UYGUR: And now for our “Con Job of the Day,” we have Paul Ryan`s deceitful and amusingly hypocritical defense of his Medicare plan. And this one`s a doozy.
Since Ryan introduced his plan in April, Democrats pointed out that it would turn Medicare into a voucher program because that`s exactly what it does. Not wanting to admit that, Ryan says the left is just scaring people. But listen to him do the same thing in the middle of his sentence here.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. PAUL RYAN (R), WISCONSIN: Millions of dollars of negative ads are being run to try and scare seniors and to try and confuse seniors. You know, the irony of this bill is with all this “Mediscare” that the Democrats are running, it`s Obamacare, itself, that ends Medicare as we know it.
Obamacare takes a half a trillion dollars from Medicare. In fact, we restore their benefits by repealing the Obamacare raid on the Medicare fund.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: You know what`s ironic? Accusing the president of scaring seniors on Medicare, as you do exactly that half way through your own sentence. But it gets worse. Ryan accused President Obama of raiding the Medicare fund, thereby cutting the — I`m sorry. By raiding the Medicare fund which then cuts wasteful spending on Medicare advantage, right? But he neglected to mention that Ryan`s plan makes the same exact cuts. Not hey, similar cuts, the same cuts. Now, usually he doesn`t know that his own plan has identical proposal on that same issue. Of course he knows. He comes on television and blatantly lies about it anyway. But what bothers me is this guy gets such reverence in Washington when he`s the same old political hack in a new young face. Like, oh, he`s so serious. He`s seriously full of it. And get a load of this final piece of irony from Ryan.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RYAN: The point I was making to the president is demagogue these issues that your own peril.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Good point. Maybe you should have taken your own advice before you said, oh, yes, Obama`s plan ends Medicare, yes, yes, yes, that`s the ticket. Paul Ryan`s pathetic attempt to pretend the president is the one cutting Medicare and then blatantly lying about his own plan is our con job of the day.
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UYGUR: Welcome back to the show, everybody. Time now for our power, power, Power Panel. I like saying it that way. Of course, they`re here to discuss the biggest news stories of the day. With me now, is the versatile Ben Mankiewicz who`s both one of the cost of The Young Turks and a host on Turner Classic Movies. Also, with me, David Sirota, radio host and syndicated columnist and all around progressive ass kicker. And finally, Josh Trevino, vice president of communications at the Texas Public Policy Foundation think tank. Josh is a conservative.
Nonetheless, we tolerate it.
(LAUGHTER)
JOSH TREVINO, TEXAS PUBLIC POLICY FOUNDATION: Hello, Cenk.
UYGUR: Hey, Josh. All right. First question for the panel. Will the purity test crush Republicans in 2012? Today Governor Haley Barbour warned conservatives at the Faith and Freedom Coalition Summit that purity is a loser for the GOP.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. HALEY BARBOUR (R), MISSISSIPPI: In politics, purity is the enemy of victory. OK? We can`t start out with the ideas the Faith and Freedom Coalition that our candidates have to agree with me on every single thing. We cannot expect our candidate to be pure. Winning is about unity.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: Josh, that took some courage on the part of Haley Barbour to say that as that convention. On the other hand, he`s dropped out, so he gets a little bit more courageous. But to you think he`s right?
TREVINO: Well, you know, Haley Barbour, of course, one of the grand men of the modern Republican Party, he is right. There`s always a tension between the ideals and the pragmatism of politics and politics being the art of compromise and the art of the possible. Our nominee and our eventual president in January 2013 won`t be the pure candidate, but he or she will be the winning candidate. And it was ever thus. Same with Barack Obama. I know you`ve had your differences with him, Cenk.
UYGUR: No question about that. But how about the flip-flopping? You mind, hey, I was kind for cap-and-trade, and now I`m kind of against it. Is that OK?
TREVINO: Well, it depends on the issue and the circumstance. Changing your mind is one thing. Flip-flopping for transparent electoral advantage is another. And the voters are smart enough to discern which is which.
UYGUR: All right, Ben, you know, this is run by Ralph Reed, this little faith and freedom stuff, right? But how has it helped the Republicans to get associated with Ralph Reed? I mean, he`s the guy who was associated with Jack Abramoff and took all his money? Like, can they ever learn a lesson here or they`re just going to double down for the rest of their lives?
BEN MANKIEWICZ, CO-HOST, THE YOUNG TURKS: I think it`s very wise for Haley Barbour to go to an event sort of run by Ralph Reed and say, I don`t think we should concern ourselves with purity. I think that`s state thinking all the part of Haley Barbour. Yes, I mean, Ralph Reed is a corrupt guy, Ralph Reed is a bad dude. And I guess these guys just don`t care. Ralph Reed took money from Indian gaming tribes and then under the – – he funneled money through the Christian coalition to pretend to argue against them while Jack Abramoff was playing one tribe off against the other in order to take Indian gaming money while Ralph Reed sits here as part of the Christian coalition and pretends to be against it all. But these guys, they don`t care.
(CROSSTALK)
TREVINO: What was he indicted for? Just, can you refresh our memories on that?
UYUGR: OK. Now, Josh, let me ask you about that. He was not indicted. That`s a good point.
(CROSSTALK)
TREVINO: Exactly.
UYGUR: Go ahead, Ben. Go ahead.
MANKIEWICZ: No. I just think it`s great. No, no, you go ahead and defend Ralph Reed. That will go well for your guys.
UYGUR: Josh, look, he even lost in the republican primary. I mean, come on! Are you saying that Ralph Reed didn`t take gambling money from Abramoff and then pretend he didn`t? Are you saying that?
TREVINO: Well, Cenk. There are entire island population in the pacific.
There`s such — a Jack Abramoff. It`s one thing to be associated with Jack Abramoff. It`s another thing to have done something actually wrong. And one assumes given the paid attention to — by Jack Abramoff by the authorities over the past several years, it`s reasonable to assume that if Ralph Reed had done something illegal, it would have come out by now.
UYGUR: All right. Now, David, look, there might be a reason why they`re going to this conference. First, it`s faith and freedom. So, of course, they love that, right? But the other reason is as always with the Republicans, the money, La Bousky (ph), right? So Reed apparently, this group is going to put in $15 to $18 million over the next year or so. Do you think that`s why they`re all attending?
DAVID SIROTA, SYNDICATED COLUMNIST: Absolutely. I think it`s a convergence of all this, that each candidate wants as much grassroots support as possible. You asked the original question, will purity hurt the Republican Party? Will demands for purity hurt the Republican Party? I think what hurts the republican candidates, and frankly this is an adage for democratic candidates, too, is not if they disagree with their party.
But if you suggested if they`re flip-flopping and it looks like their disagreements aren`t about principle. And when I hear Haley Barbour is going to a conservative audience saying that we should accept candidates who disagree with us, I think that is very smart. But I think that the question will be is whether that part of the grassroots of the Republican Party can appreciate a principle disagreement as opposed to simply political expedience based on flip-flopping.
