clinton scheduled to testify this thursday looking into benghazi. we want to begin on this sunday morning with your comments on the economy and your own financial situation. is it improving? there is a gallup survey that says it is for half of americans, at least that is how they view it. (202) 748-8001 as the light for republicans. (202) 748-8000 for democrats. (202) 745-8002 if you are an independent. send us a tweet at @cspanwj, or join the conversation online at facebook.com/cspan. thanks very much for being with us. that gallup poll, which shows for half of americans, half of the u.s. is viewing the economy better financial situation. where do you put yourself? the economy was one of the issues that came up in the first to make chronic debate that took place on tuesday in las vegas. here is one of the exchanges between bernie sanders and hillary clinton. [video clip] bernie sanders: do i consider myself part of the casino capitalist project in which the so little, and so see you have so much. is there anyone on the stage who is not a capitalist? when i think of capitalism, i think of all of the small businesses that were started because we have the opportunity and freedom in our country for people to do that and to make a good living for themselves. i do not think we should confuse what we have to do every so often in america, which is save capitalism from itself. i think what senator sanders is saying certainly make sense in terms of the inequality that we have, but we are not denmark. i love denmark. we are the united states of america, and it is our job to rein in the excesses of capitalism so does not run amok, and caused the kinds of inequities that we see in our economic system. we would be making a great mistake to turn our backs on the greatest middle-class in america. i think everyone is an agreement that we are a great algebr -- entrepreneurial nation. you can have all the growth the you want, and it does not mean anything if all of the new income and wealth is going to the top 1%. what we need to do is support small and medium-sized businesses, the backbone of our economy, but we have to make sure every family in this country gets a fair chance. host: based on the comments of the two leading democratic candidates, what is your own financial situation? is a improving? we will get your phone calls in just a moment. is the(202) 748-8001 line for republicans. (202) 748-8000 for democrats. we are also getting your comments on facebook. in fact, some of you already weighing in. frankie saying, no thanks to the government regulations and free market. than 5-6ys, way better years ago. worse says, no, it is way . en says yes, but not because of the government. again, that's question, whether or not your financial situation is improving. there is this piece in "bloomberg politics," the headline, "hillary clinton is winning the race for wall street's white house cache." she says she would like to find other ways of regulating the banks instead of breaking them out. -- them up. she beat republican rival jeb bush, even though he worked among them in the last decade. clinton offers one major reason for wall street to get behind her. inwill begin with darlene oregon, of early on a sunday morning. caller: i just wanted to comment -- you talked about the financial situation. professionaloyed in 2006. due to a work injury, i ended up unemployed and on disability. compounded by that was the investments i have for my retirement. million in half $1 real estate equities, some of which was actually cash, not just equities. no one went to jail over what happened in the banks and the mortgage companies. .ust the american people lost we built them out, no one build us out. what is going to happen to protect us from these financiers , and huge, out-of-control banks? thank you. host: thank you very much for the call. this is from cnbc. this question, why won't the presidential candidates pro address the economy? diane is joining us from alaska, independent line. how do you announce the town you are from? where is that located? caller: near anchorage. host: why are you up so early, or have you not gone to bed yet? caller: not gone to bed yet. host: good morning. caller: i'm a senior on social security. first of all, things are not improving, and i think they are less than stagnant, and getting worse for three reasons. products are, going down, and prices are going up. two quick examples. toilet tissue used to be 421 squares per roll, and now they are down to 264. the price has gone from $4.69 to six dollars here. i just paid another $.20 for a box of kleenex that also dropped by 20 sheets. that kind of thing is happening all over the place. host: how do you know this? to whati pay attention i'm doing. i pay attention in shopping. suddenly the products are getting smaller and the prices are going up. the second thing is our unemployment situation is far regulations,e government, and whoever calculates this stuff. it is like a ponzi scheme. there are so made people that are part-time, and so many businesses that have to lower their people to part-time that ,eople have to work two jobs get, if they are working at all, they're counted as a full-time worker. the thing is completely skewed. , just government regulations in general really putting the burden on small business especially. houru go up to the $15 an minimum wage, you will see more people out of work, and businesses will have to cut people, and they are having to raise the cost of toilet paper because they cannot afford the regulations. it is just a vicious circle caused by regulations and caused by not accurately reporting the figures to the middle-class americans. it is all affecting us, and things are not improving. host: diane from alaska, thank you very much for being with us. we appreciate it. this is one of the headlines from this past week from donald trump in an interview. "the hill" newspaper is reporting that the secret tovice is extending security donald trump and ben carson. both trump and carson will receive agents as early as next week. "how"the fiscal times," the presidential candidates would confront the $18.6 trillion u.s. that." -- debt." , ourll hear from joe friend. i want to let you know, this friday, we will be live with ted cruz in iowa for a townhall meeting. afterwards, he will stick around and take your phone calls. you can tune in this friday evening. go ahead. caller: i tell you what, ted inz -- i've done pretty well the stock market, but i think it's ted cruz is elected president, i think he will restore confidence. i think the stock market, with an five years, the dow jones will double, he will cut regulations, and just the confidence he gives as a great leader -- i think he is the champion.ebating steve, i'm so fired up about him, i have a hard time sleeping at night. i think he will be the greatest president in history. r a ted cruz sticker every day. i'm fired up about ted cruz and c-span. host: your financial situation, it improved under president obama? it has improved, but i think it would have improved much better with a republican president. it has done fine because i've always brought good blue-chip stocks. it would do much better if we cut the tax rate, and gave in theconfidence economy. i think under a ted cruz presidency, it would grow at least 4%. that would increase the economy, rate, restore confidence in the american people, and certainly fire up the investor. i've had lunch with you and all the people up there. you have the finest people in the country working for c-span. i'm almost as fired up -- c-span and ted cruz right now are my two favorites. .ost: thank you join us this friday evening when ted cruz joins us from iowa. caller: i certainly will. thank you so much. host: saturday evening is the democratic party dinner. five candidates are now expected to attend. is biden is invited, if he running for president. from "national review," "advantage hillary," a look at her candidacy. saying, "republicans have a little to counter the appeal of liberalism. are notarge, they offering much for families .rying to make ends meet the tax-cut policies are all focused on people who make much more than the average voter. so far, republicans do not try to even be eroding the democratic advantage on middle-class voters." this tweets, i did not out of the stock market. from cleveland, ohio, good morning. caller: good morning, steve. i want to let the whole country know that the teamsters have just cut my pension 54%. as of july 1 next year, they are going to cut it down to a little over 54%. host: why? caller: they run out of money because jimmy carter run out of truckers.he regulated i'm going to write him. host: how old are you, by the way, nathan? caller: i'm 67. i retired last year. 66.rked until i was now, they cut my pension 54%. national news media is saying that only cut of 23%. the way they get that figure is if you are over 80, there is no cut at all. if you are between 75 and 80, they prorate your cut. host: cutting from what to wear, nathan? 3975 down to 1824. host: per month? how are you going to supplement that cut? caller: i guess i will have to go back to work again. i toreson i retired is my rotator cuff. i haul cars. it is really bad on your shoulders. i've had to operations. my doctor suggested i retire d if you go backis a y to the job, you will tear again. host: a couple of newsweeklies. legalizingds," marijuana is harder than it looks. europe,"d tide into reporting from austria, one of the countries taking in the influx of syrian refugees, more than 4 million. "help, myzine," parents aren't millennial's." "yes,national review," republicans can win black voters." next is steve from spring, texas. buffalo, moved from new york to houston, texas -- spring, texas. taxes isgs and amazing. job opportunities in texas are amazing. i'm voting for ben carson for president. , thee his idea about taxes way it should be. also, i like his health-insurance ideas. health savings accounts for everybody where we all pay attention to what we are buying with our health insurance. host: thank you for the call, and thank you for listening on c-span radio. it is heard nationwide on xm, web.lso streamed