont mind paying our fair share of taxes as long as everybody the else does, too. But for far too long lobbyists have rigged the tax code with loopholes to let some corporations pay nothing while others pay full freight. Theyve riddled it with give aways that the super rich dont need while denying a break to middle class families who do. This year we have an opportunity to change that. Lets close loopholes so we stop Rewarding Companies that keep profits abroad and ry ward those that invest here in america. Lets use those savings to rebuild our infrastructure and make it more attractive for companies to bring jobs home. Lets simplify the stms and let a Small Business owner file based on her actual Bank Statements instead of the number of accountsents she can afford. And close the loopholes allowing the top 1 to pay taxes. We can use that to pay for child care and help send kids to college. We need a tax code that truly helps working americans trying to get a leg up in the new economy and we can achieve that together. Host talking about closing loopholes and alen talk about what the trust Fund Loophole is. This is one the president see as lot of potential hiveragetsdz what he is referring to is Capital Gains and a bit of political rhetoric maybe similar to the republican use of the term death tax. Its true if you have an asset that goes up and never sell it while youre alive and then at death theres a cap dal gain that has occurred know tax is paid on that either by you or by your heirs. What the president is proposing is that gain actually be taxed when you die. The truth is that could be a reasonable step if it was part of a comp hencive reform that did not raise the overall tax burden on savings. For example, you could maybe change that provision and also cut the Capital Gains rate or cut the Corporate Income tax which is the most destructive thing we have. What the president is doing is in a different context chaking that provision while raising the rate and not lowering the overall Corporate Tax burden. In that context its part of a package that is harmful to Economic Growth. But in a different context changing that specific provision would make sense. Theres no reason why it would have been taxed if you realized it while alive should escape tax just because you die. Host i want to give you a chance to respond. Guest i havent heard it called that before either. There has been general agreement for years that its one of the loopholes in the tax code that makes the least sense. You shouldnt be able to pass on Capital Gains entirely tax free. Heirs shouldnt be able to cash them in without paying a dime of tax. So i think taking on its own terms its incredibly welcomed that someone in a high profile position has recommended this. A lot of economists have been talking about it for years. I wouldnt want to overplay the negative impact on savings or investment. Something we can get into later. But in combination with what the president propodses to do, these two changes are going to go some way not all the way but some way towards reducing the disparity in the tax treatment of wages and Capital Gains. Thats a good thing. Host for the next 45 minutes or so were going to be talking with matt gardner. Hes the executive director there. American Enterprise Institute resident scholar has been on our program before. You can call in if you have questions or comments. He thinks about 110 can be raised on new fees tax too big to fail. Guest the idea is that you can levee a very low rate tax on the liabilities of a small number of the biggest Financial Institutions. The Obama Administration thinks this would apply to about 100 institutions. The idea ive heard a couple of rationizations for this but one is the too big to fail companies are deriving benefits and another is to discourage them from risky investments. Its not a bad idea. I prefer it to some of the other ideas weve heard for taxing the financial sector. Just last week Chris Van Hollen put forth a tax idea which would tax not every time you sell or buy a stock but an awful lot of financial transactions. And there are some concerns about that that may be arent as present with this approach. So what obama proposals to do is incremently more sensible. Guest i agree with a lot of that. I think the tax would not make sense and the on the other hand the fee the president is proposing on the large banks i can see the logic of it. Theres a question of how well its designed, how it will work. For example, in an ideal world you would base it not just on the size of liability but also look at how risky the investments are that the banks is making. A bank that is following conservative cautious policy and is not likely to end up that too big to fail ideally shouldnt pay the same tax than a bank pursuing a reckless policy. But theres more logic than Something Like a financial transaction. Host when you hit a 50 billion in assets what youre saying it would make more sense to do it by transactions and how theyre moving their transactions than simply whats in the bank account. Guest you would have a size criterion because it should only apply to the ones that are too big to fail. But then the size of the fee that you pay should not be ideally depend just on the amount of the liability but also should depend upon the riskness of your Investment Strategy as a bank. That would make the tax more complicated so i realize thats not something you can just easily do. Host were talking the president s tax proposals. Something hes been talking about for over a week now. Talking about this before the state of the union on the shows on the appearances around the country. Getting your questions and comments. Good morning. Caller good morning. I would like to explain why trickledown economics no longer works. When Ronald Reagan was president , Corporate Executives would hire American Workers. Today if you cut Corporate Taxes the rich Corporate Executive would expand their business and hire communist workers. Since Ronald Reagan has been president up to date filthy rich Corporate Executives have fired 7 million hardworking americans and hired 7 million communist workers. Thats why we have no jobs. Jobs dont go overseas. Corporate executives are 1020 hour americans and hire 12 hour communists. Thats what happened. They promote communism. Host i thought you were done there. Went to give math f matt a chance to respond. There has been not just those comments about president reagan but policies have been brought up this week in relation to the president s proposals. Guest sure. And its interesting because we talked about one half of what president obama had discussed. The other half is increasing the rate. And as obama himself and supporters have pointed out what he would do is take the top gains rate back up to where it was under president reagan. So a lot of people are pointing it out. In fact host the 28 . Guest yes. Its almost 24 and he would increase it to 28. So the first thing to recognize. The second thing is that unlike the case after 1986 when reagan was president the top rate was a lot higher. So 39. 6 theres still even if president obamas proposals are enacted a tax preference in place for Capital Gains between 28 and 39. 6 is a pretty big gap. Host and raising that rate to 28 , the white house estimates that 99 would br on the top 1 in the country, about 08 of those with incomes with 2 million or more. Guest that of course refers to the direct impact but we need to look at the broader impact. Capital accumulation is what drives long run Economic Growth which is beneficial for workers and all americans. You cant really just look at the direct impact. The president definitely has carefully tailored all the policies he has proposed to put the direct burden on people at the top. And its certainly redistributing program i think we can call it that. But there are costs to those policies that are felt more broadly by the population. I think those need to be considered. In response to the concerns that the caller raised about Corporate Investment in the United States, and i certainly share to see the desire to see investment in the United States rather than abroad. But cutting isnt exactly the way to do that because that is a tax on investment inside the United States. So if that rate remains as high as it is it does not make the United States an attractive place to invest. Host jeb hence erling who son our Newsmakers Program this week well show it in ilets entirety but talks about taxation is what he called the president s plan. Heres a bit from that which will air tomorrow at 10 00 a. M. Here on cspan. I know of no society that has ever taxed its way into prosperity and to growth. So again this is just an old democrat idea. Again, this is the politics of wealth redistribution. But weve got to create wealth before the president can redistribute it. And under obama nomics we continue to have the slowest weakest recovery in the post war era in struggling hardworking american taxpayers middle class families are suffering because of this. Their pay checks are smaller, Bank Accounts are smaller. It has failed. And this is just again a recycled chapter of obama nomics. It does not work. You cannot help the job seeker by punishing the job creator. And thats exactly what the president is trying to do and the president says i dont believe in trickle down economics. Well, he ought to believe in trickle down taxation. Because as he taxes these Financial Institutions ultimately that becomes a tax on hardworking american taxpayers prying to buy a car, a home, a line of credit to start their own Small Business and achief their version of the american dream. Its trickle down taxation. Host your response . Guest the starting point the idea that youve never seen a society that taxed its way to prosperity. Ive never seen a society thats been prossprut without taxing itself. The reason businesses flourish is theres an infrastructure so commerce can take place. Police protection, health care educated workforce. Without a tax system you will not have these things. So the idea that you cant tax yourself is at a basic level obviously false. In terms of redistribution, you know youre hearing that phrase a lot. The reality on the ground is that our tax system overall thats parted of what federal the federal government does. The federal tax revenues in turn are a part of our combined federal state and local revenues. When you factor all these in we are really not that progressive as a nation in terms of taxes. Were not redistributing ever much at off guest i would have to disagree partly with that. To look at how much redistribution is occurring you have to look at the taxes and the transfer payment and government payment benefit payments provided. So you can actually still be doing a substantial amount of redistribution when you consider the benefit payments being made. And thats exactly