UYGUR: I hear you. All right. Now, we have to move on to the next question for the panel. And that is, believe it or not, can Democrats trust the White House during budget negotiations? Yesterday`s meeting, the Democrats led by Representative Harry Waxman called for stronger action from the president in fighting back against the Republicans.
Someone at the meeting said that President Obama responded by saying “There`s a difference between me and a member of Congress. When I say something, markets and countries and people react in a way where it could cause us more problems than we have now.” David, I found that quote really telling. It said to me that the president`s like, oh my God, I have to worry about the markets, I can`t be doing progressive things because of the markets. Am I over reading that?
SIROTA: No, I think you`re exactly right. I mean, I think the president — the comment seems to exude that he`s thinking not about necessarily the agenda. He`s thinking about other factors. I`m not saying he should only think about what he wants. There`s many, many parts moving here. But I think you`re exactly right, that the question should be, what has he promised? What does he want to do? And will he do it? And that requires marshalling the entire platform of the White House almost regardless of those other external factors. Frankly, the president can`t control the market. We`ve learned that from George Bush to Barack Obama. He should be thinking about how to get his agenda through the Congress.
UYGUR: All right. Ben, I want to talk about taxes. Because Obama said, he was going to stay strong on that. But I`m going to read you the quote and get your reaction. He said, “Whatever we agree on, we`re still going to have a plan to argue about in 2012.” Referring to Republicans. “I`ve said I`m not going to renew the tax cuts for the top two percent. We might agree on tax reform or simplification. But on the upper income tax cuts, we`re just going to have to agree to disagree.” You know what I got out of that, Ben? That he`s going to save that tax cut issue for 2012, that he`s not really going to tell the Republicans, oh, yes, you know what, I want to raise taxes now as part of the deal.
MANKIEWICZ: Yes. So in a sense what Obama I think then is saying is, you can count on this. You can count on me, you can count on not counting on me. So finally, we won`t be able to complain about anything because at least with both of those quotes, he`s prefacing it. He`s letting you know, hey, man, enough with saying you can`t count on me, we all know it`s true. So, I`m going to give you a little hint here. You can`t count on me. And I think that`s fairly clear. At least we won`t be as disappointed.
UYGUR: But Josh, I mean, when you see these quotes, you got to be excited. Because he`s saying, no, I`m not going to fight back against the Republicans because the markets will get jittery. And on the tax increases, et cetera, we`ll save that for a campaign issue for 2012. Well, that means that it looks like you`re going to have two wins.
MANKIEWICZ: I love, I love that President Obama is contemplating running for re-election next year on a platform of high unemployment and a tax hike on the segment of the population. That`s brilliant. Couldn`t have scripted it better. So, hope and change. Welcome to it.
UYGUR: Josh, wait a minute, now. Look, look, when you talk about tax increases for millionaires, that`s an 81 percent popularity rating. You really think that that`s unpopular? How could you possibly think that?
TREVINO: I think, well, let`s look at it not from, of course, I have my principle disagreement with you on this, Cenk. But let`s look at it at a pragmatic point of view, do you, do you, Democrats all, except for me here in this little soiree, do you trust the White House and the re- election messaging apparatus to get that trough? Or do you think it`s just going to be a message of tax hikes?
SIROTA: Well, I actually do trust the White House to do this on that particular issue.
TREVINO: Well, Godspeed.
SIROTA: Because the White House can look back to the Clinton era and say, listen, did you like the economy under Bill Clinton and Bill Clinton`s tax rates? Or did you like the economy under George W. Bush`s tax rates? That`s the easiest, safest way to put it.
TREVINO: Nobody`s going to identify the Obama economy with the Clinton economy.
(CROSSTALK)
SIROTA: The Obama economy with the Clinton tax rates. All you have to say is that did you like the economy under Bill Clinton`s tax rates or do you like the economy under George W. Bush`s tax rates?
MANKIEWICZ: That might be Hillary Clinton`s primary challenge. That`s not Obama.
UYGUR: All right. OK. All right. We got to leave it right there. And, you know, if you think that the Bush tax cuts, Josh, worked out, OK. If you think you can convince the American people with that, OK. But look, what I`m worried about is this deal that`s coming up. I`m afraid that President Obama gave some clues not in the right direction. But that`s my opinion. Ben Mankiewicz, David Sirota, Josh Trevino, you guys all rock.
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CENK UYGUR, HOST: Good evening, everybody. It turns out I`m Cenk Uygur.
Now, look, we`ve got bad news for you off the top. The economy is down, and the Republicans are pushing to make it even worse, unfortunately. And that`s our lead story tonight.
Today, we learned just 54,00 jobs were added last month, bumping the unemployment rate up to 9.1 percent. Nearly 14 million people are unemployed. That is a very bad number, obviously. But the Republicans who now control half of Congress are accepting none of the blame and instead are pointing the finger at the president. Of course.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. JOHN BOEHNER (R-OH), HOUSE SPEAKER: One look at the jobs report should be enough to show the White House it`s time to get serious.
REP. ERIC CANTOR (R-VA), MAJORITY LEADER: This president continues to give speeches as if he is there for the middle class and the small businesses, but somehow the rhetoric falls short.
REP. JEB HENSARLING (R), TEXAS: Another month and another data point on the failure of Obamanomics.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: But if the House Republicans care so much about unemployment, why haven`t they brought a single jobs bill to the floor this year?
Now, after running on jobs, after blaming Obama for lack of jobs, they have not introduced one jobs bill. Not one. You know, there`s a number for that. It`s called zero.
In fact, it seems like whenever there`s a plan to take action to boost the economy, Republicans immediately oppose it. They oppose the stimulus, which the CBO says increased the number of full-time jobs by at least 1.6 million. And Republicans opposed President Obama`s bailout to save the American car industry.
Remember talk like this?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think a bridge loan no nowhere. This is a down payment on many billions to come.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I join my colleagues in opposing this bailout plan.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We need to let the market fix this. This is not a political problem. It`s a business problem.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: The president was able to push through the auto bailout anyway, and it wound up saving hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country.
Today, at a Chrysler plant in Ohio, he talked about the choices that he made.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If we let Chrysler and GM fail, plants like this would have shut down, then dealers and suppliers across the country would have shriveled up. Then Ford and other automakers could have failed, too.
So, in the middle of a deep recession, that would have been a brutal and irreversible shock to the entire economy and to the future of millions of American. So we refused to let that happen.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: Look, you know I keep it real with you. So I don`t think the President has done everything right when it comes to the economy. Actually, not by a long shot. But the Republicans have taken positions that would have been absolutely disastrous.
Can you imagine if they`d shut down GM and Chrysler and we lost all of those jobs on top of the terrible economy that we have now? My God, what would Michigan and Ohio have looked like today?
Come on. Those are terrible ideas.
