with that i will take questions and be mindful of the time. we will start with this gentlemen. everyone introduce yourself so i know who you are. >> congressman, there is a lot of criticism. a year or so. a lot of people said they were one of the ones and made a charge for that. do you still have the confidence in the periods and colleagues and everything that is going on? >> well, let me say two things about the attorney general. i will try to not personalize the comments. i tell you a mistake my side made five years ago. you alluded to the controversy

over the attorneys five years ago when i and other people made questions about the firing of the votes. i think my old side made a mistake and to the mistake we made. we personalized it a little bit and made a lot of it about attorney general gonzalez and sometimes we seemed so mad at the attorney general that people stopped hearing what we were saying about how u.s. attorneys were selected and dismissed, we made a mistake in doing that. i am not going to bend over backwards and make the sim mace take, but i want to say two things that tach my eye. the first one, fast and furious is something i have a hard time understanding. i was a junior federal prosecutor. i was 28 years of age and i tried cases with a lot of drug and gun cases. i never got to work in the high confines of the department of justice. that was above my level. we had a basic principal.

we did a lot of under cover operations. don't let guns and drugs walk. for those of you who don't watch cop shows in the room, when you do an under cover operation, you do your deal, but don't let the bad guys leave the guns or the drugs. i had to understand when i was 29 years old, trying cases in montgomery, al gamma and i would have gotten fired as a u.s. attorney if i got that wrong. people might have gotten killed. i have a hard time understanding how if i had to get all of that right as a 29-year-old, why people who are much more experienced in the department of justice seem confused about all of it. i don't understand how this came to be. i think the republicans on the hill are absolutely right to get to the bottom of it. the second thing that bothers me is, i have no idea how you relate to this. you may agree or disagree, but i

have no idea why we spent billions of dollars to figure out if roger clemens should be a novel thing. i am a convicted atlanta braves baseball fan. i apologize for that. i love baseball and as a fan of baseball, i wear e care a lot about whether roger clemens cheated. when ten baseball players went before congress and claimed they didn't use steroids why one ends up getting prosecuted and it looks like all of them probably didn't tell the truth. the john edwards case, i know opinions may be mixed, but that was a dispute over campaign finance. i don't get the priorities over people who may be wondering, do i think holder ought to stay? these guys and ladies served with the pleasure of the president. the president gets to keep them. if the president decides he wants to keep the person around

as his prerogative and voters. yes, sir? >> thank you for coming today. we made a lot of remarks with the accusation or the states are trying to disenfranchise voters and putting in place requirements and purging the roles of the people who passed away years ago. can you talk about that in detail? >> sure. let me put this in perspective. this is the only building i have been in that didn't ask me for an id. i might be outing the heritage foundation by doing that, but this is the only building i have been in where i have not been asked to present photo id. i asks i feel safe, but most of you know this from your experiences. if you go to virtually any

building in washington, d.c., you get asked for your id. the department of justice that is in court right now telling three states that they cannot pass voter id laws, that same department of justice, you can't get much past the guard gate without showing style you walk in to get there. you can't get past there without showing someone an id. it's required. i did an interview with the television or radio station a few months ago and the reporter, testifies a different side of a political persuasion from a lot of folks in this room. they were pressing about voter id and the reporter was saying isn't this a trojan horse to discriminate? i had to remind the reporter to get in her building, list of a giant sign saying photo id required, no exceptions. i had to tell her that i left my balance and i had to go back and

get it fertile. if i had gotten my license, i wouldn't have had a photo id. i am for photo id for a simple reason. it's good common sense. our financial life and our lives as people who work and go into buildings or lives as people who get on planes. we are accustomed to presenting id. i don't think it bothers anybody and disenfranchises anybody. it's common sense. back there. >> university of al bam a. >> thank you. >> great to see you, congressman. the question is this. do you think there is anything the democratic party can do in alabama and other southern states to remain viable in the state-wide elections? >> i know they can't keep doing what they're doing right now. those of you in the room who are from the south, your parents and grandparents and whatever you

were, i bet they were democrats. that's kind of a cheap guess because everybody was prior to 1970. things changed. the south became two parties and now it's one party. at one point, democrats had friends in the south and that was irrespective of how presidential elections were going. richard nixon was winning alabama with 80% and george wallace was reelected with 70% two years later. democrats had offered one seat in the legislature. democrats and voters in the south had no problem splitting their blaine it came to politics. they would think i would be a republican when it comes to the president and i will be a republican when it comes to voting for the senate and they voted for democrats for all manner of other offices. that started to change and today you look at the party id members in alabama and arkansas and

mississippi and louisiana, i want to drag race into this, but this makes a point. roughly 18% of white males identify themselves as democrats right now in the states i just mentioned. you cannot win an election with less than one out of five or one of the biggest cohorts identifies with your party. that's not going to happen. why has it happened? without getting to areas of one state's politics, democrats have tended to make two mistakes. a lost democrats have a tendency and i said at the beginning how democrats spent a lot of time telling voter what is you think is wrong. what you think is important is not so important. politics is a customer consumer oriented business. customer is always right. if you are campaigning for office and your job is saying that, you know, that issue you really care about is a dumb issue.

