the rules. >> mr. president, two minutes here because we are then going to go to our last question. >> okay. >> we need to create jobs here. and both governor romney and i agree, actually, that we should lower our corporate tax rate. it's too high, but there's a difference in terms of how we would do it. i want to close loopholes that allow companies to deduct expenses when they move to china that allow them to profit offshore and not have to get taxed so they have tax advantages off shore. all those changes in our tax code would make a difference. now, governor romney actually wants to expand those tax breaks. one of his big ideas, when it comes to corporate tax reform would be to say if you invest overseas, you make profits overseas, you don't have to pay u.s. taxes. but of course, if you're a small business or a mom and pop business or a big business starting up here, you got to pay even the reduced rate that

governor romney's talking about. it's estimated that that will create 800,000 new jobs. the problem is they'll be in china or india or germany. that's not the way we're going to create jobs here. the way we're going to create jobs here is not just to change our tax code but also to double our exports, and we're on pace to double our exports. that's creating tens of thousands of jobs all across the country. that's why we kept on pushing trade deals but trade deals that make sure that american workers and american businesses are getting a good deal. now, governor romney talked about china. az already indicated, in the private sector governor romney's company invested in what were called pioneers of outsourcing. that's mott not my phrase. that's what reporters called it. as far as currency manipulation, the currency has gone up 11%

since i've been president because we have pushed them hard and we put unprecedented trade pressure on china. that's why exports have significantly increased under my presidency. that's going to help to create jobs here. >> mr. president, we have a really short time for a quick discussion here. ipad, the max, iphones are all manufactured in china. one of the reasons is labor is so much cheaper there. how do you convince a great american company to bring that manufacturing back here? >> the answer is very straightforward. we can compete with anyone in the world as long as the playing field is level. china's been cheating over the years, one, by holding down the value of their currency, number two, by stealing our intellectual property, our designs, patents, there's even an apple store in china that's a counterfeit apple store selling counterfeit goods, they hack into our computers. we'll have to have people play on a fair basis. that's number one. number two, we have to make

america the most attractive place for entrepreneurs, for people who want to expand a business, that's what brings jobs in. the president's characterization of my tax plan is completely false. let me tell you -- >> let me go to the president here because we really are running out of time. and the question is can we ever get -- we can't get wages like that, it can't be sustained here. >> candy, there are some jobs that aren't going to come back because they're low wage, low skill jobs. i want high wage, high skill jobs. that's why we have to emphasize manufacturing. that's why we have to invest in advanced manufacturing. that's why we've got to make sure that we've got the best science and research in the world. when we talk about deficits, if we're adding to our deficit for tax cuts, for folks who don't need them and we're cutting investments in research and science that will create the next app, create the next new innovation that will sell products around the world, we will lose that race. if we're not training engineers

to make sure they are equipped here in this country, then companies won't come here. those investments are what's going to help to make sure that we continue to lead this world economy not just next year but ten years from now, 50 years from now, 100 years from now. >> government does not create jobs. government does not create jobs. >> i want to introduce you to barry green because he'll have the last question to you first. >> hi, barry. >> hi, governor. i think this is a tough question. each of you. what do you believe is the biggest misperception that the american people have about you as a man and a candidate using specific examples can you take this opportunity to debunk that misperception and set us straight? > thank you. and that's an opportunity for me, and i appreciate it. in the nature of a campaign, it seems that some campaigns are

focused on attacking a person rather than prescribing their own future and the things they'd like to do. in the course of that, i think the president's campaign has tried to characterize me as someone who is very different than who i am. i care about 100% of the american people. i want 100% of the american people to have a bright and prosperous future. i care about our kids. i understand what it takes to make a bright and prosperous future for america again. i spent my life in the private sector, not in government. i'm a guy who wants to help with the experience i have the american people. my passion probably flows from the fact that i believe in god. and i believe we're all children of the same god. i believe we have a responsibility to care for one another. i served as a missionary for my church, served as a pastor in my congre dwags for ten years. i've sat across from people who were out of work and helped them to find new work or to help them through tough times. i went to the olympics when they