And now all they want to do is cut spending, which no sane economist in their right mind believes will create more jobs. In fact, economists all say it will cost many, many jobs going forward. Why would you do that when we need jobs?
Look, is it possible that someone can earnestly believe these things as right policies in these times? Or do the Republicans have another agenda?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R), MINORITY LEADER: Our top political priority over the next two years should be to deny President Obama a second term.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UYGUR: All right.
Now, let`s talk about their agenda and the economy overall. So, joining me to do that is Jared Bernstein, former chief economist for the Vice President, and now senior fellow with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. And Stephen Moore, senior economics writer with The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board. So this should be interesting.
All right, guys. Welcome. Great to have you here on the program.
All right.
Jared, let me start with you. What do you think about the President`s economic plan? Are you disappointed with these numbers? And what can we do going forward?
JARED BERNSTEIN, FMR. CHIEF ECONOMIST FOR VICE PRESIDENT BIDEN: I think the president`s economic plan, much as you said, but more importantly, just based on independent folks who actually have money in the game, these kind of private sector analysts, have looked at the impact of the president`s plan, including the stimulus, as well as some of the actions of the Federal Reserve, and unquestionably, this president and his actions, including the restructuring of the auto firms, took an economy that was cataclysmically falling off a cliff.
I mean, remember, when the president got here, you had 54,000 jobs a month. That`s not a enough, no question about it. That`s a tough month.
The first three months of his term, over 700,000 jobs lost per month. GDP cratering at over six percent. Over two million jobs lost in the first quarter.
So, before we get too wound up on this one monthly number — and we should talk about it, because I think more does need to be done going forward — let`s not forget about where we were.
UYGUR: All right.
So, Stephen, I want to try to get your perspective on this, right? Because opposing the auto bailouts looks like it was just flat-out wrong now. And when you look at the idea of cutting spending, how in the world is that going to create more jobs? That doesn`t seem to make any sense.
So what are the Republicans offering? I don`t get it.
STEPHEN MOORE, “WALL STREET JOURNAL”: First of all, Cenk, we didn`t bail out the auto companies, we bailed out the unions. If we had not given them all this money, they would have restructured, and you`d probably — I think you`d actually have a more healthy auto industry than you do now.
(CROSSTALK)
UYGUR: Wait, wait, wait. Stephen, I don`t get that at all. What do you mean?
We didn`t give the money to the unions. We gave them to the car — they were bankrupt. So, otherwise, they would have gone under like you guys said they should.
(CROSSTALK)
MOORE: Wait a minute, Cenk. If they had gone through bankruptcy, which any normal company that doesn`t have inroads to the White House would have done —
BERNSTEIN: They did go through bankruptcy.
MOORE: But the people — as you know, Jared, the people who got screwed were the creditors. And the money that was, you know, dually owed to the creditors went to the labor unions. But that`s not the point here.
UYGUR: But that`s a perfect thing. Stephen, hold on right there, because, look, you`re saying, oh my God, the creditors got screwed here, but they`re the ones who invested in the company that went bankrupt. And you`re saying, oh, it`s a shame that we helped to keep the workers in their jobs.
But wait a minute. Yes, the money should go to the workers who are creating the cars, who are now profitable.
MOORE: No, wait a minute. In any — this is 200 years of common law, that when you have a company that goes bankrupt, the people are first in line. And this has been the case in legal law for hundreds of years. The people who are first in line are the creditors. And what the Obama administration said is no, the creditors don`t get the money, we`re going to give it to the unions.
UYGUR: So Stephen, you`re saying that the workers should have been last in line.
MOORE: No, Cenk. By the way —
(CROSSTALK)
BERNSTEIN: We can relitigate this all we want, but the facts are wrong. Everyone in line took a haircut on that one.
MOORE: The unions still exist, Jared. I mean, the fact is that the unions (ph) didn`t give nearly the concessions that are needed. And you`re going to have a situation the next time we have a recession, which hopefully isn`t now, where Chrysler and GM are going to come back for more money.
(CROSSTALK)
BERNSTEIN: OK. A, you`re wrong. And B, it`s irrelevant because you`ve saved about a million jobs. And that`s precisely what we have to be talking about right now.
MOORE: Hold on, Jared.
BERNSTEIN: When you count the supply chains.
MOORE: All right. Well, Jared, wait a minute.
You shouldn`t be talking about how many jobs were created. You were the one — it was your numbers that said the stimulus plan was going to create three million jobs. Here we are two-and-a-half years later, we have got maybe two million jobs, not as a result of the stimulus.
You said we`d have an unemployment rate less than 8 percent. We`re at 9.1 percent.
I don`t know how anybody, Cenk, could basically say that the stimulus plan was anything but one of the biggest and most expensive policy failures in American history.
BERNSTEIN: OK. Good points. Let me take them.
Now, if you look at the Congressional Budget Office, if you look at Mark Zandi and Alan Blinder, former Fed vice chair, and you look at their analysis, at the peak of the stimulus it created or saved 3.5 million jobs. Not my numbers, their numbers, happened to come out precisely as we said it.
And you`re absolutely right. We did not at the time — in late 2008, we didn`t see how high unemployment was going to go. You`re correct about that.
But those same folks find that the stimulus plan took about two percentage points off the unemployment rate. All of that is old news. What we need to talk about now, Stephen, and I`d love to get into this —
(CROSSTALK)
MOORE: Wait a minute. Wait, hold on. Jared, hold o. You`re saying the people like you who got it wrong are now saying —
(CROSSTALK)
UYGUR: Let me jump in here.
Stephen —
MOORE: All we can go on is what really happened. We don`t know what would have happened.
UYGUR: No, Stephen.
MOORE: We do know what did happen. And we got a 9.1 percent unemployment rate, which is a catastrophe for our country.
UYGUR: Stephen, listen, listen, listen. Over here, listen. OK?
First of all, he just said, that, yes, according to some analysts, over three million jobs were created. And you say, ha -ha, you got it wrong. No, he`s saying he got it right.
Now, I understand you guys disagree about that. I get it.
MOORE: Where are the jobs then?
UYGUR: Hold on. Hold on.
MOORE: What jobs are you talking about?
UYGUR: What I want to talk about is going forward — and look, I`ve got my own problems with the administration. I don`t think they were anywhere near progressive enough. I don`t think they took nearly enough action.
MOORE: You want more stimulus. You want more debt.
UYGUR: Absolutely! OK?
Now, you`re saying — OK, I assume you`re saying you`ve got a plan for jobs. I haven`t heard it yet. We have got a massive unemployment problem. Is your answer to cut spending and we lose more jobs?
MOORE: No. Government spending reductions create jobs. We learn that. And government spending increases —
UYGUR: How? How? How? How?
MOORE: Because when you cut government spending, you reduce government debt and you free up resources for the private sector. We tried it the other way.
UYGUR: We already have resources freed up. Do you acknowledge, Stephen, that there`s $1.6 trillion sitting in corporations in America right now and they`re not spending it?