on the this program every morning on xm channel 124, the potus channel. cnn with this headline, "gop candidates ignoring the middle-class, just as bernie sanders." from leland, mississippi, independent line. good morning. caller: good morning, america. americaant to enlighten to a lot of truth about a lot of things. complexustrial prison is just designed to provide jobs for a few people. they have allowed millions of people to come into this country to take jobs from people. capital behind us was the by african-americans. the white house was built by african-americans. it does not matter if an african american has lived in it, there is no place in america for us. i personally have been a manager of walmart, manager of casinos, manager of popeyes restaurants and trusted with millions of dollars of responsibility. i went to chicago, got a job in the wrong town, mistakenly watch my the wrong vehicle, and was accused of trying to break into it. i was through into jail for six months, and my life has basically been ruined. short -- to keep the keep this short. my best friend, she went from teaching to being a correctional officer. it is ridiculous. everything is going overseas. who is going to buy these products? host: let me ask you this question, how do you turn things around for you personally? veteran, i've served this country. she has to go, and leave her for 12 hours to supervise people. a lot of them are normal people. they have few opportunities. we are one of the poorest areas in america. how can people illegally, to this country, get jobs? host: thank you for the call from mississippi. "bloomberg politics" writing about senator ted cruz. he is appearing on meet the press, one of the five programs that we carry on c-span radio. 's run has been incredibly successful for our campaign. he has led polls for months, and ted cruz says the following, he has framed the central issue of this primary, who will stand up to washington. ted cruz has created what he momentum forroots his presidential bid. an average of recent national republican polls show ted cruz in six plays behind donald trump, but also third in some of the early primary states." henry is turning us from boston -- joining us from boston. respondi would like to to your previous caller, who was supporting mr. cruz. the second thing about the stock market, that if he were in office, the stock market would double. since obama has been in office, the stock market has tripled. as far as my financial conditions, i do agree with jimmy carter. the company i work for, they , matching401(k) whatever i contribute. by the time i retired, which was in 1994, i did not want to get too greedy -- i was almost a millionaire -- i got out of the stock market, and my investment today, i'm only getting something like 1% interest. that is a matter because i can ,ive comfortably on my pension my 401(k), and my ira account. that is all i have to say. host: carroll has this. send us a tweet, a lot of you have. the stock market has been great invest,e with money to but the rest have no money to risk. "the l.a. times" with continued speculation on whether joe biden will enter the democratic presidential race. times" heto the "l.a. is nearing a decision, according est adviserss close who says he is aware of deadlines for getting on ballots , but his main concern is his family, after the loss of his son, beau. judy from florida, good morning. how is your financial situation? better or worse over the past few years? caller: worse because as a senior, i cannot get a good interest rate. the increase, like the medicare also going to hamper my financial situation. seniors reallyor does not relate to what we use products and financial costs to us increasing in that area. all in all, total, for the senior, as i see it, it has not been an improvement. the compound interest helps to .eep my head above the water now, we do not get a very good return at all. host: did you save enough for retirement, by the way? caller: yes. theye those nest eggs, but are declining because you can't get the compound interest. zero-1%, so you're not getting much of anything. caller: that's right. it's declining. that's not a good thing. as far as the investments are concerned, the ira, and so forth, you still have a big difficulty with the investment because the stock market is like , it goes upg ball and down. you gain one week, and the next week, it is no good. overall, financially for seniors, as i see it, it has not been very positive. this pastearned weekend social security is not going to increase next year. figure for the call. this is from tiki who says, when will u.s. media roll out joe biden presidency, i'm sick of hearing it already. john mccormick is reporting on the "republican obama," looking at marco rubio. since the second gop debate, rubio has been taking heat from his rivals, as if he were a front runner, and in a sense is a front runner, running first among candidates who might stop donald trump. his position has strengthened, not only by a pair of strong debate performances, but also by wisconsin governor scott walker's