what the dgal Budget Office finds for example when looking at the federal tax of transfer system. The federal tax system as a whole is progressive when you include payroll taxes offset some of the progressive but not all. But then more important is the government benefits are being distributed disproportionately at the bottom as they should be and so if you look at how much inequality there is in income before the government gets involved when you just look at the Market Income with no taxes and no government benefit payments then compare that to the inequality that you see when the taxes and the benefit payments have been put into the picture the government reduces inequality by about a quarter. I dont know if thats a little or lot some may say we should do more, some less. But if we are going to have that discussion and make those decisions we have to start from knowing whats going on at this point. And we need to realize there is a significant amount of redistribution already being done much on the benefit side of the table. Host a conversation we can continue to have. Lots of callers waiting to talk. Robert. Good morning. Caller im a Small Business man trying to build my wealth. I do support a 5year Capital Gains beginning at five years recognizing that shortterm gains are nothing really but wages. You know at the present setup 12 months you can get Capital Gains. That doesnt make sense to me. I pay wages to workers. Tax on wages, their 12month income equivalent. And here somebody can invest. Make a shortterm gain and get a different tax rate. I also would like changes in a tax law to very high wages people millions of dollars a year. I recognize that as business profits not wages. They are bypassing the business tax by paying these high wages to employees. Im thinking of glaring example are the Hedge Fund Managers where they make incredible billion dollars a year wages and theyre taxed at a capital gain rate but they are employeings of a business. It just make any sense to me a Small Business man whats going on. Host lets let matt respond. Guest its interesting that you mentioned the hedget fund because to me one of the most instructive elements of the Capital Gains debate is looking at carried interest. The interesting question is when you have a tax preference, when you draw these lines in the tax code between Capital Gains which are taxed at a lower rate and other forms of income which are taxed at a higher rate what are you doing . Well, one argument is that youre encouraging people to realize more Capital Gains. Another is that youre just encouraging people to figure out ways to changing their other income into Capital Gains. And thats what you see with the Hedge Fund Carried Interest this income form they have is being characaterized as Capital Gains and a lot of people think it shouldnt be. So yeah, i mean, i think thats a real troublesome element in Capital Gains tax breaks for everyone who is realizing more Capital Gains as a result of the incentive somebody else is trying to game the system. And thats not what any of us want to see. Guest well, there is some ability to manipulate but the carry issue is much more complicated. The hedge fund does have Capital Gains income so thats not being converted into or out of anything. Its a question of how that Capital Gains income which the Hedge Fund Partnership is generating is then allocated along the different partners. The managers on the one hand and the investors on the other. And what the carried interest arrangement allows is for that to be allocated to the managers. Theres some tax savings there because the managers can benefit from the lower rate in a way that some of the tax exempt Pension Fund Investors couldnt. But its not abusive because the managers are genuinely bearing the risk of whether that materializes or not. And its their efforts and work that generate the capital gain and its a reward and incentive for the efforts that they have made. So i dont think allocating that income to the managers instead of to the investing partners is something thats abusive. Host as were going through the conversation should point viewers to your website. Alan at aei. Org. E resident scholar and the institute on taxation and Economic Policy is itep net. Org if you want to follow along. Lets go to michael waiting in florida. Good morning. Caller good morning. First off, i really appreciate cspan. Im a regular listener. I am a bit surprised, though that my first call would be to chastise the american Enterprise Institute because as a libertarian and a supporter of Free Enterprise i appreciate the organization. But it seemed like at the beginning of your introduction you sort of admitted that perhaps the death tax should be changed. And i would like to point out that when you buy a stock and it goes up sometimes quite a bit of that is just a matter of inflation. So when youre taxed on it then youre being double taxed. I will listen to your comment. Thank you. Guest i think thats a separate issue. The fact that some of these gains are inflationary are a very real problem and theres a whole set of issues surrounding capital gain taxation. I think i made clear and i want to make clear again that i dont think we should be increasing the overall tax burden on saving and investment. It is a fact that is an irrational feature that whether or not you get taxed depends on whether you sell the stosm the day before you die or whether its still in your hands the day you do die. Host i might point viewers toward your recent piece on cnn. Com. Brians up next from michigan. Caller good morning. I just had to point out that this economy has created almost 11 million jobs in the last 6 years. The stock market better than doubled. If theres anything wrong with this economy its the fact that youre not giving a living wage to people working. These are the makers not the takers. Youre not paying them well enough. Thank you. Host we heard from the viewer and jeb. Well i think credit can be widely distributed. In fact while there is clearly more prosperity in the economy now than there has been a number of years middle class families are not feeling that. Thats a message that has been conveyed for a number of years right now. One of the more admirable things in unifying themes i guess in what the president has proposed to deal with that is if you look at these tax can you tell us that he is proposing what they share in common is that theyre hoping middle class families to get ahead. You cant characaterize them as handouts. These are work related tax breaks. The earned income tax credit which increases the rewards to work. The child and dependent care credit which make it easier for two earner couples to get that second earner in the workforce. And of course education tax for crets which are making it easier for middle class families who wouldnt be able to send their kids to college to do so. These are all tax breaks that are clearly designed to get middle class families further up the economic ladder. So i think that goes right to the heart of what the caller has correctly identified as a real problem. Host several of those tax breaks the president talked about in his effort aimed at the middle class. We can go through those in our last half hour as well here on the washington journal with our two tax policy experts. On our line for republicans. Good morning. Caller my question was doesnt our trade policies and stuff with nafta and gat those agreement that is were done by both parties and they both agreed to that and businesses were sold on that idea that this was going to be good for all of us as workers corporations all of us . And this was supposed to translate into more jobs. We were higher wages. Weve seen our wages stag nate. We have seen corporates. You know, big corporations making profits through the rough because they shipped all the jobs over there, ship it back in, and have some of these straight policies and stuff that both parties have put us in. Not come to fruition the way they have. Wouldnt we all have the better life going right now . There would be more taxes generated here in the United States. And we may not be even having this discussion right now. Host fument to respond. Guest i think the caller raises good concerns about thing that is have happened in the United States. I think the link that he is drawing that is not one that can be established. We know that inequality is increasing around the developed world and i think thats an issue that needs to be confronted. But the idea that were going to address that by closing ourselves off from the rest of the world would really be counter productive. That type of isolationism is economically destructive and has never yielded the kind of results that the caller would expect from it. Host tom is next. Jim on our line. Caller good morning. I want to rant and rave so give me a few minutes. Host go ahead. Caller lets go back to eisenhower. Good republican president. O no question about it. Fast forward to Ronald Reagan. The biggest debt in the history of the country peacetime president. George bush the father comes in. Follows trickle down economics. What happens . The same thing. Bill clinton comes in office. Even the republican says he cant get rid of the deficit. He does it in six years. Terrific president. So when you look at the history of the country and then when george bush the son destroyed the country in eight years. Its a national disgraze what they did to this country. Trillions of dollars in debt. Obama comes into office saves the country. Give the guy credit. Mitch mcconnell said what he is going to do . Make sure he is the a oneterm president. He is not going to do nothing to help this guy. Host take the long view for us on the history here and tax policy. Guest sure. Well, the caller raises a couple of interesting points. One of which is that across republican, across democratic administrations for the pat quarter century really no one has taken the steps needed to restore our budget to longterm fiscal balance. Over the long haul we still face very troubling questions. Not over the next five years so much. I think the pictures looks better in the long run. But we still have hard questions to answer about how were going to pay for all the public investments the public has indicated they want and congress has indicated they want to provide. Now, in that setting the sepsible question is if youre going to do the heavy lifting of raising the 300 billion over ten years that he has said you can get from Capital Gains and this financial fee what fraction of that does it then make sense to plow into tax cuts . You know the answer is clearly not all of it. We need new revenues just to balance things in the long run. Host in his proposals the numbers we heard so far more than 200 billion of that would be plowed into some of these proposals. Guest and some used for new spending programs. Matt made a good point. This is a serious problem. It is a long run issue. Its not the next 5 years that we need to worry about but the next 25 or 50 years and weve got a big imbalance. Its a longstanding problem. Theres been decisions by republicans and democrats that have contributed to it. Ultimately were going to need to i think turn to both tax cuts and tax increases to resolve it. It wont be possible to do it on one side only. A mixture of both. But we realize need to realize is that raising taxes just on the top 1 is not going to be sufficient. We can debate all day is it good or bad to raise taxes on that group. It may depend on how you do it. But one thing we can absolutely agree on is its not going to be sufficient. Were going to have to you have broader based entitlement cuts and tax increases to close the serious gap were facing. Host florida, karen good morning. Caller simple question. Im in florida and we have no state tax. We have the minimum wage has stayed at 7. 