MOORE: Cenk, why? Because of regulation? Because of taxation?
(CROSSTALK)
MOORE: Because companies are scared to death of this administration.
BERNSTEIN: Stephen — Stephen —
MOORE: Regulation, all the things that are causing businesses to go into a cocoon. Who wants to invest in this kind of environment?
UYGUR: All right, Jared. Go ahead.
BERNSTEIN: Stephen, I know you were going to make this uncertainty point. We can have arguments about deregulation. But let`s see if we can agree on something.
There is a great deal of economic uncertainty right now. It has nothing to do with regulation. It has to do with the debt limit.
MOORE: A lot of it does.
BERNSTEIN: I think you would agree with me there.
Why not tell your Republican friends who are so concerned about certainty in this economy to allow that debt limit to increase not tomorrow, but this evening, so we can get that out of the way and get this economy back on track?
MOORE: All right. OK, Jared —
BERNSTEIN: Let me hear your response. Just focus on that one point.
MOORE: First of all, Jared, why don`t you get the 85 Democrats in the House, members of your own party who voted against the president, on that? Maybe once you can get all the Democrats on board that agenda, maybe the Republicans will come along. But you know what? I think the worst possible —
BERNSTEIN: So you support a clean debt limit?
UYGUR: All right.
MOORE: No, I don`t. I think, actually, the worst possible thing we could do for the economy right now is pass a clean debt bill that basically says we`re going to punt on getting this budget deficit down and doing something about the $14 trillion debt. That would be a disaster. I think it would cause a financial meltdown if we did that.
UYGUR: I got you. All right.
So the idea is we don`t even pay our debts and then we cut spending? And I don`t know how in the world you think that`s going to get jobs.
MOORE: Well, we should also cut taxes, Cenk. We have to do a tax cut.
UYGUR: Well, of course! Give the rich and the corporations even more money. And the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board will be ecstatic, and you`ll have all the money and we`ll have none of the jobs, and you`ll be like, yes, the rich win again!
And you guys will have a huge party on a yacht, and everybody will be happy. I got it.
MOORE: Well, except, Cenk, we`ve got two —
UYGUR: Jared Bernstein and Stephen Moore, thank you for your time tonight.
(CROSSTALK)
UYGUR: We appreciate it. We really do. Thank you for the comments.
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Cenk Uygur: Okay, now next question: is the GOP trashing the economy? Now this is a fun question. The fact that high unemployment would help the GOP defeat president obama in 2012. And no American President since Franklin Delano Roosevelt has won a second term in office when the unemployment rate has been above 7.2%. So is the GOP purposely trying to hamper job growth by proposing Draconian spending cuts in an effort to take back the White House? Now, John, I know you are going to find that to be a controversial question but do you concede that if unemployment is high, that the Republican candidate in 2012 would certainly benefit?
John Feehery: I find it rather silly because your talking about the House Republicans control the Chamber and they have their own careers on the line. They certainly want to see unemployment go down, they want to see the economy grow, they want to go back to their constituents and give them a good reason to vote for them again. They certainly don’t want to see the economy crash because that’s bad for their own political futures.
And they’re not trying to win it for another candidate; they care about their own political futures. So I think they’re trying to cut spending because they honestly believe, and I agree with them, that by cutting spending, by getting the government spending under control, and the government under control, you will grow the economy. And I think that is their strategy: they have a different philosophy.
The idea that they’re trying to trash the economy to bring down President Obama is somewhat ridiculous.
Ryan Grim: Yeah, I think John’s right. I think that honestly, the House Republicans, especially the 80 plus who have come in in this last year, they honestly do believe that by cutting spending that somehow that’s going to lead to growth in the economy. There’s no reason to think that’s even remotely true. There’s just nothing to that.
Borrowing costs right now are at historic lows. So the idea that government spending is crowding out other investments would have to have some facts behind it to be believed. And one fact you look at are interest rates. Is it crowding out borrowing? And it is not. And they have nothing else to point to, and I’d be curious, John, how is it that if you cut spending and lay off Federal workers and state workers, that grows the economy. I am genuinely curious….
John Feehery: I think the Republicans are saying, you scale back and let the private sector flourish. You cut back on some of these silly regulations, let small businesses flourish….
Ryan Grim: Corporate profits are at record highs, though. How much more can the private sector flourish?
John Feehery: But small businesses are still under the crux. We’re talking about small businesses. Small businesses are really the ones that face the government regulations.
Cenk Uygur: No, we’re talking about large businesses. The large businesses get the most amount of advantages there.
John Feehery: Most jobs come from small businesses. You got to get the government off their backs so that they can flourish.
Cenk Uygur: It’s funny how the big businesses wind up getting huge breaks what is supposed to help small businesses. They sitting on $1.6 trillion and they’re not doing a damn thing with it. Now, Jane, Ryan might be right about the 80 guys that just came in, they seem genuinely earnest, and you might disagree and I disagree with a lot of what they say, but I believe that they are earnest to some degree, right or wrong, right? But the old Republican hens they know that if you cut spending in the middle of tough economic times, you’re not going to create jobs, you’re going to cost jobs. Now to me, I think that they are eating that up.
Jane Hamsher: But that seems to be the conventional wisdom across the political spectrum right now. Everybody’s an austerity freak. And you are absolutely right, Ryan is absolutely right, in that there is no jobs program out there. There’s nobody who has the courage to say right now, to be the adult in the conversation, and say we need to have a jobs program to put people back to work. And the last thing we should be doing is cutting state budgets and firing people. That it will only make the problem worse.
So it’s not just the 80 people who have just come in, it seems to be everybody. And they’re saying it whether they believe it or not because that’s where conventional wisdom is based these days.
Cenk Uygur: John, let me ask you a specific question about that. It goes towards what Jane and Ryan were saying. There’s been no jobs bills whatsoever. And the idea that if we just give more and more to corporations and hope that they create jobs, they already have all that $1.6 trillion just sitting there and they are not creating the jobs, how in the world would that work? Do you really believe that would create jobs? Do you think that the Republicans believe that that would create jobs?
John Feehery: What we need is a pro-growth agenda, there’s no doubt about that. We need to lower the corporate tax rate, we need to give small business a chance to flourish and thrive, and we really do need to get government off the back of small business so that we can create jobs. Government jobs are not going to grow us out of the economy. Only the private sector will do that. And we do need a pro-growth agenda.
Democrats talk about raising taxes. We shouldn’t raise taxes. That’s the silliest way to get the economy going. And we’re not going to raise taxes with Republicans in control.
Ryan Grim: John, very specifically, how does cutting Federal and state spending, how does laying off Federal and state workers, help small businesses? How does it help the small business if there is less money in the economy?
John Feehery: Getting rid of inefficient government, getting rid of inefficient and stupid regulations helps the private sector to survive and thrive.