decision to drop out of the race. walker's campaign spending about $90,000 per day, a factor in him dropping out of the race. let's go to greg in arizona, good morning. caller: good morning. i'm voting for donald trump. it is just so hard to make ends meet today. people keep talking about the interest rate, and the are correct, if you look back in the 1970's, at the very early 1970's, the interest rate was 50%-17%. if you had $100,000, and you wanted to put $100,000 in the bank, you could generate $15,000 or $300,000. maybeou could generate $2000. it's incredible. the reason the stock market is doing so well is because there is a 1% break out there on the money. people have to invest in the stock market to try to get to a point where they are making some type of money. the reason they are doing that, youyou need that is because have the feds over there saying, don't raise interest rates because they know the one thing obama has going right now is the stock market. they can point to that and say how well it is doing. raising interest rates, people will pull their money out of the stock market. economy will look 10 times worse than it is now. as you said, social security is not going to go up next year. they want to take 200,000 refugees, and immediately, it is known that they will get full benefits from this country because they are refugees, not illegals. they are going to get money that actually should be going to retirees that really need the money and are suffering right now. they are not even acknowledging the cost of all of this. host: thank you for the call. dygirl with this tree, the economy is better. predict the winner of the world series? "thechicago tribune," summer of 1969." "for"the l.a. times," left in syria, it is a ghostly life," a look at the situation inside syria, as the fighting continues. many have left for austria, germany, great britain, and several hundred thousand expected to come to the u.s. register"des moines abortion rates dropped 40%. as part of our election coverage, we caught up with donald trump. he was in richmond, virginia. [video clip] donald trump: believe me, we are in a bubble. we have a phony statistic on jobs. we have 100 million people in the workforce who want to work. 100 million people. we have tremendous levels of poverty. we have welfare all over the place. these are people, who in many places, want to go out, get a job, and take him a lot of money, but we can't because we are losing a lot of jobs. we are losing them to other nations. we are losing them to stupid policies. host: donald trump in richmond, virginia last week here you can follow our coverage anytime on c-span.org. murray's is joining us from illinois, independent line. good morning. how is your financial situation, better, worse? chicago, and it seems like the only ones who progress are european americans. 60 policehired think,s, and only for, i were black. for -- thelways push only ones who get help are basically the european americans. the blackeemed like community -- it is like poor and poor, the only ones who progress are them. that if they change the felony laws, or criminal , all these guys, the black eyes locked up will have jobs because these immigrants who are working, maybe they will be able to field the jobs. has this tree, the stock market has been fantastic under president obama, i guess we will have to vote for hillary so continues. a new book getting a lot of attention, the latest by bob the last "looking at -- ." preview. bus: by the way, c-span's is in texas, as part of the c-span book festival. texas. is in austin, you can learn, on the bus, booktv's extensive programming. we also have online resources to c-span's the best of booktv. the book festival began under laura bush, when george bush was governor. there is the booktv tent. we hope you to an end. -- tune in. margaret, oklahoma, good morning. caller: good morning. host: how are you today? caller: fine, thank you. i agree with one of the other callers. concerning our economy, they are shouting, "death to america," and all they have to do when the refugees are coming in, like in and saythey let them in they are afraid. the law needs to change immediately. most people do not care what color you are, it is just how we interact. there has been a lot of lying about it. now, they shout, "death to .merica," and we let them in it is not the 10,000 we were told. it is half a million, 500,000. yesterday, i don't know if it was cnn or fox, they said that they are giving them furnished foodtments, footsteps -- stamps, every benefit unimaginable, but what are our vets getting? a park bench, if they are lucky. this is outrageous. some people have a lot to pay for. in europe, this is how bad it is. they tell the young girls, do not go with your arms showing to school or anything. pe is terrible in europe. just like in afghanistan. our soldiers are killed and i did not come out until the other day on fox, colonel david hunt and someone, they were not going to say anything, i don't think, but they both burst out saying, this is the going on in years in afghanistan. my