25 and no one can support a family on 7. 25. So i am not a political person so im going to ask you guys how you go about they actually make you have to go ahead and quote unquote get an entitlement . Otherwise you have a lousy school, which we have. Because they dont want to put taxes in. State taxes. Because they want to make sure that all the retirees come down here. So any suggestions . Host gentlemen . Guest just as a clarification. I think while theres a perception of florida has no state taxes in fact theyve got a lot. The state has among the higher sales taxes in the nation, property taxes are fairly high. My organization just released a report that identified them as having higher taxes on poor people than most states. So i would offer that clarification. Its not all about income taxes when you dont have an income tax florida has managed to get by without one for the reason it is caller identified. Youre going somewhere else but youre still raising substantial revenue. Host tax policies in states from your organization is the document youre talking about who pays distribution analysis of the tax system in all 50 states something you can get at itep net. Org. Guest i think the caller expresses concern about Public Education which is a very important issue. One of the things we need to realize is that in the difficult budgetary bath that were tacing there is a tradeoff and if we allow entitlements to go that crowds out other types of spending including education, infrastructure, and so forth. So unless were prepared to reassess the entitlement programs and also reassess our revenues then its difficult to do some of these other things that people are understandably concerned about. Host diane in kansas. Caller good morning. I am also a big fan of cspan. Community College Proposal by the president for a Free Community college the first two years. I was really interested in this because my granddaughter is going to be starting school and Community College. And it cost as little over 100 a credit hour. So as im looking up all this stuff i end up on this i. R. S. Page called the American Opportunity tax credit. And i digs cover that American Opportunity tax credit is a credit for qualified education expenses paid for an eligible student for the first four years of higher education. You can get a maximum annual credit of 2,a 500 per eligible student if the credit brings the amount of tax yield to zero you can have 40 of any remaining amount of the credit up to 1,000 refunded to you. Im going well this is wonderful. Its already a law. Already you can get back 2500 per year at any school, community or it just says higher education. And so im wondering well this would only mean that my own granddaughter would be left with a 700 bill per year for going to school Community College State University whatever. And so im going well, this is already available. So why not just increase that by say 500 a year or whatever . Its available for i talked to about five people none had heard of this including my sisters daughter who just went to Community College. And didnt have this credit or didnt know about it. Host lets get a response from matt. The president talked about simplifying the tax code so more people take advantage of the tax breaks that are already in there specifically when it comes to college education. Guest thats right. The way i would describe it in two parts. One is some people have talked about hes taken back either repealing or reducing some education tax breaks, these 529 plans which go primarily to upper income families, and is shifting some of those resources towards middle and low income families towards expansion and making permanent the tax credit that the caller just mentioned. And this is good stuff broadly what he is doing is simplifying what everyone agrees is just a mess of different education tax incentives, pairing them down and making them more coherent and better targeted as well. So i think this is all very sensible stuff. Host and i will let you comment as well as we show the headline from this past week in the washington journal push the tax 529 plan debate. Guest so i think this is a complicated area. Its interesting that the 529 proposal is getting so much attention. Im not a fan of what the president is proposing to do but for a bit different reason than what some people are proposing. I believe that people shouldnt pay an extra layer of tax just because they save. And for an ideal world all savings would be tax free. So the plans are one of the many forms of tax free saving that we have today. They should be ration liesed into a couple different tax free ways to save or go all the way to a consumption tax but im disturbed when the president says lets eliminate this. On the other hand i do not think its a major threat to access to college. The president is proposing to expand the American Opportunity tax credit and other provisions so i think its a bit out of kilter to say that the president is going to make it more difficult to go to college. What he is doing is shutting down a tax free Savings Opportunities which ipping should be more widely available to build up our pool of savings. Host lets head to ken democrats. Caller what my proposal is although i dont much believe in the republicans flat tax theory but we do have a flat tax on fica. And what simply put that we use a flat tax for the income from everybody in this country. Were all in this together. And so we make a flat tax on a fica tax for everybody in this country. The very wealthiest to the very poorest. We use the tax for all of our social programs. By doing that we would probably be able to pay for all of our health care. And as the republicans are so fond of saying we are all in this together and a flat tax of this nature would reduce the taxes for the employers reduce the taxes for the poorest in this country and make the wealthiest pay their fair share sometime on at least part of our income. Host what do you think of that proposal . Guest i think as i mentioned before the baseline way of thinking about the fairness of our tax system is that contrary to the rhetoric you hear folks at all income levels are in fact paying substantial amount of tax right now. We dont have something dramatically different from a flat tax system over much of the Income Distribution right now when you count state and local taxes. The second thing i would note is the just that in the past five years if you look at where the Income Growth is and where the income is, its in the top of the Income Distribution. Any effort to pay for public investments by relying primarily on low and middle class families simply isnt that much income there. So i think one good thing about what the president s Capital Gains proposals would do is theyre identifying an area of inequity where in fact were not taxing people in the same way. Were providing a loophole that is simply not available to low income americans the Capital Gains tax breaks and mitigating those. I think thats a sensible place to start before moving to a new structure. Guest i think the caller makes some good points. Im not sure how the flat tax that he is talking about is supposed to work so im not sure we can iron out those details right here and whether the tax code should be flalt or not is another matter. But the important point is caller is making is that if were going to have these social programs were not going to be able to pay for them exclusively by taxing a narrow group of people. So we cant just do the taxes on the top 1 for example. Obviously the top will be paying part 069 costs and should be paying part of the costs but budgetary arithmetic just tells us we have to reach more broadly than that. If we have programs put forward that were only willing to tax the top 1 for where 99 isnt willing to pay that may be a signal that we shouldnt be pursuing those programs. All of the successful established social programs that we have such as Social Security and medicare are based upon taxing a broad group of the Population Based on their ability to pay but not exclusively focusing taxes on the top 1 . Host weve got about 15 minutes left if we want to come up with a tax reform proposal this morning. Tulsa, oklahoma line for republicans. Good morning. Caller any discussion on taxes and cogs of government the president brought up Climate Change did not talk about cost of all the proposals for dealing with Global Warming Climate Change and this is really a hidden tax so far publics not recognizing it because no one is talking about it. Talk about percent of Capital Gains and things of that nature. But the cost of energy, some estimates say 2,000 to 23,000 per family per year for Global Warming Climate Change issues. And this is basically a hidden tax. The president said that electrical rates under his policy are necessarily going to skyrocket. There is some of that going on that will be felt. But i would like the panel to talk a little bit about all the hidden taxes and all the hidden fees and the costs on families associated with policies that take their income down their standard of living down obamacare, and the carbon issue are two of the major issues. Host well start with you. Guest yes. I think that we always have to look at the hidden costs as well as the costs open. The best taxes are the ones visible, transparent, that we can see and make an informed decision on whether we want them or not. As we deal with global Climate Change we have to be conscious of the costs involved. And theres often a tendency to say, well, we just its a moral gpertive that we solve this and we dont really care how we do it. And even if its costly, even if its inefficient and ends up being ineffective. What we could we need International Cooperation and we need to do it through a marketbased. It means democrats will have to abandon some of the approaches but also means republicans will need to abandon