spent billions of dollars trying to figure out if roger clemens should be in the hall of fame. i am a convicted atlanta braves fan. and i apologize for that. i'm a fan of baseball, and i care a lot about whether he cheated, i do not understand why when ten baseball players went before congress and claimed they did not use steroids why one of them ends up getting prosecuted for false statements when frankly it looks like all of them probably did not tell the truth. the john edwards case, i know opinions may be mixed on that. i saw that as a dispute over campaign finance law, so i do not get the priorities. in terms of you know, people may be wondering do i think that attorney holter should stay? look, these guys and ladies serve at the pleasure of the president, the president gets to keep them. if the president decides that he wants to keep this person around despite questions that is his

choice. and voters can make their minds up based on. that yes, sir? [ inaudible question ] >> i want to thank you for coming today and your remarks. you made a lot of big remarks regarding the accusation that states are trying to disenfranchise voters by purging the roles of those that passed away years ago, can you talk about that in detail? >> yeah, sure. let me put this in perspective, this is the only building that i have been in washington that did not ask for an i.d. and i may be outing the heritage foundation by saying that. this is the only building that i have not been asked to present photo i.d., i guess i feel safe standing here. but. most of you know this from your own experiences, if you go to any building in washington,

d.c., you get asked for your i.d. the department of justice that is in court right now telling three states that they cannot pass voter i.d. laws, that same department of justice you can't get much past the guard gate without showing somebody or the style that you walk into when you walk past there, you cannot get past without showing an i.d., it's required. i did a tv or radio station show a month ago, the reporter was a different political persuasion and i was being pressed about voter i.d. and he was saying isn't this a trojan horse to discriminate and i had to remind her, that to get in your building, there's a sign saying know toe i.d. required no -- photo i.d. required no

exceptions, if i had not turned around and got my license, i could not have gotten in to do the interviews, so i'm for photo i.d. for a simple reason. it's just good common sense. our financial life, our lives as people who work and go into billings, our lives as people who have to get on planes. we are used to presenting idaho, it's not bothering anybody. >> it's common sense. back of the room. michael, thank you. >> question for you, is there anything that the democratic party can do in alabama and other southern states to remain viable in state-wide elections? >> i know they cannot keep doing what they are doing right now. you know, those of you in the room who are from the south. you know, your parents and

grandparents whatever you were, i bet they were democrats. and that is kind of a cheap guess, because everyone was prior to 1970, and you know, things change. the south become two parties and now it's arguably 1 party. at one point, there was one dominant party in the south. richard nixon was winning alabama with 80% of the vote. and george wallace got re-elected two years later. democrats and voters in the south had no problem, you know, splitting their brain when it came to politics. they would think i'm going to be republican when it comes to president and i'll be republican when it comes to voting for senator but democrats for all manner of other offices. that started to change and today, you look at the party i.d. numbers in alabama,

arkansas, mississippi, 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 when less than 1 out of 5 of the biggest cohorts identifies with your party. that is just not going to happen. why has it happened? you know, without getting into pick areas of any 1 stand, a lot of southern democrats, remember i sidd they spend a lot of time telling you what think is wrong, politics is a customer, consumer oriented business. customer is always right. if you're campaigning for office and your job is saying, you know, that issue you really care about, that is just a dumb

issue. >> the thing that you think is important, you need to realize that that is not nearly as important as we are trying do right now in the state capitol right now, the voters do not respond well to that kind of thing. second and last point i'll make, is who are the kinds of democrats who used to win in the south? they were conservative democrats. there are just about none left in the democratic party and i am going to make this one point about it. it's a big point of debate in washington, d.c., how many of you have heard somebody say in the last few weeks, the republicans 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 is kind of what people say in washington, but here is what you ought to know.

if you are in the democratic party, if you do not 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 can testify to that. that is not simple isly part of my story, it's the part of the story of many democrats. and people say, davis, isn't it true that 35% of democrats call themselves moderates and 25% call themselves conservatives, that may be the case. there's a difference between people and the elected officials who are the voice for the party. there are plenty of moderate democrats and a few conservative democrats left in the party in terms of people who i.d. and identify with the party. but when it comes to people who are elected officials that number is low.