the thing that you think is important, you need to realize that show of hands, how many of you heard somebody say in the last few weeks, those republicans, they have gone off the far end. they are so extreme. they have no tolerance for opposing viewpoints? show of hands if you heard somebody say that. okay. that's kind of what people say in washington. here's what you ought to know. if you are in the democratic

party, if you don't think the same on about five or six or seven issues as the mainstream of your party, you are as much out to lunch as any moderate republican would be and many people can testify to that. that's not part of my story, but the story of many democrats. people say isn't it true that 35% of democrats call themselves moderates and 25% are conservatives? that may be the case and it's true with 37% of republicans call themselves moderates and nobody talks about that. let's assume that's the case for a moment. there is a difference between people and the elected officials who are the voice of the party. there plenty of moderate democrats and a few conservatives left in the party in terms of people who id and identify with the party. when it comes to people who are elected officials, that number is low. i think that's the challenge

democrats have in the south. >> i know that congressman jordan is here. please stay with us. iment to thank you for joining us. >> thank you all. thank you. >> congressman jim jordan is somebody that we worked with closely at the heritage foundation and the chairman of the study committee, he leads a group of house conservatives who are working on a number of issues to cut spending and lower taxes, prevent tax increases and solve this fiscal challenge that our country faces. we heard about his background as a wrestling champion in high school earning a career record of 150 to 1 and went on to wrestle in the ncaa and came to congress as a fiscal warrior and somebody who led the budget in spending task force for assuming

this new role. he as i understand comes directly from the oversight committee and we appreciate you making the time to be with us. join me in welcoming. >> i tell every group, don't clap. i haven't heard me talk yet. it's a great day. the sun is shining and davis found jesus and came to the republican party. god bless you. not that we are right all the time. we're not. much more. exactly right. the american people are going to say so on election day. i did come from the oversight committee and i appreciate a chance to be with you. i will be brief and you can ask questions of both republicans in a minute. this hearing, we have done a series in our subcommittee on the department of energy loan guarantee program and what's wrong with the government right now. it's stuff like this.

26 companies in the department and 26 different projects got your tax dollars. loan guarantee. 22 of those 26, this is a $15 billion program. 22 had a credit rating of bb minus. that's a fancy way of saying junk. no private money. it's okay to put your tax dollars behind the companies. solyndra went bankrupt and it's amazing. we have e-mails. think about this. the american people are figuring this out. that's why i am optimistic about what i think will happen in november. we have e-mails from the bright sources and the ceo of bright source sent an e-mail to jonathan silver at the department of energy asking the department of energy in closing e-mail was a draft letter from the chairman of the board, john bryson who became smers secretary and we have been in the news of late.

this has nothing do to do with that. a draft letter from john bri to the white house chief of staff. asking edit this letter we are thinking about sending to the white house chief of staff and talking about the loan guarantee they were seeking to get. we have this kind of stuff. on and on we go. i think it underscores how critical this election is. look, i had a chance last november and i will give a little context. we travelled to israel and we were there a week that the iaea announced iran was getting close. one of the things that came through loud and clear, we were talking to folks in the government and the private sector and they said one thing. the best way for the united states of america to help our country is for america to stay strong.

when you are strong, we're better. when you are strong, are safer. this is what the left misses. when the united states of america leads, the world is a better place. with our values and our history and heritage, it's a scary world any time of the day. it's a less scarey and a better place when we lead the world. the simple fact is this. this is again what's at stake in this election. you cannot militarily and economically. i would argue this administration is doing everything wrong. in every major policy area making it difficult to be the economic leader of the world and more difficult to lead in other ways. tax policy and monetary and fiscal and health care and every major policy area, how many in the tax, how many i think we need a new tax code. i get the same response. almost everyone raises their hands.