their opposition to carbon tax or cap and trade mechanism that operates similarly to a carbon tax. Host how do you look at this . Guest the caller raises an interesting point. Alen mentioned there are certain things that are notable for their absence in obamas tax plans. One of them obviously is a carbon tax the other is a gas tax. I think theres more and more acceptance in our future. It seems likely that in fact were going to have something resembling a carbon tax at some point. But on that front i think the thing that youre seeing a little more bipartisan support on right now is a gas tax increase and while from a fairness perspective from a progressivity perspective thats not the first place you would go. We havent hiked our gas tax in 20 years. What congress is doing right now is not theyre going to Fund Transportation either way. Theyre funding these infrastructure needs right now. Instead of paying for it in a visible way as the caller alluded to theyre paying for it in underhanded ways through this pension smoothing thing where you borrow from the future and from using general fund revenue to pay for highways. So thats an unspoken thing that i think congress is going to have to deal with. Guest i agree with that. Thats really a shameless budget gimmick. We dont have the time to elaborate but its a way to pretend the got is bringing in money when its not. Were spending a certain amount of money on highways. Highways should be paid for by drivers and motorists. Therefore we need to raise the tax or find some other way to tax motorists such as miles taxes. We cant continue to rely on general revenue and certainly not gimmicks like pension smoothing. Host probably wont be the last time we talk about it here. Mark tennessee. Youre up next. Caller i appreciate that. What i wanted to say the lady earlier brought up the issue of free schools for the first two years Community College. I would like to point out and i dont know how many people know this but caller what does the president pay for taxes when he takes his trip . I have a company car but i have to pay for that company car. Thats considered a benefit and im taxed on that. What does the president pay . Every time he takes a trip to go somewhere and its all for fund raising. Two hours maybe talking to High School Students and the rest of the time is fund raising. Who is paying for that . Im paying for that. The American People are paying for that. Host concerns there with the president tial travel . If you want to talk about what the president pays in taxes. Guest the interesting thing about president obama and i dont want to spend too much time on particular individuals. Its a broader concern obviously. But more so than some of the high profile individuals like warren buffet weve seen tax returns on. Because president obamas income is primarily from the job he has and from book royalties that income tends to be taxed at regular rates. The high profile examples of tax avoidance mitt romney for example the headline there when he ran was he paid 14 and that had a lot to do with Capital Gains tax preferences. Wearnl buffet the famous example where he himself pointed out that he paid a lower tax rate than his secretary. These are different kinds of income profiles dominated by the Capital Gains and dividend. So i dont think youre seeing that. Host its important to keep in mind going back to the question of visible taxes versus ones that are not visible is that on corporate tox is net of Corporate Income tax collected at the Company Level so its misleading to look only at the taxes being paid by the individual and exclude the taxes that theyve already indirectly paid in a less visible way at the corporate level. When you include those it looks more even. Host coming back. One thing i want to touch on is his proposal on increasing the child care tax credit. This was a topic that 60 minutes asked how Speaker John Boehner about. They released some parts of that interview already. Heres sbarne talking about Speaker Boehner. Finally, dead or alive tripling the child care tax credit for working families. Were all for helping working class families around america. I think well take a look at this when he sends his budget up. Something that could be looked at tht overall context of simplifying our tax code and bringing rates down for everyone. Possible area of compromise here between the democrats here and republicans. Guest certainly some we would look at. Host an area of compromise. Guest i hope so. I think the child care tax credit is sensible. Child care is a cost of working. Its a fundamental principle of policy that if youre taxed on the income that you get from working you should be able to deduct the cost of ing that income. Jorte wise its double taxation. The logic of saying a business should be able to deduct its business expenses from the money it brings in and be taxed only on its net profit. It relies here to the child care credit is rather stingy today the dollar caps havent been adjusted for inflation. We havent changed in more than a decade. Its long past time to raise the child care credit. I was very encouraged to see president obama propose that and im encouraged. Guest absolutely. Child care is a real expense. The fact that he is emphasizing this it goes to the heart of this idea that the tax cuts the president is proposing you know they clearly sat down and asked what are the challenges middle class families face in moving forward and earning more money and getting ahead . One of them is the cost of getting that second earner in the workplace and the cost ace sosheyated with that. Its a great plan. Host one or two more calls. Thanks for waiting. Caller good morning. My question is basically for Capital Gains. Ive noticed how everyone fights for they always say they want to tax Capital Gains at the same income level but then say its class warfare but the majority of middle class people have regular savings accounts and whatever interest we earn on those savings accounts is taxed at regular income. So why are we fighting so hard for the Capital Gains to not be taxed at the same rate of income when the majority of middle class is is paying regular income tax on the interest on savings accounts . Guest historically one of the interesting things is that for much of the past 80, 90 years we always had a tax preference of some kind for Capital Gains. Does that reflect an open and shut case that it must be lower or does it reflect the fact that the very wealthy individuals who enjoy the vast majority of Capital Gains are more politically connected more able to get the ear of lawmakers . I dont think middle class families with the small amount of i want rest they earn are an especially high profile lobby on capitol hill. Guest if we were starting with a good system from tax we would treat it the same. But that would involve a whole host of other changes. We should move to a system where all savings is tax free no matter what the form ends up taking. You could do that with various types of consumption taxes that could still be progressive. But based on what people consume and dont put a penalty on saving. Now starting from where we are today why do we have a tax break for Capital Gains . We only tax Capital Gains when you sell the asset or under the president s proposal when you die. So if you tax it at too high a rate theres an incentive to hold on longer. So theres a limit on how high you can push the rate before revenues begin to increase very slowly or possibly even decline. So starting from the system were at there are some logical reasons for why Capital Gains should be treated differently than other types of income from saving. An ideal world would have all savings. This wouldnt be the end but if you want to read more. Thank you both so much for your time. Up next well talk with the Washington Post about todays gathering of some of the top names at the Freedom Summit in des moines, iowa and later well be joined by steve king. Host were joined now by robert costa, attending the Freedom Summit in iowa thats taking place today. Steve kings Freedom Summit. This event being called the kickoff to the 2016 president ial contest. Do you agree with that . If it is who has the most to gain today . Guest you certainly feel it in the air. This is the kickoff to 2016. All the candidates there, their aides, surrogates, associates, donors, have been congregating, talking through the race, who is up, down. Because jeb bush and mitt romney are not attending this is an opportunity for some of those secondtier candidates percolating around the race, Rick Santorum, scott walker, people are going to try to step out today and make a little bit of a splash. It being so early in the president ial contest, is there any way somebody can stumble today . Is there somebody who has the most to lose today . Guest theres 200 reporters who are can he dentialed for this event. You only have 515 minutes depending on who you are to speak. Theres a potential to be overshadowed if you have a gap of sorts. Inet interesting who is going to make the news. Sara palin came in last night and talked about her potential interest. So if she starts to get some momentum today in terms of her interest in a run could overshadow some of the others. I think youre going to see reporters paying attention to comments on social issues, marriage abrgs. These have been big issues. And also on radical terrorism and whats been happening in europe. Host you talk about sara palin. Heres a quote that she gave to abc news in las vegas. Sara palin just one of those at the Freedom Summit today. Robert costa is taking your calls and questions for about the next 45 minutes or so. So you can go ahead and start calling in. Well later in the program be showing you some live shots from that event as attendees start to gather this morning. Bob, ive got to ask you about this tweet that you sent out talking about perhaps some intel you picked up at the marriott as you were getting ready for this event out there in des moines. Guest the thing to understand about the caucus is des moines isnt that big of a city and the mare yot downtown is the watering hole, it is the hot spot if youre a politico, a journalist a president ial candidate you meet in this marriott bar, it was the place in 2012. So far 2016 it seems to be the place again in this race. And you had Newt Gingrich there, Rick Santorum wearing an air force one jacket from the reagan lay bri sara palin coming in. Chuck lautner who helped san tax reform in 2012. The former senator jim demint. It an allstar cast if you want to call it that of the conservative right. It was those heroes of the grassroots activists. And they knew this marriott lobby is where reporters are and its a place to get some attention. I spoke to governor palin for example last night and i asked her to clarify her position after she gave abc news that interview on