were in trouble to help them get on track. as governor of my state i was able to get 100% of the people insured, all my kids, 98% of the adults. schools ranked number one in the nation. so all kids would have an opportunity for a brighter future. i understand that i can get this country on track again. we don't have to settle for what we're going through, for gasoline at four bucks, we don't have to settle for unemployment at a chronically high level. we don't have to settle for 47 million people on food stamps. we don't have to settle for 50% of kids coming out of college not able to get work. we don't have to settle for 23 million people struggling to find a good job. if i become president, i'll get america working again. i will get us on track to a balanced budget. the president hasn't. i will. i'll make sure we can reform medicare and social security to preserve them for coming generations. the president said he would. he didn't. >> governor -- >> i'll get our incomes up.

by the way, i've done these things. i served as a governor and showed i can get them done. >> mr. president, last two minutes belong to you. >> barry, i think a lot of this campaign maybe over the last four years has been devoted to this notion that i think government creates jobs, that that somehow is the answer. that's not what i believe. i believe that the free enterprise system is the greatest engine of prosperity the world's ever known. i believe in self-reliance and individual initiative and risk takers being rewarded. but i also believe that everybody should have a fair shot. and everybody should do their fair share. and everybody should play by the same rules. because that's how our economy's grown. that's how we've built the world's greatest middle class. and that is part of what's at stake in this election. there's a fundamentally different vision about how we move our country forward.

i believe governor romney's a good man, loves his family, cares about his faith. but i also believe that when he said behind closed doors that 47% of the country considered themselves victims? who refuse personal responsibility? think about who he was talking about. folks on social security who have worked all their lives, veterans who have sacrificed for this country, students who are out there trying to hopefully advance their own dreams but also this country's dreams. soldiers who are overseas fighting for us right now. people who are working hard every day paying payroll tax, gas taxes but don't make enough income. and i want to fight for them. that's what i've been doing for the last four years because if they succeed, i believe the country succeeds. when my grandfather fought in

world war ii and he came back and he got a g.i. bill and that allowed him to go to college, that wasn't a handout. that was something that advanced the entire country. and i want to make sure that the next generation has those same opportunities. that's why i'm asking for your vote. and that's why i'm asking for another four years. >> president obama, governor romney, thank you for being here tonight. on that note, we have come to an end of this town hall debate. our thanks to the participants for their time and to the people of hofstra university for their hospitality. the next and final debate takes place monday night in boca raton, florida, don't forget to watch. election day is three weeks from today. don't forget to vote. good night. and the debate has ended. we have just watched the second presidential debate. i'm back, maria bartiromo along

with carlos quintanilla. job creation, fair pay for women, foreign policy and libya. what do you think? >> narratives are going to start to get spun out now. clearly a lot of democrats will say the president was engaged, was energetic, was even combative in ways that he was not in debate number one. but some republicans say romney scored his points, too, maybe could have scored a couple more. the benghazi question is interesting. some might argue he fumbled that to some degree with the help of candy crowley who managed to correct him in some awkward ways shencht really did. interesting that the president left that 47% comment to the end. we were waiting for him to go on the attack on that. he did it in his closing statement. we're back with larry kudlow, sara fagan, keith boykin. your thoughts on this debate? >> i still don't know what president obama's economic growth vision is, i don't think he outlined it.

i think obama was a pretty good counterpuncher tonight. he had a lot of energy going. both these guys had a lot of energy going. but at the end of the day, i don't know what the president is intending if he's re-elected. i don't think he made the case. i think he was mostly a counterpuncher. mitt romney wouldn't let him have the counterpunch without the counter-counterpunch. i don't see what the obama case is for re-election. i didn't hear it. >> the substance perhaps people will debate, but certainly the president came out swinging post the last debate. and governor romney stuck to his mission. let's goat john harwood. your take, john? >> maria, look, i'm always reluctant to call somebody a winner of a debate. you can't prove it. you got to wait and see what polls will show over the next few day, but the story of this debate is president obama coming back very strongly from the denver performance. that's what television viewers