that is the challenge. democrats have in the south been open and inclusive party. >> i know that congressman jordan is here, please stay with us. >> thank you. i will. >> thank you all. >> congressman jim jordan is the chairman of the republican study committee, he leads on a number of committees to lower taxes and prevent tax increases and solve the fiscal challenges that our country faces. you probably have all heard about his background as a wrestling champion in high school earning a career record of 150-1. went on to wrestle in the ncaas, came to congress as a fiscal warrior and and somebody who led the rsc's budget and task force,

he has come directly from the oversight committee, i thank you for joining us, please join me inning welcoming him. >> i tell every group don't clap, you have not heard me talk yet. it's a great day, we are at the heritage foundation, and artur davis has found jesus and come to the republican party. not that we are right all the time. >> more than the other side. >> i did come from the oversight committee. i'll be brief and you can ask questions of both republicans in just a few minutes. it's amazing, this hearing we have done a series of hearing in our sub committee of the department of energy loan guarantee program. if you talk about what is wrong

with government right now, it's stuff like this. 26 companies, 26 different projects got your tax dollars, loan guarantee, 22 of the 26, it's a $15 billion program, 22 of them had a credit rating of double b minus, which a fancy way of saying junk, but it's okay to put your tax dollars behind these companies. solyndra went bankrupt, it's amazing and we had another hearing today, we have e-mails, think about this, and the american people are figuring this out and again, it's why i'm very optimistic of what will happen in november. we have got e-mails from bright source is the best example. the ceo of bright source sent an e-mail asking, the department of energy in close was a draft letter from the chairman of the board, john brison, who became the commerce secretary. and had been in the news of

late. this has nothing to do with that. but, a draft letter from john bryson, saying 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 your tax dollars, we have this kind of stuff. so on and on it goes, but we just came from that hearing and i think it under scores how critical the election is. look, i was -- polly and i had a chance in november. i'll give you a bit of context. had a chance to travel isreal, didn't matter who we were talking to, folks in the government or private sector, they all said one thing, they said the best way, the absolute best way for the united states of america to help our country is for america to stay strong.

they said when you are strong, we are better. when you are strong, we are safer. and the truth is, and this is why i think sometimes what the left misses. the truth is when the united states of america leads the world is a better place. with our values our history our heritage, it is a -- it's a scary world out there, watch the news any time of the day. but it's less scary and a better place when we lead the world. and the simple fact is this, and this is, again, i think what is at stake in this election. you cannot lead militarily, if you do not first lead economically. this administration is doing everything wrong to make us the economic leader in the world and therefore difficult to lead in other ways. tax policy, regulatory policy, monetary policy, health care policy, every policy area. i do now in every group i talk to. how many think we need a new tax code. same response, everyone raises their hands and those that are

too lazy to raise their hands nod their head. everyone gets it. on the personal side, any tax code that says, we are going to allow 47% of the population not to participate in the main tax is broken. and then on the corporate side, any tax code that says, we are going to tax american corporations the highest corporate rate in the world is stupid. so, if it's broken and stupid, you might want to throw it out and start over. think about that and then regulatory -- well, any business person you talk to, the regulation is killing us, and energy policy, we talked about loan guarantee program and crazy green energy policy. and the impact it has had on coal and fossil fuel programs. you cannot be the leading economy in the world if you do not have readily available energy at affordable cost. it's the lynch pin. it's critical, yet, with this administration and what they are

doing in the department of energy just under scores how critical and wrong they are, and how critical this issue is, we will have to get back to a strong dollar, we are. you know who the biggest purchaser of treasury bills are now? who do you think it is? yeah, we are buying them ourselves. people always say china a we are buying them ourselves, at some point we have to get back to a strong dollar, we will have to do it. and then of course, fiscal policy and health care that is on everyone's mind as well, fiscal policies, we now have a debt bigger than your gdp, it's tough to be the leading economy in the world, and the good news is that everyone else is in bad shape so people are still investing in ours and buying our treasuries, no guarantee that will have to continue, at some point we have to cut spending. any of you seen -- i shared this on the floor -- any you seen the