Ryan Grim: That’s fine. We can have the regulation argument a separate time. That was probably decided in the fall of 2008. But never mind. What about the spending argument? How does government spending hurt a small business, especially small businesses that sell a lot of things to state, local, and Federal governments? How does it hurt a small business having the government spending money?
John Feehery: There’s a couple of ways. First of all, the states are going bankrupt. And so is the Federal government. So you got to cut spending there. And the other thing, if you keep taxes low and cut taxes, you will get more capital into the private sector and it will grow jobs. And that’s what happened with Ronald Reagan. I think that it’s going to happen this time.
Cenk Uygur: I’m not sure that answered Ryan’s question but unfortunately we are out of time. And I got to tell you John, look, taxes are at a 60 year low, and we cut taxes to the bone under bush and it didn’t help our economy at all. It really, really hurt our economy.
You’re telling me to cut taxes more to stimulate the economy? We tried that for eight long years and it was a disaster, but I’m sorry, I’m getting the last word on that, panel. Sorry guys. But thank you for the conversation. As always, we loved it. Jane Hamsher, Ryan Grimm, John Feehery, see you guys next time.
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Cenk Uygur: House Democrats took their turn at the White House talking about the budget. And they made sure that the President knew their number one issue.
Nancy Pelosi: “I demonstrated the determination that we all have to reduce the deficit while preserving Medicare.”
Steny Hoyer: “Making certain that Medicare is strengthened and preserved.”
Jim Clyburn: “We must preserve Medicare.”
John Larson: “Preservation of Medicare.”
Cenk Uygur: “Gee, were they clear enough? Yes, I think so. Yes, I got it Medicare.”
Look they’re not the only ones who want to preserve Medicare, of course. The latest poll numbers show just how unpopular the Ryan plan is. Here we go, again, the millionth poll in a row. 58% of Americans oppose the plan. Even conservatives don’t like it. More than half of them say that they are against the plan. So who is this, in fact, serving? It appears nobody.
And Democrats are not letting Republicans run away from their Ryancare votes either because they know how hard it hurts them. So check out this new ad from the Progressive Change Campaign Committee.
[Woman in video clip]: “If I didn’t have Medicare, doctors bills could wipe me out. When Congressman Charlie Bass voted against Medicare, that was an attack against families just like mine.”
So it sounds like Democrats are committed to preserving Medicare, and certainly Progressives are, as you saw in that ad. So why have Democratic leaders like Steny Hoyer said that Medicare cuts are still “on the table” during these budget talks? The big question going forward: will Democrats take a stand to protect one of the most successful government programs in history or will they let Republicans needlessly win on a losing issue?
Of course, there is one plan that balances the budget and saves Medicare. It’s called the Progressive Caucus Plan. It protects Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, makes cuts to our massive defense budget, which is incredibly bloated and filled with pork; it also raises taxes but focused primarily on making sure the richest Americans bear their share of the burden. And what’s best, it balances the budget by 2021, that’s a decade earlier than the Ryan plan.
So I got to ask, as the Progressive folks and some of the other Democrats talked to the President today, did they bring this up? Hey, wait a minute, why are we only talking about the Ryan plan? Why are we talking about the Obama white House plan which is also much more conservative than that Progressive plan? The one that balances the budget best is the Progressive Caucus one.
And by the way, on issue after issue, it is by far the most popular with the American people. Raising taxes on millionaires? Over 80% of the American people love that plan. Preserving Medicare? Americans love that plan. Cutting pork out of the defense budget? Americans love that plan.
So why don’t we talk about that one. Alright, my view on that is very clear.
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Cenk Uygur: Today we had another verbal taunt from Republicans accusing President Obama of failing to get serious about the budget.
John Boehner: The fact is we haven’t seen enough progress from the White House. If the White House wants to get this done, it’s time for them to step up to the plate and get serious about it.
Cenk Uygur: I am so tired of them. Their definition of getting serious is to refuse to raise taxes at all to fix the budget mess, even if it’s on millionaires.
Eric Cantor: I ask the President hopefully that he will work with us to do so and to keep out of the discussions in surrounding the debt limit and in the Biden talks any notion that we are going to increase taxes.
Cenk Uygur: Why is that off the table? Why are we listening to these guys? Well, it better be back on the table. And now, of course, there are reports that Republicans rolled their eyes during a meeting with President Obama yesterday. Now why did they do that? Because he said that taxes were lower today than they were under Reagan. So Republicans scoffed.
Look, I think they are children, and purely educated children at that. If you are going to roll your eyes, you better know what the hell you’re talking about. Now are you going to be surprised when I tell you that, of course, they were totally wrong. Taxes are lower now than under Reagan.
Now look at the effective tax rate. That’s basically what Americans really pay in taxes after all the loopholes, exemptions and subsidies are taken into account. According to the Congressional Budget Office, it was 18.2% during the Reagan years. Compare that to the rate now while Obama is in office: this year it is estimated to be 14.8%. To do the math for you, that’s lower than 18.2%. In fact it’s a 60-year low. We are paying record low taxes, especially the rich.
Taxes are, in fact, of course, way out of whack with historical norms in this country. Under Eisenhower, top earners paid 91% in federal taxes. Remember, that was a Republican President, and, in fact, the last Republican President who balanced the budget. For most of Reagan’s time in office, the rate for the top bracket was 50% or higher. And the top income tax rate today, 35%. So roll your eyes at that. Hey, children, class is in session. Pay attention, Republicans. You might learn something.
With me now is David Cay Johnson, columnist for taxnotes.com. He is the author of the book, “Free Lunch: How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense and Stick You with the Bill.” All right, first, David, fundamental question. Republicans keep saying, oh, taxes are out of control, I can’t believe how high taxes are, we should never touch taxes. Are they even remotely accurate?
David Cay Johnson: No, they’re talking as if they’re from another planet. If you look, Cenk, at the growth in income and ways people spend money, since 1984, the lowest year of taxes in Reagan’s administration, the way you’re talking about as a share of the economy, people’s debt has grown three and a half times faster than their income, their health care bills have gone up two-thirds faster than their income. But you know what’s down? What’s the lowest of all their expenditures is federal income taxes that only grew at 39% of the rate that their income did. 39% compared to 350% for debt and 165% for health insurance.
Cenk Uygur: Right. And look, I’d love to pay low taxes. I’d love for everybody to pay low taxes. Who wants to pay more taxes? That isn’t the point. The point is do you have a budget problem or don’t you? And if you’ve got a budget problem, you’ve got to look at how you are going to fix that. If you say I’m going to take the biggest factor off the table, then you’re not really serious about the budget. But the Republicans keep going to this point anyway. I want to play you a clip from Eric Cantor again and I want to get your thoughts on it so let’s watch that.
Eric Cantor: It’s counterintuitive to believe that you increase taxes on those individuals and entities you’re expecting to create jobs.
Cenk Uygur: Is that really counterintuitive?