everybody gets it. think about on the personal side, any tax code that says we are going to allow 47% of the population not to participate is broken. in the corporate side, any tax code that said we will tax to the highest corporate rate in the world is stupid. if it's broken and stupid, throw it out and start over. think about that. any business person you talk to will tell you, energy policy will talk about this crazy loan guarantee and green energy is done. the impact that it has and this administration had on the epa on coal and other fossil fuels. you cannot. think about this. you cannot be the leading economy in the world if you don't have readily available energy at an affordable cost. it's critical. you have to have that. this administration with what they are doing and the department of energy and the

failure to approve the host of issues underscores how critical and wrong they are. monetary policy at some point will have to get back to the strong dollar. you know who the biggest purchaser is now? what do you think it is? we are buying them ourselves. everyone said china, but there is people who know too. we are buying them ourselves. we will have to get back to a strong dollar. fiscal policy and we can talk about health care. fiscal policies, a couple of numbers we share with folks. we have a debt bigger than the gdp. it's scary. the good news is everyone else is in bad shape. people are investing and buying our treasuries. there is no guarantee that has to continue. we have to cut spending. anybody of you ever seen -- i shared this on the floor. any of you seen the movie 1776, any of you watch it? it came out in 1976 in the

bicentennial. it's an old show, but there was a great scene where jefferson drafted the declaration and the congress there and they are, marking it up. it's a long process and driving adams crazy. he said we have to declare independence and start the experiment. he is fired up and they are going through this line by line. someone said well, if we say it that way, parliament may not like that. someone else said we may not want to change this sentence because king george will look at it this way. we also have to be concerned about deep sea fishing rights and adams just goes it's a revolution, dang it. we have to offend somebody. we are going broke, we have to cut spending. every family and village and county and city and every business understands this. the only entity that doesn't get the message that is the 1 that

has a $16 trillion debt. we have to do it. that's one of the things we will focus on. putting forth the plan that gets us to balance. you can't do it overnight. it shouldn't take 28 or 30 years. it shouldn't be a budget that never gets to balance like the budget. we get there in five. we think it's reasonable and something you have to do. the quicker you get after fixing it, the easier it gets done. i will finish with this and take your questions. john and i spoke about this a year ago. he said it's every third generation that has to do something big in the country. he took us back to where they were and those groups of americans said we will start a place that is going to be different than any other place ever. any other nation ever in the world where freedom means something and they prevailed and no one thought they could win

it. three generations later, americans said we can deal with the evils of slavery and get rid of the evil and keep the union together when they split apart. three generations after them, those americans said, we can deal with the great depression, in gnattyinaziism, and they wer successful. and now, here we are, three generations later, and it's our turn. and it will not be easy. i learned a long time ago, anything worth doing is never easy. it takes work, it takes effort, it takes sacrifice. it's just the way god made this place. but americans have always risen to the occasion and i'm confident we can do it again. so with that, we'll take your questions. is that what we're supposed to do? that's what i thought. and you can stand up too and we'll fire away or i can sit down. whatever you want to -- >> no. >> oh, i'm sorry. the guy with the microphone goes first. >> we had a post this morning about a couple of e-mails that were sent from an energy

department environment that were confidential, actually, marked as confidential. is that -- did you learn anything from their ceo this morning? should we be particularly concerned about those e-mails? >> i think we should be concerned in certainly a general sense. i asked their ceo just a few minutes ago about their subject. and i said, we have it going both ways. we have a private company asking the department of energy edit this letter we're thinking of sending to the white house chief of staff, and we also now have the department of energy giving internal documents to the private sector. people who are trying to get -- it's almost like, and i said this in committee, it's almost like the teacher saying to a couple of the students, not the whole class, saying to a couple of students, hey, here are the answers for the exam. we're going to give this to you. this is probably how you should structure your application and structure the things you're saying about -- i mean, it's unbelievable that that's going on in the united states of america. and again, i think this whole issue coupled with a lot of

other things i've talked about is what's involved in this campaign and will be front and center over the next few months. >> columnist for forbes.com. i'm delighted, congressman, that you mentioned monetary reform as part of the five different platforms. as a veteran of the reagan revolution, there were two major elements that took the stock market up from 1,000 when we started, back when you were still a kid, to 14,000 at its peak. and it was cutting marginal tax rates and restoring health to the dollar. i am extremely pleased that representative kevin brady has proposed a sound dollar act with 42 co-sponsors. are you one of them? >> i couldn't tell you. i may be. >> check into it. the republican party has a wonderful opportunity to move forward a healthy dollar.

glenn hubbard, an adviser to governor romney is on record as calling for a rule-based monetary policy rather than discretionary activism. there's a clear distinction between the republicans and the democrats on this. there has been no economic growth for ten years because we've had the common denominator. we had tax cuts and tax increases and this and that. but we've had a sick dollar. so putting a healthy dollar into your agenda is wonderful. i commend you for it. >> i agree. again, it's no secret what has to be done. you have to have the common sense tax code. simpler, fair, common sense tax code. you've got to have reasonable regulations, a strong dollar policy, and then start scaling back. you don't have to balance right away, but you've got to turn the ship and get it headed -- which is what paul's budget does. you do those things, and just like you referenced, we will take off with economic growth. let the american entrepreneur do what they've been doing for 200 and some years.