saw that was much more engaged, aggressive president who showed passion, who went after mitt romney, who got lucky having the final response and got to go back hard at mitt romney on the 47% after mitt romney said he was going to support all 100% of the american people, that was a good opportunity for the president. both candidates were a little hot tonight at various points. you could tell that they felt the stakes because they were not letting candy crowley control thins at times and candy was having to push back on that. i think it's also true that more of this debate was conducted on president obama's turf in part because he was aggressive and partly because there were questions about immigration which the president pushed very strongly. his edge among hispanics may be a reason he has an advantage in the electoral college right now. he had the chance to tee off on issues related to women in response to a question about pay equity and contraception, these are elements that are important

to president obama's advantage among women voters. he pressed that tonight. >> let's bring in barney frank, ranking member of the financial services committee and congressman from massachusetts. good to have you on the program. thanks very much for joining us. >> you're welcome. >> so your immediate reaction to the debate? >> well, i thought it was a very good debate. my response here is to be less a theater critic and talk more about substance. i was glad the president was tough. i think he left the governor off the hook on one thing. i think even more important or as important as 47% is etch-a-sketch. governor romney gets very indignant when the president reminds him of things he said running in the republican primaries. he didn't make up that tax cut for the wealthiest people. what mitt romney's trying to do is to move from an extremely right wing set of positions he took to compete with michele bachmann and newt gingrich for the title of the most conservative to a more centrist

position and the president pointed out these positions, ronl ne acted indignant. almost like but i said that in march. how dare you bring it up again? there was one other point. when the governor talked about his -- by the way, i got -- as a former co-worker in massachusetts with him, i got to hear more of him today than i used to when he was governor of massachusetts. we didn't hang out that much because he wasn't spending a lot of time on state's issue. but when he said look what he did out in the olympics. i was out in salt lake city this year and they had a front page story in the "desert news" saying he was successful in getting a large infusion of cash from the federal government. so it's true that mr. romney was successful in the olympics but according to what they said was he got a couple million dollars from the federal government. he somehow failed to mention that. but the fundamental point was that the president criticized him for some thing. the ak-47 which is a great

example. by the way, that was very striking. romney said i signed a bill to ban the ak-47s but now i can't because both sides got together then. >> what about job, congressman? isn't that what everybody cares about? do you feel like we heard a clear-cut answer to the jobs problem in this country from the president? >> not -- nor from mr. romney. mr. romney's four-point plan, the only jobs that creates that are people that got up to five points. creating jobs is harder than people want to think. i do think the president has a reasonable plan, first of all, one of the things that i wish he'd said, yes, we've created over 5 million private sector jobs since the turnaround began after the economic stimulus and other things, but we've lost 700,000 public sector jobs thanks to the policies of mitt romney and the republicans. we have fewer firefighters, teachers, police officers, public works employee, highway maintenance people. what we're seeing is don't cut taxes for wealthy people and

don't spend more overseas unnecessarily on the military, spend that domestically. so there, i think that's a very important point. cut the deficit intelligently you're adding jobs. if we hadn't lost those jobs thanks to republican obstruction to our effort to help the cities and the states, we'd have a much lower unemployment rate. >> on benghazi, the president's response was to say we'll get to the bottom of it. was that satisfactory? >> it is. there was a mistake -- it is relevant that the republicans did t vote to cut security. it is striking when we listen to mr. romney and other republicans how often they talk very favorably about specific government spending but then they're for cutting it overall which doesn't quite add up. but the president says it's his responsibility. i think we do have to say, look, i never blamed george bush for what happened on noo9/11.