thursday and she said yes she is seriously considering a bid. Shes not in any way ramping up her National Political operation but she wants to be in the conversation. The other intel is rick san tax reform is moving forward with a campaign. He thinks hes in a better position now than he started in 2012. He will have a better financial network, more organized in the state. He thinks his message, he just came out with a book called blue collar conservative resonates with the party. And the other thing i kept picking up last night and i think were going to hear a lot today is republicans are really interested in the idea of more firmly and forcefully addressing terrorism in europe and the middle east and talking about Foreign Policy. It is a hawkish impulse that youre going to hear today from these speakers who want to go after it in a different way than the administration has. Host and as you pointed out some of the news who is not there. Jeb bush, mitt romney not expected today. Jeb bush was at an event in San Francisco yesterday and he was talking about his meeting earlier this week with mitt romney. Heres a bit from that interview. And well come back and talk to robert costa about it. I understand that you and mitt had a very secret meeting last week. Not so secret. Just they cant hear you. Just between the two of us, can you tell us me what you guys talked about . So it was yesterday. And i went to visit governor romney. I have enormous respect for him. The meeting was set up three months ago under slightly different circumstances i guess. And i was happy to be able to continue to have the meeting. We talked about the patriots, we talked a little bit about politics not as much as you might imagine. We talked about the future of the country. We talked about a need for a more engaged Foreign Policy where the United States accepts world power status because it brings peace and stability in the world. And when we pull back and consider ourselves to be a problem in the world, it creates real problems for us and the American People. And the rest of the world. So we talked a lot about Foreign Policy. We share a very similar view about that. Im actually more interested in policy so we talked about that and he shared his views. It was a good conversation. I respect him a lot and i consider him a friend. The awkward side about this running and stuff we put aside. Thats a decision he will make and i will have my path for decision and who knows where that will lead. Host your take on those comments from jeb bush and thoughts about whether one run or do both run in 2016 . Yea is certainly the center of the political world today on saturday. But the stand on friday was San Francisco. And what what we saw from governor bush was more comfortable stepping out. He is developping a message on domestic policy and on Foreign Policy. A lot of people thought bush was going to be rusty. He hasnt really been a player during the obama era in terms of republican politics. But he really over the last few months has not only developed a fund raising network that is setting him apart but his comfort, his ease with talking through a lot of the issues and being on the stage. It is really causing some ripples in this early part of the 2016 race. I think because bush has spur prized so many people by moving so quickly and also not really flailing out of the start. For having a solid start to his potential campaign that forced romney to move into the space and start to declare his possible interest in a bid. When i spoke to romney advisers three to four years ago, they said he wanted to wait to see how the field develops to sit on the sidelines and then potentially jumped in. But when bush showed he could raise money and get ahead, romney few if he wented to be in the mix for 2016 he needed to send his own signal which is what he did with that private meeting with donors and at the Committee Meeting and elsewhere. It looks very much like governor bush is going to run and see the people close to governor romney he wants to run. But he has not yet gotten to the bush stage in terms of organizing a pac and putting the team together. So romney advisers did meet in boston on friday, yesterday as all the stuff was happening in iowa and bush was in San Francisco. So i wouldnt rule romney out yet according to what im hearing. Host well be taking viewer calls and questions for about the next half hour or so but you can continue to call in throughout the rest of the show. Well be talking about this gathering in des moines. I should point viewers to one of your pieces from january 16 in which you talk about a lot of these issues. If viewers wrant to go to the Washington Post for that. But well start on the phone. Scott, florida good morning. Caller good morning. There were a couple more names. How about is rand paul going to show up . And the other guy senator rubio. Host rand paul and marco rubio. Guest both senator paul and senator rubio will not be here in des moines. That doesnt mean theyre not making their own moves toward 2016. Rubio is on a book tour right now talking to his donors in the next few days and putting out every kind of signal that he wants to run. He is not deterred by his political mentor jeb bush getting in. I believe because of his roots blue collar appeal, immigration, Foreign Policy, he could present an alternative who is ready to go should an establishment favorite bush or romney stumble. Paul just hired a Campaign Manager, hiring more staff across the early stage. And his argument is a little different not traditional establishment type but his Campaign Manager, chip who ran bruce rounders campaign. And his case he wants to make is that he can expand the republican electorate should he be the republican nominee. That he can win in plu states. And he can also appeal to young people because of his nonintervention and libertarian views. So theyre definitely out there and running hard even if its unofficially. Host of course also this story on that recent story on pauls Campaign Manager some of his background as well from the january 2013 edition. Bobs up next, jacksonville, florida. Good morning. Caller good morning. Heres what i think about this thing in iowa. Thats really a bridge candidate. The real candidates that stand a chance are the ones being with the coke brothers. But whats happening there and ive heard real strong rumor that i believe is that the Koch Brothers the ones meeting with him today is going to finance every one of them big time. But the one that gets on the ballot is going to have to select one of the other candidates as their his Vice President running mate. So that makes a lot of sense the fact that he is going to spend so much money on all the candidates that he will have both of his candidates in the race at the same time. Whats your take about that . Host wanting to know about the Koch Brothers. Guest ill take the latter part of the question first. They are meeting with their donors this weekend. They are gathering a lot of their top people and theyre going to be listening to some candidates. For example, Governor Walker of wisconsin is going to be here in iowa and also at the meetic. And you see the Koch Brothers frustrated. Their whole political operation from what happened in 2012. Theyre mulling right now how are they going to get heavily involved behind one candidate or a few candidates. These are in. When you talk to people close to the brothers, the situation is fluid. They want a major role to play. On the iowa question, there is a lot of discussion in political circles about whether iowa should have the importance it has as the home of the first caucus. When you look at these drop low straw poll, Michele Bachmann wanted in 2011, and did not do well in the caucuses. The last 2 winners, my copy and senator santorum Mike Huckabee and senator santorum did not do well. Are they fully reflective of the republican electoral at large . People in washington, republican strategist, point to New Hampshire as the first primary it is more reflective of who the nominee will eventually be. In iowa, people are proud of the history. They like bringing these candidates in, and do not want to give up their tradition of being a place where candidates come to test their politics and prove themselves as national contenders. Host the unofficial start at the iowa Freedom Summit. We will be talking about it and our last hour. At 10 a. M. , we will be live from the Freedom Summit that is taking place in downtown des moines. Nancy in fort lauderdale, florida. You are on with robert costa. Caller my question is about sarah palin. Since, back in 2008, she was successful for her election, what does she have to do different to secure a spot . I see she has to do Something Different and my second question is, the last how is the last election she ran for a than 2016 . Guest i was with her last night. Had a brief interview with her. In the week ahead of this Freedom Summit, governor palin upcoming speech was not highly touted, not advertised in a way that was similar to the 2016 candidate. They werent paying attention to her remarks, because no one thought she would be in the 2016 mix. In terms of her National Political capital, it has not been the same since she was on the ticket in 2008. Even know she has had successful endorsements. When she gave that interview to abc news in las vegas on thursday, and she talked to Washington Post yesterday it is a signal from governor palin that, though she may not run she wants to make sure she is not forgotten. She wants to be a Political Force in 2016. That she is not simply just doing her side endeavors in the private sector. That will be interesting to see how far does she go to talk about a possible run and be a part again in republican politics. One other thing, the caller brings up a good point. If governor palin wants to step back into the arena, she has to show where she is in policy Foreign Policy, domestic policy. We have not heard a lot from her in the last few months. Host governor palin on the schedule today, along with ted cruz, Chris Christie, Mike Huckabee, rick huckabee, donald trump, governor rick perry Governor Scott walker. A full set of speakers including dr. Benjamin carson. Troy in houston, texas. Our live for republicans. Good morning. Caller thank you for your time. I wanted to ask if you had any idea about how will the republican establishment deal with the inevitable fact that the vast majority of actual Republican Voters and independents who vote for republicans over Hillary Clinton or whoever the democrats put up, their main concern is the rise of the police state and the lack of freedom and increased taxation and government regulation. If all the establishment candidates are for increased regularization how will they try to control the voters in this situation . Guest it is an interesting internal debate in the Republican Party. The