David Cay Johnson: No, not in the least. You know, the Republicans problem fundamentally, Cenk, is that they are a one issue party that’s painted themselves into a corner. What can they say given all that they have done except lower taxes is the solution. This is sort of like bleeding the patient to death because you think something is wrong with their blood. Their only solution to anything is cut taxes. Well, it hasn’t worked and taxes are, as you pointed out, at a historic 60-year low and they have been growing at less than 40% of the rate of incomes since the low point of taxes in the Reagan administration. So this is just utter, complete nonsense.
Cenk Uygur: And by the way, it’s not like the rich are paying so much more. No, as a percentage, the rich and corporations are paying a lot less and that tax burden is getting shifted onto the middle class. For example, the payroll tax as a percentage of the taxes we pay has gone up significantly. That’s what the middle class pays, right? But corporate taxes have gone down dramatically.
David Cay Johnson: Absolutely. And Cenk, your earlier guest, the Republican strategist, actually made one important point that does need to be emphasized. The very biggest corporations in America pay way, way below the statutory 35% tax rate. The big 12 that were in the report yesterday have had negative tax rates in recent years. But if you run a real small business, you have assets of a million, five million, ten million, $100 million even, you pay just about the 35% tax rate. So if the Republicans want to address something, the issue should be either everybody should be paying the 35% rate or we should lower that rate by taking away all these favors that allow big corporations to game the system, to take what are really profits in America and convert them into expenses that push them into negative tax territory or almost no tax territory.
Cenk Uygur: No, no, that’s a brilliant point.
David Cay Johnson: The top 400 individuals —
Cenk Uygur: Go ahead. Finish up the top 400 individuals because I want to come back to something you said.
David Cay Johnson: Among the top 400 individuals who in 2008 made well over $200 million each, a third of them paid an effective tax rate of 15% or less. Some of them apparently paid zero. Half of them paid less than 15%. And their total overall tax rate was about 18%. My goodness, that’s what a single wage earner pays when they make about $84,000. And these are people who are making hundreds of thousands of dollars a day.
Cenk Uygur: Right. No, it’s unbelievable. And look, the great point that you made is that the big businesses are getting away and putting all the burden on the small businesses, so when the Republicans say we want to help small business, it’s nonsense. They keep putting all the burden on the small business to pay the 35% rate and then they let the big guys get away with paying, as you pointed out for some of the top 12 companies, a negative tax rate. That’s crazy where they get money back from us. It’s insane.
David Cay Johnson: Right.
Cenk Uygur: David Johnson, thank you so much for bringing us the facts. We really appreciate it. And we’ve got to go right now but thank you again.
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The meeting between House Republicans and the President today were described as frosty and cool. If the nation’s debt limit isn’t raised within the next 63 days, the economy is the one that’s going to be iced. And today’s events proved the debt ceiling fight will probably boil down to medicare with polls running strongly against republicans? on this issue. Democrats have an opportunity to stay firm or needlessly fold. More than 100 House Republicans filed into the White House today just look at that line. There they go. And this meeting as described again, frosty and cool. this according to Republican Congressman Phil Gingrey. In the wake of the GOP’s big loss in the New York 26 district special election, Republicans were on the defensive on the issue of medicare and the architect of the GOP medicare plan, Congressman Paul Ryan says he asked the President to stop calling it a voucher program.
I just said we got to take on this debt. and if we demagogue each other at the leadership level then we’ll never take on our debt. It’s been misdescribed by the President and many others. So we simply described to him precisely what it is we’ve been proposing so he hears from us how our proposal works so that in the future he won’t mischaracterize it.
On the other side of things, Jay Carney says the President has not been mischaracterizing this plan.
Is that what the President thinks he’s doing? Is he misdescribing this plan?
No, he doesn’t. Look. As I said, there is no question that there are differences. and what the President has made clear is that he doesn’t believe that we need to end medicare as we know it, to dismantle the program as it currently exists in order to achieve significant deficit reduction.
Reporter: and the White House is still framing the debate this way.
In order to achieve the reductions that they seek in the House Republican plan and to pay for the extensive tax cuts for the wealthy that that plan calls for, they need to do things to medicare that aren’t necessary.
And Democrats might take heart that a new poll shows Americans solidly are against Ryan’s medicare plan. 54% to 38%. And on medicare, voters trust the President more than Congressional Republicans. 47% to 39%. House speaker John Boehner released a letter in which 150 economists support his premise of deep spending cuts that exceed any increase in the debt limit. But as Media Matters notes, at least 46 economists from Boehner’s letter called the 2003 Bush tax cuts fiscally responsible. and several of Boehner’s 150 economists have used extreme rhetoric to attack President Obama. Now today, Republicans once again ruled out the uncertainty talking point.
If we’re going to get serious about creating jobs in America, we’ve got to reduce some of the uncertainty. Some of that uncertainty is caused by the giant debt facing our country.
But as a broad spectrum of experts have noted, the greatest uncertainty threatening the economy right now is uncertainty over whether the debt limit will actually be raised come August 2nd. Let’s bring in Representative Peter Welch. I want to be blunt. Are Republicans holding the debt ceiling hostage, and are Democrats basically falling for it, hook, line and sinker?
They are holding it hostage. It’s a very dangerous game. The market went down nearly 300 points today. Bottom line, it’s a politically uncomfortable vote to raise the debt ceiling but the basic question is this — does America pay its bills? We always have. We always will. and in politics, you try to leverage whatever advantage you can get. Republicans do it, Democrats do it. But at a certain point, you have to exercise restraint and responsibility. We have to pay our bills. Otherwise, we’re playing with a loaded gun. Russian roulette in the American economy is on the receiving end of that bullet.
Congressman, on the surface, Democrats do appear to be winning this fight over medicare. Basically, the simple reason is the public likes medicare. However, Republicans, they are complaining the Ryan plan is being mischaracterized. In your opinion is that a fair estimation or not?
It’s not. You know, health — medicare provides security to us Americans, 65 and older. They have access to health care. Keep in mind, the Republicans in the House not only are about abolishing medicare for 55 and under Americans, but they abolish the insurance reforms that would allow you to get access to coverage if you have a pre-existing condition. So under their plan, if you are under 55, when you turn 65, you are subject to an insurance company saying yes or no on whether they’ll insure you. Now that assumes that you can even afford it. sS, no, it’s not. So now the issue on health care is about the cost of health care that is escalating two and three times the rate of inflation, wages and profit growth. And the Democrats, they have acknowledged we have to reform and control the cost of health care, but we’re not going to attack medicare. Absolutely not.
Today’s meeting was meant to augment these ongoing Biden talks in which the White House and Congressional leaders are looking at more than $1 trillion in budget cuts. Republicans want medicare to somehow be a part of that. Do you think ultimately that it’s going to be, sir?