i never blamed ronald reagan because hundreds of marines were killed in lebanon. when bad people do bad thing to americans because we are try to do good things, the president's response is appropriate. >> the governor was trying to make a case that the american people did not know what really went on, not necessarily blaming the president. but looking for an accurate assessment of terrorism. >> you think he wasn't blaming the president, you and i watched different debates. they didn't know what was going on right away, nobody did. >> but it was september 11th, right? it was september 11th and our ambassador was murdered. >> yes, it was. and we're now going to find out -- the american people didn't know what was going on right away. we didn't know what was going on right away. i'm just remind you once people said, cia wasn't very good, this was when khrushchev was overthrown. somebody said what do you mean? well, khrushchev was overthrown and you must not have good

sources in the kremlin because khrushchev was overthrown and you didn't see it comesing. you know what in khrushchev didn't see it coming either. he has great sources in the kremlin. but what the president said was, yeah, we didn't get it right right away. we're going to get it right. he has a track record that bin laden is dead. he's taking criticism from some of his own people on the left for doing tough stuff. >> nobody banged their shoe on the podium tonight, that's for sure. thank you for your time. >> barney frank. >> who won round two? we'll gather our panelists and debate that next. >> our results from how you voted on cnbc.com is next. this is a cnbc special report, your money, your vote. from local communities to local businesses.

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welcome back. john harwood with a special guest in hampstead, new york, john? >> i'm here in the spin room with glenn hubbard who is the dean of the columbia business school. top economic adviser to governor romney, previously to president jornl w. bush. i'd like to start by noting that both candidates went after your old boss george w. bush tonight. mitt romney said he didn't balance the budget, didn't get tough on china, then president obama as a way of criticizing romney said he'd go even further. how do you think romney came off in that exchange? >> two things are very important. first of all, governor romney is right, he is proposing a very

different spending and tax plan than president bush. and second, president bush isn't on the ballot. >> did you take it personally. >> no. >> when he said that bush economic poll sis weren't all that great? >> i oppose many spending increases in the past decade. but the real point is it's governor romney on the ballot and he's proposing spending restraint and tax reform. president obama is doing neither one. >> tell me about the fundamental charge that obama is making, which is that the tax cuts that we tried under bush that romney wants to do again he argues that they're, a, not paid for, and, b, won't create jobs. how do you think mitt romney handled that attack? >> i think governor romney handled that well because the truth is he's proposing tax reform. increasing investment in jobs, all very true. that's a source of growth paid by by broadening the base. ty approach the bowles-simpson commission. >> not specified? >> there are hundreds of ways to

do this. bowles-simpson is good. there are ways to do this. the point is it's straightforward to do and it encourages economic growth. we need to do it. >> let me ask you your thoughts on the benghazi question and answer exchange there. a lot of people believe that in fact the president did wait the two weeks to tell the country that in fact this was a terrorist attack. do you think this was a missed opportunity on mitt romney's part in terms of his attacking the president on this? how did you think he did with that? >> hinge d >> i think he did very well. governor romney is right, it was a two-week delay. if you look at the transcript of the rose garden interview, the president didn't talk about a terrorist act. he referred to general acts of terror in the abstract. so i think that interchange was a little confusing for many viewers, but the plain english is very clear. >> can i just ask you something. there are a lot of on the

governor's tax plan and i think he did a good job depefending i. i'm surprised that he didn't talk about getting the spending share of gdp down from 20% to 4%, no matter how you slice that will be something close to $2 trillion which would not only help balance the tax plan but probably would promote growth by taking less out of the private sector. where was the spending restraint, which i might add is so politiccally popular? >> well, larry, you're asking a great question. when governor romney was talking about the need for social security and medicare reform, when he talked about federal debt, that's clearly discussion of the need to restrain federal spending, the tax plan was brought up more by the questioners, i think that's why he focussed there. if we can't get spending back to the 20% level, we can't do the things the governor wants to do. >> one other question before we go. i did not hear -- we talked about substance. i didn't hear any new policy

that we hadn't heard before from either candidate tonight, did you? >> well, i think this is not the time to throw out new policy in the campaign. i think what the american people need to figure out is is the president -- does the president have a record he can defend and does he have a plan for the next four years? i think we heard that loud and clear. >> back to you guys. >> thanks so much, john. >> the take from big business after the break. >> then austin he jean will join us. most people tend to think more about how they brush than what they brush with. they think all brushes are the same. they're not. that's why i tell my patients about the pro-health clinical brush from oral-b. unlike an ordinary toothbrush, it has pro-flex sides

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