influence of rand paul, who talks about the over militarization of Police Forces and the unnecessary way some Police Forces act in bringing in equipment and tons of personnel for crisis situations. This has not shifted the party at large yet. We do see an influence from senator paul, in the sense that governor christie, other governors are talking about things like prison reform, drug addiction reform, changing the drug laws. There is that libertarian strain that is dripping into the republican conversations at the national level. You still see republicans, one of their traditional stances on policing is to be with the police and to have a law and order view of politics. I do not see that being a major part of the conversation. Not today, or in the coming campaign. Because of what happened in the last year any different communities, new york, missouri, is something that voters are aware of and that they will have to address. Host phone lines are open are we talking with as we are talking with robert cost of costa. He is joining us from the suburbs of des moines. Lets go to lee in indiana. Our line from democrats. Caller this meeting in iowa wont that be just, who can hate obama the most . Unemployment is looking good. The country is going good. Nobody is getting killed. On foreign soil. Obama gets no credit. I dont agree with everything he does, but shouldnt we look at this meeting in iowa as, who can hate obama the most . The republicans get their marching orders from limbaugh anyway, so it wouldnt make a difference from what they say. Guest sir i think we will have to listen very closely to what these candidates have to say. At these past events, when you hear from conservative activists and candidates, there has been criticism of the president. Now, when you talk to these advisers in iowa working for potential candidates, you get the sense that they believe we are entering the postobama era. The challenge is to define what that means for the party and for each of these individual candidates. What does that mean on income inequality, Foreign Policy, what you will see is candidates start to define how they will try to move the party ahead. It wants to be back in the National Political game. They swept the midterms, but in terms of the white house, they are trying to bigger out how to get to the the 270 you need in delightful college. Electoral college. I expect criticism of foreign and Foreign Policy. Maybe on domestic policy, you might hear a different tone. I think that is a response to what senator warren has been saying. Republicans know you need to do a better job of reaching out to the poor and the middle class voters. Marianne in new york on our republican line. Caller thank you for taking my call. I think we have had enough of the bushes. You look at their records, and i think george junior should be up for criminal charges for going into iraq. Also palin, if she is running for president she should just give money to the poor. Host which republican would you support in 2016 . Caller i heard the name ben carson. He is not a washington man. He has good common sense family values that each and every person ought to listen to. Host dr. Ben carson was on this program this week, talking about a potential president ial bid. He is the subject of a story in the wall street journal today. An outside arises in the 2016 gop field. Your thoughts on ben carson. Guest i sat down with ben carsons top advisers this past week. The sense i got is that he is moving quickly towards 2016. He has raised a lot of money. They believe that, just like the last caller, there is an appetite in the republican electorate for an outsider who does not have a Famous Family name. Who has not been around in republican politics for years. You have a maryland neurosurgeon who makes frequent appearances on fox news. He is a very popular public speaker. Has been for years a motivational speaker. This entire package is appealing to those frustrated with washington. When you are on the ground in iowa, you since momentum or carson. I am not saying he will win the straw poll or caucus, not in terms of enthusiasm, carson has it. Host the caucus on february 1. A year from now. Carson said he would make a decision whether or not to run by may 1. You think it will be sooner . Guest he may not formally declare until may, but he is doing Everything Possible to get ready. He has activists on the ground, people in other early states. He will be coming out with another book this spring. What makes carson different, instead of coming out with a political manifesto, he is coming out with a guidebook for teenagers. He is not afraid to talk about morality. Which is very conservative point of view. It is almost hardline. That brings tears from conservatives who like to see people speak from the culturae. Especially when they see people at the leadership level talk about poverty, Foreign Policy not so much on the social issues. If you are Rick Santorum or of my company, you are trying to be the iowa champion as your springboard for the national campaign, you have to Pay Attention to carson. He is eating into that block of voters. Host independent line. Good morning. Caller i feel like any other candidates any of these candidates i would never vote for them. I am leaning towards the left, but feel like the Koch Brothers cancel all their money to these candidates, but they would never win an election. Host who would you support . Caller i have not made up my mind. I am tired of the election process. I object to the fact that there are people out there that are going to be turning throwing money at these people who will never win a general election. Host comment on the link of the lenght of the president ial campaign. Guest it is going to be a marathon. It starts today. It will get bigger and bigger. I understand that the caller is angry about these candidates in that she feels it is starting to early. What makes this race compelling is, there is not a front runner. Jeb bush and mitt romney they have establishment support and are wellknown. There is no one who is playing the role romney played last time. Maybe bush will become that, but the cut there is a vacuum of power, you have been carson john bolton, john gilmore, sarah palin talking about considering a bid. Governor pence of indiana. Governor scott walker, rand paul, ted cruz, i could go on. The list is long of ambitious republicans who may jump into this race. Some of them are starting early because they need to raise money. They are starting early because if you do not have money momentum will not carry through. What happened to Rick Santorum, he was able to win on grassroots support. It was not enough to go up against the romney machine. When i talk to activists last night, they look at the santorum experience and because they did not have the money, they got crippled late in the game. They do not want that to happen again. Host we have about 15 minutes left. Christopher in buffalo, new york. Emma kratz line. Democrats line. Caller i would like to say that i wish the republicans would not be so hypocritical by complaining about the debt that we are leaving on the next generation. When they refused to start paying off that debt. They refused to raise taxes and any tax. Show me how you pay off the debt when every tax policy you propose has to be tax neutral . What ever you take all one and give back to the other, how do you pay off the debt if none of the money goes for the debt . Host pick up that point, what do you spec to hear on taxation and debt taxation and debt . Guest republican orthodoxy on taxes does not seem to be changing. That message about low taxes not budging on revenue, you are not hearing anything about any potential candidate different than that. The blue state people, Chris Christie had dinner with grover norquist, that shows you that people who are centerright are not budging with taxes. This is because republicanbased voters are not like the caller. When you talk to them they want to see taxes cut. There is a reluctance within the party on a grand bargain to not deal on revenue. In recent times, i interviewed paul ryan, he said he is not willing to raise taxes. When you see Speaker Boehner talk about tax reform, maybe they talk about changing revenue here or there. No one wants to raise revenue by new taxation. That is preventing the Republican Party from reaching the grand bargain with the democrats. Republicans expect that. You dont see the party changing. That is ingrained in republican thinking. Host that Freedom Summit beginning in 40 minutes. Live images from inside the hall where that Freedom Summit is taking place this morning. Bill is up in pennsylvania. Line for republicans. Caller i like your thinking. Santorum will not go anywhere. He is talking about religion and abortion. Who cares about that . That is personal stuff. If we keep playing with this religion, they aint going to go nowhere. I will give you a couple of things to tell them. The first thing you have to do is abolish the Internal Revenue for a flat tax. The lobbyists, that is the problem we have in this country. Democrats and republicans, the lobbyists will know go nowhere. Guest Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum, and others will be unapologetic about their social conservatism, and they will comment on the recent abortion debate in congress. On samesex marriage coming up before the supreme court. Just talking about social issues is not the path to a National General election campaign. Santorum spoke to me last night about how he wants to talk about lou caller issues. Bluecollar issues. Reviving the economies, through lower taxes for some corporations and working people. He wants to show that the Republican Party can connect better through engagement. He will be traveling to the states in the coming months. With santorum, an ardent culture warrior, and a deeply conservative person on the social issues, he knows he needs to have a balance if he wants to be a fullfledged national candidate. Huckabee is the same. He is known as a preacher and a pastor who has been long involved in the evangelical community, but he will also talk about Foreign Policy, and income inequality. Host mike on our line for independents. Caller James Madison once said that no nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare. I believe that the Republican Party is a stupid party. Maybe they are smarter than James Madison. Can you reconcile, other than rand paul, most of the republican candidates hawkish position of favoring continual warfare and the simultaneous warfare on the constitution . Host if you want to do madison statement or talk about the role of Foreign Policy in this upcoming campaign. Guest as a reporter, i can tell you what i am hearing from these candidates and their campaigns and leaders in congress. Low taxes remain something republicans insist upon as part of their platform. They will not budget. Foreign policy is more up for debate. You have the recent attacks in europe. They are reforming a lot of republicans thinking. The speeches Pay Attention to what you hear from france about france and belgian and yemen. This has pushed republicans back towards their traditional hawkish stand in terms of a muscular Foreign Policy and intervention abroad. Because of the wars in iraq and afghanistan, rand paul has picked up support within the party and beyond the party for those who are war weary. The question for paul is, how far does he push it . He has not been as far out as a libertarian as his father. He has tried to balance some hawkish views with a noninterventionists perspective. Even know he is not here he will be watching all of the speeches, wondering if he still has room to make a different kind of case for republican foreignpolicy, without being cast as an outsider why his competition. Host we are expected to dock to steve king later in the program before the event starts in iowa. Here is a headline from politico out yesterday. Steve king for a day. Democrats seizing on this event hosted as an immigration lightning rod for steve king. He comes from western iowa, and that is the conservative slice of iowa. He is up in the sioux city area, north of des moines, and move west. That is his constituency. He represents that rock red conservatism in iowa which is concerned about immigration. He has used his hardline view on immigration to become a National Political figure. 