movie 1776? yeah, it's an old show, but there's a great scene in there, jefferson drafted the declaration and they are in the congress and they are independence hall and they are marking it up. and it's a long process and it's driving them crazy. and they are going through this line by line. and someone said well if we say it that way, parliament may not like that, it could tick them off. and then someone said yeah and we may want to change this sentence and in this paragraph because king george will look at it this way, and we have to be concerned about deep sea fishing rights and adams finally said it's a revolution, we have to offends somebody. the same thing applies to we are going to broke, we have to cut spending. you have to change. every family understands this. every village, every township, every county, every business, every state. the only entity that does not get the message that oh, by the

way has a $16 trillion debt, the federal government. we have to focus on it in the rsc, putting together a budget that will balance in a reasonable period of time. it should never be a budget that never gets to balance. ours gets there in five. the quicker you get after on fixing it, the easier it is to get it done and that is what we are focused on. we will finish with this and we will take your questions. john and i spoke in an event in ohio, and he made a great point. and many of on you probably know this. he said it's every third generation that has to do something big in the country and he took us back to adams and jefferson, in independence hall, those group of americans said we will start a place that will be difference than any other place or nation ever in the world, a place where freedom means something. and they prevailed when no one

thought they could win it. and three generations later, the americans said we will get rid of this evil of slavery and we will keep the union together. they were successful, three generations them said we can deal with the great depressions and win the second world war and they were 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 and effort and sacrifice, it's just the way god made this place. but americans have always risen to the occasion and i'm confidence we can do it again. so with that, we will take your questions. is that what we are supposed to do? >> yeah. >> that is what i thought, you can stand up too or i can sit down however you want to do it. >> the guy with the microphone goes first. >> we had a post up this morning about a couple of e-mails that were sent from an energy

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

coupled with a lot of things i've talked about is what is involved in the campaign and will be front and center over the next few months. >> raffle from american principals project and column ni ni ist for forbes.com. i'm pleased you talked about reform, as veteran of the reagan revolution, there were two things that took the stock market up to 1,000, back when you were still a kid, to 14,000 at its peak. and it was a mondel laugher, it was cutting marginal tax rates and restoring health care to the dollar. i'm pleased that kevin brady has proposed the sound dollar act, with 42 co-sponsors, are you one of them? >> i cannot tell you, i may be. >> the republican party has a wonderful opportunity to move forward a healthy dollar.

okay, glenn hubbard, who is an adviser to govern romney is on record as calling for a rule-based monetary policy rather than discretionary activism, there's a clear distinction between republicans and democrats on this. there's been no growth in ten years because we had tax cuts and increases but we have had a sick dollar. so putting a healthy dollar into your agenda is wonderful, i commend you for it. >> yeah, i agree. it's no secret what has to be done. you have to have a fairer simpler fairer tax code. you need reasonable regulation, and common sense energy policy, strong dollar policy and start scaling back, you do not have to balance right away, but you have to turn the ship and get it headed in the right direction, that is what paul's budget does. you do those things and just like you reference, we will take off with economic growth. let the american businessman do

what they have been doing for 200 something years, grow the economy and create jobs. our job is to not create jobs but create a structure that is conducive to job growth, and right now, i would argue that this administration is doing just the opposite. >> can i say one thing? >> definitely. >> let me say one thing, i think everyone in the room understands this. one of the -- jim you touched on it, i'll say a little more about it. one of the big problems with the way that obama's administration team looks a domestic policy, they think there are two combinations of answers to every problem under the sun. first one is to grow the government footprint and the second is to raise marginal tax rates depending on the day of the week -- i'll throw it 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, a big problem, more children are hungry right now than at any

point in the 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 tackling a problem and it's worse now than it has ever been and by the democrats way of thinking about things the good guys are running things in their perspective? you care about the issue of poverty, and you are on the left, the good guys are in charge, 28 programs and the problem is worse than it's ever been. so, you know, i was in congress with jim for a good little bit and he is still there now, god bless his soul. the big thing that you wrestle with when you are in congress day in and day out is people on the other side who tell you, all you got to do is raise taxes and just keep growing programs. it doesn't work. >> more questions? >> sure? i was council at house