I don’t. What can be part of it is reforms in the delivery system of health care in general. Because the challenges in medicare, that is the — how attach costs, are the challenges that we face in health care. So employers who are providing health care are getting hammered with health care premium increases. Individuals who are getting — trying to buy private insurance are getting hammered with increases. That, obviously, is a factor in the cost of medicare because it’s part of health care. So the Democrats are at the table. Let’s reform health care. Let’s do price negotiation with prescription drugs. Let’s transform the payment system from the fee for service volume driven approach to a pay for value driven approach. There’s lots of things that we need to do to have more affordable and better health care. But one of the things that is absolutely essential for American security and middle class security in this time of enormous pressure in the economy is to maintain the guarantee that when you are 65 and you’ve been paying into health care, medicare all your life, you are going to get it.
While we have you here, I need to talk about the debt ceiling because we have that date of August 2nd looming. Analysts have been saying for months that unlike typical budget negotiations, the debt ceiling vote cannot be dragged out to the final day. Without risking some serious economic impacts. Is this going to be a horse to water with all of you guys getting us up to this date and then something going to happen at the very last minute and then we have to deal with whatever economic impact has happened over this summer?
Well, see, I think that’s an extraordinarily dangerous game. I think both sides have to acknowledge that we cannot play Russian roulette with the American economy. When we were talking about the continuing resolution and keeping the lights on in government for another six months, we could go to the midnight hour. If we went past it, there wouldn’t be a lot of harm. Some inconvenience. but once we rattle the markets where they believe that we’re not going to be capable to pay our bills, then that market will turn suddenly and it will turn savagely and the lasting damage to this economy will be devastating. Any member of Congress who is part of that effort and wants to overextend their hand on this leverage game is going to reap the whirlwind.
Congressman Peter Welch, thanks for joining us. We appreciate your time.
Of course, medicare is not the only entitlement under threat from the GOP budget. House Republicans propose blocking grants for medicaid which is also strongly opposed by Democrats. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi addressed both those issues today.
I think the Republicans deserve credit for doing what they believe. and they do not believe in medicare and medicaid. But I think as they find out what the ramifications are of their actions, you will see something different. I don’t see them blocking grants to medicaid. I really don’t.
Let’s turn to former Secretary of Labor under President Bill Clinton, Robert Reich, now a Professor of public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley. Professor, it’s good to see you. Twice in one day. Quite an honor.
Good evening, Thomas. How are you?
I’m great, thanks. Let’s get back to what Speaker Boehner is talking about. When it comes do uncertainty. Explain what uncertainty is over the debt limit deadline and what it could do ultimately to the economy as I was talking to the Congressman, if we drag this out until August 2nd.
There’s no doubt. I don’t know that anybody in the capital markets, in the United States or around the world believes that the United States is not going to raise the debt limit. The full, faith and credit of the United States is so important and so basic to the global capital market that they are — the debt limit will be raised. This is just an elaborate game of chicken going on between Republicans and primary — basically the Tea Party wing of the Republican party saying, look, we will not do anything. We will not swerve in this game of chicken. And Democrats who say, look, you’ve got to at least consider some tax increases on the wealthy to get the long-term budget deficit down. But, Thomas, if I can just say one thing. I think that this debate that’s going on in Washington right now, although it’s very important, and all the Democrats, I believe, are absolutely correct, this debate is becoming increasingly disconnected from where most people in this economy are. I mean, the reason that the stock market plunged today is because ADP, which is a payroll, employee payroll firm, projected that in this month, that is last month of May, there were only 38,000 jobs created. I mean, we’re in an economic crisis right now. We’re heading back toward a double-dip recession. The whole recovery is stalling. and Washington is debating budget deficits five or ten years from now. This is ridiculous.
I want you to take a minute to listen to what Speaker Boehner had to say today and then we’ll talk on the other side.
If we’re going to raise the debt limit, the spending cuts should exceed the increase in the debt limit. Otherwise, it will serve to cost us jobs in our country.
How does that make sense?
It doesn’t make any sense at all. The reason we don’t have jobs right now is because consumers are afraid that they’re going to lose their jobs or they don’t have enough money in their pockets. We’re actually seeing wages adjusted for inflation dropping. Hourly wages, 80% of Americans, supervisory or production workers, their hourly wages are dropping. They are worried about their, you know, their jobs. Housing values have dropped 33% since 2006. That’s a larger drop, Thomas, than we’ve seen in this country since the great depression. I mean, if the major asset of most people, which is their homes, takes that much of a cut, people are not going to go out and buy. And if people don’t go out and buy, then we’re going to have a return to a recession. It’s because consumers, American consumers, the vast middle class simply doesn’t have the purchasing power to continue to buy. That’s the key problem right now. It has nothing to do with the budget deficit five or ten years from now. The Republicans don’t know what they’re talking about.
Certainly homeownership is not the nest egg it used to be. I want to get your opinion on medicare and medicaid. Does it appear Republicans are using this crisis to ask for cuts that aren’t necessary as the White House has been suggesting?
Well, of course. They want to cut medicare, medicaid, get rid of food stamps. I mean, Republicans have hated medicare and medicaid ever since they were created. They were created, at least in the Republican mind, on the model of the New Deal program, social security. And, you know, these are absolutely an anathema to Republicans. They represent big government. The problem is, at least for Republicans, most Americans love medicare. They love social security. They also happen to love medicaid because medicaid is the last resort for a lot of Americans and a lot of seniors who have no other way of basically keeping going. And so what we’re having is this disjuncture between the ideology of the Republican party right now and where most Americans are on these fundamental social safety nets. And Democrats, look, obviously, Democrats are playing on this and Democrats have every right to play on it.
Robert Reich, author of “Aftershock.” Nice to spend more time with you today.
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Today there was a meeting at the White House between Republicans and President Obama. They were there to talk about raising the debt ceiling. But one Republican Congressman, Jeff Landry, had decided that he would not attend, and he said: “I don’t intend to spend my morning being lectured to by a President whose failed policies have put our children and grandchildren in a huge burden of debt.”
Now that was incredibly disrespectful so I don’t know what he was talking about saying respectfully; he doesn’t even show up. But it keeps getting worse from there on out.
Paul Ryan said this after the meeting: “It’s been misdescribed by the President and many others, and so we simply described to him precisely what it is we have been proposing so that he hears from us how our proposal works so that in the future he won’t mischaracterize it.”
How incredibly patronizing. They come right out and say he’s mischaracterized it. We had to carefully explain it to him.
And then Eric Cantor said after the meeting: “We pressed him repeatedly to stop the demagoguery.”
What a joke. Republicans complaining about demagoguery?! Oh, please.
The problem is that this kind of stuff works. They just keep whining to the rest, saying oh, no, the President’s got to work with us. He’s kind of coming in our direction. And it looks like maybe he will. Here’s Kevin McCarthy talking about that issue: “What I heard from the President is that he wanted to sit down and find real cuts now. He said that there needed to be entitlement reform, and we will work with him toward those ends.”