6, 7 years ago he was well known as someone opposed to partisan immigration reform. Since he became someone on a lot of news programs and was making speeches in congress, he has become a savvy player nationally. Even know he is a rank and file member of congress, not a committee chairman, he declined to run for the senate in 2014. He is a backbench member of congress in terms of his official position. His political influence continues to grow, because he knows he can use his perch and i was to shake the debate. He told me last night, he does not want to have a litmus test. He is not giving strict guidance. He does not want to talk about Foreign Policy or immigration. He will have their ear. Chris christie has already gone out to have discussions with steve king. He is a player. Someone to watch. I am not sure if he will endorse someone. He may wait and play an influential role from the sidelines. Because the i will governor is more centerright, and being you have had king step into that arena and enjoy and relish his role as someone people have to come to. They have to kiss the ring of king. Host jim has been waiting. Democrats line. Caller why is so much emphasis placed on the i will caucuses the Iowa Caucuses . It does not represent the total number of people in the United States. Guest this is a constant debate. When you talk to voters in other states, they wonder why. I hear that all the time. Why does iowa have this influence . It is not something that is changing. The Republican National Committee Members have agreed to let i will have the first caucus. New hampshire will continue to have the first primary. There are there is dissension among some people. It will only continue. Iowa, it forces candidates who may not be exactly like the iowa a lecture it the electorate to see if they can reach out to those voters. Sometimes base get it. You can sometimes they skip it. John mccain did not play in iowa and he won in New Hampshire and won the nomination. Mitt romney came here in 2012, he finished a narrow second two santorum. Iowa was a good balance to him. A good balance to him. If you are an outsider, who has little money, but knows how to do real politics. He shook thousands of hands. Huckabee had little money, but went to churches and talk to Church Communities and build up evangelicals. It has made National Political players of people who find a way to get some kind of political oxygen. Host thank you so much for your time this morning. Guest thank you. Host we will stay here with our viewers talking about the iowa Freedom Summit. If you want to talk about the election or the summit starting in about a half an hour. We want to turn over to the host of that event, steve king republican of iowa. Good morning. Guest good morning. Host 200 members of the media are therefore your Freedom Summit. This is being called the unofficial kickoff to campaign 2016. Are you surprised at how big this has become . Guest we started out this plan six months ago. Our first aspiration was, anyone who is looking at running for president , we would want to invite them. We buildt to accommodate them, and went back to reality. Our aspirations were larger. The reality adjustment was half of the size of what we had and it turned into a snowball, and we have a great event with most of the potential candidates and some good opinion leaders. Host we are showing viewers live shots from the event. What do you want to hear from the speakers today . Are you looking to figure out whether you will endorse one of these candidates . Guest it will not be a decision made this morning. It has to become a conviction. I understand the reality. What i hope to come out from this, is each one of them shows their wares. Whatever you choose to speak about, speak about. The only thing i have done policy wise, is encourage them to speak about National Defense and security. That is a weakness we have in the public dialogue. Other than that, it is wide open. They will throw all their ideas out there. Some will make the news, and some will just appear. It is the beginning of putting ideas on the table. I would like to see the ideas and issues debated intensely before we get around to the people and personalities. This is the launch of the nomination process and the road to the white house. Host i want to ask you about the news that has come out of this. Your thoughts on jeb bush not being there . Senator rubio, senator paul not being there . Guest i have been into medication with all of them. They had prior commitments. But her gentle also has a Governor Jindal already has prior commitments. When you are called to Something Like that, i cannot ask you not to attend. The others had legitimate things a needed to be at. I got a text from marco rubio sending his regrets. Its just about impossible to have everybody, but i do not think there has been such a collection of potential and likely candidates for the president brought together in one place this large in number, this early. It sets a new standard. Host steve king, the host of todays Freedom Summit. We will let you get to your of that. Let you get to your event. We are talking about this Freedom Summit. Happy to hear your thoughts on any of the candidates that are going to be there today or what it means for twice 16. 2016. Larry on our lines for democrats. Caller this is crazy. Poverty and Foreign Policy didnt we invade iraq for their oil. Now they want us to get oil from canada . When i hear republicans talk about Foreign Policy, we made a mistake. We should have gone after iran. As far as poverty, i was on unemployment these guys cut my unemployment and gave my money to romney. How are these people going to talk to the American People about poverty . As far as steve king endorsing somebody, that is the endorsement of death. I can hardly wait for this show to start. Host democrats it is 2027488000. Republicans, it is 2027488001. Independence, it is 2027488002. We show you live shots from where the Freedom Summit will take place. Twitter comments coming in. Talking about the interaction between bush and romney. Asking whether it is a quintess or publicity stunt that every politician who comes out with a book may be running for president. Maple shade, new jersey, independent line. Caller i am very excited about this Freedom Summit, because we will have a first look at where these candidates stand on major issues. One thing i get tired of, is people knocking social issues. They do not realize that social issues are the background backbone of this country. Abortion, a marriage, gay marriage, illegal immigration. We need to understand how these issues for our country. I am excited about ted cruz, ben carson, Rick Santorum, possibly my cut of the Mike Huckabee. These are the most conservative of the candidates. It is crucial we pick someone who will be strong to go up against the democratic candidate, because we are in a bad state right now in our country. We have to come together and get this country back. Thank you for cspan. Host there will be democrats in town in des moines according to politico. They will do their best to heather the 26 hopefuls heather the 2016 hopefuls. Fred is up next. Democrats line debt brooklyn, new york. Caller can anybody helen keller can speak at this summit. These people have been saying the total opposite, now they are going to talk about poverty . Cap these people understand that a tiger cannot change his stripes . Host republican line. Good morning. Are you watching todays Freedom Summit and who are you interested in seeing speak . Caller donald trump. I wonder if he has much of a chance of getting the nomination if he decides to run . He is a businessman. Government is a big business. Ps failed, he has come back. He knows money. Host who did you support last time around in the caucuses . Caller Michele Bachmann. Because i liked her stand on views of how to get america going forward. I thought she had a strong emphasis on taxes. I understand we need to reform the tax base. It is ridiculous. It has been ridiculous for 40, 50 years. Host the Iowa Caucuses set for february 1. We are talking about the unofficial kickoff to 2016. Want to get your thoughts on potential candidates. Phone lines are open for our last 20 minutes. Birmingham alabama, our line for independents. Caller thank you for taking my call. I would love to see more congressional hearings on the weekends when we do not have house or senate going on. I miss a lot of the congressional hearings and love to watch those. Host go to cspan. Org, our video library. Caller i do that too, but it is harder to do on my smart phone. I love steve king. I think he is a great representative. I did go after ms. Bachmann in the last election. I voted for romney, because it was another one of those lesser than to evil choices. I would love to see ted cruz, rand paul, anyone that is against continuing the government the way it is going where we find treadmills and lyons on treadmills and robotic snakes. We do stupid stuff with our money. I want to talk about people talking about getting rid of stupid stuff and putting our money towards real stuff. And stop funding terrorist nations. We borrow all this money that we send in financial aid. We dont have that money. Host abby is up next in saginaw, michigan. Democrats line. Caller i am calling regarding the freedom. I am an american. Even though i