son, a good-looking marine, now dead -- his father said he was calling in the middle of the night saying, the commander, he and three other afghani men would go out, roundup 10 little boys at night, call them boy toys, and all night long, they are tied to the bed, and they are raped, and our people could not do anything. why are we helping people like that? host: thank you for adding your voice this morning. ," a look at if paul ryan will seek the speakership, and how long john boehner will stay on the job. "last leader standing." the next debate is later this month on cnbc. o" on how donald trump almost blew up the third gop demanding it be three hours, not two hours. we are asking this morning about jobs, the economy, and your own financial situation, is a improving? this is from marie saying, 100 million people need jobs in the country, get companies are leaving the u.s.. michael joins us next. good morning. caller: how are you? host: fine, thank you. how are you? caller: pretty good. i guess i'm a so-called republican, but i don't trumptand why -- all this thing. at the end of the day, trump is out for him. he has degraded everybody in the republican field, fighting with them, and stuff. when he is supposed to be like reagan, he is supposed to not talk bad about no republican. demonizing is everybody in the republican party like he is some undercover democrat. when he says, building a wall in mexico, he says it will have "trump" on it. what does that tell you? instead of having open the united states," it will have "trump." i hope at the end of the day the candidates vote for a that has been in office and know something about it, and not just promoting their own brand. thank you. host: thank you very much for the call. this is from roger simon, " america's middle class needs a champion." you can read online at politico .com. of you are saying, we will never will never -- understand why republicans don't realize the spendable income in a capitalist society. good morning. caller: good morning. i watch your program every sunday morning, and then talk to my brother from west texas, and we discussed the issues. host: this he agree or disagree most of the time? is he a democrat or republican? caller: i classify as a republican due to my veteran retiree connections here. i would like to comment on three different items real quick. first of all, the general economy here, i consider i gradually improving. community,irement basically. within an eight mile radius of me, we have room for 50,000 additional homes at the moment. thewill be gradually -- housing industry is probably the biggest industry around here. of course, that will depend on sales, how it works out. we are looking to put in quite a few houses. and, on the federal debt. i came across a couple of facts. it seems we are paying over a billion dollars per day and in interest. the discovery channel ran a documentary on money. they say it only cost a nickel bill.nt a hundred dollar quick comment there. on immigration, we have a serious problem. i think most people seem to think that the immigrants would have to vote, illegals would have to vote to sway the election. last week, it was brought up that it seems the illegals get voted towards the electoral college vote. extraifornia, the five the illegals. a piece on bobby jindal, who has spent 55 days in iowa, close to what rick santorum has been ending. he is inching up in the caucus polls. streets, capitalism like socialism is an economic system, not a social system. kasich candidate, john was in new hampshire, talking about the economy, but also about the debt and deficit. [video clip] john kasich: the first thing we must do to get government out of our way is to start with the budget. as president, i will immediately put us on a path to a balanced budget, and i will get it done within eight years. [applause] i went to a meeting the other day where they said, we can do it by 2030 -- too long, too much .ebt within the first hundred days, we will have a plan to balance the budget in eight years. to keep her balance, i will start the process to amend our constitution to require washington to balance its budget every single year like states and families in america. we need a constitutional amendment to force them to balance the budget, and do its job. host: ohio governor john kasich this past week in new hampshire. you can weigh in on the story and the question this morning on your own financial situation on her facebook page -- our facebook page at facebook.com/cspan. jean is joining us from randolph, massachusetts. thatr: i just want to say the stock market is doing well, and that is a great thing. i just want to mention that the i think she is delusional. i think people should applaud -- the guy who taught for 80 years, and all he is trying to do is make black people responsible and self-reliant. i think people are evil talking about him that way. the call.k you for another viewer on the question, is your financial situation improving? the viewer says, yes, new jobs, retirement back from

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