Now why in the world after all these insults would the President come and work with these guys when the polls are on his side, the American are on his side, I think that that doesn’t make any sense. Joining me now is one of the people who met with the President today, Republican Representative from California, Congressman Brian Brilbray.
You brought up a lot today that I want to address. Let’s go point by point. First of all, on raising the debt ceiling, during the Bush years, you got to acknowledge that there were a great number of times that you guys raised the debt ceiling and that it was all clean votes. It was never attached to spending cuts. So why the difference now? Why shouldn’t we do it as we did before?
That is exactly why the Republicans were thrown out by the voters and that’s exactly what the voters have said: no more. We don’t want you to basically be cranking up, accepting more debt. We don’t want you to…until we straighten it out, until we prove it, they’re basically saying, we don’t trust you guys anymore to do the right thing until you put it down, a plan that is not a bunch of smoke and mirrors. And this is Republicans and Democrats, Cenk, this is not a partisan deal with the voters.
I appreciate you saying that during the Bush years you guys did it wrong, etc. But at the same time, doesn’t it seem a little convenient that when you have a Republican President, no one questions his budgets, and when you have a Democratic President, all of a sudden you say, oh, no, no, we got to have spending cuts before we touch the debt ceiling?
Cenk, you are absolutely right, that’s why the Republicans were thrown out because they didn’t do the fiscal oversight that the House was supposed to do. So you just got to accept that the voters have the final say here. They threw the Republicans out because they did exactly what you said, and they will throw us out again if we don’t stand up and say, look, fiscal responsibility is something we have to do. And they will throw the President and Congress out.
So Congressman, here’s the thing. You say we got to balance the budget. I agree with you. I am actually a fiscal conservative, alright. And I have been all along. And I appreciate that Bill Clinton did welfare reform, I appreciate that he balanced the budget along with the Republican Congress. Now having said that, the question is how. How do you do that? You guys say, hey we got to do Medicare reform, but at the same time, you talk about lowering taxes from 35% to 25% for the top brackets in that Ryan plan. Why, if we are trying to balance the budget, would we on God’s green earth want to cut taxes? That doesn’t make any sense. And it means that you have to do more Medicare cuts. If it were me, I would never sign onto that.
I think you would even admit, we want a revenue neutral across the board….There are ways if we lower the rates, and even the President said, take out some of the absurd parts of the tax code. There are issues that we can do that look like a tax cut, and let me give you an example: repatriation of $2 trillion of American money that could come back into the United States if we say, okay, bring it back for R&D, for manufacturing, for stimulating the economy, and we won’t give you a 35% hit, we will give you a 5% hit.
No way! It’s a 35% tax. Why would we lower it to 5% and give corporations this enormous tax cut and then say to the American people, I’m going to cut your Medicare because I just gave a huge tax cut to the corporations?
It’s not a tax cut for us because we are never going to be able to tax that money because that’s what I am saying.
No, you pass a bill saying, you need to repatriate that money right now. By the way, that’s the rules of a lot of other countries.
You can’t do that constitutionally.
Absolutely you can. That’s not remotely true.
We are the only country that does this, that taxes money coming back into their country.
No, that is not true, Congressman. We could easily have a law that says, hey, when you make the money abroad, you pay American taxes on it. You pay taxes on it in your own country, and whatever is extra, you pay taxes in America. There is not reason why you need to have this delay.
No, this is the point. That $2 trillion will never be taxed because the fact is that they will never bring it back in.
Because you guys don’t want it to be taxed.
No, no. It can’t be taxed right now. It can’t be taxed constitutionally until it’s brought into our terra firma. You have to bring it into our territory. No other nation does that. England doesn’t do that, Germany doesn’t do that, France doesn’t do that. But let’s move away. If you don’t believe in bringing back American money for American jobs and that they may get something on that, fine, let’s just talk about this.
We can do things, let’s just go across the board, say take these subsidies out for farm subsidies, we can do that. Ethanol subsidies. I’ve been fighting ethanol subsidies since 1995, Cenk. I’ve been saying that it was a sham. People who were on the left and said it was a good idea realize those mistakes. Let’s go correct those. I think we can get agreement on a lot of stuff.
Congressman, this goes to the heart of the issue. When you say let’s take away subsidies, if you are talking about ethanol, oil, I would love to take away those subsidies. I think they are nonsense. I think they are a redistribution of wealth to the richest companies and the richest agricultural concerns in the whole country.
But the problem is, you say I need to cut Medicare, you pay 68% of the costs, you have no guaranteed benefits, you have none of the stuff that you are used to with Medicare because I have to make sure that the corporations only pay 5% in taxes on the monies that they bring back here, I got to make sure that the top income tax bracket is lowered to 25%. And if the White House goes along with that, they are crazy. Nobody in America wants that.
Let’s be upfront about it. Nobody is talking about changing Medicare and Social Security for one senior. Not one. Not one person living today who is a senior is affected by any proposal that’s on the table. The question is what are we going to do about the long-term commitments to people that are in their early 50s and younger and how do we work out that arrangement.
So you cut their Medicare.
No, no. What is being proposed is why don’t we look at the health care plan that Congress has and work out an arrangement like that for these younger kids who are coming up. That way we can guarantee to seniors that they are not affected, that guys my age get to keep the system we want, but the younger guys are guaranteed that they are going to have a program that’s affordable past 2025. It was the President’s commission that said that program is in. If you can’t talk about working out something that is affordable for the younger generation, people that are in their 50s and 40s, while you are still guaranteeing seniors that they are totally untouched by this situation, if we can’t touch that, then that just shows you, and that’s what the President is saying, we need to discuss this. The President is willing to discuss it, and he will work with us, especially a program that guarantees seniors their social security and Medicare that they have now and talks to the younger generation, that we’re going to have a system that is sustainable for them. And the President and Congress is going to work this out. And we have to work it out before we move over because the vote shows overwhelmingly there is no stomach for raising the debt limit with having this kind of reform part of it.
Congressman we are totally out of time, so you get the last word. Thank you so much for joining us. Representative Brian Brilbray from California.
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Now for a new segment that we’re calling, “Of Course.” And you’ll see why in a second. Goldman Sachs has just snagged another Washington insider, former Senator Judd Gregg. Now this move should not surprise anyone because that’s how the system works. You do favors for Goldman Sachs when you are in office, and they do favors for you when you get out.
Senator Gregg was an outspoken critic of Obama’s adminstration’s effort to tighten oversight of the financial industry. Gee, I wonder why. He wanted to let investment banks like Goldman Sachs take bigger risks to make bigger profits.
Did Gregg care how this might endanger the American economy as it did in 2008? Of course not. He just wants to get paid, son. Paid by the same industry that contributed close to $1.1 million to his campaigns during his career.
This revolving door between government officials and Goldman Sachs is why they call the company, Government Sachs.
So when I saw that the man who fought tooth and nail to protect the banks while in the Senate was about to get paid a huge sum of money by Goldman Sachs, I thought, OF COURSE!
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