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

want to explore. and i should say now, i do have the opportunity and privilege to serve with artur and i commend his courage and leadership and what he is doing. >> thank you. >> that is just right on target. >> thank you. >> and he was a pleasure to serve with when we were on the committee together. >> congressman, the i can ask about obama-care, the doughnut hole for medicare, and the pre-existing conditions and the so-called slacker provision for 26-year-olds. you have had some grumbelings among even some -- >> careful now. >> -- among even republicans saying they may want to be preserving these, regardless of what the supreme court does, what should the house do? >> i hope the supreme court throws out the whole loss and

gets rid of the individual mandate. i hope it happens, if they don't, if they do, they just do the individual mandate and leave the rest in place, we should work to, if in fact the voters do what i think they will do this november and keep the republicans in charge of the house, then we should repeal all of obama-care and restart the whole debate and not focus on 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 we want to especially power families. we want to especially power moms and dads and individuals to make their health care decisions. i tell folks, the biggest problem with the health care law, why americans like it so much, is the fundamental fact that this administration missed. americans do not like being told what to do. is that why we are americans, we like freedom, and feel it's

improvement. americans don't like -- people came here because in europe they said you have to practice your faith a certain way, and they said no we don't, we will go to america and do it the way we think the good lord wants us to. and this administration said we will tell you how you are going to get your health care, we will put 15 people in charge, someone between you and your doctor and americans said no you're not. we don't like it. you know the old joke about americans, we hate being told what to do so much, most americans travel down the highway and see a sign that says 55, for most americans that is not the limit, that's the challenge. so the key is the individual mandate, we should throw the whole thing out, and back to the point, market structure, and let's the market dictate, it's better than big government.

>> two quick points, one of them i touched on. one of the things that the american people figured out way before most people in washington, d.c. figured it out. the american people figured out that if you write a thousand page bill that you cannot say with certainty how it will play out in the lives of ordinary people. that is why according to the "wall street journal" and according to the "washington post" and "new york times," a significant amount of private employers are going to drop their plans all together or are going go to a plan that has higher premiums for people. remember four years ago when democrats said over and over, this is going to help the 15% who do not have health insurance and the 85% who have it, web when they said the 85% who got it, nothing will change for you.

now, someone whisper in president obama's ear that that is not right, so he changed it to nothing will change for you because of this plan. whatever that meant. the reality is because of this plan, because of the exchanges it sets up, because of the way those exchanges are administered, it will be easier for the average company, if it's trying to get buy in a dire economy to get rid of health insurance for people. think bit, how do you pass a plan that we are told is the most revolutionary thing since 1965 and one of the big incentives in the plan is for companies to walk away from providing health insurance. and this is a bipartisan statement, neither democrats nor republicans spent nearly enough time thinking about the constitutionality of what was going on. we were arguing about money, money is important, we were

arguing about structure and size, because that is important. but jim, very few folks in our ranks now give our colleagues credit, but very few folks in the congress were saying, we need to step back and as first principals, do we have the authority to do it? there's a wonderful lady running for congress in utah named mia love who will make history out there if she wins. when people asked her what is your philosophy of government, she said three things, is it sustainable and we afford it and third of all is it in my jurisdiction to do it? we need mia love in congress so i can give her that shout out, not enough congressmen think about it, even if it's sustainable, and affordable you have to ask the basic question, do we have the authority to do it and if government can say to you, you have to buy health insurance. regardless of your family situation, regardless of what you