grow this economy and create jobs. it will happen. our job is to not create jobs, but create a structure that's conducive to job growth. and right now i would argue, as we've briefly talked about, that this administration is doing just the opposite. >> can i have one thing? >> you can definitely. let me say one thing. i think it's important everybody in the room understands this. one of the -- jim, you touched on it and i'll say a little bit more about it. one of the big problems with the way the obama administration's economic team looks at domestic policy, they think there are two combinations of answers to every problem under the sun. the first one is to grow the government footprint and the second one is to raise marginal tax rates on, depending on the day of the week and how the moon and the stars align, go over $1 million or $500,000. i'll just throw this out to you. we have a big problem right now with hunger among children. you know, you've seen a lot of the specials on tv. it's a big problem. more children are hungry right now than at any point in this

country's history. there are 28 government programs that deal with the problem of children who are facing hunger. how can you have 28 programs, ostensibly tackling a problem, and it's worse now than it's ever been, and by the democrats' way of thinking about things, the good guys are running things from their perspective. if you care about the issue of poverty and you're on the left, well, the good guys are in charge. 28 programs and the problem is worse than it's ever been. so, you know, you know, i was in congress with jim for a good little bit and he's still there now, you know, god bless his soul. the big thing that you wrestle with when you're in congress, day in and day out, is people on the other side who tell you, all you've got to do is raise taxes and just keep growing programs. it doesn't work. >> other questions? vermont? >> sure.

i was council of house administration several years ago, and we're now about to go into this the process of subpoenaing the white house for documents. but unic the senate, the house does not have the legal authority to enforce its own subpoenas, so we're going to have to rely on the justice department to go to court and enforce subpoenas against this white house. and my question is, have we thought about going to the romney administration and to our friends in the senate and saying, if we do have a majority, let's pass a law that gives the thousands the same power as the senate to enforce its own subpoenas. so in the future, we don't have to rely on what could be a corrupt justice department to -- >> interesting, yeah. i've not -- the first time i've heard that is now. i did talk to darryl a little bit this morning about this issue and i appreciate the good work darryl's doing on our committee, leading our committee. but that may be something we do want to explore.

and i should say now, i did have the opportunity and privilege to serve with -- and i commend his courage and leadership and what he's doing. that is just right on target. so, thank you. and he was a pleasure to serve with when we were on the judiciary committee together. >> congressman, if i could take the prerogative and ask a question about obama care. my colleague in the paper yesterday outlining three provisions of obama care. the doughnut hole for medicare, the pre-existing conditions, and the so-called slacker provision for the 26-year-olds. now, you've heard some grumblings -- >> careful, now! >> -- among even some republicans, saying that they might want to be preserving these. your thoughts on, regardless of what the supreme court does, what the house should do. >> well, i mean, i hope the supreme court gets rid of the individual mandate and throws out the whole law.

so i hope that's what happens. if they don't, if they do, if they just do the individual mandate and leave the rest in place, then we should work to, if in fact, the voters do what i think they're going to do this november and keep republicans in charge of the house, put a new person in charge of the white house and give the senate pack to the republicans, we should repeal all of obama care and restart the whole debate. and not focus about washington as the so-called answer to health care, but focus on market solutions. i mean, it's really that basic, and i think when you explain that, that you want to empower families, with we want to empower moms and dads, empower individuals to make their health care decisions. i always tell folks, the biggest problem with this health care law is the fundamental fact that this administration missed. americans don't like being told what to do. that's why we're americans. we actually think freedom is important. go back to the guys who started the place. they rebelled against the greatest country in the world at the time and they were part of

the reason we wanted freedom but wanted so much more. people came here because we've got to practice our faith a certain way, and they said, we're going to go to america and do it the way the good lord want us to do it. and long comes this administration and the congress last time and said, we're going to tell you how to do your health care, we'll put 15 people in charge, put someone between you and your doctor, and americans said, no, you're not, we don't like it. you know the old joke about m p americans, most americans travel down the highway and see the sign that says 55, for most americans, that's not the limit, that's the challenge. that's how we look at things. so the government tells you you're going to get health care, you've got to be kidding me. the key is that individual mandate, but we should throw the whole thing out and structure -- again, market structure, let individuals in the market help us get to the right -- it will always be better than big government. >> can i one thing -- >> yeah. >> look, two quick points. one of the