normally vote democrat. Words such as the legal people, there are a lot of immigrants, and we need to be talking about how we can all Work Together to be americans. All separate. Host lets go to mobile alabama. Independents line. Caller i want to talk about this summit. I used to be a republican until i saw them change their views concerning our constitution. It was voted for the people by the people. We are not supposed to support israel and egypt. The Prime Minister of israel is coming to our country to war the president and congress. The Republican Party have crossed the line. They are worse than the british empire. They have lost their vision. I want the Republican Party to be the true Republican Party like lincoln. They will not solve the race problem, the problem of poverty. They always blame the victim. Lets not let foreign governments dictate our vision. Host we have about 15 minutes left in todays show, before the Freedom Summit takes off. Here are a few headlines about potential gop candidates in 2016. Headlines about jeb bush and his statements yesterday at the Automobile Dealers Association in San Francisco. You can see that speech on cspan. Another headline promises adult conversation. The headline in the wall street journal on ben carson. Alexandria minnesota. Our line for republicans. Caller good morning. About that guy who called from new york about our debt dropping. We could if we close the border and got bit of those that dont belong to the government is supporting. What is wrong with the with iowa having the caucuses . Host as we said, getting ready to start in about 15 minutes. Want to bring in jason noble with the des moines register. Good morning. Iowans getting a unique perspective when it comes to the president ial race. It is being called a big deal by the national media, is it a big deal to iowa . Guest this is being seen as the kickoff to the iowa campaign. Now through next february, we will have president ial candidates here on a regular basis. This is the kickoff. Host for potential candidates, what is more important, the speeches or the meet and greets that happens along with this summit . Guest they are both important. With the meet and greets, we have had news about the digital candidates hiring staff in iowa. There are those meetings happening. At restaurants and Conference Rooms around des moines, there will be an emphasis on these potential candidates meeting the activists oneonone, shaking their hands, chatting them up in the hall here today. The speeches are important. Its the first opportunity to present a message and to say speak about what their position and the things they will stand for in a potential campaign. This audience will be tuned in. They want to see contrast between the candidates. Host four viewers watching this event at home, talk about how it is structured and what they will see and how it works. Guest we have a lineup of 23 speakers. They will be talking for different lengths of time. The ones who are serious potential president ial candidates will get 20 minutes to speak. They will be in front of 1200 republican activists. They will deliver whatever message and whatever time they have. It will be a long day. Eight solid hours of speeches. Host i will let you get to a long day for you, covering all the events at the Freedom Summit. Appreciate your time. We have about 10 minutes left. Taking your calls on this Freedom Summit as we continue to show you live images. If you want to stick around after the show, we will go into the start of the Freedom Summit. East happen, connecticut, line for independents. Caller there is one thing that people have been common in on have in common, that is money. The only person i will vote for is a person that backs the fair, flat tax. That controls the money in this country. It flattens out the tax system and gets rid of the irs. That is what i will be looking for in a candidate. Thank you cspan. Hhost james is in new jersey. Emma kratz line. Are you democrats line. Caller i will be taking a peek at the summit. I will not watch the whole thing. I want to make a comment. I am an africanamerican veteran. The republicans are just off course all the way with this pipeline. They should be trying to compromise with president obama in creating a total jobs program. Put people act to work. They should work with him to try to pass immigration. They should work with the democrats on trying to reinforce the Voting Rights act. I am appalled that they can just ignore social programs. Governor christie, he should be back here in new jersey trying to help these people that just had this fire. Host talk to me about the 2016 democratic side. Is there somebody you are supporting . Caller i am supporting Hillary Clinton all the way. No doubt. Host james in new jersey. On the issue of Hillary Clinton against potential against republican names, the Washington Post did some polling. Between clinton and rand paul, they have clinton with 54 . Paul has 41 . Jeb bush, clinton 53 christie 40 . Go to their website if you want to see that early polling. Tony in San Francisco, california. Line for independents. Caller i would vote for Hillary Clinton. I hope she does not blow it like talking too much. This guide ted cruz, i think of a used car salesman. You have a nice weekend. Host rose is in harrisburg pennsylvania. Our lines for republicans. Taking your comments about the Freedom Summit. Caller i am a black republican. I think hillary and president obama is making our country look like idiots. We look like idiots to the rest of the world. Thank you. Host phone lines are open. Democrats, 2027488000. Republicans, 2027488001. Independents, 2027488002. Brad, good morning. Caller it is going to be guns, god, gays, abortion, and muslim. It will be a wonderful freak show. Put it on all the Mainstream Media for the world to see. 150 years ago they would be selling white sheets and herds. Host independent line. Caller i was a democrat until Ben Ghazi Ben ghazigatge. I worry about the influence Condoleezza Rice has over the bush family. I have read the memoirs of george tenant, dick clark donald rumsfeld, and it is clear to me that she is incompetent. That she should not be placed on any kind of National Security team. Having her a heartbeat away from the presidency would give me a heart attack. She is responsible for ignoring repeated memos from Dick Clark George tenant, and others, including vladimir putin. Obama bin laden was going to attack. She ignore them repeatedly. I looked into her scholarships. Her dissertation was roundly criticized by scholars. She is not on the level of people like richard haas or the president. I am trying to warn bush. She had a negative influence on his brother, george bush. She dominated him, in my opinion. She excluded him from being able to connect from other members of his team who were relegated by Condoleezza Rice. Host time for a few other callers. Note, the president left just a couple of hours ago for his trip to india. A story in the wall street journal. The president will end that trip a day early and head to saudi arabia to pay his respects to King Abdullah who died this week and was buried yesterday. Before he left, the president attended the conference of mayors summit at the white house. Had one an unusual introduction. Kevin johnson, the mayor of sacramento, interviewed the president. That introduction has been making the rounds. We will play a bit of that for you now. [applause] ladies and gentlemen, you guys ready . Standing 61 100 80 pounds, southpaw from columbia university, from high school in honolulu, the point guard of pennsylvania avenue, the 44th president of united, barack obama. [applause] host the introduction there. Whats the full event online at cspan. Org. Halftime for a few more calls. Have time for a few more calls. The Freedom Summit getting ready to start in a couple of minutes. Michael in georgia. For republicans. Caller i am thankful for cspan. On the elections, as far as the republicans are concerned, there are too many out there viable candidates to say who is the front runner or who will be the ultimate candidate for the Republican Party. I am hoping that Hillary Clinton runs. Mainly because i have worked in the country of saudi arabia after retiring from the military. Every one over there has a cell phone. You have your numbers programmed in for emergency contacts. One of them will be your boss. Long story short, the ambassador in benghazi had an International Cell phone. Why has no one asked who he called that evening . I am thinking hillary was number one on his list and she probably hung up on him. So much for the democrats. Have a good day. Host fayetteville, north carolina, our line for democrats. Will you be watching this Freedom Summit . Caller you know why i am watching . I am watching a whole lot of people i see so many people in the audience, most that look like they had a shortage of food. Most of the Republican Program they do not want to support the least of them. If you ask them their names most of them will be proud to say their parents were immigrants. I do not understand why we have gotten to the point where we have forgotten why that statue of liberty is there. People need to understand, a man needs to understand, and the republicans love to fight wars. Martin luther king has said, if man dont stop war war will stop mankind. We need to get smart. I do not know why these candidates there used to be a time where you could look up ben franklin, john adams, and these people. They get the most uncouth people. King is one of them. They are destroying this country. People better wakeup and start loving and forgiving each other. I listen to other people talk, i have not heard anyone talking about the poor, helping the sick, medicare, feeding the hungry. They are just criticizing. Host the headline in the hill newspaper about this event getting ready to start. The battle for iowa begins. The king event is significant the kickoff for the cycle for republicans. It is a year out, and it will be the first realtime where iowans will gather to look at these candidates sidebyside and decide who they like. Noting that together will be crucial to many of the candidates who are hoping to unify enough of the states evangelical christians, tea party, and libertarian activists. The caucuses helped launch huckaby in 2008. Time for one or two more calls. Jim from missouri. Our line for independents. Caller i have been watching and what bothers me is that there are two votes taken. One wasone was taken to keep the pipeline here in the states. The other that really bothers me is they wanted all the steel to be used to be for america. That got voted down again by republicans. As far as steve king goes, i thought it was very meanspirited of mr. King to Say Something about a young girl who has never done anything to him at all. The other comment he made his mexicans